It's Christmas Eve

It is Christmas Eve... Good Cheer to one and all.

Four American Soldiers died today...

What a glorious Christmas it is for the entire Bush regime and its families.

They do not have to fear the spectre of death arriving at their door from the death of one of their loved ones fighting its PATRIOTIC WAR in Iraq.

DEATH will not swing it's scythe through the Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld/Snow/Ashcroft/Wolfowitz family trees this Christmas season.

Four soldiers died today in Iraq.

Their families, instead of gathering beneath their Christmas Trees to bask in the magic of Santa's bounty, must face the gaping emptiness of a branch brutally severed from their future blossoms, and the wrenching knowledge that every Christmas Eve Day to come will celebrate the anniversary of not Good Will and Cheer, but the excising of a major part of their core spirits.

They must suffer the ignominy of knowing that America was important enough for THEIR family to protect, but not important enough for any one member of the people responsible for taking us into Iraq to fight. The ULTIMATE PATRIOT was not patriotic enough to have his own branches risk the ultimate act of patriotism.

My heart, my soul, and my prayers are with the many courageous Americans who have family members lost or still there fighting. You are the true heroes of America. Your sacrifices will never be forgotten, and history will raise each and every one of you to the iconic position you so richly deserve.

SMOKING IS AN ADDICTION...RIGHT? SO HOW COME?

Alcoholism is an addiction...yet there are laws against those who indulge in alcoholin ways effecting the rest of us...most of the time...unless you are famous...say like Paris Hilton, Mel Gibson, and Wynonna Judd.

Sex can be an addiction...yet there are laws against those who indulge this addiction being able to indulge it against those of us who are not interested...unless...of course you happen to be famous...like Bill O'Reilley, and Tom Foley.

Drus addiction is not encouraged by our laws...offenders find themselves behind bars or forced into rehab...sometimes even the famous are forced to comply...believe it or not...like Robert Downey, Jr.

But smoking is an addiction that we, the ones who are allergic to second-hand smoke, cannot avoid even though we choose NOT to smoke...because smoking is an addiction that the legal beagles have NOT made laws to protect the rest of us against. (Just how many of our politicians are tobacco addicts, and therefore OFFENDERS hmmm?)

I am allergic. I have lung and sinus problems thanks to years of second-hand smoke...yet when I leave a store I must plow through the thick haze of smokers hovering just outside the door indulging in an addiction that hurts them BUT also HURTS ME!

All I want is to be able to breathe the air God placed here for me...not the nicotine laden poison that wafts out of the cigarettes AND the dragonian nostrils of those selfish saps addicted to them.

Addictions...why is it LEGAL to indulge in this addiction in such a way that forces the rest of us to ALSO suffer from it?

I am not saying don't smoke...but you have cars or your fellow smokers have cars...go to them, close yourselves in...and puff away until you have fed the beast for another fifteen minutes. STOP polluting the air that I must make my way through every time you light up in public!

Channeling Napoleon...and THEN some.

Napoleon Bonaparte...short, egomanical and with gut problems bigger than the size of his...uhm...Piles?

Isn't it nice to know that 200 years later we have another...dumper of note?!

Considering the stink Republicans forced us to wade through because of President Clinton's deposit on a dress...you remember that dontcha?...a deposit that only stopped the wheels of government because the Republicans felt they had to bring it to the forefront of a Washington cleanup...it seems far more important to note that our own Little Napoleon infliction's ability to bring down Air Force One, not by making a deposit, but by perfuming the air with pre-deposit ewww-de-flatulence, sums up the entire honor they have brought back to the White House.

I always knew the current administration was FULL OF IT...but I never realized its toxcitity was dangerous to jet planes. History will record that this administration's gas initiative couldn't solve the energy problems we face but COULD ground the advanced technology of today's jet propulsion systems.

Also, I must say that it never occurred to me that those who boarded Air Force One would be in desperate need of the types of masks we were told our service men and women would need while engaged in Iraq...until now.

Pepe Le Pew could not have done it better!

Paddy at Last!

It only took 40 plus years...a mere heartbeat of time in the Grand Scheme of things...but at long last George Dubya has found his way to the rice paddies of Viet Nam.

Do you think he will find it the SAME jungle that the multitude of America's military found it back in the 60's and 70's...when the war raged?

I remember...

Since it didn't happen all THAT long ago...

Perhaps a year...PROBABLY less...

When my adult daughter...

Noting Dubya's VALUABLE service to our Country during the monumentally difficult war in Viet Nam...

At least when he could be found, that is, back then...

In the National Guard...

Thanks to Daddy Bush...

In Texas...

The HOTBED of Viet Cong incursion!!!!

(Why have our history books failed to recount all the skirmishes, Dubya and his fellow NG'ers((National Guarders, that is,) engaged in during their military service during the 60's and 70's.)

I have to admit to my shame...or encroaching Alzheimers...that I can NOT, to this day, remember the North Viet Namese trying to take Dallas, Waco, Abiliene, or ANY Texas strongholds.

(Musta been during my OSTRICH days when I had my head buried in the bomb cellar beneath our dog pen.) ANYBODY can have a bomb cellar beneath their home! :>)

There are those, I am sure, who scoff at Dubya's enlistment and pivotal performances fighting the enemy in the Texas division of the National Guard...but surely they MUST be wrong. How could Dubya, an absolute fanatic about engaging America in HIS war in Iraq, all these years later, have skirted Viet Nam and his duty to protect and defend his Country when it had been HIS turn to fight?

I wonder, was Texas as much of a mess as Saigon back then? Did Dubya have to worry about the similarities between the allies he was fighting for and the enemy he was fighting against all looking alike as the men and women who fought the war on the foreign soil in Viet Nam did?

What a shame we did not have embedded journalists in the Texas jungle back then? How much more glory would Dubya be able to draw upon were there news footage of him engaging The Viet Cong back to be produced at will. (He might not have had to wear that spiffy flight outfit during his STUPENDOUS "Mission Accomplished" ego-op three years ago.)

I am fairly certain there will be PLENTY of news footage from his sojourn in TODAY'S Viet Nam and his "Aw Shucks! I'm just an average sorta guy" humility.

By traveling to the much CALMER Viet Nam of today, Dubya will FINALLY be able to accurately describe the places he never saw all those years ago, (Although I doubt he'll have the opportunity to EXPERIENCE the lesson's...oh Let's Say John McCain and John Kerry had while in Viet Nam back then)...

And hopefully he will ALSO be able to return those North Viet Cong rebels he and his fellow Texas National Guardsmen captured (you HAVE to wonder where they were imprisioned, dontcha?)long years ago and as far away as the Rice Paddies of the Longhorn State of Texas. (Do you think they used the Alamo as their prison encampent?)

I suppose Dubya's arriving this late is better than NEVER arriving...sorta...maybe...

All I can say to Dubya is...

Now that the Viet Nam War is over...LONG over...it is truly great of you to finally visit the place that spawned all those VC that dastardley kept all you Texas military types so busy back then...

Bravo Warrior Man Dubya!!!

Another Levee Fails?

Rummy is gone!

The SAME Rummy that Bush said only days ago would be with him until the end of his reign...along with Mr. Sharpshooter, Dick Cheney.

BOTH of these men received Bush's declaration of cohesive support...Yet, on Tuesday, the Country changed the waves in Bush's private ocean...so he cast Rummy overboard...much the way he cast Louisiana and Mississippi overboard after Hurricane Katrina.

I guess Rummy's levees weren't strong enough to stem the tide of the tsunami set off by his excecution of Bush's botched war.

No matter how many targets must be tossed into the percolating seas of Bush's incompetence, the fact remains that ultimately BUSH is the one at fault for the debacle of Iraq, the illegal use of torture, the illegal detaining of prisoners, the gross mismanagement of the health care changes his régimé put into law, and the lies...SO MANY LIES...that fall like venom from all of the progammed Hydra's mouth.

STAY THE COURSE...yesterday Bush claimed that the Democrats AND we poor, dumb lemmings that voted them into power...had erroneously assumed Bush meant to STAY THE COURSE in Iraq, but as Keith Olbermann showed last night on Countdown...(Dontcha just LOVE Keith Olbermann?)...Bush, from his OWN lips echoed the phrase STAY THE COURSE 29 times...and as recently as last week?

WAIT...I think I begin to understand...Bush is a puppet who's in a state of semi-conscious catatonia and it is really CHENEY speaking. Bush could hardly be able to remember what he might have said in this altered state...right?

Hope...Again...At Last!

Five years...such a long time to go without feeling hope in one's spirit...but that is what those American's who couldn't see through the "Good Ol' Boy" charade the current resident at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue showed the world were suckered into electing their regime in to power. Five years...of absolute control and tenacious strangle-hold over all three branches of our Government. Five years of no checks and balance against the autocracy of George W. Bush and his puppet master, Dick Cheney. Five years of corrupt rewriting of the very basics of the Constitution that they had been empowered to defend and protect by the voters they betrayed.

BUT Now we have some hope...thanks to yesterday's sweeping of American politics by so many areas in the government machinery.

Now is the time for this regime to be reminded that they are not ABOVE the Law...that they cannot rewrite the Constitution just so they can continue illegal and immoral acts.

Now the WORLD that did NOT vote this corrupt incompetence, has cause to hope too. Imagine not being given the opportunity to chose this regime, but having to endure the consequences of this administration and its neo-con autocracy?

I hope Americans now realize that when they vote for the top office, they are also voting for the person who will effect not just us, but the tenor of the world too. We have a responsibility that is far wider in scope than JUST choosing the head of OUR Country. We are not ostriches who can bury our heads in the ground. Like it or not, we are a GLOBAL community and as such must choose those who represent us with far more care than we have ever had to in the past.

I hope this new wave puts the breaks on 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and its covert violation of all that America stands for. I hope the wave of yesterday's change ripples out and finally reins in this White House and its band of sorry bandits. Because we need to remember this White House STILL has two more years of mucking about.

Oh, and how is it a change to bring in another Bush bud to run this war? I am, of course, speaking of the schnook who is Rummy's replacement!

Safer today than on 9/11????

In what Universe is the Republican Administration living? Surely not the same one the rest of us are living in. President Bush would have us believe that we are safer today because of his leadership than we were on 9/11 but how? Last year his administration proved that we aren't safe from Natural disasters and their aftermath even when they knew well in advance that catastrophe was coming...so how can we possibly be safe from the plotting of people who have shown themselves cunning and steadfast enough to attack us wherever this Administration chooses to place us? President Bush placed our citizens in Iraq. Prior to that Iraq was not a feeding frenzy for the AlQaida terrorists. President Bush was so intent on our safety AFTER 9/11 that he was brokering a deal to turn over the safety of our ports to the very peoples that attacked us...I of course refer here to the Dubai ports deal. President Bush declared the MISSION ACCOMPLISHED long ago and yet accuses his opposition to the continued OCCUPATION and ASSASSINATION of American troops in today's Iraqi Civil War as soft on American Security...I mean HELLO...The Americans that are dying in Iraq are not dying in the war that was declared ACCOMPLISHED that Americans approved...so how can opposition be traitorous, communistic, or defeatist?

The Bush Administration DOES display a time-honored American trait...Speaking with FORKED-TONGUE.

Safer? When Has THIS President and his bunch of Merry Incompetents done ANYTHING that has been successful?

Have the Social Security reforms been successful?

Have we found and brought Osama Bin Ladin to justice?

Did they find Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq?

Has the Katrina damage been restored?

Was/IS the wire tapping legal?

Has NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND worked?

O.K. YES the tax cuts for the UPPER 1% of the American people WAS successful...so 1% of the American people have something positive to say about this President and his band of Merry buffoons...But that sort of leaves the other 99% of us wallowing in the mire created by them along with the rest of the world that had nothing to do with electing them but have to endure the negativity of his misguided ego.

OOOPS...HE DUN IT AGAIN!!!

I know the Republicans as a whole have a hard time recognizing BRAIN DEAD as evidenced by the Terri Schiavo mess, but surely there must be one among the Bull masses with still a spark of brain synapses electricity to vet Bush's speeches...but given today's speech, I guess not.

Bush once again, opened mouth, inserted butt and spewed out caca...I refer to his comment about the 5 BILLION in revenue lost because of the 9/11 attack as being the worst the Americans suffered that day. Money...NOT the lives of 3000 American people!

I finally figured out where Bush spends his time. Like Scrooge McDuck, Bush spends his day swimming in his money bin because to make money the basis of the measuring stick of America's losses on that day sure means he has no concept of what the real world is about.

Even IF the 5 billion really WAS the worst we suffered that day, I would have to argue that the 5 billion was just a drop in the bucket compared with the trillions Bush has since squandered in his fight in Iraq that had NOTHING to do with the Al Qaida attacks against America.

Caca...Brain Dead...Out-of-touch...Incompetent...The list of superlatives goes on and on.

The Hills Are Alive...

...Does anyone remember the Sound of Music? Remember Liesl and her boyfriend and how that boyfirend becomes a Nazi soldier even though he is little more than a child? Nazi...student...bet you that our government could not use our students against their wills in today's conflict...right? Bet today's lead autocrat would not override the rights, the feelings, the emotions of mankind for his own nefarious desires to rewrite the laws of the land...right? Hmmm

Well it seems that right after 9/11 and BEFORE the Patriot Act was even a minor brain burp in the collective mine field of the Bush regime, they had already begun trawling the records of all students receieving federal aid for college looking for potential terrorists and guess what...despite years of mining this data base there is no evidence that they have found any. Sort of reminds you of the new laws governing high schools being unable to deny recruitment officers having unfettered access to your children while they are in school without your notice so Bush and his minions can snatch them out from under you without your even knowing they are at risk.

The Hills are alive with the sounds of Bushites.

Retroactive War Crime Protection?

World War II. Hitler. Mengle. Himmler. Goerhing. War Criminals all as defined by the Geneva Convention.

The Geneva Convention has stood the test of time...(well over sixty years since the end of WW II)...in dealing with autocrats, despots, demigods, dictators, who felt they had the right to play God and treat their fellow man however cruelly and inhumanely. People are not insects to be crushed beneath the strongest boot, no matter how much power those boots contain.

The Bush administration has drafted amendments to the War Crimes Act that would RETROCATIVELY protect policymakers from possible criminal charges for authorizing humiliating and degrading treatment of detainees. WHY do we need an amendment if the acts conducted under Bush's banner, are not illegal?

IF, however, they ARE illegal, what message would it send to the world if we enact laws to retroactively protect those who ignored the Geneva Convention by abusing detainees? How can America expect fair treatment of HER men and women prisoners around the world, if America can with the swipe of Bush's pen, make America's inhuman treatment of others, OK?

PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, let you Senators and Representatives know that NO ONE is above the law...NO ONE!

Thank You West Wing

West Wing, that show that gave us President Bartlett, also explained about Fridays being DUMP THE TRASH DAY when those brilliant whizzes at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue give the news media those topics they wish to have lose their potentially hurricane force impact upon them and their...oh...do I dare say it?...INCOMPETENCE and downright DISHONESTY...by Monday.

Why else, I have to wonder, would we have been pleasured with the dubious pearls of wisdom and veracity by Condeleesa Rice with David Gregory on MSNBC's Hardball tonight?

I can't think of any other reason...can you?

Liberators...US?

Hundreds of thousands of Shiites are marching in support of Hezbollah today...not in Lebanon...but in Baghdad...you know...Baghdad, Iraq...chanting "Death to Israel. Death to America."

Isn't that the same Baghdad...you know...IN IRAQ...that we were told would meet us as LIBERATORS, with flowers and dancing in the streets? WELL, they ARE in the streets, but thay shur ain't dancin'!

One has to wonder if the Shiites, that our government placed in power, would be marching and chanting in Baghdad had we NOT wrested power from Saddam...you know...back when we turned our eyes away from...oh, say OSAMA BIN LADIN...and focused on that demigod of excess who was far too self-eccentric to belong to Al Qaida?

I know...I'M the delusional one...right? I thought fighting a war was SUPPOSED to go after those who took down the WTC on 9/11 and make US...AMERICANS feel secure. Hmmm...Baghdad...the Baghdad OUR military LIBERATED...has hundreds of thousands of those WE lost 2500 of our finest military personnel over...are marching in those same streets waving flags supporting the HEZBOLLAH...NOT America...and yelling "DEATH TO ISRAEL...DEATH TO AMERICA."

I have a question...If Hezbollah is so GREAT...how come THEY didn't oust Saddam?

But that question aside...we liberated Iraq as an extension???...of the War on Terror sparked by Al Qaida's attack on the WTC...in order to make us...AMERICANS...feel safer within our own borders.

We alienated MOST of the world...that had been 100% behind us when we attacked Afghanistan...and now those that we FREED and placed in power, are calling for the death of Israel AND America.

Do you feel safer?

OH YEAH...IRAQ IS SUCH A MONUMENTAL SUCCESS STORY...dontcha think?

From God's Lips...

...To Bush's tree collisioned mind? GLOBAL WARMING IS A MYTH!

To the rest of us sizzling like spastic eggs atop Teflon, the myth is easier to see through than the dense heat drenched air.

Have you tried breathing in this cauldron intensified air? I mean surely liquefied eye of newt and wing of bat can't hurt as much...

AND what hurts the most...the naysayer of global warming...Mr...I-Haven't-Met-an-oil-based-by-product-I-haven't-liked...gets to wallow in the best air condtioning that money can buy! OUR...you know...the TAXPAYERS...money!

Like a Good Neighbor...Barf Bags Are There?

I am trying very hard to pry my jaw up from the floor!

I heard it on the news, but felt certain the wax in my ears must have reached a depth comparable to the waxy-yellow build-up from the commercials of old. But NO...Later on Countdown with Keith Olberman on MSNBC, Keith confirmed what my slack-jawed reaction had reacted to.

The Madison Avenue ad wackos had REALLY slipped into the depths of marketing swampland. I don't know about you, but having corporate ads placed on air-sickness Barf Bags seems...oh...I don't know....STUPID!!!

Think about it. You're sitting in your seat, nervously trying NOT to seem nervous, mentally chastising the Dramamine you took for not quelling the spiraling nausea inside your belly when the plane catapults into the upper ranges of the atmosphere---and your stomach wants to join it.

Gulping against the inevitable expulsion of what seems to be every meal you've consumed since you left your mother's womb, you reach for the air-sickness bag supplied by the airline. Do you, as you wrest the spring loaded lips apart of this delightfully designed bag, take note of the displayed corporate logo and think to yourself..."Hmmm...Bank of America is offering free checking and a toaster to all new depositors?" NOT ME!!! I'm too busy losing my cookies.

O.K...so maybe AFTER all the bile my battered innards can spew into the daringly imprinted bag and my hands are shakingly sealing up the offending proof of my internal unrest, I'll take note of the Barf Bag's corporate sponsor and think, "How nice that Allstate thought so much of us sufferers that they decided to entertain us...sorta like reading a magazine while in the john?"

NOPE!!! When you need to barf, reading a snazzily placed ad on your bucket, or your air-sickness bag is NOT going to happen. SO what does that say about the media genius who came up with this idea?

STUPID!!!!

Corporate America you have slithered to a NEW LOW!!! But then again maybe State Farm, Allstate, Senator John Q. Public, and Viagra BELONG on Barf Bags!!!

To Heaven and Hell

Two deaths...two very diverse attitudes.

Ken Ley...corporate thief of MONUMENTAL proportion died at his vacation home in Aspen because he did NOT have to turn himself into the legal system after he was found GUILTY by a jury until some comfortable...for him...later date. YEAH CORPORATE CRIME...,you do the crime but can POSTPONE the time...AND during that postponement continue to avail yourself of the fruits of your illegally gotten gains. I mean SERIOUSLY...ASPEN! The playground of the rich and famous. ASPEN...as in Colorado...The same COLORADO that spent almost ALL of the last ten years focusing on John and Patsy Ramsey for the brutal death of their daughter! (Boulder IS in Colorado!)

Patsy Ramsey died this week after fighting cancer for thirteen years...that's three years LONGER than her being a suspect. Patsy died...never knowing who killed her baby...never being accorded the sympathy a parent who loses a child to senseless violence would be shown...She and her husband lived for much of these years under the UMBRELLA of SUSPICION...only to have a GRAND JURY fail to indict...yet her death brings out the media finger-pointers wondering what secrets she took to her grave! PUHLEESE...She has known for a long time her end was coming...(cancer doesn't kill quickly....it is NOT a heart attack!)...despite the evidence of ANOTHER person invading their home in Boulder on that fateful Dec. 26th early morning...STILL the media ponders what secrets about Jon Benet's death Patsy took to her grave?

Meanwhile Ken-rip-em-off-big-time-Ley, CONVICTED by a JURY gets to vacation AFTER the fact at the luxury home his ill-gotten gains afforded him in ASPEN?

There is something decidely wrong with this. Patsy was NEVER indicted let alone found guilty of killing or aiding in the murder of her daughter...(and you KNOW how hard they all TRIED to prove her guilty)...but her death brings out that same-sorry spiel; "WHAT DOES SHE KNOW BUT ISN'T TELLING AND CAN NOW NEVER TELL?" While Ken-boy-are-you-Enron-ers-fools-Ley gets to spend his GUILTY CHARGE in Aspen merrily spending more of the monies he should not have ever had access to.

To heaven and hell...hmmm...Patsy spent the last ten years in a double hell here on earth...she lost her child...a mother's worst nightmare...and she could not shake the suspicious finger of an incompetent legal system that had her branded a murderer. Heaven...one can only pray that she has found in Heaven the daughter she loved and cruelly lost upon her passing and is now contentedly at peace.

As for Ken-I'm-the-man-who-stole-your-retirement-future-Ley...you may have THOUGHT you had found heaven...and it probably appeared like you had...but now the BIG MAN gets to call the shots and I somehow doubt that HE will see the benevolence that ripping off all those people should buy you. The old adage that you can't take it with you, works BIG-TIME in HIS TERRITORY. Hell? For you, Ken? I wonder if it won't be WORSE than Hell for you. For everyone you harmed, you will have to atone via HIS methods...and HE has you for the LONG-TERM-SENTENCE...where Aspen will not even be a comforting memory.

I know that doesn't help those Ley ripped off...but know that he will be spinning on HIS spit for a very long time!

And as for you Patsy, may you rest now in the peace you did not find here on Earth...despite the media hounds reopening the tired-old rhetoric of your never proven duplicity.

Playing Hide "N" Seek

Oh Where, Oh Where has the Constitution Gone...Not so long time passing...Where oh Where has the Geneva Convention Gone....not long ago...Where oh Where have our basic rights gone...Gone to Bushwhacked everyone...Oh When will we ever learn...Oh When will we ever learn? (Sung to Where Have All The Flowers Gone?)

A democracy...is that what we are? It's what we are SUPPOSED to be, but where is the democratic process in imprisoning, torturing, and ridiculing human beings while denying the rights guaranteed UNDER THE LAW?

Dispensing with human dignity...even for alleged terrorists reduces US to the SAME level we claim the terrorists crawl around in. Is it O.K. to be a slithering snake because you have Old Glory tattooed to your molting skin?

How are our tactics any better than those we are at war with? If we want to spread human dignity and democracy, how can we dispense with it...no matter what we believe the provocation is?

I cannot help but wonder how those 3000 souls that died in the 9/11 attack would feel about the path this administration has taken since THEIR ultimate sacrifice.

We are a Country comprised of MANY cultures. It is always a challenge integrating so many diverse ideologies into a somewhat coherent mantra for following by all.

I find it very confusing that on the one hand, The President and his regime' wish to give the multitude of ILLEGAL Immigrants amnesty...they CHOSE to violate the laws here by invading this Country illegally...but because they aid the Businesses here, we are to just turn a blind eye to their criminality and open our arms in granting them ALL the alleged rights of American life...yet many of those being held without benefit of the legal system in Gitmo, are criminals WITHOUT due process?

I am 1/4 Cherokee. The Trail of Tears is part of my history...AND America's. America has a history of treating those they consider BENEATH them poorly....yet time and time again, their treatment is proven for the evil that it is. How many Japanese Americans who were here legally and only had committed the crime of not having the right slant to their eyes, were sent to Containment (a euphemism for PRISON CAMPS...perhaps NOT as bad as those run by the Nazi's but still cruel beyond measure)...during the Second World War?

How many men, women, and children found themelves strung up to the nearest tree because they were confiscated from THEIR native lands and transported here just so they could be abused for their skin color by genteel Southern plantation owners?

How many Irish immigrants were shoved into third place cargo holds aboard luxury ships because they DARED to hope they would be treated with humanity here in the United States, but were instead treated as scum that one had to scrape from their boots, less they become contaminated by spud fungus?

The list goes on...and in EACH case America's attitudes were proven horribly, cruelly wrong?

How is what we are doing to these detainees any different than what Hitler did to HIS POWs? I KNOW Bush doesn't like being likened to Hitler...or Napoleon...or Ghengis Khan...but look at history. Is what America is doing ANY different than what ANY ideological hot-head done throughout history?

Bush is photographed looking out of the cockpit with this child-like animation on his face...Seeing those types of pictures reminds me of Nero...playing with his fiddle while Rome burned around him.

It is time to stop looking at this as a game of Cops and Robbers. It is TOO real for that. Take off your ten gallon hat, unhook your spurs, Mr. President and bring BACK the Contstitution you were charged to UPHOLD not surreptiously...or blatantly circumvent.

One other thing before I post this.

I have listened to the Bush supporters ranting about the fact that the Democrats have no cohesive centralized ideas about how to deal with the debacle in Iraq. Stay the Course, even though EVERYONE devoted to the ELEPHANT recites that like their daily prayer, it is NOT working.


I would be very upset if everyone in the Democratinc party DID agree.

Iraq is a festering debacle. If the Democrats all agreed, they would be as hard to rally around as the Elephants.

The ELEPHANTS want to stay the course...a course that is NOT working. At least the Donkeys know it is going to take a LOT of creativity to extricate ourselves from Iraq and are not willing to be pressured by any one faction within their ranks to rally around a plan or idea that they do not believe is a viable answer. I am encouraged by this ebb and flow of theories, and dismayed that the Elephants are so rigidly willing to spout over and over, what has proven not to work. Dissent and the discussions and modifications of same, IS what democracy is SUPPOSED to be.

KEEP UP THE CHALLENGING WORK OF DEBATING AND REFINING DEMOCRATS....IT'S A REFRESHING CHANGE FROM THE THIGH-DEEP PIES THE ELEPHANTS KEEP DUMPING ON US.

Is Washington BROWN enough for you?

Our Nation's capitol is

BROWN!

I am NOT a member of either political party...Therefore, I am in the position of being able to fairly...without bias...evaluate the performance of our Political arena. I have noticed that Washington, D.C. is BROWN!

Why do I say that?

Terry Schivo, a young woman who should NOT have been at the epicenter of the Republican brown nosers leaping so qucikly into the fray...(who says our governemnt moves slowly?)...to claim that they know better than the actual doctors TREATING Ms. Schivo about what was best for this woman, a woman that none of them offered to pay the accumlating medical bills for, (even though HER doctors disagreed with the Republican's position)...to deny her the dignity of God's CHOSEN time for her death. Dontcha love, though, that they, the politcal brown tossers, say they are fighting for Terry BECAUSE to not continue keeping her alive would be taking her life OUT of God's hands! (Reminds of Bush, the one all those browners are queing up to pay their brown homage to, claims that stem cell research is bad because it plays God, while his two children, Jenna and Barbara, are only here because he and Laura let science..."In Vitro" one-up God in giving them those children.)

Then we have the recent ire over the news media reporting about the "SECRET" methods being used to monitor and track alQaida. How can the browners speak this tripe with a straight face? Bush himself as well as his helium inflated second Cheney spoke to the media years ago about following the money trail. AND this is the same bunch of Browners who continue to say there was NOTHING wrong with Bush/Cheney outing a CIA operative because she happened to be married to an ambassador who disagreed with what the Browners were claiming as the reason for the war...reasons that have since been proven lies.

Frist, Hastert, Alito, Rumsfeld, are only the tip of the brown ice berg that flows within the dark, murky, brown waters within the Beltway.

And you know what? I have NEVER liked the color brown, and I like it even less on the faces of those people elected to represent the PEOPLE...not the posturing demi-geniuses inside 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

Spin the Wheel

There are just SO many topics of shame to chose from, I think I need a wheel to spin.

There's the rumors of a "relationship" between Dubya and Condi...can I just comment on that by saying...EWWWWW!!! Here's a man who can rarely speak without tripping over his tongue...can NEVER ride a bicycle without doing bark-damage to the plant world he rides into, and claims "MISSION ACCOMPLISHED" in a splashy photo-staged extravaganza then has the nerve to accuse the OTHER party of "Cut and Run" tactics because they want a definitive date for the END of that Mission Accomplished. This is the SAME Dubya that proclaimed he would bring HONOR back to the White House after the "horrid" lies told by the former President about...horrors upon horrors...HIS PERSONAL LIFE. This is the same Dubya that thinks he is ABOVE the Constitution...such a pesky piece of nonsense dontcha know...and that unlike the TRUE function of the Executive Branch...(EXECUTING THE LAWS)...he's authorized by powers unknown to anyone with ANY knowledge of politics, to MAKE THE LAWS AS HE SEES FIT! OK...Maybe that last bit might give him a MODICUM of appeal to someone like Condeleesa Rice...but still I say EWWWWWWWW!!!!

I mean, seriously...Has anyone noticed how Laura Bush's mouth has morphed into the sour look one would get if one had been sucking on a lemon for a VERY long time? Doesn't that suggest just how much of an EWWWWW we are talking about here?

Moving On...For the first time I find myself having to applaud Arnold Swartzenneger. (How bizarre is that?) Seems CA's stellar governor had the moxie to REFUSE Bush's request,(demand)that California send its National Guard to stomp the length of the Mexican Border. I never thought I would find a reason to praise CA's governor, but I am now in that position. Swartzenegger and Qwest Communications...You give us hope!

To Senators Lautenberg and Menendez...YAY!!! Thank you for voting FOR a deadline for the debacle in Iraq this week. These two men comprise the senators from NJ. (You know...right across the Delaware from where we have Rick Santorum, Senator from PA ANNOUNCING this week that WMDs HAVE been found in Iraq...those powerfully degraded, virtually harmless OLD and long forgotten...by Saddam himself...stockpiles from back in the late 80's WMDs that Santorum proudly touts as REAL FINDS...((Doesn't that smack of the ORIGINAL CLAIMS by Dubya and his band BACK in 2002 as the erroneous and long proven inaccurate reasons we went to Iraq?))...as he smirks that oily smirk he has become so infamous for.)

Senators Lautenberg and Menendez voted the way MOST of America WANTS their representatives to vote. I want our military ACTUALLY fighting the ones responsible for 9/11...NOT the demi-alQaida leaders that our invasion of Iraq has let rise to delusions of power.

To those who are overseeing the out-of-control spending of Dubya's posse', I say...GET OFF YOUR DUFFS AND OVERSEE!!!

If Dubya had been applying for a job when he threw his Stetson into our Political arena he would have been canned long ago. Think about all the lies he told to get Americans to vote for him. I think it is time we Americans demanded that our politicians keep the promises they make rather than making them just so they can get elected, then quickly forgetting about them. Our government's representatives should be trustworthy...O.K., O.K., I KNOW they are NOT, but just because that is the way things HAVE been done, doesn't mean it is the way things SHOULD be done. Deceit is deceit whether it manifests itself under oath...(Blll Clinton's allegedly Impeachable crime)...or whether it rears itself aboard an aircraft carrier in front of a sign that says "MISSION ACCOMPLISHED". If you make a promise while running or representing, you owe it to those who entrusted the power of their vote to you, to come through. Lies on the stand in a Court Room are considered a crime...why aren't lies told from the voting platform, the Capitol floor, the White House podium...the White House Press Room...The Pentagon, etc., etc., etc.?

Can you imagine the corporate world allowing management to get away with the level of incompetence shown by the current band of merry buffoonss within the Beltway?

The wheel just keeps spinning. It is REALLY hard figuring out which topic of shame to write about. Maybe I'll figure it out next time.

For now, I apologize for my lack of topic.

Pick Up Your Feet

I'm originally from Pennsylvania, but today I am glad that I don't have to take credit for having Rick Santorum as one of the TWO senators representing me. I have found Rick Santorum to be lacking in basic ethics before...his harangue against malpractice lawsuits AFTER suing and winning a staggering judgment on his wife's behalf pops into my mind...his harangue about the quality of life of one Terry Schivo whom he, just like Dr, Senator Bill Frist, had never met, examined, or had access to her medical records...but yesterday's proclamation by Rick Santorum is without as doubt the worst.

Rick Santorum has not served in the military, but he is in a war to save his political carcass, so it's O.K. to boldly lie about finding the WMDs that allegedly was the reason for us invading Iraq. (Hasn't Rickie heard...Bush's most recent excuse for this debacle of a war is NOT WMDS, but for the LIBERATION OF THE IRAQI PEOPLES FROM A VICIOUS DICTATOR)

Never mind that the weapons...degraded mustard gas that would give Rickie such a burn on his lying lips if he ever got close enough to check out his statement...never mind that if this "find" was significant enough to warrant publicity would have already been broadcasted via the loudest megaphone or tin can phone system the smirking President could access...never mind that we have heard it all before...(remember those traveling labs that we saw plastered across our screens in the very early days of the LIBERATION?)

Rickie fights from the comfort of his wealth and prestige but feels no compunction about telling the truth. Meanwhile 2,500 men and women have died fighting a REAL war so he can claim success not based on the reality of their sacrifices, but on LIES to boost HIS political popularity!

SHAME ON YOU RICK SANTORUM. I am GLAD that I do not have to bare the weight of having placed my trust in you to represent me. You are a smarmy little weasel who thinks it is O.K. to lie so you can win your fight for political power, while gaining that power on the lives of our courageous and HONORABLE military.

To Rickie, and to ALL politicians I say SHAME on ALL of you for the lies. How do any of you manage to sleep at night when you haven't got even a passing acquaintance with truth and honor?

DUCK!!! More Cow Pies are a'flyin'

Praise for the war...the war in IRAQ...not the war against the people who were responsible for the attacks against us on 9/11. Praise for being bullies...because whether we like it or not, America WAS the bully in Iraq.

On September 11th, 2006 it will be five years since the attack against America. We got Sadaam...did we REALLY want him?

This little demi-god who was contained by the nearly ten years of U.N. sanctions against him?

As I have said in earlier posts...YES he was a BAD man. There is no place reserved in the upper tiers of Heaven for Sadaam...Purgatory? Maybe...but although he caused Hell for many, he was not behind the 9/11 attacks against us. al Zarcowi??? (I KNOW that's not how his name is spelled, but phonetically it is as close as I can get.)...He was not a POWER in Iraq until AFTER we allegedly liberated Iraq....but we got him...only to have another head of that particular Hydra sprout from its serpentine body.

We got Sadaam's egomaniacal sons. Bad guys, true, but again NOT the ones responsible for 9/11. (I can imagine the wives, girlfriends, and young females in Iraq are glad we got those two...rapists, murderers, strong-armed hoodlums...yes...but egotists that were not any more willing to share their dubious powers with alQaida than their father would have been.)

So now that we have these four really not-so-nice men, do you feel safer?

The war in Iraq continues. Our death toll JUST for our own people since "liberating" Iraq (never mind the scores of innocent men, women, children, and civilians dead),is almost as high as the number of people killed during the 9/11 assault.

DO you feel safer?

The Bush administration says we ARE safer because there have been no attacks on American soil since he took up the reins against the Insurgent Dogs.

I may not be a world leader, or belong to a prestigious think tank, but common sense tells me that if we have lost almost as many of our citizens in the last three years inside Iraq as were lost in the 9/11 attack, we are NOT safer...just we have placed our citizens where it is easier for the terrorists to kill us in THEIR background. Why should they plot and plan an extravagant attack against us here, when it is so much easier for them to chip away at us with daily persistence in their own playground? They, not us, blend in over there.

I remember one of the biggest problems we faced in Viet Nam was knowing who the friends were and who the foes were because they ALL looked alike...and why shouldn't they have? They, not us, were indigenous to that area. The same is true in this debacle in Iraq. The alleged insurgents LOOK just like Joe-Abdul-Smith.

I have listened to the debates going on over ending this war and giving a date for withdrawal of our troops. Our troops should NEVER have been sent into Iraq. The Bush administration owes America one humongous apology. In its eagerness to finish what Bush senior started, it used the 9/11 attacks to gain entry into Iraq by becoming the bully.

Osama bin Laden has NOT been captured or killed. How anyone inside 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue can celebrate and applaud is beyond me. No amount of spin can change the facts that IRAQ was NOT alQaida until AFTER we bombed the crap out of them.

Are we safer? We bombed a country not even remotely connected to those responsible for 9/11. Now that we know without doubt that they had NOTHING to do, what are we doing? Although they deny it, it seems to me that we are Nation Building. WE want Iraq to be OUR democracy attached to us by not-so-invisble chains of possession.

Prior to the onset of the OUR Revolutionary War, we had our own people plotting and planning the downfall of King George. We didn't have China deciding to come here with their firepowder to blast the Red Coats into oblivion. The people living HERE decided they wanted the change...and not ALL of the people here made that choice. There were plenty of loyal subjects here, but those who wanted their freedom wanted it badly enough to give up their OWN lives to get it.

Iraq wanted its freedom from Sadaam? Iraq wanted to be out from under the control of this megalomaniac? Then why didn't they do something about it?

We know that many Iraqis escaped to the West, set up new lives here and abroad while doing nothing to bring an end to the government they claim was so horrid. If freeing your Country means so much, as it did for the forefathers of THIS Country, why didn't they do something about it? The insurgency shows that death means little to the Iraqi people and the Muslim leaders. If freedom was truly what the Iraqi people wanted, why didn't they fight for it?

Bush claims we have done a noble thing in Iraq. Being a bully is noble? Allowing the very Jihadists that we claim were responsible for 9/11 into the vacuum left by ridding Iraq of Sadaam makes for a better life for the Iraqi people? HOW?

America was attacked. I do not know if our policies around the world fuel the anger that inspired alQaida to begin attacking us. I am not a politician. I do not have access to the information about our conduct around the world...but America WAS attacked. There is a huge festering wound that weeps within the very fabric of what is America because of 9/11. Innocent people died, and the rest of us are left to try to make some kind of sense of it. America was attacked....Not by Iraq. America was attacked by alQaida. AlQaida was not in Iraq...it IS now. Do you feel safer? Osama bin Ladin is still out there plotting and planning. For now his plots and plans do not require traveling...we are in his backyard...ripe for easy picking. We turned our backs on pursuing him with the tenacity Bush promised...we turned that tenacity on Sadaam...and we got Sadaam.

One would assume that once we got Sadaam, Iraq and our military would be safer. Al Zarcowi proved how naive'we were.

We got Zarcowi...within 12 hours the violence of the insurgency escalated and a new leader came to the forefront.

Our political parties need to look long and hard at Iraq. The area is unstable, they say so we dare not leave...who destabilized Iraq? By remaining are we not making it all the more unstable? When you consider that alQaida's recruitment numbers are up BECAUSE we are in Iraq, how can anyone believe our continued presence helps?

Our military deserve the finest minds determining battle strategy. They deserve the respect for their skills and willingness to die for OUR security. They deserve the best tools OUR tax dollars can buy...Have we given that to them in this debacle in Iraq?

To the Republicans I say...No amount of spin can alter the fact that your party is ultimately responsible for the multitude of mistakes made since 9/11. To the Democrats I say, get off your collective stools and start making real waves. Being against the war does NOT mean you are anti-troops, anti-America, or anti-homeland.

To those politicians who have actually SERVED,(and I KNOW there aren't MANY of you) I say...remember what being a member of the militaryy is SUPPOSED to be and make sure you fight so that today's military HAS what it needs and so richly deserves. I also say give our military the battle we all agreed should be theirs to fight...ending alQaida...not policing Iraq's civil war.

Hypocrisy...alive and well...

Isn't it nice to know that in this enlightened age, hypocrisy is alive and well? How do I know this? Well after watching the events of the last week, I would be hard pressed NOT to.

This Country does not go for the jugular against...oh...say Ann Coulter...who is selling her books on her attacks against what many of us would consider patriotic...I mean those wives who lost husbands to the 9/11 attacks, and those family members, like Cindy Sheehan who lost family members to this allegedly Patriotic...(how can ANYONE think killing is a badge of Patriotism)...war..but let someone...oh Like the Dixie Chicks dare to dis the President, a man who by the way has done very little to prove HIS patriotism...and they are vilified, receive death threats and are treated as enemies that rank higher on the list than Osama. Remember him...Osama Bin Laden...the man Bush said was 100% responsible for 9/11...until he decided that Saddam was responsible and had WMDs...that he didn't have?

Ann Coulter has not served in Iraq. The Dixie Chicks have not served in Iraq. Ann Coulter was still in diapers during the Viet Nam War. The Dixie Chicks weren't even twinkles in their parent's eyes. Ann Coulter cannot claim any talents that she can separate FROM extreme tenets of Bush Patriotism that she spouts with arrogant though misinformed regularity. The Dixie Chicks rode to fame on...My God...their MUSICAL talents. Having no discernible talents has not kept Ms. Coulter from spouting her outrageous venom...BUT because the Dixie Chicks ARE gifted, they have been told to stick to their gifts and stop mouthing off.

Hmmm Talented trio but not allowed to open their mouths.

Hmmm. A woman with NO talent but who constantly is opening her mouth and spewing BS.

Dixie Chicks are unpatriotic for not liking Bush AND having the guts to say so.

Ann Coulter hates the loved ones of the military and the TRUE victims of 9/11...but ADORES all things BUSH.

Bush never went to War. (Daddy Bush got him out of it.) But he knows more about war and the military because due to the Supreme Court sticking their noses into what was SUPPOSED to have been a democratic election process, he's the Commander in Chief. As Commander in Chief he captured Saddam...NOT Osama. He directed the conditions that led to Abu Grhaib...and more recently the massacre in Haditha. (I KNOW you were still in diapers Ms. Coulter, but your bud SHOULD remember the Mi Lai massacre during the Viet Nam War, but trust me Ms. Coulter, massacres of innocents are NOT good things.)

The Dixie Chicks are having to cancel concerts here in the good old U.S. of A. because they dissed the President. Don't you find it ironic that back in 2002 Rummy and Bush's other band of Merry Men were dissing the French but today are having to practically get down and lick their heels to gain their support. ALSO while the U.S. is having its concerts cancelled, the Dixie Chicks are having to ADD dates to their International dates? Somehow I cannot imagine Ms. Coulter having to add BOOK SIGNING dates for her tome of outrageous trash...either here or abroad.

Hypocrisy.

Ann Coulter...LOVES Bush but HATES the men and women in the military and their families who are the ones making the sacrifices so SHE has the freedom to flap her gums. Yet she tells these fine people NOT to flap theirs because by doing so they are taking advantage of the tragic losses of their family's lives.

The Dixie Chicks don't like Bush. Given his approval rating they are not alone.

The Dixie Chicks fans feel betrayed. EXCUSE ME!!! Who betrayed whom? You ADORED the outspoken manners of the Dixie Chicks BB...(Before Bush)...yet wanted them to change AB (After Bush)...because it was the PATRIOTIC THING TO DO!!!


My patriotism lies in honoring the sacrifices made by those who ACTUALLY give their all to protect and serve. The men and women of the Military AND their families. The families who have to live with the starkest losses after 9/11.

Bush is the President...because he's the president he automatically deserves to be treated like he's some kind of a god?

Not that long ago Bill Clinton was the president, I don't remember the Republicans doling out much in the way of respect, do you? In fact, I seem to remember Ann Coulter coming onto the scene about then and being one of the talking heads that had the MOST to say AGAINST President Clinton. How is it that her challenging, and disrespecting Clinton was O.K. but anyone who dares speak out against Bush is UN-patriotic?

HYPOCRISY...YEP...it IS INDEED ALIVE AND WELL!

Put the Blame Where it Belongs!

I cannot understand anyone criticizing Brad and Angelina for donating the money they got for their daughter's pictures to the children of Africa. Both David Levy and Catherine Kauffman currently quoted as outraged that Brad and Angelina did not donate their money to America's poor children, should be ashamed of themselves.

In the first place...America...America donated tons of money to Katrina relief...America also paid for such stellar relief items as sex changes, season tickets to sporting events, and condoms...LOTSA condoms...all in the name of Katrina relief. Fema did such a WONDERFUL job didn't it?

If the Foster care system is bad, which it is, how about our politicians stop funding the shady deals being made by Halliburton...and this Administration.

We are pouring trillions of dollars into Iraq...but as Katrina showed, we DO have a third world Country right here. I am a firm believer in not pouring good money into bad. Iraq has proven to be bad in so many ways...how about some of those squandered and misappropriated funds that Americans work hard to supply our politicians, be funneled back into programs to help our own people FIRST!

The premise that Angelina and Brad make their money here in America and should therefore spend it here, is simple minded. Does Mr. Levy really believe that these two stars are as successful as they are because America goes to see them? Somehow I imagine they make a lot of money around the world. (Isn't David Hasselhoff more popular in Germany than he is here?)

BUT even if Mr. Levy was right, who is he to tell them where they should spend their money? The Bush White House and its associates made their fortunes here in good old U.S. of A. yet I do not see them spending any of their money on American relief. If I remember correctly Dubya donated a paltry $10,000.00 of his own money to Katrina relief. Considering how much he has squandered during his tenure as President, that hardly seems like more than a drop in his personal rain puddle.

Angelina and Brad chose a marvelous way of introducing their new baby to the World AND making that introduction help an area that has been forgotten, ignored, or worse. To turn their generosity around and make it into something evil-spirited is so wrong.

In the past we have had scandals with American charities mismanaging funds. (As in leaders pocketing, diverting, stealing monies donated in the name of charity.)

I do not know anything about Mr. Levy's or Ms. Kauffman's agencies, but that they would come out and criticize ANY effort on anyone's part in helping children...ANYWHERE in the world...makes me certain that they are not organizations I would want receiving MY money.

In a Country as rich and prosperous as America for their to be deaths due to poverty is a black mark not against the people of America, but the politicians elected to REPRESENT the people. They are placed in office to advocate for the people...ALL the American people...but they place business and special interest groups before the well-being of America.

So to Angelina and Brad I say, God Bless. To Mr. Levy and Ms. Kauffman, I say SHAME ON YOU. If you want to blame someone for the conditions here in America, blame those who operate within the Beltway.

Burrs in My Saddle

I really did try NOT to need to write this, but I just took my BP and I'm afraid if I don't vent, something else...something I'd rather NOT have venting...will...SO here goes!

Ann Coulter...The self proclaimed WITTY one, who finds it is humorous to call women who lost their immediate loved ones in 9/11 "harpies", opportunistitc witches who have made their fortunes off of the backs of their dead loved ones so should not care if anything has changed to prevent ANOTHER 9/11, is the catalyst for my risen blood pressure.

Ms. Coulter...you say that 9/11 was not THEIR tragedy. To a certain extent I DO agree. This Country, that had not been violated on its OWN soil since Pearl Harbor, lost its innocence. In that respect we are ALL victims of the carnage of 9/11. BUT unless I missed something, YOU, MS. COULTER, did not lose anyone immediately attached to you...even though, may I add, you have certainly parlayed the 9/11 events and the actions of the current "would-be-king" to make your own fortunes. What price innocence? Having not still been in diapers during the Viet Nam War and Richard Nixon's attempts to usurp power in the name of that War, I have many more memories to draw upon in making my commentaries than you do...here and elsewhere.

That said, I would much rather lose my innocence than someone I have loved and lived with. We already knew that America's borders were not secure and that Al Qaida wanted to harm America. (Do you NOT remember the attack on the WTC nine years earlier?) SOOOO America lost her innocence....sorta, but not on 9/11...She, America, was already aware that she was vulnerable to outside enmity. Al Qaida had not spent those intervening nine years transmiting its contempt and hatred for America via the old tin-can phone line...so how much of OUR innocence did America REALLY HAVE to lose on 9/11?

We hurt. The Nation of America hurt...and the world understood our pain on that day. How could they not? How could anyone not understand the pain of losing 3000 plus innocent lives and in such a dramatic way? How could anyone not understand the soul-shattering tragedy for all those families that lost their loved ones on that day...and the aching void they've had to endure every day since?

The pain of 9/11 is a wound that still bleeds five years later. As long as I live, I will never forget the anguish I felt watching innocent people throw themselves out of the crippled towers. I will never forget the masses of people covered in the pulverized aftermath of the Towers disintegration or the stark looks of the bewilderment on the faces of New Yorkers fleeing Ground Zero.

I hurt, MS. Coulter...for all of those lives whose unique voices were crushed out on 9/11. BUT, I did NOT lose an immediate member of my family. Had I lost a loved one, the gaping wound that exists within my memories of 9/11 would multiply to the nth degree. There would be no level of peace for me...especially when I see that nothing...not ONE thing has changed. Imagine knowing that your loved one's death was for nothing, because this Country did not learn from it, and others could so easily be blasted into the same depths of despair five years later.

Our borders are no more secure today, despite the billions wasted in the last five years, allegedly FOR securing those borders. The Intelligence community is a quagmire of misdirection, confusion, and incompetency draining us of our hope for a better future.

Imagine, Ms. Coulter, if your loved one had died on 9/11...then imagine that the Administration tries to push through a plan for the very geographic factions that bred the murderers of 9/11 to be contracted to secure our sea ports! Does that make any sense? Isn't that the same as locking the fox inside the henhouse and throwing away the key all the while hoping that THAT fox doesn't have his own rabid fangs?

Wishful thinking didn't work after the FIRST attack on the WTC...Somehow I doubt that the terrorists have dummied down enough since 9/11 for us to think it'll work as a deterrent now.

You lost no one, but you have ridden to celebrity on the tainted carpet of 9/11. You have lined your bottom line on the sacrifice of others. You tar and feather any who disagree with you and/or your little Dubya as non-patriotic...but you are not over in Iraq fighting for the war that your Dubya touts so highly...any more than any of HIS family members, friends, or cronies are there.

You like the freedom afforded by the Constitution, but viciously wish to deny those same rights to the brave women who chose not to just disappear within their grief, the same rights to speak out and be heard. They lost family, but they also HAVE family...family they are tenaciously trying to keep from ever having to live through another senseless 9/1l-like assault. You, on the other hand, seem to have lost nothing more than your humanity.

I praise the New Jersey Widows. I praise the mothers, sisters, wives, brothers, fathers, sons, aunts, and uncles of our Courageous Soldiers for speaking out and demanding to know WHY they must sacrifice when nothing is being done to make it better. War is not a panacea...nor should it be an accepted way of living. Since no WMDs were ever found, this war is allegedly NOW about giving the Iraqi people democracy...but you, Ms. Coulter, viciously wish to deny democracy to the people who have lost their loved ones fighting for that philosophy.

In other words...simpler words...It's time to get off your soap box and let those who have earned their rights to speak out, to do so.

Cow Pies...The Sequel

I found some more BEEF.

Are you as sick of the TomKat nonsense as I am? HELLO...!!! I fail to understand the questionable behavior of Mr. Tom. Leaping onto sofa's like a crazed bi-polar. Claiming that having this baby with his malleable "Kitten" meant everything to him...yet where was he when "Kitten" was due to deliver? Placing his movie career and publicity of same first. (I guess when you accept a percentage of the profits from a film rather than a salary, family, in this case the imminent arrival of one member of the family...takes LAST place. Can't disappoint those movie ticket buying fans for something as inconsequential as the birth of your child.)

YET...by contrast we have Brad Pitt. He did NOT attend the Cannes Film festival because of the IMMINENT due date of HIS baby with Angelina Jolie. In the months leading up to the arrival of HIS baby, we saw Brad showing an amazing affinity for parenting AND support of his co-parenting partner. The pictures of Brad with Maddox show a trust in the looks Maddox casts Brad's way...and who wouldn't melt seeing Brad with little Zahara?

When Ann Curry interviewed Angelina the joy this woman is experiencing came out in marvelous giggles. With TomKat it seems Tom drags Kat around so he can plaster his lips onto hers at just the right moment when there is a vast public forum to capture the moment. (Makes one wonder if there isn't a cameraman somewhere...maybe in the vaults within the Celebrity Scientology compound, that doesn't have the digital proof that Tom really DID engage in the "nasty" with Kat once-upon-a-time.)

The few times Kitten actually DID open her mouth to speak of her "THRILLING' love-relationship with Mr. Tom, her gushes seemed..I don't know...more like what a girl would say who has a HUGE crush on her favorite matinee idol...BUT HEY...isn't that what really WAS happening here? Didn't Katie say she was in love with Tom when she was a girl and had posters of him plastered around her room?

Brad seems to be more of a true partner with Angelina. He doesn't drag her around like a toy trophy for the world to admire his abilities at attracting a woman young enough to be his daughter. He seems to genuinely adore the role of father...to ALL of the children involved in his new-found family. He does not parade around like some father-figure needing to guide the little woman in the proper way of being a woman about to give birth. (Just how Tom, who has never given birth can possibly know the RIGHT way to give birth is beyond me...AND beyond a man whose claim to fame OTHER than creating his questionable religious doctrine...was as a writer of "SCIENCE FICTION" Yeah...Dr. L.Ron Hubbard, pseudo-psychiatrist, gynecologist, internist, etc., etc, etc.)

Tom seems to just want public verification that even though he never had a biological child with either of his wives or former girlfriends, his swimmers really CAN do more than a dead man's float...assuming that is, that that cameraman really DID document the deed and inserted a mini camera into "Kitten" to follow the course of Tom's paddlers as they sought unity with the "golden egg".

AND May I say that TomKat's drama deprived Brooke Shields, a woman who exhibited tremendous courage in view of her post-partum depression to give birth to her new baby. Tom criticized her for her illness...he who KNOWS psychiatry without benefit of a medical degree, thereby practicing medicine without a license!...(does anyone know if Tom ever went to college at all, and if he did, what he studied? It certainly wasn't compassion...which is SOME of what psychiatry teaches.)

So this completes my current sequel of Cow Pies...but stay tuned...I am sure more will land in the upcoming days and weeks.

"I FIRST learned about it..."

I am confused. The President keeps telling us that "he didn't know about the shady acts of people in his administration and conducting HIS war until the media releases it." How can this be when we KNOW now, thanks to the media, that he has been monitoring all of our phone calls since 9/11? If he's monitoring ALL calls...ESPECIALLY those that are from abroad...(ha, ha, ha...or yeah RIGHT!)...then how can ANYONE involved in THIS administration claim ignorance?

And while I am on the subject of the confusion wafting from Washington, how can we believe in the current threat from Iran and THEIR nuclear power when Washington was SOOOO sure that Iraq had those extremely elusive WMDs that allegedly required our soldiers conduct an unending war against that Country?

Not since the administration of Richard Milhouse Nixon have I felt such confusion...nor such an air of becoming a Country where the people [you and me] are losing the power and rights the Constitution assures us...along with the lives of our brave men and women who are supposedly fighting to PROTECT those rights.

The Wind is a-blowin'

June 1st begins this year's Hurricane Season.

Isn't it sad that we are over 8 trillion dollars in debt due to this administration but those devastated by LAST year's hurricane season have not received enough Federal Funding to even return to their homes? I have to wonder where Americans would rather see their limited tax dollars spent...here in America...or overseas where every step forward meets with a bomb of destruction.

I was raised to believe it is never wise to continue funneling good money into bad. We have been in Iraq how many years now...? Hmmm...let me see...one?...no...two?...no...three?...four?...no...four PLUS years. In all those years have we REBUILT Iraq?

Judging from the pictures that appeared on last night's news...you know...the news that told us about two CBS employees being killed and one more critically injured...Iraq is LESS rebuilt despite the trillions of dollars wasted there, than the Katrina ravaged States here in America.

The winds are about to begin blowing again. There can be no denying that American citizens will be struck by the fury of Mother Nature. New Orleans still has not had her levees repaired. (Would it take trillions of dollars to repair our levees?) But the administration says it is not going to rebuild those places demolished by Katrina. It IS, however, going to continue sending money and resources to Iraq.

Good money for bad.

There are those who say we MUST stay the course in Iraq...WHY? Perhaps there HAVE been SOME improvements in SOME areas in Iraq, but let's face it...they've got oil...and since we all know how expensive it is to buy gas for our cars and homes, having oil is a pretty acceptable way for them, the Iraqis, to pay for their OWN rebuilding. They are now out from under the hand of Saddaam...(BTW...does anyone wonder why we were able to find Saddaam in his hole in less than a year but have been unable to find Osama, the TRUE mastermind behind 9/11, in FIVE years?)...so isn't it time they start acting like an independent country and start paying their own way? I mean, really, Bush got most of the world to erase ALL of Iraq's accumulated debt, so they are basically starting their government with a clean financial slate.

I cannot help but wonder what will happen when the next devastating event takes place here in America.

Think about it.

All those displaced people and businesses from Katrina last year. How many of them are unable to work and/or pay taxes? Isn't that cutting into the Country's bottom line? What if there is mass destruction in other parts of the Country that leaves even more people without homes and/or jobs. Rebuilding should and NEEDS to begin at home.

We are never going to understand the enmity that exists among the Iraqi people. The religious differences...which considering they are all supposed to be Muslim, seems REALLY strange to me...I assumed truth is ALWAYS truth...right? How can the Suni, Kurds, and Shiites have DIFFERENT truths when they allegedly all believe in the same Koran? Since they have this difference, isn't it up to them to figure it out...and pay for that process?

America has enough of her own problems that need the resources she is pouring into Iraq. We have gang violence with its collateral innocent bystander destruction and fear. We have hurricanes and tornadoes getting ready to do their worst. We have high gas bills and cars that make a mockery of the term "conservation". We have our own third world Country right here...(No one who saw the most impoverished victims of Katrina can deny we have a third world Country right here in the good old U.S. of A.)...we have borders that are open to infiltration FIVE years after 9/11.

Imagine how secure our borders would be if we had spent some of the trillions spent in Iraq on our own security?

We got Saddaam...but the mastermind of 9/11 still is free...WHY? He is NOT in Iraq...and has not been there...not even ONCE since 9/11. Saddaam kept Osama out...(can you imagine these two megalomaniacs being willing to SHARE power with each other?...The idea is psychologically LUDICROUS!)...He WAS in Afghanistan, but for reasons that history is going to criticize harshly, we left Afghanistan for the Al Qaida leader in Iraq, Saddaam? Don't you find it strange that Al Qaida only became active in Iraq AFTER America and its coalition went in there to remove Saddaam and his two arrogantly sadistic sons?

The wind is a-blowin'. Hurricanes and tornadoes ARE going to wreck paths through the American dream...will America help restore the dream, or allow the continued mess we're supporting in Iraq to turn OUR dream into a nightmare of total loss?

Memorial Day Ramblings

Today is the day we celebrate Memorial Day...although the original day is tomorrow. I watched the photo op of the laying of the wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown soldier and I felt my heart twist. I listened to the speech telling us that the way to honor the many brave men and women who fell during the wars this Country has engaged in is to STAY THE COURSE.

Am I being hard on the man when I snort and think about how he honored this Country during HIS time to serve by first getting into the National Guard and then going A.W.O.L. from that cushy service?

I had a brother who ALSO enlisted rather than go to Viet Nam in the Army. He enlisted, though, in the Navy and saw duty in Viet Nam...six years to be exact.

My father...well...Dad was NOT the bravest of soldier. He was drafted at the beginning of the second World War. To say that he spent most of his time doing KP rather than training to carry the weapons of war would be a modest understatement. Dad was NOT cut from soldier cloth...but he did NOT evade the call to put his civilian life on hold...and although he was, for the most part, a coward, he served by taking care of the feeding of those who WERE a bit braver than he. He did NOT go A.W.O.L. from his cushier position. He did not circumvent his duty to serve as the government saw fit to require his service.

I have a son who enlisted in the U.S. Coast Guard. The Coast Guard that is by its very definition contracted to police OUR Coasts. He fulfilled his tour JUST before 9/11 and this administration's declaration of war on Iraq. When that declaration was made, my son wanted to re-enlist. DID HE? He was married by that time with a step-child. Back when this administration first threw its collective hat into the ring to run for the Presidency, I saw in Dubya's eyes the truth that if elected, we would go back to Iraq and finish what Bush Sr. did not...so I implored my son NOT to re-enlist. Something told me that a man who evaded service in the war of HIS generation would not have any idea what conducting a war involved...Sadly, time has proven my premonitions right.

My heart aches for the men and women placed in harm's way. They are heroes each and every one of them. I honor them on this day and EVERY day because they have EARNED my honor and respect. I am too old to serve and have to admit that were I not, I am not sure I would have the courage to place myself in their armor...any more than the offspring of this administration who ARE of the right age to serve, seem to be.

Perhaps that is the worst hypocrisy of this war. STAY THE COURSE...but none of HIS or his MINIONS have any stakes in the wellbeing of those who are FIGHTING this Course he and his minions push us to honor. None of Dubya's, Cheney's, Jeb's, Rumsfeld's offspring felt this conflict worthy of THEIR service.

To all those who DID step forward and all those who have stepped forward and served, I thank you. To those who have lost loved ones in ALL our conflicts, thank you. To those who have yet to see combat, Bless you for bravery that shines so bright and courage that supercedes anything I have done in my 50 plus years.

Bifocals...

Benjamin Franklin invented the bifocal LOOOONNNNGGGG before the PC was invented. I am sure that had Mr. Franklin KNOWN the PC was coming he would have created bifocals that did not make you feel like one of those bouncing dogs people put in the back windows of their cars. I ALSO believe he would have created a lens that did not distort the screen we must look at while reading/writing, AND he would have created a lens that pinpointed printing errors like little laser beams so you would never miss typos or scripos.

I thought I had made ALL the corrections to the scripos from transferring my story from MS Word here to my blog, but my bifocals did not laser beam ALL the errors and it seems I missed one. What I learned from rechecking my story, is that the scripos are where apostrophes should go. (Good thing I didn't write using all those fancy curlicues, and color changes that are available on MS Word.)

Bifocals are a regrettable sign that we are aging, as are creaky knees, chest muscles that try and valiantly ALMOST succeed in KISSING those self-same creaky knees, hair that turns intriguing shades of gunmetal gray, snowy white, a slushy-side-of-the-road yuck. Another sign of aging...Well I went to Walmart today to pick up a few things AND the prescription my doctor felt important enough to call in for me last night. I REMEMBERED the few things!

I know, I know some of you are saying that I COULD dye my hair back to its striking blonde, pre-old-age hues, but I figure I have earned the right to show the signs of a life well led...but I will ALWAYS wish for SMART bifocals...And a little birdie to sit on my shoulder and whisper in my ear GET YOUR MEDS!!! There's NEVER a trusty parrot around when you need one! :>)

Me...a PUBLISHED WRITER?

Six years ago I had an agent/editor working diligently with me to get my writings published. After years of family and friends...(the ones I was haphazardly writing for)...urged me to get my work published. Since writing has always come easily to me, I never thought of myself as a writer...just a thought transcriber. For an entire year we worked on the many transcripts I had already written so we would have a large body of work to present to publishers. (When you haven't attended Writing Conferences, it is really hard to get your writing published.)

We were on the verge when my agent/editor's wife suffering from a deep period of depression, got into her car and drove herself into a tree. Her death sent my agent/editor into his OWN tailspin. He literally walked away from everything and everyone.

I assumed that he would eventually return...but alas, he has not. I hate the idea of trying to start all over again, but the muse inside me will not stop forcing me to write...and once again, friends and family are nipping at my heels urging me to again go for the gusto...as in get myself another agent and get published.

It won't be easy to find the time to deal with the intricacies of publishing, but perhaps it will give me something to focus on other than my daughter's seizures and my failing lungs.

SO...I thought perhaps I might post a short story here and see if I get any kind of feedback...Are you ready then, to be my guinea pig?



THE END
By
Lin Holmes
December 26, 2000

With a flick of her wrist, she opened the barrel. Carefully she removed the spent cartridges, letting them drop to the floor where they ricocheted in all directions. The box of bullets was on the table to her right. She reached for a handful, lining them up, sentinels of power, destruction, and release, on the coffee table in front of her.

For a long minute she stared at them, her tummy fluttering, her heart beat thundering inside her chest, her resolve, absolute. Taking a deep, steady, methodical breath, she picked up the first bullet and slid it into one of the six chambers.

The sound of metal scraping against metal seemed loud in the deafening silence surrounding her. Her mind was empty. She did not think. All thinking had been exhausted hours, days, weeks, months ago.

The second bullet penetrated the waiting chamber in the barrel.

She'd already dispensed with six of the lethal projectiles, but was confident no one would learn of her perfidy until she had completed her mission. Her stomach muscles contracted and fluttered. She spread her hand across the slight curve, wishing things could have been different.

Her fingers shook ever so slightly as she placed the third bullet. She would not think! She COULD not undo what had already been done. Retreating now was not a possibility because she could never again be the woman she'd been just a few short months ago.

The fifth bullet slid in with a bit more decisiveness than had the one before it.

The clock on the mantle bonged the half-hour. Thirty more minutes to go. She had to be ready.

Bullet six filled the barrel. She closed it with a soft, but final snick, placed the loaded gun onto the coffee table, rose to her feet and headed for the bathroom. She stripped the bloody clothes from her body, leaving them in a careless pile on the floor.

The shower cleaned her, leaving her body scented, not in spattered metallic blood, but in the rich perfume of her favorite soap. This was the part she had not planned for because she had not meant to get blood on the clothes she'd worn for the first phase of her mission. What would she wear for the final confrontation?

Her closet was not huge, but it held an ample wardrobe to choose from. Should she dress in silk and satin, or appear as usual when at home, denim and fleece?

Comfort won out over elegance.

She brushed her long golden brown hair until it crackled. Laying the brush back on her vanity, she surveyed herself in the triple mirror. She looked peaceful. How deceptive, she thought, rising to her feet with practiced grace.

She looked around her bedroom, not allowing herself to see anything but her possession and effects. For the last four months she'd forced herself to continue living here, but hadn't been able to feel at HOME here. That feeling had been ruthlessly taken from her, and nothing would ever give it back to her.

Flipping off the light she returned to the living room. In the corner sat her computer. She went to it, booted it up and then called her last word processing file to the screen. She needed to check it for spelling and grammar errors. There were none.

Her eyes went to the clock above the mantle. Five more minutes. She knew she should be nervous, scared even, but she wasn't. All she felt was relief. Soon she'd be able to put it all behind her.

She went to the couch, settled herself so she was looking directly at her front door. Her belly fluttered. She ignored it, reaching for the gun. The metal felt cool against the palm of her hand. She removed the safety and waited.

The clock struck the hour. She lifted the gun, aimed the sight at the target, and pulled the trigger.

A 911 call by a neighbor had the police there within twenty minutes. The suicide/confession note she'd typed using her word processor was found blinking on the screen of her computer.

The file read:

In my bathroom are the clothes I wore when
I shot and killed John Latham earlier tonight.
Scattered on the floor of my apartment are the
Spent cartridges from that murder.

Four months ago, John Latham broke into
my apartment and savagely beat and raped me.
Now I'm pregnant.

John Latham, a known and repeat sex offender,
was caught and admitted his crime, but the
District Attorney's office reduced his charges.
He served EIGHT weeks for destroying my life,
and the lives of the other women he raped before
Me.

Something HAD to be done.

This child growing in my stomach carries
Latham's seed. Living with the memory and
emotional death of what John Latham did to
me is more than I can handle. A child conceived
in that violence and Latham's light sentence
were the final straws.

To that end, I determined that the best thing for
the three of us, John Latham, the habitual
predator, myself, changed forever by what he
did to me, and this child, who very well might
grow up to be the next generation of John
Latham, was to take our lives.

I feel no remorse for killing John Latham.
He was and always would be an animal
feeding off of the fear and harm of others.
I did what the law refused to do. I
PERMANENTLY ended the crime spree of
this sadistic beast!

I chose not to be found wearing the clothes
I wore when I killed John Latham because
I did not want to die with his blood tainting
my body.

I wish the Law had done its job, but since it
refused to, I had no choice.


Sincerely,
Senator Elizabeth Ann Morrow
Fifth District.

Cow Pies...

...or in other words...HERE'S THE BEEF

I have several beefs I want to write about today and unfortunately ALL of them current.

Where to begin?

How about ARCs? For those of you who don't know what an ARC is, let me explain. ARCs are ADVANCED READERS COPIES of books sent to readers contracted with the publishing companies to read these Unedited copies and NEVER to sell them. (Boy do I WISH I was on those lists, because as I stated in my Profile, I LOVE TO READ)...But I have gone into eBay and found sellers who sell NOTHING but ARCs. ARCs do not give the authors, the CREATORS of these jewels, ANY credit, or acknowledgement. Yesterday, an ARC of Janet Evanovich's upcoming book TWELVE SHARP sold for a staggering $611.04. (On June 20th, the book can LEGITIMATELY be purchased for $16.17 via Amazon.com.

To the seller AND the buyer I say "SHAME ON YOU". What you have done is no different than if you had held the author up by gunpoint. The seller, who did nothing but accept the contracted PRIVILEGE of receiving book titles LONG before they are available to the masses, FREE, your windfall is nothing short of sacrilegious. To the buyer...I don't care if you purchased this book as a COLLECTOR'S ITEM...it is no different than receiving STOLEN GOODS. You have stolen from the author...you have stolen from the Publisher...you have stolen from all of us who love books and respect them as the crown of creative genius they are. SHAME, SHAME, SHAME.

On to my next "PIE" in today's sky.

Senator John McCain...I really respected and LIKED you before. You were a man of honor and compassion. Had you won the nomination for President over the current man back in 2004, I would have happily voted for you. I was appalled by the attack the Bush Campaign waged against...not you...that would have been, although dirty, I suppose given the contentious atmosphere that overcomes supposedly decent people when they are politically driven...acceptable...but to attack your wife and family? That was abhorrent to me. I gave you kudos for defending your loved ones. So what happened? Why did you forget the slings and arrows slung by the Bush Campaign and literally climb into their snake infested bed? Where is your honor? NO ONE ATTACKS MY FAMILY WITHOUT FOREVER ASSUMING THE ROLE OF AN ENEMY! Attack me all you want, but don't EVER take on my family. What happened to YOUR honor? How can I, as a loving family member EVER entrust someone who would place his political ambitions over his family? Politicians speak loudly about "Family Values" but when it comes down to the nitty-gritty they will jump off the family bandwagon if it means slithering their way into the political morass. SHAME, SHAME, SHAME to all you politicos who forget that family is far more important than the intrigue of politics.

Cow Pie Three...I have a 30 year old daughter who is permanently disabled. Because of this she is one of the millions snagged in the Medicare disaster. I tried this weekend to get a prescription filled for her only to be told I could not because her Medicare provider number was not valid. I had to spend ALL of Friday and half of Saturday unwinding this latest of the Medicare D screw up before I could get her the medications she needs. I am only in my 50's yet dealing with the Medicare prescription plan caused me to tear out chunks of my hair and mutter words that my Granny, bless her beloved soul, would have washed my mouth out for. I cannot imagine being a frail elderly person having to deal with this debacle. Why is it everything the current administration places its seal on turns out so wrong?

Cow Pie Four...To those people who believe that we went into Iraq to LIBERATE the people from a vicious tyrant...I say...we have an equally vicious tyrant...judging from the number of people who set sail on rinky boats, or flimsy rafts hoping to defeat the violent currents to reach our Country...right off the tip of Florida. If liberation really WAS the excuse, wouldn't it have been much more cost effective to have liberated Cuba?

Cow Pie Five...For those who really think the current Administration has kept us from being attacked again I say this...why should Al Qaeda attack us here? They have easier access to Americans IN Iraq. We lost over 3000 people in the 9/11 assault. How many of our brave and honorable Americans have we lost in Iraq? we have not been protected from attack...we have just made the attack field for killing Americans much easier over there.

Cow Pie Six...The tax cuts that this administration is so proud of did nothing for the masses. We got a total of $8.00. (Thank God McDonald's is a cheap place to eat out at.)

Cow Pie Seven...We cannot rebuild New Orleans and the other towns devastated by Katrina, but we MUST rebuild Iraq? Why? Considering all the money that has already been spent in Iraq it seems to me the terrorists who had been kept OUT under Saddaam, bomb and shoot up those efforts on a daily basis. I doubt the victims of Katrina would shoot up their rebuilt territory. SO where is the American taxpayer most likely NOT to be squandered?

Cow Pie Eight...No Child Left Behind...Why are our drop out numbers up since the institution of this initiative? I cannot help but wonder if the President would be able to pass the tests he has made a requisite to today's graduating students.

Cow Pie Nine...Stem cell research. Please explain to me how it is playing God to do stem cell research but it was not playing God when the President and his Wife availed themselves of artificial means to have their daughters? In Vitro is not conception by God's methods, is it? So if it is OK to create life artificially why isn't it OK to try to preserve life using similar technology? We treat our pets with more kindness than we do our family of mankind.

I think I'm running out of Cow Pies...no I just can't think of them...but I am sure once I have sat back and thought about this, I will be able to come up with more.

Domestic Spying

I do not understand why there is so much approval for the domestic mining of our media sources. If we give up our rights, even for something that seems as important as routing out terrorism, we are giving up the very ideals that supposedly we are trying to bring to Iraq...and once they have been usurped, they will be impossible to regain.

9/11 was NOT the first time America was assaulted by foreign agents. Pearl Harbor was an assault on American soil. We made sacrifices during the Second World War, but we never gave up the basic rights fashioned by the framers of the Constitution. Not as a whole. Yes, we committed unjust deeds on the whole of Japanese Americans...a fact that history reminds us. That stain is one we cannot remove from the ink blotter of America's tapestry. BUT we did not deprive the entirety of the Country of the rights that are our democratic brickwork.

Here we are sixty years later and without a squeal of protest we are blindly going to allow the rights that our Founding Fathers fought a monarchy to gain the right to be free and have the privacy they guaranteed us because the world is filled with evil people?

The world has ALWAYS been full of evil people that wanted to hurt us. We engaged in a prolonged Cold War with people that wanted to harm us. We fought a long and fruitless war in Viet Nam in the name of spreading the democracy that is at the core of our Country's existence.

During the fifties, many INNOCENT people were swept into the nightmare of McCarthyism. They were painted as traitors, pulled before Congress and grilled...in other words...they were put through a government sanctioned witch hunt.

We MUST live by the Constitution. There are AMPLE avenues for the government to monitor those they need to monitor without wiping out the very basic rights our government was fashioned on. There are limits...there are checks and balances...and they are important to protect. Without them, we no longer have a democracy. And if we don't have a democracy, what are we trying to spread in Iraq really?