Fraud

If you only follow the mainstream news outlets, there's a fair chance that you have missed what is likely the biggest story this year - the current mass protests in Iran over the fraud of their recent election. From what I have seen and heard, it is being covered only in passing, and with absurd efforts to connect it to our own narrow political squabbles. But if you want to get a sense of what is really going on, I suggest poking around a bit - Andrew Sullivan is probably the best place to start. Though be warned, a lot of the material he is posting is pretty raw - meaning that it is bloody and violent, and much of it of indeterminate accuracy.

But given Iran's history (both recent and over the long scope of human civilization) and critical position in a volatile part of the world, what is happening there now is incredibly important. And in many ways, it shows both the best and the worst of humanity - the twin aspects of a quest for freedom and a dedicated hold on power no matter the cost.

Jim Downey

(Cross posted to my blog.)

for another happy-happy Monday morning post about the economy! Yay! Everyone gather around, and let Uncle Jim tell you a story...

"We're screwed."

Did you like my story? Oh, you want details? If you insist.

No, I'm not going to talk about the Dow being down below 7,000 for the first time this century (it's at 6,900 as I write). Nor about the news this morning of AIG's additional $61.7 billion loss last quarter. Those are just symptoms.

It's been a warm week here in central Missouri. 40s early on, up almost to 70 midweek. Yesterday it was 60s. With sun, and the sort of rain you get in early spring.

Little wonder that the trees are starting to bud, jonquils break through the topsoil, snowdrops in full riot.

Naturally enough, it's supposed to snow tonight and tomorrow.

* * * * * * *

NPR had a fascinating - and frightening - story this morning:

Taxpayer Beware: Bank Bailout Will Hurt

A single piece of paper may just be one of the most surprising and illuminating documents of the whole banking crisis.

It's a one-page research note from an economist at Deutsche Bank, and it outlines in the clearest terms the kind of solution many bankers are looking for. The basic message: We should forget trying to get a good deal for taxpayers because even trying will hurt.

"Ultimately, the taxpayer will be on the hook one way or another, either through greatly diminished job prospects and/or significantly higher taxes down the line," the document says.

Hehehehehe:

City to OK water-bill surcharge

The Seattle City Council is expected Tuesday to approve a surcharge on city water customers to help cover the cost of a $22 million court-ordered rebate to water customers.

The rebates are for fire hydrant costs that were wrongly charged to water customers. Fire hydrants are a basic city responsibility and have to be paid for from the general fund, the state Supreme Court has ruled.

OK, read that again. Got it? The city screwed up and charged water customers for basic city infrastructure. So they have been ordered to pay said customers back for the overcharges. And to do so they are going to slap a surcharge onto water bills.

Gotta love it.

As someone in the comments said:

How to put the scr*ws to people four times in a row.

1. Charge some customers for a city financial responsibility.

2. Pay the lawyers to defend the city for wrongfully doing so that will be paid for by all city water customers.

3. Charge the customers for the refunds they have been ordered to pay the customers who were originally charged as well as all city water users.

4. Charge the customers for the legal fees it's going to cost the city to defend itself from the upcoming law suit for wrongfully charging all water customers for the city being ordered by court to refund the fees it wrongfully charged "some" of the customers.

Brilliant.

Jim Downey

(Via BB. Cross posted to my blog.)

So, last time I borrowed money from a bank, for a Federally-guaranteed Small Business Loan, it was a bit of a nightmare. They wanted to know everything down to my shoe size, with a fair amount of documentation to support the claim that I wear an 11 wide. And, needless to say, they wanted to know exactly what I was going to do with the $50,000 I wanted to borrow - complete with a detailed business plan, revenue forecasts, et cetera. Given that I wanted to borrow the money, I didn't find this too onerous; rather it seemed to be a reasonable expectation, if a tad tedious.

But don't expect that street to run both ways.

Where'd the bailout money go? Shhhh, it's a secret

WASHINGTON – It's something any bank would demand to know before handing out a loan: Where's the money going?

But after receiving billions in aid from U.S. taxpayers, the nation's largest banks say they can't track exactly how they're spending the money or they simply refuse to discuss it.

I'm not real big on conspiracies. I don't think that the US government was behind the 9-11 attacks, or that the UN has an agreement with extra-terrestrials to reveal their presence and influence in our world in 2017. While the Warren Commission had problems, I don't think that Oliver Stone was right about the JFK assassination.

But maybe - just maybe - the International Banking Conspiracy nuts have a point. I've never really thought so, despite the growth in power and scope of multinational corporations, the increasing symbiosis between politics and industry, et cetera. I just figured that normal political & economic forces were at work.

But the Big Bailout Debacle(tm) has me wondering. From the AP:

Here in the Midwest there is a real and significant problem with meth - to the point of paranoia on the part of both the population and government. This has led to laws restricting access to certain precursor drugs and chemicals, reports of environmental damage (meth labs tend to produce some really nasty chemical contamination), and the development of special task forces of local, state and federal police agencies to target meth production and distribution. It is the War on (Some) Drugs on steroids.

So it is fairly easy to see how something like this can happen:

Town Finds Drug Agent Is Really an Impostor

GERALD, Mo. — Like so many rural communities in the country’s middle, this tiny town had wrestled for years with the woes of methamphetamine. Then, several months ago, a federal agent showed up.

Here's a 9 minute trailer from the movie Expelled due for release in February 2008. Oh boy, I can hardly wait. Pay attention and you will notice part of this trailer was filmed at the Voter Issues Conference sponsored by the Family Research Council. If the FRC's involvement hasn't sufficiently raised the alarm, how about two of their more infamous spokesman, James Dobson and Tony Perkins?

The FRC is a Christian political organization that promotes values such as anti-homosexual rights, prayer in schools, abstinence only education, teaching creationism in science class instead of or along side evolution, ending women's reproductive rights, anti-birth control and even stopping stem cell research that could better the lives of millions of Americans. Hmmm. I wonder why the FRC is so interested in the movie Expelled and Intelligent Design?

Some of you may already be licking your chops in anticipation of tomorrow's (Tuesday 11/13 8pm EST) PBS special called Judgement Day: Intelligent Design on Trial.

Others may be upset and ready to complain of bias.

I expect the program to be enlightening, educational and entertaining. As you can see from the second trailer posted, not everyone is happy about this event. The Discovery Institute is doing it's best to predispose creationist proponents towards their usual anti-science mindset.

So, after you get through the funnies and catch up on the news, pour yourself another cuppa and sit back to be completely terrified by this diary from dKos: BREAKING: George W. Bush closet "Joel's Army" member?

No, I didn't write it. I didn't even comment in it. But it sets forth a pretty convincing case that our president is actually an end-times dominionist, of the most strident premillennialist variety.

And when seen through this filter, a lot of the otherwise almost-insane words and actions of the president make a lot of very frightening sense.

So, read it. But be prepared to be scared.

Jim Downey

We all want a cleaner America, but corporate America wants us to do it for them.

It is interesting what happens when you read American news in foreign publications. I found the following article on the BBC news website. A NYC family stopped using all modern conveniences, including turning off the power in their apartment for one year. I found this intriguing, and started reading up on their progress. The Father created a blog called 'No-Impact Man' to track his progress.

On their blog, there is a post about the organization 'Keep America Beautiful,' which I remember from my youth as the organization with the Indian spokesperson. It always seemed like a good idea, with good motives. However, I found out something very disturbing about this group;

“Keep America Beautiful was founded in 1953 by group of businessmen from the beverage and packaging industries who were concerned that government would make them responsible for solving the litter problem by regulating their industries.”

Giving Landover Baptist a run for their money! Baptists For Brownback 2008!

[link] Today, in an America filled with adulterers and baby-killers, an even worse sinner casts a shadow over them all—the atheist. Yet atheists are difficult to spot. They hide their sinister cult behind masks of smiles, science and soft, pleasant voices. Your next door neighbor might be an atheist. You just can’t tell.

Imagine if it was simple to identify atheists and their tainted works. Would it not be grand? Think how much easier it would be to protect your children’s eyes, ears and souls from atheists’ influences if their websites, books, movies and yes, even their very clothes, were clearly labeled with a bright scarlet “A”.

Curses! Those godly folks have somehow conspired to place one of those scarlet "A"s on UTI as well! Now if I can only keep UTI from being listed on their Hellbound list... **shakes fist**

Hat-tip to Juan Cole: the neocon-slanted National Post has an article about a new law in Iran mandating "that all Iranians wear 'standard Islamic garments' designed to remove ethnic and class distinctions reflected in clothing... It also envisages separate dress codes for religious minorities, Christians, Jews and Zoroastrians, who will have to adopt distinct colour schemes to make them identifiable in public."

It's a very revolting, very condemning story. Only it's not true. Iran's sole Jewish member of Parliament said that "It is a lie, and the people who invented it wanted to make political gain." Even the National Post published an official redaction.

In related news, Iraqi troops ransacked Kuwaiti hospitals, looting incubators and leaving babies to die. After all, someone with a vested interest in an American war on Iraq said so, so it must be true. Also, the CIA has never engaged in psyops, and no media outlet is ever slanted to the right.

Check out Mark Crispin Miller discussing “Fooled Again” at UMass Amherst on April 9. The recording is up at KPFA - Guns and Butter Archives. Miller’s passion is clear and he points directly at the fundamentalist religious energy behind stolen elections.Listen to the audio.

Miller makes it quite clear how a subset of the right is trying to build a theocracy. It is 40 minutes well spent and much faster than reading his book.

Tagged: mark crispin miller fooled again elections religious right election fraud

So I'm writing this little piece about "The war on terror" and for fun did a little Google search for "The War on Christians." Up pops a link to a christian site called "The Traditional Values Coalition" (I won't give them the benefit of a link).

The second paragraph of their post reads:

The campaign to destroy religious freedom has already started in Canada with the passage of C-250, a bill that adds "sexual orientation" to Canada's hate crime laws. The legislation was pushed by anti-Christian legislator Svend Robinson. This activist has recently been picked up by police for shoplifting a $50,000 piece of jewelry to give to his sex partner.

If you read this correctly, the "christians" are, by a rational person's standards, endorsing crime against gay people. If not, why would they complain about an amendment to an anti-hate crime bill that protects gay people.

To distract the susceptible reader from their endorsement of the hate crime, they throw in the fact that one of the amendment's supporters has been "picked-up" for shoplifting. This of course has no bearing on the hate crime bill, so why did the "christians" include it in their post?

One reason is the "shoot the messenger" or "ad hominum" attack. If the person delivering the message is "bad" then the message is also "bad."

Ihlin’s post today at Daily Kos While you were bitching about the Democratic Party... got me wondering. Can we progressives agree on anything?

Ihlin is right, lots and lots of attention was paid to Alito and domestic spying while the double-speak titled Budget Reconciliation Bill squeaked through the house and “saved” the government a mere $39 billion (against a deficit of $400 billion, a whopping 10%).

Where are our priorities? Who is out there setting them? Why can’t we be consistent? Yes, yes, I know these questions have been asked many times before. But I bet they still have not been answered?

If we use dKos as an indicator of priorities, it would appear that Cindy Sheehan and what she wears to congress is number one, Jack Abramoff is number two, and until recently, Alito was number three. I’m sorry, but Cindy, Jack, and Anthony are not our agenda. In fact, two of the top three items are republican in nature.

Face it, until we progressives can agree on anything, we will always come in second in race with only two runners. Quick, who lost the Super Bowl last year? You get my point?

In the Kingdom of the Half Blind is a beautiful piece by Bill Moyers. In about as harsh a tone Moyers can muster, he chastises the Bush administration on its secrecy.

Moyers, a long time journalist, puts us into LBJ's shoes at the beginning of the Vietnam war and what happend to drive the US into that mess.

With this as a backdrop and the the role of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), Moyers paints a bleak and scary picture of the current administration and the press. He also tells the story of his own run-in with the Bush administration during the production of his PBS program Now with Bill Moyers.

A key quote from the article:

It has to be said: there has been nothing in our time like the Bush Administration's obsession with secrecy. This may seem self-serving coming from someone who worked for two previous presidents who were no paragons of openness. But I am only one of legions who have reached this conclusion. See the recent pair of articles by the independent journalist, Michael Massing, in The New York Review of Books. He concludes, "The Bush Administration has restricted access to public documents as no other before it." And he backs this up with evidence. For example, a recent report on government secrecy by the watchdog group, OpenTheGovernment.org, says the Feds classified a record 15.6 million new documents in fiscal year 2004, an increase of 81% over the year before the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001. What's more, 64% of Federal Advisory Committee meetings in 2004 were completely closed to the public. No wonder the public knows so little about how this administration has deliberately ignored or distorted reputable scientific research to advance its political agenda and the wishes of its corporate patrons. I'm talking about the suppression of that EPA report questioning aspects of the White House Clear Skies Act; research censorship at the departments of health and human services, interior and agriculture; the elimination of qualified scientists from advisory committees on kids and lead poisoning, reproductive health, and drug abuse; the distortion of scientific knowledge on emergency contraception; the manipulation of the scientific process involving the Endangered Species Act; and the internal sabotage of government scientific reports on global warming

I got a strange call the other day. Perhaps someone can help me out. I need some advice from my theistic friends. The conversation went something like this:

DS: Hello?

Caller: Hi! My name is Bob and I'm trying to help out one of your neighbors who was blinded saving a bus full of children. It's a very sad story. Your neighbor Jesse was blinded and needs your help.

DS: Wow that's terrible! What happened?

You might enjoy my post about Thomas Paine at my blog "A Rational Being" (Formerly Non Sequitur *)

Just follow this link to read seven (7) small paragraphs that simply dismiss the idea of God's revelation to Moses, Jesus, and Mohamed.

Paine's simple logic and language should be quoted often in the current exchanges about "God". Though he was a Deist.(Deist's believe god exists but he has not revealed himself to us). We can still use his logic and ideas.

ARB