why was this woman killed?

i don't understand. i just don't understand. is it because your god is better than her god? silly me, i thought they were the SAME god

of course it has nothing to do with a deity. it has to do with power AND insanity........

WE fucked up. we fucked up badly by stirring that pot in the middle east. we have a king who by sheer stubborness (and bad juju and worse advice) is allowing our women and men to be killed, allowing our coffers to be drained AND allowing the residents of the middle east to be brutalized and murdered.

Family reeling from matriarch's brutal slaying


By Arwa DamonCNN
BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- "They killed my mother! God help me, they killed my mother!" Osama Rumani sobbed into his cell phone before handing it to his brother Ali, who was crying even harder.
At the other end of the line were relatives in Canada. As Ali spoke to them, Osama cursed the unknown killers through his tears: "May God orphan you. May you lose your mother and go through this pain. Shoot her once, shoot her twice, break her leg, her arms, but why this?"
Osama covered his face as he cried. His mother, Umm Luma, was an ordinary citizen, well-loved in the neighborhood where she was gunned down in front of her home. (Watch a family describe losing 'our leader at home' -- 2:46)
In recent months, terrorists and death squads in Iraq have increased attacks on civilians. Though the Pentagon says the sectarian violence is not tantamount to civil war, it concedes that the swelling sectarian strife has produced an upsurge in attacks, kidnappings and execution-style killings.......

i have some questions

is parsons still being allowed to build? sounds like it.
why was parsons allowed to have these contracts?
did anyone investigate their PRIOR contracts and work?
why weren't they stopped sooner? why after seeing ONE building were they allowed to continue?
are we going to sue them for the money they stole from the citizens of the united states?


Congress Is Told of Failures of Rebuilding Work in Iraq

By JAMES GLANZ
WASHINGTON, Sept. 28 — In a sweeping new assessment of reconstruction failures in Iraq, a federal inspector told Congress on Thursday that 13 of 14 major projects built by the American contractor Parsons that were examined by his agency were substandard, with construction deficiencies and other serious problems.
The final project, a prison near the southern Iraqi city of Nasiriya, was terminated for other reasons, said the inspector, Stuart Bowen, who heads the Office of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction. Delays and cost overruns led to its cancellation.
Whether because the political stakes in Iraq have risen with the approach of the November elections, or simply because of the scope of the problems, Mr. Bowen’s testimony set off outrage on both sides of the political aisle on a topic — reconstruction failures — that previously was mostly in the sights of Congressional Democrats.
“So when they get the construction right, something else goes wrong?” said Representative John M. McHugh, Republican of New York, referring to cost and schedule problems that had plagued many projects.
“Wow — thank you,” Mr. McHugh said, seemingly speechless for a moment after Mr. Bowen answered in the affirmative............

if a tree falls in the woods

if you SEE it but you're not allowed to photograph it or allowed to tell anyone else about it, does that mean it DID NOT happen?

Iraqi Journalists Add Laws to List of Dangers

By PAUL von ZIELBAUER
BAGHDAD — Ahmed al-Karbouli, a reporter for Baghdadiya TV in the violent city of Ramadi, did his best to ignore the death threats, right up until six armed men drilled him with bullets after midday prayers.
He was the fourth journalist killed in Iraq in September alone, out of a total of more than 130 since the 2003 invasion, the vast majority of them Iraqis. But these days, men with guns are not Iraqi reporters’ only threat. Men with gavels are, too.
Under a broad new set of laws criminalizing speech that ridicules the government or its officials, some resurrected verbatim from Saddam Hussein’s penal code, roughly a dozen Iraqi journalists have been charged with offending public officials in the past year.
Currently, three journalists for a small newspaper in southeastern Iraq are being tried here for articles last year that accused a provincial governor, local judges and police officials of corruption. The journalists are accused of violating Paragraph 226 of the penal code, which makes anyone who “publicly insults” the government or public officials subject to up to seven years in prison.
On Sept. 7, the police sealed the offices of Al Arabiya, a Dubai-based satellite news channel, for what the government said was inflammatory reporting. And the Committee to Protect Journalists says that at least three Iraqi journalists have served time in prison for writing articles deemed criminally offensive. ............

this is what our senate just voted FOR

This Is What Waterboarding Looks Like

Senate passes Bush detainee bill (and i'm not surprised to tell you one of my senators, da liebs, was one of 12 democrats to vote FOR this insidious bill)

has anyone tried the new blogger beta version?

if yes, please drop me a comment on it

thanks

they are here to protect the unborn AND

the belief earth just appeared in the sky one day. they are here for many things, but i guess killing a non-fetus is ok wit dem. why not? after all, it's just a life. a HUMAN life. makes sense to me. send someone death threats because they actually HAVE A BRAIN, believe in science and PROOF



Judge received death threats after ruling on intelligent design
Associated Press
LAWRENCE, Kan. - A judge who struck down a Dover, Penn., school board's decision to teach intelligent design in public schools said he was stunned by the reaction, which included death threats and a week of protection from federal marshals.
Pennsylvania U.S. District Judge John E. Jones III told an audience in Lawrence Tuesday that the case illustrated why judges must issue rulings free of political whims or hopes of receiving a favor.
In a 139-page decision last year, Jones ruled that the Dover school board intended to promote religion when it instituted a policy requiring students to hear a statement about intelligent design before ninth-grade biology lessons on evolution. He ruled that it is unconstitutional to teach intelligent design as an alternative to evolution.
"And if you would have told me when I got on the bench four years ago that I would have death threats in a case like this as opposed to, for example, a crack cocaine case where I mete out a heavy sentence, I would have told you that you were crazy," he said. "But I did. And that's a sad statement."
Jones' ruling drew attention in Kansas, which was involved in a controversy over evolution last year, after the Kansas State Board of Education inserted criticisms of evolution into the state's science standards.
The judge spoke at the University of Kansas' Difficult Dialogues at The Commons series, which includes several speakers who will discuss the evolution and intelligent design debate.
Evolution says species change over time in response to environmental and genetic pressures, while intelligent design says life is too complex to have developed without a designer......

a 'newspaper' makes fun of keith olbermann

after mr oldermann received at this HOME ADDRESS a threatening letter containing a powdery white substance (which later turned out to be laundry detergent)
The Rupert Murdoch-owned newspaper, The New York Post, may have just impeded an FBI investigation into terroristic threats.
I know this because I was a recipient.
i wonder what the person who wrote the story would have done and thought if it had happened to them.

'NY Post' Makes Fun of Olbermann's Reaction to Getting Letter With White Powder

By E&P Staff Published: September 27, 2006 2:50 PM ET updated 8:00 PM ET
NEW YORK One would think journalists might not make fun of a high-profile industry colleague, in this day and age, receiving an envelope -- at home -- which contains white powder. But that seemed to be the case at the New York Post's "Page Six" today in reporting on an alleged incident involving Keith Olbermann, host of MSNBC's "Countdown." Olbermann is not only a frequent critic of President Bush and the Iraq war -- he has been involved in a long feud with Fox News in general, and with Bill O'Reilly in particular. Fox News and the New York Post share an owner: Rupert Murdoch.Several leading news organizations in recent years have summoned "HazMat" teams and sent employees to the hospital after receiving letters with white powder at their offices. The Post itself received a so-called "anthrax letter" in the fall of 2001, infecting three staffers, who all recovered. Here is the Post item, which appeared under the headline, "Powder Puff Spooks Keith."*MSNBC loudmouth Keith Olbermann flipped out when he opened his home mail yesterday. The acerbic host of "Countdown with Keith Olbermann" was terrified when he opened a suspicious-looking letter with a California postmark and a batch of white powder poured out. A note inside warned Olbermann, who's a frequent critic of President Bush's policies, that it was payback for some of his on-air shtick. ............

and


Keith Olbermann ReceIves a Death Threat, and the New York Post Thinks It's Pretty Darn Funny

The New York Post's unctuous Page Six "reported" it, but it's also been independently confirmed that MSNBC's Keith Olbermann -- whose brave commentaries of late taking to task the Bush Administration (and President Bush himself) have invited genuine comparisons to Edward R. Murrow -- opened a suspicious letter with a California postmark that was mailed to his New York City home late Tuesday night and out poured a white powdery substance. A threatening note inside reportedly indicated that this represented revenge for his outspoken on-air views of late.
It turns out the powder was laundry detergent and (thank God) not anthrax or any other toxic substance. But Olbermann obviously didn't know it was harmless until later on and, panic-stricken, called 911 at about 12:30 a.m. ET early this morning, according to the Page Six item. While preliminary tests of the powder confirmed the detergent finding, Olbermann, as a precaution, asked to be taken to the hospital just to be certain..........

and here is mr olbermann's reply to that 'newspaper' (video included). and it's far worse than i thought. according to mr olbermann, the fbi asked for QUIET on the story in order for them to better investigate the threat. the 'newspaper' shot off it's big fat mouth AND got MOST of the 'FACTS' wrong to boot

Olbermann: Threatening letter no joke
Keith Olbermann responds to the New York Post's report

By Keith Olbermann
Anchor, 'Countdown'
MSNBC
Updated: 8:58 p.m. ET Sept 27, 2006
The Rupert Murdoch-owned newspaper, The New York Post, may have just impeded an FBI investigation into terroristic threats.
I know this because I was a recipient.........The Rupert Murdoch-owned newspaper, The New York Post, may have just impeded an FBI investigation into terroristic threats.
I know this because I was a recipient...........

i know this is going to come as a shock to you

BUT king george LIED AGAIN. he was so pissed the world finally heard THE TRUTH, that our 'war on terror' in iraq was in reality STOKING the FIRES and creating MORE chaos and MORE terrorists, he SAID HE WAS GOING TO RELEASE THE ENTIRE REPORT.

i was so surprised when now they say they CANNOT release the report (aren't you shocked and surprised as well???)!

White House Refuses to Release Full NIE

By KATHERINE SHRADER

WASHINGTON (AP) - The White House refused Wednesday to release the rest of a secret intelligence assessment that depicts a growing terrorist threat, as the Bush administration tried to quell election-season criticism that its anti-terror policies are seriously off track.
Press secretary Tony Snow said releasing the full report, portions of which President Bush declassified on Tuesday, would jeopardize the lives of agents who gathered the information.
It would also risk the nation's ability to work with foreign governments and to keep secret its U.S. intelligence-gathering methods, Snow said, and "compromise the independence of people doing intelligence analysis."
"If they think their work is constantly going to be released to the public they are going to pull their punches," Snow said.................

i am almost at a point

where i just want to say, f**k ALL of 'em.

f**k the right wing christian closed minded, evil, nasty, hate inducing and inspiring nazis, f**k the sunnis, f**k the shiites, f**k the jews, f**k the palestinians, f**k the catholics, f**k the protestants, and f**k everyone who supports the united states being in iraq

AMERICA IN IRAQ
Women and children slaughtered in Baghdad
SUNNI GROUP SAYS IT CAUSED STREET INFERNO

and this

U.S. Army extends 4,000 tours of duty in Iraq



(i'm not at that point yet, but close)

i read this heartbreaking story

in the washington post

it was about a soldier, edward richmond, jr who shot a civilian in iraq. he was convicted, demoted, served time and dishonorably discharged.

there is no doubt he shot the civilian. HE admits it. his story differs from some of the witnesses testifying against him.

edward richmond jr should NEVER have been put in the situation to begin with. he was trained to kill and according to him had ORDERS to kill if the civilian moved. that is a distinct possiblity. i could believe that. i am NOT excusing any of this. what i am saying is my heart is breaking that time after time, story after story i have to hear this and read this while many families have to live with this for the rest of their lives both here AND in iraq.

oh, i am NOT lumping mr richmond in with the lindy england crowd. there is no evidence of any kind that says he was one of 'THOSE TYPES'

does 2,687* deaths in iraq equate to JUST A COMMA???

*the u s death count in iraq as of today

what is wrong with everyone? why aren't you calling your senators and congress people. this war MUST stop and it must STOP NOW. it's NOT the fault of 'liberal journalists' 2,687 americans are dead because of this war based on lies (this figure of course doesn't count all those wounded mentally and physically nor those in afghanistan). how many more of our women and men are YOU willing to loose?

Battle Breaks Out in Media Over Bleak NIE Iraq Assessment

By E&P Staff Published: September 24, 2006 4:50 PM ET updated 6:15 PM ET, 9:30 PM
NEW YORK A pitched battle over an intelligence assessment, covered first by The New York Times and then The Washington Post, broke out across the media today. Former Secretary of State Alexander Haig went so far as blame the whole fuss -- over the negative view of the war in Iraq and the war on terror -- on liberal journalists. CNN aired an interview with President Bush in which he declared that one day the Iraq war will look like "just a comma." The National Intelligence Estimate declared that the war in Iraq has increased Islamic radicalism, worsening the overall terror threat, cutting at the heart of the White House defense of its strategy. The assessment “should put the final nail in the coffin for President Bush’s phony argument about the Iraq war,” Senator Edward M. Kennedy (D-MA) said in a statement. Senator Arlen Specter (R-PA) said that “my feeling is the war in Iraq has intensified Islamic fundamentalism and radicalism." But the Senate majority leader, Billl Frist, said "we are going to be fighting this battle, this war overseas, or it’s going to be right here in this country.”The White House quickly issued a statement pointing out that Bush had noted that Osama bin Laden had declared the war in Iraq to be the most “serious issue today for the whole world.” It said the press report on the document "is not representative of the complete document." ...........

this has been in the news of late

not just in yesterdays and todays new york times. it's something WE knew all along. we stirred the pot up. not with a teaspoon but with a GIANT paddle. yet, where is the outcry? so few of us are raising our voices.

NYT: Spy agencies say Iraq war worsens terrorism threat

Filed by RAW STORY

Spy agencies say that the Iraq war has worsened the threat of terrorism, according to a front page article in Sunday's New York Times.
"A stark assessment of terrorism trends by U.S. intelligence agencies has found that the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq has helped spawn a new generation of Islamic radicalism and that the overall terrorist threat has grown since the Sept. 11 attacks," reports Mark Mazzetti.
"The classified National Intelligence Estimate attributes a more direct role to the Iraq war in fueling radicalism than that presented either in recent White House documents or in a report released Wednesday by the House Intelligence Committee, according to several officials in Washington who were involved in preparing the assessment or have read the final document," the article continues...........

instead of being in jail where he belongs

this man was rewarded by king george - given an ambassadorship to italy.

he tortured (supported the torture) of teenagers. that's SICK AND AGAINST THE LAW.

it's a sad and scary tale. it happened and even though he's given up his ambassadorship, he's still running around loose (with a building in italy named after him)

and here i thought the reagans had nasty-ass friends

Ambassador de Sade

By John Gorenfeld, AlterNet Posted on November 8, 2005, Printed on September 24, 2006http://www.alternet.org/story/27725/
Among our president's appointments of GOP activists to important posts, we've done worse than Melvin Sembler, the Ambassador to Italy who couldn't speak Italian. Unlike the FEMA chief, who had real responsibilities, Sembler sometimes found himself a fifth wheel around his own embassy. As the Washington Monthly has reported, the scandal that claimed Scooter Libby's job last month may have sprung from secret Rome meetings between neocons, an Iran-Contra figure and an Italian intelligence boss who later pushed phony WMD documents -- all behind Sembler's back.
But where Melvin Sembler, 74, demands attention is as an object lesson in how cruelty can be redeemed by the transformative power of political donations. For 16 years, Sembler, with his wife Betty, directed the leading juvenile rehab business in America, STRAIGHT, Inc., before seeing it dismantled by a breathtaking array of institutional abuse claims by mid-1993. Just one of many survivors is Samantha Monroe, now a travel agent in Pennsylvania, who told The Montel Williams show this year about overcoming beatings, rape by a counselor, forced hunger, and the confinement to a janitor's closet in "humble pants" -- which contained weeks of her own urine, feces and menstrual blood. During this "timeout," she gnawed her cheek and spat blood at her overseers. "I refused to let them take my mind," she says of the program. The abuse took years to overcome.
"It sticks inside you," she told Williams, "it eats at your soul." She told AlterNet that she was committed at 12, in 1980, for nothing more than being caught with a mini-bar-sized liquor bottle, handed out by a classmate whose mother was a flight attendant. Samantha's mother suspected more, and a STRAIGHT expert reassured her fears. The small blonde junior high-schooler was tricked into being taken to the warehouse-like STRAIGHT building. Her mother, told by counselors that her daughter was a liar, was encouraged to trick the girl for her own good.
Overcome by dread in the lobby, Samantha tried to run but was hauled into the back by older girls. Inside, as was standard operating procedure, she began the atonement process that cost over $12,000 a year: all-day re-education rituals in which flapping the arms ("motivating") and chanting signaled submission to "staying straight." She was coerced, she says, into confessing to being a "druggie whore" who went down on truckers for drugs. "You're forced to confess crimes you never committed." (Some survivors call it extortion.).........

...........But today, Sembler's trail of purchased political friendships has led him through the opulent doors of the $83 million "Mel Sembler Building" in Rome, christened this year with help from a longtime ally in Congress, Rep. C.W. Bill Young (R-FL). Not the palace where Sembler worked as ambassador, but another of the Eternal City's architectural treasures, built in 1927 and now dedicated as an annex to the U.S. Embassy in a $30 million renovation at taxpayer expense. "Narcissus is now Greek and Roman," said the Washington Post of the monument. No one could remember any other diplomat receiving such honors, not even Benjamin Franklin.
"We don't do that, do we?" George W. Bush reportedly told the congressman, according to Congressman C.W. Bill Young 's (R-Florida) speech during the ceremony. "We don't name buildings for ambassadors where they have served."
"Mr. President," the politician replied, "I introduced the bill and you signed it." Bush may have missed the Sembler Building provision, tucked as it was into an appropriations bill. But he owed much to the longtime family friend, whom he thanked on "The Jim Lehrer Report" [RealAudio] in 2000 for raising $21.3 million at a single dinner in April, a new record. Asked what favors the money paid for, Bush professed wonderment at the premise: "I know there's this kind of sentiment now -- I heard it during the primaries ... [that] if someone contributes to a person's campaign, there's this great sense of being beholden."
At the Sembler Building, visitors can stroll among the Italian frescoes of cherubs and heavens, and marvel at the spoils of Bush family loyalty, and meditate on the human costs that made Sembler's paradise possible.............