This came in yesterdays e-mail.

Spiraling tingles of Truth rippled through my prescence as I read these words. We are not alone in our Quest for Peace.

***************************
Southern California Americans for Democratic Action
University of Southern California
Los Angeles, California
Sunday, February 17, 2002
United States Congressman Dennis J. Kucinich (D-Ohio)
Email responses to Dkucinich@aol.com

PRAYER

I offer these brief remarks today as a prayer for our country, with
love of democracy, as a celebration of our country. With love for our
country. With hope for our country. With a belief that the light of
freedom cannot be extinguished as long as it is inside of us. With a
belief that freedom rings resoundingly in a democracy each time we
speak freely. With the understanding that freedom stirs the human
heart and fear stills it. With the belief that a free people cannot
walk in fear and faith at the same time. With the understanding that
there is a deeper truth expressed in the unity of the United States.
That implicate in the union of our country is the union of all
people. That all people are essentially one. That the world is
interconnected not only on the material level of economics, trade,
communication, and transportation, but innerconnected through human
consciousness, through the human heart, through the heart of the
world, through the simply expressed impulse and yearning to be and to
breathe free. I offer this prayer for America.

Let us pray that our nation will remember that the unfolding of the
promise of democracy in our nation paralleled the striving for civil
rights. That is why we MUST CHALLENGE the rationale of the Patriot
Act. We must ask why should America put aside guarantees of
constitutional justice?

How can we justify in effect canceling the First Amendment and the
right of free speech, the right to peaceably assemble? How can we
justify in effect canceling the Fourth Amendment, probable cause, the
prohibitions against unreasonable search and seizure? How can we
justify in effect canceling the Fifth Amendment, nullifying due
process, and allowing for indefinite incarceration without a trial?
How can we justify in effect canceling the Sixth Amendment, the right
to prompt and public trial? How can we justify in effect canceling
the Eighth Amendment which protects against cruel and unusual
punishment?

We cannot justify widespread wiretaps and Internet surveillance
without judicial supervision, let alone with it. We cannot justify
secret searches without a warrant. We cannot justify giving the
Attorney General the ability to designate domestic terror groups. We
cannot justify giving the FBI total access to any type of data which
may exist in any system anywhere such as medical records and
financial records.

We cannot justify giving the CIA the ability to target people in this
country or intelligence surveillance. We cannot justify a government
which takes from the people our right to privacy and then assumes for
its own operations a right to total secrecy. The Attorney General
recently covered up a statue of Lady Justice showing her bosom as if
to underscore there is no danger of justice exposing herself at this
time, before this administration.

Let us pray that our nation's leaders will not be overcome with
fear. Because today THERE IS GREAT FEAR IN OUR GREAT CAPITOL. And
this must be understood before we can ask about the shortcomings of
Congress in the current environment. The great fear began when we had
to evacuate the Capitol on September 11. It continued when we had to
leave the Capitol again when a bomb scare occurred as members were
pressing the CIA during a secret briefing. It continued when we
abandoned Washington when anthrax, possibly from a government lab,
arrived in the mail. It continued when the Attorney General declared
a nationwide terror alert and then the Administration brought the
destructive Patriot Bill to the floor of the House. It continued in
the release of the Bin Laden tapes at the same time the President was
announcing the withdrawal from the ABM treaty. It remains present in
the cordoning off of the Capitol. It is present in the camouflaged
armed national guardsmen who greet members of Congress each day we
enter the Capitol campus. It is present in the labyrinth of concrete
barriers through which we must pass each time we go to vote. The
trappings of a state of siege wrap us in a state of fear, ill
equipped to deal with the Patriot Games, the Mind Games, the War
Games of an UNELECTED President and his UNELECTED Vice President.

Let us pray that our country will stop this war. "To promote the
common defense" is one of the formational principles of America. Our
Congress gave the President the ability to respond to the tragedy of
September the Eleventh. We licensed a response to those who helped
bring the terror of September the Eleventh. But we the people and our
elected representatives must reserve the right to measure the
response, to proportion the response, to challenge the response, and
to correct the response.

BECAUSE WE DID NOT AUTHORIZE the invasion of Iraq.
We did not authorize the invasion of Iran.
We did not authorize the invasion of North Korea.
We did not authorize the bombing of civilians in Afghanistan.
We did not authorize permanent detainees in Guantanamo Bay.
We did not authorize the withdrawal from the Geneva Convention.
We did not authorize military tribunals suspending due process and
habeas corpus.
We did not authorize assassination squads.
We did not authorize the resurrection of COINTELPRO.
We did not authorize the repeal of the Bill of Rights.
We did not authorize the revocation of the Constitution.
We did not authorize national identity cards.
We did not authorize the eye of Big Brother to peer from cameras
throughout our cities.
We did not authorize an eye for an eye.
Nor did we ask that the blood of innocent people, who perished on
September 11, be avenged with the blood of innocent villagers in
Afghanistan.
We did not authorize the administration to wage war anytime,
anywhere, anyhow it pleases.
We did not authorize war without end.
We did not authorize a permanent war economy.

Yet we are upon the threshold of a permanent war economy. The
President has requested a $45.6 billion increase in military
spending. All defense-related programs will cost close to $400
billion. Consider that the Department of Defense has never passed an
independent audit. Consider that the Inspector General has notified
Congress that the PENTAGON CANNOT PROPERLY ACCOUNT FOR $1.2 TRILLION
IN TRANSACTIONS. Consider that in recent years the Dept. of Defense
could not match $22 billion worth of expenditures to the items it
purchased, wrote off, as lost, billions of dollars worth of in-
transit inventory and stored nearly $30 billion worth of spare parts
it did not need.

Yet the defense budget grows with more money for weapons systems to
fight a cold war which ended, weapon systems in search of new enemies
to create new wars. This has nothing to do with fighting terror. This
has everything to do with fueling a military industrial machine with
the treasure of our nation, risking the future of our nation, risking
democracy itself with the militarization of thought which follows the
militarization of the budget.

Let us pray for our children. Our children deserve a world without
end. Not a war without end. Our children deserve a world free of the
terror of hunger, free of the terror of poor health care, free of the
terror of homelessness, free of the terror of ignorance, free of the
terror of hopelessness, free of the terror of policies which are
committed to a world view which is not appropriate for the survival
of a free people, not appropriate for the survival of democratic
values, not appropriate for the survival of our nation, and not
appropriate for the survival of the world.

Let us pray that we have the courage and the will as a people and as
a nation to shore ourselves up, to reclaim from the ruins of
September the Eleventh our democratic traditions. Let us declare our
love for democracy. Let us declare our intent for peace. Let us work
to make nonviolence an organizing principle in our own society. Let
us recommit ourselves to the slow and painstaking work of statecraft,
which sees peace, not war as being inevitable. Let us work for a
world where someday war becomes archaic. That is the vision which the
proposal to create a DEPARTMENT OF PEACE envisions. Forty-three
members of congress are now cosponsoring the legislation. Let us work
for a world where nuclear disarmament is an imperative. That is why
we must begin by insisting on the commitments of the ABM treaty. That
is why we must be steadfast for nonproliferation.

Let us work for a world where America can lead the way in banning
weapons of mass destruction not only from our land and sea and sky
but from outer space itself. That is the vision of HR 3616: A
UNIVERSE FREE OF FEAR. Where we can look up at God's creation in the
stars and imagine infinite wisdom, infinite peace, infinite
possibilities, not infinite war, because we are taught that the
kingdom will come on earth as it is in heaven. Let us pray that we
have the courage to replace the images of death which haunt us, the
layers of images of September the Eleventh, faded into images of
patriotism, spliced into images of military mobilization, jump cut
into images of our secular celebrations of the World Series, New
Year's Eve, the Superbowl, the Olympics, the strobic flashes which
touch our deepest fears, let us replace those images with the work of
human relations, reaching out to people, helping our own citizens
here at home, lifting the plight of the poor everywhere. That is the
America which has the ability to rally the support of the world. That
is the AMERICA which stands not in pursuit of an axis of evil, but
which is itself at the AXIS OF HOPE and FAITH and PEACE and FREEDOM.

America, America. God shed grace on thee. Crown thy good, America.
Not with weapons of mass destruction. Not with invocations of an axis
of evil. Not through breaking international treaties. Not through
establishing America as king of a unipolar world. Crown thy good
America.

America, America. Let us pray for our country. Let us love our
country. Let us DEFEND OUR COUNTRY not only from the threats without
but FROM THE THREATS WITHIN. Crown thy good, America. Crown thy good
with brotherhood, and sisterhood. And crown thy good with compassion
and restraint and forbearance and a commitment to peace, to
democracy, to economic justice here at home and throughout the world.
Crown thy good, America. Crown thy good America. Crown thy good.

Thank you.

Pat, thank you so much for posting this. It is a sobering view that gives us all pause for serious thought. IMHO, the only thing I wish he'd done differently is to put it in a framework that is not partisan-oriented. By using phrases like "our UNELECTED President" he makes his message "dismissable" by Republicans, and that's a shame, because this is a message that needs to be heard by all Americans. (By the world, really, but especially by Americans, because we are the only ones in a position to actually DO anything about it directly.) It's not a partisan message, it's a message that strikes at the core of everything we all value about America, whatever our party affiliations or leanings.

The trends and actions described here are deeply troubling to me, and should be deeply troubling to freedom-loving people everywhere. Regardless of the origins of the terrorist attacks on the WTC, it is a fact that they have been used as rationale and justification for the broadest and swiftest consolidation of power in the Executive branch of government in the history of our country, including EXTREMELY dangerous suspensions of due process and Constitutional protections that amount to nullifying some of the most precious safeguards of the Constitution by executive order. This is something our forefathers and family members fought and died to protect! And this is all being rushed into effect on the emotional wake of a brutal attack that has left us all shell-shocked and emotionally vulnerable, with all dissent swiftly silenced by labeling it "unpatriotic."

Folks, that's baloney ... and what's more, it's dangerous baloney. There is no more loyal and patriotic American alive than yours truly, and I'm here to say that it is NOT unpatriotic to question our government when it suspends civil liberties, delivers MASSIVE unspecified war powers into the hands of a single branch of government, authorizes SWEEPING expansion of wiretapping, surveillance, arrest and detention without criminal charges, and countless other Big Brother measures that would have scared the bejesus out of any American just months ago ... questioning those actions - and saying a loud NO to them is NOT unpatriotic, it is the patriotic exercise of everything America is supposed to stand for. If our liberties, our right to oversee and challenge governmental policies, our staunch adherance to the Bill of Rights, our respect for the individual and the minority, our belief in "innocent until proven guilty" are allowed to vanish before our eyes ... then what have we got left to be patriotic about?

My friends, and especially my dear fellow American friends, I urge everyone to take a few deep breaths and deeply consider what is happening here. Don't let emotional calls to patriotism blind us to the fact that what we are seeing happen in the wake of this tragedy is the swift erosion of exactly those things that we love about America, and that REAL patriots have fought to defend throughout the existence of this great country ... and that the entire world (despite much anger at some of our current policies) is depending on us to defend.

Don't let it go!

Love,
Greg

Thanks Pat, (and Greg) that was amazing to read.

And timely too. Recently some friends and I had a conversation which drifted along similar lines. I thought of posting about it here, but I understand that as an 'outsider' it might not have been well received. I am greatly heartened to see that there are politicans out there who are willing to speak out. Though the subject is scary, the fact that it is at least being broached will help me sleep better tonight.

Love,
Terri

Thank you sooooo much Pat. Bravo, Dennis J. Kucinich.

and thank you, very much as well, Greg, for defining patriotism as something other than non-critiicism and blind acceptance of the current multi-media marketing and propaganda being shoved down our throats every day.

all day i've been thinking about this question of patriotism, its true meaning, as opposed to the mish-mash of sentimental, non-thought process gibberish that presently abounds.

and then i happened upon upon this thread!

truth is in the air.

love from snowpea

thought you might find the following interesting and thougt provoking -

What is victory?

As the six-month anniversary of the September 11th attacks approaches, and as Bush's War on Terror continues unabated, we would do well to consider carefully the definition of victory. In the days after the Towers fell, we were promised the heads of Osama bin Laden and his followers. We were told our enemies attacked us because they despised our freedoms. We were promised the nation would become a safer, more secure place.
In the weeks that followed, those promises began to drift. All but a fervent few dismissed the idea that we were attacked because of our freedoms as simple-minded rhetorical quackery. Most of the nation had at least a dim idea that our foreign policy and addiction to Mideast oil played at least some part in the terrorists' hatred for our country. Certainly, there has always existed theological friction between the Christian and Islamic realms, but this could not account for what happened.

In the aftermath of September 11th, signs went up in windows all across the country that read: "Osama bin Laden - Wanted, Dead or Alive." These came in response to George W. Bush's bombastic statements to the press and the people. His administration, we were told, had worked overtime to establish unimpeachable links between the Saudi-born terrorist and the deaths in New York and Washington, D.C. This culminated with a fuzzy videotape, a government translation of which all but assured the planet that bin Laden was responsible. The entire mission boiled down to one imperative, ineloquently phrased by Bush: Get 'im.

Here was justice. Debate pertaining to whether or not bin Laden should be tried in public or by secret military court flooded the airwaves, but one thing was sure - the entire enterprise would be considered an utter failure if this man were not brought to justice or killed. At the end of the day, there was no difference between the two. For most, justice would be served by his assassination. The blood and tears flowing through the streets of New York demanded no less, and the armies of America were mobilized to fulfill this goal by virtually any means necessary.

Then came the drift. The administration quietly but firmly shifted the mission. Instead of bin Laden, our target was the terrorist network known as Al Qaeda. Some weeks later the mission transformed again, and the Taliban became the prime target. There is no secret as to why this happened. Bin Laden is a ghost and Al Qaeda are wraiths. The Taliban, however, were sitting ducks, easy targets for the Daisy Cutter and the cluster bomb.

Today, it is widely believed that our efforts in Afghanistan have yielded tremendous victories. The Taliban, we are told, have been destroyed. No more will they harbor terrorists or threaten American interests. The facts, however, speak differently. In a recently disclosed classified CIA report, that agency warned of looming chaos in Afghanistan if the warlords and their tribes are not brought under some kind of control. At the end of the day, the Taliban were no more than a gang ruled by warlords like bin Laden and Mullah Omar. Rather than destroying the threat such warlords represent, we have done little more than rearrange the dust.

Civil war looms in Afghanistan, of the same breed that brought the Taliban to power in the first place. If we intended to make the world safer by bombing that nation, we have failed miserably. Afghanistan is as disorganized and dangerous as it ever was. Exacerbating this disorder are the bodies of thousands of Afghan non-combatant civilians, killed by our bombs on the roads and homes of that nation. The Defense Department has finally begun to admit that such mistakes have indeed happened.

Each of the dead has beloved relatives who will hate America forever because of our messy intervention there. If the chaos of Afghan civil war gives rise to a ruling faction populated by these relatives, America will once again be faced with an implacable enemy burrowed into a nation that remains God's gift to the guerilla fighter.

After all the bombs, after putting our troops in harm's way, after all the bombast and rhetorical fire, we have very little to show for our efforts. The Taliban still exist in scattered form. Osama bin Laden remains alive and free. The necessity of his capture has been stripped of all force, as was stated by Secretary of Defense Don Rumsfeld, whose statement on February 21st that "it would be nice" if Osama and Omar were apprehended flies in the face of everything we set out to do on September 12th.

Our forces have killed exactly six Al Qaeda leaders, according to the Defense Department's own estimates. Because we relied upon proxy warriors from the Northern Alliance to do our fighting, whose loyalty to our cause is suspect to say the very least, it is believed that thousands of Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters have been allowed to go free. The handful of detainees held at Guantanamo represent only a fraction of the force we swore to destroy or arrest. There is no victory here, and never mind justice.

In the face of this failure, Bush and his administration plans for a widening war. Damaging rhetoric about an 'Axis of Evil' has undone years of improving diplomatic relations with Iran and North Korea, inspiring those nations to spiral off into anti-American sentiments not seen in decades. Iraq is widely touted as the next target for our war, yet the lack of effective proxy fighters on the ground there promises a messy entanglement for our troops.

The administration would have us believe the Kurds would serve in this capacity. Each time there has been conflict between Iraq and the Kurds, the latter have been slaughtered. This is not a recipe for success. Worse, the international coalition pulled together in the aftermath of September 11th stands against a war in Iraq. That coalition will shatter if we initiate full-blown combat operations there, leaving us to stand alone in a dangerous world.

Somalia, Yemen and the Philippines likewise wear the mark of the bullseye. Since we have yet to conclude our business in Afghanistan with any measurable degree of success, it would be folly to expand the conflict elsewhere, unless that expansion serves to distract us from our lack of success to date. It has been said that war ultimately serves itself. There would be no victory in proving this postulate correct.

The desire for justice walks hand in hand with the need to know why all of this has happened. In all the coverage that the September 11th attacks have received, and with the blistering pace of change since that day, there has been little investigation into why Osama bin Laden and his 19 kamikazes were able to do what they did. In fact, such questions have been hushed at the highest levels. Both Bush and Vice President Cheney, on the eve of the recent State of the Union address, telephoned Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle and asked him not to push too hard in search of an answer to this question in his upcoming Congressional hearings on the matter. Cheney's request was little more than a veiled threat.

Coming from the men whose responsibility it is to ensure that such an attack never happens again, this request is simply astounding. September 11th stands as the most egregious failure of the American intelligence and security apparatus since Pearl Harbor. Given all that is at stake, there is only one explanation for this inexplicable behavior: Bush and Cheney have something to hide, and will do whatever they can to keep their secrets hidden from view.

The world knows that Bush and Cheney spring from the cream of the energy industry crop, and owe much of their political success to the funding received from companies like Enron, Halliburton and Unocal. Scant notice, however, has been paid in this country to the level of involvement these entities had in the setting of American foreign and domestic policy. Congress' non-partisan General Accounting Office is presently suing Cheney to begin an investigation into the matter, but the White House is fighting their questions at every step.

Why?

In 1998, the American energy interest Unocal sought to build a pipeline from Turkmenistan, through Afghanistan, and into Pakistan's seaports in order to bring to market the massive natural gas reserves lying fallow in the region around the Caspian Sea. After bin Laden bombed American embassies in Africa, however, the Clinton administration ruled that any deals with the Taliban were forbidden, thus cracking the middle of Unocal's plan.

When the Bush administration took power, however, these restrictions were removed. The administration began a detailed dialogue with the Taliban regime in an effort to revive the Unocal deal. The Taliban resisted, and it is reported that in response, the Bush administration threatened war against them if they did not go along. Accept our carpet of gold, the Taliban was reportedly told, or be buried under a carpet of bombs. In order to further this plan, the Bush administration hindered the FBI's investigations into terrorist networks in Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia, so as not to offend the regimes they hoped to include in the pipeline deal.

It was widely publicized in the wake of September 11th that bin Laden's anger towards America was fueled by the presence of Western troops in Saudi Arabia, home to the sacred sites Mecca and Medina. Islamic law forbids non-Muslims from occupying this region, and bin Laden's terror campaign that began with the first bombing of the World Trade Center was geared towards the forced removal of these troops. The Bush administration's presence in Afghanistan likely represented yet another challenge to bin Laden's fundamentalist world view, and his violent tendencies went unencumbered after our investigative agencies were ordered to turn a blind eye to his activities. The rest, sadly enough, is history.

These dealings continued well after September 11th with the announcement that Hamid Karzai would become the new leader of Afghanistan on December 2nd, 2001. Karzai was the main choice of the Bush administration, and on the surface his nomination was meant to herald a new day for that tortured nation. In fact, Karzai was little more than a strategically wise plant for those who still dreamed of a profitable pipeline for the Caspian gas.

One of Karzai's first jobs was as a consultant for Unocal, which never abandoned its desire to see the gas exploited. A week after Karzai was sworn in, the Bush administration nominated Zalmay Khalilzad, another Unocal consultant, as his special envoy to Afghanistan. Before his new job, Khalilzad went to great efforts to convince Bush and his people that the Taliban was a stable government worthy of the pipeline deal.

A joint statement was released by Pakistan's President Musharraf and Afghanistan's Karzai after their first meeting on February 8th of this year. The two promised "mutual" brotherly relations" between their nations.

Furthermore, they agreed that a Central Asian pipeline running from Turkmenistan, through Afghanistan, and into Pakistan was in the best interests of all nations in the region. According to the Associated Press report of this meeting, which received almost no notice here in America, Unocal was waiting in the wings for such a conversation between these nations. And so it goes.

Time may well describe September 11th as the fallout from a failed negotiation between the Bush administration and the strategically-placed Taliban regime. It is likely that this is the reason the General Accounting Office's suit against Cheney is being so vehemently resisted by the White House. For years, the argument that American interests would be served by de-emphasizing our reliance on Mideast oil has been pressing. Cheney's secret energy committee likely dealt with this question, and their answer to this problem may well have been buried in the ground surrounding the Caspian sea. Only the pesky resistance of the Taliban stood in the way.

Cast in this light, it is no wonder that he and Bush leaned on Daschle to limit the scope of the 9/11 investigation. If such facts became public, the Bush administration would fall, and the global hegemony enjoyed by American energy interests would shatter.

None of this matters to the dead. They did not know of Bush's involvement with the Taliban on September 11th. They were not aware of this administration's deference to energy corporation interests in the formation of foreign policy. They had no clue that our investigative and intelligence forces, our sword and shield, were stripped of their power to defend the country so as to further that agenda. They trusted the President and his people to take care of the business of security, and knew nothing of the conflict of interest inherent in a mob of energy company CEOs running the store.

If America is to move intact through the minefield of the 21st century, we must redefine the threat that faces us. It is not the shadow men with the deadly eyes that cause us to lie awake at night, but the treason of divided loyalty along the halls of power in Washington. Afghanistan has been dangerous since the dawn of time, an eater of armies. Only when the diplomacy of corporate profiteering became involved did the violence of that region infect our shores.

That infection has led us to the brink of global war. The cure is not to kill, to invade, to make war and excuses. The cure is the understanding of consequences, and the cleansing of our sacred governmental institutions. When entities like Unocal control our foreign policy, blood runs in rivers down our streets. The best interests of the people are not represented, but are in fact completely disregarded in pursuit of new markets and profit.

This administration and its priorities represent a clear and present danger to the United States of America. Victory will not be found by a furthering of their agenda. Victory will be instead found by exposing, in public and for all the world to see, the roots of our common catastrophe. In the aftermath of September 11th, it was the expectation and the demand of all that we stand together as one, in the name of the common good. Victory will come when our government and foreign policy meets this goal.

William Rivers Pitt
truthout.com
02.26.02

http://www.workingforchange.com/article.cfm?ItemId=12879

Thanks Pat and snowpea. There is some rather frightening but interesting stuff there

The media?

There was a thread (on Auriel's forum) that mentioned the 'liberation' of Kabul by the Northern Alliance. The impression I got was that this was shown (on US tv stations) to be a joyful event 'with music, and women running around, shedding their burkhas and at last feeling the sun on their skin' - or something to that effect.

Here in the UK, our television screens showed us groups of women attempting to remove their head coverings and being beaten around the head with clubs (by members of the aforementioned NA). The other night a programme was shown about the current state of Afghanistan. Half the population are starving to death, the rest are being robbed and/or beheaded by bandits - roadside executions, apparently.

How is the media of your country (I'm asking everyone here) portraying/reacting to 'post war' events?

Plus ca change... and would someone kindly put me right and tell me just what is going on?

Love Tanya, whom would like to come back as an ostrich - if you please.

Tanya,Im Canadian,but find CNN carries the best coverage. Its my hope that everyone can watch at least 20 minutes of headlines a day of International News..as well as local..as it all starts at the local level when its all said and done.

Think Global, Act Local

Connie Chung just less than an hour ago talked about propaganda in relationship to the Daniel Pearl murder video. Im happy to hear they arent running that for all to see,as well as not talking about the actual horrific details of it...as we know what happened.
When it comes to these different reports,Ive heard both stories also,..I think it might depend on what country is putting out the report??

Two nights ago,Wolf Blitzer titled his report.."The Pentagon says it will never lie to us..Is it telling the truth".. ( ) Im sorry,but I had to chuckle.

One of the reports out today (CNN)was based on a Gallup poll...the Muslim countries opinions on the US.
Unfavorable 64 percent
Favorable 16 percent.

They report the facts(?)..I just listen and take it in,and gather knowledge as to how it all escalates and manifests.

Hi EveryOne..

My computer crashed a couple of days ago... actually it was Friendly AI sabatoge

All Thanks go to our very own Master of the Web.. Greg Thanks for providing a place to expound upon our inalienable right to Free Speech.

It's good to be back on line.. excellent information gathering here. There's more coming... Jupiter Direct>>>>>

Follow Your Heart
Pat

Hi Pat

Welcome back from computer limbo. Thanks for sending me some links related to the Daniel Pearl incident, which I posted on the thread named for him.

Some of the material we are seeing here is oriented toward the failings or hidden agendas of particular groups or entities (such as the Bush administration) ... that's only natural at this time, because that's the administration that's actively pursuing "American" policy at this time. But we should be clear that the insight we want togain from this is that such actions are the result of a power-and-control initiative that goes far beyond particular individuals, administrations, or nations ... it is the result of a broad group of rich and powerful people and individuals who have gained influence at the highest level of ALL political parties, nations, and organizations.

In this context it's worth noting that Nadine Strossen, director of the liberal ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) noted the the record of the Clinton administration with respect to the same erosion of constitutional safeguards discussed above was equally abysmal, and said there's no reason to suppose that the sweeping power-grab by the executive branch under the Bush administration would have been any different if Gore had been president. Rather, this is an insidious trend that dominates both parties (and of course has roots beyond the US Government):

quote:

---

Like this year's anti-terrorism bill, the 1996 Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act granted the government new powers while at the same time insulating certain enforcement actions - notably death sentences - from meaningful oversight by federal judges.

Within months of the passage of the 1996 anti-terrorism bill, Congress enacted two other laws - the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act and the Prison Litigation Reform Act - that also shielded from review by neutral judges executive authority over disfavored minorities.

---

BTW, this is not meant as a defense of Bush ... I am neither a Republican nor a Democrat, and certainly no supporter of the agendas of the president or his associates ... but it IS meant to keep us focused on the much bigger issue of human beings versus coercive power, rather than narrowing the focus to politician or party bashing. That's just not where the root of the problems lies.

Sorry I've been a little scarce today, I'm putting out some fires that will keep me really busy for a few days, so I have to peek in when I can. Keep up the good work and lively discussion all!

Love,
Greg

Gore didnt "get in" for a reason(s).
Things probably would have been different,thats actually been a common consensus in news reports I heard a couple weeks back. Actually, what was said was on the WORLD front,things would have been very similar,but on the local front,different.

The ballots were "played with" for a reason.
All meant to be I would presume.

And god said,we will "know the mysteries" one day soon.

Who knows for sure, Aries? But I wouldn't say that "common consensus in news reports" is necessarily good reason for believing anything ... more an indication of what the mass media wants us to believe ... or occupy ourselves thinking about and debating. Divide and conquer! I still think if we're preoccupied with party versus party it distracts us from thinking about people versus tyranny.

Love,
Greg