Saturday, February 16, 2008

We're Really Sheeple, No Kidding


A new science discovery reported from Leeds University says that humans and sheep have herd mentality. We sure proved that here in America in 2002 and 2003 when we were talked into invading Iraq for bin Laden's attack on 9/11, flags flying from every house and car.

ScienceDaily reports: "Results from a study at the University of Leeds show that it takes a minority of just five per cent to influence a crowd’s direction – and that the other 95 per cent follow without realising it." They go on to report: “We’ve all been in situations where we get swept along by the crowd,” says Professor Krause. “But what’s interesting about this research is that our participants ended up making a consensus decision despite the fact that they weren’t allowed to talk or gesture to one another. In most cases the participants didn’t realise they were being led by others.”

Sheeple, easily led, no questions asked.

Baa.

Dopey America: The Age of American Unreason


Dumbed-down is all around. Author and guest of Bill Moyer's Journal, Susan Jacoby says that the mess we are in politically can be traced to rampant ignorance floating around this nation. Of course you and I are the victims of 'them' because they vote.


In one part of interview with Moyers she talked about the need for presidents to be good teachers. She said, "Bill Clinton and George W. Bush are two of the biggest failures as teachers in chief of any presidents we've ever had. Bush at foreign policy obviously. It's great to bring people along with you when everybody's in favor of the war as they were in 2003 'cause there was this desire to strike back at somebody, anyone, for 9/11. So Bush just said, "Oh, yeah. Saddam Hussein had something to do with 9/11." And people believed it."


On Clinton she said, "The reason that health care reform was dead on arrival was that the American people hadn't been educated and prepared for any kind of change. Bill Clinton just announced his plan which had been developed kind of secretly, without much public participation. The health insurance industry jumped in with its Harry and Louise commercials."


On education in general in America, Jacoby states flatly, "I think our schools are doing a bad job of teaching history and science." No kidding. I have held this opinion for many, many years. Look at how many people look back at their history classes and say, 'it was so boring!' The same can be said of science, too, especially if it was taught only through a text book, void of labs or experimentation.


Moyers asked, "What does it say to you, Susan, that half of American adults believe in ghosts? Now I take these from your book. One-third believe in astrology. Three quarters believe in angels. And four-fifths believe in miracles."


Jacoby answered, "I think even more important than the fact that large numbers of Americans believe in ghosts or angels, that is part of some religious beliefs. Is the flip side is of this is that over half of Americans don't believe in evolution. And these things go together. Because what they do is they place science on a par almost with folk beliefs."


Science as 'folk beliefs.' That says something about our level of intelligence in America. Perhaps that is why the Bush Administration was recently condemned by 15,000 scientists who said that this administration had 'censored, suppressed and falsified important environmental and health research.' And the majority of Americans didn't know the difference.


Here's an important statement Jacoby said right after this that piqued my interest: "And I think-- if I may inveigh against myself, ourselves, I think the American media in particular has a lot to do with it. Because one of the things that really has gotten dumber about our culture the media constantly talks about truth as if it-- if it were always equidistant from two points. In other words, sometimes the truth is one-sided."


The media as co-conspirators in ignorance and subsequently the ruse. She chides Time magazine for perpetrating this 'truth as equidistant' in this: "...there was a huge cover story in TIME Magazine in 2002 about the rapture and end of the world scenarios. There wasn't a singular secular person quoted in it. They discussed the rapture scenario from the book of Revelation as though it was a perfectly reasonable thing for people to believe. On the one hand, these people don't believe it. On the other it's exactly like saying-- you know, "Two plus two, so-and-so says, 'two plus two equals five.' But, of course, mathematicians say that it really equals four." The mathematicians are right. The people who say that two plus two equals five are wrong. The media blurs that constantly.


The author goes on, "One out of every five Americans still believes that the sun revolves around the earth. But you shouldn't have to be an intellectual or a college graduate to know that the sun doesn't revolve around the earth. There's been a huge failure of education."


Yes there has, and it is not getting better, which is a perfect opportunity for scoundrels to offer ideas to the American public that they cannot refute. Our society has been easily duped and is an easy target for propaganda due to our cultural illiteracy. No doubt that is why it was so easy back in 2002 to convince millions of Americans and hundreds of Congressmen that Saddam Hussein was guilty of 9-11.


Who knows the answer to our dilema? How do we educate thye masses? How can we warn them that there are many scoundrels out there who wish to kidnap our nation for their own ends, for their own skewed political agenda?

Friday, February 15, 2008

U.S. Scientists Want a Supportive President for '08

Leading U.S. scientists hope that the next president does not do what they say the George W. Bush Administration has done: censor, suppress and falsify important environmental and health research. A panel of prominent scientists in Boston -- convened by the Union of Concerned Scientists, an activist group -- announced a joint statement asking Congress to protect scientific integrity. More than 15,000 government scientists signed onto the statement.

What hasn't George Bush screwed up? Whoever the next president is, he or she will have to spend their entire first term in office cleaning up after this incompetent nincompoop. I can proudly say I never considered voting for the dope.

Growing Up Right-wing

I grew up in a GOP household, but not right-wing. My parents were Eisenhower and Taft Republicans; they were moderate men who worked for the common good. I can't imagine growing up in these days in a right-wing household. What conversation must be heard at the dinner table each evening? Would the rantings of Rush, Sean, Laura and Ann dominate the conversation; the right-wing spin on with all that is important to know about society, government and politics. Grumble, grumble, damned liberals!

Our children grew up not knowing about right-wing radio or FoxNews. They got their information from PBS, NBC and other network news stations. During our family dinners we talked about people, often the oppressed, and what could be done about their situations in life. Is that 'liberal' talk? Seems to me it is Jesus talk.

When our children were in grade school we sponsored a Laotian family, a Hmong family, who fled their country after the Vietnam War when the Vietcong began to retaliate for these mountain people's efforts in rescuing American pilots shot down over the mountains between Cambodia and Vietnam. Our children became friends with theirs, and we were all enriched by this cross-cultural association. They were dirt poor and the subject of much bigotry from people who called them gooks and other slanderous remarks. Our children knew better; we taught them better.

Our children learned to accept all different kinds of people, especially the downcast and marginal. Today they are healthy adults who are very mindful of the variety of folks who call America their own. Liberals? If the word means all-encompassing in thinking, then yes, liberals. My wife and I are very proud of them and, as they raise their own children, we see them instilling love for others in their parenting skills too.

Thursday, February 14, 2008

FLIPFLOPPIN FLIPFLOPPER



Yesterday, the Senate ratified the Intelligence Authorization Bill, 51-45.
This bill contained a provision from Sen. Diane Fienstein(D-CA) establishing one interrogation stndard across the government.

Senator John McCain has spoken just recently in opposition to waterboarding and the use of torture. McCain has said the practice “is not a complicated procedure. It is torture.” He has previously called waterboarding “very exquisite torture.” He spoke in a recent Republican debate of the wisdom of adopting the Army Field Manual Standard. Witness his statements in the video I have provided.

When confronted yesterday with the decision to stick with his conscience or cave in to the conservative wing of his party, McCain chose to ditch his principles and instead vote to preserve waterboarding.

Mr. McCain, a former prisoner of war, has consistently voiced opposition to waterboarding and other methods that critics say is a form torture. But the Republicans, confident of a White House veto, did not mount the challenge. Mr. McCain voted “no” on Wednesday afternoon.

The White House has said that it would most certainly vetoe the bill if the senate passed it.

After Bush vetoes the bill, McCain will again be confronted with a vote to either stand with President Bush or stand against torture. He indicated with his vote today where he will come down on that issue.

John McCain, he against for waterboarding before he was for it!

Putin: The U.S. "threatens our national security"


George saw his soul and it was pure. Today the BBC reports:


"Mr Putin spoke of 'retargeting our missiles' at any US missile shield Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeated his threat to target missiles at neighbouring states if they site parts of the planned US missile shield. Mr Putin said the US proposal to base interceptors in Poland and a radar in the Czech Republic "threatens our national security".


George Bush looked into his soul and he saw a good friend. Was that his 40th or 41st mistake, I've lost track?

Dangling Abortion at the End of the Fishing Pole

Jesus knew, as he was surrounded by fishermen, that you ought not use the same bait time after time and expect different results. It seems that Republicans keep a business card in their Brooks Brother's suit and hand it out to the voters every November. The card reads, 'Pro Life.' Then they go off to Washington and vote for war and against poverty, education, and health care.

H.L. Mencken's famous quote: "No one in this world, so far as I know — and I have researched the records for years, and employed agents to help me — has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people."

But, after a while, sometimes after a long while, they catch on- these plain people, and that 'pro life' business card turns shabby.

My dear mother, rest her soul, was lured to the GOP over the abortion issue. She was raised in a very Democratic household, but, somewhere when those business cards were being handed out, she took one and laid it on her dresser. Elderly Catholics swallow easy bait. I still receive letters addressed to her from 'missions' somewhere in South Dakota, because she read their begging letter and wrote a check.

Younger Catholics are not so easily duped. In 2006, as we recall, Catholics threw the business card in the wastebasket and voted 55 to 45 for Democrats. These folks have been paying attention. Each Sunday, Catholics are reminded of the virtue of social justice; social justice has been an earmark of the Catholic Church's teaching for many years. They have been fooled by the GOP business card way too often: they have watched for 7 years the administration that they voted for in 2000 and 2004 trample upon social justice. The SCHIP veto is but the most egregious example of it all.

Younger Catholics have watched Congressional Republicans squash programs for the poor while voting for billions of dollars for the Pentagon. They have seen the GOP tax cuts for the wealthy and for the corporate world, while they stonewall national health care for all citizens. They've watched blue collar jobs evaporate as multinational companies close up factories here and move overseas to capitalize on near-slave labor. They aren't dumb people. They have been paying attention.

They will vote for either Clinton or Obama in the fall despite the phony 'pro life' business card flashed in their faces. They've been played for the fool way too often by the Republican Party.

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Joe Lieberman Votes with Fellow Republicans for Waterboarding

>>UPDATED below <<

The Senate narrowly voted against the practice of waterboarding with no help from Republican-lite Joe Lieberman. Ohio's George Voinovich and nearly 40 other Republicans thought that waterboarding was just fine for our democracy. The complete vote is here.

There were a few surprises in the voting. Nebraska's two senators voted against their parties, Democrat Nelson voting for the torture practice and Republican Hagel voting no. Oregon's Gordon Smith, a Republican in a very blue state, voted no as did both of Maine's Republican senators, Snowe and Collins.

It will be interesting to see how the hometown voters will view those senators who voted for waterboarding. John Sununu of New Hampshire and Norm Coleman of Minnesota, both Republicans up for reelection this fall, voted for waterboarding. Apparently their internal polling suggested that their constituents favored this legislation.

UPDATE Feb. 14 8 AM

This from YahooNews:

WASHINGTON - A senior Justice Department official says laws and other limits enacted since three terrorism suspects were waterboarded has eliminated the technique from what is now legally allowed, going a step beyond what CIA Director Michael Hayden has said.

"The set of interrogation methods authorized for current use is narrower than before, and it does not today include waterboarding," Steven G. Bradbury, acting head of the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel, says in remarks prepared for his appearance Thursday before the House Judiciary Constitution subcommittee.

"There has been no determination by the Justice Department that the use of waterboarding, under any circumstances, would be lawful under current law," he said. It is the first time the department has expressed such an opinion publicly.

Congressman Robert Wexler Confronts Condi Rice Lies


I received the following email from Congressman Robert Wexler today:


Today, in hearings on Capitol Hill, I confronted Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on her role in the lies, exaggerations, and misdirection that led us into the Iraq war. During my questioning, Secretary Rice falsely stated that she never saw intelligence casting doubt on the Bush Administration claims that Saddam possessed weapons of mass destruction.

This unbelievable statement is flatly contradicted by numerous government reports and CIA testimonials. (To watch the video of my exchange with Secretary Rice, click here.) Secretary Rice's responses demonstrate once and for all that we need aggressive oversight over this out of control Administration. Unfortunately, the Bush Administration has ignored the constitutional right of Congress to provide such oversight. It is time Congress took aggressive action to assert our rights on behalf of the American people.

The House of Representatives must immediately hold former White House Counsel Harriet Miers and White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten in contempt of Congress for their failure to respond to congressional subpoenas. I have been aggressively lobbying Members of Congress to support a vote on contempt, and I am thrilled to report that Speaker Pelosi told me directly that she agrees it is well past time to vote on contempt. I am anticipating that the House will shortly vote on resolutions of both civil and criminal contempt for both Miers and Bolten.

No one should be immune from accountability and the rule of law. Not Harriet Miers or Josh Bolten. And especially not Condoleezza Rice, George W. Bush or Dick Cheney. It is time to defend the Constitution and our rights as a co-equal branch of government.

I will continue to take on the Bush Administration for their outrageous abuses just as I confronted Condoleezza Rice today and Attorney General Mukasey last week. (Click here to see my questioning of Mukasey.) With your help we will hold these top Bush officials in contempt and continue our efforts to hold impeachment hearings for Vice President Dick Cheney. Thank you, as always, for your great support.

Yours truly,

Congressman Robert Wexler

Natural Security: A Darwinian Approach to a Dangerous World"


Natural Security: A Darwinian Approach to a Dangerous World is a new book by Raphael Sagarin which suggests that the United States might apply some of nature's methods to better protect the nation from terror threats. Perhaps John McCain should read it and thereby stop embarrassing himself with his 100 years of war nonsense.


"Sagarin and Taylor's Natural Security searches for the roots of political stability by studying interaction in its most fundamental forms, from genes and cells to ideology. This fresh, bold book heralds a vital integration of evolutionary analysis with real-life problems."--Richard Wrangham, Ruth B. Moore Professor of Biological Anthropology, Harvard University.


Duke University Assistant Professor Raphael Sagarin, who co-edited the book with security expert Terence Taylor, said biological organisms inherently understand they can't eliminate all risks; they have to identify and respond to only the most serious threats, or they end up wasting their resources. Wasting resources? The Pentagon ought to read this book as well.


The author says, "These models suggests the (Transportation Security Administration) would be more effective by being much more selective in whom it considers for screening, rather than trying to eliminate all risks."


I'm reminded of the idiotic quote of Don Rumsfeld - the one about going to war with the army you have, not the one you want.


Treason of the Senate Continued

Last night the US Senate put another nail into the coffin of the Constitution. The Senate voted 68-29 to reauthorize giving the executive branch, the President,increased power to tap our phones,computers, and e-mails WITHOUT obtaining FISO approval, before or even after the fact.

FISO? That was our secret court. The Senate supports providing immunity for telecom companies, especially AT$T,who previously, contrary to law, released our private information for warrantless surveillance programs used by Bush-Cheney. The Senate says that it is an anti-terrorist measure. Bush immediately praised the Democratic Senate for passing a "good bill".

This bill will permit the executive branch, any President, our growing autocracy, to secretly intercept our private communications WITHOUT a court order. FISO has been gutted! NO warrant to a secret court for approval will be needed. Moreover, this is an extension of citizen surveillance as prior to now the calls were for overseas communication. This bill provides for domestic calls as well.

Who wrote the bill? The Democrats, led by John Rockefeller. Rockefeller said: "This is the right way to go." Sure is, if we want an absolutist US Government! In final passage, 16 other Democrats voted "aye". Neither Clinton nor Obama believed it was important to vote.

What does that say?

Virginia Leaving the Confederacy

Those die-hard segregationists still rearing their ugly, bigoted heads in the state of Virginia are becoming rare in that Confederate capital state these days. One million Virgina voters voted Democrat yesterday, mostly for Obama. The GOP only mustered 400,000 votes.

Apparently, tolerance of racial difference is roooting itself in this once solid red state. Way to go, Virginia! Let's hope that one day, maybe two decades from now, South Carolina, the first state to leave the Union, the home of Ft. Sumter, may finally accept black folks as fully-American.

Tuesday, February 12, 2008

Kangaroo court' to try men accused of role in September 11 attacks

"What we are looking at is a series of show trials by the Bush administration that are really devoid of any due process considerations," said Vincent Warren, the executive director head of Centre for Constitutional Rights, which represents many Guantanamo detainees. "Rather than playing politics the Bush administration should be seeking speedy and fair trials," he said. "These are trials that are going to be based on torture as confessions as well as secret evidence. There is no way that this can be said to be fair especially as the death penalty could be an outcome."

What is most interesting about this so-called 'kangaroo court' is that such 'courts' have been used by a wide variety of dictators and other sordid rulers all over the globe, including, interestingly, Saddam Hussein. We have become them.

Hillary's Scarlett O'Hara Act

"Many African American women are simply refusing to play Mammy to Hillary. " Now, there's a sentence worth pondering.

That's what author Melissa Harris-Lacewell believes. Her article is posted on TheRoot.com. She says:

"Sister voters have a beef with white women like Clinton that is both racial and gendered. It is not about choosing race; it is about rejecting Hillary's Scarlett O'Hara act.

"Black women voters are rejecting Hillary Clinton because her ascendance is not a liberating symbol. Her tears are not moving. Her voice does not resonate. Throughout history, privileged white women, attached at the hip to their husband's power and influence, have been complicit in black women's oppression. Many African American women are simply refusing to play Mammy to Hillary."

Whoa! I suggest you read the entire article to understand just how repressive the 'Mammy' figure is to black women.

That Sucking Sound: The Pentagon and Your Dollars


Ross Perot warned of the sucking sound that was the American jobs being sucked to Mexico. They were. Today, there is another sucking sound with similar results: The Pentagon is sucking up tax-payers' dollars at an enormous rate.


Gwynn Dyer in TheSpec.com writes: "But there is a great deal more money in the current U.S. defence budget [$585 billion] -- probably three times as much -- that has nothing to do with the "war on terror." Even if you accept the deeply suspect proposition that invading foreign countries is a useful way to fight terrorism, invading the target countries (which generally do not inhabit the higher reaches of the technological pecking order) does not require 11 aircraft carriers and fleets of Stealth bombers."


Don't tell that to John McCain or any right-winger because you may be called un-patriotic. It is patriotic to give the Pentagon whatever it wants because, after all, we don't want them to invade our country. It's the castle wall argument: build it higher to protect the people who are already starving to death to pay for the wall. After all, China...


Will we ever learn? Such stupidity still exists in those who purport to keep us safe.

Monday, February 11, 2008

East German Film Reminds Me of Bush, Cheney et al


The Lives of Others, a film set in East Germany in the mid 1980's, tells the story of the Stasi, the DDR secret police. Everybody is a suspect, most especially the more liberal people in their society such as actors and playwrights. It is hard to imagine that all of this was taking place just 20 years ago in a nation that had already suffered many injustices under Hitler.


Today we heard on the evening news that six inmates from Guantanamo were formally charged for the September 11 plot. Rumblings of waterboarding torture used on some of the captives rose to the surface as well. The Stasi of the DDR used torture on their captives as well.


It was an interesting conjunction of events as this film from Netflix arrived on the same day today's news. Secret police, secret files, wiretaps, torture rooms, and control of the citizens. The one difference, however, is that in the film there is redemption.

But He Was Our Thug!

[a guest-posting from Engineer of Knowledge]

This posting warrants a little history lesson. In 1979 President Jimmy Carter had severed diplomatic relations with Saddam Hussein’s Iraq and put it on a list of “terrorist nations.” This prohibited the sale to Iraq many U.S. made goods that could strengthen the Iraq militarily. Remarkably, in late 1983, none other than Donald Rumsfeld journeyed to Baghdad to pay court to Saddam Hussein on behalf of President Reagan. The purpose was to re-establish diplomatic relations with Iraq. This happened after it had become widely known that Saddam had used poison gas on Iranian troops. Soon Iraq enjoyed a brisk business with American firms. Some which supplied him with high-tech equipment and other materials of potential dual civilian and military use.

The Washington Times (Oct. 1, 2002) reported, the U.S. Centers of Disease Control even supplied Iraq with strain of all the germs Iraq used to make weapons. Included were anthrax, the bacteria that make s botulinum toxin and the germs that caused gas gangrene. Even after Saddam had used poison gas on his own people in the late 1980’s, the U.S. kindly guaranteed a $4 billion “agricultural” loan extended to Iraq by Italy’s Banco de Lavoro.

Now this brings us to the first Gulf War when the President, George H. W. Bush, encourage the Shia to rise up against Saddam but quickly backed off and dropped support to the uprisings. In 1991 on the ABC program, “This Week” the then Secretary of Defense, Dick Cheney stated that the administration’s reason for not going into Iraq at that time was, “They preferred the stability in Iraq under Saddam to what was predicted as a Civil War with the U.S. troops caught in a quagmire between the two religious fractions.”

Yes there was a time when Saddam was OUR brutal dictator with large oil reserves. Things were fine with the Status Quo until the event of 9/11. The oil cartel in the White House saw a chance to grab control of all Iraq’s oil reserves under the pretext of crushing the global terrorist threat. Now Dick Cheney is going around the television talk show circuit stating that no one could have ever predicted Iraq would have degraded into a Civil War when our troops went to liberate the Iraqi people and bring them freedom. All of those heart attacks must have given him memory loss from his own statements in 1991. You could also conclude that this means that no one else in the administration was doing their homework resulting in the poor job performance of this administration; or was it just blinding oil ambitions?

Don't Look Behind that Religious Curtain!

They've fooled so many Christians; still are.
Bombing for Jesus! Waterboarding for God!

In fact, Waterboarding for God by writer Ray McGovern caught my eye this morning. I was thinking of a young blogger who posts here. Over the weekend, the young man said that he finds Bush 'credible and trustworthy.' By the way, the 20-year-old describes himself as a good Christian and, naturally, Republican.

Bamboozled by Bush, conned by Cheney; there are quite a few 'good Christians' out there who actually believe that these two men are following Jesus' principles as they invaded Iraq. Somehow they are gullible enough to believe that a self-described Christian politician would never do anything against God's law, against the teachings of Jesus.

For many months on this blog, as my regular readers know, I have raised this contradiction to the attention of my readers. We who are not captured by Christ, we who have watched politicians for 50 to 60 decades, understand that obfuscation is deeply rooted in the political arena, especially for the cunning ones with a skewed world view. Bush and Cheney have proved that over and over again. Yet, many 'believers' can't seen to disconnect from their fantasy. I find it totally mystifying.

McGovern in today's article juxtaposes the annual prayer breakfast where Bush spoke with the Cheney speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference. Bush spoke of God, Cheney of torture. Which did Christians pay attention to?

If some good Christian person out there can justify a preemptive invasion and bombing of a nation which did no harm to us, I'd like to hear it. If a good Christian person could justify torture, let him speak. If a good Christian could tell me that lying to the citizens by the president deserves to be lauded by descriptive words like 'credibility and trustworthiness' I wish to hear it.

The Jesus I know weeps at all of this. Do I know a different Jesus? Is my Jesus the anti-Christ?

More Hypocrisy: Bush Budget Earmarks

As if you are shocked, Bush is a hypocrite again. Standing on his wobbly soapbox, threatening to veto bills with earmarks, the rope-a-dope-n-chief has plenty of his own earmarks in the 2009 budget he sent to Congress last week. How about $12 million for a parachute repair shop at the American air base in Aviano, Italy? Now there's an important expenditure. Or $6.5 million for research in Wyoming on the “fundamental properties of asphalt.” Need-to-know more about asphalt, indeed! There's more: The president requested $125,000 for a new rapid bus line on Troost Avenue in Kansas City, Mo., and $11 million for bus-only lanes along parts of Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles. And $800,000 for the Neosho National Fish Hatchery in Missouri.

When did a presidential budget become a pork barrel for constituents and party donors? When? Oh, never mind, foolish me thinking that presidential actions ought not involve politics.

The McCain Judgment

At age 71, you'd think that wisdom may have some hold on a person's judgments, especially when it comes to war. Obviously John McCain was blind-sided by Cheney, Bush and the rest of the neocons when he foolishly supported the Bush War on Iraq. The sad reality is that he still is, five years later. That ought to worry lots of Americans. Was it those years of torture in Vietnam? We'll never know, but we ought not trust him with the keys to the military.

His other positions, as right-wing pundits would tell you, have vacillated extensively from the party line, but his support for the Bush War on Iraq has never changed. Full support including that telling statement a few weeks back about the possibility of another Hundred Years War.

The evidence of the ruse perpetrated by the Bush-Cheney administration is now crystal clear, even though some dead-enders still cling to the hope of unearthing some WMD's buried in the desert sands. There were none. There were no nukes either. No uranium from Africa. No aluminum tubes for enrichment. No al-Qaeda connection. No threat of a mushroom cloud.

Here's a major clue and a quite frightening one that McCain intends to continue the Bush-Neocon policies in Iraq and the Middle East. Yesterday President Bush said: "there is “no doubt” in his mind that presumptive Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) is a “true conservative.” “I know his convictions. I know the principles that drive him,” Bush said in an interview with Fox News Sunday, adding, “Look, he’s very strong on national defense. He’s tough fiscally. He believes that tax cuts ought to be permanent. He’s pro-life. I mean…his principles are sound and solid as far as I’m concerned.”

Bush wants to pass the war torch to McCain and he will willingly keep the fires burning.

It was a ruse, a con-game, thought up by neocons with a skewed world vision. Yet, McCain bought it all, every scene in the unfolding skit. He still does. He thinks that by continuing the war [and more wars] that he will be making America safe. He is terribly misguided and those who embrace his warmongering policies are surely uneducated and misguided as well.

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