Freetalk about USA culture: 25 new messages in 20 topics

The culture of the United States of America.

03/19/06 / 03/20/06 / 03/21/06 / 03/22/06 / 03/23/06 / 03/24/06 / 03/25/06 / 03/26/06 / 03/27/06 / 03/28/06 / 03/29/06 / 03/30/06 /

Thursday, March 30, 2006

25 new messages in 20 topics - digest ==>Read...

soc.culture.usa
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Today's topics:

* The Saga of the $257 Billion Joint Strike Fighter - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/b21683cec403a252
* Still an Iraq Optimist? You Might Just Be a Fanatic - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/540849c9d723e2f9
* Politicizing Foreign Aid: Bush Appointee Randall Tobias - 1 messages, 1
author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/c0afe244932370c1
* Immigration & White Racism: The Ghost of George Wallace - 1 messages, 1
author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/9c06cd95119c0c23
* UK: Faced with Major Protests, Condi Scrubs Mosque Visit - 1 messages, 1
author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/621e2ef9e70f6f89
* A War in Search of a Justification - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/f7088a43dda26dc2
* Puerto Rican Rep in Cuba Slams US - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/b004fba93a13a97e
* Afgh: Blitz by Taliban Sparks Bloodiest Fighting in Months - 1 messages, 1
author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/b9291e022ab11339
* The game played by big boys...in Asia. - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/3873fe4998efd80d
* Illegals/Amnesty = Modern Day Slavery in the U.S. - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/5f29a1268a937658
* WITH THE RESISTANCE OF PALESTINE AND IRAQ.... - 4 messages, 2 authors
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/48db0384115e9156
* DOWN WITH ZIONISM,IMPERIALISM AND COLONIALISM - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/4703cf02ee883a20
* DICTATOR IN CHIEF, CAN YOU AFFORD THE ARSEHOLE? - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/b4cc564b8f6709c5
* SECURING THE KIKE REALM - 2 messages, 2 authors
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/8dd1ed5cdcb29a1b
* Did Anyone Notice? - 2 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/d42aac831cfa7f17
* Ms. Jihad U - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/42e5f302eb9f0c32
* PATSY, OR JUST A STUPID IDIOT! - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/9115f21d613418cd
* NO FREE RIDE ANY MORE! - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/66b2a96e6aac1929
* BHARATIYA OFFICIAL DEFENDS DEAL WITH U.S. - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/5646d4faf621319e
* IRAN PLANS 'WAR GAMES' IN THE PERSIAN GULF........ - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/42726506b667902e

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TOPIC: The Saga of the $257 Billion Joint Strike Fighter
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/b21683cec403a252
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== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Fri, Mar 31 2006 4:56 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

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The Saga of the $257 Billion Joint Strike Fighter

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

CounterPunch - March 30, 2006
http://www.counterpunch.org/wheeler03302006.html

The Saga of the Joint Strike Fighter

Just Because It's High Tech and Costs $257 Billion Doesn't Mean It Works

By WINSLOW T. WHEELER

Remember America's P-39 "Aircobra" or the all-purpose Messerschmitt 210
Hornisse (Me-210 Hornet) of World War II? Or perhaps the U.S. Air Force's
expensive all-weather F-89 Scorpion of 1950?

Everyone should. They carry important lessons. Each was an advanced
technology combat aircraft, and the Bell P-39 was even low cost, relatively
speaking. But each was also a dismal failure.

The P-39 was almost helpless against the Japanese Zero; the Me-210 -
produced in considerable numbers was such a disaster that German pilots
refused to fly it, and it was fobbed off onto Germany's "allies." The F-89
didn't even make it into the air combat of the Korean war. That a combat
aircraft is "high tech" or even that it is expensive is no guaranty it will
be a success in combat.

In the 1970s, the Air Force started to buy large numbers of the low cost
F-16 to compliment the high cost F-15. Both designs were highly successful,
but neither were what the Air Force initially wanted. The subject of
internal bureaucratic wars, both designs, especially the F-16, were forced
on the Air Force by a small group that became known as the "fighter mafia."
The aircrafts' extraordinary performance paid off, both in combat and in the
Pentagon bureaucracy. Today the Defense Department (DOD) seeks to replicate
the F-15/F-16 experience with small numbers of the high cost F-22 and large
numbers of the low cost Joint Strike Fighter (also designated F-35).

It is unclear, however, whether the F-22/F-35 duo comes from the tradition
of the F-15/F-16 or the P-39 and the F-89. The F-22 is already the subject
of considerable controversy, and it appears the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter
may be in for the same.

A recent report on the F-35 from the Government Accountability Office (GAO)
tells a foreboding story. Begun in 1996, the program is already showing cost
increases, production reductions, and schedule delays. Worse, the ongoing
acquisition plan is to ignore the highly successful "fly before you buy"
experience with the F-16 and to test the F-35 only well after full
production has begun.

According to the GAO report, the current DOD plan is to spend $257 billion
to buy 2,443 aircraft with the first aircraft becoming operational in 2013.
This plan is already costing 84 percent more in the development phase than
originally planned; program acquisition costs per aircraft are up 28
percent, and it is all taking five years longer than first thought.
Moreover, the DOD plan has already reduced the number of aircraft to be
produced by 535 aircraft. The report also notes that there appears to be
little promise that the current acquisition plan will not experience even
more cost overruns, schedule delays, and production reductions.

Nor is there any promise that F-35 performance will be what was originally
promised. In fact, no one will know until well after production has begun.
Flight testing will not begin until four years after production starts. By
2013 when initial operational testing is finally complete, 424 aircraft will
have been produced. As so often happens with such "concurrent" acquisition
programs, when the inevitable technical problems are discovered, there will
be additional delays and costs to address them.

The GAO recommends that DOD delay most production until after sufficient
testing has shown the design can perform at just a basic level, but the
Pentagon has rejected that modest, even tentative, recommendation. The
unfortunate result would seem almost inevitable.

[Winslow T. Wheeler is the Director of the Straus Military Reform Project at
the Center for Defense Information. He spent 31 years working for US
Senators from both parties and the Government Accountability Office. He
contributed an essay on the defense budget to CounterPunch's new book:
Dime's Worth of Difference. Wheeler's new book, "The Wastrels of Defense:
How Congress Sabotages U.S. Security," is published by the Naval Institute
Press.]

*
================================================================
NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems
Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us
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TOPIC: Still an Iraq Optimist? You Might Just Be a Fanatic
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/540849c9d723e2f9
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Fri, Mar 31 2006 4:56 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

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Still an Iraq Optimist? You Might Just Be a Fanatic

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

The Huffington Post via Progreso Weekly - Mar 30, 2006
http://www.progresoweekly.com/index.php?progreso=Arianna_Huffington&otherweek=1143698400

Still optimistic about Iraq? You just might be a fanatic

By Arianna Huffington

Before the president delivered his sunny-side-up speech on Iraq this
week, a senior White House official offered a preview: "With this
speech the president says, 'Let me tell you why I'm so positive.'"
Hearing that, I expected the speech to be one of the shortest on
record: "I'm so positive because I'm a stone-cold fanatic. And God
bless America."

It was nearly three years ago that I offered the only possible
explanation for the ever-widening chasm between what the White House
claims is true and what is actually true: We are being governed by a
gang of out and out fanatics.

As I put it in a May 2003 column, just weeks after the president's
upbeat - and wildly inaccurate - Mission Accomplished moment:

"The defining trait of the fanatic - be it a Marxist, a fascist, or,
gulp, a Wolfowitz - is the utter refusal to allow anything as piddling
as evidence to get in the way of an unshakable belief. Bush and his
fellow fanatics are the political equivalent of those yogis who can
hold their breath and go without air for hours. Such is their mental
control, they can go without truth for, well, years. Because, in their
minds, they're always right. Oopso facto."

This idea formed the basis for my last book, "Fanatics and Fools" (the
Fools being the enablers in the Democratic Party). And Bush and
Cheney's statements around the third anniversary of the invasion of
Iraq have only reinforced my diagnosis: This administration is teeming
with zealots for whom evidence is little more than an obstacle on
their chosen course.

This evidence-be-damned fanaticism has been front and center as the
White House tries to put a positive spin on what the president called
"the beginning of the liberation of Iraq." Which is kind of like
saying that my wedding was the beginning of my divorce.

As promised, the president did indeed use [last week's] speech to
explain his seemingly delusional optimism on Iraq. But instead of
opting for my direct, one-line explanation, the president offered a
very long story about the city of Tal Afar - which he called "a
concrete example of progress in Iraq."

Trouble is, after going on and on and on about the significance of Tal
Afar, he then turned around and admitted it really wasn't much of an
example at all: "I wish I could tell you that the progress made in Tal
Afar is the same in every part of Iraq. It is not." So it turns out
that Tal Afar is not an example but an anomaly.

But why quibble over details? The president admitted "the situation on
the ground remains tense," but refused to backtrack from his Sunday
claim: "I'm encouraged by the progress." Nothing like 15 more bodies
being discovered around the capital to give these guys a confidence
boost.

But Bush's fanaticism was mild compared to Cheney's, who must have
devoured the collected works of Norman Vincent Peale before hitting
"Face the Nation" on Sunday.

"I think we are going to succeed in Iraq," he told Bob Schieffer. "I
think the evidence is overwhelming." As overwhelming, Mr. Vice
President, as the proof that Saddam had reconstituted his nuclear
program or that Mohammed Atta had met with an Iraq intelligence
officer in Prague?

Cheney, usually the administration's go-to guy on gloom and doom,
managed to stay positive even when reminded of his tragically
erroneous predictions that U.S. forces would be "greeted as
liberators" and that the insurgency was in its "last throes."

True to fanatical form, Cheney stuck to his guns (oops, I forgot the
Political Satirist Association's voluntary 60-day moratorium on Cheney
firearms references - my bad). Who else but a fanatic could claim, as
the VP did, that those fantasy-based assessments were "basically
accurate and reflect reality"? So let's review: In the fanatics'
lexicon, dead wrong equals "basically accurate" and delusional equals
"reflect reality."

Cheney also made the startling claim, with as straight a face as his
crooked mouth would allow, that when it comes to Iraq, "the facts are
pretty straightforward." Indeed they are: over 2,300 U.S. dead, over
17,000 U.S. wounded, a minimum of 33,000 dead Iraqi civilians, a
sputtering reconstruction, soaring Iraqi unemployment, and
lower-than-promised levels of fresh water, electricity and oil
production.

As he said, "the evidence is overwhelming."

Unfortunately for the White House fanatics, Operation Rose Colored
Glasses coincided with the far darker assessment of Ayad Allawi, who
said Iraq is nearing a "point of no return": "We are in a civil war."

Gen. Casey begged to differ, telling CNN: "We're a long way from civil
war." But in 2004, President Bush considered the then-prime minister's
credibility on Iraq unimpeachable: "He's a brave, brave man. ...You
can't change the dynamics on the ground if you've criticized the brave
leader of Iraq."

So let's give the final word to this brave, brave man: "We are losing
each day, as an average, 50 to 60 people through the country, if not
more. If this is not civil war, then God knows what civil war is."

Perhaps The Almighty should pass the word on to the fanatic in the
Oval Office next time they speak.

© 2006 Arianna Huffington.
Distributed by Tribune Media Services, Inc.

*
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NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems
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TOPIC: Politicizing Foreign Aid: Bush Appointee Randall Tobias
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/c0afe244932370c1
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== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Fri, Mar 31 2006 4:56 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

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Politicizing Foreign Aid: Bush Appointee Randall Tobias

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

Progreso Weekly - Mar 30, 2006
http://www.progresoweekly.com/index.php?progreso=Engler&otherweek=1143698400

Politicizing aid

Can progressives in good conscience demand increased foreign aid
under the new Director of Foreign Assistance, Randall Tobias?

By Mark Engler

Americans concerned about global hunger, disease, and deprivation have
long argued that our country should take leadership in providing
development assistance to impoverished populations abroad. After 9/11,
even more citizens pointed to foreign aid as a means to create strong
international ties, promote democratic institutions, and build a safer
world. That the U.S. should catch up with European countries, which
provide much larger infusions of foreign aid relative to the size of
their economies, seemed like a reasonable and timely demand.

As it turns out, we might want to be careful what we wish for.
Currently, the Bush administration is overhauling the structures
through which the U.S. provides such assistance, and there are reasons
to fear that the changes will not be for the better. Under
the banner of "transformative diplomacy," Secretary of State
Condoleezza Rice is promising an aid program that is more overtly
politicized than ever - one tied less to the ethical imperatives of
alleviating poverty than to the White House's short-term political and
military objectives.

This month, the Senate has worked to confirm Randall Tobias as the new
administrator of the United States Agency for International
Development (USAID). Once promoted, Tobias, currently head of the
White House's Office of Global AIDS, will also be the first Director
of Foreign Assistance. This position is a deputy-level post at the
State Department that will report directly to Secretary Rice.

Along with the Tobias appointment, the administration is moving USAID
inside the State Department. The diverse programs that disperse some
$19 billion in foreign assistance each year will be consolidated under
the new director's supervision. Streamlining bureaucracy can be
a good thing, to be sure. But there are several problems with the
changes.

The first is that Tobias's record makes him the wrong man for the job
at USAID. Before joining the Bush administration, Tobias was a major
Republican campaign contributor who served as CEO of the
pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly & Co. There he worked to counter
demands for better access to generic AIDS drugs in the developing
world by lobbying for corporations' intellectual property rights.

As director of the Office of Global AIDS, Tobias received criticism
from groups ranging from Planned Parenthood to Human Rights Watch for
pushing a politically loaded, abstinence-based response to AIDS
prevention in Africa. According to guidelines issued by Tobias's
office, two-thirds of the prevention money channeled this year through
the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief must be directed to
abstinence and faithfulness programs. The guidelines, first reported
by the Baltimore Sun in December, have been publicized by the Center
for Health and Gender Equity, which campaigned against Tobias's
appointment.

In a March 2004 Congressional hearing, Tobias went so far as to
question the well-documented effectiveness of condoms in reducing
transmission of HIV. He repeated his claims the following month,
saying, "Statistics show that condoms have really not been very
effective." Such actions led The New York Times to write an editorial
about Tobias's promotion arguing that the ambassador "proved himself
unable to resist pressure to abandon proven AIDS prevention
strategies in favor of the abstinence programs supported by the
religious right."

Tobias's propensity for injecting an ideological agenda into
purportedly apolitical programs bodes ill for USAID. It may fit
nicely, though, with the Bush administration's larger goals for
restructuring our country's foreign assistance programs.

Since its creation during the Kennedy administration, USAID has
operated outside of direct State Department control. This allowed it
to pursue long-term development programs that were not necessarily
tied to the shifting geopolitical priorities of any one president. In
practice, of course, U.S. foreign assistance has always been
politicized. During the Cold War, aid was expressly deployed as part
of the fight against Soviet Communism. But the formal independence of
USAID helped the institution value its staff members' expertise in
development over their ideological fervor.

In consolidating USAID under the State Department, the Bush
administration is tying aid money to U.S. strategic interests in a far
more overt manner. This is part of a wider trend. As Oxfam America
argues, "[S]ince the attacks of September 11th there has been a
drastic shift in U.S. foreign assistance that has blurred the lines
traditionally separating development and humanitarian aid from
political and military action."

The paradigm of "transformative diplomacy," unveiled by Secretary Rice
in January, is the latest embodiment of this shift. It will include
the redeployment of U.S. diplomats from Washington and
European cities to countries in Asia and the Middle East. A main
thrust of transformative diplomacy is a closer alignment of foreign
aid with political concerns. Development advocates worry that this
will mean that dollars for poverty reduction programs will become
conditional aid used as payback for allegiance from poorer governments
- - those countries sufficiently eager to join a "coalition of the
willing" or to sign a "free trade" pact.

It's not just outside critics who are concerned. In a meeting between
the Secretary of State and USAID staff in January, employees bombarded
Rice with questions about the political nature of the changes.
Reporting on the meeting, the Boston Globe quoted an anonymous USAID
official who at once defended Rice's strategic plans and confirmed the
worst fears of his co-workers: "He said the days when aid workers
could set their own agenda, without concern for national security
priorities, are over. 'That's a peacetime luxury,' he said. 'We're a
country at war.'"

Most Americans would be surprised to learn that, even in the best of
times, very little of the money we direct to "foreign assistance"
actually goes to health and education programs for the poor. The bulk
takes the form of military aid and economic assistance for states with
strategic importance, such as Egypt, Jordan, Iraq, Russia,
Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Colombia. In recent years, an increasing
amount of money has been shifted away from development and toward
programs aimed to "strengthen democracy," "encourage good governance,"
or "promote economic reform."

This type of rhetoric usually sounds fine, but the goals are vague and
easily politicized. They can allow aid to be put to nefarious ends. In
the case of the Millennium Challenge Account, one of the new programs
created by the Bush administration, a country's "openness to
international trade" is listed as one of the criteria used to select
aid recipients. Openness is measured using an index provided by the
arch-conservative Heritage Foundation. In Central America, leaders
quickly got the message; observers in the region widely believed that
receiving assistance from the account went hand in hand with
supporting the controversial Central American Free Trade Agreement
(CAFTA).

Likewise, the White House has often sold its reforms as efforts to
promote effectiveness in foreign assistance - undoubtedly a worthy
goal. But the case of AIDS funding, where the Bush administration went
on to ignore the scientific data about effective prevention, has cast
doubt on its sincerity. On a more general level, former Deputy
Assistant Secretary of State for Africa Carol Lancaster recently
observed to journalists that aid recipients such as Egypt that receive
money for political purposes know that the U.S. won't cut them off if
funds aren't used efficiently. Thus, they have little incentive to
stem corruption.

Working to address U.S. security concerns is not an illegitimate goal
of foreign assistance. However, the invasion of Iraq provides tragic
illustration that when the Bush administration pursues long pent-up
policy goals under guise of fighting terror, it can have disastrous
consequences - and in fact make the world a more dangerous place. It
gives us ample reason to be wary of aid programs used to buy or bully
allies, and to be skeptical of arrangements in which health and
education professionals must answer to White House political
operatives or Pentagon planners.

The Bush administration's current bureaucratic maneuvers do not mean
that Americans should give up on the idea of foreign aid altogether.
Real aid - long-term development assistance offered out of the belief
that societies with less poverty, disease, and inequality are more
likely to be healthy democracies - can contribute to creating a world
that is both safer and more just. That's what we want when we demand
more funding for poor countries. That's what too often went missing
when aid programs were politicized in the past. And that's what we're
even less likely to get under Randall Tobias.

[Mark Engler, a writer based in New York City, is an analyst with
Foreign Policy In Focus. He can be reached via the website
http://www.DemocracyUprising.com. Research assistance for this
article provided by Kate Griffiths. This article was first published
by MotherJones.com and appears with permission of the author.]

*
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TOPIC: Immigration & White Racism: The Ghost of George Wallace
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/9c06cd95119c0c23
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== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Fri, Mar 31 2006 4:57 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

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Immigration & White Racism: The Ghost of George Wallace

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

CounterPunch - March 30, 2006
http://www.counterpunch.org/santos03302006.html

Immigration and White Racism

The Ghost of George Wallace

By JUAN SANTOS

When the late Alabama Governor George Wallace--surrounded by armed
guards--stood on the steps of the University of Alabama to prevent a young
Black woman from entering the University of Alabama, he declared,
"Segregation today, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever!"

He also inspired a man who would later stand at the US / Mexican border,
armed to the teeth, to prevent other brown skinned people from entering
someplace he didn't want to them to enter--the United States.

A year ago Jim Gilchrist brought the mainstream media to a frenzy as they
reported on his Minuteman Project, a group of racist vigilantes who'd
traveled to the border--guns in hand--to stop the immigrant "invasion" and
the "re-conquest," they said, of the US Southwest by Mexicans.

Later, Gilchrist ran for the US House of Representatives as a member of
American Independent Party--the party founded by Wallace, the
arch-segregationist.

Like Wallace with the Dixiecrats of his day, Gilchrist has plenty of allies
in Congress--chief among them Colorado Representative Tom Tancredo, best
known for advocating that the US "take out" the Muslim holy city of Mecca
with a nuclear weapon. Tancredo is also known as the head of the
Congressional Immigration Reform Caucus, where, chillingly, he leads 91
members of Congress.

Tancredo and his crew don't like migrants--when the Denver Post profiled an
undocumented high school student with a 3.9 GPA, the Congressman tried to
have the boy deported.

Tancredo's Caucus is also credited with pushing through Congress the passage
of the now-notorious Sensenbrenner immigration bill--the one that, if
approved by the Senate, would make all people in the US who lack papers into
instant felons, a criminalized, stigmatized and profoundly vulnerable
under-caste.

The Congressman is consistent. After taking out Mecca, it would seem,
Tancredo holds that undocumented immigrants "need to be found before it is
too late. They're coming here to kill you, and you, and me, and my
grandchildren."

The Minutemen love Rep. Tancredo, and they do not leave the man to suffer
alone in his profound paranoia.

Minutemen co-leader Chris Simcox would have us believe that "we need the
National Guard to clean out all our cities and round them [migrants] up.
They are hard-core criminals. They have no problem slitting your throat and
taking your money or selling drugs to your kids or raping your daughters and
they are evil people."

The temptation, of course, is to dismiss these people as mere crackpots. The
problem with that analysis however, is clear. These people have power.
They've dominated and defined the debate on immigration for the past
year--at least until this past weekend, when well over a million--even two
million people--marched in opposition to their xenophobic and persecutorial
dementia.

Southern California activists have seen that racist dementia up close, time
and again, as we confronted the Minutemen and their allies in an effort to
keep things from ever getting this far.

We saw it in the eyes of breakaway Minuteman leader James Chase in the
darkness of the southern desert at midnight, he armed with a shotgun; we
with nothing but our bare hearts.

We saw it in the eyes of Minuteman supporter Hal Netkin as he slammed his
car into a crowd of mostly Chicano protestors as Jim Gilchrist addressed the
California Coalition for Immigration Reform. Gilchrist joined the Coalition,
which has been identified as a racist hate group by the Southern Poverty Law
Center.

Painted as American a hero by the likes of California Governor Arnold
Schwarzenegger, Gilchrist has been accused by a former campaign volunteer of
integrating Nazi activists into his campaign for Congress.

He lost the special election, despite his endorsement by Sensenbrenner ally
Tancredo.

But he put fear into Republican politicians--fear that incumbents would face
vote draining, immigrant bashing third party candidates in November if they
didn't take a hard right line against migrants.

They feared Gilchrist sympathizers like the rightist California group Save
Our State, which has regularly drawn organized Nazis to their protests, and
which uses the exact rhetoric used by open white nationalists and
supremacists--such as calling Mexican culture a "cesspool."

The corporate media, informed time and again of Nazi, white nationalist and
militia connections to the anti-migrant movement, has continued to paint the
anti-migrants as part of a mainstream. Gilchrist himself has claimed he has
"240 million" supporters, despite the fact that the anti-immigrant movement
as a whole could field only 700 activists for its "National Day of Protest"
this year. They were outnumbered 10 to 1 wherever they turned across the
country.

Even so, Tancredo, Sensenbrenner and the extreme, racist, right wing
elements they represent were on the verge of a major legislative victory.
They were so close they could taste it.

Until Sunday.

Until La Gran Marcha in Los Angeles.

Then their dominance cracked.

They were on the verge of a walled off country. On the verge of migrants
hunted down, rounded up by La Migra and the police--of brown skinned people
disappearing in the streets and penned in concentration camps they call
"detention centers." They were on the verge of passing a cruel law that
would make all migrants without papers felons and make all Brown people
suspects in a hostile nation. They were on the verge of a new ethnic
cleansing of America.

And even though the mass protests of recent days have deeply shaken them,
they still might win.

Sensenbrenner says he's not intimidated.

Gilchrist, of course, is promising his followers "absolute" victory.

He says the things more seasoned power brokers won't say. Although they're
on the same side, he says the Sensenbrenner bill doesn't go far enough. He
wants a wall from sea to sea. He wants the National Guard at the border.

He called the families who marched together "throngs of illegal alien
bullies" and dubbed the mass demonstrations for basic human rights a
"classic insurrection." He pledges to stand, "stoically unmoved"--one might
imagine like George Wallace on the steps of the university, facing down a
lone young African woman, armed thugs in tow.

The future will be decided in the days to come. As senators debate their
take on migrants, they will continue to put their fingers to the wind, to
see just how far they can go without profoundly alienating their middle
class allies and without provoking rebellion from below. Senate Republican
leader Bill Frist plans to let two bills be debated there, including his own
draconian take-off on the Sensenbrenner bill.

As the debate begins this week, at least 20 LA area high schools are
planning a massive walkout, on the birthday of Cesar Chavez. A national
network of migrant support groups will lay out a strategy for more vast
demonstrations like La Gran Marcha.

They must not stand alone. You must stand with them.

If you don't, the dream of George Wallace's ghost may yet come true--a
racist, even fascist USA. Today, tomorrow and forever.

[Juan Santos is editor of Mexica Tlahtolli, a Chicano and Native American
newspaper in Los Angeles.]

*
================================================================
NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems
Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us
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==============================================================================
TOPIC: UK: Faced with Major Protests, Condi Scrubs Mosque Visit
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/621e2ef9e70f6f89
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Fri, Mar 31 2006 4:57 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

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UK: Faced with Major Protests, Condi Scrubs Mosque Visit

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

[BBC World reported later on March 30 that Condi will NOT be going nezr
the Blackburn mosque, because of the uproar the plan caused.-NYTr]

Snowmail - Channel 4 News (UK) - Mar 30, 2006
http://www.channel4.com/news/snowmail/index.html

Condi's mosque trip cancelled

Anyone from Blackburn out there reading this? If so, have you got any handle
on where Condi Rice may or may not be going on her controversial visit
there? Plenty of anti-war protesters would like to deposit her down one of
the town's 4000 holes I'd imagine - but will they get anywhere near?

I mean any senior Bush administration official visiting anywhere in the UK
(or Europe probably) would be the subject of protest right now, but Jack
Straw's particularly proud of his patch and its large Muslim population. But
was there even a planned visit to a mosque? Was it cancelled? It's all
getting a bit Keystone Cops as we try to find out just where Ms Rice will be
going and what protests she'll encounter.

*
================================================================
NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems
Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us
339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org
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==============================================================================
TOPIC: A War in Search of a Justification
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/f7088a43dda26dc2
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Fri, Mar 31 2006 4:57 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

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A War in Search of a Justification

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

CounterPunch - March 30, 2006
http://www.counterpunch.org/frank03302006.html

Lots of Smokescreens, No Guns

A War in Search of a Justification

By JOSHUA FRANK

On March 20, the twits at FrontPageMag.com interviewed Lt. Gen. Tom
McInerney, a retired U.S. Air Force pilot, who stated without a doubt that
Saddam shipped WMD off to Syria on the eve of the Iraq invasion. McInerney
was referring to documents he believes prove that Saddam was hiding his
horrible weapons. Of the 600 documents that have been released to the public
thus far, none, I repeat none, say that Saddam shipped off his WMD to secret
hiding spots.

It is clear that McInerney, a Fox News (sic) commentator, and the FrontPage
conspiracy nuts are desperate to find evidence that WMD existed in Iraq
prior to the invasion three years ago. They are also hoping to uncover ties
between bin Laden and Saddam. Many of the documents they hope will uncover
these claims contain forgeries, rumors, and disinformation. In short, they
aren't the most reliable sources.

Nonetheless, here's an example of the hearsay propped up by McInerney:

"Yes, [Saddam shipped off WMD] to three locations in Syria and one in
Lebanon [Bekaa Valley] in the September-December 2002 time frame. This
information was provided by Jack Shaw, the former deputy undersecretary of
defense for international technology security. He charged that Saddam's
stockpiles of WMD were moved by a Russian Spetznatz team headed by Yevgeny
Primakov, the former Russian intelligence chief, who came to Iraq in
December 2002 to supervise the final cleanup."

I suppose if Jack Shaw says it's true, it must be. Right. Here's a guy who
in December 2002 released a report of Saddam's alleged crimes, but as Noam
Chomsky noted at the time,

"It was drawn almost entirely from the period of firm U.S.-UK support, a
fact overlooked with the usual display of moral integrity. The timing and
quality of the dossier raised many questions, but those aside, Straw failed
to provide an explanation for his very recent conversion to skepticism about
Saddam Hussein's good character and behavior."

On the flip side of the translation game, Saddam noted over and again that
Iraq had no WMD in 2002. In several of the documents now available on the
Web in English, Saddam Hussein is quoted as saying to his deputies:

"[The UN inspectors] destroyed everything and said, 'Iraq completed 95
percent of their commitment. We cooperated with the resolutions 100 percent
and you all know that, and the 5 percent they claim we have not executed
could take them 10 years to [verify]. Don't think for a minute that we still
have WMD. We have nothing."

McInerney and other war supporters have attempted to interpret the Arabic
material that has yet to be released in English. Letting the amateurs slug
it out is not likely to produce anything of quality or truth. Yet, many
conservative bloggers have tried to nail down Saddam's ties to bin Laden by
highlighting documents that seem to refer to a 1995 meeting between bin
Laden and an Iraqi intelligence officer in the Sudan. However, many
intelligence officials claim such documents must be taken with a grain of
salt. Conversations were recorded over the radio; others were only passed
along by secondhand sources but none have produced any direct link between
Saddam and a-Qaeda. Even so, a meeting between in the mid-1990s doesn't mean
Saddam had anything to do with 9/11, or that the two were in cahoots against
the U.S.

Besides, if a smoking gun did exist, wouldn't the Bushies be the first to
point it out? Why would they need an ex-fighter pilot on David Horowitz's
neocon site and a few right-wing bloggers to uncover the truth? As with most
of Bush's PR, the release of these documents is only meant to boost his
dismal poll numbers.

Searching out justifications for the Iraq invasion are all the war's backers
seem to have left. I guess they all failed to read David Kay's report on the
matter of WMD. Even Charles Duelfer, another war supporter like Kay who
sought Saddam's nonexistent arsenal and wrote a report about it, is
convinced Saddam didn't have squat even before the first bombs dropped in
2003.

Now, I think it is pretty simple (but obviously hard for the war supporters
to grasp): if Saddam didn't have WMD before the war began, then he didn't
have any WMD to ship off to Syria and hide. That means there was nothing to
destroy, either.

Nada. Zilch.

It's just more fabrications from the seekers of the nonexistent smoking gun.
The only thing smoking right now, however, is the war crowds' continued lies
and smoldering reputations.

[Joshua Frank edits the radical news blog www.BrickBurner.org and is the
author of Left Out! How Liberals Helped Reelect George W. Bush, published by
Common Courage Press (2005).]

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==============================================================================
TOPIC: Puerto Rican Rep in Cuba Slams US
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/b004fba93a13a97e
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Fri, Mar 31 2006 4:57 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

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Puerto Rican Rep in Cuba Slams US

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

Prensa Latina, Havana
http://www.plenglish.com

PR Representative in Cuba Slams US

Havana, March 29--Edwin Gonzalez, the Puerto Rican representative in Cuba of
the National Pro-Independence Hostosiano Movement (MINH) added to reiterated
denunciations of abuses by US federal agents against his country.

Cuba's local daily Juventud Rebelde quoted the activist as recalling that
hundreds of Puerto Ricans, summoned by the MINH, recently protested the
presence of the FBI, urging it to leave the country.

"We have been denouncing this for decades," affirmed Gonzalez, regarding the
repressive role the FBI has played in his country.

The country's indignation against Washington's outrages has multiplied after
the assassination of pro-independence leader Filiberto Ojeda, last September
23, and the aggression against journalists reporting a raid in Rio Piedras
locality last February 10, with the involvement of FBI forces, he noted.

For the first time, Puerto Rican authorities made a complaint to the US
Congress, demanding respect for national sovereignty and slamming White
House violations in the country.

*
================================================================
NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems
Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us
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==============================================================================
TOPIC: Afgh: Blitz by Taliban Sparks Bloodiest Fighting in Months
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/b9291e022ab11339
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Fri, Mar 31 2006 4:57 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

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Afgh: Blitz by Taliban Sparks Bloodiest Fighting in Months

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

AP via The Washington Post - Mar 30, 2006
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/29/AR2006032902191_pf.html

U.S. Troops Repel Blitz By Taliban

By Rahim Faiez
Associated Press

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan, March 29 -- Taliban fighters on Wednesday launched a
rare concerted attack on a base used by multinational forces in southern
Afghanistan, killing an American soldier and a Canadian soldier and sparking
fierce U.S.-led retaliation that killed 32 insurgents in the bloodiest
fighting in months.

Assaults by the radical Islamic militia have grown in intensity recently,
and the group has warned of a renewed offensive this year.

The most recent assault was directed at a remote forward operating base in
the Sangin district of Helmand province. A small contingent of American and
Canadian troops are stationed at the base with Afghan soldiers.

The violence began late Tuesday, when Taliban insurgents ambushed an Afghan
convoy as it returned to the base, killing eight Afghan soldiers, said Col.
Chris Vernon, a spokesman for the British military.

U.S. and British warplanes and helicopters were called in to provide air
support and a Canadian quick-reaction force was sent from Kandahar to the
base.

Early Wednesday, the base came under a "significant Taliban attack" that
killed the Canadian and American soldiers, Vernon said. At least five
coalition troops were wounded, including three Canadians and an American,
officials said.

Twelve Taliban fighters died in the attack, while 20 others were killed
after coalition aircraft and artillery fire forced them to flee into the
desert.

The U.S. military said that coalition troops who overrran a Taliban base in
Helmand found two "headquarters buildings" containing large caches of
weapons, bombs and ammunition. All were blown up, the military said.

"The capturing of these two compounds with boots on the ground produced
significant intelligence and allows us to continue to put pressure on the
enemy," U.S. Brig. Gen. Anthony J. Tata added.

The American's death brought to 223 the number of U.S. service members
killed in and around Afghanistan since the Taliban was driven from power in
2001. Twelve Canadians have been killed in the country since 2002, according
to the Canadian Press news agency.

In other violence, suspected Taliban rebels attacked a police checkpoint in
Kandahar late Tuesday, killing two officers and wounding four, according to
a police.

Also Tuesday, a roadside bomb killed six Afghan soldiers in Helmand
province. Four private security workers -- a Namibian and three Afghans --
were killed elsewhere in the south in attacks blamed on Taliban rebels.

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==============================================================================
TOPIC: The game played by big boys...in Asia.
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/3873fe4998efd80d
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Fri, Mar 31 2006 7:07 am
From: "J.Venning"

"Komin" <veakrin@gmail.com> wrote in message news:1143773239.244049.11380@j33g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
> Employees of the CIA was involved in Opium drug dealings during the
> Vietnam war ,
>
Don't you think they were also involved in the Opium War?
J.

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Illegals/Amnesty = Modern Day Slavery in the U.S.
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/5f29a1268a937658
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Thurs, Mar 30 2006 11:07 pm
From: Just another American

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1606530/posts?q=1&&page=151

In the old way of slavery, the slaves' 'wages' went to their
previous owners and their overseers.

They also went to their housing, meals, etc. Modern-day slavery
has eliminated the initial outlay for purchasing and transporting
your slaves. They now come to you.

The elimination of this initially large outlay has opened the doors
for smaller businesses to take advantage of modern slavery. No
longer are the financial resources of a large plantation required to
finance purchasing of new laborers when you've worked the old ones
to death.

Overhead such as housing and overseers has also been eliminated.
Slaves now 'care' for themselves, finding small shelters where they
pack as many of themselves inside as possible for shelter from the
elements so they can save drastically on housing costs.

This also gives modern day slave owners the formerly unheard of
ability (under the old pre-1860s slavery) to trade in their weaker,
sick, or lazy slaves for new ones who've just arrived at no expense.

This then allows modern-day slave owners to split up the money that
would have otherwise been spent on these ongoing expenses to pay
ridiculously small 'wages' to their slaves, who then send much of
that money home to keep their families alive.

And that, folks, is the replacement for the whip-wielding overseer.
Work for me, as long and hard as I tell you, for whatever I feel
like paying you, or your family will starve. In some ways, modern
slavery is worse than what we abolished 150 years ago.

--
"Be a good time to put up that border fence,
but Air Force One would just fly over it..."

==============================================================================
TOPIC: WITH THE RESISTANCE OF PALESTINE AND IRAQ....
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/48db0384115e9156
==============================================================================

== 1 of 4 ==
Date: Fri, Mar 31 2006 12:07 am
From: "serwad"

....AGAINST GLOBALIZATION, IMPERIALISM AND ZIONISM!
United against empire
Amira Howeidy

March 30, 2006

As Washington ratchets up tension against both Iran and Syria, the
Cairo fourth anti-war conference expressed its solidarity with the Iraqi and
Palestinian resistance and threw its weight behind Tehran's right to possess
nuclear weapons, reports Amira Howeidy

As Arab leaders didn't quite flock to the Sudanese capital this week
to attend the18th Arab Summit, international and Arab activists in Cairo
were winding up a vigorous anti-war conference that could not have
contrasted more with the diplomatic stands being taken in Khartoum.

The fourth Cairo Conference, held from 23 to 26 March in the Downtown
headquarters of the Press Syndicate, under the title 'With the resistance of
Palestine and Iraq... Against Globalisation, Imperialism and Zionism,' was
attended by Osama Hemdan, Hamas's senior political representative in
Lebanon, who sat on the podium throughout the four days of the conference.
He was joined by the group's Yemen representative Gamal Eissa, and later by
Attallah Abul-Sabh, fresh from his appointment as the minister of culture in
the Hamas government.

Meanwhile, in Khartoum, not a single member of the Hamas government
could be present. According to Hamas leader Mohamed Nazzal, their attendance
had been obstructed by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and his Fatah
faction, who postponed the formation of the cabinet to coincide with the
summit and thus prevent Hamas officials from attending.

So, while Hamas and other resistance or Islamic groups were absent
from the Sudanese capital, despite their growing influence, the Cairo
anti-war conference in its fourth year took on board regional developments,
most notably the rise of Islamists, since the occupation of Iraq in 2003.

In the halls of the Egyptian Press Syndicate posters of Gamal
Abdel-Nasser decorated walls and pillars. There was a brisk trade in anti-
globalisation T-shirts, Arabic "resistance" songs on CDs featuring Fayrouz,
Marcel Khalifa and Sheikh Imam, and images of Che Guevara. A few metres
away, socialist activists displayed posters and publications. The attendance
of dozens of representatives from Western anti- war and anti-globalisation
groups completed the international gathering.

The presence of many members of the Muslim Brotherhood, including
crowds of male and female university students, was striking not for its
conspicuousness, but because it appeared to fit in harmoniously in what was
an intensely Arab- Western leftist environment. And, both sides recognised
it.

Speaking to the audience during Sunday's closing session Greek
activist Petros Costantine, from Stop the War, said he was "very proud" to
be sitting among so many activists and politicians, "especially from Hamas
which, in Europe, is labeled a terrorist organisation".

"The real terrorists," he added, "are George Bush, Tony Blair and also
my own president, Karolos Papoulias. They are the coalition of the willing
who kill and loot Iraq. As a socialist it's very clear whose side I'm on."

The hall rocked with applause.

The consensus on the right of Palestinian and Iraqi resistance groups
to fight for the liberation of their occupied lands was reiterated by
speaker after speaker. It was unsurprising, therefore, that Hamas's Hemdan
should have emerged as the conference's star. His talks were repeatedly
interrupted by applause.

"We are still in the stage of national liberation in Palestine and we
are employing various tools for that purpose," he said. "Despite our
electoral gains, let me assure everyone that the philosophy of resistance is
still there and we will not allow the government to abort the resistance
project."

Speaking about Hamas's obstacle-strewn road to forming a cabinet and
international and Arab pressure on its leaders to recognise Israel and
abandon armed resistance, Hemdan said: "It's about time [Arab governments]
admitted that the peace process was a failure. And it is about time we
talked about Arab rights."

Hemdan was among several speakers to address the "new realities" on
the ground. Terrorism, resistance, aggression, the will of the international
community and globalisation were all terms, he said, that needed to be
redefined.

"As it stands today, when the Iraqi people resist the occupation they
are labeled terrorists, but when the US-led occupation kills 150,000 Iraqis
it is viewed as an attempt to spread peace and prosperity. When we in
Palestine defend ourselves and resist the occupation we are also terrorists,
but when Israel kills innocent citizens, demolishes their houses, steals
their land and transforms entire towns into prisons Israel continues to be
viewed as a victim."

His speech was met with another long round of applause.

Hemdan called on the conference to "defend" the resistance and relay
the message in Europe.

For William Cook, an anti-war activist and professor of English at the
University of La Verne in southern California, such redefinitions are
equally important for the American people who, he said, "do not understand
the truth of what is happening in Palestine and in Iraq". It is Hamas's
duty, he said, to expose Israel to the world "and call its bluff".

Solidarity with Iran was no less intensely felt, and US threats
against Iran occupied the second half of the discussions as speakers,
especially Western activists, called on the anti-war movement to place Iran
high on its agenda. They agreed that in the event of a US strike against
Iran the international anti-war movement would take to the streets in mass
demonstrations.

One participant, who described himself only as an "Egyptian citizen",
zealously argued that "although Iran doesn't have them we support its
possession of nuclear weapons. The Arabs as well should have nuclear weapons
to defend themselves from Israel's nuclear warheads."

British Trotskyist John Rose's brief talk on deliberate attempts to
inflame sectarian tension in Iraq also met with much applause

"Since when did the Western media pay attention to 'Sunni' and 'Shia'
affiliations?" he asked. Rose, of Jewish descent and the author of The Myths
of Zionism, added that he would not at all be surprised if American forces
were behind the massive explosion of the Samaraa Shia shrine in Iraq last
month.

An exercise in preaching to the converted? Not as far as many
participants were concerned. For them, the Cairo Conference has become more
than a platform to vent their anger. It has evolved, they say, into a
crucial meeting not only between North and South, but between a wide array
of political movements and ideologies which had little in common before they
were united by the American imperial project.

Hamas's Islamists, often the stars of the Cairo Conference, have also
moved on, said Essam Noaman, a pan-Arab former Lebanese MP and minister.
"Today the Islamists are the 'neo-nationalists'. They are Islamists and
nationalists at the same time."

"We are very keen on interacting with the international anti-war
movement," Hemdan told Al-Ahram Weekly. "We are all together in this as we
struggle against American hegemony, and maybe our European friends from the
anti- war movement can help us in our cause and relay our message better
than we can ourselves."

The conference's communiqué expressed full solidarity with the Iraqi
and Palestinian resistance and the Syrian and Iranian regimes and urged the
boycott of US and British products.

== 2 of 4 ==
Date: Thurs, Mar 30 2006 9:09 pm
From: "NefeshBarYochai"

I happened to have the experience of witnessing Salah Jafar's mother
having intercourse with several mammals that looked like small mean
possums. It was a hot day. I was hiking from Jerusalem to the Yam
Hamaleck. I noticed a Bedouin tent and of course being the inquisitive
person I am took a walk by the tent. There was a sign in front of the
tent in Arabic and English as follows "Stink of the Jafar Family."
Immediately I realized these were not normal Arab Bedouin but the kind
of Bedouin that make a home in there genitals for the strongest
Spirochete in the Middle East, The Salah Jafar Spirochete. The reason
the Salah Jafar Spirochete is so strong is because it was cultivated
between the legs of menstruating Poodle. That's correct Salah Jafar
boinked a Standard Poodle named Yasir. But the reason the Salah Jafar
Spirochete is so strong is because Salah Jafar boinked the Poodle in
the tucas being as filthy as his customs allow. So I observed in the
Salah Jafar Bedouin tent, Salah Jafar penetrating in the tucas of a
helpless brown and white goat with long black ears. I immediately throw
up and that's when his mother started screaming at me to leave, but
when she saw I was just temporally sick she lifted her black gown and
asked if I would pick the lice of her pussy and then screw her like a
pig. Why me being sick made her need me is beyond me? It was that
moment when I realized I was a born again Jew because I felt a
repugnance for her like any Jew feels for a person that has lice from
sleeping with non-human animals. I ignored her and started to walk away
when she pulled a small caliber pistol, maybe a 25 automatic and
ordered me to piss all over her. She said my urine would kill the lice
plus she enjoyed the smell of Jewish urine. So as I pissed all over
her when Salah Jafar asked me to shit in a plate so he could have some
dinner. So I shit in a plate and Salah dined on my fecal and I left
the area never to come back again. The moral of this story is: When an
Arab woman asks you to pick the lice off her pussy, if you shit your
trousers it is ok.

== 3 of 4 ==
Date: Fri, Mar 31 2006 12:13 am
From: "serwad"

United against empire
Amira Howeidy

March 30, 2006

The hall rocked with applause.

His speech was met with another long round of applause.

Hemdan called on the conference to "defend" the resistance and relay
the message in Europe.

British Trotskyist John Rose's brief talk on deliberate attempts to
inflame sectarian tension in Iraq also met with much applause

The conference's communiqué expressed full solidarity with the Iraqi
and Palestinian resistance and the Syrian and Iranian regimes and urged the
boycott of US and British products.

== 4 of 4 ==
Date: Thurs, Mar 30 2006 9:14 pm
From: "NefeshBarYochai"

==============================================================================
TOPIC: DOWN WITH ZIONISM,IMPERIALISM AND COLONIALISM
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/4703cf02ee883a20
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== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Fri, Mar 31 2006 12:09 am
From: "serwad"

United against empire
Amira Howeidy

March 30, 2006

The hall rocked with applause.

His speech was met with another long round of applause.

Hemdan called on the conference to "defend" the resistance and relay
the message in Europe.

British Trotskyist John Rose's brief talk on deliberate attempts to
inflame sectarian tension in Iraq also met with much applause

The conference's communiqué expressed full solidarity with the Iraqi
and Palestinian resistance and the Syrian and Iranian regimes and urged the
boycott of US and British products.

==============================================================================
TOPIC: DICTATOR IN CHIEF, CAN YOU AFFORD THE ARSEHOLE?
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/b4cc564b8f6709c5
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Thurs, Mar 30 2006 9:10 pm
From: "NefeshBarYochai"

==============================================================================
TOPIC: SECURING THE KIKE REALM
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/8dd1ed5cdcb29a1b
==============================================================================

== 1 of 2 ==
Date: Fri, Mar 31 2006 12:11 am
From: "serwad"

"BernardZ" <DontBother@NOSPAM.com> wrote in message
news:MPG.1e9698534f0637e39896ca@west.Usenet-News.net...
> In article <MsRWf.15204$g6.11008@bignews8.bellsouth.net>,
> serwad@bellsouth.net says...
>> Look at Palestine. Horror/chaos destabilizes people and it
>> takes generations to restabilize and build back a civilization.
>>
>
>
> Actually this is a true statement. When Israel ruled the region
when in the fuck did israel exist?

== 2 of 2 ==
Date: Thurs, Mar 30 2006 9:11 pm
From: "NefeshBarYochai"

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Did Anyone Notice?
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/d42aac831cfa7f17
==============================================================================

== 1 of 2 ==
Date: Thurs, Mar 30 2006 9:13 pm
From: "Jim E"

"Four-Way Windowpane" <sheet@blotter.org> wrote in message
news:3M_Wf.10521$tN3.10020@newssvr27.news.prodigy.net...
> Jim E wrote...
>> <Joseph> wrote in message
>> news:iokm2294p34u1p4s3ap9kq8cdt7kkdlkp0@4ax.com...
>>
>>>The mainstream (controlled) United States Media has been totally
>>>ignoring the ongoing fiasco in Iraq for the past two days. Not a
>>>single report concerning the war or its resulting casualties has
>>>been reported.
>>>
>>>Meanwhile, illegal Mexican immigration (an ongoing issue that has been
>>>confronting America for decades) is being used as a convenient
>>>diversionary subject to divert public attention away from Iraq.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Nothing of note happened in Iraq you simpering loser.
>> Check the services.
>
> Here's one with current U.S. casualties, an external link to
> Iraqi casualties, and daily updates on the constant bombings,
> beheadings, and other assorted chaos:
>
> http://icasualties.org/oif/
>
> They have a news archive with stories from all the major press
> services like AP and Reuters, complete with links. Here are
> just a few I selected occurring in the last week or so:
>
> March 30: Suicide bomb kills seven people in Baghdad
> March 30: Gunmen kill two civilians in Kirkuk
> March 30: Gunmen kill eight refinery workers in Iraq
> March 30: Three killed in Bakery shooting
> March 30: Oil pipeline destroyed near Kirkuk
> March 30: Police discover body of strangled man
> March 29: Two roadside bombs wound one in Baqubah
> March 29: Around 30-40 bodies are found in Baghdad streets daily
> March 29: Gunmen storm Iraq trading firm, killing 8
> March 28: Dean of Anbar University kidnapped in Ramadi
> March 28: Six police wounded near Kirkuk
> March 28: Three groups of Gunmen Kidnap 24 Iraqis
> March 27: Gunmen kidnap 16 Iraqi company employees
> March 27: Seven dead in Baghdad blast
> March 27: Five police wounded in Mosul grenade attack
> March 26: At least 69 Iraqis die in violence
> March 26: Three corpses found in al-Yarmouk neighborhood
> March 26: Bombing at Basra School Kills Student
> March 26: Writer jailed for defaming Kurdish leader in Iraq
> March 25: Two bodies found - shot, blindfolded and bound
> March 25: Ten bodies found in Baghdad
> March 24: Iraqi official survived assassination attempt
> March 24: Gummen kill four family members in Mahmudiya
> March 24: Five more bodies found in Sadr City
> March 24: Five killed in Khalis mosque blast
> March 24: Three power station employees shot dead in Taji
> March 24: Iraq attacks kill 3 police, 4 bakery workers
> March 23: Suicide bomber wounds eight police near Haditha
> March 23: Bomb outside Shi't mosque kills 6, wounds 20
> March 23: Car Bomb kills 15 at Baghdad anti-terrorism unit
> March 22: Iraqi Shi't pilgrims ambushed, 13 dead
>

Rags killing rags, so what.
These savages have been offing each other since that pedophile allah
shithead twisted their brains into useless monkey shit.

Jim E

== 2 of 2 ==
Date: Thurs, Mar 30 2006 9:14 pm
From: "Jim E"

"Salah Jafar" <codeman@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:KwRWf.13357$VL2.13233@trnddc04...
What the Jooz want, the Jooz get.
SJ

You would do well to remember that loser.

Jim E

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Ms. Jihad U
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/42e5f302eb9f0c32
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Fri, Mar 31 2006 12:14 am
From: "serwad"

"DoD" <thecats@ss.mil> wrote in message
news:pV%Wf.30419$iR1.19101@tornado.rdc-kc.rr.com...
>
> "Ya salama" <serwad@bellsouth.net> wrote in message
> news:1143750294.864854.137690@v46g2000cwv.googlegroups.com...
>>
>> DoD wrote:
>>> On January 15, 2002, the Student Government of the University of South
>>> Florida (USF) voted to support USF President Judy Genshaft's decision to
>>> fire Sami Al-Arian from his job as a professor with the school. The
>>> nearly
>>> decade-long investigation into Al-Arian's involvement with an overseas
>>> terrorist organization
>> WHY? WAS SAMI WORKING FOR THE TERRORIST THUGS OF ISRAEL?

THE ONLY TERRORISTS IN MIDDE EAST ARE ZIONAZI MURDERERS AND THIEVES!

==============================================================================
TOPIC: PATSY, OR JUST A STUPID IDIOT!
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/9115f21d613418cd
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Thurs, Mar 30 2006 9:15 pm
From: "Jim E"

"serwad" <serwad@bellsouth.net> wrote in message
news:czRWf.15271$g6.260@bignews8.bellsouth.net...

Plagiarized shit that alex couldn't write on his best day flushed.

This makes you look so stupid alex.

Jim E

==============================================================================
TOPIC: NO FREE RIDE ANY MORE!
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/66b2a96e6aac1929
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Thurs, Mar 30 2006 9:19 pm
From: "Jim E"

<clifffreeling@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1143728024.318163.101610@i40g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
>
> Jim E wrote:
>> "serwad" <serwad@bellsouth.net> wrote in message
>> news:zhJWf.1340$z7.378@bignews3.bellsouth.net...
>> >
>> > Three years ago an Israeli Army bulldozer -
>>
>> Squashed the liquid shit out of a islamizoid sympathizer.
>>
>> COOL !!
>
> Forty bucks says you eat boogers.
>

Alzheimer's reversion to kindergarten insults?
Pathetic.

Jim E

==============================================================================
TOPIC: BHARATIYA OFFICIAL DEFENDS DEAL WITH U.S.
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/5646d4faf621319e
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Thurs, Mar 30 2006 9:19 pm
From: usenet@mantra.com5j2 and/or www.mantra.com/jai (Dr. Jai Maharaj)

Indian Official Defends Deal With U.S.

Associated Press
New York Times
Thursday, March 30, 2006

Washington (AP) - A landmark civilian nuclear cooperation
deal with the United States would not boost India's
nuclear weapons arsenal, India's foreign secretary said
Thursday.

In often strong words, Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran
attacked the criticism that has surrounded a pact critics
say would weaken efforts to stop the spread of nuclear
weapons. He told an audience at the Heritage Foundation,
a conservative think tank, that India's record on nuclear
issues has long been one of restraint and responsibility.

''India cannot be a partner and a target at the same
time,'' Saran said.

More here:
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-US-India-Nuclear.html

- - - - - - -

Posted on 3/30/2006 8:13:33 PM by Irreverent

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

-To: Irreverent

Saran takes on NPT lobby, rebuts claims on Indian weapons
plan

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1606542/posts

Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran on Thursday took the US's
non-proliferation pundits head-on and sought to demolish
the series of arguments advanced by them in recent weeks
to derail the Indo-US nuclear deal.

In the course of an address to the Heritage Foundation,
Washington's foremost conservative think tank, Saran came
up with a point-by-point rebuttal to make the case that
the nuke deal neither weakens the non-proliferation
regime nor lets India an opportunity to build up its
arsenal in a big way.

"If our posture so far has been one of restraint and
responsibility - not disputed even by our critics - there
is no reason why we should suddenly change now," he
commented.

"Some aspersions have been cast on our technology control
record. I would like to strongly underline that not only
our non-proliferation record but even the export control
record - that goes back to the 1984 MOU with USA - has
been exemplary," he said.

Delivering the address before proceeding to Capitol Hill
for a series of meetings with key lawmakers, Saran termed
it "a false analogy" to hold forth that making an
exception for India would weaken the non-proliferation
regime and encourage other non-nuclear states that may
harbour weapons ambitions.

During a Q&A that followed, Saran said any legislation
that emerges from the US Congress should be in line with
"the parameters of understanding" reached between the two
governments. "If it's within bounds, we won't have a
problem," he said while responding to a question on the
possibility of Congress seeking conditions to implement
the deal. He, however, hastened to add that one would
have to see precisely what emerges.

Turning to those still weighing the merits of the nuclear
understanding, Saran posed: "Does it serve global
security if India remains outside the non-proliferation
system? Will India's rising demands for oil and attendant
implications for global oil prices help the world
economy? What would be the emission consequences of
greater consumption of fossil fuels?"

He dwelt on the commitment India has made to refrain from
transferring enrichment and reprocessing technologies to
nations that do not have them, adding: But India cannot
be a partner and a target at the same time."

Asked to comment on the possibility of an extraordinarily
long haul for the nuke deal legislation in Congress, he
said India, being a democracy, was not surprised that
there should be an extended debate with doubts being
raised. He then went on to say: "We believe we have
satisfactory answers to reservations (being expressed)."

Disagreeing with those claiming that India has succeeded
in extracting a lot more in the bargain, Saran commented:
"Our US interlocutors have been tough negotiators and the
deal that we finalized on March 2, 2006 has been a fair
one."

"I hope that when the Congress examines this issue, they
will have before them a vision of the scope and breadth
of our possible relationship - one based on the
congruence of principles and pragmatism that our Prime
Minister has articulated - and will link that to the
nuclear agreement," Saran said.

Posted on 3/30/2006 8:16:55 PM by CarrotAndStick

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

-To: CarrotAndStick

We'll see how the house and senate respond to this
historic proposal

Posted on 3/30/2006 8:21:46 PM by mylife

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

-To: CarrotAndStick

wrt things nuclear, "partner" and "target" with/of the US
are figments of his imagination

Posted on 3/30/2006 8:22:51 PM by Vn_survivor_67-68

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

-To: Irreverent

The crux of this initiative GNEP

http://www.gnep.energy.gov/

Posted on 3/30/2006 8:38:44 PM by mylife

End of forwarded messages from:
http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1606599/posts

Jai Maharaj
http://tinyurl.com/a5ljc
http://www.mantra.com/jai
Om Shanti

Hindu Holocaust Museum
http://www.mantra.com/holocaust

Hindu life, principles, spirituality and philosophy
http://www.hindu.org
http://www.hindunet.org

The truth about Islam and Muslims
http://www.flex.com/~jai/satyamevajayate

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==============================================================================
TOPIC: IRAN PLANS 'WAR GAMES' IN THE PERSIAN GULF........
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/42726506b667902e
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Thurs, Mar 30 2006 9:05 pm
From: "K Miller"

What ever it takes to PISS-OFF the Israeli's (you can expect that from the President of Iran).

The Missile Attack will be nothing less than a 'PROVOKED' retaliation in response to the Iranian Council.

Just A Thought.

:- |

"The Last 2455 daysT ?" <stargatedecember2012@yahoo.ca> wrote in message
news:1143774160.701685.78900@j33g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
> FROM THE WEBSITE www.news24.com/
>
> Iran plans 'war games'
> 29/03/2006 21:44 - (SA)
>
> Farhad Pouladi
>
>
> Tehran - Thousands of Iranian troops will on Friday start a week-long
> military manoeuvre in the Gulf to ready armed forces for warding off
> "threats", a senior commander announced on state television.
>
> The commander of the navy of revolutionary guards corps, Rear-Admiral
> Mostafa Safari, did not specify the nature of the threat although the
> manoeuvre comes amid increasing tensions with the West over Tehran's
> nuclear programme.
>
> "The revolutionary guards corps navy and air force in collaboration
> with (Iran's regular) army, navy, (the volunteer militia) Basij, and
> the Iranian police will start a manoeuvre from 31 March until 6 April
> in the Persian Gulf and Sea of Oman," he said.
>
> Iran has two armed forces in which both have their own ground, naval
> and air force all under the command of Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah
> Ali Khamenei.
>
> He added: "We hope ... We will gain the necessary and needed readiness
> to decisively reply to any kind of threats."
>
> "More than 17 000 soldiers and sailors will be used, along with 1 500
> different kind of vessels, in addition to the different sorts of jet
> fighter planes, choppers and different missiles," he added, but did not
> say whether Iran will use its ballistic missiles.
>
> Iran has medium-range Shahab-3 missiles with the capability of 2 000km,
> able of hitting arch-enemy Israel and US bases across the Middle East.
>
> "The exercise will cover an area stretching from the northern tip of
> the Persian Gulf all the way to the port city of Chah-Bahar in the Sea
> of Oman extending 40km into the sea," he said.
>
> In addition, the spokesperson of the manoeuvres, Rear-Admiral Mohammad
> Ebrahim Dehghan told state television that the strait of Hormouz will
> be one of the focal points of the exercise.
>
> "Some 80% of the Persian Gulf's oil is shipped out of this strait over
> which Iran has dominant and accurate control," he said.
>
> "If the enemy wants to make the area insecure, he should be rest
> assured that he will also suffer from the insecurity, since we know the
> location of their vessels," he added.
>
> On Wednesday, Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov warned that any
> attempt at using force or coercion to resolve the standoff over Iran's
> nuclear programme would be counter-productive.
>
> "Any ideas about a coercive, forceful solution to the issue are highly
> counter-productive and cannot be supported," Lavrov told reporters in
> Moscow.
>
> Iran's defence minister, Mostafa Mohammad Najjar, said nearly two
> months ago that Islamic republic will give an "extremely quick and
> destructive response" to any attack against its nuclear facilities.
>

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¶ 9:23 PM

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