January 15, 2004

California Taxes are Going Up

The govenator of California is proposing the we vote for a borrow and spend packages as an alternative to raising taxes. What Republican's don't get that goverment borrowing is a tax. Every dollar borrowed has to be paid back with interest.

California has a lot of fat in the goverment. I think it's time to cut government bullshit and reduce the size of the state payroll. Let's not do this with borrowed money. Let's actually solve the problem - or pay for it by taxing the rich. I'd rather see millionaires pay their share than to burden the public with debt so the rich get a big tax break.

Posted by marc at 06:09 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 13, 2004

Choosing a Democratic Presidential Candidate

Letter to the Editor

Democrats are faced with the challenge of picking a candidate to overthrow the Bush regime. How do we choose? To me it's somewhat of a process of elimination and the candidates past voting record is as strong of a test as you can get.

I have a real problem with Gephardt, Kerry, Edwards, and Lieberman because they vote with Bush too often. They all supported Bush's fraudulent war in Iraq. They voted for Bush's tax cuts for the rich. I just can't vote for Democrats who vote with Bush and sell out our country. I want a candidate who isn't sleeping with the enemy.

Posted by marc at 09:32 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

January 11, 2004

Bush orders settlement to conservative GOP website by City of Fresno

Settlement funnels money to local conservative website on orders of president George Bush. Rightwing website "FreeRepublic" to recieve large settlement from City of Fresno.

This is urgent-read and call the attorney general's office as soon as you can. We must stop this criminal give-away to GOP activists at taxpayer expense.

The City of Fresno has announced it is paying a large settlement to the "FreeRepublic", a right wing conservative website/forum to settle a lawsuit filed by Freerepublic alledging defamation and damage of reputation. Some background on the case:

The case FreeRepublic vs. City of Fresno stems from a bulletin sent to Fresno Police by Fresno Human Relations Commissioner Debbie Reyes regarding an event planned on sept. 13th by the Fresno chapter of FreeRepublic Network. This event, billed by Freerepublic as a picnic/rally was a subject of concern to Reyes as she had been made aware of possible counter-protests to the picnic/rally by activists critical of FreeRepublic Network's harrassment of anti-war activists and general right-wing extremist nature. Ms. Reyes faxed a notice to police that there might be possible conflicts at the event and notified them that FreeRepublic was well known as an organized hate group disguising themselves as patriotic americans. This notice and resulting publicity resulted in the lawsuit naming City of Fresno, Debbie Reyes, and Mayor Alan Autry as defendants. They alledged Reyes fax resulted in defamation and filed suit seeking $1,000,000 compensation.

The very very strange thing in all this is George Bush met with Fresno Mayor Alan Autry on 10/15/2003 and there is good reason to believe this lawsuit by the FreeRepublic Network was the main topic of conversation between the two. The FreeRepublic online forum is a darling centerpiece of the GOP party, the largest and most highly trafficked GOP oriented website in existence. Progressive activists have long suspected FreeRepublic receives under the table covert funding directly or indirectly from the GOP party. So it is quite likely and plausible that when Autry met with Bush and discussed this with him Bush told him to pay off these good old-boy conservatives and get some funds into their hands so they can continue their fight against the left and all things progressive.

It is clear that before any settlement is paid to FreeRepublic an investigation into ties between Mayor Alan Autry and FreeRepublic should be undertaken. He has been supportive of their activitys to a suspicious degree and it is apparent he was very interested in arranging for the city to settle out of court on the lawsuit and quickly get some money into the hands of his fellow patriots at FreeRepublic.


Did Fresno Mayor Alan Autry work at the suggestion of George Bush to supply a large cash settlement to FreeRepublic at taxpayer's expense? Demand an investigation.

Contact:
California State Attoney General
(916)322-3360

Posted by marc at 02:25 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Bush and Blair behind Khadaffy's WMD sham

From the Toronto Sun. You won't see this in the American Press.

By ERIC MARGOLIS -- Contributing Foreign Editor

MIAMI -- Just before New Year, President George Bush and Britain's PM Tony Blair staged what French call a "coup de theatre."

That's Gallic for pulling a political rabbit from one's hat.

The rabbit in question was none other than Libya's Col. Moammar Khadaffy, once reviled as the world's most dangerous man and America's Enemy Number One.

After eight months of secret negotiations with Washington and London, the eccentric Libyan strongman grandly proclaimed his nation was abandoning its weapons of mass destruction (WMD).

Bush, his neo-conservative supporters, and the U.S. media crowed that Khadaffy's surrender confirmed the wisdom of invading Afghanistan and Iraq. The evil Khadaffy had been cowed into giving up his arsenal of deadly WMD.

Other "rogue" states would hasten to follow Libya's lead.

But on closer inspection, there was much less to this drama than met the eye. Khadaffy, in fact, had no viable WMD, contrary to fevered claims by neo-con propagandists.

According to UN inspectors and European intelligence sources, Libya had only small amounts of World War I technology mustard gas, a primitive battlefield weapon.

It had no biological or nuclear weapons. Libya had no means of delivering WMD beyond some rusting Scud-B missiles with only a 180-mile range.

Libya possessed an assortment of nuclear junk: a small research reactor, some lab equipment, and a few inoperative, third-hand centrifuges bought from Pakistan or Malaysia.

There is no sign, at least so far, of any capability to make or deliver WMD.

When I was in Libya interviewing Col. Khadaffy, I found there was not a single elevator repairman in the country.

Bakers had to be imported from Egypt to make bread. Seventy percent of Libya's military equipment was broken down. In short, tiny, backward Libya, with a population of only five million, had no military capability.

However, in the 1980s, Libya certainly did fund all sorts of violent revolutionary groups and was implicated in the bombings of French and U.S. airliners.

After 17 years of punishing sanctions against Libya, Khadaffy sought to improve relations with the West by paying reparations for the airliners, and handing over for trial two agents involved in the 1988 Pan Am bombing.

Now, by pretending to eliminate WMD he does not possess, the colonel has given a huge political bonus to Bush and Blair, a way for them to evade censure for shamelessly lying their nations into the Iraq war. They will reward Khadaffy by halting efforts to overthrow him, slowly lifting sanctions, and allowing U.S. and British oil firms to resume exploiting Libya's high-grade oil. That's politics.

The CIA helped Khadaffy into power in 1969. In the 1980s, the U.S., Britain and France each tried to assassinate him.

Now, it seems the flamboyant colonel with nine lives is slated to be reborn as a good Arab and U.S. ally.

Right after the Libyan charade, Washington opened a major new campaign to deprive Pakistan of its nuclear arsenal. The U.S. media trumpeted leaked government reports alleging Pakistan had secretly supplied Iran, North Korea, and Libya with nuclear technology. These reports blurred the lines between exports of civilian and military nuclear technology.

Washington accused Pakistan of being a major nuclear proliferator. Pakistan nervously admitted some of its nuclear scientists may have privately aided neighbour Iran, which has sought nuclear weapons for the past 28 years.

So far, accusations that past or current Pakistani governments were involved with covert nuclear weapons exports remain unproven. A director general of Pakistan's intelligence agency, ISI, once told me Iran had offered to pay Pakistan's entire defence budget for 10 years in exchange for nuclear technology, but Islamabad refused.

Whatever the case, this whole business is worthy of Alice in Wonderland. Who came down from the mountain to ordain that only the U.S., Russia, Britain, France, China, North Korea, India and Israel are allowed to possess nuclear weapons or sell nuclear technology?

The U.S. is about to build a new generation of earth-penetrating nuclear weapons. China and Russia are working on new nuclear systems.

India is building a very powerful nuclear arsenal and developing intercontinental missiles.

Israel has sold India advanced nuclear warhead and missile technology.

Muslim nations, it appears, are the only ones not allowed to possess WMD.

India used to rightly call this "nuclear apartheid" until President Bush allowed Delhi into the nuclear club.

Now that Iraq has been crushed, the White House's next targets are clearly Iran and Pakistan.

Neither pose any threat to the U.S.

Political and economic pressure on Pakistan will intensify.

President Pervez Musharraf, who has been unfailingly responsive to U.S. demands, may soon be asked to place Pakistan's nuclear weapons under joint U.S.-Pakistani control, a prelude to the total elimination of its nuclear arsenal, scientists, and weapons manufacturing capability.

If Bush were really serious about reducing nuclear weapons, as he claims, instead of building more nukes, he should slash America's still huge, quite useless arsenal of thousands of nuclear warheads.

That would be called leading by example.

Posted by marc at 01:57 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

One Hell of a Site for 9-11 Info

This site http://www.complete911timeline.org has everything. Not just the 9-11 timeline but info about the fake Anthrax scare that was created to pass the Patriot Act. Advance warning on 9-11, Afgan oil pipelines, Bin Laden Saudi and Bush connections. A must read for any patriot who loves America and despises what Bush is doing to it.

Posted by marc at 12:05 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack