posted 09-06-2002 11:58 PM            

hey Mr. lighning stRike
your are in the light today lou

[Edited 1 times, lastly by mark sky on 09-07-2002]

posted 09-07-2002 12:13 AM            

each bad guy has anouther side (repo~crate)
to vote for (but none against~it seemZ)
GoD blEsS

the human in you for being so
patient with these
anti~human types
anti earth (while stopping up the knews)
with UN platitudes about

[Edited 1 times, lastly by mark sky on 09-07-2002]

posted 09-07-2002 10:55 PM            

When Dick Cheney was CEO of the oilfield supply firm Halliburton, the company did $23.8 million in business with Saddam Hussein, the evildoer "prepared to share his weapons of mass destruction with terrorists."

So if Saddam is "the world's worst leader," how come Cheney sold him the equipment to get his dilapidated oil fields up and running so he to could afford to build weapons of mass destruction?

In 1998, the United Nations passed a resolution allowing Iraq to buy spare parts for its oilfields, but other sanctions remained in place, and the United States has consistently pressured the U.N. to stop exports of medicine and other needed supplies on the grounds they could have "dual use." As the former Secretary of Defense under Bush the Elder, Cheney was in particularly vulnerable position on the hypocrisy of doing business with Iraq. (Although in 1991, after the Gulf War, Cheney told a group of oil industry executives he was emphatically against trying to topple Hussein.)

Using two subsidiaries, Dresser-Rand and Ingersoll-Dresser, Halliburton helped rebuild Saddam's war-damaged oil fields. The combined value of these contracts for parts and equipment was greater than that of any other American company doing business with Iraq -- companies including Schlumberger, Flowserve, Fisher-Rosemount, General Electric. They acted through foreign subsidiaries or associated companies in France, Belgium, Germany, India, Switzerland, Bahrain, Egypt and the Netherlands.

In several cases, it is clear the European companies did no more than loan their names to American firms for the purpose of dealing with Hussein. Iraq then became America's second-largest Middle Eastern oil supplier.

This story was initially reported by the Financial Times of London over two years ago and has since been more extensively reported in the European press. But as we have seen with the case of Harken Energy and many other stories, there is a difference between a story having been reported and having attention being paid to it (a distinction many journalists have trouble with). Thus the administration was able to dismiss the new information on shady dealings at Harken as "old news" because not much attention was ever paid when the old news was new.

When Cheney left Halliburton, he received a $34 million severance package despite the fact that the single biggest deal of his five-year career there, the acquisition of Dresser Industries, turned out to be a huge blunder since the company came saddled with asbestos liability. (On the campaign trail, Cheney often claimed he had been "out in the private sector creating jobs." The first thing he did after the Dresser merger was lay off 10,000 people.)

Halliburton, America's No. 1 oil-services company, is the nation's fifth-largest military contractor and the biggest non-union employer in the United States. It employs more than 100,000 workers worldwide and does over $15 billion a year. Halliburton under Cheney dealt with several brutal dictatorships, including the despicable government of Burma (Myanmar). The company also played questionable roles in Algeria, Angola, Bosnia, Croatia, Haiti, Somalia and Indonesia.

Halliburton also had dealings with Iran and Libya, both on the State Department's list of terrorist states. Halliburton's subsidiary Brown & Root, the old Texas construction firm that does much business with the U.S. military, was fined $3.8 million for re-exporting goods to Libya in violation of U.S. sanctions.

If you want to know why the Democrats didn't jump all over this story and make a big deal out it, it's because -- as usual -- Democrats are involved in similar dealings. Former CIA director John Deutsch is on the board of Schlumberger, the second largest oil services firm after Halliburton, which is also doing business with Iraq through subsidiaries.

Americans have long been aware that corporate money has consistently corrupted domestic policy in favor of corporate interests, and that both parties are in thrall to huge corporate campaign donors. We are less accustomed to connecting the dots when it comes to foreign policy. But there is no more evidence that corporations pay attention to anything other than profits in their foreign dealings than they do in their domestic deals.

Enron, as usual, provides some textbook examples of just how indifferent to human rights American companies can be. Halliburton's dealings in Nigeria, in partnership with Shell and Chevron, provide another such example, including gross violations of human rights and environmental abuses.

No one is ever going to argue that Saddam Hussein is a good guy, but Dick Cheney is not the right man to make the case against him. I have never understood why the Washington press corps cannot remember anything for longer than 10 minutes, but hearing Cheney denounce Saddam is truly "Give us a break" time.

To find out more about Molly Ivins and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate web page at www.creators.com.

posted 09-08-2002 02:52 PM            

FROM> The Oregon Peaceworker Volume 15 Number 7 September 2002 page 6

"TRACKING THE CHEMTRAIL MYSTERY" by Courtney Scott

posted 09-11-2002 11:46 PM            

"itz a joke" if you know
how to laugh
good knight

posted 09-12-2002 12:15 AM            

surrender your box cutters
and prepair to board

posted 09-12-2002 12:40 AM            

unknown to it is afraid to confront
itz enemy known as
YOU

posted 09-12-2002 12:50 AM            

you as i are able to pretend
awareness as the tankerloads in nude ate the sky

posted 09-12-2002 09:27 PM            

you hear and now
resplendent
see the truth

posted 09-12-2002 09:36 PM            

where is Bob Dylan when you need him?
mayhaps at the biodiversity camp
of Maurice Strong?

[Edited 1 times, lastly by mark sky on 09-12-2002]

posted 09-13-2002 10:57 PM            

The argument for reshaping the political landscape in the Mideast has been pushed for years by some Washington think tanks and in hawkish circles. It is now being considered as a possible US policy with the ascent of key hard-liners in the administration - from Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith in the Pentagon to John Hannah and Lewis Libby on the vice president's staff and John Bolton in the State Department, analysts and officials say.

The argument we would be starting a democratic wave in Iraq is pure blowing smoke.

Jessica Mathews, president of Carnegie Endownment for International Peace
Iraq, the hawks argue, is just the first piece of the puzzle. After an ouster of Hussein, they say, the United States will have more leverage to act against Syria and Iran, will be in a better position to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and will be able to rely less on Saudi oil.

The thinking does not represent official US policy. But increasingly the argument has served as a justification for a military attack against Iraq, and elements of the strategy have emerged in speeches by administration officials, most prominently Vice President Dick Cheney.

''The goal is not just a new regime in Iraq. The goal is a new Middle East,'' said Raad Alkadiri, an Iraq analyst with PFC, a Washington-based energy consulting organization. ''The goal has been and remains one of the main driving factors of preemptive action against Iraq.''

Cheney revealed some of the thinking in a speech in August when he made the administration's case for a regime change. He argued Hussein's overthrow would ''bring about a number of benefits to the region'' and enhance US ability to advance the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

''When the gravest of threats are eliminated, the freedom-loving peoples of the region will have a chance to promote the values that can bring lasting peace,'' he told the national convention of the Veterans of Foreign Wars.

The arguments are, by no means, uniform, and critics dismiss some as wishful thinking. Even among neoconservatives who see an attack on Iraq as a first step toward transforming the Mideast, there are debates over how far-reaching and fast the change will be.

The more modest version sees an attack as sending a message to the rest of the region, making clear the US is prepared to unilaterally deploy its military power to achieve its goals, objectives, and values.

Among its most extreme versions was a view elaborated in a briefing in July by a Rand Corp. researcher to the Defense Policy Board - an advisory group to the Pentagon led by Richard Perle, a leading hawk.

That briefing urged the United States to deliver an ultimatum to the Saudi government to cut its ties to militant Islam or risk seizure of its oil fields and overseas assets. It called Iraq ''the tactical pivot'' and Saudi Arabia ''the strategic pivot.''

Within those poles some clear themes are emerging, and Saudi Arabia receives much of the attention, analysts and officials say.

Patrick Clawson, deputy director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, contends that a pro-US Iraq would lead to a reassessment of the US-Saudi alliance, which dates to World War II but has become strained since Sept. 11 attacks, and the worsening of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

A friendly Iraq - home to the world's second-largest oil reserves - would provide an alternative to Saudi Arabia for basing US troops. Its oil reserves would make Saudi Arabia, the world's largest oil exporter, less important in setting prices, he said. In general, others contend, a US-allied Iraq could work to diminish the influence of OPEC, long dominated by Saudi Arabia, over oil supplies and prices.

''We would be much more in a position of strength vis-a-vis the Saudis,'' Clawson said.

Others espousing the vision see potential changes in Syria and Iran, as well. The fallout from an attack on Iraq could bring to a head the longstanding power struggle in Iran between conservatives in the clerical leadership and reformers grouped around President Mohammad Khatami.

Some see the reformers invigorated by the example of a democratic Iraq, or even a surge in popular discontent leading to far-reaching change. At the very least, they argue, the show of US power would give the administration more leverage in pressuring Iran over its suspected missile and nuclear programs.

The United States could exert that same leverage in forcing an end to Syrian support for Lebanon's Hezbollah, a Shiite Muslim guerrilla group allied with Iran that opposes Israel.

A powerful corollary of the strategy is that a pro-US Iraq would make the region safer for Israel and, indeed, its staunchest proponents are ardent supporters of the Israeli right-wing. Administration officials, meanwhile, have increasingly argued that the onset of an Iraq allied to the US would give the administration more sway in bringing about a settlement to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, though Cheney and others have offered few details on precisely how.

''Maybe we do stir the pot and see what comes up,'' one US official said.

In its broadest terms, the advocates argue that a democratic Iraq would unleash similar change elsewhere in the Arab world - an argument resonant among Bush administration officials who have increasingly called for change in a region where Western-style democracy is virtually nonexistent.

''Everyone will flip out, starting with the Saudis,'' said Meyrav Wurmser, director of the Center for Middle East Policy at the Hudson Institute in Washington. ''It will send shock waves throughout the Arab world.

''Look, we already are pushing for democracy in the Palestinian Authority - though not with a huge amount of success - and we need a little bit more of a heavy-handed approach,'' she said. ''But if we can get a democracy in the Palestinian Authority, democracy in Iraq, get the Egyptians to improve their human rights and open up their system, it will be a spectacular change. After a war with Iraq, then you really shape the region.''

Critics call the arguments misguided at best, with tragic worst-case scenarios.

''There are some people who religiously believe that Iraq is the beginning of this great new adventure of remapping the Middle East and all these countries. I think that's a simplistic view,'' said Judith Yaphe, an Iraq scholar and senior research professor at the National Defense University.

Jessica T. Mathews, president of Carnegie Endownment for International Peace, a Washington policy group, said that installing a democracy in Iraq, much less the rest of the Middle East, would be extraordinarily difficult, if not out of the question. She contended that change in Iraq is more akin to building a wall brick by brick and will require the support of allies.

''The argument we would be starting a democratic wave in Iraq is pure blowing smoke,'' Mathews said. ''You have 22 Arab governments and not one has made any progress toward democracy, not one. It's one of the great issues before us, but the very last place you'd suspect to turn the tide is Iraq. You don't go from an'' authoritarian '' dictatorship to a democracy overnight, not even quickly.''

Nevertheless, there are signs the thinking has powerful backers.

While many of the hawks are under the wing of Wolfowitz, several conservatives hold influential positions in Cheney's office and in the State Department, which is headed by the administration's most prominent moderate, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell. During the Clinton administration, many of them served with far-right, defense-oriented think tanks such as the Center for Security Policy and the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs.

Perle, an adviser to both groups, remains a resident fellow at the hawkish American Enterprise Institute and a member of the board at the Hudson Institute.

''There are people invested in this philosophy all throughout the administration. Some of the strongest voices are in State,'' said one senior US official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The most vocal hawk at the State Department is Bolton, who holds two titles - undersecretary for arms control and international proliferation and senior adviser to the president for arms control, nonproliferation, and disarmament.

© Copyright 2002 Globe Newspaper Company

posted 09-15-2002 12:08 AM            

dislectic at the most
oil and drugz and control
GOD DamN the Pussher man (i say) steppenwolf

before the total takeover was a time where
the davids could fight the carliels Go lie eth

yet the origination of life
listens to david

and spurns the conflagurationZ of nationz
dishonered and in shame

so be the table of life
and the level playingfield

we assemble without as within compromises
EVERYTHING

posted 09-15-2002 01:49 PM            

Russians flip switch, say they made it rain

September 8, 2002

BY VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV

MOSCOW--A day after acrid smoke from forest and peat fires blanketed Moscow, a light rain Friday cleared the air--and the government claimed the credit.

The Emergency Situations Ministry said it drew rain clouds to the smog-shrouded capital and created showers by switching on a cube-shaped piece of equipment, 3 feet on each side, that sits atop a ministry building.

''Yes, we did it,'' ministry spokesman Viktor Beltsov said proudly of the drizzle that brought relief after several rainless weeks.

It was the first time the ministry used the ionizer, a device developed by its research institute that cranks out electrically charged atoms.

''The flow of ions blew a hole in the smog layer and drove its particles up higher,'' said the institute's director, Mikhail Shakhramanian. ''At the next stage, oxygen ions concentrated humidity.''

Todd Miner, a meteorologist at Pennsylvania State University, said he wasn't familiar with the Russian government's device, but he said it wasn't impossible to create a light drizzle under certain conditions.

However, he said, ''in general the data I'm aware of suggests that in the past the benefits of producing rain has been minimal at best."

AP (Chicago Sun Times)

posted 09-19-2002 11:20 PM            

the forest regulator
lives in a city
the "represenantive lives" in DC
the pusher lives in a castle
overlooking the base

they herd the sheep to slaughter
to feed the masses
asleep

aRisE now

posted 09-19-2002 11:29 PM            

just vision
and all that it entials
we see
in the plane blue sky
remains a mist er ry

desparat ly seeking the an sewer
the de viel er of the soul

but the PC of um the um planet
throw salt over their shoulders
so to speak

the unexistant tankers
continue to unload while

[Edited 2 times, lastly by mark sky on 09-19-2002]