An article in the May 24 issue of Newsweek, titled “The Roots of Torture,” has revealed the bitter internal disputes triggered in the US government by the Bush administration’s decision to discard the Geneva Conventions and foster a general atmosphere of lawlessness with regards to detainees held by the US. Although Newsweek does not point this out, its article confirms that the Bush administration was conscious of the fact that the interrogation methods it was employing against prisoners captured in Afghanistan were in violation of US and international law, leaving US officials open to prosecution for war crimes...
Average IQ by state and how they voted in 2000: notice a pattern here?
This chart is derived from taking the Ravens Advanced Progressive Matrices of average IQ by state (Source:IQ and the Wealth of Nations) then simply applying that state's election results from the 2000 presidential election.
As Linda Greenhouse recently pointed out in The New York Times, the legal arguments the administration is making for the secrecy of the energy task force are "strikingly similar" to those it makes for its right to detain, without trial, anyone it deems an enemy combatant. In both cases, as Ms. Greenhouse puts it, the administration has put forward "a vision of presidential power . . . as far-reaching as any the court has seen."
That same vision is apparent in many other actions. Just to mention one: we learn from Bob Woodward that the administration diverted funds earmarked for Afghanistan to preparations for an invasion of Iraq without asking or even notifying Congress.
What Mr. Cheney is defending, in other words, is a doctrine that makes the United States a sort of elected dictatorship: a system in which the president, once in office, can do whatever he likes, and isn't obliged to consult or inform either Congress or the public.
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/27/opinion/27KRUG.html
Despite statements by such officials as the Bush administration's former chief weapons inspector, David Kay; its former anti-terrorism chief, Richard Clarke; former chief United Nations weapons inspector Hans Blix; as well as admissions by senior administration officials themselves, a majority of the public still believes Iraq was closely tied to the al-Qaeda terrorist group and had WMD stocks or programs before US troops invaded the country 13 months ago.
Earlier this month, the government announced that annual Amazon deforestation had grown 2 percent last year, to 9,169 square miles - an area the size of New Hampshire and the second-highest year since officials started tracking it in 1988.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0422/p01s02-woam.html
Thursday April 15, 2004 4:46 PM
CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) - President Bush is to blame for the death and violence that is going on in Iraq, said Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, a fierce critic of the U.S. administration.
During a speech to commemorate his return to power in the wake of short-lived 2002 coup, the leftist Chavez also accused the Bush administration of playing a key role in the failed attempt to oust him...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-3981202,00.html
His campaign store sells a pullover from nation whose products he has banned from being sold in the U.S.
Violators of the import ban are subject to fines and jail, according to the U.S. Treasury Department (ed: but do you think Whistleass will get a fine?)
Bush last July signed into law the Burmese Freedom and Democracy Act, saying "The United States will not waver from its commitment to the cause of democracy and human rights in Burma."
The official merchandise Web site for President George W. Bush's re-election campaign has sold clothing made in Burma, whose goods were banned by Bush from the U.S. last year to punish its military dictatorship
Bush campaign officials did not return calls seeking comment. The imports are potentially an issue because outsourcing has become a hot political topic in the election.
A normal, average citizen, I unlock the front door and enter my home. I don't know if anyone has entered surreptitiously -- perhaps a sneak-and-peek job by Ashcroft's black-bag boys.
I boot up my computer to go online. I don't know if my email is being monitored, if my keystrokes are being recorded.
I call my attorney, about a family matter. I don't know if communication with my lawyer, previously regarded as "confidential," is being listened to. (This, and the other examples above, and many below, flow from the Bush-Ashcroft "USA Patriot Act.")
I visit my physician, and learn later that my employer found out about a chronic condition I had and laid me off, to keep his insurance costs down. The doctor-patient confidentiality I thought existed is now breachable by government agencies in cahoots with insurance companies...
(read the disturbing rest)...
