The truth at any cost lowers all other costs — curated by former US spy Robert David Steele.
Click on the photo for 878 photos covering the beauty and talent paegeant, in which many of the new Republics from Eastern Europe and elsewhere shined.
El pueblo avanca. Con gran carino para el pueblo Venezolano, suladmos as todos, con gran esperanza sobre nuestru futuro espalada a espalda.
Six senators representing 3 percent of the population are running things because the White House wants it that way
By Robert Reich
Aug. 23, 2009 | On Thursday, the so-called Gang of Six – three Republicans and three Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee – met by conference call and, according to Max Baucus, D-Mont., the committee's chair, reaffirmed their commitment “toward a bipartisan healthcare reform bill” (read: less coverage and no public insurance option). The Washington Post reports that the senators shared tales from their home states, where some have been besieged by protesters angry about a potential government takeover of the nation's healthcare system.
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It's not even as if the gang represents America. The three Dems in the gang are from Montana, New Mexico and North Dakota – states that together account for just over 1 percent of Americans. The three Republicans are from Maine, Wyoming and Iowa, which together account for 1.6 percent of the American population.
So, I repeat: Why has it come down to these six? Who anointed them? Apparently, the White House.
Continue reading “Journal: Why the Gang of Six is deciding healthcare for 300 million of us”
The Foreclosure Wave” — Now a Tsunami of Sorts
The past eight weeks have been the army's worst time in Afghanistan since the US-led invasion eight years ago. Here, in his brutally frank diaries of life on the front line, a serving soldier records the bitter toll of death, and his anger and frustration at the lack of military and political support Mark Townsend The Observer, Sunday 23 August 2009.
EXTRACTS as Highlighted by Chuck Spinney:
We need better weapons. Every one of the SA80s stopped firing after one round (weapons were cleaned and oiled just as we were trained) but these weapons are a load of shit.
The chiefs should be pressing for a better weapons system. And why don't the army have more sniffer dogs? Would be finding IEDs [improvised explosive devices] a lot easier with a furry friend running about and a lot more lives would be saved. Since I've been here, haven't seen one dog. Told might have to go back to Camp Bastion because of injury.
Some say security fears are counterproductive
By Bryan Bender
WASHINGTON – Melting ice caps. Drought. Spreading disease. US defense planners view global climate change as a national security threat because it could create millions of new refugees and intensify conflicts over resources.
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A new debate is unfolding over whether linking climate change too closely with security planning will create a self-fulfilling prophecy, running the risk that the United States will rely too heavily on its armed forces to deal with global problems.
Continue reading “Journal: MILNET Flags Fighting Global Warming With CIA?”
Despite Surge in U.S. Deployments, More Civilians Are Posted in War Zone; Reliance Echoes the Controversy in Iraq
Wall Street Journal, August 22, 2009, Pg. 6, By August Cole
Even as U.S. troops surge to new highs in Afghanistan they are outnumbered by military contractors working alongside them, according to a Defense Departm! ent census due to be distributed to Congress — illustrating how hard it is for the U.S. to wean itself from the large numbers of war-zone contractors that proved controversial in Iraq.
The number of military contractors in Afghanistan rose to almost 74,000 by June 30, far outnumbering the roughly 58,000 U.S. soldiers on the ground at that point. As the military force in Afghanistan grows further, to a planned 68,000 by the end of the year, the Defense Department expects the ranks of contractors to increase more.
Continue reading “Journal: MILNET Flags Afghanistan Contractors Outnumber Troops”
In the name of beating the Taliban, the West is sticking with allies who are anything but the good guys, reports Paul McGeough.
Buried in the wastes of south Afghanistan, Oruzgan is a lost-cause province often invoked as a decorative footnote, because it is the birthplace of Mullah Omar, the founder of the Taliban.
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As home to the bulk of Australian forces in Afghanistan, Oruzgan also has become the military parking-lot in which Canberra spins its wheels, at the edge of a nation-building black hole consuming hundreds of billions of dollars coughed up by the international community.
Phi Beta Iota Editorial Comment: USG, in name of USA, is still “best pals” with 42 of th 44 dictators on the planet. Click on Ambassador Mark Palmer's photograph to access his utterly honest book, Breaking the Real Axis of Evil: How to Oust the World's Last Dictators by 2025, and his presentation to OSS '04.
Ambassador Palmer has INTEGRITY. Without it, no foreign policy will succeed, and will continue to waste national blood, treasure, and spirit.
