christopher shays

making your stomach turn at every opportunity.....

a few minutes ago on bbc world service (on npr) i heard shays asking erik prince some questions (from yesterday i would assume). he asked something like, how many diplomats (who were under blackwater protection) died in 2005, 2006 and 2007 - NONE replied prince. shays then said,

"Thank you for doing a perfect job."

granted i didn't hear the whole session BUT i'll bet stomach-churning-shays didn't ask, 'HOW MANY INNOCENT CIVILIANS DID YOU BUTCHER in 2005, 2006, 2007???' could prince answer, NONE to that?

piece o' steamin' shite
In House hearing, Democrats assail Blackwater
By Brian Knowlton and John M. Broder
WASHINGTON: Guards working for a private American security firm in Iraq have an aggressive and sometimes reckless record - involvement in nearly 200 shootings in Iraq since 2005 - and their use by the U.S. State Department amounts to an expensive and perhaps indefensible privatization of the military, congressional Democrats said Tuesday.But the head of the Blackwater security firm, Erik Prince, said his workers, operating in hostile and chaotic conditions, had been the victims of a "rush to judgment."Representative Henry Waxman, the California Democrat who is chairman of a House committee that is studying the record of the firm in Iraq, said that companies like Blackwater amounted to an inadequately controlled private military force."If we don't have enough troops to do the job, then we need to get more troops," Waxman said at a hearing Tuesday of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Privatizing security services was "causing us problems with the Iraqi people," he said.But Prince - commenting publicly for the first time on a shooting in Baghdad on Sept. 16 in which Blackwater guards have been accused of killing at least eight civilians - rejected the depiction of his employees as trigger-happy "cowboys."..........

and no one is up in arms

about this, because???????????????

each day king george and his court are DIRECTLY responsible for the deaths of many men and women. ours AND theirs. each day people suffer because of king george and his court, the kids with no medical insurance, the people living in fema trailers and so much more. king george's appointments have been LESS than stellar. THEIR staffs have been far less than stellar as well (look at the 'i hate all iranians' babe). king george and his court have committed CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY. we are doing nothing.

here is yet ANOTHER blip on the radar screen

Man Bush chose to lead Pentagon contracting probes left under fire to become Blackwater COO
Jason Rhyne and Nick Juliano
The private security firm Blackwater USA, which has faced mounting criticism following an incident earlier this month in which armed guards from the group purportedly killed 11 unarmed Iraqi civilians, has numerous links to the White House as well as many current and former Republicans.
The connections include the firm's chief operating officer Joseph Schmitz, who was tapped by President Bush in 2002 to "oversee and police the Pentagon's military contracts as the Defense Department's Inspector General."
The relevation was first reported by Ben Van Heuvelen in Salon.
Serving until 2005, Schmitz went on to preside over "the largest increase of military-contracting spending in history" and joined Blackwater just a month after his departure from the Pentagon, according to Van Heuvelen.
"The resignation comes after Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA) sent Schmitz several letters this summer informing him that he was the focus of a congressional inquiry into whether he had blocked two criminal investigations last year," according to a 2005 article in the LA Times.........................

he's right in one way,we ARE human

we ALL do make mistakes. at work, just last week i made one. it was small and caused no damage but it upset me horribly. i wrote up a system change request a while ago. it's now in it's testing stage. i don't test (any longer), someone else does. part of that request was to be able to stop most people from making changes on certain individuals who reside on one of our main systems. i had to list out individually ALL of the items that would generate a stop so people couldn't mess with the individuals who reside on this system. when i did the name section, i listed the first name, middle name, nickname and a couple of other items we get to choose from. what i DIDN'T LIST and what of course was BLATENTLY OBVIOUS WAS THE LAST NAME. i just missed putting ONE word in my sytem change request. that word was 'LAST'. of course the it person who coded my request already INCLUDED the last names. but, i was visibly upset AT MYSELF. i made a stupid idiotic mistake. i am human, i make stupid mistakes.

this is NOT a mistake. killing someone is NOT a mistake. it's not to be taken lightly and brushed off like forgetting one obvious word. when you're human and you make a little mistake, it SHOULD bother you a bit. when you're human and you kill and innocent it SHOULD tear you apart inside. you shouldn't take it in stride and shrug your shoulders and say, 'hey, i'm human, i made a mistake'. NO YOU DIDN'T MAKE A MISTAKE. YOU TOOK A HUMAN LIFE

Blackwater boss defends contractors' 'honorable' work
.............In response to some of the allegations raised by Waxman, Prince said, "If we put 1,000 guys out in the field, humans make mistakes and they do stupid things sometimes. We try to catch those as much as we can." ............

A HUMAN LIFE is not a STUPID mistake. you don't just forget about it (like my adding the word 'last' to my document) and go on. you don't if you ARE indeed human

of course it's misdiagnosed

AND misunderstood in grrrls. after all, they ARE JUST grrrls...........

(it's changing a bit today......but when they used to study things such as heart attacks WOMEN WERE ALWAYS EXCLUDED. women and grrrls, don't get 'sick'. it's ALWAYS in their heads)

Girls Are Often Neglected Victims of Concussions
By ALAN SCHWARZ
WEST HARTFORD, Conn. — Hannah Stohler sat beside the piano she could no longer play, in the living room that spun like a carousel, in the chair in which she tried to read but could not remember a word. Ten months after her third concussion while playing high school soccer knocked her into a winter-long haze of headaches and dizziness and depression that few around her could comprehend, Stohler recalled how she once viewed concussions. “I thought they were a football injury — a boy thing,” said Stohler, a junior at Conard High School in West Hartford, Conn. “Those guys are taught to hit hard and knock people to the ground. But anyone can get a concussion, and I don’t think a lot of girls recognize that. They have no idea how awful the effects can be — it changes your life.”
Stohler, 16, has more company than most people know. While football does have the most concussions (and controversy over their treatment) in high school athletics, girls competing in sports like soccer and basketball are more susceptible to concussions than boys are in the same sports, studies show.............

what's the answer? well for one, all grrrls should be BANNED from playing sports. they should be taken out of school at age 10, further taught (because of course the training of grrrls should start at birth) how to cook, sew, keep house and greet their manly man when he comes home and of course married off to their first cousin when they turn the ripe old age of 14!

can you imagine how

really BAD one has to be in order to be FIRED as a mercenary? i'm guessing that is PRETTY bad....

i'm sitting here blogging about it, thousands of OTHERS are blogging about it, even OUR MILITARY has issues with blackwater.........yet...............what will be done?


Blackwater Portrayed As Out of Control
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Blackwater USA is an out-of-control outfit indifferent to Iraqi civilian casualties, according to a critical report released Monday by a key congressional committee.
Among the most serious charges against the prominent security firm is that Blackwater contractors sought to cover up a June 2005 shooting of an Iraqi man and the company paid, with State Department approval, the families of others inadvertently killed by its guards.
Blackwater has had to fire dozens of guards over the past three years for problems ranging from misuse of weapons, alcohol and drug violations, inappropriate conduct and violent behavior, says the 15-page report from the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.
Just after the report was released, The Associated Press learned the Federal Bureau of Investigation is sending a team to Iraq to investigate an incident that has angered the Iraqi government.......
............The 122 personnel terminated by Blackwater is roughly one-seventh of the work force that Blackwater has in Iraq, a ratio that raises questions about the quality of the people working for the company.
The only punishment for those dismissed was the termination of their contracts with Blackwater, says the report, which uses information from Blackwater's own files and State Department records...............

and................in the name of the lord, let's KILL KILL AND KILL SOME MORE (i know when i think of christianity i think of guns)

Erik Prince

.....Gender: Male Religion: Born-Again Christian Race or Ethnicity: White Sexual orientation: Straight Occupation: Business, Military Party Affiliation: Republican....
..........Erik Prince is a multi-millionaire right-wing fundamentalist Christian from a powerful Michigan Republican family. His wealth came from his father, Edgar Prince, who headed Prince Automotive, an auto parts and machinery manufacturer.
A major Republican campaign contributor, he interned in the White House of President George H.W. Bush and campaigned for Pat Buchanan in 1992, finding time to intern for conservative congressman Dana Rohrabacher as well. Prince founded the mercenary firm Blackwater USA in 1997 with Gary Jackson, another former Navy SEAL.
Prince's sister Betsy DeVos is a powerful conservative in her own right. Married to the son of Richard DeVos (Republican bankroller and co-founder of Amway), she served as chair of Michigan Republican Party in the 1990s.............

i didn't even want to mention

that shite show 'kid nation' (in all fairness i've NOT seen it. but who the f**k would allow their kid to participate? it's NOT for social GOOD, it was for F**KING MONEY) at any rate, i DO have to mention it now because of this

Tell CBS to Stop Killing Animals in Cheap Attempts to Boost Ratings!
.............For those unfamiliar with the show, Kid Nation features a group of kids who are "left" in an Old West-style town for 40 days. In the latest episode, some of the kids are shown arguing about whether or not to kill three chickens for dinner. Several of the children had grown close to the chickens during their time on the show and didn't want them to be killed. Eventually, a small group of children convinces the others to go along with killing the animals because no other protein sources are available to them. The kids proceed to chop off the birds' heads on air. Some of the children were clearly traumatized.
Moonves and CBS should have ensured that these kids had access to vegetarian protein sources (such as beans, nuts, whole grains, veggie burgers, etc.) so that they could have gone with their compassionate instincts and not killed these animals. Under the premise of showing "reality," Moonves and CBS have now caused animals to die and kids to be scarred, just so the network could make more money. ....................

RADIOHEAD IS A COOL BAND

and this just is icing on the cake (oh i like cake too, the band AND the food)

Radiohead to give away new album

By Angela Monaghan

Radiohead, the internationally renowned band, has taken the unusual step of telling fans that they can pay as much or as little as they like for the band's new album In Rainbows.
Shane Richmond: It's been done before, but this time it is Radiohead

In a break from industry tradition the UK band famous for hits including Creep, Paranoid Android and Karma Police, has told fans "it's up to you" what they pay to digitally download the album.
This isn't the first time that an artist has opted to charge nothing for its album, but the move is significant because Radiohead remains one of the biggest bands in the world.
Radiohead is free to sell its album directly from its official website because it is no longer tied to a record label. So far the album is only available to pre-order from the website, where it can be downloaded on release on October 10..............

no balls, NONE

and i hope we ALL remember this come the next time they are up for election

Senate approves $150B in war funding

By ANNE FLAHERTY, Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON - Thwarted in efforts to bring troops home from Iraq, Senate Democrats on Monday helped pass a defense policy bill authorizing another $150 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The 92-3 vote comes as the House planned to approve separate legislation Tuesday that requires President Bush to give Congress a plan for eventual troop withdrawals.
The developments underscored the difficulty facing Democrats in the Iraq debate: They lack the votes to pass legislation ordering troops home and are divided on whether to cut money for combat, despite a mandate by supporters to end the war.
Hoping the political landscape changes in coming months, Democratic leaders say they will renew their fight when Congress considers the money Bush wants in war funding.............

i have a friend.............

who is NEVER going to 'bama..........


Court Leaves Ala. Sex Toy Ban Intact

not homer's d'oh, but DUH!!!

Most in Poll Want War Funding Cut
Bush's Approval Rating Ties All-Time Low

photo of the week

Photo of the week "Jesus is a Dead Iraqi Child," reads a sign held by a student from Abilene Christian University at a Sept. 21 antiwar demonstration. Photo by Greg Kendall-Ball.

the question

BEGS asking American Conservative Mag Mocks Petraeus As 'Sycophant Savoir' - Will Congress Condemn It Life They Did the Moveon.org Ad?

Posted by Jon Ponder

The cover of the October 8, 2007, issue of Pat Buchanan’s magazine, American Conservative, shows a photo of Gen. David Petraeus under the headline, “Sycophant Savior.” The cover story is subheaded, “General Petraeus wins a battle in Washington — if not in Baghdad.”
Compare the criticism implied in that headline with the much vilified headline of the ad from Moveon.org: “General Petraeus or General Betray Us? Cooking the books for the White House.”
Beyond the headline, the American Conservative article is harshly critical of the general and the partisan political role he has chosen to play. The writer, Andrew J. Bacevich, describes Petraeus as a “politcal general of the worst kind — one who indulges in the politics of accommodation that is Washington’s bread and butter but has thereby deferred a far more urgent political imperative, namely, bringing our military policies into harmony with our political purposes.”..........

the scariest woman in america?

you tell me

if 'she' IS a woman (and of course i mean NO offense to the trans-gendered community here)

and is that some sort of nazi brooch or neckpiece 'she' has on? what's up with that? hey sista grrrlfren, RED IS NOT YOUR COLOR.

if this 'woman' isn't IMMEDIATELY FIRED well then.........

(wonder how 'she' feels about blacks, latinos, eye-talians???????????)

I hate all Iranians, US aide tells MPs

By SIMON WALTERS

Britsh MPs visiting the Pentagon to discuss America's stance on Iran and Iraq were shocked to be told by one of President Bush's senior women officials: "I hate all Iranians."
And she also accused Britain of "dismantling" the Anglo-US-led coalition in Iraq by pulling troops out of Basra too soon.
The all-party group of MPs say Debra Cagan, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Coalition Affairs to Defence Secretary Robert Gates, made the comments this month. The six MPs were taken aback by the hardline approach of the Pentagon and in particular Ms Cagan, one of Mr Bush's foreign policy advisers.
She made it clear that although the US had no plans to attack Iran, it did not rule out doing so if the Iranians ignored warnings not to develop a nuclear bomb.
It was her tone when they met her on September 11 that shocked them most.
The MPs say that at one point she said: "In any case, I hate all Iranians."
Although it was an aside, it was not out of keeping with her general demeanour. .........

...........Tory Stuart Graham, who was on the ten-day trip, would not discuss Ms Cagan but said: "It was very sobering to hear from the horse's mouth how the US sees the situation." ..............

huh? A TAX EXEMPT CHARITY

that does millions of dollars worth of work for the pentagon? that 'hires' someone to work for them at over $13,000 a MONTH who only came to a christmas party (who NEVER actually WORKED for them)

and our children aren't receiving health care. and our people are still suffering from events such as storms in the gulf. and we're invading countries who NEVER did any harm to us.........

wtf??????????

Air Force Arranged No-Work Contract
Experts Question Official's Deal With Nonprofit


By Robert O'Harrow Jr. Washington Post Staff Writer
While waiting to be confirmed by the White House for a top civilian post at the Air Force last year, Charles D. Riechers was out of work and wanted a paycheck. So the Air Force helped arrange a job through an intelligence contractor that required him to do no work for the company, according to documents and interviews.
For two months, Riechers held the title of senior technical adviser and received about $13,400 a month at Commonwealth Research Institute, or CRI, a nonprofit firm in Johnstown, Pa., according to his r¿sum¿. But during that time he actually worked for Sue C. Payton, assistant Air Force secretary for acquisition, on projects that had nothing to do with CRI, he said. Riechers said in an interview that his interactions with Commonwealth Research were limited largely to a Christmas party, where he said he met company officials for the first time.
"I really didn't do anything for CRI," said Riechers, now principal deputy assistant secretary for acquisition. "I got a paycheck from them."

besides being responsible

for so much destruction, despair, death..................

he IS also responsible for NOT trying to save our planet. no amount of his words NOW can change that. he revoked laws (which just happened to have been passed by bill clinton) making big bid-nez accountable for THEIR contribution to the killing of our planet. he never believed (or just flat out doesn't care) in global warming and pollution killing our earth. he's a disgrace AND a liar

Bush struggles to stay relevant in climate debate

By Caren Bohan
WASHINGTON, Sept 30 (Reuters) - U.S. President George W. Bush, hosting major polluting nations last week, sought to convince skeptics that he wants to help shape the next global deal on climate change, despite his long history of shunning such efforts.
But with only 15 months left in office, his chances of becoming a major player in the debate over climate change are diminishing quickly, analysts and diplomats said.
They added that his resistance to the kind of mandatory emissions limits sought by many allies in Europe and Japan may further weaken his influence as negotiations intensify over a successor treaty to the Kyoto Protocol. That treaty, which Bush rejected, expires in 2012.
Bush told a gathering of envoys from the 17 biggest emitters of greenhouse gases that he took global warming seriously and that the United States would do its part to combat it.
His acknowledgment of a problem highlighted a shift from his previous questioning of the science linking human activity to rising temperatures..;.;.......

i thought i was doing my good deed of the day

well, I THOUGHT WRONG

i was at the corner of asylum and prospect (the very same corner i found mambo sven wandering around at) at about 2:30 ish am this morning. stopped at the light, smoking a butt listening to npr. i hear something and turn to my leftt. it's a young woman, short hair, glasses with a backpack. she asked me for a ride. #1) there is NO room in my car for anyone but the driver. i'm not exaggerating not one little bit. there is NO room front OR back OR even in the trunk. and #2) there is NO way (even if there WAS room in my car) i would give a stranger a ride at 2:30 am. i told her, no, i couldn't give her a ride and of course i pointed out there was NO place for her to sit. she started crying and told me she had just walked from the base of avon mountain (which is quite the haul in the middle of the night). her brakes went out (in avon) and her car was towed. she added the avon police were the ones who gave her a ride to the bottom of the mountain. well, i told her i'd give her some money to call a cab. i handed her $10.00. she didn't have a phone (no surprise there at this point). sooooooooo, i called a cab for her on my cell phone. i gave the location as the corner of prospect and asylum. the dispatcher said they MUST have a street address. they couldn't pick someone up at a corner. ok i said, i'd call right back. i told the young woman to walk down prospect a bit to the first house and i'd meet her there. i drove over, got the address of grace church (870 prospect) and called the cab company again. i gave them that address and told them the woman was going to broad street (oh, that's where she told me she lived). i backed my car up a bit (she hadn't quite made it to 870) and told her a cab would be there in 5 to 20 minutes. then I GAVE HER ANOTHER $5.00. i drove off into the darkness. picked my coffees up at dunkin' and came into work. no sooner than i sat down but my cell rang. it was a man asking if i was at the church. noooooooo i said (and i felt a chill). well he then asked if i was the woman he picked up. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO i said. turns out he was a couple of blocks from the address she gave him (on broad) and the meter was at $8.00. she told him she only had $5.00!!!! so she gave him the 5, started to cry and got out. i told the man no. she had MORE than 5 (i didn't tell him i gave her 15). now i felt bad for him. i even entertained the though (i got it AFTER i hung up with him) of calling the cab company back and asking him to stop by and i'd GIVE HIM the rest of her fare (i didn't though). i told him i found her wandering around prospect, her telling me her car got towed, me giving her money and me calling her a cab. that's it, i didn't know her, i just felt badly for her. he mentioned something about calling the police (not on me of course, on her).

those wild and wacky

italian nuns!

liliana, annamaria and gianbattista
mother superior jumped the guuuuuuuuuun, mother superior jumped the guuuuuuuuuuunnnnnnn
Italian archbishop closes convent after nuns come to blows
A convent in southern Italy is being shut down after a quarrel among its last three remaining nuns ended in blows, press reports said Sunday.
Sisters Annamaria and Gianbattista, reportedly upset about their mother superior's authoritarian ways, scratched her in the face and threw her to the ground at Santa Clara convent near Bari in an incident in July that was kept quiet until now.
Archbishop Giovanni Battista Pichierri tried to reconcile the nuns but finally decided in late August that they had "clearly lost their religious vocation" and asked the Vatican for permission to close the convent............

my blood is boiling

remember, a 'christian' president is directly responsible for destroying the whole nation of iraq. for killing tens of thousands of it's citizens, for destroying homes, for displacing millions AND of course for the 3,803* deaths of OUR men and women

these men (and a few women) have one f**ked up view of what christianity is

McCain: I'd prefer Christian president
WASHINGTON - Sen. John McCain said in an interview published Saturday that he would prefer a Christian president over someone of a different faith, calling it "an important part of our qualifications to lead." In an interview with Beliefnet, a multi-denominational Web site that covers religion and spirituality, the Republican presidential hopeful was asked if a Muslim candidate could be a good president.
"I just have to say in all candor that since this nation was founded primarily on Christian principles ... personally, I prefer someone who I know who has a solid grounding in my faith," McCain said. "But that doesn't mean that I'm sure that someone who is Muslim would not make a good president."............

*figure as of 1:50 am et

sick, queasy, afraid, ANGRY

that's how i feel. remember the words to the who song...........WON'T GET FOOLED AGAIN

now i think iran is being run by madmen, no doubt about that. iraq was as well. HOWEVER, we had NO RIGHT to invade. sure saddam SHOULD have been taken out but not like he was. look at what we did. are we going to allow this to happen again? oh yeah and remember, iran is MUCH BIGGER than iraq. how many more men and women are we willing to lose? my answer, NONE
was ANYONE a threat to us BEFORE we invaded iraq? well certainly NOT iraq....THEY didn't bomb the world trade center, the pentagon and crash the plane in pa
Hersh: 'War with Iran will be about protecting the troops in Iraq'
Greg Wasserstrom
The only thing different about the Bush Administration's rhetoric about Iran and statements made regarding Iraq before the US invasion in 2003 are the words chosen, says journalist Seymour Hersh.
"They've changed their rhetoric, really. The name of the game used to be nuclear threat," Hersh said on CNN's Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer, adding a moment later, "They've come to the realization that it's not selling, it isn't working. The American people aren't worried about Iran as a nuclear threat certainly as they were about Iraq. So they've switched, really."
The Bush Administration is all but set to authorize a campaign of limited, surgical airstrikes against Iranian targets, Hersh reports in the New Yorker's latest edition. In his piece, Hersh writes, "During a secure videoconference that took place early this summer, the President told Ryan Crocker, the U.S. Ambassador to Iraq, that he was thinking of hitting Iranian targets across the border and that the British 'were on board'... Bush ended by instructing Crocker to tell Iran to stop interfering in Iraq or it would face American retribution."..........

i'm not one to

assume someone is gay based on their attire





BUT LOOK AT THIS DUDE




methinks he doth protest (as in ALLEGED gay bashing) too much if you get my drift (hey peeps it's my idea of humor here, but really that tie HAS to go - well so does the ken burns do)

Son of fallen Bush aide suspected in Washington gay-bash
Nick Langewis
(via PageOneQ)--A Georgetown University sophomore, implicated in a gay-bashing by a fellow student, has ties to the Bush Administration, RAW STORY has learned.
19-year-old Philip Anderton Cooney, pictured here in the spring of 2005, is the son of fallen Bush aide and American Petroleum Institute oil lobbyist Phil Cooney.
Phil Cooney was appointed chief of staff with the White House Council on Environmental Quality, suffering criticism for his lack of environmental experience. After his resignation and subsequent hire to a position with ExxonMobil, it was found that Cooney had reportedly tampered with data to support the Bush line on climate change..........