Lies About the War and Lies About Ourselves by Daniel N. White

by Daniel N. White
Featured Writer
Dandelion Salad
February 19, 2010

My younger brother the attorney has a friend from high school I know reasonably well who is also an attorney–he’s worked in the biggest state’s AG’s office doing appellate criminal for a quarter century now, and is at the top of the legal food chain there. Let’s call my brother’s friend Bill. Bill has an adult son I met for the first real time two and a half years ago during their last visit to Austin. Bill’s son had been getting in trouble in his home town and the final straw was his stealing a senior police officer’s bicycle and riding around him in circles taunting him. That part might be sort of funny but the other stuff he was up to wasn’t, and the law had been gunning for him, so even with a daddy who had no small amount of legal clout he was in serious trouble and the judge was giving him the choice of the military or prison. The boy took the military, and the Army was giving what sounded to him and his folks the best deal–two year enlistment, but you’d be going to Iraq for one of those years. Boy took the deal; his parents signed off on it.

Justice Department clears Bush lawyers for ‘torture memos’

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By Marisa Taylor
McClatchy
Feb. 19, 2010

WASHINGTON — Two former high-level Bush administration officials who provided legal justification for harsh interrogations of overseas terror suspects are likely to escape any formal punishment now that the Justice Department has concluded they should not be held legally responsible.

In a long-awaited report released early Friday evening, Deputy Associate Attorney General David Margolis said that former department lawyers John Yoo and Jay Bybee should not have their law licenses revoked as a consequence of their legal advice to the Bush administration signing off on the controversial interrogation methods.

[…]

via Justice Department clears Bush lawyers for ‘torture memos’ | McClatchy

see

US exonerates authors of Bush torture memos + Spanish judge to probe Guantanamo torture claims

Michel Chossudovsky: US will start WW3 by attacking Iran + Europe’s 5 “Undeclared Nuclear Weapons States”

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RussiaToday
February 19, 2010cho

A UN nuclear watchdog report suggests Iran could be developing a nuclear bomb, apparently confirming long-held suspicions in the West. But Tehran denies the claims, again insisting that its atomic intentions are peaceful. Michel Chossudovsky, who’s from an independent Canadian policy research group, believes that what Iran says hardly matters, because the U.S. is planning for war…

The Silent War: Israel’s Blockade of Gaza

Dandelion Salad

MedicalAidPalestine
February 15, 2010

Israels blockade of Gaza has been in place for almost three years.

Building on existing closures and restrictions, the blockade means the delay or denial of a broad range of items food, industrial, educational, medical deemed “non-essential” for a population largely unable to be self-sufficient at the end of decades of occupation. The blockade prevents access by sea, land and air, effectively closing off a population of 1.5 million Palestinians from the outside world.

This short film examines what the blockade means for the people of Gaza, as they struggle to rebuild their lives over a year after Operation Cast Lead.

F. William Engdahl: Strategic denial of oil in Haiti? + The Fateful Geological Prize Called Haiti

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TheRealNews
February 19, 2010

Engdahl: Geo-physics suggest there could be massive oil and mineral deposits in Haiti

Operation New Dawn by Cindy Sheehan + CONTEST: Obama Calls War on Iraq “A New Dawn” — What Do You Call It?

by Cindy Sheehan
Featured Writer
Dandelion Salad
Cindy Sheehan’s Soapbox Blog
Cindy Sheehan’s Soapbox
February 19, 2010

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“The very word ‘war’, therefore, has become misleading. It would probably be accurate to say that by becoming continuous war has ceased to exist. … War is Peace.” — George Orwell, 1984

If I forget everything else in my life, I will never forget the night I walked in my front door with my dogs, Buster and Chewy, and saw the three military officers standing in my living room.

I knew the moment I saw them that Casey was dead. It doesn’t take a genius to put that equation together. On one side of the equal sign is your recently deployed soldier-son, and on the other side are three Army officers standing in your house looking like they would rather be just about anywhere else.

Lost Causes are the Only Causes Worth Fighting For by Cindy Sheehan

by Cindy Sheehan
Featured Writer
Dandelion Salad
Cindy Sheehan’s Soapbox Blog
Cindy Sheehan’s Soapbox
February 19, 2010

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Peace of the Action

“You must not kill your neighbor, whom perhaps you genuinely hate, but by a little propaganda this hate can be transferred to some foreign nation, against whom all your murderous impulses become patriotic heroism.” — Bertrand Russell

In the movie, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, at the end of a filibuster, idealistic freshman U.S. Senator, Jeff Smith (played by Jimmy Stewart) gives an inspiring speech where he says, “Lost causes are the only causes worth fighting for.” Before he collapses on the Senate Floor, he croaks out, “you fight for the lost causes even harder than the others—you even die for them.”

“Love thy neighbor,” is the reason that Senator Smith (everyman) gives for fighting for “lost causes” the hardest. Whether one believes in this Christian command or not, it is the best reason to fight for lost causes.

Part III: Exposing Our Enemy – Meet the Economic Elite by David DeGraw

Dandelion Salad

by David DeGraw
Amped Status
February 19, 2010

The Economic Elite Vs. The People of the United States of America: Part III

“The money powers prey upon the nation in times of peace and conspire against it in times of adversity. It is more despotic than a monarchy, more insolent than autocracy, and more selfish than bureaucracy. It denounces as public enemies, all who question its methods or throw light upon its crimes… As a result of the war, corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money powers of the country will endeavor to prolong it’s reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed.” – Abraham Lincoln

Matthew Bristow: Colombia’s cocaine trail, Pt.2: The labs + Pt.3: Patrolling the coast

Dandelion Salad

http://therealnews.com

Farmers often have little choice who they sell their coca paste to. The buyers take it to labs deep in the jungle to turn into cocaine, but anti-narcotics police are on the trail.

Snowmageddon Etiquette – at work

Dandelion Salad

TheSecondCityNetwork
February 17, 2010

You shouldn’t hurt people who disagree with you. But a little urine never hurt anybody who wasn’t drowning in it.*

Stay warm, everybody.

By Andy Cobb and The Second City

Featuring Second City Alumni Andy Cobb and Nyima Funk

*Anyone drowning in urine probably has more pressing issues to worry about then their carbon footprint anyway, and can be excused from this whole nasty climate argument. Good luck to them all.

The Stimulator: The Five Cockrings Died

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subMedia

This week:

1. Torch Cock Block
2. Take Back our City
3. Heart Attack
4. The Motherfuckin NLG
5. Gord Hill breaks it down.