Sedition...

2009-11-12T21:26:00.005-06:00

Note To Architects:

Outdoor structures, and the sun,
have a sense of humor.

2009-11-10T21:44:00.002-06:00

Please Don't Thank Me For My Service -
Veterans Day 2008, Veterans Day Any Year
http://www.veteransforpeace.org/Please_do_not_thank_me_for_my_service.vp.html
Written by Hal Muskat (of Veterans For Peace)

I'm thinking right now of The Wall in DC. Of trips to the Armory with my dad, a WWII vet. I'm thinking of those two hundred names and faces I can't remember, eighteen and nineteen year old boys from my Basic Training company, KIA before their 20th birthdays. I've seen their names on that wall while looking for my own.

Every time I hear, "Thank-you for serving!" I want to reply, "Fuck You!"

For which of the following are you thanking me:
a) learning how to do field abortions on "pregnant gook girls";
b) Being part of a military that is responsible for millions of deaths in Vietnam;
c) Refusing orders to Vietnam;
d) Participating in the GI Movement;
e) Thinking for myself;
f) Not thinking for myself;
g) Following or not following orders?

As a member of the United States Army from 1965 - 1970, I was NOT defending America, our allies, your families or friends. America was NOT being attacked by the Vietnamese, much in the same way that America is NOT being attacked by Iraqis.

I for one, do NOT thank current soldiers for their service in Iraq or Afghanistan! I thank and honor those who repudiate this nation's militarism. I thank Iraq Veterans Against the War for their thought, action and lives. I thank those veterans who organized and testified at the IVAW Winter Soldier Hearings last year and who continue to give witness to atrocity and mayhem. ivaw.org/wintersoldier/testimony

On Veteran's Day, I salute, in addition to IVAW, Vietnam Veterans Against the War, Veterans For Peace, The National Liberation Front of Vietnam, WWII Allied Forces led by General Dwight Eisenhower; Resistance fighters against the nazi's throughout Europe; Resistance movements from South Africa to South Harlem, from Philadelphia to Nicaragua where my government spent millions attempting to overthrow a democratic government who's president had the nerve to be critical of the United States.

I do salute those who choose to defend America. Go get the bad guy, McCain will tell you right where he is, but why thank anyone for killing tens of thousands of civilians cause you can't find the right cave and invaded the wrong nation? Should I thank today's soldiers for being lied to and believing in that lie? Perhaps their "good intentions" deserve a salute?

On this Veteran's Day, I again salute those veterans, from the armed forces of all nations who use their training, intelligence and compassion to seek ways in which our governments can find peace without increased militarization of the globe and our ways of life.

You may thank me, and I'd be honored, for my resistance to imperial war, for my support of the National Liberation Front of Vietnam, for my continued activism that nourishes my soul and gives me reason to live and create.

Just don't blindly thank me for anything you don't know about.

Perhaps that's why I can't seem to find my name on that Wall in a waking state.

2009-11-10T21:21:00.003-06:00

Prospect of More U.S. Troops Worries Afghan Public
November 7, 2009
By ALISSA J. RUBIN

CHARIKAR, Afghanistan — As Americans, including President Obama’s top advisers, tensely debate whether to send more American troops to Afghanistan, Afghans themselves are having a similar discussion and voicing serious doubts.

In bazaars and university corridors across the country, eight years of war have left people exhausted and impatient. They are increasingly skeptical that the Taliban can be defeated. Nearly everyone agrees that the Afghan government must negotiate with the insurgents. If more American forces do arrive, many here say, they should come to train Afghans to take over the fight, so the foreigners can leave.

“What have the Americans done in eight years?” asked Abdullah Wasay, 60, a pharmacist in Charikar, a market town about 25 miles north of Kabul, expressing a view typical of many here. “Americans are saying that with their planes they can see an egg 18 kilometers away, so why can’t they see the Taliban?”

Such sentiments were repeated in conversation after conversation with more than 30 Afghans in Kabul and nearby rural areas and with local officials in outlying provinces. The comments point to the difficulties that American and Afghan officials face if they choose to add more foreign troops.

If the foreign forces are not seen so by Afghans already, they are on the cusp of being regarded as occupiers, with little to show people for their extended presence, fueling wild conspiracies about why they remain here.

The feeling is particularly acute in the Pashtun south, but it is spreading to other parts of the country. More American troops could tip the balance of opinion, particularly if they increase civilian casualties and prompt even more Taliban attacks.

The grass-roots view among Afghans is at odds with those of top Afghan officials, as well as many American military commanders, who strongly endorse a full-blown counterinsurgency strategy, including a large troop increase.

The aim of sending more troops would be to help secure Afghanistan’s biggest cities and towns to make the population feel safe and in doing so to show that the foreign presence can bring benefits.

At the same time, the Americans support the idea of negotiating with moderate members of the Taliban, but would prefer to do so once the insurgency has been weakened. And, that, in turn, may also require more troops.

Interior Minister Hanif Atmar said he was in “full agreement” with Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the American commander of forces in Afghanistan, that a full-blown counterinsurgency strategy was necessary, including more forces.

“One piece of that strategy is a troop increase as a stopgap measure that will create an environment in which Afghan security forces can continue to grow and people will be protected against insurgents,” he said.

The mood on the street is darker and more wary. Mr. Wasay and several friends visiting his pharmacy were discussing the Taliban’s killing of a police chief in a rural part of the province. The rumor was that Taliban fighters had severed his head and delivered it to his son, according to one of Mr. Wasay’s friends.

True or not, the anecdote was part of a growing mythology of Taliban power and a general perception that neither the Afghan government nor American troops were protecting Afghans.

Daily life continues to be so precarious for many people interviewed, especially those outside Kabul, that they have come to believe that the United States must want the fighting to go on.

“In the first days of the war, the Americans defeated the Taliban in just a few days,” said Mohammed Shefi, a graduate student in the pharmacy school at Kabul University. “Now they have more than 60,000 forces and they cannot defeat them.”

Alex Thier, an analyst at the United States Institute of Peace, who has spent years working in Afghanistan, said the country’s mood was shifting. “What’s changed fairly recently was the confidence of the population as to whether we can actually achieve the job, even with more resources,” he said.

These doubts do not tally with some surveys, like the poll taken by the International Republican Institute, in which a majority of Afghans appeared to be positive about Americans and said they thought that the country was going in the right direction. However, the security environment in Afghanistan makes it a difficult place in which to conduct polls, and the survey by the institute, a pro-democracy group affiliated with the Republican Party and financed by the American government, was taken in July before the rampant fraud in the presidential election.

Zia Ahmet, a seller of tea kettles and pots just down the street from Mr. Wasay, was positive about the current international presence, but dubious about increasing it. “Instead of increasing foreign troops, it’s better to equip the Afghan National Army and the Afghan police,” he said, a view that was shared by almost everyone interviewed. “The local army are known in the villages, and they are more useful than foreign troops.”

A tribal elder in Balkh Province, in the remote north, said the insurgency had disrupted life for farmers and herders, and he repeated one of a growing number of conspiracy theories about the Americans’ intentions. In his version, the Americans were transporting Taliban fighters to the north and dropping them from helicopters at night, on the theory that the Americans wanted more fighting so they could stay in the country. Other versions have the British transporting the insurgents.

There is no truth to the accounts, according to American military officials in Kabul.

Graduate students at Kabul University were no less suspicious. “Those countries that are working with the U.S. and are friends of theirs are Saudi and Pakistan and those are the same countries the insurgents are coming from,” said Abdullah, a graduate student in the Faculty of Islamic Law who, like many Afghans, has only one name.

While the notions may seem absurd to Americans, they have added to an increasingly volatile public mood here. A story that American forces burned a Koran in Wardak Province brought hundreds of young people into the streets last month to protest the American presence, even though the story was roundly disputed by Afghan and American officials.

With less certainty about America’s continued commitment, there is a growing sense that the only sure way to peace is through negotiations with the Taliban. “They are the sons of this country, it is right to negotiate with the Taliban,” said Mohammed Younnis, a shopkeeper in Charikar who sells tea, sugar and grains.

“This government is Afghan, and the Taliban are Afghan; they should build the country together,” he said.

2009-11-10T20:12:00.000-06:00

Army Releases September Suicide Data

Oct 8, 2009

By By Wayne V. Hall
OCPA Media Relations

WASHINGTON, D.C. (October 8) — The Army today released suicide data for the month of September. Among active-duty Soldiers, there were seven potential suicides. One has been confirmed as a suicide, and six are pending determination of the manner of death. For August, the Army reported 11 potential suicides among active-duty Soldiers. Since the release of that report, four have been confirmed as suicides and seven remain under investigation.

There were 117 reported active-duty Army suicides from January 2009 through September 2009. Of those, 81 have been confirmed, and 36 are pending determination of manner of death. For the same period in 2008, there were 103 suicides among active-duty Soldiers.

During September 2009, among reserve component Soldiers who were not on active duty, there were seven potential suicides. Among that same group, from January 2009 through September 2009, there were 35 confirmed suicides. Twenty-five potential suicides are currently under investigation to determine the manner of death. For the same period in 2008, there were 40 suicides among reserve Soldiers who were not on active duty.

Over the past year, the Army has engaged in a sustained effort to reduce the rate of suicide within its ranks. This effort has included an Army-wide suicide prevention stand-down and chain teach for every Soldier; the implementation of the Army Campaign Plan for Health Promotion, Risk Reduction and Suicide Prevention; the establishment of both a Suicide Prevention Task Force and Suicide Prevention Council; a long-term partnership with the National Institute of Mental Health to carry out the largest ever study of suicide and behavioral health among military personnel; and more than 160 specific improvements to Army suicide prevention policies, doctrine, training and resources.

"Whether it's additional resources, improved training or ensuring those in our Army community can readily identify the warning signs of suicidal behavior, all our efforts often come down to one Soldier caring enough about another Soldier to step in when they see something wrong, " said Brig. Gen. Colleen McGuire, Director, Army Suicide Prevention Task Force. "Soldiers will be willing to do that if they know help is available, if they believe there is no stigma attached to asking for that help, and if they are certain that Army leaders remain absolutely committed to the resiliency of our entire Army Family."

Soldiers and Families in need of crisis assistance should contact Military OneSource or the Defense Center of Excellence (DCOE) for Psychological Health and Traumatic Brain Injury Outreach Center. Trained consultants are available from both organizations 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year.

The Military OneSource toll-free number for those residing in the continental U.S. is 1-800-342-9647, their Web site address is www.militaryonesource.com. Overseas personnel should refer to the Military OneSource Web site for dialing instructions for their specific location.

The DCOE Outreach Center can be contacted at 1-866-966-1020, via electronic mail at Resources@DCoEOutreach.org and at www.dcoe.health.mil.

The Army's most current suicide prevention information is located at www.armyg1.army.mil.

2009-11-09T23:23:00.003-06:00

An Anonymous Poem

This is an anonymous reader's comment submitted to Revolution newspaper, early November 2009. The header for it reads, "This is a poem I wrote in memory of some of the stolen lives due to police brutality:"

Jan 1, 2009. It’s new years and I guess everyone should be celebrating but I am laying face down on the ground. I can taste the concrete, rock, spit, and urine. Treating me as if I was an animal. Shit I think even animals have more rights than me. At least people fight for them while I get neglected because of the color of my skin. I am handcuffed and that might as well have been the rope over my neck cause this is lynching. I’m not even resisting. His knee is on my head and I’m choking on my blood. Why are there two cops on me?

Lord forgive me for I have sinned I was born with darker pigmentation than these pigs. Now I am a victim of the swine, but these pigs are much more deadly and their target is us. I was shot point blank at the BART station. I didn’t even get to see my killer, coward, cause he shot me in the back. I guess they are the only ones celebrating now. All I wanted to do is go home to my family, to my wife, and my child. Cold blooded murder. My life was stolen. I AM OSCAR GRANT!

Jul 25 2008 Oakland. Why is he stopping me? My instinct is to run. My heart is pulsing heavy. I’m scared. I was right to run because he is a murderer! He was acquitted last year from killing another man on Jan 1 2008, but remains a cop. Just another fucking trigger happy pig. I stop to pull out my….phone. He shot me eight times in the back. No more need to sugarcoat this epidemic of police brutality. It’s our extermination. My life was stolen. I AM JODY WOODFOX! I AM ANDREW MOPPIN!

Nov 26, 2006 New York. I could be the happiest man on the planet about to embark into my new life with my fiancée and daughter. Tomorrow is my wedding day, but never realized this is my last second. I got into the car and I accidentally hit the car next to me. They surround my car, but I didn’t know who they were. Undercover cops. I am unarmed please don’t shoot.

1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8. Just another victim the irony is the police murdered my brother, too. 22,23,24,25,26,27. Cock back and reload, it’s not over, bullet shells after bullet shells hitting the earth are symphonies, the national anthem for the police. My overflowing blood is worse than when the levees broke. I’m leaving my wife at the altar, but it wasn’t my choice. I’m sorry. 45,46,47,48,49,50. 50 SHOTS LATER. I’m only a memory in the distant winds howling. Officers were acquitted. My life was stolen. I AM SEAN BELL!

April 6, 1996 SF. I have been robbed! Help! Help! I was robbed! The only help that I received was pepper spray in my face. It burns. You cannot even see the tears running down my face cause of the acid in my eyes. Why are they handcuffing me? I was robbed. He shoved my face into the ground, the blood is oozing out of my mouth, as if the sewers are over flowing from a storm the garbage overflowed. The police’s garbage is revealed. He’s foot is on my back, you can hear the cracks, his imprint my back so that I will never forgot who killed me while I’m watching from the skies. I never received immediate medical attention and I died on the way to the hospital after 35 minutes when it only takes 3, suffocating off my own spit, vomit, and blood. My life was stolen. I AM MARK GARCIA!

Police brutality is the swine disease going around our inner cities and taking over. See, this is our own version of the holocaust. This is genocide. Just because we have a black president does not change anything. It didn’t change when we had the first black cop, it didn’t change when we had the first black DA, it didn’t change when we had the first black judge, and it is not going to change now! The system has not changed. See, we still have cold-blooded murders and cold-blooded cover-ups.

See, we’re conditioned to dread our own skin. Driving while black. Talking while brown. Breathing while poor. It’s never ending. My fears one on top of another. Excessive force is just another word sorry, my bad. Next time I won’t shove your face into the ground and shoot bullets after bullets, but there isn’t a next time, so it doesn’t matter. I’M SEAN BELL, I’M JODY WOODFOX, I’M ANDREW MOPPIN, I’M MARK GARCIA, I’M OSCAR GRANT. And our lives were stolen. I am all those falling souls from the streets.

2009-11-09T13:01:00.001-06:00

Big Bird of Sesame Street as a "Birther"?

Watch this satire edit video with Big Bird as a right-winger who goes on a mini-tirade against Michelle Obama during her new appearance on Sesame Street. It's short and hysterical.

Only problem is that the backwards Right-wingers and Birthers just nod and applaud Big Bird -- they don't know it's satire. So, that's my problem with satire as political art. It very often fails to actually educate or expose. It can just look like the artist is making the same statement as the character being satirized.

2009-11-01T10:26:00.003-06:00

Enough Of This "Common Ground" With Theocrats!
"Pro-Lifers" Are NOT Grassroots Freedom-Fighters;
They Are The Foot Soldiers Of The Right-Wing Fascists!

Below is my comment posted at an article by OpEdNews editor Rob Kall, where he suggests the Health Care Reform protests could "learn" a tactic from the "pro-lifers." For the full article and all comments, go to http://www.opednews.com/articles/Photo-Essay-Heroes-FIghti-by-Rob-Kall-091031-958.html#comment241571

Learn from the Christian fascist movement???

Well I certainly would never expect to hear THIS from Rob Kall:

"When anti-abortion, "pro-live" protesters protest at family planning centers, they carry signs and verbally go after employees. There's something to learn from them."

Since when do people who believe in freedom and civil rights imitate those who are fighting to restore the Dark Ages of women being submissive in every way to her husband and The Church?

By making such a bogus and insulting suggestion, Rob has joined the side of those urging real freedom-lovers to find "common ground" with the armies of the encroaching theocracy, the xenophobists, the racists, the women-haters, the gay-bashers, and the death penalty-lovers. Rather, we need to look towards our own goals more clear-eyed, and find the most righteous and powerful means towards those ends. ANY suggestion that the people in struggle for true civil rights in this country have ANYTHING in common with the pro-liar movement is a tool in THEIR hands, not ours.

2009-10-24T16:45:00.004-05:00

October 17, 2009

Army Experience Center's Bad Experience: Turns out Training Kids to Kill Not Popular with Public

By David Swanson Published in the November/December 2009 Humanist

(Above, Sarah Wellington and Celeste Zappala. Below, Granny Peace Brigade member Joan Pleune speaks to members of Iraq Veterans Against the War. Photos by Cheryl Biren. Joan, Sarah, and photographer Cheryl were among those arrested.)

“This is so cool! This is so cool!” a thirteen-year-old boy repeated as he squeezed rounds from a real M-16, picking off “enemy combatants” in a video game while perched atop a real Army Humvee.
“I just came to the mall to skateboard but everyone said this was pretty cool. I just had to try it and it's great!”

The person reporting on this youthful enthusiasm was Pat Elder, who serves on the Steering Committee of the National Network Opposing the Militarization of
Youth. Elder also described young teenagers congratulating each other for “killing ragheads” and “wiping out hajis.”

All of this fun went on at the Army Experience Center (AEC), a 14,500-square-foot “virtual educational facility” in the Franklin Mills Mall in a suburb of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The U.S. Army opened the center in August 2008 and planned to run it for two years as a pilot program. If the center proved able to recruit as many new soldiers as five ordinary recruiting stations, the Army planned to build them nationally. The AEC cost more than $12 million to design and construct, but of course the Army spends several billion dollars a year on recruitment.

Peace activists and concerned citizens from the surrounding area and up and down the East Coast quickly formed a campaign dubbed “Shut Down the AEC” (shutdowntheaec.net). Through a series of nonviolent protests and demonstrations, some of them involving arrests, protesters raised concerns and generated a flood of negative media attention for the Army's latest recruitment tool. As a result, the Pentagon called on Donna Miles, a writer for the American Services Press Service, the Pentagon's propaganda arm. Miles had already published soothing articles following scandals at Abu Ghraib, Walter Reed, and various incidents involving civilian casualties. As Elder points out, “Either Miles is incredibly prolific, with 229 articles attributed to her this year, or she's a pseudonym for several under the employ of the Pentagon.”

Miles reported on the AEC thusly: “Thirteen-year-old Sean Yaffee, for example, doesn't see himself joining the military. But he's becoming another regular at the center, where he can play the same computer games he has at home, but in the company of his buddies. Yaffee said he's learned a lot about the Army at the center. ‘It just tells you about the Army experience, but it doesn't pressure you,' he said. ‘I'm really just here to have a good time.'”

Sweet, but the public wasn't buying it and the protests continued. On September 12, 2009, a crowd of 250 activists marched to the AEC in opposition to the use of public dollars to teach children—in a quasi-public-space—that killing can be fun, while also recruiting eighteen-year-olds to engage in the real thing. This time, police arrested six protesters and one journalist. The journalist, Cheryl Biren, wasn't with the protesters but was picked out of the crowd, apparently because of her professional camera.

Days prior to this long-planned and publicly announced protest, the Army preemptively announced that it would likely close the AEC and not open any others in shopping malls, as had been planned. The reason? Are you ready to hear this?

By their own admission, the Army doesn't need any more recruits because the bad economy has driven up recruitment significantly.

Now, the truth is that the economy is lousy, unemployment is rising, and the military has cut back on other recruitment expenses, the stated reason being the rise in recruitment that comes with a lousy economy.

The whopper of a lie is that the Army could ever be satisfied with its recruitment numbers. And the glaring omission was the protests. While the Army is cutting back in recruitment on some areas, it's still spending billions of dollars per year, and it is spending those billions where they'll be most effective, which means, in part, where they will generate the least opposition and negative attention. Early reports, prior to the protests, were that the AEC was succeeding in its recruitment goals. Following the protests, the AEC mysteriously became ineffective.

Stories in the Associated Press and other news services reported the Army's likely decision and transcribed the Army's explanation, noting the protests as an afterthought lower in the reports. Media outlets that support the spread of democracy, as opposed to the spread of militarism under the banner of democracy, would have told this story quite differently and used it as a lesson showing that citizens can have an impact on what their government does.

The Army won't announce our victories for us. We have to claim them. We the people drove Alberto Gonzales out of town, made the Iraq War illegal by turning the United Nations against it, and we may have scared George W. Bush away from pardoning his subordinates' crimes. We the people have turned many Americans against wars of empire, and we have made the Army Experience Center a bad experience for the Army.

Seven people were arrested on September 12, six of whom were risking arrest: Debra Sweet, Elaine Brower, Sarah Wellington, Joan Pleune, Beverly Rice, and Richard Marini. The seventh was Biren, who was covering the event for OpEdNews. She didn't have a shirt or a sign or anything associated with the activists. She made it clear that she was a journalist. Then she and the other five women spent the night in the Roundhouse, the central jail in Philadelphia, from which they were released into the street at 5 a.m. the next morning, denied permission to use their cell phones until after the doors had slammed behind them.

Biren told me: “The images that are most critical to me as a photographer and reporter are those at the end, of protesters being arrested. Trying to prevent me from (or punishing me for) taking them reminds me of Bush not allowing photos of the caskets of dead bodies coming home from war. The way in which they try to prevent us from recording this kind of news in the making is shameful. It's anti-democracy.”

Sarah Wellington Being Arrested at AEC, taken moments before Biren Was Arrested, photo by Cheryl Biren, from the collection of photos she took, then hid the chip the photos were on when the police arrested her.

The reporter continued: “The action against me was violent and vengeful. A police officer rushed me from the side suddenly"and pulled me forcefully into the line of protesters. Later, another officer had to physically pull this officer off of me because he was so incredibly aggressive and enraged. I'm convinced it was because I was taking pictures of the arrests.”

An arraignment for charges of criminal conspiracy and failure to disperse was scheduled for September 23 for the six women. Restoration of our rights to freedom of speech, assembly, and press hangs in the balance. But we can nonetheless chalk up a victory against the mighty war machine.

David Swanson is the author of the new book, Daybreak: Undoing the Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union, by Seven Stories Press and of the introduction to The 35 Articles of Impeachment and the Case for Prosecuting George W. Bush by Dennis Kucinich. In addition to cofounding AfterDowningStreet.org, he is the Washington director of Democrats.com and sits on the boards of a number of progressive organizations in Washington, DC.

reprinted from 2009, American Humanist Association

Author's Bio: David Swanson is the author of the upcoming book "Daybreak: Undoing the Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union" by Seven Stories Press and of the introduction to "The 35 Articles of Impeachment and the Case for Prosecuting George W. Bush" published by Feral House and available at Amazon.com. Swanson holds a master's degree in philosophy from the University of Virginia. He has worked as a newspaper reporter and as a communications director, with jobs including press secretary for Dennis Kucinich's 2004 presidential campaign, media coordinator for the International Labor Communications Association, and three years as communications coordinator for ACORN, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. Swanson is Co-Founder of AfterDowningStreet.org, creator of ConvictBushCheney.org and Washington Director of Democrats.com, a board member of Progressive Democrats of America, the Backbone Campaign, and Voters for Peace, a convenor of the legislative working group of United for Peace and Justice, and chair of the accountability and prosecution working group of United for Peace and Justice.

2009-10-23T08:03:00.002-05:00

This is the best art I've ever seen on Youtube -- done in respectful remembrance of legendary scientist Carl Sagan. It uses Sagan's own voice via the "auto-tune" effect (that Matrix thingy) and mixes video from his series with original, gorgeous music by the artist who created the video. This is inspiring. A must-see. Created by artist John Boswell, as part of his Symphony Of Science project, using music to spread an appreciation of science.

Mars.

2009-10-16T18:08:00.005-05:00

Native American Chief Addresses Deaths In Sweat Lodge Chief Arvol Looking Horse Speaks Out

By All Nations Indigenous Native American Indian Cultural Center
Native Elder Addresses Deaths In Sweat Lodge
Arvol Looking Horse

A white man, James Arthur Ray, who owns a company called Spiritual Warrior charges 60 people almost $10,000 each, or more than a half a million dollars, then directs them not to eat or drink for three days before allowing them to cook in a sweat lodge. Each person is then allowed only a space equivalent to two foot by 3 foot space to sit until they “see the light” or die! His Twitter site even says “something must die before something new can be born”

How many things are wrong here? Well first this traditional Native American event is truly a spiritual event, not a “For Profit Event”. Second, the true event is held by a person of native indian descent who have knowledge and understandings of the nature of the spiritual journey. It appears that once again greed interfered with common sense. Why would anyone pay these outrages fees to be conducted by someone who doesn’t even know or understand the spiritual meaning or significance?

One must ask what James Arthur Ray, a self proclaimed wealth builder, of non Native American descent, from southern California has to do with Native American spiritual growth? Ray's company, James Ray International, is based in Carlsbad, California and brags of raising profits of over 500% last year. He holds two hour wealth building seminars around the country for up to 2000 people for $2000 per person, that’s 2 million an hour, not bad!

What do Native Americans have to say about this? We had to ask. So we’ve contacted the spokesperson for the Native American Indian Cultural Center. In general they are appalled and insulted that anyone would take their age old spiritual tradition and turn it into a Greed Mongers’ Money Grabbing Machine and on top of that abuse it in such an insane way that people would put their life on the line.

A spokesperson of the nonprofit cultural center in the heart of the Black Hills of South Dakota called All Nations Indigenous Native American Indian Cultural Center said this is one of the reason we are trying to help by educating everyone about the history of Native Americans. We wish to accurately inform the general public as to our traditions. Sweat lodges are not games to be played with by people that do not have the understanding of their use in spiritual journeys, quests or healing.

Our hearts go out to the families of the people that have been affective in a negative way over this matter.

Arvol Looking Horse, a 19th Generation, Keeper of our Sacred White Buffalo Calf Pipe, says, “I am concerned for the 2 deaths and illnesses of the many people that participated in a sweat lodge in Sedona, Arizona that brought our sacred rite under fire in the news. I would like to clarify that this lodge and many others, are not our ceremonial way of life, because of the way they are being conducted. My prayers go out for their families and loved ones for their loss.

Our ceremonies are about life and healing, from the time this ancient ceremonial rite was given to our people, never has death been a part of our inikag'a (life within) when conducted properly. Today the rite is interpreted as a sweat lodge, it is much more than that. So the term does not fit our real meaning of purification.

Inikaga is the oldest ceremony brought to us by Wakan Tanka (Great Spirit). 19 generations ago, the Lakota/Dakota/Nakota Oyate (people), were given seven sacred rites of healing by a Spirit Woman Pte San Win (White Buffalo Calf Woman). She brought these rites along with our sacred C'anupa (pipe) to our People, when our ancestors were suffering from a difficult time. It was also brought for the future to help us for much more difficult times to come. They were brought to help us stay connected to who we are as a traditional cultural People. The values of conduct are very strict in any of these ceremonies, because we work with spirit. The way the Creator, Wakan Tanka told us; that if we stay humble and sincere, we will keep that connection with the inyan oyate (the stone people), who we call the Grandfathers, to be able to heal ourselves and loved ones. We have a "gift" of prayer and healing and have to stay humble with our Unc'i Maka (Grandmother Earth) and with one another. The inikag'a is used in all of the seven sacred rites to prepare and finish the ceremonies, along with the sacred eagle feather. The feather represents the sacred knowledge of our ancestors.

Our First Nations People have to earn the right to pour the mini wic'oni (water of life) upon the inyan oyate (the stone people) in creating Inikag'a - by going on the vision quest for four years and four years Sundance. Then you are put through a ceremony to be painted - to recognize that you have now earned that right to take care of someone's life through purification. They should also be able to understand our sacred language, to be able to understand the messages from the Grandfathers, because they are ancient, they are our spirit ancestors. They walk and teach the values of our culture; in being humble, wise, caring and compassionate.

What has happened in the news with the make shift sauna called the sweat lodge is not our ceremonial way of life!

When you do ceremony - you can not have money on your mind. We deal with the pure sincere energy to create healing that comes from everyone in that circle of ceremony. The heart and mind must be connected. When you involve money, it changes the energy of healing. The person wants to get what they paid for; the Spirit Grandfathers will not be there, our way of life is now being exploited! You do more damage than good. No mention of monetary energy should exist in healing, not even with a can of love donations. When that energy exists, they will not even come. Only after the ceremony, between the person that is being healed and the Intercessor who has helped connect with the Great Spirit, the energy of money can be given out of appreciation. That exchange of energy is from the heart; it is private and does not involve the Grandfathers! Whatever gift of appreciation the person who received the help, can now give the Intercessor whatever they feel their healing is worth.

In our Prophesy of the White Buffalo Calf Woman, she told us that she would return and stand upon the earth when we are having a hard time. In 1994 this began to happen with the birth of the white buffalo, not only their nation, but many animal nations began to show their sacred color, which is white. She predicted that at this time there would be many changes upon Grandmother Earth. There would be things that we never experienced or heard of before; climate changes, earth changes, diseases, disrespect for life and one another would be shocking and there would be also many false prophets!

My Grandmother that passed the bundle to me said I would be the last Keeper if the Oyate (people) do not straighten up. The assaults upon Grandmother Earth are horrendous, the assaults toward one another was not in our culture, the assaults against our People (Oyate) have been termed as genocide, and now we are experiencing spiritual genocide!

Because of the problems that began to arise with our rebirth of being able to do our ceremonies in the open since the Freedom of Religion Act of 1978, our Elders began talking to me about the abuses they seen in our ceremonial way of life, which was once very strict. After many years of witnessing their warnings, we held a meeting to address this very issue of lack of protocol in our ceremonies. After reaching an agreement of addressing the misconduct of our ceremonies and reminding of the proper protocols, a statement was made in March 2003. Every effort was made to insure our way of life of who we are as traditional cultural People was made, because these ways are for our future and all life upon the Grandmother Earth (Mitakuye Oyasin All my relations), so that they may have good health.

Because these atrocities are being mocked and practiced all over the world, there was even a film we made called “Spirits for Sale”. The non-native people have a right to seek help from our "First Nation Intercessors" for good health and well-being, it is up to that Intercessor. That is a privilege for all People that we gift for being able to have good health and understand that their protocol is to have respect and appreciate what we have to share. The First Nations Intercessor has to earn that right to our ceremonial way of life in the ways I have explained.

At this time, I would like to ask All Nations upon Grandmother Earth to please respect our sacred ceremonial way of life and stop the exploitation of our Tunka Oyate (Spiritual Grandfathers).

In a Sacred Hoop of Life, there is no ending and no beginning!”

Namah'u yo (hear my words),
Arvol Looking Horse,
19th Generation Keeper of the Sacred White Buffalo Calf Pipe Bundle.

2009-10-13T16:12:00.002-05:00

Dangerous Moves To Reinstate Death Penalty For Mumia Abu-Jamal
(Lead Counsel Robert Bryan addresses the international battle to set the stage -- from both sides)

Dear Friends:

October 10 was World Day Against the Death Penalty. I am in The Netherlands at the invitation of Amnesty International. On Friday I gave a lecture at a prestigious law school to a wonderful group of students on behalf of Mumia. Yesterday I spoke at the showing of In Prison My Whole Life, sponsored by Amnesty, concerning my client and the death penalty. Mumia is now a global symbol in the campaign against the death penalty.

I am presenting litigating the issue of the death penalty in the United States Supreme Court. Last year we won a new jury trial in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, Philadelphia. The state has gone to to the Supreme Court seeking a reversal of that ruling and the execution of my client. We are presently litigating the matter. Next week the court will hear arguments in an older case from Ohio, Smith v. Spisak, which has a similar issue.

There is a new effort underway to destroy the support for Mumia, who has been on Pennsylvania's death row for nearly three decades. The government's purpose is to kill him. This is the most dangerous time for Mumia since his 1981 arrest. I am fighting for his life. The support of the movement in Germany is crucial to the fight to save and free him.

Der Spiegel magazine published an article on 24 August 2009 which contained misquotes, distortions, false facts, and outright lies. Under influence from the right wing, it was a clear effort to promote the government effort to kill Mumia. The reporter could not even get right the simple fact of where I live in San Francisco, writing stupidly that Pacific Heights is an "alternative area." It states that Mumia was a high school drop out, overlooking the fact that he finished, attended university, and now has two university degrees: a Bachelor of Arts from Goddard College; a Master of Arts from California State University. She falsely stated that Mumia was not working as a journalist at the time of his arrest. Her description of the homicide scene was wrong. In a transparent effort to destroy raising needed funds for the defense, the reporter lied in writing that one million dollars has been raised. In fact the defense has no money - we are broke and thus cannot do things needed for Mumia; the reporter was aware of this. She criticized Mumia because he must wait until a new jury trial to explain in court what happened at the time of the shooting.

This week Reporters Without Borders, headquartered in Paris, published a video interview regarding Mumia's case and the latest case developments. It is in English, French and German, and can be found at: http://www.rsf.org/spip.php?page=article&id_article=34689

Finally, last spring at the Akademie der Künste I announced that we would be issuing an online petition for Mumia. He and I decided to wait until this month for its release. It will be coming soon.

You in Germany have been wonderful in the outpouring of your concern for Mumia. At this crucial time your activism is needed more than ever.

With best wishes,

Robert R. Bryan
The Netherlands

-------------
Law Offices of Robert R. Bryan
2088 Union Street, Suite 4
San Francisco, CA 94123-4117

Lead counsel for Mumia Abu-Jamal

2009-10-12T00:42:00.001-05:00

Interracial marriages were illegal in this country too -- support equal rights for all people. This photo was taken at Sunday's National Equality March for glbt rights.

2009-10-12T00:30:00.003-05:00

Lady GaGa Performs "Imagine" at Gay Rights Event

On the eve of the March For Equality in Washington D.C. for Gay Rights, Lady GaGa performed at the Human Rights Commission gala (following President Obama!) Her appearance was a very righteous action, as was marching the next day.

Some of her improvised lyric changes:

People of the nation are you listening
It isnt equal if its sometimes
I want a real democracy
Imagine all the people
In love equally

2009-10-09T19:37:00.002-05:00

Obama, the Nobel Prize, and What Peace Means
Friday, 09 October 2009 16:24
By Cindy Sheehan

I guess to the Nobel Peace Prize Committee it means presiding over the further destruction of the population of three countries that didn’t harm anyone.

I guess it means voting for every war-funding bill while one is a Senator.

I guess it means continuing the use of the obscene and immoral drones.

I guess it means continuing torture and building larger prisons to pre-emptively and indefinitely detain suspected “terrorists.”

I guess it means using the politics of fear to justify your wars. “Afghanistan is a war of necessity.” “There are still people in the world who want to hurt Americans.”

I guess it means increasing your military budget.

I guess it means paying back your donors on Wall Street and in the insurance companies to profoundly harm people in your own country.

I guess it means hiring hostile people like Hillary Clinton, Robert Gates, Stanley McChrystal and Petraeus.

I guess it means extending the damaging embargo on Cuba and threatening “crippling economic sanctions” for Iran.

I guess since the committee awarded the prize to Jimmy Carter who gave rise to the Taliban and al Qaeda in Iran giving billions to those who fought against the USSR (talk about Blowback), it tells the people of Afghanistan if you are killed, we will give your killer the Nobel Peace Prize.

Jesus Christ, why didn’t they just give it to George Bush?

The US Peace Movement was put on life support with the election of Democrats. I hope now that we have a president who is just a tool of the war machine AND a Nobel Peace Laureate that it hasn’t put the final nail in the coffin of the Peace Movement.

Peace to us means, not just an absence of war but, an absence of preparing for war.

Peace to us means that innocent people won’t suffer for profit.

I guess to the Establishment: War is Peace.

2009-10-09T17:51:00.000-05:00

Congratulations President Obama on the Nobel Peace Prize -- Now Please Earn it!
A letter from filmmaker Michael Moore
Friday, October 9th, 2009

Dear President Obama,

How outstanding that you've been recognized today as a man of peace. Your swift, early pronouncements -- you will close Guantanamo, you will bring the troops home from Iraq, you want a nuclear weapon-free world, you admitted to the Iranians that we overthrew their democratically-elected president in 1953, you made that great speech to the Islamic world in Cairo, you've eliminated that useless term "The War on Terror," you've put an end to torture -- these have all made us and the rest of the world feel a bit more safe considering the disaster of the past eight years. In eight months you have done an about face and taken this country in a much more sane direction.

But...

The irony that you have been awarded this prize on the 2nd day of the ninth year of our War in Afghanistan is not lost on anyone. You are truly at a crossroads now. You can listen to the generals and expand the war (only to result in a far-too-predictable defeat) or you can declare Bush's Wars over, and bring all the troops home. Now. That's what a true man of peace would do.

There is nothing wrong with you doing what the last guy failed to do -- capture the man or men responsible for the mass murder of 3,000 people on 9/11. BUT YOU CANNOT DO THAT WITH TANKS AND TROOPS. You are pursuing a criminal, not an army. You do not use a stick of dynamite to get rid of a mouse.

The Taliban is another matter. That is a problem for the people of Afghanistan to resolve -- just as we did in 1776, the French did in 1789, the Cubans did in 1959, the Nicaraguans did in 1979 and the people of East Berlin did in 1989. One thing is certain through all revolutions by people who wish to be free -- they ultimately have to bring about that freedom themselves. Others can be supportive, but freedom can not be delivered from the front seat of someone else's Humvee.

You have to end our involvement in Afghanistan now. If you don't, you'll have no choice but to return the prize to Oslo.

Yours,
Michael Moore
MMFlint@aol.com
MichaelMoore.com

P.S. Your opposition has spent the morning attacking you for bringing such good will to this country. Why do they hate America so much? I get the feeling that if you found the cure for cancer this afternoon they'd be denouncing you for destroying free enterprise because cancer centers would have to close. There are those who say you've done nothing yet to deserve this award. As far as I'm concerned, the very fact that you've offered to walk into the minefield of hate and try to undo the irreparable damage the last president did is not only appreciated by me and millions of others, it is also an act of true bravery. That's why you got the prize. The whole world is depending on the U.S. -- and you -- to literally save this planet. Let's not let them down.

2009-10-04T23:07:00.001-05:00

Eyes Wide Open exhibit: letter from Debra Sweet

Last night I was out on the Ellipse with the Eyes Wide Open exhibit, originally put together by the American Friends Service Committee to commemorate, with empty boots, the US military lives lost in Iraq, and Iraqi civilians killed there as well. For the first time, the display was just the 870 military killed since 2001 in Afghanistan. To the side was a spiral of shoes of all kinds and sizes, down to infant socks, commemorating the Afghani civilians, number unknown, who have died in the occupation. Thousands of people came by, and hundreds walked among the boots, including active duty military and soldiers and Marine who had been in Afghanistan. They indicated a lot of questioning in the military right now.

Tomorrow, the first Monday in October, the Supreme Court's new session begins, and we will be there protesting torture. Then, the protest moves to McPherson Square, and a march to the White House. President Obama is holding an outdoor press conference around 11:00 am, I hear, so perhaps we'll get there in time to bring our loud anti-war message and make the news. World Can't Wait will be displaying the Museum of U.S. Torture.

Many of you have see parts of Rethink Afghanistan, the new film by Robert Greenwald. Listen to the voices of people trying to survive in Afghanistan after 8 years of bombing, occupation, and relentless war, and tell me to "give Obama's surge a chance!"

One father points to his 3 year old daughter standing in the mud with no shoes on and says:

"For God's sake, ...I want to sell this child, but nobody wants her. What can I do? I have nothing. I am poor. I don't have any blankets, I don't have any shawls, I don't have any clothes. There is no food that I can put in her mouth."

Watch this, and share it with others. YOU can be part of the 48-hour surge of resistance, helping to provide World Can't Wait with funds to run our National Office for the rest of the year, joining in from anywhere. One of the protesters expecting to be arrested tomorrow in non-violent civil resistance against the 8 years of occupation of Afghanistan, messaged me that she wants to donate, but is not sure she'll be out of jail by Tuesday. She, and you, can go right now to give the virtual fund raiser an early bump!

Debra Sweet, Director, The World Can't Wait

P.S. Within the next weeks, President Obama will announce up to 20,000 more troops will deploy to Afghanistan in addition to replacing up to 14,000 support troops with "trigger-pullers." This will only mean increasing the death and destruction brought to the Afghan people. And U.S. involvement in Iraq is not only not over, but is becoming a permanent occupation.

2009-10-02T18:55:00.002-05:00

“So, how was Burning Man?!?!?!?!”

I haven’t yet given a cohesive answer to any of the many people in my life who have asked me the question above. And I won’t try to do it here either. Overall, it’s too much for a Cliff Note. More like a Tolstoy novel. But here’s one of many, many enormous lessons learned.

On the playa we mostly share desires to experience a fuller spectrum of living. But when we leave, we become divided into two large camps.

One is for those who want to keep the playa as their fantasy getaway, the dream of perfection that could never be. May nothing wake them from the dream, ever. But it's just a dream.

The other camp is made of those who plot to continue the rebellion. We’re the ones that say we already KNEW humans were capable of such genius and love, but we have to make communities and NATIONS that allow these qualities to be what guides millions. We’re the ones that do think it is possible. We’re the ones who are NOT satisfied with feeling completely happy one week per year then counting the days for the next 51.

The two camps argue over issues like open sexuality, raising kids, BRINGING kids, cell phones, diet, you name it. May those debates continue to keep us thinking critically and focused on what matters to our souls.

Unfortunately, if one person is in one camp and they love someone in the other, they may not last very long together…

Fortunately, warriors such as myself love a good fight.
I smell a cross-camp kidnapping.
Watch out.
You know who you are.

2009-10-01T23:36:00.003-05:00

A story of two protests in the United States, six weeks apart.

August, 2009, in Portsmouth New Hampshire, an armed protester threatens to "water the tree of liberty" with the blood of tyrants and patriots.

September, 2009, in Pittsburgh, unarmed protesters challenge the G-20 leaders to stop destroying the earth, and exploiting its people.

For whom did the batons, gas, sound weapons, National Guard and curfews get deployed? Who got arrested? Who got endless news coverage and who got almost none? Whose free speech was protected and who was criminalized?

Outraged by the police/military repression of protest at the G-20 in Pittsburg? Sign this letter to be delivered Friday October 2, and ask your friends to sign it.

http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/1170/t/3716/petition.jsp?petition_KEY=2115

2009-10-01T20:57:00.000-05:00

Split This Rock Poem of the Week - Sinan Antoon

When I was torn by war

I took a brush
Immersed in death
And drew a window
On war's wall
I opened it
Searching
For something
But
I saw another war
And a mother
Weaving a shroud
For the dead man
Still in her womb

Baghdad, 1990

- Sinan Antoon

Sinan Antoon

From The Baghdad Blues (Harbor Mountain Press, 2007), used by permission.
····
Sinan Antoon - poet, novelist, and translator - was born in Iraq and moved to the US after the 1991 Gulf War. His work, including Baghdad Blues and a novel, I`jaam: An Iraqi Rhapsody, has been widely published in Arabic and English. Antoon is an Assistant Professor at New York University.
····
Antoon will be featured at Split This Rock Poetry Festival: Poems of Provocation & Witness, March 10-13, 2010, in Washington, DC. The festival will present readings, workshops, panel discussions, youth programming, film, activism - four days of creative transformation as we imagine a way forward, hone our community and activist skills, and celebrate the many ways that poetry can act as an agent for social change.

For more information: info@splitthisrock.org. Split This Rock is co-sponsored by the Institute for Policy Studies, the country's oldest multi-issue progressive think tank.

Please feel free to forward Split This Rock Poem-of-the-Week widely. We just ask you to include all of the information in this email, including this request. Thanks!

2009-09-29T22:49:00.002-05:00

"For the Children...."
[col. writ. 9/19/09]
(c) '09 Mumia Abu-Jamal

The next time I hear a politician promise to do something 'for the children', I may heave.

If one thing is clear in this nation, it is that children are hated. Oh -- we don't use that word to describe our relationships with them, but if we honestly examine those interactions we find that it would be difficult to describe in ways other than 'hate.'

For the last several months, I've been reading, studying and thinking about the nation's public school system. I've read classics in the field, like Jonathan Kozol's 1967 work, Death At An Early Age, a stunning account on his years as a permanent sub [!] in Boston's Black populated schools in Roxbury, where kids were taken down into dark, dank cellars and beaten with rattan sticks.

But what happened in the dark basements of the buildings, while certainly dramatic and deplorable, could hardly be worse than the systematic slaughter of the minds of tens of thousands of children, who were, in Kozol's words, "intellectually decapitated" daily by a racist, segregated school system.

Truth is, any major U.S. city could've been used with similar results - Harlem, Chicago, Philadelphia, Baltimore, for nationally, the drop-out rate is 50%.

Public schools are places where kids go to get their minds and souls killed.

And what is war but old men sacrificing young men in often meaningless battles? What is the so-called 'War on Terror' but a mindless slogan used to sell lies like 'Weapons of Mass Destruction?'

And what are soldiers but mostly children, molded into madmen, who fight and die, so that old rich men can get richer?

Daily, we drug millions of schoolchildren, some as young as 4 years old with Ritalin, because we describe them as hyperactive or deficient in attention --which means they don't sit still, while we bore them out of their brains, with what we laughingly call an education.

'For the children' we leave a diseased and poisoned planet, an economy on crutches, and a world boiling with hatred for their fathers.

Isn't it about time we really stopped doing more damage to the children?

(c) '09 maj

2009-09-29T18:59:00.001-05:00

Scary: Bullet Makers Can't Keep Up With Demand
Posted by Liliana Segura, AlterNet at 2:00 PM on September 28, 2009.

"I call it the Obama effect," says one Louisiana gun dealer.

From the Associated Press (via the Houston Chronicle): Bullet makers can't keep up with demand

Bullet-makers are working around the clock, seven days a week, and still can’t keep up with the nation’s demand for ammunition.

Shooting ranges, gun dealers and bullet manufacturers say they have never seen such shortages. Bullets, especially for handguns, have been scarce for months because gun enthusiasts are stocking up on ammo, in part because they fear President Barack Obama and the Democratic-controlled Congress will pass antigun legislation -- even though nothing specific has been proposed and the president last month signed a law allowing people to carry loaded guns in national parks.

According to the article, "gun sales spiked when it became clear Obama would be elected a year ago and purchases continued to rise in his first few months of office. The FBI’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System reported that 6.1 million background checks for gun sales were issued from January to May, an increase of 25.6 percent from the same period the year before."

This is only the latest news report showing a rise in demand for guns and ammo since Obama took office. But the president didn't accomplish this on his own; a good deal of credit goes to the gun lobby, which has always relied on fearmongering and paranoia as critical parts of its strategic arsenal. In its propaganda campaign in the run-up to the 2008 election, the NRA portrayed Obama as the most anti-gun candidate in the history of the republic.

"Never in NRA's history have we faced a presidential candidate ... with such a deep-rooted hatred of firearm freedoms," read a letter sent out last August. The mailing purported to lay out "Obama's Ten Point Plan to 'Change' The Second Amendment," despite the fact that the "points" did not match Obama's campaign positions on guns. One of them was a ridiculous claim charging that Obama plans to "close 90 percent of the gun shops in America."

So perhaps it's no surprise that gun enthusiasts are behaving like colonists under siege. "I call it the Obama effect," one Louisiana gun dealer said, adding, “It always happens when the Democrats get in office."

But more than one dealer described the current situation as unprecedented.

"We are working overtime and still can’t keep up with the demand,” said Al Russo, spokesman for North Carolina-based Remington Arms Company, which makes bullets for rifles, handguns and shotguns. “We’ve had to add a fourth shift and go 24-7. It’s a phenomenon that I have not seen before in my 30 years in the business.”

It's hard not to be alarmed by such statements given the collective, apoplectic rage that has been directed at Obama -- and anyone perceived to support his policies -- not to mention the well-publicized tea-baggers who have shown up at rallies packing heat. Yet Congress seems to be too firmly in the grip of the gun lobby to waste much time worrying about this. Just this month, the Senate voted to force Amtrak to allow its passengers "to carry unloaded and locked handguns in checked baggage, even though Amtrak officials had raised concerns that the proposal could present 'numerous challenges,'" according to the New York Times. Under the legislation, "Amtrak would lose the funds earmarked for it in the must-pass spending bill if it did not comply with the new regulations."

The Houston Chronicle has more.

2009-09-28T00:50:00.004-05:00

Sometimes you plan to do a performance...
and you end up just having some quiet time to make music for yourself.

Sometimes you find out, much later, that somebody WAS watching...

Just stumbled upon this shot of me playing kalimba during Burning Man the first week of September. I'd met a photographer named Scott Finsthwait, and gotten his card. Looked up his work today on Flickr and discovered he'd taken this photo of me from atop a tower. Sweet.

2009-09-27T14:52:00.002-05:00

The World Appreciates Great Black Music -- although Americans often miss it completely

Stockholm, Sweden:

Korea, I think?

Montreal, Canada:

Taiwan:

2009-09-22T00:31:00.003-05:00

"Town Hell Meeting"

I'd love to see the new Health Care Reform Bills address what causes some Americans to be unable to think farther than their pinkie toe. It must be a disease, it is highly contagious, and it seems like America has been in some sort of pandemic with it for several hundred years.

2009-09-18T22:16:00.001-05:00

Sorry, Joe, but you've got to go.
America won't tolerate your potshots.

We all know that we might disagree with each other from time to time. And most of us learned that there's a right way and a wrong way to handle disagreements.

But not Congressman Joe "Heckler" Wilson. America deserves better than a Member of Congress who takes cheap potshots at our Commander-in-Chief. Sorry, Joe. You've got to go.