NATIONAL SECURITY ALERT – SENSITIVE INFORMATION

I watched this video this morning and I simply cannot see how anyone can reconcile the first hand accounts with the “official story”. The direction of the plane, the position of it in relation to the witnesses and the weird shit Lloyde starts talking about off camera at the end are enough for anyone to question the “story”. These guys at Citizen Investigation Team do a great job interviewing and documenting the witness accounts and using Pilotsfor911Truth footage to show how things simply do not add up.

Does it answer all the questions? No, but neither has the 911 Commission or any other explanation. All that those deniers of a government conspiracy have are “I can’t believe my government would do this”, (just like my father telling me that his President “would never lie” to him… you gullible old fool).

But this documentary is more than for your education, Conservative09 and the rest of the idiots like you. This is a call to stand up and do something. Join reality and help me save America. But, if you have no other reason except education, watch this film, then come back and explain that they are all wrong, mistaken, or lying.

The following is from their website home page:

To whom it concerns, i.e., everyone:

In 2006 Citizen Investigation Team launched an independent investigation into the act of terrorism which took place at the Pentagon on September 11, 2001. This exhaustive three-year inquest involved multiple trips to the scene of the crime in Arlington, Virginia, close scrutiny of all official and unofficial data related to the event, and, most importantly, first-person interviews with dozens of eyewitnesses, many of which were conducted and filmed in the exact locations from which they witnessed the plane that allegedly struck the building that day.

Be forewarned: Our findings are extraordinarily shocking and frightening. They are also deadly serious, and deserving of your immediate attention. This is not about a conspiracy theory or any theory at all. This is about independent, verifiable evidence which unfortunately happens to conclusively establish as a historical fact that the violence which took place in Arlington that day was not the result of a surprise attack by suicide hijackers, but rather a false flag “black operation” involving a carefully planned and skillfully executed deception.

If you are skeptical of (or even incensed by) this statement we do not blame you. We are not asking you to take our word for it, nor do we want you to do that. We want you to view the evidence and see with your own eyes that this is the case. We want you to hear it directly from the eyewitnesses who were there, just as we did.

Please understand that this information is not being brought to your attention simply for educational purposes. It is presented within the context of a “call to action” accompanied by a detailed step-by-step strategy intended to inspire and empower you to do something about it. But first, please familiarize yourself with the evidence by viewing and paying close attention to the 81-minute video presentation, National Security Alert.

Thank you for your concern and thank you for your action.

Sincerely,

Craig Ranke and Aldo Marquis

more about “NATIONAL SECURITY ALERT – SENSITIVE I…“, posted with vodpod

Citizen Investigation Team offers this compilation of independent verifiable evidence exposing the 9/11 attack on the Pentagon as a psychological black operation of deception. Consider this a non-violent call to action as everyone is encouraged to copy and distribute this conclusive evidence to media, political, and authority figures while first requesting, and then demanding a response. Inaction by authorities and media to this information amounts to a crime of obstruction of justice so it’s time they are held accountable. This is particularly the case as more innocents are slaughtered and additional billions of dollars are spent on a fraudulent “war on terror” perpetuated under any other name. Please visit CitizenInvestigationTeam.com for full resources and a step-by-step strategy as to how you can take action on this critical life or death information.

h/t DeProgram

Untold Truths About The American Revolution

By Howard Zinn, July 3, 2009
The Progressive

There are things that happen in the world that are bad, and you want to do something about them. You have a just cause. But our culture is so war prone that we immediately jump from, “This is a good cause” to “This deserves a war.”

You need to be very, very comfortable in making that jump.

The American Revolution–independence from England–was a just cause. Why should the colonists here be occupied by and oppressed by England? But therefore, did we have to go to the Revolutionary War?

How many people died in the Revolutionary War?

Nobody ever knows exactly how many people die in wars, but it’s likely that 25,000 to 50,000 people died in this one. So let’s take the lower figure–25,000 people died out of a population of three million. That would be equivalent today to two and a half million people dying to get England off our backs.

You might consider that worth it, or you might not.

Canada is independent of England, isn’t it? I think so. Not a bad society. Canadians have good health care. They have a lot of things we don’t have. They didn’t fight a bloody revolutionary war. Why do we assume that we had to fight a bloody revolutionary war to get rid of England?

In the year before those famous shots were fired, farmers in Western Massachusetts had driven the British government out without firing a single shot. They had assembled by the thousands and thousands around courthouses and colonial offices and they had just taken over and they said goodbye to the British officials. It was a nonviolent revolution that took place. But then came Lexington and Concord, and the revolution became violent, and it was run not by the farmers but by the Founding Fathers. The farmers were rather poor; the Founding Fathers were rather rich.

Who actually gained from that victory over England? It’s very important to ask about any policy, and especially about war: Who gained what? And it’s very important to notice differences among the various parts of the population. That’s one thing were not accustomed to in this country because we don’t think in class terms. We think, “Oh, we all have the same interests.” For instance, we think that we all had the same interests in independence from England. We did not have all the same interests.

Do you think the Indians cared about independence from England? No, in fact, the Indians were unhappy that we won independence from England, because England had set a line–in the Proclamation of 1763–that said you couldn’t go westward into Indian territory. They didn’t do it because they loved the Indians. They didn’t want trouble.

When Britain was defeated in the Revolutionary War, that line was eliminated, and now the way was open for the colonists to move westward across the continent, which they did for the next 100 years, committing massacres and making sure that they destroyed Indian civilization.

So when you look at the American Revolution, there’s a fact that you have to take into consideration. Indians–no, they didn’t benefit.

Did blacks benefit from the American Revolution?

Slavery was there before. Slavery was there after. Not only that, we wrote slavery into the Constitution. We legitimized it.

What about class divisions?

Did ordinary white farmers have the same interest in the revolution as a John Hancock or Morris or Madison or Jefferson or the slaveholders or the bondholders? Not really.
It was not all the common people getting together to fight against England. They had a very hard time assembling an army. They took poor guys and promised them land. They browbeat people and, oh yes, they inspired people with the Declaration of Independence. It’s always good, if you want people to go to war, to give them a good document and have good words: life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Of course, when they wrote the Constitution, they were more concerned with property than life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. You should take notice of these little things.
There were class divisions. When you assess and evaluate a war, when you assess and evaluate any policy, you have to ask: Who gets what?

We were a class society from the beginning. America started off as a society of rich and poor, people with enormous grants of land and people with no land. And there were riots, there were bread riots in Boston, and riots and rebellions all over the colonies, of poor against rich, of tenants breaking into jails to release people who were in prison for nonpayment of debt. There was class conflict. We try to pretend in this country that we’re all one happy family. We’re not.

And so when you look at the American Revolution, you have to look at it in terms of class.
Do you know that there were mutinies in the American Revolutionary Army by the privates against the officers? The officers were getting fine clothes and good food and high pay and the privates had no shoes and bad clothes and they weren’t getting paid. They mutinied. Thousands of them. So many in the Pennsylvania line that George Washington got worried, so he made compromises with them. But later when there was a smaller mutiny in the New Jersey line, not with thousands but with hundreds, Washington said execute the leaders, and they were executed by fellow mutineers on the order of their officers.

The American Revolution was not a simple affair of all of us against all of them. And not everyone thought they would benefit from the Revolution.

We’ve got to rethink this question of war and come to the conclusion that war cannot be accepted, no matter what the reasons given, or the excuse: liberty, democracy; this, that. War is by definition the indiscriminate killing of huge numbers of people for ends that are uncertain. Think about means and ends, and apply it to war. The means are horrible, certainly. The ends, uncertain. That alone should make you hesitate.

Once a historical event has taken place, it becomes very hard to imagine that you could have achieved a result some other way. When something is happening in history it takes on a certain air of inevitability: This is the only way it could have happened. No.

We are smart in so many ways. Surely, we should be able to understand that in between war and passivity, there are a thousand possibilities.
_________________
Howard Zinn is the author of “A People’s History of the United States.” The History Channel is running an adaptation called “The People Speak.” This article is an excerpt from Zinn’s cover story in the July issue of The Progressive.

h/t World Prout Assembly

Is Major General Albert “Bert” N. Stubblebine III an American Traitor?

I am confident that 9/11 was an inside job. Even if some of the details of the official story are true, we aren’t getting all of the story.

Unfortunately, 9/11 has also become a politician’s “third rail”, in that, if they address it openly, they are made a laughing stock by the complicit MSM. People will go to extraordinary links to belittle and minimize those who see that this thing was orchestrated from on high and that the official story is one of the most ludicrous “theories” that has been presented thus far. They base their confidence in how dumbed down the American public is and how Nationalistic (as opposed to patriotic) we have become as a society.

We readily accepted the storyline lock, stock and barrel. It just seems too evil for an American to do, doesn’t it?

Well, not if you understand the truth about our foreign policy over the last century. There is no doubt that our “trusted” American officials have done some of the most vile, evil and despicable things in our name. They have set up numerous false flag events and even some were on board with the Nazi regime (and only backed away when they saw it floundering). We have underminded so many countries’ elected officials and caused coups and takeovers of democratically elected leaders all over the world.

Jeremiah Wright nailed it when he said the chickens have come home to roost. There is so much back wash hatred for our deeds as an Empire that it will take another century to clean up the mess these Corporately owned asswipes we call our leaders have brought upon us and the rest of the world.

Back to the good General (h/t DeProgram, btw).

In 1981 to 1984, he was the commanding General of the United States Army Intelligence and Security Command He was in a documentary called “One Nation Under Siege” in 2006 where he was interviewed and said that he knew for a fact, after studying the pictures of the Pentagon crash site, that a 757 never hit that building. Period.

He explains in the clip a little about his past responsibilities, which included photographic analysis of this type of data. It was his job to analyze these types of events and come to a conclusion of what occurred. Listen to him in his own words:

WAIT! Did he also say that explosives were used to bring down the towers and that WTC 7 was most definitely a controlled demolition? What will the fools like Conservative09 do about such a traitor?

Well, of course, they will belittle him because he had the balls to stand up and say what needs/MUST be said… The Truth. The will look and evaluate the very same information, but instead of using common sense and any real investigative skills, will regurgitate the Rush Limpballs storyline of hatred and obfuscation.

In the very Wiki article I read from, it has some verbiage that says (explaining it all so very well):

Inferring Stubblebine’s connection to parapsychology and being a supporter of the Stargate Project is made without credible citation, reference & could be dubious and/or libelous.

Moreover, it is noteworthy that these allegations come at the heels of Stubblebine’s condemnation of the 9/11 Commission.

You see how this works, right? Any thinking person should question the official story, no matter how much W wanted you not to (which, btw, if George W Bush says one thing is true, find the exact opposite course of action  and truth is actually found). Even when a high falutin’ General says something that seems childishly obvious to anyone paying attention, it goes against the official story. Then the character assassination occurs.

Is it any wonder that so many people keep their mouths shut?

Well, not me, my redneck cronies. I have so little to lose at this point, all I can do is scream what I see as the truth from my rooftop at BuelahWorld.

However, when it comes to you blind assed rednecks who don’t care or worse, swallow Hannity’s tiny pecker of lies, you need to wake up and get your act together. Why? Because all of this is connected.

Every action we have taken internally and externally as a country has been related to that fatefulorganized day. Every Patriot Act/revision. Telecom Immunity. Wars in Afghanistan and Iraq (now Pakistan). Torture. The Police State.

All of it hinges from this one day that is so full of inconsistencies and lies within the official report that it truly takes a mindless fool to believe it all.

There are Patriots standing up to this and you need to educate yourself about what is happening and what they want to happen.

So, is Stubblebine a traitor?

Of course not! He is a Patriot for standing up to the obvious lies. Maybe some of your rednecks need to stand up and be Patriots for a change, as well.

PS: I would tell you Happy Independence Day, but that lie of independence changed just after 9/11/01.

The Conscience Of A Left-Libertarian/Anarco-Sindicalista/Spanish-Speaking Jewish Panamanian Resident Gambling And Finance Guy: WHY THE “CAP-N-CRUNCH” PROVISION IN ACEASA OF 2009 (Obama’s environmental thing) IS FUCKED

Hello, Rednecks! Que hay mis panas y panaches estadunidoenses del Sur? I principally blog at EDITORIALS FROM HELL’S LEADING NEWSPAPER but I’ll be cross-posting a lot of material for as long as BuelahMan and Lynda want me to. HELL is covering the Sarah Palin resignation in detail, so this will be the first piece I’ve written in a long while which will appear somewhere else first. Quite simply, they’ve been following the doings of Sarah Palin on a daily basis and have tons and tons of info and interpretation of the woman and the phenomenon. Also, the following is kind of an adapatation of some comments I’d left on Torrance Stephens’s RawDawgBuffalo site in response to his take-down of The American Clean Energy and Security Act.

Yes, another week brings yet another Multi-Trillion USD expansion of the US government, with its trusty sidekicks, the contraction of the social sector of US government spening, and the expansion of the Plutocratic rights of the pillars of the Friendly Fascist United States Of America.

A confession off the top which is probably not necessary for anyone who’s read me here, on THE DAILY PITCHFORK, and/or heard me with Dr Stephens and Lovebabz each Thursday night at 11pm Eastern on the RawDawg Buffalo Radio Show: My views are not classifiable into any familiar ideology box. I am a capitalist. I believe in free markets. I have an MBA in finance and applied mathematics from UCLA. I’ve been a founding partner of three off-shore hedge funds and an entrepreneur who’s started a number of entrepreneurial ventures in the U.S. and Latin America. That said, I hold the pillars of the Friendly and Unfriendly variants of American BushBaManuel Fascism infuriating and my orientation will always be to peace, personal freedom, social justice, anti-imperialism, anti-Zionism, cooperation, and steady economic growth. I there’s every right with the IDEA of capitalism and much of its practice. I also have found much to like in most serious economic philosophy, from Adam Smith to Karl Marx to David Ricardo to John Maynard Keynes to Emma Goldman to Samuel Gompers to Irving Fisher to Leon Trotsky to Thorstein Veblen to Herbert Marcuse to Milton Friedman to Ronald Coase to Harry Markowitz to Noam Chomsky & Ed Herman to Black & Scholes to Von Neumann & Morganstern to Modigliani & Miller to Eugene Fama to Angela Davis to Paul Krugman to Gary Becker to Richard Posner to John Meriwether to Paul Krugman to Barry Goldwater to Malcolm X to Hugo Chavez to Kenneth Clarke to Alberto Carrasquilla Barrera to Eduardo Schwartz to Barr Rosenberg and so on….I’m open-minded. All love good thinkers and find pearls of wisdom everywhere but I have no sacred cows, the two least sacred being the Salesmen-In-Chief George W. Bush and Barack H. Obama. That infuriates a lot of people. There are times I’m going to seem like the world’s most hard-hearted capitalist and times you’re going to be sure I’m a REAL SOCIALIST. Because I am. Both. Free-market, fiscally and monetarily conservative, low-tax favoring, capitalist. And socially and class conscious “big government” socialist…you get the picture…

Let’s take up the “Cap-And-Trade” provision of HR 2454, American Clean Energy and Security Act, basically as I lamented to Torrance Stephens.

TORRANCE: Isn’t it funny that two libertarians like you and I oppose Cap-N-Crunch? We’re “supposed” to be in favor of market-based solutions to “negative social externalities,” si o no?

Well, like, you, I say in this case “NO!” I say it, though, with a theoretical understanding of the concept behind Cap-N-Crunch: THE (RONALD) COASE MECHANISM.

This is very dense stuff but worth a glance if anyone’s really into the philosophy of it:

Externalities and the Coase Theorm: Hypothesis or Result

http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=kDX7SiDfOK0C&oi=fnd&pg=PA291&dq=%22Schweizer%22+%22Externalities+and+the+Coase+Theorem:+Hypothesis+or+Result%3F%22+&ots=4vf4Pjpx8i&sig=6zuGcgHq6TokX5AAsUb2iJJ3iFU

The problem here is that Coase was writing in a GLASS-STEGALL, pre-NEW CFTC world. With the total deregulation (YET NOT A TOTAL LIBERTARIAN DISPERSION OF FUNGIBILY THROUGHOUT SOCIETY) of derivative instruments, Cap-N-Crunch is bound to fail.

I’ll use the naive case. They say that the number of CO2 emissions credits would be reduced by some amount at the end of each year by not replacing some number of settled or expired contracts.

Great. But it’s total bullshit. If I sell you one put-option on the right to prevent the expulsion of so much CO2 particulate over such a period of time with such a strike price, interest rate, and premium…THEN, I buy from you a call-option on the right TO POLLUTE in such a manner by such a date with the same characteristics as the other contract, WE HAVE CREATED A SYNTHETIC RIGHT TO POLLUTE THAT DIDN’T EXIST BEFORE, OVER-THE-COUNTER AND UN-REGULATED, YET WHOLLY LEGAL AND BINDING WITH THE FORCE OF LAW ANYWHERE IN THE USA. YES, WE’VE CREATED RIGHTS TO CAUSE NEGATIVE SOCIAL EXTERNALITIES IN POOR NEIGHBORHOODS JUST BY A LITTLE HAND WAVING!

Cap-N-Crunch is therefore a fraud and a lie and all it does is set into law the right to pollute as much as possible. The man who first started discussing this idea is also the man who is the majority shareholder in the company that will make, design and HELP THE FED SUPERVISE the CO2-EMISSIONS MARKETS.

That man’s name is (drum roll please)………AL GORE, JR.

I also write in opposition to the measure and to the same ignorance among the Sheople in the American political class, MSM and greater voting and non-voting populace.

I posted Dennis Kucinich’s speech against the Air Thingy on my Facebook page and I got bombed with the same commentary.

“Come on. It’s a start.”

“You’re just like Dick Cheney and Rush Limbaugh.”

“It’s fine for you in Panama. What about us?”

“The SIERRA CLUB is for it”

“Al Gore is for it”

And so on…I really don’t know why it falls to me so often to be critiquing bad policy. Well, in this case, I do know why. Because in addition to having studied Ronald Coase’s work in grad school, I AM A COMPLEX SYNTHETIC O-T-C DERIVATIVES TRADER. My job isn’t to save the world. My job is to make good money from bad. I can see the flaws in the legislation because that’s how I’ve made my living, by catching errors of construction of markets and errors in pricing of markets.

I know a lot of people just like me — people who are comfortable making money in the anonymity of portfolio trading, but who oppose tyranny, oppression, subjugation, war,pollutants,the criminal IN-justice SLAVERY SYSTEM,etc.

There are even famous libertarian and progressive finance thinker practioners like John Meriwether and Barr Rosenberg whose examples I follow on this. I thought Dennis Kucinich’s speech covered the problems in more down to earth way than I did, employing progressive critiques of the physical damage to people, especially poor, and libertarian critiques of vesting ever-more social control to the government.

Yet, when I start speaking or writing about LOOT AS LOOT AS LOOT, I am assumed to be some kind of right-wing Nazi thug. Last I checked, I just used what I know from my training and practice to show why the Obama measure is PROMOTIVE OF POLLUTION NOT PREVENTATIVE OF IT.

The unsurprising thing was when I asked Obama-luvvers if they’d read even an executive summary of the legislation, NONE HAD.

Kelso’s Nuts love you

Rupert Murdoch’s News Limited Showing Signs Of Mass Fear and Loathing

I want to reach out to all blogs that are not afraid to call Murdock’s shitty corporation for what it is: a propaganda arm of The Elite. An entity chalk full of lies and deceit on a daily basis. A purposeful scam used to mind rape the gullible Americans who bother to tune in or read from his American owned dogs like Fox News

It makes me wonder if old Rupe is having some financial woes (I hope the old asslicker ends up in Madoff’s cell, or better yet sharing a Rush syringe and dying from Dumbassery).

Prison Planet has the entire story, but I did want to address a few of the statements the CEO of News Limited had to say (as quoted in the Prison Planet article (h/t Fighting Tyranny, btw). His name is John Hartigan and it appears to me that he is very afraid of the influence and safety net against their propaganda that the blogosphere has become for the likes of him and his companies.

His opinion on blogs and bloggers is outrageously ironic when you consider the character and performance of his own deviant newspropaganda outlets:

“Something of such little intellectual value as to be barely discernible from massive ignorance.”

“Bloggers don’t go to jail for their work. They simply aren’t held accountable like real reporters….It could be said the blogosphere is all eyeballs and no insights.”

“In the blogosphere, of course, the mainstream media is always found wanting. It really is time this myth was blown apart.”

“Blogs, and a large number of comment sites, specialise in political extremism and personal vilification. Radical sweeping statements without evidence are common.”

Bloggers, I don’t know about you, but this has me grinning like a mule eatin’ briars. Can you imagine the pair of hypocritical balls it takes to make these statements while working for that scumbag, Murdoch? After all the lies and water they carried for Bush and the neoCons (and still try). I don’t know what their third quarter is like, but they had a $8.4 BILLION loss in Feb., so I imagine that has them rankled, a bit.

But much more importantly is the fact that it is the internet with its independent bloggers, commenters and reporters who examine their disinformation and quickly disperse it shown for the bullshit it is made of. It is wonderful how fast we pass along information (good and bad). It is up to bloggers and the like to fact check, provide links and offer sound commentary, as a general rule, but the blogosphere is far more than just us political commentary/information blogs like this puny thing you’re reading now. Linking everything together has another motive and rationale for implementation (to regain their quickly slipping stronghold on their customersvictims).

Many people are tuning out from Faux News. There are still the die hard O’Reilly/Hannity viewersnutcases, but even many of them are turning elsewhere. Sure, there is the new “Libertarian” Glenn Beck that is trying to ride the populous wave which is gathering a few more “conservatives” who are deathly afraid of “liberalism” and God forbid they watch Olbermann or, cough, teh gay, Maddow (who is my favorite TV new personality of them all… but that doesn’t get her much). I have said countless times here and elsewhere to turn off that idiot tube when it comes to news and information. Many newspapers suck, but even they are better than TV. Obviously, if you have access, the internet is the best source for news and information, but you need to stick with independent sources (don’t go to Fox News online, as an example).

The US Stock Market Is Being Propped Up By The Government Intervention and Manipulation

more about “The US Stock Market Is Being Propped …“, posted with vodpod

h/t Global Research and Original below:

http://zerohedge.blogspot.com/2009/06/cnbc-this-market-continues-to-be.html

go 2 minutes into the video

Larry Levin  “….this market continues to be propped up by government intervention and manipulation and unfortunately as that continues to happen this market can go highrer the government has been doing a good job of keeping it that way no matter what the real underlying current is. …(Questio CNBC: What about the second half?)
Levin: “If the government can keep putting out all these IOUs and printing money, I guess not. Many professional traders would have told you that this market should not continue to move up as it has; move up 4 months in a row basically months ago,  … You’re gonna have to pin it on Obama and his staff that they’ve kept this market propped up the way they have……They’re doing a good job  Every single day we have some backstop from the government These are NOT free markets anymore. “

Wilbur Ross (fund manager) we’re facing an environment where Washington is the new Wall Street. It seems like no capital transactions get doe at all without some kind of  intervention from washington. And it makes me wonder; How do we ever get off those vitamin pills?…all we are doing is transferring liabilities from private to public sectors.

Larry Levin is a professional futures trader. He has been in and around the S&P 500 futures pit at the largest futures exchange in the world; the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME), for almost 20 years  author Secrets of traders

Cynthia and Mairead Speak From The Jail and The Latest Updates

My friend Anita sent an emailer out that needs distributing among blogs and other areas. It appears that her Verizon/Yahoo account is screening what she wants to express (giving me even more ammunition to say what pieces of shit those two entities are).

The day I am screened is the last day I pay them for service (Charter is on notice).

Well, now I have gone and done it! My Verizon/Yahoo will not let me send anything out! So I am blocked by the powers that be!

Please use this gmail addy until the problem is remedied!

Anita

*****************************

Several updates and video…

Cynthia’s voice…

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I have this from David Josue, Cynthia McKinney’s assistant during her presidential campaign:

[12:42:27 PM] I just got off the phone with Alisa Green of the US embassy in Tel Aviv. She told me that Cynthia refused to sign the deportation. The order states that she violated the Israeli blockade. The embassy told me that Israeli law requires that inmates that refuse to sign a deportation must be kept in jail for 3 days before they are sent away. It will be Sunday before we know when and if she will leave Israel. (STOP)

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Nobel Peace Laureate speaks from Jail Cell After Arrest on Boat Delivering Humanitarian Aid to Gaza

Irish Nobel Peace Laureate Mairead Maguire speaks to us from her jail cell in Israel. She was taken into custody along with twenty others, including former US Congress member Cynthia McKinney, when the Israeli military boarded their ship in international waters as it tried to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza.

We begin with the latest news of the ship that was seized by the Israeli military Tuesday as it tried to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza. Israeli forces boarded the ship and towed it to the Israeli port of Ashdod. The 21 activists on board include former Congressmember and presidential candidate Cynthia McKinney and the Irish peace activist and Nobel laureate Mairead Maguire. Huwaida Arraf and Lubna Masarwa were released while the other 19 remain in detention. Mairead Maguire joins us on the line from her jail cell.

Go to the link to listen or view:

http://www.democracynow.org/2009/7/2/nobel_peace_laureate_mairead_maguire_speaks

Where In The World Is Universal Healthcare? Venezuela’s Horrible Socialized Medicine State

How many of you still swallow the MSM shit burger about how horrible Chavez and Venezuela are? Isn’t it amazing how he differs from our politicians in that he seems to actually care about his fellow citizens and their health (not so much around here, eh)? The fact is that Americans are so snookered (or downright stupid) that they believe all the bullshit that the Politicians blather (these are the same assholes who get much of their campaign financing from the same assholes who are gouging us in healthcare). Funny how that works, huh?

Susie at C&L links to one of the better articles I have read that exposes the truth about the comparison of them versus us (sometimes, even that democratic party sycophantic blog gets something right). I just wish Amato would get off that Dem Party bandwagon. Me thinks he wants and needs to rub elbows with these same shitbags who are ravaging America and his indebtedness (or awestruck fandom) is not helping true Progressives. In the meantime, I will give the ones there who actually act as if they are progressive their due when deserved (Blue Gal and Susie are a couple of the best):

A Look at the Venezuelan Healthcare System

By Caitlin McNulty, Venezuela Analysis

Many in the United States fear that people would abuse a free health care system, causing overcrowding and a compromised level of care. Others claim that a single payer system would limit the freedoms of both doctor and patient. These claims, propagated by the corporate media in the United States, are a hollow attempt to keep those in the US from organizing to demand single payer health care.

The right to health care is guaranteed in the Venezuelan Constitution, which was written and ratified by the people in 1999.  Through implementing a state-funded social program called Barrio Adentro, or inside the barrio, free comprehensive health care is available to all Venezuelans. Beginning in June 2003 through a trade pact with Cuba, Venezuela began to bring Cuban doctors, medical technology, and medications into rural and urban communities free of charge in exchange for low-cost oil. The 1.5 million dollar per year program expanded to provide a broad network of small neighborhood clinics, larger regional clinics, and hospitals which aim to serve the entire Venezuelan population. (1) Chavez has referred to this new health care system as the “democratization of health care” stating that “health care has become a fundamental social right and the state will assume the principal role in the construction of a participatory system for national public health.” (2) In Venezuela, not only is health care a right; it is recognized as essential for true participatory democracy.

Some of what characterizes this movement towards health care for all includes popular participation, preventative medicine, and evaluation of community health issues. Western medicine typically operates in a top-down fashion. Doctors treat symptoms, and often fail to evaluate the larger picture of community health issues or teach prevention. (3) In a private for-profit system, there is little incentive to prevent costly illnesses. In Venezuela, however, Barrio Adentro began constructing clinics within neighborhoods where many had never been to a doctor. Through this program, a community can organize to receive funding to build a clinic and bring in doctors. The community is responsible for creating health committees, the members of which go door to door to assess the specific health issues of their community.  Doctors who live in the communities also make house calls. (4) People participate in the process of serving the health needs of the entire population.

The extensive health program is also being used to train a new generation of Venezuelan doctors. The training program takes place within the clinic system itself and relies heavily on experiential learning. The program seeks to build a new relationship between doctor and patient based on the values of service, solidarity and compassion. Doctors participating in the training program are coming from the communities they are learning in and serving, building on their intimate knowledge of the communities to provide truly compassionate and personalized care.  Using popular forums, medical professionals are able to respond to the needs of the community and offer education, treatment and consultation addressing unique public health issues.(6)

Although the system began by focusing exclusively on preventative health, it has expanded to include emergency health services, mental health services, surgeries, cancer treatment, dental care, access to optometrists as well as free glasses and contact lenses, support systems for those with disabilities and their families, as well as access to a large variety of medical specialists. They have succeeded in taking an under funded, corrupt public health care system and changing not only the quality and accessibility but also the mentality of those working there. Instead of a for-profit industry systematically denying access to large sectors of the population, health care in Venezuela is seen as a basic human right. No one is turned away, and no one is denied care. In Venezuela, they treat whole person, not simply their illness, and money stays where it belongs- outside of the health care system.(7)

During my time in Venezuela, I developed a cough that went on for three weeks and progressively worsened. Finally, after I had become incredibly congested and developed a fever, I decided to attend a Barrio Adentro clinic. The closest one available was a Barrio Adentro II Centro de Diagonostico Integral (CDI) and I headed in without my medical records or calling to make an appointment. Immediately, I was ushered into a small room where Carmen, a friendly Cuban doctor, began questioning me about my symptoms. She listened to my lungs and walked me over to another examination room where, again without waiting, I had x-rays taken. Afterwards, the technician walked me to a chair and apologized profusely that I had to wait for the x-rays to be developed, promising that it would take no more than five minutes. Sure enough, five minutes later he returned with both x-rays developed. Carmen studied the x-rays and informed me that I had pneumonia, showing me the telltale shadows. She sent me away with my x-rays, three medications to treat my pneumonia, congestion, and fever, and made me promise to come back if my conditioned failed to improve or worsened within three days.

I walked out of the clinic with a diagnosis and treatment within twenty-five minutes of entering, without paying a dime. There was no wait, no paperwork, and no questions about my ability to pay, my nationality, or whether, as a foreigner, I was entitled to free comprehensive health care. There was no monetary value connected with my physical well-being; the care I received was not contingent upon my ability to pay. I was treated with dignity, respect, and compassion, my illness was cured and I was able to continue with my journey in Venezuela.

This past year, a family friend was not so lucky. At the age of 56, she was going back to school and was uninsured. She came down with what she thought was a severe case of the flu, and as her condition worsened she decided not to see a doctor because of the cost. She died at home in bed, losing her life to a system that did not respect her basic human right to survive. Her death is not an isolated incident. Over 18,000 United States residents die every year because of their lack of prohibitively expensive health insurance. The United States has the distinct honor of being the “only wealthy industrialized nation that does not ensure that all citizens have coverage”.(8) Instead, we have commodified the public health and well being of those live in the US, leaving them on their own to obtain insurance. Those whose jobs do not provide insurance, can’t get enough hours to qualify for health care coverage through their workplace, are unemployed, or have “previously existing conditions” that exclude them from coverage are forced to choose between the potentially fatal decision of refusing medical care and accumulating medical bills that trap them in an inescapable cycle of debt. And sometimes, that decision is made for them. Doctors often ask that dreaded question; “do you have insurance?” before scheduling critical tests, procedures, or treatments. When the answer is no, treatments that were deemed necessary before are suddenly canceled as the ability to pay becomes more important than the patient’s health.(9)

It is estimated that there are over fifty million United States residents currently living without health insurance, a number that will skyrocket as unemployment rates increase and people lose their work-based health care coverage in this time of international financial crisis.(10) Already this year, 7.5 million people have lost work-related coverage. Budget cuts for the state of Washington this year will remove over forty thousand people from Washington Basic Health, a subsidized program which already has a waiting list of seventeen thousand people.(11) As I returned to the US from Venezuela, I was faced with the realization that as a society, the United States places a monetary value on life. That we make life and death judgments based on an individual’s ability to pay. And that someone with the same condition I had recently recovered from had died because, according to our system, her life wasn’t insured.

Many in the United States fear that people would abuse a free health care system, causing overcrowding and a compromised level of care. Others claim that a single payer system would limit the freedoms of both doctor and patient. These claims, propagated by the corporate media in the United States, are a hollow attempt to keep those in the US from organizing to demand single payer health care. Primary care and preventative medicine are seen as the first steps towards sustainable universal health care, keeping people out of costly hospital stays, tests, and treatments down the road.  Socializing the costs of medicine keeps costs low by preventing expensive treatments and health problems. It is difficult to understand how much quality, free health care means until you find yourself in a position of vulnerability and need. I felt a sense of security traveling in Venezuela that I do not feel in the United States; in Venezuela, there is a safety net ready to catch you when you fall. People in the US must ask themselves, as a country, where our values lie and how we have not only let people slip through the cracks but worked to systematically exclude them. Do we believe that insurance corporations and the medical industrial complex should be profiting from denying care and keeping sick people from receiving treatment? Or do we believe that care should be separate from an individual’s ability to pay? As a nation, we must embrace our humanity and value life over profits.

Notes:

1 Wilpert, Gregory. Changing Venezuela The History and Policies of the Chavez Government. New York: Verso, 2006.

2 “Mision Barrio Adentro.” Mision Barrio Adentro. 02 June 2009 <http://www.barrioadentro.gov.ve/>.

3 Wilpert, Gregory. Changing Venezuela The History and Policies of the Chavez Government. New York: Verso, 2006.

4 “Mision Barrio Adentro.” Mision Barrio Adentro. 02 June 2009 <http://www.barrioadentro.gov.ve/>.

6 “Mision Barrio Adentro.” Mision Barrio Adentro. 02 June 2009 <http://www.barrioadentro.gov.ve/>.

7 ibid

8 “Insuring America’s Health: Principles and Recommendations -.” Institute of Medicine. 02 June 2009 <http://www.iom.edu/?id=19175>.

9 “PR-2000-43/ WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION : ASSESSES THE WORLD’S HEALTH SYSTEMS.” 02 June 2009 <http://www.who.int/inf-pr-2000/en/pr2000-44.html>.

10 “Census Revises Estimates of the Number of Uninsured People – Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.” Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. 02 June 2009 <http://www.cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=245>.

11 “PR-2000-43/ WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION : ASSESSES THE WORLD’S HEALTH SYSTEMS.” 02 June 2009 <http://www.who.int/inf-pr-2000/en/pr2000-44.html>.

Scary Marijuana Bedtime Stories

Pete at DrugWar Rant listed many of the horror stories we have heard all our lives:

it’ll turn you into a bat/ax murderer/assassin, it’ll make black men look at a white woman twice, it’ll kill your brain cells, grow man-boobs, make you unmotivated, destroy your memory, cause cancer, make you get pregnant or shoot your best friend, fund terrorists, destroy your sperm, and a whole lot of other things.

How many times have you heard all the horror stories about weed’s affect on people? We’ve had almost a century of brainwashing, so I am not surprised that many people believe the bullshit told them by “those that know”: people like our Drug War Heroes and Czars, policemen who’s job depends upon it, and a whole host of prisons chock full of those evil doers who snuck a hit (Obama, you lucky bastard).

I wonder of all the horror stories you hear, how many of those people actually have tried the shit. I mean really!

I grew up in a home that railed against weed, while those railing were holding a scotch and water in their hand, 15 minutes after swallowing a Valium. Neither of my parents ever took a hit, or if so, never admitted it. My Dad died in ‘82, so we have not been able to discuss this while I was an adult, but my mom is still kickin’.

She can blather all the cliche sayings and fear tactics about it, she can browbeat a person virtually to death over the horrors of weed and its lead to failure and mental illness (which is hypocritically hilarious coming from a total fruitcake, herself), but she cannot give a single example of having tried or experienced it herself.

This is nothing new for these people and if I truly believed as they do, I wouldn’t touch it, either. But that fear is unfounded. Dangerously so, for it is keeping us from using a miracle drug that no Drug Company will ever be able to replace (Marinol is 100% synthetic THC, so for those of you who are worried about the Killer Bud killing you, it is far less potent than the drug maker’s stuff: so much so that medicinal users say it makes them sick and doesn’t work as well as regular consumption).

Look, I don’t use simple because I am broke and I get demotivated under heavy usage. It does affect my ability to interact with people while selling high tech equipment. I soundly and thoughtfully do not use the stuff with any regularity (unless around someone that has it socially) and when I do, I prefer to vaporize it, rather than smoke it (doesn’t harm the lungs at all).

But beyond me, I have a person in my household that HAS experimented with it in the past for her illness and we know for a fact that it is a far superior medication for her condition than any pharmaceutical made. Period. Hand’s down. Her meds average (without Insurance, which we are a breath away from losing) $1,000/month (our health insurance premium is $1,173/month, as a reference). And her meds have added almost 75 pounds to her small frame, she stays in a stupor, and cannot work and function like normal people. She has been moved from med to med to med and nothing really works.

Yet, here we have a natural substance that helps her far more than anything man made and she is so afraid to use it because of prison that she refuses. They are forcing her into this situation of helplessness when there is a freaking weed that I could grow that would help her more than anything else known to man.

Now, here is where this all congeals into a post: her condition is similar to one that the fear mongers have been saying will get cause her to get worse if using. And I have heard similar things my entire life about it. My point is that we have been fed a century’s worth of lies and innuendo about this plant and it is obvious that many believe it hands down due to that fear, without ever having any formal training or experience with it.

I wonder how well one would do learning to drive with a driving instructor that never drove before? Or only had information that was drummed up from 50 years ago?

Doesn’t it seem imperative to you that the people who have used this for medicinal purposes will know how it affects them, moreso than someone who has never even tried it or that has never conducted experimentation on the substance?

But it doesn’t stop there, we actually have to fight junk science that is purposefully formed to misinform us, in face of evidential personal experience that differs totally from their storyline, Pete continues:

Marijuana and Mental Illness? Not so fast.

Junk science exposed again.

It doesn’t matter how good the scientific research is… it is still junk science if it results in implied conclusions, particularly when they are publicized based on political opportunism rather than waiting to follow through to real proof.

The whole connection of marijuana to schizophrenia and psychosis that has been touted worldwide was clearly in that category – no proof of causality, evidence of self-medication, and lack of certainty regarding diagnosing the onset of the conditions. Yet, all sorts of “serious” people have accepted as certain that marijuana causes schizophrenia and psychosis.

Paul Armentano analyzes the situation:

Most notably perhaps, a team of researchers writing in the July 28, 2007 edition of the prestigious scientific journal The Lancet, boldly proclaimed that smoking cannabis could boost one’s risk of a psychotic episode by 40 percent or more. [...]Of course, there was a fatal flaw with The Lancet’s argument — one that, oddly enough, every single MSM outlet failed to mention. Empirical data did not support the investigators’ hypothesis that smoking marijuana was associated with increased rates of schizophrenia or other mental illnesses among the general public — a fact that even the authors begrudgingly admitted when they declared, “Projected trends for schizophrenia incidence have not paralleled trends in cannabis use over time.” [...]

Two years after The Lancet’s dire predictions, a team of researchers at the Keele University Medical School have once and for all put the ‘pot-and-mental illness’ claims to the test. [...]

“[T]he expected rise in diagnoses of schizophrenia and psychoses did not occur over a 10 year period. This study does not therefore support the specific causal link between cannabis use and incidence of psychotic disorders. … This concurs with other reports indicating that increases in population cannabis use have not been followed by increases in psychotic incidence.” [Abstract]

Another Barack Bush Lie

Obama Lies. Often. And Without fear of accountability.

Signing Statements

h/t AfterDowningStreet

Are You A Good Boy Scout or Girl Scout?

The best ones are prepared for almost anything (kinda proves that my “scouting” abilities suck):

Bank Holiday (Swine Flu Second Wave) Coming in Late August?

Looking at what happened last September/October, we know that the whole ponzi financial system is very fragile. Gerald Celente issued a bank holiday warning late last year. A Congressman from PA told that the world financial system was only a few hours away from complete meltdown last year. German chancellor Angela Merkel, argued that national sovereignty over financial regulation is what caused the crisis in the first place. The stage has been set for a new global finiancal order to soon take effect.

Bloomberg reports corporate executives have started ditching their stocks at a rate not seen in years. This suggests that the market—currently enjoying one of the greatest rallies in decades as stocks continue to rise from last year’s post-crash nadir—is about to have the rug pulled out from under it, a fact that corporate executives in the know are taking to heart as they scramble to get rid of their worthless stocks before the general public realize what’s going on.

“They’re looking to take some money off the table because they think the rally will come to an end,” said Ben Silverman, the Seattle-based research director at InsiderScore. “It’s the most bearish we’ve seen insiders, on a whole, in two years.”

The last time there were more U.S. corporations with executives reducing their holdings than adding to them was during the week ended June 19, 2007, the data show. The next month, two Bear Stearns Cos. hedge funds filed for bankruptcy protection as securities linked to subprime mortgages fell apart, helping trigger almost $1.5 trillion in losses and writedowns at the world’s biggest financial companies and the 57 percent drop in the S&P 500 from Oct. 9, 2007, to March 9, 2009.

There’s much more information in the report about stock sales at individual companies, but, perhaps the most important detail is that insider selling reached an all-time record back in the first quarter of 2000, as the 18-year bull market in stocks reached its climax, the official demarcation point between “dotcom” and “dotbomb”.

Are the wheels coming off the system? Many think so.

Bob Chapman’s Int’l Forecaster newsletter revealed (5/20) this startling intelligence (from within US State Dept & embassies):

”Some US embassies worldwide are being advised to purchase massive amounts of local currencies; enough to last them a year. Some embassies are being sent enormous amounts of US cash to purchase currencies from those govts, quietly. But not £’s. Inside the State Dept there is a sense of sadness & foreboding that ‘something’ is about to happen, unknown re a date—just that within 180 days, but could be 120-150 days.”

Bob quotes another source that “Panasonic has told their people to be back in Japan by Sept 09.”

Harry Schultz, dean of newsletter writers, has quoted the Chapman letter of May 30 regarding US embassies being sent large amounts of cash with which to buy local currencies, to last them a year. Here is Harry’s remarkable take on the situation:

“My HSL suspicion is that the elite plan another FDR style “bank holiday” of indefinite length, perhaps very soon, to let the insiders sort-out the bank mess which is getting more out of their control every day. Insiders want/need to impose new bank rules. Widespread nationalization could result, already under way. It could also lead to a formal US$ devaluation, as FDR did by revaluing gold (& then confiscating it). But devalue against what? The euro? Doubtful. Gold? Maybe. Or vs. the IMF basket of currencies (which seems more likely)—& much in the news recently. Any kind of bank holiday will push the US$ lower, which may be a bonus benefit to their ongoing scenario of letting the $ fall. Such a fall would get the devaluation they want without having to declare it. In sum, the insiders want more bank & system control, fewer banks & a lower US$. A bank holiday would suit all their needs.

A Bob Chapman subscriber reported overhearing 2 FEMA jacketed men talking to a police chief in Calif. They wanted to federalize the police across the US. They (govt) would be closing banks in late Aug, early Sept & that it will get ugly.”

A bank holiday would be a response to panic, which is not imminent. It may happen in the future when all the problems are revealed, but only in response to an acute situation. A proactive shutting down of banks is not in anyone’s economic interest. Spending would freeze up and a total loss of confidence would ensue, sending everything into a downward spiral.  What could change this equation would be a pandemic type of event.

Late August also marks the date when the Spanish flu became incredibly deadly:

In late August 1918, the second wave of the Spanish flu struck three port cities at nearly the same time. These cities (Boston, United States; Brest, France; and Freetown, Sierra Leone) all felt the lethalness of this new mutation immediately.

If history repeats itself and the swine flu second-wave becomes a mega-death killer, late August or early September would be the time of year we can expect it to hit with fullforce. The Spanish flu spread quickly, killing an estimated 50 million to 100 million people around the world.

If this Swine Flu is the Spanish Flu reborn and has escaped the labortory (or been unleased as a population control device), then banking insiders might know this. If there is a conspiracy afoot, late August or early September seems a good time  for their ‘bank holiday’ because they know people will be preocupped with the pandemic.

Now is the time to prepare for worst case senerio, as any good Boy or Girl Scout would do.

I have no idea if it will be the Swine Flu or some other catalyst, but they will need the scapegoat to implement the worst that is on its way. The system is crashing all around us and they aren’t telling us the truth about it.

I am headed to the attorney in a few minutes to file Chapter 7. This is the last “boy scout” badge I hope to earn.

h/t unSpy and the original article can be found at ReclaimAmerica

oye’

In this June 12, 2009 photo, Rabbi Aaron Katz is seen during a service at the progressive Judaism Synagogue in Warsaw. He is Poland’s first openly and unabashedly gay rabbi. Katz settled in Warsaw with Kevin Gleason, a former Hollywood producer with whom he entered into a registered domestic partnership in Los Angeles two years ago. (AP Photo/Alik Keplicz)

WARSAW, Poland – When Rabbi Aaron Katz walks the streets of Warsaw’s former Jewish quarter, scenes of that lost world fill his imagination: Families headed to synagogue, women in their kitchens cooking Sabbath meals, his father as a boy with the sidecurls of an Orthodox Jew.
But Katz’s life could hardly be more different from that prewar eastern European culture, at least in one key respect: He is Poland’s first openly gay rabbi.
Born in Argentina 53 years ago to parents who fled Poland before the Holocaust, Katz is the latest rabbi to play his part in reviving a once vibrant Jewish community that was all but wiped out by Hitler.

He settled into Warsaw’s historic Jewish district in March with Kevin Gleason, a former Hollywood producer on such reality TV shows as “The Bachelor” and “Nanny 911,” with whom he entered into a registered domestic partnership in Los Angeles two years ago.
They live only three streets from the birth home of Katz’s father in a modern and spacious apartment with their dogs, two gentle brown boxers. Katz says he is moved by the links to his past, but keeps his focus on the future.
“I don’t think we will come back to this great Jewish life,” he said, referring to prewar Poland, a country where one person in 10 was Jewish and where synagogues, yeshivas and shtetls defined the landscape. “But I hope we will have a normal Jewish life in Poland.”
Katz is certainly an anomaly in conservative Poland, where to be either Jewish or gay is challenge enough — at least outside the cities. Of a population of 38 million, about 5,000 are registered as Jews, while thousands more have part-Jewish ancestry, and some have returned to their roots since Poland shed its communist dictatorship.
Katz is the second rabbi to serve Beit Warszawa, a Reform community with 250 members that was founded in the capital 10 years ago by Polish and American Jews who felt little affinity with some Orthodox practices, such as separating men and women during Sabbath services. The Reform movement ordains gay rabbis.
Homosexuals have won acceptance at differing levels throughout post-communist Eastern Europe. The Czech Republic and Slovenia recognize same-sex partnerships, as will Hungary from July 1. Poland hasn’t gone that far. It has an active gay rights movement and gay nightclubs in the cities, but the Catholic church and some conservative politicians still publicly describe homosexuality as abnormal and immoral.
Katz, a citizen of Argentina, Israel and Sweden, says so far he has not faced anti-Semitism or homophobia in Poland. But some community members, speaking in private, reveal a degree of discomfort.
One woman at a Sabbath service whispered that she found Katz’s open sexuality too “aggressive.” A longtime male member counseled against writing about the rabbi, lest anti-Semites use it against the community.
A third member, Piotr Lukasz, said he himself supports gay rights, and marched with an Israeli flag during a recent gay rights parade in Warsaw. But he said he had heard others complain that it would weaken an already small and fragile community.
“They say that Poland is not a ready for a gay rabbi because the outside society is very conservative,” said Lukasz, a 23-year-old student of cultural anthropology. “An openly gay rabbi is something very controversial.”
Others, though, seem comfortable, as evidenced by a recent string of dinners where Jews and non-Jews joined Katz and his partner at their home, digging into goulash or chicken-and-potato meals around the dining room table and socializing through the evening.
Katz is the chief cook — it’s because he likes to be in charge, says Gleason, who instead welcomes guests warmly at the door and keeps their wine glasses filled through the evenings.
“I think the rabbi’s home should be open,” Katz said. “The moment that you take a position, your family takes the position too. It’s a role.”
Katz’s life as a rabbi has been an evolution from one world to another. In the 1980s and early 1990s he was Sweden’s chief Orthodox rabbi, married to a woman with whom he had five children now aged 16 to 31. Later he lived and worked in Berlin and Los Angeles. He had a dark beard, but today is clean-shaven.
The only photograph in their living room shows Katz and Gleason on the day they sealed their partnership — which they refer to as a marriage — surrounded by both their families, including Katz’s sons and daughters, who are close to the couple and who showed their acceptance of the union with a gift of a ketubah, a traditional Jewish wedding certificate.
Katz’s journey away from Orthodox Judaism was part of his “coming out process,” he explains, but also was influenced by the realization that some of his children were not attracted to Orthodox worship. He concluded that Reform Judaism was more attractive to the young.
Still, he insists that as modern as he is, he loves tradition.
He keeps a kosher home and has enthusiastically embraced the Jewish tradition of matchmaker, using his dinners to introduce singles — usually heterosexuals but not exclusively.
Asked how many marriages have resulted, he said “a couple,” but Gleason jumped in to correct him: “You’re being modest,” he said.
Gleason, 50, was born into a Catholic family but converted to Judaism for Katz. He left Hollywood and now does administrative and fundraising work for the synagogue. He attends services, sitting in the back and tapping on his watch when he feels the rabbi’s lively sermons are getting to long.
Still, the openness of their relationship can catch people in Warsaw off guard.
“I introduce him as my partner they say, ‘Oh he’s also a rabbi?’” Katz said. “When I say ‘my partner’ they think I mean like in business. So I say ‘no, no, no, we are living together.’”

.. and those monitoring this prior???

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31604191/ns/business-us_business/

NEW YORK – It was a crime of epic proportions: a multibillion-dollar Ponzi scheme that wiped out fortunes, drained retirement nest eggs, ruined charities and foundations, and even pushed some investors to commit suicide.

[cont @ link]

This is all well and good, but what about the accountability of those in our government agencies who’s job it is/was to oversee companies like this along the way???? I demand their pay checks back!!!!

Basic CPR Classes…

… teach and have taught forever, that if someone has any pulse, ANY– do NOT do CPR, that stops the heart!!!
[just sayin']
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_michael_jackson

NOW The Gullible Fools Come Out Pissed (As Usual, A Day Late and a Dollar Short)

I hear ya, Marie, but if you didn’t figure out the bastards were lying to you before you actually voted for the lying scumbag, then all that can really be said about you is that your judgment is shit.

Too damned late and another election gone due to the gullible fools who call themselves “progressives”. Another 4 years of the same old shit.

Ask for your money back now, Marie, but I hold you and all of the rest of you idiots responsible.

I Want My Money Back! (Pres. Obama!)

by Marie Marchand

I want my money back.

I gave $20 a week for seven months, plus $60 every once in a while for a t-shirt and sticker.  I gave of my modest purse joyfully.  Once I add that all up, it makes a grand total of… $106 billion?!  Wait a minute, I thought I was supporting change I could believe in, not more of the same bloodshed and war!

Betrayal is a part of life.  After awhile, you just come to expect it.  Yet, the initial shock always hits you as a surprise.  Alas, the nature of betrayal.  Humans are vulnerable to being betrayed because underneath our husky shells, our pain and hardened hearts, we are soft and trustful creatures.  We want to believe in people.

I’m not that young, so I possess some cynicism.  But I’m not that old either, so I manage some idealism.  Sure, I am used to being betrayed by my government.  But I thought my days of calling the White House in tears were over.  To think that Barack Obama preyed on this naive hope in me and millions like me is unforgivable.

I expect the Republicans to throw money at the Military Industrial Complex.  Yet, from the Democrats, I was promised a different direction (like OUT of the Middle East).  Regrettably, there has been miniscule change.  There is still nothing to believe in.

It is against my religion to say the Pledge of Allegiance.  (I am a Christian so I pledge allegiance only to God.)  I did, however, pledge my time and treasure to Barack Obama.   On November 4, 2008, I danced in the streets waving the American Flag, feeling proud to be an American.  I was pathetically close to bustin’ out some Toby Keith ditties.

It’s not just the $106 billion that makes me feel betrayed.  It’s not just the fact that Gitmo probably won’t be shut down after all.  It is not even the president’s assurance to Republicans that he will not release the photos of detainee abuse.

It is the rumors of intimidation and strong-arming that are, to me, the greatest betrayal.

That President Barack Obama sent Rahm Emanuel and Nancy Pelosi to bully anti-war Democrats into voting for the supplemental (and threatening to withdraw the leadership’s support for their re-elections if they didn’t) is a shameful misuse of power.  Where’s the humanity I once saw in Barack?  It’s just more of the same and I can’t stomach it.

I knew I was naïve; yet like millions of Americans, I had no choice but to believe.  Our hearts were desperate for hope.  We saw Barack Obama as an oasis in the desert.  To think that he may be just a mirage is heartbreaking.When you have a minute, give Wisconsin Senator Russ Feingold a call at (202) 224-5323.  He was the only Democrat in the Senate to vote against the war funding (along with three Republicans and an Independent).

Oh, and please consider supporting my grassroots campaign to get my $680 back so I can donate it to the Whatcom Peace & Justice Center. Thanks.

h/t CommonDreams

Marie Marchand is executive director of the Whatcom Peace & Justice Center in Bellingham, WA.