Isaiah 5:20

Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!

ELECTION 2008
Pelosi's abortion theology 'mangles' Christian teaching
Catholic House members say she 'denigrates common faith'

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Posted: August 27, 2008 11:50 pm Eastern By Bob Unruh ©2008 WorldNetDaily

DENVER House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's abortion theology remains under attack, with Catholic members of Congress writing her to castigate her re-interpretation of church teachings and a priest on the EWTN network condemning her for a perspective in which, he believes, she would bomb a city full of innocent people.

WND reported earlier when the Denver Catholic archbishop, Charles Chaput, said Pelosi and those who claim abortion can be reconciled with the Christian faith simply don't know Christianity.

The issue is hitting hard at the Democratic Party as it holds its 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver this week to nominate Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, an ardent abortion proponent who has gone beyond the desires of even the National Abortion Rights Action League in advocating for the controversial procedure. In fact, as a state lawmaker in Illinois, he declined to support a requirement that an abortionist provide necessary medical services to a baby who survives an abortion, because it would be a burden on the abortionist.

[MORE]

It can happen here and it is.

NYPD PLAN TO TRACK MILLIONS OF LAW-ABIDING PEOPLE IS AN ASSAULT ON PRIVACY RIGHTS (New York Civil Liberties Union)
The New York police department's (NYPD) plan to photograph and track every vehicle entering Manhattan and then keep data on each vehicle in a database for an undisclosed period of time is an attack on New Yorkers' right to privacy, said representatives from the New York Civil Liberties Union.
"The NYPD's latest plan to track and monitor the movements of millions of law-abiding people is an assault on this country's historical respect for the right to privacy and the freedom to be left alone," said NYCLU Executive Director Donna Lieberman. "That this is happening without public debate, and that elected officials have had no opportunity to study this program is even more alarming."
The NYCLU is currently pursuing a freedom of information request filed last fall with the NYPD and the Department of Homeland Security regarding a Ring of Steel-style program to set up thousands of surveillance cameras in lower Manhattan. Both government bodies have resisted transparency and have repeatedly refused to allow any information about the system to be reviewed.

Source: nyclu.org (8-12-08) MORE

More Brazen Electioneering

Executive privilegeshowdown looms for Congress, White House
WASHINGTON -- Congress and the Bush administration headed for a preelection showdown Wednesday over the issue of executive privilege, with House Democrats scheduling a hearing that would put a key former administration figure under oath and the Justice Department mapping a last-ditch court appeal.
Justice lawyers said they would go to court as soon as today to block a ruling by U.S. District Judge John D. Bates that forces the White House to cooperate with a congressional investigation into the politically charged firing of nine U.S. attorneys in 2006. The move came as Democrats pushed ahead with that investigation.
Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Michigan), the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, announced that he was calling former White House counsel Harriet E. Miers to appear before the committee on September 11 to answer questions about her role in the firings. Conyers also set a September 4 deadline for the administration to turn over White House documents concerning the firings as well as a log detailing what documents it was withholding because of security concerns and why.
Legal experts said they doubted that the Justice Department would succeed in persuading the federal appeals court in Washington to intervene in the matter at this point. But it was also unclear what questions Miers would choose to answer if she took the witness chair next month, and that raised the possibility of further legal wrangling.
MORE

What the NWO boys are up to in Georgia

Excellent Analysis from the Centre for Research on Globalisation

Putin Walks into a Trap

by Mike Whitney
Global Research, August 14, 2008

The American-armed and trained Georgian army swarmed into South Ossetia last Thursday, killing an estimated 2,000 civilians, sending 40,000 South Ossetians fleeing over the Russian border, and destroying much of the capital, Tskhinvali. The attack was unprovoked and took place a full 24 hours before even ONE Russian soldier set foot in South Ossetia. Nevertheless, the vast majority of Americans still believe that the Russian army invaded Georgian territory first. The BBC, AP, NPR, the New York Times and the rest of the establishment media has consistently and deliberately misled its readers into believing that the violence in South Ossetia was initiated by the Kremlin. Let's be clear, it wasn't. In truth, there is NO dispute about the facts except among the people who rely the western press for their information. Despite its steady loss of credibility, the corporate media continues to operate as the propaganda-arm of the Pentagon.
...

Russia deployed its tanks and troops to South Ossetia to save the lives of civilians and to reestablish the peace. Period. It has no interest in annexing the former-Soviet country or in expanding its present borders. Now that the Georgian army has been routed, Russian president Medvedev and Prime Minister Putin have expressed a willingness to settle the dispute through normal diplomatic channels at the United Nations. Neither leader is under any illusions about Washington's involvement in the hostilities. They know that Georgian President Mikail Saakashvili is an American stooge who came to power in a CIA-backed coup, the so-called "Rose Revolution", and would never order a major military operation without explicit instructions from his White House puppetmasters. Most likely, the orders to invade came directly from the office of the Vice President, Dick Cheney.

The Georgian army had no chance of winning a war with Russia or any intention of occupying the territory they captured. The real aim was to lure the Russian army into a trap. US planners hope to do what they did so skillfully in Afghanistan; lure their Russian prey into a long and bloody Chechnya-type fiasco that will pit their Russia troops against guerrilla forces armed and trained by US military and intelligence agencies. The war will be waged in the name of liberating Georgia from Russian imperialism and stopping Putin from achieving his alleged ambition to control critical western-owned pipelines around the Caspian Basin. Much of this "think tank" generated narrative has already appeared in the mainstream media or been articulated by American political elites. Meanwhile, the fighting in the Caucasus has drawn attention away from the US carrier groups located in or around the Persian Gulf presumably awaiting orders for the long-anticipated confrontation with Iran. Was that the real motive behind the invasion in South Ossetia; to create a strategic diversion for a larger war in the Middle East?

In June, former foreign policy adviser to President Jimmy Carter, Zbigniew Brzezinski, presented the basic storyline that would be used against Russia two full months before the Georgian invasion of South Ossetia. The article appeared on the Kavkazcenter web site. Brzezinski said the United States witnessed "cases of possible threats by Russia, directed at Georgia with the intention of taking control over the Baku-Ceyhan pipeline".

Brzezinski: "Russia actively tends to isolate the Central Asian region from direct access to world economy, especially to energy supplies..If Georgia government is destabilized, western access to Baku, Caspian Sea and further will be limited". http://www.kavkazcenter.com/eng/content/2008/06/13/9798.shtml

Nonsense. Neither Putin nor newly-elected president Dmitry Medvedev have any such intention. It is absurd to think that Russia, having extracted itself from two pointless wars in Chechnya and Afghanistan, and after years of grinding poverty and social unrest following the fall of the Soviet state, would choose to wage an energy war with the nuclear-armed US military. That would be complete madness. Brzezinski's speculation is part of broader narrative that's been crafted for the western media to provide a rationale for upcoming aggression against Russia. Brzezinski is not only the architect of the mujahadin-led campaign against Russia in Afghanistan in the 1980s, but also, the author of "The Grand Chessboard--American Primacy and it's Geostrategic Imperatives", the operating theory behind the war on terror which involves massive US intervention in Central Asia to control vital resources, fragment Russia, and surround manufacturing giant, China.

"The Grand Chessboard" it is the 21st century's version of the Great Game. The book begins with this revealing statement:

"Ever since the continents started interacting politically, some five hundred years ago, Eurasia has been the center of world power.....The key to controlling Eurasia, says Brzezinski, is controlling the Central Asian Republics."

This is the heart-and-soul of the war on terror. The real braintrust behind "neverending conflict" was actually focussed on Central Asia. It was the pro-Israeli crowd in the Republican Party that pulled the old switcheroo and refocussed on the Middle East rather than Eurasia. Now, powerful members of the US foreign policy establishment (Brzezinski, Albright, Holbrooke) have regrouped behind the populist "cardboard" presidential candidate Barak Obama and are preparing to redirect America's war efforts to the Asian theater. Obama offers voters a choice of wars not a choice against war. Here is the whole article.

Georgia Crisis Analysed

Asia Times Online
Aug 13, 2008
Russia Marks Its Red Lines

By F William Engdahl

What is playing out in the Caucasus is being reported in the United States media in an alarmingly misleading light, making Moscow appear the lone aggressor after it sent troops into the breakaway Georgian region of South Ossetia following a Georgian offensive on that territory.

The question is whether President George W Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney are encouraging Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili to force the next US president to back the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) military agenda of the current Bush administration. Washington may have badly misjudged the possibilities, as it did in Iraq, and there are even possible nuclear consequences.
Read the Rest - highly recommended

Kosovo Chickens

The EU and the US will argue that there is no parallel to be drawn between Kosovo and the Georgian breakaway regions. But that is not how much of the world, including China, South Africa and Indonesia, see it. And it is not how Russia sees it. The first chickens of Kosovo's independence are coming home to roost.

from the NewStatesman

Superpower swoop

Misha Glenny

Published 14 August 2008

What Russia and America are really doing in Georgia and who set the trap? Vladimir Putin and his thuggish FSB pals or Dick Cheney and his equally unflappable neocon friends?

Georgia's decision to seize large parts of Tskhinvali, the capital of the breakaway region of South Ossetia, on the evening of 7 August was a disastrous political miscalculation, even in an era that is increasingly defined by spectacularly poor judgement.

Within three days of the assault, Russian forces had responded by in effect neutralising Georgia's military capacity, which President Mikhail Saakashvili's government in Tbilisi had spent several years and considerable sums of money building up.

Clearly, Russia has been goading and provoking the Georgian government for several years into making the big mistake. The parastates of Abkhazia and, above all, South Ossetia, have been under the control of a toxic coalition of criminals and both former and serving FSB officers.
Read the Rest

He's Got It

Funmurphys: the Blog The Triumph of Hope over Experience

Christian Libertarian

By Kevin Murphy on July 16, 2004 1:28 PM

Christian Libertarian - that's how Josh Claybourn describes himself. I don't know if I'd go that far, but I think that Christianity with its emphasis on faith is more libertarian than works (following the law) based religions.

What are the beliefs of Christianity (at least from my point of view) on law? Well, God does have laws. There are laws you have no choice about -- the physical laws that govern the universe. They are the same everywhere and universally obeyed by all of creation without any possible choice.

But there are also other laws, where we do have choice. Let's call them moral laws, and we can keep them, or we can break them. Up to this point, some other faiths would be agreeing with me. But here's where Christianity comes in -- nobody follows moral laws perfectly. We are all sinners is a basic Christian teaching. And what is the penalty for sin? Death. Now I happen to think that there are immediate consequences for vice and virtue, and there are defered consequences. But what's clear is, under God's law, every person on the planet has transgressed against God's moral laws, and the penalty for doing so is death. I see dead people, and they don't even realize they are dead.

So if we were to institute God's law as our own, we'd have to execute everybody on the planet. So really, what would be the point? And quite frankly, it seems awfully presumptious to pre-empt God. Since no man is saved by the law, why then should we try? And what would our plan of salvation be?

What then should our laws be based upon? Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of happiness is a good start. Human laws should be for our own use, not our own good. If God does not compel good, how and why should we, especially since our means are so much less. And as our means are so much less, so too should our laws be.

To be sure, there is overlap between God's moral law and what should be human laws - thou shalt not murder comes to mind. But who's going to enforce thou shalt not covet your neighbor's spouse or stuff? Or love God with all your heart, or love your neighbor as yourself? Jesus called out the last two as the wellsprings of all the commandments, and is there any real way to humanly enforce these laws?

Now don't take this to mean that I don't think following God's laws isn't important -- I just think that is between ourselves and God, with the help of our fellow children in Christ, not the local constable and magistrate. The law doesn't save. Repeat that after me: the law doesn't save -- Jesus saves. It's okay if humans don't outlaw everything that God does. By all means we should never shirk declaring what's right and what's wrong nor should we lose sight of the power of our example.

Peak-Oil shmeek oil?

[is peak oil a scam?] (Bob Chapman)
Vast unexploited oil reserves? An economic threat from too much oil? Dark pools of liquidity, threats of hyperinflation from unsound economy and Fed practices, remembering the lessons from The Great Depression, reactionary measures to protect the dollar ... An examination of a crisis scenario

Excerpt:
Lindsey Williams, who has been an ordained Baptist minister for 28 years, went to Alaska in 1971 as a missionary. The Transalaska oil pipeline began its construction phase in 1974, and because of his concern for the spiritual welfare of the "pipeliners," Mr. Williams volunteered to serve as Chaplain on the pipeline, with the subsequent full support of the Alyeska Pipeline Company. Because of the executive status accorded to him as Chaplain, he was given access to the information that is documented in his book, 'The Energy Non-Crisis', which shows that peak oil is a scam because our domestic reserves in the North Slope of Alaska alone are at least as large as those in Saudi Arabia and are potentially large enough to power the US with domestic oil for two centuries. Recently this year, due to the sensitive nature of his book, Mr. Williams' life was threatened and he was forced to shut down his web-site and stop selling his books and CDs. At the urging of Dr. Stanley Monteith of Radio Liberty, he called back the same oil executive who had warned him about the danger he would be in if he continued to disseminate certain information to ask if in fact there was any information that he could convey to the public without upsetting the powers that be . . . .

Basically, Mr. Williams was told that over the next twelve months, from mid-2008 to mid-2009, (1) news of super giant oil fields, ready to produce, would be announced for two locations, in the Northern Slopes of Russia and in Indonesia, which oil fields would together contain more oil reserves than the entire Middle East; (2) that this news would drive oil prices down to $50/barrel; (3) that OPEC countries, especially in the Middle East, would be bankrupted by this price decrease; (4) that this would cause the financing of our foreign trade and current account deficits through purchases of treasury paper by foreign nations with their surplus oil profits to collapse, leading to the collapse of the dollar; (5) that the collapse of the dollar would cause unprecedented financial strife and turmoil in the US, and that it would take many years for the US to recover from this financial debacle; (6) that they (big oil) support John McCain for President; and (7) that US domestic oil reserves would never be tapped, and that any legislation which might allow domestic reserves to be tapped would not be allowed to pass, leaving the US dependent on foreign oil forever.

News of the Russian oil field has been announced just as predicted, but whether the rest happens as stated above remains to be seen. Nevertheless, many of these revelations seem quite feasible, so we thought we would comment on how these revelations might play out under the current financial scenario.

Source: theinternationalforecaster.com (7-26-08) MORE

And then read this:

Why should Ron Paul Republicans "get with the program" when they are slammed with these kinds of shenanigans?

Ron Paul followers pose political danger for McCain

LAS VEGAS (AP) — The outsider, Internet-fueled movement led by feisty Republican congressman Ron Paul remains afloat even after John McCain's victory in the party's presidential primaries.

In the libertarian-leaning West, where Paul's message of distrust of the federal government, opposition to the Iraq war and ardent individualism played particularly well, there is talk of Republicans straying from McCain. Libertarian candidate Bob Barr has emerged as a favorite alternative for Paul activists, followed by Constitutional Party candidate Chuck Baldwin.

...

"At the end of the day, Republicans are going to vote for John McCain. He's a Western candidate who understands water issues, land issues. He's a fiscal conservative," said Rick Gorka, a campaign spokesman. "His message is appealing to a broad spectrum of voters."

There is little sign of that unification yet. In Nevada, state Republican officials abruptly shut down the state convention as a group of well-organized newcomers were poised to win delegates for Paul.

The group led by Paul supporters then held its own rogue convention and elected its own delegates. For its part, the state party could not get enough delegates to attend a second convention and appointed delegates by committee. A judge ruled against the Paul supporters when they filed suit. They now plan to file a challenge with the Republican National Committee.

Both groups are heading to the national convention in St. Paul, Minnesota, in early September.

"We're trying to say, 'Hey, you guys got to play by the rules, and if you don't, you'll face the consequences,"' said Wayne Terhune, a 57-year-old dentist in Sparks, Nevada, and a leading Paul activist in the state.

Even without Nevada, Paul will send at least a handful of delegates to the national convention. Outside the convention hall, his supporters have reserved a 15,000-seat basketball arena for a "mini-convention."

(Read the rest here.)

These Neocon drone/country club Republicans controlling the state parties have violated every party bylaw and election law they can think of to keep out Ron Paul supporters and keep there party as small and exclusive as possible. They are begging and pleading to lose -- and not just the Presidency. Are they really any better than the Democrats?

Furthermore

from michael zacharia, also on usatoday.com
The Republicans havent balanced a budget at the federal level in years even after having been the majority party in the House and Senate for the first 6 years of the Bush administration. Their candidates dont even talk about the issue, instead they joke about which country we are going to war over next, or pretend like they can solve the immigration issue by building one long fence. At least the Democrats will bust the budget on domestic priorities that matter to people here. There is no good reason for Paul supporters to support a moralizing, big government Republican party, when Libertarians are the ones who actually are making an argument for smaller government that promises more freedom and less wars.

Since he was so good at crashing planes ...

... Why note elect him POTUS!

This post on USAToday.com sums up our disgust pretty well:
The GOP would rather you like McCain, because he seems so solidly 'old school'...so wonderfully patriotic, after all he has been in Washington for 25 years...he was a pilot (logged a whole 20 hours of flying) during Vietnam. Well, here are some facts, since the GOP doesn't like to deal in those: McCain graduated from college at the BOTTOM of his class: 894th out of 899th. That alone makes it easy to see why he can't keep the factions and politics of the middle east strait when talks about them. It also explains why he says he doesn't know much about the economy...I certainly believe it! McCain on Family values: After returning from Vietnam, he finds that his wife has been disabled in a car crash. While still married and living with his 1st wife in 1979 he was, according to The New York Times, “aggressively courting a 25-year-old woman who was as beautiful as she was rich.” (McCain then divorced his wife, who had raised their three children alone while he was imprisoned in Vietnam, and launched his political career with his new wife’s family money.) McCain on the Economy: - In December 07 he said, "The issue of economics is not something I've understood as well as I should." - In January 08 he said, “I don’t believe we’re headed into a recession,” he said, “I believe the fundamentals of this economy are strong and I believe they will remain strong.” - In March 08 he said, "I will not play election year politics with the housing crisis," adding, "I have always been committed to the principle that it is not the duty of government to bail out and reward those who act irresponsibly, whether they are big banks or small borrowers." - Guess it's not his problem if thousands of Americans become homeless thanks to deregulations in the mortgage industry (which were supported by McCain). - In April 08 when asked about the state of the economy, "I’m very concerned about it, Neil. And obviously the way it’s been going up is just terrible. But I think psychologically � and a lot of our problems today, as you know, are psychological � the confidence, trust, the uncertainty about our economic future, ability to keep our own home."
- In April 08 when asked about why he supported the gas tax holiday, "This might give them a little psychological boost. Let’s have some straight talk, it’s not a huge amount of money" McCain on Taxation: - In 2001 he argued AGAINST Bush's tax cuts saying, "I cannot in good conscience support a tax cut in which so many of the benefits go to the most fortunate among us, at the expense of middle class Americans who most need tax relief." - In 2006 he said, "The tax cuts are now there, and voting to revoke them would have been to -- not to extend them would have meant a tax increase." Even tax-cutting advocates who cheered McCain's reversal could not help but call it what it was: "It's a big flip-flop," said conservative movement leader and president of Americans for Tax Reform Grover Norquist, "but I'm happy he flopped."

Your Military Industrial Complex at Work

Did the U.S. Army Arrange a 'Sweetheart' Deal to Sell Russian Helicopters to Iraq?

By Sharon Weinberger July 25, 2008 | 8:00:00 AM The Defense Department quietly gave a U.S. company a contract to provide 22 new Russian-made Mi-17 troop transport helicopters to the Iraqi military in a deal worth an eyebrow-raising $325 million, DANGER ROOM has learned.

Iraq's effort to re-equip its military has been marred with corruption, including a notorious plan to buy used Mi-17s from Poland in a deal that involved accusations of shoddy equipment and was eventually scrapped. This new Mi-17 contract, which involves Iraqi money routed through the Pentagon's foreign military sales process, was designed to avoid problems that occurred in the previous sale. But in an unusual move, the U.S. Army sole sourced the contract to ARINC, a Carlyle Group-owned company.

The deal, which was consummated earlier this year, may represent the highest price ever paid for the Russian-produced helicopters, which are sold by a number of brokers, as well as directly from the manufacturers in Russia.

Read the rest of the sorry story.

Sneaking Chemical Weapons in the Backdoor?

US weapons research is raising a stink

The US Army's XM1063 projectile is designed to be 'non-lethal' - but is it peaceful or hovering on the brink of illegality?

• David Hambling
• The Guardian,
• Thursday July 10 2008
• Article history

The XM1063 will use a 155m howitzer to deliver its non-lethal payload such as this one being fired in Iraq (Photograph: Patrick Baz/AFP

Is the XM1063 a stink bomb, a banana skin, or a bad trip? It's hard to know. XM1063 is the code name for the US army's new secret weapon which will "suppress" people without harming them, as well as stopping vehicles in an area 100m square. But is it a violation of chemical weapons treaties, or a welcome move towards less destructive warfare using non-lethal weapons?

Exactly how it works is classified, but we have established some details. The first part of the weapon is an artillery round - or as the army puts it, "a non-lethal personal suppression projectile" - fired from a 155mm howitzer, with a range of 28km. It scatters 152 small non-explosive submunitions over a 1-hectare area; as each parachutes down, it sprays a chemical agent. Development was overseen by the US Army's Armament Research, Development and Engineering Centre (Ardec).

A presentation by the makers, General Dynamics, says the XM1063 will "suppress, disperse or engage personnel" and "deny personnel access to, use of, or movement through a particular area, point or facility" (=see PDF).

Read more ...