According to a blog in the New Republic this morning, a lot of the more mainstream, or traditional, protest groups in NYC have no use for the anarchists and were encouraging police to arrest them when they got out of line.Anyway, still waiting to hear from Wow! about the virtues of crony capitalism.

Anarchists promise disruptions

Aug 30, 2004 They don't have permits to demonstrate, and they don't want them."We don't ask for permission," said John Flannigan, a member of the A31 Coalition, the anarchist group so named for the dozens of protests it has organized for today, Aug. 31.The protests are not about ousting George W. Bush or promoting John Kerry. For the organizers, today's plans of direct action and civil disobedience across the city are about challenging the nature of modern politics."We feel permits are part of the problem here," said A31 member Eric Laursen. "We're challenging a system that requires you to get a permit in order to speak your mind."Among some of the events the anarchists are planning for today are actions at the Manhattan office sites of companies that the group feels have benefited from the war, such as the Carlyle Group, Rand Corporation, Hummer and Chevron. In addition, people who want to join the group's events are invited to meet up at 4 p.m. at Union Square.Anarchists bristle at the idea of regimented authority and have been loosely banded to exchange ideas and plans, so it's unclear exactly what could happen Tuesday.In preparation for the convention, anarchists have met in coffee shops and art lofts, churches and Internet cafes for more than a year planning a spectrum of action -- everything from street theater, die-ins and teach-ins to a convergence on the Garden and disruption of RNC events.One action will remain a secret until moments before its execution. Anarchists will text message one another when the location is determined."As many people as there are in the street, there are going to be that many different kinds of civil disobedience," Flannigan said. Police officials say that, as with earlier protests, officers will not engage protesters unless they have to and do not want to create conflict where it's not necessary."We're aware of them and we have appropriate measures in place as part of the overall security plan," a police spokesman said.A police source was more blunt."If they do bad things we're going to stop them," the source said.Laursen recognizes confrontation may be inevitable. But he hopes the din of conflicts and arrests does not drown out A31's central message."This is part of building a movement," he said. "It shows people that you can take charge of your own dissent. You don't have to let a politician speak for you."

Crony capitalism is anti-competitive and exclusionary.Consider the case of the Montreal Expos. Two separate investment groups have offered to buy the team and move them to the DC area. But the exclusive club of baseball owners has been preventing the sale for a number of years to protect Peter Angelos, owner of the Orioles and one of their cronies, from competition. That's capitalism? Where's the free market?Why does a GOP-controlled government allows baseball's monopoly to continue in the first place? Especially since, in this case, Angelos is a trial lawyer and huge contributor to the Democratic Pary.

A group of people that knew how to to invest their money and turn a profit.... Arrest them, throw them in the gulag and destroy the keys immediately! Exhume the bodies of the dead Bushies and throw them in there tooooooooo. Capitalism MUST BE STOPPED!!!!!!!!

Utter three words -- George Walker Bush -- and watch eminent author Kevin Phillips, a longtime Republican, a former Nixon aide and past party theoretician, pucker like he has inhaled a pickle."I've never understood why we take Bush and his family seriously," he says. "They come from the investment-inherited-money wing of the Republican Party. They display no real empathy for anyone who is not of their class…""They aren't supply-siders; they're crony-siders...”...His best-selling, muckraking book on the family that has held the presidency for eight of the past 16 years, "American Dynasty: Aristocracy, Fortune and the Politics of Deceit in the House of Bush," is a sustained rummage through the Bush family closet. He pulls out all manner of files on the early Bushes and the Walker branch of the family, and their dealings with post-World War I German industrialists and post-World War II Saudi princelings. And he draws a bright connecting line between those wheeler-dealer financiers and their Texas-lite descendants.Phillips's bottom line is unsparing. He describes the Bushes as second-tier New England monied types who made the strategic move from Greenwich, Conn., to Midland, Tex., just as the nation's power pendulum took a southern swing. This was not a particularly daring strike into the interior. Rather, like proper Wall Street capitalists, the Bushes and many other financier families had sniffed the scent of sweet cash and sent a relative or two to investigate.http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A42831-2004Aug28.html

I believe John Kerry. I have always believed him. I believed him when he said he supported the war in Iraq, and I believe him now when he says he was really opposed to it all along. I believed him when he said he would take care of our troops regardless, and I believe him now when he says he was only showing them just how much he cares by voting to cut off their funding when the going got rough. I believed him when he said he was caught in the crossfire in Cambodia in 1968 and I believe him now, when he reportedly admits he wasn't. I believed the senator when he said every last detail of that blue Cambodian Christmas was “seared” into his brain, and I believe him now when he says he’s not quite sure if his recollection of that blessed event is solid. And I most certainly believed him when he testified before the transparently non-partisan Senate Foreign Relations Committee on April 22, 1971, swearing America made him commit horrific but strategically needful acts, like hunting down cattle and dogs for sport. I believe the senator and his fellow Vietnam Veterans Against the War were motivated by nothing but patriotism and love for their vile country. I believe the senator’s totally unsolicited television appearance on the Cavett show in April 1971 was in truth doctored, even then, by the radical right-wing Carlyle cabal, operating in concert with the Saudi royal family, the CIA, and the reactionary conservative media conglomerate, News Corp. I believe in a secret, subterranean, centralized corporate authority. I believe in the Kerry standard of adherence to the First Amendment, enunciated by the senator in his formal complaint to the FCC accusing the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth and the Bush campaign of illegally conspiring to discredit him--a standard which holds that censorship is okay so long as it acts to suppress speech in instances where there exists "overwhelming evidence [of] coordination with the Bush campaign." I note with appreciation the senator’s use of the word “overwhelming.” I believe the senator when he says there is no evidence of any similar coordination between his own campaign and MoveOn.org. I believe the senator when he says Bush’s attorney, Benjamin Ginsberg, is clearly in bed with special interests, and I believe him when he says his own lawyer, Joe Sandler, clearly is not. I believe counselors like Ginsberg who represent campaigns, parties, and soft groups simultaneously are all acting illegally, even though the law and the FEC declare they aren’t. I agree with the senator that all lawyers working in conjunction with the Bush reelection team and the SBVT are automatically suspect, and I agree with him, too, that counselors representing the DNC and their sludge funds are by default not even remotely fishy. I believe the senator has the right to criticize his country, just as I believe VVAW had the right to criticize it, too. And I believe the senator now has the right to force John O’Neill to abrogate his right to criticize the senator, just as I believe the SBVT should be forced to abrogate its right to criticize the senator, too. I believe those sixty-some-odd veterans who signed affidavits are all lying, just as I believe the senator and his massive army of eight are the only ones telling the truth. I believe the senator is being sincere when he lauds Michael Moore, whom he thinks should never be censored, and I believe he’s being sincere, too, when he denounces Paul Galanti, whom he thinks must be. I believe the senator is being sincere when he condemns as illicit the $17 million in 527 and 501 soft money the Bush campaign has raised thus far, and I believe he’s being sincere when he condones the $186 million his own campaign has to date accumulated by these same unquestionably above-board means. I believe the senator when he says he favors a strong national defense, and I believe he was in fact actively strengthening our nation’s defenses throughout the 1990s by systematically hacking military and intelligence budgets to bits, and by voting to slay every single major weapons system that ever dared lumber across the Senate floor. I see nothing suspicious in the report that the senator was awarded the Purple Heart for sustaining mortal scratches etched by whizzing bullets on December 2, 1968, even though he wrote in his journal a full nine days later, on December 11, that he and his crew in the Viet Cong had not yet “been shot at.” I believe the Purple Heart was similarly bestowed upon every rice-paddy warrior, who, like John Forbes Kerry, suffered self-inflicted, practically lethal nicks, cuts, and bruises, and I believe, too, that the Bronze Star and other medals of valor are routinely granted for knee scrapes. I believe the terror threat was first invented and then exaggerated by the Cheney administration in order to build a pipeline in Afghanistan and seize Iraq’s vast oil reserves on behalf of Hallow-burton. I believe George W. Bush is personally responsible for every single plight the world has known since 9/11 and for every single individual grievance, too. I believe Michael Moore, Al Gore, Howard Dean, Paul Krugman, Jim Hightower, Jeff Rense and Janet Jackson are all part of a vast left-wing anti-conspiracy truth squad called Bush-Busters. Especially Janet Jackson.

You say you want a revolutionWell you knowWe all want to change the worldYou tell me that it’s evolutionWell you knowWe all want to change the worldBut when you talk about destructionDon’t you know you can count me outDon’t you know it’s gonna be alrightAlright alright

Hey Franklin,

FUCK YOU!

You just attempted to rationalize the apparent violence to be perpetrated by you and your “Peace Movement” cohorts. You suck. If there is any loss of property and (God forbid) loss of life, I hope it is 100% visited upon your side and not some innocent cop doing his job or an innocent store owner trying to do his. You sicken me. You sicken most Americans.

dear "sweet irony"please post original stuff - for others' stuff, just provide the linkcraig - i'll be waiting with my own eggslet's not forget President Kennedy (who was Elected president as were most) who said "those who make peaceful revolutions impossible make violent revolutions inevitable"any destruction of property should be blamed on Bloomberg who has done everything possible to make peaceful dissent difficultand while two wrongs do NOT make a right, let's not forget the violence and destruction for which multi nationals are responsible - as well as this current government

A good point. You almost get the feeling that the GOP is there just to provoke a reaction that they can exploit. Hopefully no one will be so stupid as to incite or engage in violence or destruction of property, and will make their political point without using idiotic extremist rhetoric that discredits the broad opposition to Bush.

What is Blowback? Just wait and see come November.....AT the corner of 10th Street and Second Avenue, an angry New Yorker was haranguing passers-by about “1,000 body bags coming home from Iraq”. In a park nearby another man, inexplicably attired in a red minidress, handed out invitations to a “war crimes tribunal” where President George W Bush would be “judged by the American people”. Both men later appeared in St Mark’s church where more than 150 radical political activists had gathered last week to compare notes on a packed agenda of marches, rallies and protests timed to coincide with Bush’s arrival in Manhattan for next week’s Republican convention. There is a hint of revolution in the streets of New York, but the organisers of what may be one of the biggest anti-government demonstrations in America since the 1960s are wrestling with a dilemma. They may end up helping Bush rather than hurting him. Far from embracing the rebellion against Republican rule, Democratic officials are keeping their distance from a potentially explosive grassroots upheaval that may prove to be dangerously counterproductive for Senator John Kerry, the Democratic challenger, whose lead in the opinion polls has begun to melt away after a series of attacks on his Vietnam war record. Some of Kerry’s aides and many of his supporters fear that scenes of radical mayhem in New York will alienate moderate swing voters who may associate any extremist turmoil with the Democrat campaign. “The Republicans will do all they can to make the street protesters look like the disruptive, concealed and explosive heart of the Democratic party,” warned Norman Mailer, the writer who is one of New York’s best-known liberals. At St Mark’s last week, activists emphasised their commitment to non-violent protest. One anarchist group will hold a tea party outside the mayor’s mansion; other events include a “Books not Bombs youth convergence”, a “hip-hop protest and party” and a public reading of the American constitution. The centrepiece of a “week of resistance” will be a march on Madison Square Garden, where Bush will deliver a closing address after four days of Republican celebration. Organisers expect at least 250,000 people to march and newspapers have given dire accounts of potential anarchist disruption. One leaked police document warned that protest tactics might include fire bombs, acid throwing and attacks with nail-studded potatoes. A sense of looming confrontation was heightened when the New York Police Department unveiled its latest riot control gadgets, including helicopters with “night sun” lights to illuminate streets at night, bulletproof personnel carriers and a “mega megaphone” that can broadcast across several city blocks. At the back of many Democrat minds are memories of their party’s 1968 convention in Chicago, when rioting against the Vietnam war was widely seen as having damaged the campaign of Hubert Humphrey, the party’s presidential nominee who crashed to defeat against Richard Nixon. Most protests next week will focus on a different war — in Iraq — but to the chagrin of increasing numbers of Democrats, lingering divisions over Vietnam are continuing to dominate the presidential race. Kerry’s decision to make his Vietnam war record the centrepiece of his run for the White House has embroiled the Democratic challenger in an increasingly vicious battle over his time as the young commander of a US Navy Swift patrol boat. A bestselling book by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth (SBVT) has accused Kerry of lying about several key incidents during his service and denounced him for “betraying” fellow veterans when he turned against the war. Heavily financed by Republican sympathisers close to Bush, the group has also produced a television advertisement that appears to have provoked a sharp decline in support for Kerry among veterans. A second attacking Kerry’s post-war record was unveiled on Friday. Kerry filed a formal complaint to stop the advertisements this weekend, claiming the SBVT has been acting as a front for the Bush campaign. Despite evidence that the veterans group is politically motivated and that several members have lied or contradicted themselves, the affair has swamped the Democratic campaign. While Kerry has aggressively rebutted accusations he did not deserve his medals, he remains in trouble over an old claim that he spent Christmas 1968 under fire after being illegally ordered into Cambodia. In their book Unfit for Command, Swift Boat veterans allege Kerry never visited Cambodia. In one poll last week the “bounce” that Kerry had received from the Democratic convention last month had shrunk to a one point lead over Bush. A survey by CBS showed Kerry’s support among veterans had fallen; having been tied with Bush at 46% a month ago, he now trails by 18 points. Next week it will be Bush’s turn to bounce and many New York Democrats are painfully aware that the president may be propelled even higher should rioting erupt on the streets. “Do the activists know what they are going into?” asked Mailer in New York magazine. “Or do they assume that expressing their rage is equal to getting Kerry elected? It could have exactly the opposite effect.”

Actually, I'm pretty sure that W. was passed out drunk on the floor of his fraternity house, not scratching his ass in some barracks. Perhaps I've missed it, but has anyone -- Amnesty, HRW, even the State Dept. -- pointed out that running military operations out of a religious structure, as al-Sadr is doing, is a war crime?Sorry BIII, won't make it to NYC, but if you guys do something worthy of egg-throwing I'll just go by Franklin's house when he gets back!

This is your chance to come throw eggs and stuff at us.Party for the ProtestersWed. Sept. 1st 7PM @Siberia356 W. 40th st. at 9th ave. NYC(unmarked black door/red light) Blowback at 7:30pm - COME EARLY!!with:Shoplifting (Seattle)Kid Casanova (NYC)Shellshocked (NYC)Pretty Flowers (NYC)The Sundresses (Cincinnati)The Bamboo Kids (NYC)Shellshag (San Fran)Blowback (???)

so do we get to see any of you in NYC next week? we've got one gig lined up so far, on the 1st, but we hope that other opportunities may surface. have y'all gotten LIES yet? you simply must.

george bush been a total failure in more ways than one for our country and the people and voting populations are not being served in our best interest when we have oil puppets running the errands for the oil corporations in Washington as bush and cheney are doingand if taking all those 87 billion american dollars to Iraq and spending only a small percentage of those american tax dollars and funneling through federal contracts our tax dollars into the pockets of Texas oil corporations was the intent why are our american soldiers still dying in Iraq?And why is our country still invading and threatening Iraqi holy sites? Do bush and cheney see no end to their bloody thirsty fangs?I am sick and tired as a native Texan of watching the republican party do dishonor to the Vietnam medal holders of this Country who went to the jungles of Vietnam while george bush picked his teeth in a barrack and scratching his ass, while John Kerry lived the horrors Vietnam had to offerand this includes the torture of the vietnamese because it is known to almost all Vietnam soldier sweethearts and wives, that indeed actrocities in Vietnam by american troops was committed and I for a fact heard it from the horse's mouth when my boyfriend who went to Vietnam cried and told me about how many "ears he had cut off and how many fingers he had cut off in Vietnam"So everybody knows that what John Kerry lived and saw in Vietnam was seen by some of our own people and we know this because we cannot deny to ourselves the horror stories we heard from our loved ones coming back on leave from VietnamIt was a slaughter and the simple act of being thrown in the slaughter jungles of Vietnam was enough to give all those soldiers who fought for their lives while george bush picked his nose in some pilot barrack learning to fly, after Vietnam was overHOW CONVENIENT BUSH FOR YOU TO AVOID THE BLOODBATHS IN VIETNAM AND NOW TRY TO PREACH TO THE COUNTRY AND TO THOSE WHO WALKED IN THE JUNGLES OF VIETNAM LIKE JOHN KERRY DIDgeorge bush is a disgrace to the country and has caused more damage with his lack of sympathy for the State of New York when he could have warned about 9-11 on August 6, 2001 through a presidential memorandum pointing out specifically!THAT OSAMA BIN LADEN A BUSH BUSINESS PARTNER, WAS THREATENING TO USE "AIRCRAFT" AND "HIJACKINGS" TO COMMIT HIS CRIME AGAINST THE UNITED STATESoh but bush didnt think the warning was "specific enough"george bush is the biggest terrorist and he must not be allowed to rape our country another four years and this we will not allowENOUGH MR. BUSH OF TRYING TO DISTRACT THE COUNTRY FROM THE REAL PIT OF HELL BUSH HAS PUT US IN BY ATTACKING THE HONOR OF VETERANSAND HOW ABOUT TALKING ABOUT THE BODY BAGS BUSH HAS SENT BACK FROM IRAQ WHEN HE DID NOT SET ONE FOOT IN VIETNAM?hey bush, you want to assault the integrity of the federal military service? WELL IN WHAT WAR DID APPOINTED WIMPS FIGHT? AND WHAT EXPERIENCE DID THIS REPUBLICAN BASTARD HAVE TO SPILL SO MUCH AMERICAN BLOOD?HEY BUSH IT AINT YOUR BLOOD SO IT WAS EASY TO USE THE TROOPS WASN'T IT? AND IT WASN'T RUMSFELD'S KIDS EITHER NOR CANDOLEEZA'S? SO IT WAS EASY TO SPILL THE AMERICAN TROOP BLOOD WASN'T IT BUSH? BUT WAS ALL THIS BLOODSHED WORTH IT AFTER DESTROYING IRAQ IN ORDER TO HAVE A REASON TO RECONSTRUCT IRAQ WITH AMERICAN CORPORATIONS WHO WOULD BLEED THE BUCKS SENT TO IRAQ?hey bush, why dont we talk about what a thief you have been in this nation instead insulting the integrity of the honor of the Veterans of Vietnam who made it to tell us the truth of the slaughter jungles Vietnam became because it is true ears and fingers were cut in Vietnam and it is truth that we even tried to hide our sins of slavery so how about more respect for the veterans mr. bush? and how about telling us about your business ties with the Osama bin Laden family and how under the bush/cheney administration, Osama bin laden family members were allowed to leave the U.S.?SEE AMERICA, IT HAS BEEN A CONSTANT HABIT OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY DISTRACTING OUR COUNTRY WITH ASSAULT ON MEDAL HOLDERS OF THE VIETNAM WAR WHILE IN THE MEANTIME, IN what war did bush serve? in the bloodiest body count in America in Iraq?It is easy for a democratic government to be overtaken by dangerous political parties and this time the republican party will no longer be allowed to continue to rape America, did you get that bush? that not everybody fell for your bloody lies and we will remove corporate repubican s from office for being the crooks that they areIN WHAT WAR DID THE WIMP BUSH SERVE AND IN WHAT WAR JUNGLE DID BUSH SET FOOT ON WHEN HE WAS HIDING SUCKING ONE FINGER AND SCRATCHING HIS SORRY ASS WITH THE OTHER?

Astounding. Bushes seem to get dumber with every generation...Bush's Nephew Rips Armed Border GuardsSat Aug 21, 9:13 PM ETBy MARK STEVENSON, Associated Press WriterMEXICO CITY - President Bush (news - web sites)'s nephew, campaigning for overseas votes in Mexico on Saturday, called the federal policy of arming U.S. Border Patrol agents with plastic pellet guns "reprehensible."Speaking in a mix of English and sometimes-halting Spanish, George P. Bush said his uncle was not to blame for the gun policy…http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=589&ncid=734&e=4&u=/ap/20040822/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/bush_nephew_mexico

That was partly my reaction as well. I don't see how they could object to the ad -- if not for the invasion, they wouldn't be at the Olympics. But I don't blame them at all for being pissed about Bush taking credit for their success on the campaign trail. I'd also be pissed that the US put in charge the same guy who was Uday's right hand.Of course, if I were from Najaf or Fallujah, and had family residing there, I doubt that I'd say anything good about Bush, even if I felt that way. Too dangerous.I don't see that the direction of the Democratic Party that you're decrying has anything to do with it.

Nice. If Bush had not intervened, these schmucks would still be getting tortured by Saddam's son. And if they loose get killed for it.Ungrateful Assholes!I am a life-long Democrat (albeit a conservative one) and DISPISE where party leaders such as Kerry, Kennedy, Daschele, Pelosi and others have taken it. I have seen and heard Senator Zell Miller speak and have read his exceptional book "No Longer A National Party", and stand in line with him, Ed Koch and many other Dems who will be supporting George W. Bush this Fall. BTW, I went so far as to write in Senator Miller in the Ohio Presidential Primary some months ago. I will miss his leadership in Congress.

Unwilling participantsIraqi soccer players angered by Bush campaign ads featuring teamhttp://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2004/olympics/2004/writers/08/19/iraq/index.html

NYC to GOP: Drop Dead! Tourists are pleasantly surprised when New Yorkers act as friendly and polite as the people back home in Maybury. However, delegates to this month's Republican National Convention shouldn't expect to be treated to our standard out-of-towner treatment. The Republican delegates here to coronate George W. Bush are unwelcome members of a hostile invading army. Like the hapless saps whose blood they sent to be spilled into Middle Eastern sands, they will be given intentionally incorrect directions to nonexistent places. Objects will be thrown in their direction. Children will call them obscene names. They will not be greeted as liberators. Well aware that it is barren soil for their party's anti-urban, anti-immigrant, anti-feminist, overtly racist ideology, Republican leaders have wisely avoided New York City as a convention site for the past 150 years. Even as the rest of America turns red, we New Yorkers remain as liberal as the people's republic of San Francisco: fewer than 18 percent of the citizens of New York's five boroughs (which include relatively conservative places like Staten Island) cast ballots for Bush/Cheney in 2000. But White House strategist Karl Rove sees the continued exploitation of 9/11 for partisan political gain as Bush's key to victory in November. That means bringing the big bash three miles north of the hole where the Twin Towers used to stand, where most of the victims of 9/11 were burned, suffocated, impaled and pulverized. Making hay of the dead is also the point of this confab's timing. The 2004 Necropublican National Convention is being held a full month later than normal, from August 30 to September 2. The original plan was to have Bush shuttle between Madison Square Garden and Ground Zero for photo ops to coincide with the third anniversary of the September 11th attacks. Bush's visits to the Trade Center site were quietly canceled a few months back after 9/11 survivors expressed revulsion at the idea. But it was too late to change the date. Anti-Republican sentiment is rising to a fever pitch here as the dog days tick down to the dreaded affair. A poll cited by the local ABC affiliate shows 83 percent of New Yorkers don't want their city to host the RNC. And many of them are planning to do something about it. Rejecting ex-mayor Ed Koch's call to "make nice" with the party that used the deaths of 2,801 New Yorkers--most of them Democrats--for everything from tax cuts for the rich to building concentration camps at Guantánamo and Abu Ghraib to invading Iraq to enrich Dick Cheney and his fellow Halliburton execs, some groups are encouraging liberal-minded New Yorkers to volunteer for the city's squad of official greeters. Creatively altered maps of streets and subways will be handed out to button-clad stupid white men. Other saboteurs wearing fake RNC T-shirts will direct them to parts of town where Bush's policies have hit hardest. Rumor has it that prostitutes suffering from sexually transmitted diseases will discourage the use of condoms with Republican customers. Anywhere between 250,000 and 1,000,000 anti-Bush demonstrators are expected to hit the streets of Manhattan, but the city and protest organizers can't agree on where to put them. Activists say they'll direct marchers to Central Park, their preferred site; city officials are threatening mass arrests if they do. Adding to the already combustible Chicago '68 vibe is a possible wildcat strike by city cops and firefighters. And now, as if everyone concerned wasn't already tweaky, FBI agents are traveling around the United States, to harass members of leftist groups planning to protest the New York RNC. Strikebreaking policemen and private security personnel may be able to keep the protesters away from the convention hall. But Republicans who venture outside the Garden deserve the abuse ordinary New Yorkers will likely inflict upon them. True, the Administration eventually coughed up the $20 billion aid package Bush promised the city after 9/11. But that sum--equal to the cost of occupying Iraq for four months--barely made up for such disaster-related expenses as police overtime, debris removal and rebuilding damaged subway stations and tunnels. New York's economy hasn't even begun to recover. As the nation's official unemployment rate hovers at six percent, the city's runs around eight. Mayor Michael Bloomberg, a Republican, opposes virtually every Bush Administration decision concerning New York City. Even viler than Bush's urban neglect is his failure to avenge the World Trade Center victims as he pledged to do on 9/14, dusty firefighter helpfully posing under his arm on The Pile. After 9/11, Al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden were in Pakistan. They and the Taliban received funding from Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. The 19 hijackers, organized by Egyptian Islamic Jihad, were Egyptian and Saudi. But Bush didn't attack Pakistan, Saudi Arabia or Egypt. He went after Afghanistan and Iraq instead, nations that had nothing to do with 9/11 but offered business opportunities for GOP-connected oil concerns. Incredibly, he siphoned more money and arms to the Egyptians, Saudis and Pakistanis. Not only did Bush let the terrorists get away, he raised their allowance. If today's GOP retained a shred of the dignity and patriotism that it once possessed as the Party of Lincoln, it would have dumped Bush in favor of a candidate more interested in defending America than his wealthy contributors. Republicans are neofascists now, and that's why New Yorkers good and true will be yelling at them to go back home.

Shut It Down – New York City 1 September 2004 The nation and entire world will be watching NYC during the Republican National Convention. With that many eyes on us it is imperative New Yorkers send a loud message-- one that strongly challenges the current Administration’s policies and shows the Republican Party that we have had enough. Enough intolerance. Enough failed leadership. Enough false promises. And enough exploitation of our city for political gain. Tom DeLay wants to go to the theaterBroadway Shows --- SHUT IT DOWN ! Lynne Cheney needs a new cocktail dressShopping --- SHUT IT DOWN ! James Inhofe likes four star diningRestaurants --- SHUT IT DOWN ! Marilyn Musgrave enjoys ordering room serviceHotels --- SHUT IT DOWN ! The most significant impact we can have as New Yorkers during the convention is simply not showing up. September 1st is the perfect opportunity for New Yorkers who work in the city's service industries to call in sick. Actors, musicians, waiters and waitresses, retail salespeople, hotel staff --- we know who keeps this city running, at least as far as the visitors are concerned. We have the power to SHUT IT DOWN. But the sacrifice should be shared and we are challenging all New Yorkers who want to send the Republicans a strong message, to SHUT IT DOWN and call in sick to work on September 1st – the day before Bush’s acceptance speech. There should be the maximum number of conventioneers in town, looking to see a show, go to dinner or shop that day. We can make it difficult if we SHUT IT DOWN. Don't Bring Your Hate To Our Doorstep and Expect a Welcome Mathttp://www.shutitdownnyc.com/MainPage.htm

Typical FBI BS, going all the way back to the Manhattan Project, when they were wasting their time observing Szilard's every movement while Fuchs was walking out the front door with the goods.

FBI Tracks Potential GOP Protestershttp://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040816/ap_on_el_pr/gop_convention_security"...activists fear a repeat of the last Republican convention, in Philadelphia, where authorities were accused of rounding up protesters on trumped-up charges before they could take to the streets. Police raided a warehouse and seized puppets that protesters planned to use as props, and arrested an organizer on misdemeanor charges and held on $1 million bail before his case was dropped. ""The intelligence unit of the New York Police Department has been watching Web sites run by self-described anarchists. It also has sent young, scruffy-looking officers posing as activists to protest-organizing meetings, said one high-ranking law enforcement source, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

I wonder if anyone checked with Michael Powell and the other commissars at the FCC about Kid Rock. Maybe Howard Stern can play a few of his songs and see what they do.Jessica Simpson, of course, if part of that very small minority of Americans who are even dumber than W!I guess it could be worse. They could parade out that slut Britany Spears. Nice to see the values crowd hasn't lost its sense of irony or hypocrisy.

Yo Kid fuckin' Rock fuckin' rules dude and he's down with the president, so fuck you fuckin' fucks W's gonna fuckin' bitch slap Kerry with some fat cock in November.check this out:http://www.observer.com/pages/world.aspRock for W.Recently Mark McKinnon, the media director for the Bush campaign, in response to the news that Bruce Springsteen and other rock musicians would be touring to raise money for Democrats, told The New York Times that George W. Bush had his own supporters in the entertainment world. Mr. McKinnon cited in particular Lee Ann Womack, Kid Rock and Jessica Simpson.As a service to readers who may not be familiar with Kid Rock, the following are excerpts from his lyrics:from "Classic Rock":Well guess who’s back, with a big fat cockIt’s the kid motherfucker with the classic rockLike wax that booty, yodeleyeho, punkSlappin you hoes with dick when I get drunk.From Alabama to Texarkana Bend over bitch and let me slam her …. Playin shows, fuckin hoesGot the dope in my veins and up my nose.from "WCSR":Kid Rock motherfucker yo I ain’t no fagI fuck bitches dry I fuck em on the ragTag their toes—check em off my listHoes get fucked—they don’t get kissed.from "Fuck Off":So blow me bitch I don’t rock for cancerI rock for the cash and the topless dancers …. from "Welcome to the Party":’Cause I’m a player that you love to hateGot your girl suckin dick on videotapeI like pussy, suckin on tittiesFucked a lot of different bitches from a bunch of different cities.Kid Rock and I’m the same old foolI’ll tell ya drop your boyfriend then drop outta high schoolI got a whirlpool, don’t even askLickin pussy underwater shootin bubbles up your ass.from "Fuck U Blind":I’ll fuck u blind bitch I’ll fuck u blind bitchI’ll fuck u blind till you just can’t see no moreI’ll fuck u blind bitch I’ll fuck u blind bitchI’ll fuck u blind till you just can’t see no morefrom "Pimp of the Nation"Pimp of the nation, I could be itAs a matter of a fact, I foresee itBut only pimpin hoes with the big tush—While you be left pimpin Barbara Bush.

August 17, 2004

Interrogating the Protesters

For several weeks, starting before the Democratic convention, F.B.I. officers have been questioning potential political demonstrators, and their friends and families, about their plans to protest at the two national conventions. These heavy-handed inquiries are intimidating, and they threaten to chill freedom of expression. They also appear to be a spectacularly poor use of limited law-enforcement resources. The F.B.I. should redirect its efforts to focus more directly on real threats.Six investigators recently descended on Sarah Bardwell, a 21-year-old intern with a Denver antiwar group, who quite reasonably took away the message that the government was watching her closely. In Missouri, three men in their early 20's said they had been followed by federal investigators for days, then subpoenaed to appear before a grand jury. They ended up canceling their plans to show up for the Democratic and Republican conventions.The F.B.I. is going forward with the blessing of the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel - the same outfit that recently approved the use of torture against terrorism suspects. In the Justice Department's opinion, the chilling effect of the investigations is "quite minimal," and "substantially outweighed by the public interest in maintaining safety and order." But this analysis gets the balance wrong. When protesters are made to feel like criminal suspects, the chilling effect is potentially quite serious. And the chances of gaining any information that would be useful in stopping violence are quite small. The knock on the door from government investigators asking about political activities is the stuff of totalitarian regimes. It is intimidating to be visited by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, particularly by investigators who warn that withholding information about anyone with plans to create a disruption is a crime.And few people would want the F.B.I. to cross-examine their friends and family about them. If engaging in constitutionally protected speech means subjecting yourself to this kind of government monitoring, many Americans may decide - as the men from Missouri did - that the cost is too high.Meanwhile, history suggests that the way to find out what potentially violent protesters are planning is not to send F.B.I. officers bearing questionnaires to the doorsteps of potential demonstrators. As became clear in the 1960's, F.B.I. monitoring of youthful dissenters is notoriously unreliable. The files that were created in the past often proved to be laughably inaccurate. The F.B.I.'s questioning of protesters is part of a larger campaign against political dissent that has increased sharply since the start of the war on terror.At the Democratic convention, protesters were sent to a depressing barbed-wire camp under the subway tracks. And at a recent Bush-Cheney campaign event, audience members were required to sign a pledge to support President Bush before they were admitted.F.B.I. officials insist that the people they interview are free to "close the door in our faces," but by then the damage may already have been done. The government must not be allowed to turn a war against foreign enemies into a campaign against critics at home.

Is this the main reason you mutts want john f. kerry for President?:The former Mrs. John Heinz is in bed – financially – with the radical Left.Teresa Heinz Kerry has financed the secretive Tides Foundation to the tune of more than $4 million over the years. The Tides Foundation, a “charity” established in 1976 by antiwar leftist activist Drummond Pike, distributes millions of dollars in grants every year to political organizations advocating far-Left causes. The Tides Foundation and its closely allied Tides Center, which was spun off from the Foundation in 1996 but run by Drummond Pike, distributed nearly $66 million in grants in 2002 alone. In all, Tides has distributed more than $300 million for the Left. These funds went to rabid antiwar demonstrators, anti-trade demonstrators, domestic Islamist organizations, pro-terrorists legal groups, environmentalists, abortion partisans, extremist homosexual activists and open borders advocates.During the years 1995-2001, the Howard Heinz Endowment, which Heinz Kerry chairs, gave Tides more than $4.3 million. The combined Heinz Endowments (composed of the Howard Heinz Endowment and the Vira I. Heinz Endowment) donated $1.6 million to establish the Tides Center for Western Pennsylvania, a Pittsburgh office of the San Francisco-based Tides Center. Since that time, the local branch has tirelessly pushed an anti-business agenda in the name of “preserving the environment.” However, it is the Tides Foundation’s national organization whose connections are most disconcerting. The Tides Foundation is a major source of revenue for some of the most extreme groups on the Left. Tides allows donors to anonymously contribute money to a host of causes; the donor simply makes the check out to Tides and instructs the Foundation where to forward the money. Tides does so, for a nominal fee. Drummond Pike told The Chronicle of Philanthropy, “Anonymity is very important to most of the people we work with.” That becomes understandable when one views the list of Tides grant recipients. And who are the beneficiaries of this money? The Antiwar Movement Senator John F. Kerry has gone far with his nuanced view of Operation Iraqi Freedom. He voted for the war resolution but specified a litany of conditions the Bush administration must meet before he would support combat, then proceeded to vote against funding troops already in harm’s way – then claimed he had always supported the president when Saddam Hussein was captured. The grant recipients of the Tides Foundation, to which Kerry’s wife has steered more than $4 billion in “charitable” funds, understand no such nuance. Tides established the Iraq Peace Fund and the Peace Strategies Fund to fund the antiwar movement. These projects fueled such hysterical protest organizations as MoveOn.org, the website that recently featured two separate commercials portraying George W. Bush as Adolf Hitler. (Howard Dean, not Kerry, won MoveOn.org’s “virtual primary.”) The antiwar movement often boasted that MoveOn.org and the radical website Indymedia provided them “alternate media coverage.” Indymedia, an enormous news and events bulletin board with local pages in most of the world’s major cities, provided a vital link for radical activists often with violent agendas to coordinate their protests. Indymedia received $376,000 from the Tides Foundation. The Institute for Global Communications is another leftist communications facilitator that received Tides grant money. IGC, which during the 1990s was the leading provider of web technology to the radical Left, links to “recommended sites” such as the War Resisters League (a group whose purpose is enabling peaceniks to refuse to pay taxes) and the leftist American Friends Service Committee. Most disturbing is the link to Ramsey Clark’s International Action Center, which has supported Slobodan Milosevic and North Korean strongman Kim Jong-Il. The IAC is the force behind International ANSWER, which sponsored the major antiwar (and anti-Bush) rallies before the invasion of Iraq. When ANSWER was outed as a Communist organization, United for Peace and Justice, headed by longtime Communist Party member Leslie Cagan was created as a "moderate" alternative. UFPJ is also a Tides grant recipient.The Tides-funded “A Better Way Project,” which opposed war in Iraq, also coordinated efforts of United for Peace and Justice and the Win Without War Coalition. The celebrity-laden Win Without War Coalition, along with the Bill Moyers-funded Florence and John Schumann Foundation, ran full-page ads in the New York Times opposing the War on Terrorism. This will not be the last overlapping of far-Left causes. The Islamist Front Immediately after 9/11, Tides formed a “9/11 Fund” to advocate a “peaceful national response” to the opening salvos of war. Part of the half-million dollars in grants the 9/11 Fund dispersed went to the New York Gay and Lesbian Anti-Violence Project to protect the rights of homosexual Arabs. The Foundation replaced the 9/11 Fund with the “Democratic Justice Fund,” which was established with the aid of George Soros’ Open Society Institute. (Currency speculator and pro-drug advocate Soros is, like Teresa Heinz Kerry, a major contributor to Tides, having donated more than $7 million.) The Democratic Justice Fund seeks to ease restrictions on Muslim immigration to the United States, particularly from countries designated by the State Department as “terrorist nations.” Tides has also given grant money to the Council for American Islamic Relations. Ostensibly a “Muslim civil rights group,” CAIR is in fact one of the leading anti-anti-terrorism organizations within the Wahhabi Lobby, with links to Hamas. CAIR regularly opposes and demonizes American efforts to fight terrorism, claiming, for instance, that Homeland Security measures are responsible for an undocumented surge in “hate crimes.” CAIR officials have reason to fight Bush’s anti-terrorism measures: all too many CAIR officials are on the record supporting terrorism. CAIR Executive Director Nihad Awad openly stated in 1994, “I am a supporter of the Hamas movement.” Community Affairs Director Bassem K. Khafagi has been arrested for visa and bank fraud. Randall Royer, a Communications Specialist and Civil Rights Coordinator at CAIR, was arrested along with a group of Islamic radicals in Virginia for allegedly planning jihad. CAIR has defended terrorist “charities” shut down by the Bush administration. Every few months some CAIR campus official is arrested for aiding and abetting terrorism. The Legal Matrix The Tides Foundation has funded a number of the pillars of the radical legal establishment. Chief among these is the National Lawyers Guild, which began as a Commnist front organization and is proud of its lineage. At its recent convention last October, the concluding speaker was Lynne Stewart, an indicted terrorist NLG lawyer arrested for helping her client – convicted 1993 World Trade Center bombing mastermind Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman – communicate with his terrorist cells in Egypt. In her speech, Stewart said she and her NLG comrades were carrying on a proud tradition of their forebears, past and present: And modern heroes, dare I mention? Ho and Mao and Lenin, Fidel and Nelson Mandela and John Brown, Che Guevara who reminds us, “At the risk of seeming ridiculous, let me say that the true revolutionary is guided by a great feeling of love.” Our quests like theirs are to shake the very foundations of the continents.More recently, the NLG has endorsed the March 20 call to End Colonial Occupation from Iraq to Palestine & Everywhere” organized by International ANSWER, and has posted a petition for “Post-Conviction Relief” for convicted cop-killer Mumia Abu-Jamal. Tides’ Peace Strategies Fund has funneled money to the Center for Constitutional Rights. The CCR was stablished by Sixties radical William Kunstler, defender of the Chicago 8, and Arthur Kinoy. The two also had plans to establish a new Communist Party. Executive Director Ron Daniels has been honored by the Communist Party USA for his work. Daniels also has a long and cordial relationship with racist, anti-Semitic “poet laureate” Amiri Baraka. Since 9/11, CCR has channeled its efforts into fighting every effective Homeland Security measure. They have opposed increasing the government’s ability to wiretap Islamists suspected of plotting terrorism and moaned the sequestering of terrorist detainees at Guantanamo Bay was an unexcusable form of “racial profiling.” CCR President Michael Ratner has portrayed American soldiers as the offenders, guilty of 9/11 by their Middle East policy and guilty of keeping Islamist killers “shackled, hooded and sedated during the 25 hour flight from Afghanistan.” CCR has also defended Lynne Stewart’s “innocence” in aiding Sheikh Rahman’s Islamic Jihad. Tides also funds the Alliance for Justice, a group dedicated to stopping Bush judicial appointees (a cause John Kerry can agree wholeheartedly endorse). Other Tides grants have gone to the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights and the Asian Law Caucus. Environmental Extremism The Tides Foundation has funded the Ruckus Society, a group of anarchist Greens who rioted and looted Seattle during the 1999 World Trade Organization riots. The Tides Center of Western Pennsylvania, established in Pittsburgh with Heinz Family funds, advocates for environmentalist measures that have helped put holes in the Rust Belt’s economy. Tides money has also squashed free speech. Thanks to complaints generated by the Tides-funded Environmental Working Group, ABC cancelled a John Stossel piece exposing the misleading nature of environmental advocacy in public elementary schools. Greenpeace is a well-known Tides grant recipient. Greenpeace is best known for its illegal actions, endangering humans in order to make a point about the environment. Tides gave Greenpeace a quarter of a million dollars over ten years. Lest one think only Tides’ money is going to radicals, not funds directly controlled by Teresa Heinz Kerry, remember that Heinz money has repeatedly found its way to the Earth Island Institute. On September 14, 2001, the Institute’s website bore the headline “U.S. Responds to Terrorist Attacks with Self-Righteous Arrogance.” Heinz family philanthropic funds have also had some dubious effects on the presidential race. The League of Conservation Voters has recently endorsed John Kerry’s presidential campaign. The Heinz Family Foundation gave LCV at least $20,000 and donated almost $250,000 to a member of the LCV board. Perhaps this circular rotation of cash and endorsements should not surprise anyone. The grant-making institutions of the Left and their feverish recipients ultimately form an amorphous, leftist entity. One never needs to search very far to find connections between a leftist foundation and extreme advocacy groups. Teresa Heinz Kerry, George Soros, Bill Moyers and the Ford Foundation fund the Tides Foundation/Center; Tides funds the National Lawyers Guild, CAIR, MoveOn.org and United for Peace and Justice; those organizations then unite in fluid coalitions to protest against their common political enemies (Republicans). Ultimately, their representatives end up on Bill Moyers' PBS programs or active within the Democratic campaigns of their fundraisers. Between now and the election, these organizations will run constant interference for the Democratic presidential nominee (presumably Kerry himself): they will march en masse against the Bush administration again and again; they will file more lawsuits against the administration's Homeland Security measures, decry any effective response to terrorism, claim the United States is guilty of slaughtering Iraqi civilians and petition leftist judges to open America's borders to Islamist terrorists. After they help his election, President Kerry will be indebted to them. And then they will insist he begin implementing their political agenda. Moreover, they will have a close ally in the East Wing of the White House, an ally more intimately tied to them than she is to her (second) husband. (She only adopted his last name and political party registration less than 18 months ago. “Politically, it's going to be Heinz Kerry,” she recently said. “But I don't give a sh-t, you know?”) Teresa Heinz Kerry will play a potent role in saving her second husband’s presidential campaign now – as Hillary Clinton did in 1992, and again during her husband’s impeachment. Like Hillary, in return for her service, Heinz may demand a place at the table for her pet causes. Caveat emptor.

The problem with your argument, dumb ass, is that Michael Moore really said that. Tom Ridge didn’t.

Deleted by author 08-15-2004 11:05 PM

"...There are terrorists under my bed. There ARE terrorists under my bed..."

"...There is no terrorist threat. There is NO terrorist threat..."

Justice Disputes Key Terror Case Evidence By SARAH KARUSH and JOHN SOLOMON, Associated Press Writers A man shown in a videotape of landmarks in New York, Las Vegas and California has told investigators the tape was an amateur film and not surveillance as prosecutors portrayed at the trial of four suspected terrorists last year, Justice Department officials and lawyers said Wednesday night. James Thomas, a lawyer for one of the Detroit defendants, said the new witness testimony undercuts one of the key pieces of evidence used against his clients. "It was an amateurish video taken by school kids," Thomas said. http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040812/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/terror_trial&cid=542&ncid=716

And yet another reason to Vote Nader:Thank you, John Kerry, for helping make us Vietnam veterans war heroes now, but you also were the primary reason that the American public grabbed sturdy unbending brooms of judgment and swept us into the closet of silence and shame for so many years. Now, with your latest unreported insanity, you are getting ready for our society to grab those same stiff brooms and sweep our brave, noble young men and women fighting against the War on Terror in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere, into that cold, dark cell of heartbreak and betrayal, like we Vietnam veterans had to endure in silent dignity. I cannot and will not watch this country go through that again.The hardcore America-hating, Israel-hating, jihad-spouting Muslim clerics in the mideast are very excited and passing around a front page newspaper story from the very anti-American TEHRAN TIMES in Iran. In the country that is home of the world’s toughest theocratic dictatorship, an e-mail from Democratic Presidential nominee, you, John Forbes Kerry, sent to the paper by your campaign committee, although they deny sending it, was printed word-for-word on the front page of Iran’s main newspaper. Your message states emphatically that, if elected President, you, John Kerry plan to travel to the mideast and elsewhere and apologize for our actions and the actions of President Bush in the War on Terror. You are already apologizing. It says that you plan to apologize to friends and foes alike. That is right, folks. John Kerry will say he is “sorry,” and in his mind, all those jihad extremists, who have vowed to kill all Americans wherever we are, will simply forgive us, hold hands with Kerry, start singing “Kumbaya,” and all will be right in the world. This is insane! You have also made statements you will do these actions within 100 days of becoming President.Senior writer Kenneth R. Timmerman in the March 1st edition of INSIGHT, tells about the massive campaign contributions to the Kerry-for-President campaign by three Iranian businessmen living in the US, who are lobbying for the US lifting of sanctions on Iran and accepting the anti-Christian, anti-Jewish, anti-American Tehran regime and the close ties of one to the chairman of Mobil Oil. “Pro-democracy dissidents” in Iran are shocked and appalled at your remarks, and have reported that in Iran and other Mideastern countries, that all the extremists and anti-west mullahs who strongly supported the attacks on the World Trade Center, Pentagon, USS Cole, Marine Barracks, and anyplace Americans congregate, want you to become our President, but they are scared to death of George W. Bush. Just think, The Democratic candidate for President, you, John Forbes Kerry, is endorsed by the Al Q’Aida, Hezbollah, PLF, and Hamas.But on February 27, 2004, in a speech at UCLA , you, while trying to talk tough, despite voting against all major weapons systems for the past 18 years, stated that you will continue the War on Terror, but would use our police forces, and especially those in foreign countries, and you would also put our troops back under the powder blue flag of the United Nations. You recently made comments about Bush making troops fight without Kevlar vests, but you, Senator Kerry, voted against buying them while you were in the Senate. Senate Bill 1689. Passed 87-12. You were one of the 12. Remember? Like the Kama Sutra, Senator, you change positions constantly. You’re not going to end the War on Terror, but instead use police to handcuff terrorists and read them their rights; then a week later, you are going to end the War on Terrorism and apologize to everyone we have offended, such as Iran. What is it going be next week, John Kerry? You flip-flop more than a beached tuna on steroids. You convinced TV reporters Chris Wallace on Fox and NBC’s Tim Russert that a photograph circulating the web and news showing you a few rows away from Jane Fonda at a September, 1970 Anti-War Rally at Valley Forge, was simply a coincidence and that you and Hanoi Jane barely knew each other. But, in fact, Senator, there were only 8 speakers that day, including Fonda, Donald Southerland, and Bella Abzug, and Hanoi Jane funded that rally, and the keynote speaker was you, John Forbes Kerry, executive committee member of Vietnam Veterans Against the War.We must be Americans first, and think about our political parties after that. Sometimes we lose sight of that. I have six grown children and two are democrats. I voted for Jimmy Carter. This is not about politics. It is about standing up to the ultimate playground bully, and not simply cowering and kissing his shoes.I left it “all on the field” in the jungles back there when I was medevaced out of Vietnam in March of 1969 and sent back to hospitals in “The World.” Although You, Mr. Kerry, painted all of us Vietnam veterans with the yellow brush of My Lai, most of us, draftees and lifers alike, actually poured our hearts out in the tropical rain forests and in the rice paddies, thoroughly gave it our all, and acted as warriors who had honor. I have a son earning his green beret at Fort Bragg right now and a daughter-in-law who was on orders for Iraq but is making me a grandpa again. I am not going to stand by and watch them go through the same treatment we did, because some of our well-meaning fellow Americans choose to wear blinders and believe things just because they heard it on the network news or simply not care enough to get involved.I am not a “baby-killer, torturer, or murderer,” John Kerry. I am a Vietnam veteran and an American who will not soon forget, or ever want to see again, any more jets loaded with fuel and screaming, innocent Americans slamming into our buildings on our very own soil. I have shed enough tears for ten lifetimes. We all have. I will never again let my fellow countrymen get away with making American veterans feel like bastard step-children. Santayana said, “Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”John Kerry, I now call on my “Band of Brothers,” those who have heard the sound of guns and cries of orphaned children, those who hate war more than anyone who has not been there, to join me in this difficult battle ahead. Republicans, democrats, independents, and the apolitical, I call on the 25,000,000 veterans of this country to help me confront this evil facing our great nation, not with guns and bombs, but with our voices, our votes, our computers, and with all our fighting spirit. My fellow veterans, your families, survivors, and neighbors: God bless you and God bless America. You want proof of all I have to say. Here are the references:http://michnews.com/artman/publish/article_2889.shtmlhttp://www.chronwatch.com/content/contentDisplay.asp?aid=6246http://www.iranvajahan.net/cgi-bin/news.pl?l=en&y=2004&m=03&d=01&a=12http://www.washingtontimes.com/op-ed/20040229-105340-2864r.htmhttp://johnkerry.com/pressroom/speeches/spc_2004_0227.htmlhttp://nyyrc.blogspot.com/http://www.daneshjoo.org/article/publish/article_3130.shtml Want more proof? Read the very exposing February 27, 2004 article, on page 8, of the NY Sun by Thomas Lipscomb, founder of Time Books and publisher of Admiral Elmo Zumwalt’s best-selling book. “ON WATCH ”. Also read what the man who pinned the Silver Star on John Kerry had to say about him. The article is entitled “Setting Straight Kerry’s War Record “ Don Bendell is a former green beret captain, who served in Vietnam on an A-Team and in the Top Secret Phoenix program in 1968 and 1969, as well as in three other Special Forces Groups. He is a best-selling author of 21 books, with over 1,500,000 copies of his books in print worldwide, and a seventh degree black belt master in four martial arts, who was inducted into the International Karate Hall of Fame in 1995 and Martial Arts Museum of America in 1996. e-mail: don@donbendell.com

How does a piece in a Washington Times-connected publication attacking Kerry's alleged terrorism policies translate into a vote for Nader?

Yet another reason to vote for Ralph Nader in November:Senator Kerry's Non-War on TerrorismWritten by Barbara Stock Friday, March 05, 2004 On March 3, 2004, suicide bombers in Iraq walked into crowds of praying fellow Muslims and blew themselves apart killing over one hundred innocent people. The terrorists' goal is to start a war between the Sunni and the Shiite Muslims, destabilize Iraq, and turn the Iraqi people against the United States Their message is very clear. On September 11, 2001, Islamic terrorists hijacked four planes and did something no one else has ever dared to do--they attacked the United States mainland. Three thousand innocent people died. The terrorists' message was very clear. What is John Kerry’s plan to deal with such attacks? His plan is no different now than it was in the 1990’s. Deny that there is any war at all. Liberals believe that such attacks are just an aberration. The attacks are isolated incidents that only happened because of America’s bad behavior in the world. America must apologize to the world and in particular to the terrorists and the countries that support them. We must understand their anger and change our way of life to assure that we no longer anger or offend them. Bill Clinton blamed the attacks on the crusades and America’s imperialistic attitude. A blanket American apology for acts past and present appears to be John Kerry’s liberal platform on his non-war on terror. How can you have a war against terrorists when you believe the only terrorist is the present occupant of the White House? An e-mail sent to Democrats in the Middle East from the Kerry campaign was published word-for-word in the Tehran Times, and Kerry’s plan reportedly brought great joy to the fundamentalist leaders in Iran. There have been denials from the Kerry camp that the e-mail was sent to the hard-line, fundamentalist Iranian paper, but the paper's editors claim that it was sent directly to them from Senator Kerry’s campaign office. They printed it, and the frightening thing is that they didn’t have to change a word for it to serve their purpose. All the terrorists--and the states that support them--have to do is wait and hope that John Kerry wins the American presidential election and their world will stop being rocked. They fear George W. Bush with good reason. They have no reason to fear the spineless John Kerry who plans on worshipping at the altar of the U.N. and world opinion. Kerry will seek U.N. permission to protect our country and her citizens. This little-reported e-mail was perhaps the most apologetic and cowardly words ever written by a man running for the highest office in the free world. The Iranian fundamentalists waved the e-mail in the faces of their people to demonstrate that there is a powerful American that does not support their fight for democracy. In fact, this man, who may be president, will re-open a dialog with the hard-line Mullahs and ''forgive them'' for 25 years of terrorism and attacks against Americans. This message to terrorists from Kerry was front-page news all over the Middle East. It laid out how he would spend his first 100 days in office traveling the world and personally begging forgiveness for the American ''sin'' of defending herself against terrorists who are only reacting to our insufferable behavior. Kerry will plead to the world that Bush over-reacted to the 9/11 attack and as president, he will not inflict retribution on the attackers but open a ''dialog'' with them. He will go before the almighty, corrupt United Nations and be humble and hope that they will accept the United States ''back into the world community.'' Oh how bin Laden must be smiling at this moment. He must be salivating at the very thought of John F. Kerry becoming the next American president. John Kerry is sure that the offer of America’s hand in friendship and a few lawyers will solve the pesky terrorist problem. There is no doubt in my mind that should that come to pass, we as a country will pull back a bloody stump. You don’t have a ''dialog'' with a rabid dog—you shoot it before it bites you. As someone who has past the half-century mark in life, I have seen several American presidents. Never have I ever heard one say he will throw himself on the mercy of the world and ask their forgiveness for being the successful and powerful country that we have become. Never have I heard an American president apologize for defending freedom and the American people. Can you imagine Truman asking for the world to forgive us for damage done during WWII? ''Please forgive that we had to do so much bombing to defeat Hitler and his Nazi war machine and save the world. Neville Chamberlain had the right idea. We should have had a ‘dialog’ with Hitler.'' When Ronald Reagan uttered the words, ''Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!'' liberals had a collective stroke. Reagan was labeled a maniac who would surely start WWIII. A show of strength was boorish and arrogant! We must have a ''dialog'' with the communists. John Kerry has declared the war on terror exaggerated and a legal matter. John Kerry’s cowardly demeanor will endanger American lives and American sovereignty. We will become a paper tiger once again. Being the world’s only superpower is not a popularity contest. Much of Europe will rejoice because we will be as weak as they. The terrorists will celebrate because they know they will win the war by defeating us from within and the world will once again be their killing field without fear of punishment.Complete text of the Kerry e-mail is at:http://www.insightmag.com/news/2004/03/16/Politics/Kerry.Will.Abandon.War.On.Terrorism-621288.shtml

Typical bullshit from the people who think they're fooling us:"We don't do politics at the Department of Homeland Security" - Tom Ridge Dir. Dept. of Homeland Security 8/3/04[intelligence behind the new alert was] "the result of the president's leadership in the war on terror" - Tom Ridge Dir. Dept. of Homeland Security 8/1/04I guess not sending funds to pay for heightened security measures in New York City is another example of leadership in the war on terror. Thank you oh great and powerful leader!!!

More Proof:The REAL John KerryWatch Now: RealPlayer (rtsp://real.stream2you.com/RNC/RNC07200.rm)WindowsMedia (http://media1.stream2you.com/rnc/072304v2.wmv)

Why Kerry Must Be Stopped at All Costs:The Toxic Career of Rand BeersKerry's Drug War ZealotBy SEAN DONAHUEWhen Rand Beers quit his job as counter-terrorism advisor to President Bush, and signed up with John Kerry's presidential campaign, he quickly became a hero to Democratic Party loyalists and the "Anybody but Bush" crowd. But Beers, who has become Kerry's top national security advisor and would likely serve as National Security Advisor or Secretary of State in a Kerry administration, has a dark history. Under Presidents Clinton and Bush, he served as Assistant Secretary of State for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, and was one of the chief architects of and apologists for the United States' cruel policies in Colombia.Beers was most closely associated with the disastrous aerial crop fumigation program the U.S. introduced in southern Colombia. The State Department hired DynCorp, a private military contractor, to fly crop dusters at high altitudes over the rainforests of southern Colombia, spraying a chemical cocktail that includes a stronger version of Monsanto's popular and controversial herbicide, Round-Up, over suspected coca fields. Beers was the public face of the fumigation program, defending and advocating for it in Congressional hearings and in the media.Touted as a way of stopping cocaine from entering the U.S., the fumigation program targets the poorest people with the least involvement in international drug trafficking--the coca growers--while leaving the cocaine processors and exporters, who make the real profits in the drug trade, completely untouched. In a good year, a farmer planting 5 acres of coca can bring in $4,000. Once that coca is processed into cocaine and brought to the U.S. it has a street value of close to $800,000. During a visit to Putumayo, the main coca growing area in southern Colombia in 2001, a parish priest told me "We look on in great pain when we see how the farmers are trampled on like cockroaches while the big traffickers walk the streets of New York and L.A."The processing and export of cocaine are largely controlled by wealthy landowners and the right-wing paramilitaries that support them, while coca growers are "taxed" by the Marxist rebels of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC.) The paramilitaries are technically considered terrorists by the U.S., but play a significant role in protecting U.S. economic interests by using massacres to clear off land for oil development, logging, hydro-electric dams, and cattle ranching, and by assassinating union organizers, indigenous leaders, and other critics of the political and economic order in Colombia, while the FARC keeps attacking oil pipelines and kidnapping wealthy people--and so the FARC is defined as a "narco-terrorist group," and U.S. policy is focused on weakening the FARC. Fumigating coca crops indirectly cuts into FARC revenues, and so the program is sold to the public as part of both the war on drugs and the war on terrorism. Beers played a central role in creating the myth of the "narco-terrorist" which has been used to justify both the fumigations and continued U.S. military aid to Colombia.The program has had no measurable impact on the availability, price, or purity of cocaine in the U.S., let alone the rate of cocaine addiction in this country. Historically, whenever coca has been eradicated in one area of the Andes, production has spiked in other areas. The truly difficult materials for cocaine producers to procure are the chemicals used to process coca into cocaine. But the U.S. has made only minimal efforts to regulate the export of these chemicals.The farmers who grow coca in southern Colombia are growing it not by choice, but out of necessity. Over 60% of Colombians live on less than $2 a day. As a result of economic globalization, the bottom has dropped out of markets for coffee, bananas, wheat, and other legal crops. The soil in Putumayo is poor, anyway, and won't support repeated plantings of most cash crops. And farmers growing legal crops have to transport them over dangerous, poorly maintained dirt roads, while coca buyers are willing to go into remote villages to buy coca leaves and coca paste. None of this means much to Rand Beers, who told ABC's John Stossel that:"An illegal activity is an illegal activity. And one doesn't get a special pass for being poor. They have to recognize that every effort to grow coca will be challenged by the government. Every work effort, every dollar, every pound of sweat that goes in to growing that coca may be lost." Besides being cruel, Beers' attitude ignores the fact that farmers who don't grow coca have been hurt just as badly by the fumigations as farmers who do grow coca. Glyphosate, the active ingredient in the chemical cocktail used in the fumigation program, is a broad-spectrum herbicide that kills any and all green plants. The crop fumigation planes fly at high altitudes, and so their spraying is at best imprecise. As a result, many farmers growing only legal crops have lost everything. In January of 2001, I visited a government-funded yucca cooperative that was intended to help farmers find an alternative to growing coca. The cooperative had been fumigated and the entire yucca crop had been destroyed. I met one woman who had invested everything she had in the co-op and now had no way to feed her children. She wanted to go to the city to beg, but couldn't leave town because the paramilitaries who had killed her brothers had a roadblock on the only road out of La Hormiga. Corn and plantain crops on surrounding farms had been destroyed as well. Many people were complaining of rashes, respiratory problems, and temporary blindness caused by the fumigations.When confronted with these problem's, Beers' Colombian counterpart, Gonzalo de Francisco, National Security Advisor to Colombia's President, replied that "Fumigation is like chemotherapy, sometimes you end up killing the patient." Beers, for his part, consistently denied that there was any evidence that there was any evidence that the fumigations were causing health problems. The U.S. State Department and the Colombian government both claim that farmers whose legal crops are fumigated are compensated for their losses, but community organizers in Putumayo report that few if any farmers have actually been compensated, and the U.S. Embassy has been unable to provide any concrete evidence that the compensation program is working.Beers went even further in defending the fumigation program when giving a sworn deposition in a lawsuit filed against DynCorp in a U.S. Federal District Court by indigenous tribes in Ecuador who claimed that their health and their crops had been damaged when herbicides sprayed in Colombia drifted over the border on the wind. Desperate to keep the suit from proceeding to trial, he argued that the fumigation program was vital to U.S. national security because it was an essential part of the war against terrorism in Colombia. He then went a step further, stating, under oath, that "It is believed that FARC terrorists have received training in Al Qaida terrorist caps in Afghanistan."Beers' claim was, of course, absurd and unfounded. The idea that Islamic fundamentalists would align themselves with hardline Marxists halfway around the world doesn't meet the laugh test. An Associated Press story on Beers' testimony quoted three baffled Washington insiders: "'There doesn't seem to be any evidence of FARC going to Afghanistan to train,' a U.S. intelligence official said. 'We have never briefed anyone on that and frankly, I doubt anyone has ever alleged that in a briefing to the State Department or anyone else.' [...] 'That statement is totally from left field,' said a top federal law enforcement official, who reviewed the proffer. 'I don't know where (Beers) is getting that. We have never had any indication that FARC guys have ever gone to Afghanistan.' [...] 'My first reaction was that Rand must have misspoke,' said a veteran congressional staffer with extensive experience in the Colombian drug war. 'But when I saw it was a proffer signed under oath, I couldn't believe he would do that. I have no idea why he would say that.'" Beers later recanted his testimony, claiming that he had been misinformed. But his bizarre allegation reflects his fundamental belief that the war on terrorism and the war on drugs are inextricably linked, and that the coca farmers who are forced to make payments to the FARC are legitimate military targets, and their neighbors' legal crops are acceptable collateral damage. Rural Colombians pick up clearly on the message coming from the U.S.--last June a community organizer in Cauca told me: "Often we are mislabeled as drug traffickers or terrorists. Nowadays with Bush, we are all terrorists. It is not just those who plant bombs or fly planes into the Twin Towers. It is those of us who cultivate our land and believe in the dignity of our lives and of our country." If John Kerry lets Rand Beers continue to guide his foreign policy, a Kerry administration will be no better for rural Colombians than a Bush administration. Democrats who believe that Senator Kerry offers a humane alternative to Bush should think long and hard about what Rand Beers would set loose on the world if he were allowed to run the State Deparment. Sean Donahue directs the Corporations and Militarism Project of the Massachusetts Anti-Corporate Clearinghouse. He has traveled to Colombia three times on human rights delegations sponsored by Witness for Peace and the Colombia Support Network. He is available for interviews and talks and can be reached at info@stopcorporatecontrol.org.

Yeah creating a newer stronger breeding ground for Al-Qaeda is a great way to protect America, we can definitely thank the administration for that.What qualifications did W have before taking office that would make him any stronger a candidate for Commander-in-Chief than John Kerry? Protecting Corpus Christi from Vietnamese invaders?He learned on the job because he had to, we were attacked on his watch. Also, the "growning threats" are not coming from Iran, they are coming from terrorists like these. Please point out to me where Iran is mentioned in this article, I must have missed it. http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1506&ncid=1506&e=1&u=/afp/20040801/ts_alt_afp/us_attacks_threat_040801143622