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1/15/03 peace rally at which I was so lucky to get to see Ron Kovic speak, the Purple Heart veteran and author of the book and Oliver Stone/Tom Cruise movie "Born on the Fourth of July". He is paralyzed from the chest down and so bravely spoke of sacrifice from his wheelchair. Quote from one of his talks: "We are well aware that this war can only cause us more sorrow, more suffering as a nation, as a people. We will go to the streets in great numbers in the coming weeks and months. And we will make history. Because we must make history. We must be willing to sacrifice. We must be willing to serve, as a people, as citizens, we must participate, we must have the courage, and find that courage if we don't have it, to step over the line, to say 'Enough', and to say 'This country is our country, we love this country, we are sick and tired of the way this country has been represented. We are sick and tired of the way other people view us as a people.' They have soiled our name. They have taken the good name of the people of this beautiful, beautiful country, they have taken the name of the people of this country, and they have run it through the mud. And we are going to take this country back, because it belongs to us. And we will create a beautiful country, a country we can be proud of, a country that the rest of the world will look upon and say 'They're a good people. They're a reasonable people, a kind people, a compassionate people.' Because we are a beautiful people. And we who sit here before you, we know that this is a great country, we know this is a beautiful country. We feel the potential of this country. You are going to see the potential of this country, on the streets of this country, on the streets of the cities of this country. You are going to see not only a great movement, but you are going to see a society change, and you are going to see history. This is the beginning."

5/13/03 Michael Daniels: Reprinted from A Journal of Postmodern and Critical Thought Devoted to Academic Discourse on Peace and Justice...(see also KIDS' Current Issue)..."Human Nature: Power vs. Justice"...Foucault and Chomsky are perhaps the major intellectual-activist figures of the past thirty years in the Western world, and as such, their discussion is of some significance in setting out not only their intellectual differences, which I take to be quite profound, but also their similarities. As the discussion reveals, Chomsky and Foucault share a similar understanding of the history of scientific knowledge and its development and also its misapplication in the social or human sciences. In the political realm, both men recognize the need to challenge sources of illegitimate power and authority within their own societies. More...

4/15/03 Tim Robbins at the National Press Club: "I imagined our leaders seizing upon this moment of unity in America, this moment when no one wanted to talk about Democrat versus Republican, white versus black, or any of the other ridiculous divisions that dominate our public discourse." "I imagined leadership that would take this incredible energy, this generosity of spirit and create a new unity in America born out of the chaos and tragedy of 9/11, a new unity that would send a message to terrorists everywhere: If you attack us, we will become stronger, cleaner, better educated, and more unified. You will strengthen our commitment to justice and democracy by your inhumane attacks on us. Like a Phoenix out of the fire, we will be reborn. And then came the speech: You are either with us or against us. And the bombing began. And the old paradigm was restored as our leader encouraged us to show our patriotism by shopping and by volunteering to join groups that would turn in their neighbor for any suspicious behavior." More...

5/13/03 passed on from StategyPage.com by Captain Robert Lynn, Public Affairs Officer, 3rd Brigade, Florida Guard (and my cafe buddy): "The Baath Socialist Party, the organization Saddam Hussein took over and used to control Iraq, was officially dissolved by the American military commander in the region. The Baath party basically represented the interests of the Sunni Arab minority (about 20 percent of the population) in Iraq. Even though the Baath party is gone, the Sunni Arabs are still there. Moreover, the Sunni Arabs have the highest education levels in Iraq (and always have) as well as the most management experience in running the country.This is causing problems." Among which, gentle reader, is my first hearing of PeaceWatch's Verna Avery Brown warning us not to throw out the baby with the Baath. More...

5/14/03 Reuters: Oscar-winning documentarian Michael Moore has found backing -- from Walt Disney's Miramax Films -- for a film about the September 11 attacks that criticizes Bush. "Fahrenheit 911", which refers to the date of the hijackings and "Fahrenheit 451", Ray Bradbury's dystopian tale of book burning, will look at the United States in the aftermath of September 11, 2001 and links between the families of Bush and Osama bin Laden. Moore used the "Fahrenheit 911" title for a February 2002 e-mail to fans in which he said publisher HarperCollins hesitated in the aftermath of the hijackings to publish his book, "Stupid White Men". More...

5/14/03 International A.N.S.W.E.R. email: SAY NO TO U.S. AGGRESSION AGAINST CUBA! PROTEST BUSH'S SPEECH ATTACKING CUBA, MAY 19-20: Days of nationally-coordinated local actions protesting Bush's new attacks on Cuba. On May 20, Bush is scheduled to speak in Miami, announcing a new round of hostile and aggressive measures against Cuba. On May 19 and 20, people across the country will be holding demonstrations and press conferences opposing a new U.S. war and threats against Cuba. The A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition urges all of its Organizing Centers and affiliate groups to organize demonstrations or to join already-planned demonstrations.

5/14/03 Kelley Kramer: George W. Bush Resume. Past work experience: Bought an oil company, but couldn't find any oil in Texas, company went bankrupt shortly after I sold all my stock. Bought the Texas Rangers baseball team in a sweetheart deal that took land using taxpayer money. Traded Sammy Sosa. With fathers help (and his name) was elected Governor of Texas. Texas Gov. Accomplishments: Set record for most executions by any Governor in American history. Became president after losing popular vote by over 500,000 votes, with the help of my father's appointments to the Supreme Court. Accomplishments as president: Spent the surplus and bankrupted the treasury. In first two years over 2 million Americans lost their jobs. First president to have all 50 states of the Union simultaneously go bankrupt. First president to enter office with a criminal record. After taking the entire month of August off for vacation, presided over the worst security failure in US history. Failed to fulfill my pledge to get Osama Bin Laden 'dead or alive'. Failed to capture the anthrax killer. I have successfully prevented any public investigation into the biggest security failure in the history of the United States. Appointed more convicted criminals to administration positions than any other president. Fewest press conferences of any president since the advent of television. Signed more laws and executive orders amending the Constitution than any other president. First president to unilaterally attack a sovereign nation against the will of the United Nations and the world community. Records and References: At least one conviction for drunk driving in Maine (Texas driving record has been erased and is not available). For personal references please speak to my daddy or uncle James Baker (They can be reached at their offices of the Carlyle Group for war profiteering, sometimes along with bin Ladens). I set the all-time record for most people worldwide to simultaneously take to the streets to protest me, more than against any person in the history of mankind. (http://www.hyperreal.org/~dana/marches/) More...

5/14/03 A US Attorney General Ramsey Clark in a VoteToImpeach email: President Bush, the Vice President, Secretaries Powell and Rumsfeld, Attorney General Ashcroft are celebrating as their friends in American corporations plan to reap vast profits and control oil resources, the prize for international crimes. They must be held accountable. Nearly two hundred thousand people have already voted to impeach online. Many tens of thousands of paper ballots are being counted. Votes are pouring in. Impeachment is the nonviolent means the American people have to take back the Constitution in time to restore honor to our government and find peace with the rest of the world. 5/12/03: Ramsey Clark at the National Press Club gave an important talk with q and a. Mr. Clark gave an eloquent and impassioned explanation for the case for impeachment of George W. Bush and others, citing Iraq and the assault on civil rights. His address will be aired on C-Span. Please check the C-Span schedule for future air times. The video can also be viewed on the C-Span website. Search "Ramsey Clark" in the Video Search section in the upper right hand corner of the website and select "U.S. Militarism Threatens the Destiny of Humanity." Ramsey Clark will be one of the featured speakers at the May 17-18 National A.N.S.W.E.R. Conference in New York City.

9/31/99 Tucker Carlson interviewing then-Governor Bush re Karla Faye Tucker death row clemency, reprinted from Molly Ivins' "Shrub": In the weeks before the execution, Bush says, Bianca Jagger and a number of other protesters came to Austin to demand clemency for Tucker. "Did you meet with any of them?" I ask. Bush whips around and stares at me. "No, I didn't meet with any of them", he snaps, as though I've just asked the dumbest question ever posed. "I didn't meet with Larry King either when he came down for it. I watched his interview with her, though. He asked her real difficult questions, like 'What would you say to Governor Bush?'" "What was her answer?" I wonder. "Please," Bush whimpers, his lips pursed in mock desperation, "don't kill me." I must look shocked--ridiculing the pleas of a condemned prisoner who has since been executed seems odd and cruel, even for someone as militantly anti-crime as Bush--because he immediately stops smirking. More...

3/31/03 Michael Parenti in "To Kill Iraq": Liberal intellectuals are never happier than when, with patronizing smiles, they can dilate on the stupidity of George Bush. What I have tried to show is that Bush is neither retarded nor misdirected. It is time we dwelled less upon his malapropisms and more on his rather effective deceptions and relentless viciousness. Many decent crusaders have been defeated because of their inability to fully comprehend the utter depravity of their enemies. Michael Parenti's latest books are The Terrorism Trap (City Lights); To Kill a Nation: The Attack on Yugoslavia (Verso): and the 7th edition of Democracy for the Few (Wadsworth). More...

5/15/03 Mark Morford (thanks Meg) BushCo Reams Nation Good: No WMDs after all, no excuse for war, too late for anyone to care anymore. Ha-ha, suckers. Ha-ha-ha oh man did we ever get smacked on that one. Conned big time. Punk'd like dogs. Turns out it really was all a big joke after all. The war, that is. All a big fat nasty murderous oil-licking lie, a sneaky little power-mad game with you as the sucker and the world as the pawn and BushCo as the slithery war thug, the dungeon master, the prison daddy. You really have to laugh. Because it's just so wonderfully ridiculous. In a rather disgusting, soul-draining sort of way. See, there are no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. No WMDs at all. Isn't that great? What's more: There never were. Ha-ha-ha. Gotcha! No warehouses teeming with nuclear warheads, no underground bunkers packed with vats of boiling biotoxins, no drums of crazy-ass chemical agents. Those lowly U.N. inspectors were right after all. Who knew? We've been sucker-punched and ideologically molested and patriotically sodomized. Let's ask the U.S. search teams themselves, ShrubCo's own squadrons of biologists, chemists, arms-treaty enforcers, nuclear operators, computer and document experts and Special Forces troops who've been in Iraq for weeks now, searching frantically. Surely they've found something, right? Surely we can now prove that Saddam was fully intending to fillet our babies and annihilate Florida and poke the eyes out of really cute kittens on national TV for sadistic pleasure, right? Gimme a hell yeah! Whoops. Bad news. As The Washington Post reports, the 75th Exploitation Task Force, the group absolutely certain it would immediately find steaming neon-lit stockpiles of WMDs, is coming home with its tail between its legs. Found nothing. Nada. Psychopatriots are a little nonplussed. Bush is merely "embarrassed." The WMD line was just a ploy that, tragically, much of the nation bought into like a sucker pyramid scheme after being pounded into submission with hammers of fear and Ashcroftian threats and bogus Orange Alerts and having their tweezers confiscated at the airport. It's all over but the shouting. And the screaming. And the endless years of U.S. occupation in the Middle East, the quiet building of U.S. military bases in Iraq so we can keep those uppity bitches Syria and Egypt and Lebanon in line, forge ahead with the long-standing plan to strong-arm those damn Islamic nuts into brutal compliance with Bushco's bleak blueprint for World Inc. Should we care that Osama, the actual perp of 9/11, is still running around free? That terrorism hasn't been quelled in the slightest? That the Mideast is more of a U.S.-hating powder keg than ever, thanks to BushCo? That the economy is in the worst shape it's been in decades? Should we care that we just massacred tens of thousands of Iraqi (and Afghan) civilians and soldiers and suffered a little more than 100 U.S. casualties and have absolutely nothing to show for it except bogus force-fed pride and this weird, sickening sense that we just executed something irreparable and ungodly and karmically poisonous? Nah. Just laugh it off. More...

5/17/03 Captain Robert Lynn, Public Affairs Officer, 3rd Brigade, Florida Guard (and my cafe buddy): If you can�t find the weapons of mass destruction that were supposed to be the main justification for our war on Iraq, forget about it and start talking about something else � namely, what a great democracy we�re going to create for the wonderful Iraqi people. That seems to be the latest tactic of the Bush Administration and most of the mainstream news media in coming up with a new reason why we went to war at all. The problem with the tactic is that lots of the wonderful Iraqi people don�t want anything even remotely resembling democracy. ...the Shiites themselves started demanding the creation of a theocratic state along the lines of what exists in Iran, ... Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfield had solemnly announced, �If ... those people don�t subscribe to the principles we�ve set forth � then they�ll stay out, and that�s life.� There�s something refreshing in Rumsfield�s frankness, but what it tells us is that the �democracy� being �created� is a fake. �Democracy,� if it means nothing else, means that the people get to pick their rulers. What Rumsfield tells us is that the Iraqis aren�t going to pick anybody unless he �subscribes to the principles we�ve set forth.� More...