"They will loosen the reins on Terror."
Extremists everyone.
Habeas corpus abolishment ruins Bill of Rights
http://kennebecjournal.mainetoday.com/view/letters/3235767.shtml
On Sept. 29, Congress passed the Military Commissions Act of 2006 at the behest of President Bush and wiped out our Bill of Rights. And we, the people, like the chicken with its head cut off but doesn't yet know it, are still running around as though nothing in our lives has changed.
The greatest tragedy to ever befall our nation happened, and our flags are not at half-staff, we are not gathered together in mourning, nor are we holding the president and his Republican Congress, who swore an oath to protect, uphold and defend our Constitution, accountable for their treachery. What is wrong with us that we have lost our most cherished way of life without a roar; without a whimper?
"We are a nation of laws, not of men," Thomas Jefferson said of our new Republic. Now, 230 years later, we have become a nation of men, not of laws. One man's whim, Bush's, now decides who shall live and who shall die, who will suffer cruel and useless torture, who will rot in prison without The Great Writ of Habeas Corpus -- the cornerstone of human freedom since the year 1215, which guaranteed prisoners held without charge the right to challenge their incarceration in a court of law. Abolishing habeas corpus obliterates our Bill of Rights, destroys our democracy, and silences dissent.
May God have mercy on us.
Patricia Norton
Augusta
1009
Ah, Glen Beck the all seeing and correct 'Married Man.' "Father Knows" Glen Beck "Best."
1015
commercials
1017
If the Republicans maintain control the Social Security Act will be attacked.
Bush makes work on immigration and Social Security top priorities
GOP candidates told: Talk issues
WASHINGTON -- President George W. Bush said Republicans can hold their congressional majority by focusing on national security and the economy, and that he'll return to overhauling Social Security as a domestic priority for his last two years in office....
... Regardless of how many seats Democrats may win, Bush said he'll make the tactical changes necessary to accomplish his goals. At the start of each congressional session, he said, "you test the mood of the Congress, find out what their appetite will be. But it doesn't change your priorities."
The top items on the agenda, Bush said, are immigration and Social Security. The Republican-led Congress stymied Bush on both after he was re-elected in 2004 and made them his top priorities....
1027
The reason why the rhetoric by major newsprint continues to rant that staying in Iraq is essential to the outcome of the sovereignty of that country have 'bought into' the idea that nation building is required in Iraq as it is 'in fact' the central front on terror. There is no central front on terror. Iraq is on it's way to dividing into three sovereign countries with religious leadership. They don't want the central government.
It's been foretold years ago.
CIA Officers Warn of Iraq Civil War, Contradicting Bush's Optimism
by Warren P. Strobel and Jonathan S. Landay
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0122-01.htm
WASHINGTON - CIA officers in Iraq are warning that the country may be on a path to civil war, current and former U.S. officials said Wednesday, starkly contradicting the upbeat assessment that President Bush gave in his State of the Union address.
The CIA officers' bleak assessment was delivered verbally to Washington this week, said the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the classified information involved.
The warning echoed growing fears that Iraq's Shiite majority, which has until now grudgingly accepted the U.S. occupation, could turn to violence if its demands for direct elections are spurned.
Tens of thousands of Shiite Muslims protest in the streets Baghdad, Iraq. The protesters are demanding a fair election process for Iraq. (Photo/ Tom Pennington) Meanwhile, Iraq's Kurdish minority is pressing its demand for autonomy and shares of oil revenue.
"Both the Shiites and the Kurds think that now's their time," said one intelligence officer. "They think that if they don't get what they want now, they'll probably never get it. Both of them feel they've been betrayed by the United States before."
These dire scenarios were discussed at meetings this week by Bush, his top national security aides and the chief U.S. administrator in Iraq, L. Paul Bremer, said a senior administration official, who requested anonymity.
Another senior official said the concerns over a possible civil war weren't confined to the CIA but are "broadly held within the government," including by regional experts at the State Department and National Security Council.
Top officials are scrambling to save the U.S. exit strategy after concluding that Iraq's most powerful Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al Husseini al Sistani, is unlikely to drop his demand for elections for an interim assembly that would choose an interim government by June 30.
IN the year 2004, "The Lancet" stated there were 100,000 Iraqis dead in a 100 to 1 ratio of dead American soldiers. Now, in a repeat statistical survey the same prestigeous journal states there are 600,000 deaths of Iraqis, in a ratio of 215 dead Iraqis for every dead American soldier. Occupying Iraq is out of fear for the outcome of when the USA leaves. In satiating fear the USA is committing genocide against these people. We know for a fact there has been soccer fields turned into graveyards in places like Fallujah, a Sunni city that has been completely leveled. What makes you think for one minute the numbers put before us by The Lancet isn't correct?
The Grand Ayatollah al Sistani has been able to maintain his flock in Iraq in the face of the hatred of Saddam Hussein. There is absolutely nothing to fear in the teachings of this man, yet, because he is a Muslim Ayatollah the USA sees him as a threat to the potential nation building Bush has ensued. The Grand Ayatollah al Sistani is a man of peace. His flock is flourishing as a majority in Iraq as testimony to that. There is nothing to fear about this man. There is nothing to fear about a young Cleric al Sadr who has witnessed the deaths of his entire male family members at the hand of Saddam Hussein. In order for Bush to nation build he has to either 'convert' the Shi'ites into sheep to his central government or he has to kill them. The first initiative won't work. The Shi'ites will never again 'risk' their opportunity for a safe place on Earth for all of them. They won't become sheep. They don't mind voting for the chance of peace and security, but, they will never give up their 'private armies' to allow a central authority over them again. The later, whereby Bush continues to mask genocide by demonizing men like Cleric al Sadr will only come to serve the hatred of the USA and as a focus of more attacks by determined and vengeful terrorists.
1048
There needs to be no war in Iraq. There needs to be no central authority beyond what the people of Iraq find necessary. The central government are comprised of men that are primarily exiles whom speak English and understand the international community while holding clout with Bush and Cheney. The Iraqi people understand these men little nor care to. They listen to their Holy Men who do not necessarily understand or care about the dynamics in Baghdad and it's central government either. The people of Iraq and their Holy Men understand only 'one thing' and that is compliance with a government's authority allows them to stay alive. When Bush and Bremer shut down the newspaper by Cleric al Sadr it was a betrayal of a Holy Man that determined in his understanding of the world that the occupying military would eventually, if not already. become the next dictator. He had a right to that opinion and concern, yet the free expression of it was taken from him. To cement the reality that closing the newspaper was a legitmate maneuver, Bush characterized this young and inexperienced cleric who probably didn't and still doesn't speak English as a radical man whom no other Holy Man would approve of. That isn't so. The Grand Ayatollah al Sistani demanded the Iraq Central Authority to meet all of Cleric al Sadr's demands following the defeat of the USA attacks at the Imam Ali Mosque and it did. If the Grand Ayatollah, a man of peace has that degree of love and respect for Cleric al Sadr then he must be the same kind of man with the same vision of a nation completely safe for the Shi'ites.
There is no doubt the people of Iraq will be melded into a spiritual unity with Iran in time as they are all Shi'ites, but, that isn't trouble as is demonized. Iran has a large, moderate and educated "middle class" that before the invaison had many members in the Parliament. Iran was experiencing 'free expression' of it's student populations and the Prime Minister at one time paid attention to these burgeoning democratic movements.
In the last year, The Grand Ayatollah al Sistani opened schools in Iran. Why? Because Iran already has a univeristy infrastructure that can compete internationally, and Iran is safer than Iraq. Do you see where all this is going? The Grand Ayatollah wants his flock's young people educated to the standards of Iran's middle class. It's a trend I can respect and one with a great deal of promise considering the burgeoning competitive economies of Asia. There is a sophistication in Iran that will never exist in Iraq so long as there is war. The Grand Ayatollah is wasting no time to place his young people in a Shi'ite university system in Iran to bring back to Iraq an educated and sophisticated 'brain trust' that can bring legitimacy to the central govenrment or to an exclusive Shi'ite nation out of the hands of exiles and out of corruption that is rampant in Iraq's central government.
1112
The USA is in the way and the prolonged war endangers the existance of these people. Our continued presence in Iraq is an atrocity to humanity. Iraq never was and still is not a threat to the USA.
What are we doing there?
1116
CNN is turning their 'Broken Govenrment' ANGLE into a campaign for the re-election for Republicans. You don't want to go there. Believe me you don't want to go there. The focus on war is to divert the electorate from the issues of exploitation that is planned for Bush's last two years. Bush cares little about the soldiers of this country so much as the political clout they bring his party. The USA has been replaced in Afghanistan by NATO because Bush's military was too incompetent to lead to a victory over al Qaeda. Now. Bush is left to kill Iraqis to his satisfaction for his political campaigns at home regardless of the outcome of the burgeoning instabiilty that will assuredly become Iraq.
The Iraqis are not our enemy. The Shi'ites and their Holy Men are not our enemy. These people need a chance to have their nation of exclusivity and perhaps as they find peace rather than war they will find a friendship with the USA rather than seeking to end that relationship for fear of domination. Stop killing Iraqis. They have suffered enough.
We don't belong in Iraq.
We never did.
enough.
