Post-election, Sarah Palin is talking like a pageant entrant who only understands that she lost but not that she did the campaign harm nor turned the electorate against her party.

Her responses merely imply that she knew all along that Africa is a continent and the the Vice President does not run the Senate.

This beauty pageant intellect had not idea of the impact of the inflammatory rhetoric her coaches told her to mouth. That she willingly and enthusiastically attempted to combine her hockey-mom winking charm with junior-high style gossip that casually declared Obama to be an execution-deserving traitor underlies the junior-high shallowness of her world view.

If she thought that over-the-top campaign speeches were standard fare because her Party had been successful more than once in doing so, she was either as politically naive as she appears or she flat out slept through any civics class presented to her.

The Telegraph is publishing a story today and I've posted excerpts below. Click on the link to read the entire article.

Anyone pretending outrage at the implication that Palin is the victim in this story is either equally civics-challenged or equally as stupid as Palin herself.

Sarah Palin blamed by the US Secret Service over death threats against Barack Obama

Sarah Palin's attacks on Barack Obama's patriotism provoked a spike in death threats against the future president, Secret Service agents revealed during the final weeks of the campaign.

The Republican vice presidential candidate attracted criticism for accusing Mr Obama of "palling around with terrorists", citing his association with the sixties radical William Ayers.

The attacks provoked a near lynch mob atmosphere at her rallies, with supporters yelling "terrorist" and "kill him" until the McCain campaign ordered her to tone down the rhetoric.

But it has now emerged that her demagogic tone may have unintentionally encouraged white supremacists to go even further.

The Secret Service warned the Obama family in mid October that they had seen a dramatic increase in the number of threats against the Democratic candidate, coinciding with Mrs Palin's attacks.
 

Whether in photos and films doctored by the pros to look both appealing and intelligent, Mrs. Palin revealed herself as a shallow thinker who has spent most of her life making knee-jerk decisions based entirely on self-interest.

Put such a person in the hands of consultants and image-mongers who themselves have little if any conscience and her own gullibility and world view from the shallow end of the pool only gets magnified.

He late-campaign remarks whining about criticism of her campaign criticisms of Obama revealed just how much Sarah Palin is a small-town rural personality. Nothing wrong with small-town and rural personalities so long as within that environment upbringing necessary skills like critical thinking and an ability to see both sides of an issue are taught or acquired.

... so long as within that rural environment (one in which I also dwell) a dominant us/them either/or attitude is not the overriding norm.

Mrs. Palin seems to be in oblivious denial of the consequences of her own actions. She is too interested in self-promotion to worry about ethics.

Posted SwanDeer Project at 4:51 PM PST

Updated: Sunday, 9 November 2008 9:02 AM PST

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I invite you to click on the following link and live blog your thoughts to the Washblog.com site. Washblog is a statewide progressive blog  in need of more opinions from South West Washington State.

If you're watching the election returns tonight, join in our conversations.

Click here:Washblog.com

Live blogging throughout the day ... 

... news, thoughts, predictions, bets, hopes and fears.

Multiple entries desired ... shout outs, high fives, moans & groans.

Join Us.

I lean toward KOS's predictions ... what the country needs is Obama at or above 400 electoral college votes.

I think it's in the best interest of the country to express a total repudiation of Bush Republican politics and a complete sweeping  out of office of every rubber stamp politician who put party above country.

King 5 news reported late last night a Gregoire poll lead of 42% to 36%. Okay, but even in solidly Democratic Pacific County there are a powerful lot of Rossi signs on front yards.

Are there enough stampeded individuals in this Blue state to elect Rossi against their own best interests? If a cold emotionless stare and blank face when talking serious stuff ever suggested a Manchurian Candidate devoid of genuine sincerity and a desire to communicate honestly it's Mr. Rossi.

I repeat what I've said before. I see and talk with them every day. I listen to their concerns and fear for their personal health and well-being.  

Any citizen of this state on a fixed income who votes for Dino Rossi has been blinded by something other than a light.

Any small business owners who think Rossi will shoulder-to-shoulder with them about the things which really make a difference in their prosperity - or even survival - have sucked on the kool-aid big time.

Posted SwanDeer Project at 6:43 AM PST

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MSNBC has an article on its front page entitled "Praying for election miracles". It's about politically active priests and preachers exhorting their faithful to petition God to vote on Tuesday.

Then there's The New York Times article about the organization, Media Matters, entitled An All-Out Attack on `Conservative Misinformation that includes a complaint from Republican pollster and talking point framer Frank Luntz.

Let's start with the God who will be shirking civic duty if HE does not vote.

In some instances the prayerful petition appears to focus somewhat on an innocent desire to get out the vote. The underlying assumption however seems to be that those "gotten out to vote" by God will be voters aligned with those who are making the politically prayerful petition.

On the other hand there are those who are openly asking God to forget about freedom of agency or choice; asking instead that HE impose HIS will on the people. This in some sort of spiritual puppet string-pulling and mind control that will cause a majority of the American electorate to vote in harmony with the God-and-Politics stampeders.

These preach values that demand personal subordination to a religious party line. They are not values of fairness, compassion, peace, charity nor understanding. These are values based on an assumption of a punitive and judgmental God that looks, talks and acts like Pat Robertson or John Hagee.

In these final moments of this election season, they are pleading with God to confirm and validate their own assumptions as to what God and religion are supposed to mean in the United States of America.

Of an impartial civic mind they are not. But they do want to get out the vote.

Then we have Frank Luntz on Media Matters:

 "I think they are one of the most destructive organizations associated with American politics today," said Frank Luntz, a pollster forRudolph W. Giuliani and Newt Gingrich who this year has led on-camera voter focus groups on Fox News, a frequent Media Matters target.

"They are vicious. They only understand one thing: attack, attack, attack."

"If I were a Democrat, I would tell them to shut up," Mr. Luntz said. "If I were a Republican, I would tell my candidates to ignore them."

If you've ever listened to Luntz in person (I've watched him spar with Bill Maher on Real Time several times) you will see an almost smug declaration of how Democrats would be more successful if they would listen to his interpretation of the perceptive gullibility of the American electorate.

But currently Luntz has his career at stake with this election. His words attempt to hide the fact that if the American electorate gets uppity and starts insisting on something more than sound-bite and talking-point campaigns, he's done with his fame, fortune and cosmetic high-regard on cable TV.

I've long held a view that when a political candidate hires a campaign consultant of the Frank Luntz spin doctor ilk - that candidate has robbed his/her potential constituency of a relationship of trust.

Such an act places a manipulative gate-keeper smack dab between the citizen and the elected representative. If we accept that sort of arrangement with our candidates the common denominator of civic intelligence is dramatically lowered.

Luntz can't deny that. No spin doctor can deny that. These folks do not raise  civic intellectual awareness  in this country any more than the do purveyors of American Idol, Survivor or Heroes who merely want you to watch and buy.

I've appreciated what Media Matters has done in helping the curious cope with a conservative radical partisan stampede tactic.

Rather than agreeing with Luntz and his whine about destructive organizations, I believe that so long as there are any ideologically driven information predators communicating with voters,  organizations like Media Matters and Fact Check are necessary.

As for political prayer circles, I don't want God jumping in the middle of American life like an overbearing moral Genghis Kahn who proclaims "Live subordinate to me and my BOOK or you'll hurt my feelings, die in your sins and be sent to hell!"

Preachers who goaded their flocks into American voting booths in 2004 managed to get trusting people to cast purely negative-minded votes for false civic reasons.

In 2004 the pain and frustration for me was not limited to the Kerry loss. Much more than that was the sense that the election - if not stolen - was still severely impacted by information manipulation and outright lying.

I perceived that the majority of those who voted were misled. Non-voters remained off the beaten path because political tacticians wanted them  out of sight and out of mind - voluntarily self-suppressed.

We were not even left with the consolation that a definite majority of the American voters had spoken; that the will - wise or unwise - of the majority of American citizens had been expressed.

We were stuck with the realization that the majority of those who had spoken were manipulated and led to the booth under false pretenses (including 14 states with God & Politics initiative ballots put in place by people like Rove and Luntz.)

Civically and spiritually, I counsel that we do not let someone else -in any context - tell us once again what to think and how to vote.

I counsel that we make an effort to perceive the lies and half-truths proclaimed in campaigns.

I counsel an activist - even formally organized - civic campaign to put limits on purchased political ads, sound-bite advertising and contests decided by whoever has the most money available to flood the media with shallow inflammatory nonsense.

I've already made my arguments for and against the candidates of my choice. Repeating any of that is not appropriate to the theme of this opinion.

As we move forward, I intend to advocate more and more for genuine civic wisdom and participation in this country.

"Change" can be a spin-doctor word use to get out the vote. I hope real change means a return to the idea that America is essentially one big town hall.

I'd like to see a circumstance where voters are renewed, re-aroused and willing to insure that never again will the bamboozle trump the truth.

I'd like to see political apathy become as unacceptable as sexual harassment, domestic violence, child abuse, identity theft and belching in church.

I want to move past next Tuesday satisfied that this time voter apathy, ignorance and gullibility has not once again harmed this state and this nation to a much greater degree than another terrorist attack.

Posted SwanDeer Project at 11:11 AM PDT

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... or pretend that it's not important or necessary? As I write this, extremely legitimate and quite serious people are looking for ways to set right America's recent global and social criminal history

I seriously doubt that even half the readers here could spontaneously declare who Robert Jackson was.

Two months ago on this very blog Lietta Ruger brought up the same theme. To no one's surprise, the response was essentially "ho hum" and "yea so?" Yet we bloggers really are among the most civically active members of society and I wonder how it is that we got so sophisticatedly wise about political campaign strategy and remain so inept, ignorant and apathetic about genuine civic responsibility? There are duties required by that responsibility when things go wrong or when some among us seriously harm the rest of the world in our name.

There's a notion that the most rapid path toward resolution of all America's faults and mistakes - not to mention restitution and repentence - lies merely in working to elect specific candidates. It is an empty and naive sentiment. Civic responsibility is love of country and not about looking for or appreciating merely doing the least we must.

That's like survivor Guanajuato. Some are voted out and some stay. The game will continue with a new slate of contestants next season.

It's not unlike loving to shop for our favorite foods or things while having no idea about all the processes involved that brought our delectables to market.

We seem to consider the purchase itself a more significant and needful event than the actual creation - the bringing into being of that thing which we desire to possess.

Buyers may know how to cook, use or wear something they can easily obtain repeatedly and casually by mere purchase without any knowledge of the effort and circumstances that make such a purchase possible.

We may even consider ourselves knowledgeable afficionados about that which we glorify but in reality we have no idea.

We may even pooh pooh someone else's concerns because we can persuasively justify our investment of time, energy and emotional resources in our favorite things.

Such in fact is what I'm doing right now in grinding my ax about civics, national reputation, morality and conscience and not paying attention to getting a candidate elected or another defeated.

I admit it

So what's your excuse?

How is it you can get excited or discouraged about the most recent polls, political stupidity, chicanery and deception and how that might cost someone the election without making noise about REAL social global justice?

Will an election loss make for you a disaster that many seem to emotionally equate to your favorite teams's having lost the Super Bowl?

Or perhaps your civic sense is a touch more intense than that. Perhaps losing the election will be result in a vague civic unease that in actuality is mere intellectual awareness while we go about our post-election consumption?

How can we get so lost in the heat and competition of emotional politics but never arouse a mature and wise emotion when we know we ought to?

Are we genuinely moved to care about our future - a future that will be an undeniable consequence of failure to perceive past events honestly and accurately and failure to set them right?

Can Veterans of my generation still make a difference? Hell, I don't know.

I tell my own children and older grandchildren flat out that my generation has greatly and comprehensively screwed up their future; that they absolutely must take back their country in a way they themselves see fit.

How they do that is theirs to figure out. They should not believe that they can be told honestly and truthfully by any political party or church as to who they vote for without question.

They won't take back their country by choosing more of the same thing that brought all this foolishiness to pass.

If we cannot and will not look at the future in that manner then those of us who don't care; those of us who shrug it all off are THE citizens of an imperial nation that continues raping less able societies abroad.

We are the citizens who sustain the Imperial States of America and will make of the coming blowback events an ugly reality.

Tags: war crimes, america, imperialism, torture, invasion, murder, homicide, genocide, justice, honor, core values

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Posted SwanDeer Project at 8:48 AM PDT

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Where not to find real family values in Washington State

When it comes down to the nitty gritty, we as attention-paying citizens or don't-give-a-damn citizens need to come out of the closet. We need to admit who or what we stand for and declare what philosophy and policies best reflect our concerns.

If we are most focused on American Idol, Nascar, the Oklahoma City Sonics and crime shows, let's just stay where we are, with asses super-glued to the couch.

If we are paying even slight attention to what is going on, listening even with half an ear to campaign slogans, television sound bytes and what passes for popular journalism in this country, let's make a real appraisal of who stands for what?

I'll start with Republicans because appraising most Democratic policies really means labeling Demo priorities as corporate Republican values moderated in a lefterly direction.

We have discredited Republicans on their last lap of driving this machine with one hand on the steering wheel and the other hanging out for lobby money.

Republicans have one foot pressing metal to the floor and the other nowhere near the brakes.

Why?

Because McCain and his party have only one single song to sing ...

America is at War!
American lives need to be lived in a wartime environment.
American citizens need to practice a total deferral to the self-defined patriotism of the elect.

Republicans continue to insist that American citizens absolutely must trust their future to those few at the top of the power pole who want to replace the current benchwarmers. Only this time there is some combat experience that boils down to John McCain's trigger-happiness and his dubious declarations that in addition to sound generalship, he is also highly informed and experienced in domestic matters.

Right.

Given the Cheney/Bush version of urgency and importance of the need for a coherent national security objective guided by wise, strong, stubborn and insensitive leadership, Republicans insist that we must accept all this in its continuing context.

State Republicans make the same insistence. If you trust the BIAW and candidate Rossi with their corporatist view of what's best for working families and the poorest among us, here is the national and state Republican Platform in a large nutshell:

(1)
We must fight the war on terror while remaining strictly stuck with the Republican Tax Cut Experiment which has not helped Mr. Bush avoid being a president who has presided over national economic failure.

If we want to vote Republican we are then left to hope for the best but continue to expect the worst and recognize that the burden of middle class taxes are going to continue paying for our prosecution of the war on terror and no-bid contracts to non-family oriented business.

(2)
We will prosecute the war on terror in a pay-off-the-national-debt circumstance created by this administration that will be an ongoing burden on our grandchildren. Trillions of dollars of debt generated by a Republican party that has always labeled Democrats as "taxers and spenders" is not something Leno and Maher can make jokes about.

Rather, the Republican Party's solution to all economic woes - as highlighted by that mental economic genius, John McCain - is for Republicans to be the "tax-cutters and spenders" party.

(3)
We will continue to prosecute a war on terror while in the Bush 3rd term John McBush and his party are baiting us with the phrase "ownership society." Ownership society to Republicans is in reality merely another means of generating - you guessed it - more profits for business.

"Owning" health care, retirement, education and homes only happens when you "buy" something from chosen lobbied corporate interests (see Medicare D plan), "invest" in something to own or by patriotically consuming what the Jones are already consuming so as to keep up civic duty.

(4)
We will prosecute the war on terror while an ungodly number of us go without access to adequate health care. That's one thing tens of millions of Americans could use ownership of.

Of course the rest of we middle classers do "own" always-increasing health care premiums. Somehow I fail to see how this helps the troops, keeps terrorists at bay, or will make it easier when we invade Iran in order to secure whatever non-attention-paying Americans (apparently the largest voting block in the state and nation) will buy into as a security blanket worth supporting.

(5)
We will prosecute the war on terror while the Republicans - under the guise of "ownership society"- preside over corporate reductions and/or eliminations of pension funds. Why is it that we must be patriotic and support a "conservative" tax-cut and spend commander-in-chief under this circumstance?

(6)
We will prosecute the war on terror while Republicans who pretend that the extreme Christian Right represents the majority of American Christian voters. The Republicans will continue to be willing to work hand in glove with the Christian Zionists to encourage Israel to widen it's borders in order to look like the Israel of prophesy. Otherwise, in the John Hagee playbook, Jesus and his Armageddon Asteroid cannot End the Times and leave all of us more liberal-minded Christians Behind.

Your Republican Party thinks more of these folks than the attention-paying voters who live and work all around us.

(7)
Republicans will continue our "war on terror" all the time camouflaging an absolute conviction on the part of failed foreign policy theorists that American might is the brave new world of the future ...

... that American might will facilitate our continued consumption of an inordinate share of energy reserves.

Why?

Because we can, that's why.

(8)
Republicans will forever deny any criminality on the part of their pseudo-religious political shill who did their bidding when they thought they would have the majority votes forever. Under Republicans we will prosecute an ongoing string of military adventures that will continue to cost the precious blood of our children. These folks will continue the patriotic hypocrisy that ignorantly and naively assumes that the poor and middle class of this country constitute a willing and unlimited supply of military manpower for decades to come.

These things are what the Republicans did not and will not tell you.

They want to prosecute the war on terrorism and do it in terms of maintaining their own discredited and - when it comes to corporate welfare - dishonest domestic economic theories.

It does not matter what you and I think so long as they are in power.

Only you and I can take this out of their hands.

They will not change things unless we intervene.

So all you self-styled economic sophisticates who have bought into Republican capitalism worship keep your heads in the sand. If you cannot see just how many corporations in this country are only showing profits primarily through government intervention, bail-outs and contracts - you go ahead. Reveal to the rest of us just how poorly you understand the less-government-more-free-enterprise ticket.

Grover Norquist may someday buy you a latte from the last standing Starbucks after the government becomes so small it goes down the bathtub drain.

Of course you may be standing behind the Starbucks counter brewing and serving the latte yourself.

Grover won't mind. He's smarter than you in a really dumb way.

So all you righteous Christians who see John McCain as led by George Bush who is led by God to export war and death to all evil-doers:

As we attempt to impose a fake American dominance on the world based on our national credit rating and economic extortion backed by big-stick-waving, go ahead and look the other way while your narrow morality authorizes a trashing of the American Dream.

Those of you who have been politically born again into the cult of a Republican Jesus, can keep insisting that Jesus would vote the same way;

would advocate for George Bush and John McCain on FOX , Limbaugh's program - even the 700 Club

- and would go along with the deaths of civilian men, women and children in Iraq or anywhere else as "acceptable collateral damage."

If you think John McCain on the national stage and Dino Rossi and his fellow BIAW-paid for philosophical automatons inside this state hold the key to wise governance, you still haven't done your homework.

The holes in your common sense and civic wisdom remain vast and empty.

Posted SwanDeer Project at 9:13 AM PDT

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6:30 PM  MSNBC Panel speaking honestly or trying to make the news. Buchannan and Scarborough peeing on themselves in defense of Hillary's 3:00 Am ad.

The majority in this country are not as fear-driven as broadcasters make us out to be. McCain as more Bush and more fear is not going to keep the election close playing only one note.

McCain as a continuation of Bush? Word is there'll be temptations to refer to McCain as John Dubya McCain as if Dubya were his middle initial. Accurate no?

Bush at 19% is offset by the fact that U.S. has not been attacked since 911. Bush gets credit?

Or the natural ability of the spectrum of leadership in this country to do something with security? 

6:45 PM

Pennsyvania Governor Rendell represents and talks like a same old same old party hack. The kind who feel the nominee should be someone who has paid their dues. Trying to talk around 11 losses in a row, implying Hillary will win them all tonight ... 

On Maher last Friday he practically declared that we owe gratitude to Obama for bringing so many voters back to the polls and arousing the next generation. Now that they're here, "Thank you Obama ... us same old party hacks will take it from here. Hillary has paid her dues and we're going to justify her."

6:54 PM 

McCain's speech.

Newspeak ... includes assumptions that we are not a people who think or who pay attention.  Plying talking points like an old guy at the bazaar who is limited in his understanding of his audience. He's not speaking to his choir, he's speaking to an audience assumed to have the mentality and experience of his own generation and mine.

The future is not those generations. The future leadership generation is powerfully interested in changing how business is done in this country.

McCain's speech could be offered to any political audience of the 70's and 80's.

"An uncivil brawl over the spoils of power" effectively defines the Bush presidency and administration and what this country has suffered.

My friends is what the huckster says when he want's you to give up something he's going to misuse or simply pocket.

7:05 PM

Russert quoting Democrats: "This is the 3rd term of a Republican Administration in the midst of a recession."

Perhaps they'll have to try harder to make us afraid ... very afraid.

Posted SwanDeer Project at 6:39 PM PST

Updated: Tuesday, 4 March 2008 7:11 PM PST

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This serves as an example of how a consciousless amoral constitutionally- accepted non-human entity treats fellow constitutional human entities.

It's also a reason why - when short-sighted politicians like candidate Rossi talk about running the government like a businss - wise citizens will go get their loved ones and especiall those most vulnerable, bring  them in the house and lock all the doors. 

SantaFeNewMexican.com

USDA investigating meat supplier

Sarah D. Wire | Los Angeles Times

1/30/2008 -

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Wednesday that it was investigating a Chino, Calif.-based supplier of meat to the National School Lunch Program after release of a video showing slaughterhouse workers using inhumane and illegal practices on weak and sick cows.

The video, presented by the Humane Society of the United States at a news conference Wednesday morning, showed workers at Hallmark Meat Packing using forklifts to pick up and roll animals too weak to stand and forcing sick or weak cows to stand by shooting high-pressure water sprays into their nostrils or repeatedly shocking them with electricity.

Federal and California laws prohibit the slaughter of "downer" cattle — those that cannot stand or walk — for the human food supply, to prevent animal cruelty and the consumption of unhealthy animals.

Meat processed at Hallmark is distributed by Westland Meat Co., also of Chino. According to the USDA, Westland sold 27 million pounds of frozen meat last year to federal food and nutrition programs, including school lunches and meals for the poor and elderly.

The Humane Society said the hidden-camera video was taken by an undercover investigator who worked at the plant for six weeks last year. Within hours of the video's release, the USDA suspended Westland's participation with those programs and placed a hold on all products that are destined for the programs.

Steve Mendell, the president and chief executive officer of Westland and Hallmark, was meeting Wednesday afternoon with USDA officials and was not available for comment. The company released a written statement in his name saying it had "taken immediate action to terminate the two employees and suspend their supervisor pending his explanation."

Animals ready for slaughter are inspected daily by the USDA. Wayne Pacelle, president of the Humane Society, told the news conference that the abuse would take place before the inspector arrived at the slaughterhouse.

The undercover investigation found workers using "Herculean efforts to get 'downers' into the kill box," Pacelle said.

"The attempt was to make them so distressed and to cause them so much suffering that these animals would get up and walk into the slaughterhouse," he said. "If they could walk past (the inspector) or even just stand, they would pass."

Westland's general manager, Anthony Magidow, said the workers' actions on the video do not reflect the company's standard practices. He said the slaughterhouse was audited monthly by the USDA and a private company to monitor employee practices.

"We got on this the moment we found out," Magidow said. The company obtained the video Tuesday after The Washington Post reported its existence.

Magidow said the employees shown in the video had worked in the slaughterhouse for many years and "felt they knew how to handle these animals better than we do."

U.S. Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer issued a release late Wednesday expressing confidence in the food inspection system, while noting that he was "deeply concerned" about the Humane Society's allegations. But he faulted the society, which he said "did not present this information to us when these alleged violations occurred in the fall of 2007. Had we known at the time the alleged violations occurred, we would have initiated our investigation sooner, and taken appropriate actions at that time."

In response, the society said it had turned over the results of its investigation to "appropriate California law enforcement officials." Local authorities, the society said, had asked for "extra time" before the information became public.

The USDA banned the use of "downer" cows for slaughter in 1989 after bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE, began to spread across the United Kingdom. Regulations were tightened in 2003 after a cow with BSE was identified in Washington state.

Studies by several universities have shown a correlation between "downer" cows and those with BSE, popularly known as mad cow disease. Of the 15 cases of mad cow disease found in North America — most of them in Canada — 12 have been from "downer" cows. Although it is rare, humans can contract a form of the disease by eating meat from cows with BSE.

Posted SwanDeer Project at 7:14 AM PST

Updated: Thursday, 31 January 2008 7:17 AM PST

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Reference Today's Aberdeen Daily World:
Baird faces his constituents in Raymond

I like the article cause obviously they couldn't find a picture of some handsomer guy and were afraid to put up a picture of Lietta as a mother/grandmother being uppity and rude to a U.S. Congressman.

Actually, being uppity and rude was not at all what Lietta said and did. Within minutes after she started her first question you could sense how most of the audience was sitting up and paying attention rather than attempting to shush her or insist that she keep quiet so others could speak.

Furthermore, Brian Baird -  as he answered most  questions - kept returning and making eye contact with Lietta while speaking. That is what usually happens when a speaker comes to understand what constitutes the most serious concern of the audience.

It's not surprising that even in rural Pacific County, Iraq and flub-a-dub Republican presidents and politicians are on everyone's mind. Out here in the boondocks some thought the audience would be more willing to talk about Spartina grass in the Willapa Bay or road construction on State Highway 6.  

Fat chance.

Cross posted to Willapa Magazine and Daily Kos

[Aberdeen] DAILY WORLD / DAVID SANDLER
Arthur Ruger of Bay Center talks about his

views of the Iraq war with Congressman

Brian Baird at a town hall meeting at

Raymond High School on Saturday. Ruger

and his wife, Lietta, have a nephew and

a son-in-law currently serving in the military.

Brian addressed most of my arguments and contentions about his his surge-supporting credibility before I ever had the opportunity to challenge him. His pre-emptive strike derailed what would have been my slam-dunk challenge items.

You know, the slogan stuff:

"military dog-and-pony show",
"I talked to one or two soldiers from our district,"
even one of my more cherished talking points: "an  abstract war unless you have skin in the game."

I had promised Lietta that I would keep my curmudgeon mouth quiet until later in the meeting - perhaps when folks stopped worrying about Iraq and were ready to go mow Spartina grass or whine about time delays on Highway 6.

After Lietta got his attention (and perhaps the audience got an opportunity to put faces to their neighbor's names about which they'd only read in the newspapers or online) my chance arrived.

I managed to somewhat govern the rage inside after listening to Brian present what I perceived as talking points typical of all Democrats who've caved to their fear of an electorate stampeded by lying republican sensationalized propaganda.

I did so by projecting an image of my two military family members sitting between Lietta and me - tied to their seats and unable to move out of them and  with duct tape over their mouths.

I asked Brian to give me the sort of thing we should expect from all our elected officials;
something I know I've never seen nor heard from any republican and few Democrats.

Our Democratic politicians must stop hiding behind form-letter responses and talking-point corn-flake answers. We need them to speak with us face to face with honesty.

To my best recollection, I said to Brian Baird,

"I've listened to what sounds like talking-point answers from you. These are the very answers and logic we've heard from the republican president and his party supporters.

Brian, you're sounding like Republican partisans who have talked to us voters for years as if we were stupid and gullible. It is personally insulting to be talked to that way and you're doing it once again today.

I'm asking you to look us directly in the eye and flat out tell us why my soldier-son's blood is worth the supposed six-month outcome you've described - which even you admit to be a house of cards.

Tell us right here and right now with no allusion to American foreign policy and nonsense about broken pottery barns and social chaos in Iraq.

What should I tell my soldiers about what their blood means to Brian Baird?"

I'll get to his answer in a moment, but first I think we need to talk civics.

For those of you who can't find America on a map because drinking liberally, watching sports, amateur entertainers and survivor contestants are far more interesting, you can go read somewhere else if you're bored.

As for you liberal orthodoxists for whom absolute adherence to pretend liberal doctrine means that any elected official who commits ANY act of heresy is immediately excommunicated, you need to grow up here and now!

Think about what Baird is doing and what he has been subjecting himself too in the name of genuine citizen civic duty, patriotism and his conscience.

Think about what Murray, Cantwell, Pelosi, Reid, and all the Democratic cave-in cowards have not done.

I watched one fellow stand up and wail on and on at the Congressman (not TO him, but AT him) about elected officials expected to merely vote the will of the people who sent him to Congress.

He insisted that Baird be our voice but not think for himself.

I've always mostly agreed with that notion - mostly,  but not totally. Cause I'm willing to concede that if my elected representative gets access to information affecting an upcoming vote and has no time to poll his constituents, he must used his wisdom.

I may not agree with his choices but how can I dispute his conscience and best effort?

Why would I fire him for doing what he thought he should? As a union shop steward I would go after management full bore for firing my co-worker based on such logic.

We don't always elect the smartest person to represent us. But not being the smartest isn't a representative's problem, it's ours for assuming we should elect smart robots. Our challenge is to elect representatives with integrity who don't place lobbyists and cash above the needs of those they represents.

Our challenge is to elect representatives who won't take talking-point orders from party officials who are not supposed to be party leaders FIRST and elected officials SECOND;

and who won't threaten independent thinkers with party reprisals, retaliation or party discipline for not going along with official partisan-dictated policy.

And of course ... we elect representatives with courage - not only courage to vote their conscience with their best wisdom - but also courage to take responsibility and accountability for that vote; to go back to the people and stand in front of them.

I am in major disagreement with Brian Baird on his on his position on the surge and his confidence in General Petraeus. But in all honesty, I am in major agreement with Brian Baird on his ability to be a real elected representative of his people.

When you come down to it, Baird is the only politician I've seen in my lifetime who displayed the courage to willingly take an unpopular decision and then leap out of the frying pan from which his opinion was given and straight into the fire to take the heat.

That's what those of us who CAN find the United States on a map ought to be able to understand.

So what did Baird say when I asked him what I could share with our family soldiers about their blood?

Baird did not hesitate when he replied that "You probably won't like it, but ... " [and I have to paraphrase the rest of his lengthy response.]

Baird described himself as not only our elected representative but also a patriotic and civic-minded American citizen. Now all talk can be cheap talk. Any time any of us self-describe we run the risk of spouting cheap talk.

However, in this case, I saw nothing cheap in what Brian Baird said nor how he said it. Whether you agree or not, that's what we want in our officials.

Baird believes that contrary to my apparent assumption that he himself wants us to expend our most precious blood to pay the price of stupid Bush/Republican/Neocon policies, we must understand that leaving our blood in harm's way is a necessary  support of America's core values and to our being part of a global community and not the superpower that fools make us out to be.

It's as much a support of American core values as is advocating for the restoration of habeas corpus and the end of unlawful and unnecessary wire tapping.

We are part of a community where we may not like the price we are paying, but where in fact we have created a situation we have no right to reasonably ask other countries to clean up for us. We cannot expect other countries to willingly send their own blood into harm's way for something our fools-for-leaders did in our name.

He looked me in the eye and told me that yes, he felt that risking my soldiers' blood is worth it ... and that yes, if he had grown children and it meant sending his own children into harm's way he would not change his position.

I then felt challenged to look him back in the eye and without relying on my own political talking-points, tell him why and in what effective manner I would ask the leadership of any other nation to clean up the pile of crap we left laying in the world's living room.

I couldn't come up with any useful nor justifiable  notion with which I could suggest that some other family replace my family's solder.

Those rationales inside our anti-occupation repertoire were impotent and mindless rehashing of arguments that only go so far toward solving the problem.

Baird came over to Lietta and me after the meeting and agreed to Lietta's request for an on-going update exchange regarding our military family members in harm's way.

Another citizen who was talking with us at that moment turned to Brian and said, "When your children are 18, you'll think differently about sending them to war."

Lietta and I spoke about this on the way home. Our military son-in-law re-enlisted a few years ago.  

In preparation for his impending redeployment to Iraq within 3 weeks, he is not talking panic-talk nor shouting "Please Mr. Custer, I don't wanna go!"

No, he is quietly and bravely preparing himself for another 18-month tour.

THAT is the kind of soldier most military families have been sending to Iraq.

THAT is the kind of soldier even Brian Baird recognizes as coming from only a very small group of citizens who man this war for the rest of us;

a vast national majority of us who make up a not-to-be-bothered non-patriotic society worried about hard-ons, super bowls and spending money.

OUR soldier has also authorized us to keep at our government.

"Mom, you're the only voice we have," he said to her when Lietta first overcame her own reluctance to speak out and got involved.

So he's there taking responsibility for his enlistment contract. He's doing his duty while hoping and needing that we do ours - and you do yours.

Are we continuing our effots to go after Brian Baird and all those elected officials who are in a greater position to stop the crooks and liars who are the real villains?

You betcha!!

However, that confrontation in which I was a participant yesterday turned out to be much more clearly perceived than online videos or sensationalized news and internet accounts of angry constituents threatening and demeaning a U.S. Congressman for his position.

We absolutely must stay real with this stuff.

I only speak for me, and in spite of what I believe is Brian Baird's wrong-headed trust of General Betrayus's surge promises and his inappropriate criticism of Moveon.org, I saw the kind of elected official we need more of.

By insisting on some sort of pretend orthodoxy falsely perceived as connected to an anti-war position, we ask Brian and others to flip-flop;

to subject themselves to our own narrow manipulations rather than the manipulations of others.

We expect them to be threat-driven, but only to OUR  threats and not the mindless threats of some other fools.

Being anti-war is but a small part of how I feel in  my role as a responsible civic-minded citizen.

In my own larger context as a veteran, as the father of soldiers and probable grandfather of soldiers, I must stand with each of you and we must be genuine patriots who will make wise decisions when called upon.

We are a military family opposed to war in the abstract but understanding that crap happens;

that despite our highest ideals of peace and global  harmony, our warrior blood is what Americans need when it's time to be grown-ups;

when our maturity recognizes the need take the gloves off.

Posted SwanDeer Project at 11:31 AM PDT

Updated: Monday, 24 September 2007 7:59 PM PDT

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Mitt and Me, children of the 1960's. 

Mitt Romney and I are the same age (60), grew up in the same church, served as Mormon Missionaries in the same years, and were given  draft deferrals as "ministers and/or divinity students" through Mormon Church political agreement with the feds and selective service. 

But our "stuff in common" seems to kind of stop there.

"When Mitt's deferments ended and he became eligible for military service in 1970, he drew a high number in the annual lottery that determined which young men were drafted. His high number ensured he was not drafted into the military."

My deferments ended in December, 1968, when I enlisted in the USAF. That first lottery - had I not signed up - would have delivered a number in the 340's to me which probably meant Mitt would have been called up before me. But by then it was too late.

My grades were too damned low at Texas A & I Univ. (now Texas A & M Kingsville) and I knew I was squandering my college time. However, in 1968 while most of the smart kids my age were desperately trying to end Kenny Rogers' "Crazy Asian War,"  I was oblivious to all that liberal crap and still a devout and conservative Rocky Mountain Mormon.

In 1969 Uncle Sam's Flying Service sent me to Syracuse University to study Russian.

1969 ... you remember ... Woodstock took place only 70 miles from Syracuse.

Woodstock?

Me ... the True Blue Rocky Mountain Mormon who was mad at Jane Fonda - not because of Hanoi - but because of Barbarella?

I refused to go to Woodstock, counting it a patriotic virtue worthy of the highest righteousness to which a returned Mormon missionary could aspire.

Right!

Which did not satisfy my hep kids - now my adult adult children - who are still astonished at my youthful closed mind.

Dad, it was only 70 miles and you didn't go?

Okay okay, back to Mitt and Me.   According to AP and Yahoo News,

"Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney on Wednesday defended his five sons' decision not to enlist in the military, saying they're showing their support for the country by "helping me get elected."

... "The good news is that we have a volunteer Army and that's the way we're going to keep it," Romney told some 200 people gathered in an abbey near the Mississippi River that had been converted into a hotel. "My sons are all adults and they've made decisions about their careers and they've chosen not to serve in the military and active duty and I respect their decision in that regard."

He added: "One of the ways my sons are showing support for our nation is helping me get elected because they think I'd be a great president."

Romney's five sons range in age from 37 to 26 and have worked as real estate developers, sports marketers and advertising executives. They are now actively campaigning for their father and have a "Five Brothers" blog on Romney's campaign Web site.

Romney noted that his middle son, 36-year-old Josh, was completing a recreational vehicle tour of all 99 Iowa counties on Wednesday and said, "I respect that and respect all those and the way they serve this great country."

Now what kind of cheap and shallow answer is that?

As a chickenhawk, Mitt needs more Republican/Cheney/Rove posture training.

You see, chickenhawks are never going to get much mileage as brave, courageous and bold Republicans in the tradition of Ike or even Bob Dole. The best thing for them to do is keep as quiet and low-key as possible so their absence of traditional male virtues doesn't get broadcast too extensively.

And certainly you do not make public speeches justifying not only your own lack of military service, but somehow glossing over the absence of traditional male virtues in your sons and other Republican allies who - in the grandest tradition of Yellow Elephants - cruise around campaigning to be the leader of a country that for the most part was forged by war.

The Mormon Church and I parted ways eventually. For my part it was an ugly divorce full of my multitudinous  recriminations against literal fundamental religion.

The Church, however,  had no need to defend itself from the likes of me so they just ignored me.

Eventually I cooled down and now the Church and I are amiable; almost friends. My dentist is the local Bishop. Most of the rest of my family in Utah and Idaho talk to me.

The young LDS missionaries even come to my house when ward members forget to tell them about the apostate living in that corner house. When they come knocking at the door, my wife usually lets them in, brings them to me and then goes somewhere else.

I usually josh around with them until it becomes obvious that I know the music and the words to the recruiting song they want to sing.

Most recently, after I listened to them praise our Christian in the White House and joke about Adam and Eve - not Adam and Steve, I gave them a dose of my liberal stuff about electing cheats and liars. One of them young guys asked,

I told him I hadn't yet made up my mind.

"I'm against her!", his voice sounding like a chant.

I told him that as a Bush supporter, he hadn't struck me as one who'd ever vote for Hillary anyway. When I asked him why he was against her, he again seemed to chant,

" Because she wants to bring back the draft!" he said. ;

I asked him what would be wrong with that if he supported Bush and Bush's war.

"Yeah, but I don't want to go over to Iraq and fight!"

Well, neither do the sons of Mitt Romney, the man who as commander in chief would "triple Guantanamo" which means more of the Abu Ghraib stuff that has endeared Alberto, Dick and George to most Americans.  . 

So now I've seen and listened to Candidate Romney several times.

Earlier this year I even posted a blog asking "Would you vote for a Mormon for President?  As compared to what?"

As someone bitterly disappointed by the last two presidential elections and who has doubts about ever again voting even for a Republican candidate in my own county, I nevertheless thought I might be tempted by my background and heritage-based assumptions to support Mitt as the most morally predictable of all candidates of both parties. 

But now I've seen and heard enough.

Back in the day (oh ... say 15 years or more) I would have uncritically campaigned and voted for Ole Mitt without hesitation. As many Mormons I'm sure today believe that Mitt as an active Mormon, a former Mormon Bishop and Stake President is several cuts above the rest of the morally challenged candidates in both parties, I would have voted for him then.

- but not now. 

He not only comes across as shallow and slick - possessing the substance and ethical sense of a highly skilled ladies shoe salesman in Macy's - but has compromised himself and his own image of integrity by the same shallow obeisance to Dobson-the-Hut and company that McCain proferred.

Recent performances reveal that Mitt IS ultra-sensitive and self-conscious about his religion. His simultaneous distancing from and defending Mormonism reveals him as someone afraid to acknowledge the fundamental Christianity of his beliefs which is a virtue and attribute quite laudable.

But then his church is likewise ultra sensitive, self-conscious to a fault and way too obsessed with image to appreciate the essential spiritual indifference of most Americans who really do not care which church is your church.

Politically, Mitt seems to be trying to paint himself and his sons as all-American Civic-Minded Patriots who admittedly are chickenhawks; but that chickenhawks are the reason why America enjoys the global reputation it has today.

Well, the Romneys have it right on at least that count.  

Posted SwanDeer Project at 9:51 PM PDT

Updated: Thursday, 9 August 2007 6:21 AM PDT

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In this country - whose founding was authored by the finest political minds available on the North American continent at the time - our wisest thinkers never intended nor authorized any sort of executive branch managed by an elected imperial president. Not then and not now.

Nor did our wisest thinkers ever authorize in the Constitution a diminishing of citizen acccountabilty to itself for keeping everyone as honest, open and above board as possible.

Nothing in 200 years has changed ... not world wars, great depressions and certainly not terrorist attacks. None have required, let alone justified, the suspension or change of Constitutional process/procedure and checks and balances that rein in potential and real aspirations to increased power by one branch over the others.

Americans have never chosen that circumstance and do not chose it at this time.
Americans have never agreed that a pretend "war on terrorism" is the modern equal of past World Wars that required consideration of nothing more than momentary suspension of Constitutional rights in the name of security.

The war on terrorism is not that kind of conflict and does not represent that kind of danger to America.

Americans know this and have known this however many have forgotten it or believed someone else's magic promise of freedom from exaggerated and manufactured fear.

Americans have a choice to make and a choice to convey to the powers that be.

No imperial presidency
No stepping above the law
No silliness about branches and accountability

No executive privilege without open, honest and provable justification.

American Choice for Americans
Impeachment for un-American choices.

Posted SwanDeer Project at 9:46 AM PDT

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Palast Exclusive: The Goods on Goodling and the Keys to the Kingdom

And The No Longer 'Missing' Rove Emails Revealing the Cagey Scheme to Steal 2008...

This Monica revealed something hotter --- much hotter --- than a stained blue dress. In her opening testimony yesterday before the House Judiciary Committee, Monica Goodling, the blonde-ling underling to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and Department of Justice Liaison to the White House, dropped The Big One....And the Committee members didn't even know it.

Goodling testified that Gonzales' Chief of Staff, Kyle Sampson, perjured himself, lying to the committee in earlier testimony. The lie: Sampson denied Monica had told him about Tim Griffin's "involvement in 'caging' voters" in 2004.

Huh?? Tim Griffin? "Caging"???

The perplexed committee members hadn't a clue --- and asked no substantive questions about it thereafter. Karl Rove is still smiling. If the members had gotten the clue, and asked the right questions, they would have found "the keys to the kingdom," they thought they were looking for. They dangled right in front of their perplexed faces.

The keys: the missing emails --- and missing link --- that could send Griffin and his boss, Rove, to the slammer for a long, long time.

Kingdom enough for ya?

But what's 'caging' and why is it such a dreadful secret that lawyer Sampson put his license to practice and his freedom on the line to cover Tim Griffin's involvement in it? Because it's a felony. And a big one.

Our BBC team broke the story at the top of the nightly news everywhere on the planet - except the USA - only because America's news networks simply refused to cover this evidence of the electoral coup d'etat that chose our President in 2004.

Here's how caging worked, and along with Griffin's thoughtful emails themselves you'll understand it all in no time.

The Bush-Cheney operatives sent hundreds of thousands of letters marked "Do not forward" to voters' homes. Letters returned ("caged") were used as evidence to block these voters' right to cast a ballot on grounds they were registered at phony addresses. Who were the evil fakers? Homeless men, students on vacation and --- you got to love this --- American soldiers. Oh yeah: most of them are Black voters.

Why weren't these African-American voters home when the Republican letters arrived? The homeless men were on park benches, the students were on vacation --- and the soldiers were overseas. Go to Baghdad, lose your vote. Mission Accomplished.

How do I know? I have the caging lists...

I have them because they are attached to the emails Rove insists can't be found. I have the emails. 500 of them --- sent to our team at BBC after the Rove-bots accidentally sent them to a web domain owned by our friend John Wooden.

Here's what you need to know --- and the Committee would have discovered, if only they'd asked:

1. 'Caging' voters is a crime, a go-to-jail felony.
2. Griffin wasn't "involved" in the caging, Ms. Goodling. Griffin, Rove's right-hand man (right-hand claw), was directing the illegal purge and challenge campaign. How do I know? It's in the email I got. Thanks. And it's posted below.
3. On December 7, 2006, the ragin', cagin' Griffin was named, on Rove's personal demand, US Attorney for Arkansas. Perpetrator became prosecutor.

The committee was perplexed about Monica's panicked admission and accusations about the caging list because the US press never covered it. That's because, as Griffin wrote to Goodling in yet another email (dated February 6 of this year, and also posted below), their caging operation only made the news on BBC London: busted open, Griffin bitched, by that "British reporter," Greg Palast.

There's no pride in this. Our BBC team broke the story at the top of the nightly news everywhere on the planet --- except the USA --- only because America's news networks simply refused to cover this evidence of the electoral coup d'etat that chose our President in 2004.

And now, not bothering to understand the astonishing revelation in Goodling's confessional, they are missing the real story behind the firing of the US attorneys. It's not about removing prosecutors disloyal to Bush, it's about replacing those who refused to aid the theft of the vote in 2004 with those prepared to burgle it again in 2008.

Now that they have the keys, let's see if they can put them in the right door. The clock is ticking ladies and gents...

(Ed Note: You can easily contact your Congress Members to call and/or email them this information by clicking here. Let them know they need to take action. Now. And feel free to point them towards this article, URL: http://www.bradblog.com/?p=4594)

===

Greg Palast is the author of the New York Times bestseller, Armed Madhouse: from Baghdad to New Orleans - Sordid Secrets and Strange Tales of a White House Gone WILD. For more info, or to hear Brad Friedman, Ed Asner and other troublemakers read from Armed Madhouse, go to www.GregPalast.com

Stewart: Justice officials are 'taking [a crap] inside my head!'

David Edwards and Muriel Kane
Published: Friday May 25, 2007

Posted SwanDeer Project at 7:51 AM PDT

Updated: Saturday, 26 May 2007 8:09 AM PDT

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If we ever in our civic existence want or need leaders who don't make mistakes, we can keep Bush. He takes responsibility for other people's decisions and actions taken in his name, but never says the mistake was his.

What do we have to show for it? Well let me count the ways ...

- Dubya's litany of broken campaign promises

- Dubya's litany of false, misleading or downright stupid economic, social and foreign policy declarations that never made sense in the first place

- Dubya's always-changing but mistake-free rationales parading as legitimate reasons for foreign policy and military strategic blunders - none of which Mr. spread-freedom-at-the-point-of- America's-imperial-guns has ever admitted to be wrong or mistaken measures.

Look where the man who never errs and never admits to error has taken us. It's not a place about which even guys and gals in rural Southern taverns can jingoistically brag.

Folks who make mistakes never learn from their own until they first admit and acknowledge a mistake. "Taking responsibility" most of the time in Bush land suggests that a bad idea was not the decider's mistake. Rather, it was an inheritance from some other mistake-maker.

Now I don't know about you but I have to say that along with the dumb stuff I've done in my life, the good guy I believe myself to be resides in how I have and continue to address my own past choices and actions.

- you know, them there mistaken things and them there wise things I said and did. I might not be proud of all of my life's behaviors but I don't have to bluff my way to respect by trying to look perfect in the eye of my drinking buddies at the Elk Snout Tavern or my brothers and sisters in our local Jesus of The Elk Snout Born-Again Church of the Holy Evangelical Horde.

Which brings me to the horde of candidates telling us that they should be president because they know their evil opponnents, they know how their evil opponents think and they know how to beat them. Evil opponents have made a sad and public career of denying reality, pretending to never make mistakes, taking responsiblity for actions in a way that leaves them pretending that their bath water is drinkable.

This gang that has never shot straight has built a legacy in future American History texts of being the number one loser, most dishonest and incompetent presidential administration in the history of the world's finest democracy.

We don't NEED a president who won't admit fallibility.

Listen up Hillary. If we wanted someone too proud, stupid and arrogant to admit mistakes

- somone in thrall of spin doctors -

we'd find someone just like Dubya.

We spoke to you 6 months ago with an electoral voice whose volume has exceeded even the voice that blew away most of the Democratic power in Congress in 1992. Read between the lines and stop imposing your ambition-driven assumptions on that electoral reality.

We don't want a Dubya look-alike ... When you transparently attempt to act like your wisdom includes a denial of mistakes and in so doing you are already looking presidential we won't buy that farm.

Every time we've done so, the accompanying lack of substance tempts us to denial in not admitting we were wrong. And In so doing, historicially we've found new electable incomptents to replace current loser incumbents.

Please don't go there Ma'am.

If youwant to act presidential then, be someone who is honest with your base of support. If dumb locals like me were able to see - almost from the start of Bush's first years in office - a sham in action, how is it that many elected representatives to this day insist that Mr. Bush was more competent then than now?

- that he had already demonstrated legitimate presidential wisdom,

- that if he said such was so, we had to give him the benefit of the doubt?

Many of us saw throught the Bush-Cheney-Powell bogus justifications for a dumb-ass war and we have never claimed to be smart or smarter than you guys. But in this regard I'll take credit for being smarter back then than you cause I would have taken the Feingold and Obama positions, spoken out and voted against the resolution myself.

Because by 2003 Bushco was already a lying sham and none of you non-admitters of mistakes have ever proven that you had some higher wisdom that justified voting the way you did.

Give us a real break. Give us a president who's up front and honest, without nuance, without non-answers. Then we'll give you our vote and tell others to do the same.

Posted SwanDeer Project at 12:20 PM PDT

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CITIZENS' HEARING ON THE LEGALITY OF U.S. ACTIONS IN IRAQ January 20-21, 2007 Tacoma, Washington, USA

The Citizens' Hearing on the Legality of U.S. Actions in Iraq will be held on January 20-21, 2007, in Tacoma, Washington, two weeks before the Feb. 5 court martial of Lieutenant Ehren Watada at Fort Lewis.

The Citizens' Hearing will function as a tribunal to put the Iraq War on trial, in response to the Army putting Lt. Watada on trial as the first U.S. military officer to refuse deployment to Iraq.

Part I Photo is mine

About half way through the Hearing, my brain suddenly connected the dots of concepts from the American Government class I took as a 12th grader in 1964. Here we sat assembled talking about our government and what's wrong with it,

- perhaps a majority of us taking for granted how that document (whose name gets tossed around like mustard and ketchup at a barbecue) protects us with more force and authority than had a brigade of troops standing guard outside the doors been present (unless necessary which then would make a military brigade a right of every citizen.)

What better demonstration that what all this is about is to live in one of the very few places on the globe where we can get away with it; that in a democracy some things lead to even greater manifestations of citizen power.

Here's what we got away with this past weekend:

Amendment I - Freedom of Religion, Press, Expression. Ratified 12/15/1791.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Being married to an activist who can get things done has its positive perks which include sitting up front where I can hear and see stuff a lot more thoroughly. (And even for an old Veteran who thinks he's seen it all and knows everything, sitting up that close is no place to be caught falling asleep!)

Photo of Lietta is mine

So I thought I'd get my notebook and write down what I expected would be a thought, concept or cool quote that might enter my ears once every ... oh, say 45 minutes. I'd hear something I could use as a talking point or theme for long-winded articles or rants.

So ready to take notes, both feet on the floor and somewhat alert, I started listening and then began to write.

When it was over the old callous on my writing finger was back, having regressed some 40 years ago.

I don't have a laptop, just a calloused writing finger and 36 pages of talking points.

I'll leaving the laptopping and live blogging to Noemi who ought to get some kind of blogging award from somebody who knows a good job when they read one.

So no, don't panic! I'm not going to write up 36 pages of talking points.

But I am going to start writing over the next few weeks about thoughts the came flying into my awake old military-Veteran mind as I sat protected by a document.

Thoughts:

What would a "Constitutional" model of citizenship look like?

Does a good citizen live in indifference to freedoms possessed by few and coveted by most who live on an entire planet?

Does a good citizen justifiably think that the pursuit of happiness includes mere patriotism of consuming American-made products, enjoying corporate sponsored shallow entertainment, going to work, giving up withheld taxes and living only for today?

Does a good citizen leave most of the important stuff to bigmouth politicians who talk down to an entire electorate that is far wiser that it itself realizes?

Does good citizenship stop at the door to a military recruiter's office?

Does a good citizen-soldier agree and commit to stop thinking and merely follow orders once a uniform is donned?

Hell yes!

• Hell yes I will go
• But don't tell me I can't think
• Don't tell me I can't discern
• and don't tell me I have to violate law and repudiate the Constitution to help some fool up my chain of command stay in the driver's seat.

Our assembly waited for no one's endorsment.

• We gathered
• We deliberated
• We will be heard
• We will demand REAL American Constitutional justice for all!

if the illegality of the order to march out and kill is a concern included in the Consitution, why is it not relative to a thinking soldier's right?

By the way - to all fools who say "You signed on, you knew what you were doing, stop whining and get going!" - read an officer's oath.

That oath includes the primary and overarching vow to protect and obey the Constitution. Nowhere does an officer's oath -unlike an enlisted man's oath - include a vow to obey without question or assessment of orders from all superior officers.

So I'm already worked up but have to get going to work so I can earn more tax money to pay - among other things - other citizen soldiers to protect the rights of every other American citizen and their court marital presiders.

This then will start a series for me.

I'll close this morning with a quote from my distant relative, a much maligned (and deservedly so from my own reading of history) former president, but a highly admired, respected and effective military officer and commander of all American forces at the time. Ulysses S. Grant.

Grant's words in and of themselves, authorize any and all - past or present - U.S. military officers to think for themselves, even if they never run for president.

Photo owner:thinkquest.org

More later ...

Posted SwanDeer Project at 12:01 AM PST

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In a vivid sign that George W. Bush's incompetent handling of the Iraq war has fully reached across the political aisle and become too glaring for even his Congressional allies to ignore, Senator Norm Coleman (R-MN) sent a blunt letter to Defense Secretary Robert Gates late last week bitterly complaining about how another extension of Minnesota troops in Iraq has been handled. "I am extremely disappointed to hear that the President's decision to implement a troop surge in Baghdad will have a major, negative impact on the Minnesota National Guard," Coleman wrote in the letter. "These soldiers have made the ultimate commitment to serve our country and defend our freedom. They deserve better than to find out just two short months before their planned return that their tours will be extended for at least another 125 days. Most don't know when they'll be coming home at all, and none know what their extended mission will entail." The letter was prompted by the Bush-McCain Doctrine of war escalation requiring that the Minnesota National Guard's 1st Brigade Combat Team -- which includes over 2,500 Guard members -- have their stay in the Iraqi civil war extended by at least four months, when their families were anxiously awaiting a reunion around March 1. Coleman also said that the families discovered their soldiers' homecoming had been indefinitely postponed through the media, and not the Defense Department. "Their families also deserve better than the insensitive manner in which this announcement was handled," Coleman continued in his letter. "These families have been eagerly counting the days until they could welcome our veteran heroes back to the United States. To find out that their soldier's stay has been extended is heartbreaking. To find out by watching the news on TV is completely unacceptable." In a vivid sign that George W. Bush's incompetent handling of the Iraq war has fully reached across the political aisle and become too glaring for even his Congressional allies to ignore, Senator Norm Coleman (R-MN) sent a blunt letter to Defense Secretary Robert Gates late last week bitterly complaining about how another extension of Minnesota troops in Iraq has been handled. "I am extremely disappointed to hear that the President's decision to implement a troop surge in Baghdad will have a major, negative impact on the Minnesota National Guard," Coleman wrote in the letter. "These soldiers have made the ultimate commitment to serve our country and defend our freedom. They deserve better than to find out just two short months before their planned return that their tours will be extended for at least another 125 days. Most don't know when they'll be coming home at all, and none know what their extended mission will entail." The letter was prompted by the Bush-McCain Doctrine of war escalation requiring that the Minnesota National Guard's 1st Brigade Combat Team -- which includes over 2,500 Guard members -- have their stay in the Iraqi civil war extended by at least four months, when their families were anxiously awaiting a reunion around March 1. Coleman also said that the families discovered their soldiers' homecoming had been indefinitely postponed through the media, and not the Defense Department. "Their families also deserve better than the insensitive manner in which this announcement was handled," Coleman continued in his letter. "These families have been eagerly counting the days until they could welcome our veteran heroes back to the United States. To find out that their soldier's stay has been extended is heartbreaking. To find out by watching the news on TV is completely unacceptable."

Posted SwanDeer Project at 12:01 AM PST

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