Your comments about current world events.

STRESS
Stress sickens and kills more people than smoking or war. (We do not need stress.)
If you love others, you love yourself. (It is important to love yourself. No stress,)
If you hate others, you hate yourself. (Hate causes stress)
If you harm others, you harm yourself. (Stress )
If you help others, you help yourself. (No stress.)
If you help others, you will always have everything you need. (No stress.)
If you are greedy, You have more than you need. (Stress)

"Satan" is an ancient word used for eternal hatred. Hate is a parasite that eats away a healthy body and feeds on avarice and destruction. Where there is love, there can be no hate.
"Greed" is defined as: Acquisitive or selfish desire beyond reason.

"Jesus" was an unselfish, loving, forgiving man, who did not condone killing for any reason. Those who say they follow Jesus, insult him by being selfish, greedy and by condoning killing. Those who say they follow the bible, and then justify hate, greed, executions, and war are really followers of their own self interests, not the interests of Jesus, the true bible, or mankind.
"Pro life" is a political tool used to advance one's self in the eyes of Christians.
A person who condones hate, war or executions can not be "pro Life" or a "Christian" in the eyes of Jesus.
Open your eyes America, we are being led down a primrose path to hell.

THE PRESIDENT'S FAMILY VALUES by Michael Moore

To All My Fellow Americans Who Voted for George W. Bush:
On this, the fourth anniversary of 9/11, I'm just curious, how does it feel?

How does it feel to know that the man you elected to lead us after we were attacked went ahead and put a guy in charge of FEMA whose main qualification was that he ran horse shows? That's right. Horse shows.

I really want to know -- and I ask you this in all sincerity and with all due respect -- how do you feel about the utter contempt Mr. Bush has shown for your safety? C'mon, give me just a moment of honesty. Don't start ranting on about how this disaster in New Orleans was the fault of one of the poorest cities in America. Put aside your hatred of Democrats and liberals and anyone with the last name of Clinton. Just look me in the eye and tell me our President did the right thing after 9/11 by naming a horse show runner as the top man to protect us in case of an emergency or catastrophe.

I want you to put aside your self-affixed label of Republican/conservative/born-again/capitalist/ditto-head/right-winger and just talk to me as an American, on the common ground we both call America.

Are we safer now than before 9/11? When you learn that behind the horse show runner, the #2 and #3 men in charge of emergency preparedness have zero experience in emergency preparedness, do you think we are safer?

When you look at Michael Chertoff, the head of Homeland Security, a man with little experience in national security, do you feel secure?

When men who never served in the military and have never seen young men die in battle send our young people off to war, do you think they know how to conduct a war? Do they know what it means to have your legs blown off for a threat that was never there?

Do you really believe that turning over important government services to private corporations has resulted in better services for the people?

Why do you hate our federal government so much? You have voted for politicians for the past 25 years whose main goal has been to de-fund the federal government. Do you think that cutting federal programs like FEMA and the Army Corps of Engineers has been good or bad for America? GOOD OR BAD?

With the nation's debt at an all-time high, do you think tax cuts for the rich are still a good idea? Will you give yours back so hundreds of thousands of homeless in New Orleans can have a home?

Do you believe in Jesus? Really? Didn't he say that we would be judged by how we treat the least among us? Hurricane Katrina came in and blew off the facade that we were a nation with liberty and justice for all. The wind howled and the water rose and what was revealed was that the poor in America shall be left to suffer and die while the President of the United States fiddles and tells them to eat cake.

That's not a joke. The day the hurricane hit and the levees broke, Mr. Bush, John McCain and their rich pals were stuffing themselves with cake. A full day after the levees broke (the same levees whose repair funding he had cut), Mr. Bush was playing a guitar some country singer gave him. All this while New Orleans sank under water.

It would take ANOTHER day before the President would do a flyover in his jumbo jet, peeking out the widow at the misery 2500 feet below him as he flew back to his second home in DC. It would then be TWO MORE DAYS before a trickle of federal aid and troops would arrive. This was no seven minutes in a sitting trance while children read "My Pet Goat" to him. This was FOUR DAYS of doing nothing other than saying "Brownie (FEMA director Michael Brown), you're doing a heck of a job!"

My Republican friends, does it bother you that we are the laughing stock of the world?

And on this sacred day of remembrance, do you think we honor or shame those who died on 9/11/01? If we learned nothing and find ourselves today every bit as vulnerable and unprepared as we were on that bright sunny morning, then did the 3,000 die in vain?

Our vulnerability is not just about dealing with terrorists or natural disasters. We are vulnerable and unsafe because we allow one in eight Americans to live in horrible poverty. We accept an education system where one in six children never graduate and most of those who do can't string a coherent sentence together. The middle class can't pay the mortgage or the hospital bills and 45 million have no health coverage whatsoever.

Are we safe? Do you really feel safe? You can only move so far out and build so many gated communities before the fruit of what you've sown will be crashing through your walls and demanding retribution. Do you really want to wait until that happens? Or is it your hope that if they are left alone long enough to soil themselves and shoot themselves and drown in the filth that fills the street that maybe the problem will somehow go away?

I know you know better. You gave the country and the world a man who wasn't up for the job and all he does is hire people who aren't up for the job. You did this to us, to the world, to the people of New Orleans. Please fix it. Bush is yours. And you know, for our peace and safety and security, this has to be fixed. What do you propose?

I have an idea, and it isn't a horse show.

Yours,
Michael Moore

Dignity in Death

If a dog or a horse is suffering, we put it out of it’s misery. It is given a shot and quietly passes away. But, a human, that’s different. We stick tubes in them and let them lie in misery for fifteen or twenty years. I heard that people raged against the judge who made the decision to pull the tube on Terri Shiavo. They should have done it fifteen years ago, she could have been with God all of that time.

The shame is that the government made a law that does not permit a person to choose dying in dignity. What happened to the rights of people. I thought the government and the church were supposed to be separate. Seems like we are controlled by a bunch of fanatics and hypocrites. Pro life does not condone abortion, but war is alright and it’s alright to take that unwanted child who grows up in a hostile world and commits a crime of murder to be executed. So we saved the infant but not the person, or persons, that infant killed, or the infant’s life in the end. Where is the logic in that?

But if we are going to execute them, let’s do it up right. Stick tubes in them and feed them intravenously until the time of the execution, and then simply pull out the tubes and let them die. So it might take a couple of weeks to die, but it would save electricity, and no one would have to cook for them. We are still living in the dark ages.

Menu Of Comments

o War!!
o Thoughts by some Intelligent People
o IT MATTERS - from a Benedictine Nun
o Side Bar Article in the "British Weekly" about Hillary Clinton
o Speaking of the Boston Tea Party:
o Industrial Revolution and the Secret Society
o Letters to the President - Pro and Con.

Your comments!
Comments about current world events.
How you feel about certain developments, etc.

As this grows, categories will be added for comments on various subjects. Only comments submitted through the form on this site will be posted.

No one was in charge.

Hurricane Katrina - Our Experiences
Sep 6, 2005, 11:59
By Paramedics Larry Bradsahw and Lorrie Beth Slonsky

Note: Bradshaw and Slonsky are paramedics from California that were attending the EMS conference in New Orleans. Larry Bradsahw is the chief shop steward, Paramedic Chapter, SEIU Local 790; and Lorrie Beth Slonsky is steward, Paramedic Chapter, SEIU Local 790. [California]

Two days after Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans, the Walgreen's store at the corner of Royal and Iberville streets remained locked. The dairy display case was clearly visible through the widows. It was now 48 hours without electricity, running water, or plumbing. The milk, yogurt, and cheeses were beginning to spoil in the 90-degree heat. The owners and managers had locked up the food, water, pampers, and prescriptions and
fled the City. Outside Walgreen's windows, residents and tourists grew increasingly thirsty and hungry.

The much-promised federal, state and local aid never materialized and the windows at Walgreen's gave way to the looters. There was an alternative. The cops could have broken one small window and distributed the nuts,
fruit juices, and bottle water in an organized and systematic manner. But they did not. Instead they spent hours playing cat and mouse, temporarily chasing away the looters.

We were finally airlifted out of New Orleans two days ago and arrived home yesterday (Saturday). We have yet to see any of the TV coverage or look at a newspaper. We are willing to guess that there were no video
images or front-page pictures of European or affluent white tourists looting the Walgreen's in the French Quarter.

We also suspect the media will have been inundated with "hero" images of the National Guard, the troops and the police struggling to help the "victims" of the Hurricane. What you will not see, but what we witnessed, were the real heroes and sheroes of the hurricane relief effort: the working class of New Orleans. The maintenance workers who used a forklift to carry the sick and disabled. The engineers, who rigged, nurtured and kept the generators running. The electricians who improvised thick extension cords stretching over blocks to share the
little electricity we had in order to free cars stuck on rooftop parking lots. Nurses who took over for mechanical ventilators and spent many hours on end manually forcing air into the lungs of unconscious patients to keep them alive. Doormen who rescued folks stuck in elevators. Refinery workers who broke into boat yards, "stealing" boats to rescue their neighbors clinging to their roofs in floodwaters. Mechanics who helped hot-wire any car that could be found to ferry people out of the City. And the food service workers who scoured the commercial kitchens improvising communal meals for hundreds of those stranded.
Most of these workers had lost their homes, and had not heard from members of their families, yet they stayed and provided the only infrastructure for the 20% of New Orleans that was not under water.

On Day 2, there were approximately 500 of us left in the hotels in the French Quarter. We were a mix of foreign tourists, conference attendees like ourselves, and locals who had checked into hotels for safety and
shelter from Katrina. Some of us had cell phone contact with family and friends outside of New Orleans. We were repeatedly told that all sorts of resources including the National Guard and scores of buses were pouring
in to the City. The buses and the other resources must have been invisible because none of us had seen them.

We decided we had to save ourselves. So we pooled our money and came up with $25,000 to have ten buses come and take us out of the City. Those who did not have the requisite $45.00 for a ticket were subsidized by
those who did have extra money. We waited for 48 hours for the buses, spending the last 12 hours standing outside, sharing the limited water, food, and clothes we had. We created a priority boarding area for the
sick, elderly and newborn babies. We waited late into the night for the "imminent" arrival of the buses. The buses never arrived. We later learned that the minute the arrived to the City limits, they were commandeered by the military.

By day 4, our hotels had run out of fuel and water. Sanitation was dangerously abysmal. As the desperation and despair increased, street crime as well as water levels began to rise. The hotels turned us out and locked their doors, telling us that the "officials" told us to report to the convention center to wait for more buses. As we entered the center of the City, we finally encountered the National Guard. The Guards told us we would not be allowed into the Superdome as the City's primary shelter had descended into a humanitarian and health hellhole. The guards further told us that the City's only other shelter, the Convention Center, was also descending into chaos and squalor and that the police were not allowing anyone else in. Quite naturally, we asked, "If we can't go to the only 2 shelters in the City, what was our alternative?" The guards told us that that was our problem, and no they did not have extra water to give to us. This would be the start of our numerous encounters with callous and hostile "law enforcement".

We walked to the police command center at Harrah's on Canal Street and were told the same thing, that we were on our own, and no they did not have water to give us. We now numbered several hundred. We held a mass
meeting to decide a course of action. We agreed to camp outside the police command post. We would be plainly visible to the media and would constitute a highly visible embarrassment to the City officials. The police told us that we could not stay. Regardless, we began to settle in and set up camp. In short order, the police commander came across the street to address our group. He told us he had a solution: we should walk to the Pontchartrain Expressway and cross the greater New Orleans Bridge where the police had buses lined up to take us out of the City. The crowed cheered and began to move. We called everyone back and explained
to the commander that there had been lots of misinformation and wrong information and was he sure that there were buses waiting for us. The commander turned to the crowd and stated emphatically, "I swear to
you that the buses are there."

We organized ourselves and the 200 of us set off for the bridge with great excitement and hope. As we marched pasted the convention center, many locals saw our determined and optimistic group and asked where we were headed. We told them about the great news. Families immediately grabbed their few belongings and quickly our numbers doubled and then doubled again. Babies in strollers now joined us, people using crutches,
elderly clasping walkers and others people in wheelchairs. We marched the 2-3 miles to the freeway and up the steep incline to the Bridge. It now began to pour down rain, but it did not dampen our enthusiasm.

As we approached the bridge, armed Gretna sheriffs formed a line across the foot of the bridge. Before we were close enough to speak, they began firing their weapons over our heads. This sent the crowd fleeing in various directions. As the crowd scattered and dissipated, a few of us inched forward and managed to engage some of the sheriffs in conversation. We told them of our conversation with the police commander
and of the commander's assurances. The sheriffs informed us there were no buses waiting. The commander had lied to us to get us to move.

We questioned why we couldn't cross the bridge anyway, especially as there was little traffic on the 6-lane highway. They responded that the West Bank was not going to become New Orleans and there would be no
Superdomes in their City. These were code words for if you are poor and black, you are not crossing the Mississippi River and you were not getting out of New Orleans.

Our small group retreated back down Highway 90 to seek shelter from the rain under an overpass. We debated our options and in the end decided to build an encampment in the middle of the Ponchartrain Expressway on the center divide, between the O'Keefe and Tchoupitoulas exits. We reasoned we would be visible to everyone, we would have some security being on an elevated freeway and we could wait and watch for the arrival of the yet to be seen buses.

All day long, we saw other families, individuals and groups make the same trip up the incline in an attempt to cross the bridge, only to be turned away. Some chased away with gunfire, others simply told no, others to be
verbally berated and humiliated. Thousands of New Orleaners were prevented and prohibited from self-evacuating the City on foot. Meanwhile, the only two City shelters sank further into squalor and disrepair. The only way across the bridge was by vehicle. We saw workers stealing trucks, buses, moving vans, semi-trucks and any car that could be hot-wired. All were packed with people trying to escape the misery New Orleans had become.

Our little encampment began to blossom. Someone stole a water delivery truck and brought it up to us. Let's hear it for looting! A mile or so down the freeway, an army truck lost a couple of pallets of C-rations on
a tight turn. We ferried the food back to our camp in shopping carts. Now secure with the two necessities, food and water; cooperation, community, and creativity flowered. We organized a clean up and hung garbage bags from the rebar poles. We made beds from wood pallets and cardboard. We designated a storm drain as the bathroom and the kids built an elaborate enclosure for privacy out of plastic, broken umbrellas, and other scraps. We even organized a food recycling system where individuals could swap out parts of C-rations (applesauce for babies and candies for kids!).

This was a process we saw repeatedly in the aftermath of Katrina. When individuals had to fight to find food or water, it meant looking out for yourself only. You had to do whatever it took to find water for your kids
or food for your parents. When these basic needs were met, people began to look out for each other, working together and constructing a community.

If the relief organizations had saturated the City with food and water in the first 2 or 3 days, the desperation, the frustration and the ugliness would not have set in.

Flush with the necessities, we offered food and water to passing families and individuals. Many decided to stay and join us. Our encampment grew to 80 or 90 people.

> From a woman with a battery-powered radio we learned that the media was talking about us. Up in full view on the freeway, every relief and news organizations saw us on their way into the City. Officials were
being asked what they were going to do about all those families living up on the freeway? The officials responded they were going to take care of us. Some of us got a sinking feeling. "Taking care of us" had
an ominous tone to it.

Unfortunately, our sinking feeling (along with the sinking City) was correct. Just as dusk set in, a Gretna Sheriff showed up, jumped out of his patrol vehicle, aimed his gun at our faces, screaming, "Get off
the fucking freeway". A helicopter arrived and used the wind from its blades to blow away our flimsy structures. As we retreated, the sheriff loaded up his truck with our food and water.

Once again, at gunpoint, we were forced off the freeway. All the law enforcement agencies appeared threatened when we congregated or congealed into groups of 20 or more. In every congregation of "victims"
they saw "mob" or "riot". We felt safety in numbers. Our "we must stay together" was impossible because the agencies would force us into small atomized groups.

In the pandemonium of having our camp raided and destroyed, we scattered once again. Reduced to a small group of 8 people, in the dark, we sought refuge in an abandoned school bus, under the freeway on Cilo Street. We were hiding from possible criminal elements but equally and definitely, we were hiding from the police and sheriffs with their martial law, curfew and shoot-to-kill policies.

The next days, our group of 8 walked most of the day, made contact with New Orleans Fire Department and were eventually airlifted out by an urban search and rescue team. We were dropped off near the airport and managed to catch a ride with the National Guard. The two young guardsmen apologized for the limited response of the Louisiana guards. They explained that a large section of their unit was in Iraq and that meant they were shorthanded and were unable to complete all the tasks they were assigned.

We arrived at the airport on the day a massive airlift had begun. The airport had become another Superdome. We 8 were caught in a press of humanity as flights were delayed for several hours while George Bush landed briefly at the airport for a photo op. After being evacuated on a coast guard cargo plane, we arrived in San Antonio, Texas.

There the humiliation and dehumanization of the official relief effort continued. We were placed on buses and driven to a large field where we were forced to sit for hours and hours. Some of the buses did not have
air-conditioners. In the dark, hundreds of us were forced to share two filthy overflowing porta-potties. Those who managed to make it out with any possessions (often a few belongings in tattered plastic bags) we were
subjected to two different dog-sniffing searches.

Most of us had not eaten all day because our C-rations had been confiscated at the airport because the rations set off the metal detectors. Yet, no food had been provided to the men, women, children, elderly, disabled as they sat for hours waiting to be "medically screened" to make sure we were not carrying any communicable
diseases.

This official treatment was in sharp contrast to the warm, heart-felt reception given to us by the ordinary Texans. We saw one airline worker give her shoes to someone who was barefoot. Strangers on the street
offered us money and toiletries with words of welcome. Throughout, the official relief effort was callous, inept, and racist.

There was more suffering than need be.
Lives were lost that did not need to be lost.
Sep 6, 2005, 11:59
By Paramedics Larry Bradsahw and Lorrie Beth Slonsky

Thoughts by Intelligent People

There can be no high civility without a deep morality. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

I am very doubtful whether history shows us one example of a man who, having stepped outside rational morality and attained power, has used that power benevolently. Clive Staples Lewis

Political surrender leads almost inevitably to moral surrender also, -Jawaharlal Nehru

Men are not made religious by performing certain actions which are externally good, but they must first have righteous principles; and then they will not fail to perform virtuous actions. Martin Luther

As soon as we lose the moral basis, we cease to be religious. There is no such thing as religion overriding morality. Man, for instance, cannot be untruthful, cruel or incontinent and claim to have God on his side.- Mohandas Karamchand (Mahatma) Gandhi

Increase of material comforts, it may be generally laid known, does not in any way whatsoever conduce to moral growth.- Mohandas Karamchand (Mahatma) Gandhi

Let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle. - George Washington

Morality is the basis of things and truth is the substance of morality. - Mohandas Karamchand (Mahatma) Gandhi

Right and wrong

I would rather be right than president. - Henry Clay.

Whatever is physiologically right is morally right; and whatever is physiologically wrong is morally wrong. - Mark Hopkins

I refuse to accept the cynical notion that nation after nation must spiral down a militaristic stairway into hell of thermonuclear destruction. I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant. - Martin Luther King, Jr.

Rectitude

A straight line is the shortest in morals as in Mathematics. - Maria Edgeworth

If you would convince a man that he does wrong, do right. Men will believe what they see. Let them see. - Henry David Thoreau

The man who is so conscious of the rectitude of his intentions a to be willing to open his bosom to the inspection of the world, is in possession of one of the strongest pillars of a decided character. The course of such a man will be firm and steady, because he has nothing to fear from the world, and is sure of the approbation and support of Heaven.- William Wirt.

IT MATTERS
Words to think about from a Benedictine Nun

National Catholic Reporter
Is There Anything Left That Matters?

by Joan Chittister, OSB 05/29/03

A Benedictine Sister of Erie, Sister Joan is a best-selling author and well-known international lecturer. She is founder and executive director of Benetvision: A Resource and Research Center for Contemporary Spirituality www.benetvision.org, and past president of the Conference of American Benedictine Prioresses and the Leadership Conference of Women Religious. Sister Joan has been recognized by universities and national organizations for her work for justice, peace and equality for women in the Church and society.She is an active member of the International Peace Council.

This is what I don't understand: All of a sudden nothing seems to matter.
      First, they said they wanted Bin Laden "dead or alive." But they didn't get him. So now they tell us that it doesn't matter. Our mission is greater than one man. Then they said they wanted Saddam Hussein, "dead or alive." He's apparently alive but we haven't got him yet, either. However, President Bush told reporters recently, "It doesn't matter. Our mission is greater than one man."
      Finally, they told us that we were invading Iraq to destroy their weapons of mass destruction. Now they say those weapons probably don't exist. Maybe never existed. Apparently that doesn't matter either. - Except that it does matter. I know we're not supposed to say that. I know it's called "unpatriotic." But it's also called honesty. And dishonesty matters.
     It matters that the infrastructure of a foreign nation that couldn't defend itself against us has been destroyed on the grounds that it was a military threat to the world.
     It matters that it was destroyed by us under a new doctrine of "pre-emptive war" when there was apparently nothing worth pre-empting. It surely matters to the families here whose sons went to war to make the world safe from weapons of mass destruction and will never come home.
     It matters to families in the United States whose life support programs were ended, whose medical insurance ran out, whose food stamps were cut off, whose day care programs were eliminated so we could spend the money on sending an army to do what did not need to be done.
     It matters to the Iraqi girl whose face was burned by a lamp that toppled over as a result of a U.S. bombing run.
It matters to Ali, the Iraqi boy who lost his family - and both his arms - in a U.S. air attack.
     It matters to the people in Baghdad whose water supply is now fetid, whose electricity is gone, whose streets are unsafe, whose 158 government ministries' buildings and all their records have been destroyed, whose cultural heritage and social system has been looted and whose cities teem with anti-American protests.
     It matters that the people we say we "liberated" do not feel liberated in the midst of the lawlessness, destruction and wholesale social suffering that so-called liberation created.
     It matters to the United Nations whose integrity was impugned, whose authority was denied, whose inspection teams are even now still being overlooked in the process of technical evaluation and disarmament.
     It matters to the reputation of the United States in the eyes of the world, both now and for decades to come, perhaps.
     And surely it matters to the integrity of this nation whether or not its intelligence gathering agencies have any real intelligence or not before we launch a military armada on its say-so.
     And it should matter whether or not our government is either incompetent and didn't know what they were doing or were dishonest and refused to say.
     The unspoken truth is that either as a people we were misled, or we were lied to, about the real reason for this war. Either we made a huge - and unforgivable - mistake, an arrogant or ignorant mistake, or we are swaggering around the world like a blind giant, flailing in all directions while the rest of the world watches in horror or in ridicule.
     If Bill Clinton's definition of "is" matters, surely this matters. If a president's sex life matters, surely a president's use of global force against some of the weakest people in the world matters. If a president's word in a court of law about a private indiscretion matters, surely a president's word to the community of nations and the security of millions of people matters.
     And if not, why not? If not, surely there is something as wrong with us as citizens, as thinkers, as Christians as there must be with some facet of the government. If wars that the public says are wrong yesterday - as over 70% of U.S. citizens did before the attack on Iraq - suddenly become "right" the minute the first bombs drop, what kind of national morality is that?
     Of what are we really capable as a nation if the considered judgment of politicians and people around the world means nothing to us as a people?
     What is the depth of the American soul if we can allow destruction to be done in our name and the name of "liberation" and never even demand an accounting of its costs, both personal and public, when it is over?
     We like to take comfort in the notion that people make a distinction between our government and ourselves. We like to say that the people of the world love Americans, they simply mistrust our government. But excoriating a distant and anonymous "government" for wreaking rubble on a nation in pretense of good requires very little of either character or intelligence.
     What may count most, however, is that we may well be the ones Proverbs warns when it reminds us: "Kings take pleasure in honest lips; they value the one who speaks the truth."
     The point is clear: If the people speak and the king doesn't listen, there is something wrong with the king. If the king acts precipitously and the people say nothing, something is wrong with the people.
      It may be time for us to realize that in a country that prides itself on being democratic, we are our government. And the rest of the world is figuring that out very quickly.
      From where I stand, that matters.

Side Bar Article in the "British Weekly"

Saturday, June 21,2003 - Number 954

TO ANYONE who takes at least a passing interest in American politics it comes as no surprise that the publication of Hillary Clinton's memoirs has unleashed a flood of anti-Clinton criticism in the media.
    Using the former President as a pinata has long been a favored pastime of this country's conservative pundits, but it was something of a shock to see a similar diatribe against Clinton published in the London Times this week.
     Perhaps prompted by George W Bush's failure to revive the American economy, the article's author, Stephen Pollard, a fellow at a right-wing European think tank, joined a growing chorus of like-minded pundits in claiming that Clinton enjoyed 'astonishingly good fortune with the economy'.
     This increasingly widespread revisionist approach to history gives no credit to Clinton's economic policies. Using the same rationale one could also assert that Ronald Reagan also got lucky, while Jimmy Carter was catastrophically unlucky. whenever success is ascribed to luck, it is tempting to remember the famous retort: "the harder I work, the luckier I get".
      Clinton's failings were many. But his detractors insult our intelligence when they fail to mention his enormous intellect, his huge capacity for work or his undoubted skills as a politician. Clinton is considered by many impartial observers to be among the brightest Americans of his generation. You don't become a Rhodes Scholar through luck. You don't win election to the White House (twice) by luck And you certainly don't preside over the longest peacetime boom in American history by luck.
     Clinton's detractors, of course, prefer to obsess on his womanizing and adultery. It seems they just can't forgive Clinton for twice winning a presidential election and doing such a better job than his successor. Whenever the present incumbent of the White House starts to feel the heat on any issue, Republicans launch into a familiar refrain, the gist of which is, 'things may be bad, but 'aint you glad you've got a President who doesn't cheat on his wife?"
      Actually, no. Nor should we be happy to have in the Oval Office a self-described C student who quits work every day at 6pm, even in time of war. A man who was arrested four times during a prolonged spell of 'youthful irresponsibility'. And a man who dodged the Vietnam War by enrolling in the Texas Air National Guard, and who failed to show up even for that duty during his final year of service, perhaps because it coincided with the introduction of random drug testing.
     Politics aside, the best way to judge a president is by what he delivered for his country. Under Clinton, we had a budget surplus, peace, prosperity and sex. Under Bush we have a ballooning deficit, war, recession and Christian fundamentalism.
       We know which we prefer.

__________________________________

Retirement Anyone?

No wonder Hilary wanted to be a senator! Social Security! Perhaps we are asking the wrong questions in this election year. Our Senators/Congressmen do not pay into Social Security, and, therefore they do not collect from it. Social Security benefits were not suitable for them. They felt they should have a special plan.

Many years ago they voted in their benefit plan. In more recent years, no congressperson has felt the need to change it. After all, it is a great plan. For all practical purposes their plan works like this. When they retire no matter how long they have been in office, they continue to draw their same pay until they die, except it may be increased from time to time by the cost of living adjustments. For example, former Senator Bradley and his wife may be expected to draw $7,900,000.00 over an average life span, with Mrs. Bradley drawing $275,000.00 during the last year of her life. Their cost for this excellent plan is "0", nada, zilch.

They voted this little perk in for themselves, totally free to them. You and I pick up the tab for this plan. Retirement plan funds come directly from the General Funds.

Our tax dollars at work! With Social Security, which you and I pay into every payday for our own retirement, and with an equal amount matched by our employer, we can expect to get an average of $1,000.00 per month. We would have to collect our benefits for 68 years and 1 month to equal the Bradley's benefits.

Imagine for a moment that you could structure a retirement plan so desirable, a retirement plan that worked so well, that Railroad Employees, Postal Workers, and others who were not in the plan would clamor to be included. This is how good Social Security could be, if only one small change was made. That change would be to jerk the Golden Fleece Retirement Plan out from under the Senators/Congressmen. Put them into the Social Security plan with the rest of us. Watch how fast they fix it!!!

If enough people receive this, maybe a seed will be planted, and maybe good changes will evolve. How many people can YOU send this to? Other possibilities are: Send it to your local newspaper (letters to the editor), I was going to suggest your local city officials, but they may get ideas and incorporate it into their charter then the city taxes would go up. Where do we go for help. I think we need another Boston Tea Party.

Speaking of the Boston Tea Party:

Boston tea party (Had there been press coverage, we would still belong to England.)

Headlines: December 16, 1773 - Terrorists raid Her Majesty’s Ships!

Boston, in the Colonies: Terrorist boarded three British ships (the Dartmouth, the Eleanor, and the Beaver) in the middle of the night and stole tons of valuable goods (tea - not reported) from her holds (The fact that it was dumped into the harbor was not reported.) The Ships were lying unguarded at a dock in the Boston Harbor. "These terrorist will be dealt with," claims Her Majesty. A fleet of warships have been dispatched to bombard Boston - 150,000 troops will be sent to clean up after the bombardment. Her Majesty said, "I will not stop until all of the terrorist are captured or killed. I deeply regret the death of any innocent civilians, but business is business. We lost valuable tax items. It will not happen again."

What really happened. (The people banded together.) - Angry and frustrated with British rule, plus the final straw, a new tax on tea, American colonists calling themselves the Sons of Liberty and disguised as Mohawk Native Americans boarded three British ships (the Dartmouth, the Eleanor, and the Beaver) and dumped 342 whole crates of British tea into Boston harbor on December 16, 1773. Similar incidents occurred in Maryland, New York, and New Jersey in the next few months, and tea was eventually boycotted throughout the colonies.

07/025/2004 Sam’s Thoughts About the Power Behind Our Government

First, I was born in America and I am very proud of most of the people of America. There are many things that have been done over the years, in the name of the people, that I am not proud of, but I love America and what it stands for. I am not a sheep and I don’t believe everything that is handed me - and I will tell you why, and also a theory I have that seems to be proving true..

I’m not quite sure when the thoughts came to me, but I believe it was in the fifties. By that time I had experienced a wide variety of things and happenings in my life. I read that if you want to be a good writer, you must live your life fully, with many experiences to draw from. I did that. I ventured into things to see where they would take me and what would happen. Fortunately for me, I survived.

I saw and learned how politics worked from an early age. It is said that in 1820 my Great-great- great -grandfather was governor of Pennsylvania. My grandfather was also in politics, in a town run by the "Boys". I played football with their kids and hung out with them. As I grew up I learned the ways to do things, and saw things happen. Gambling was open, $2 and $3 whorehouse were abundant. I hung out in their clubs before I was old enough to drink. It was during the war(World War II) and things were loose.

With all of that and much more in my head, I came up with a theory about our country. I don’t know what triggered it, or even why I was thinking about our country, that brought on this thought. But here it is, as best I can remember it from those days. I have told this to many people, who looked at me like I was crazy. Business men told me that it couldn’t be, because, if it was true they would know about it. So much for that. Here it is.

During the time of the industrial revolution when a few unscrupulous, sharp, men were amassing fortunes in industry, there were a few revolutions going on in France; one that erupted in 1789 lead the Queen, Marie Antoinette, to the guillotine in October 16, 1793, along with a few others. Then there was one in 1830 and another one in 1848. All caused by the common people who were dissatisfied with their treatment by the government.

So, when the big money started to roll in and the public was being enslaved with low wages and poor working conditions, the money people had to devise a way to protect themselves and their wealth. They didn’t want the same thing that happened in France to happen to them in America. They naturally wanted to keep their wealth, and they desperately wanted to continue adding to their piles of money. Now how could that be done with out being beheaded? Simple! And they did it.

They first formed a secret group, a society of dedicated men, who had mutual interests (money-power), and then they pooled some of their money and took control of the government, but made it appear that the people had the control through votes. They gave the people a say in the elections and the government. Of course it always went the way of the Society. If for some unforseen reason it didn’t go their way, they always had a backup, and they soon corrected their problem. Assassination was a fix-all. The Mafia learned from that society.

This secret society controlled everything, including the federal reserve. This control has been passed down to their children to this day. The last presidential election almost gave away their hand by the fiasco that happened in Florida. You remember, the president’s brother’s state. The state that fixed the election. We the people have been led down the yellow brick road, and these guys are laughing all the way to the bank. The society knew how to play the special interest groups. The name of the game was greed. That is how con men are able to fleece people. They use the greed in the suckers to manipulate them. Hitler was brilliant at doing that.

And now we are at the crossroads once again. We have a man in office who lied to us, (Didn’t most of them?) Used a national disaster to better the financial position of his cohorts, his Father and himself.. Lead our young into a war that served no benefit to the people of the United States. Over a thousand dead and twice as many wounded and maimed for life. And he cut their salary and cut the VA funding. We fought for oil, but did one veteran of that war ever get one free quart of oil for their sacrifices?

This man, gave aid to the enemy, by getting them out of the country immediately after the disaster. And made up stories to lead us into eliminating one of his Father’s competitors for oil. We elected him, or did we? In France they called those actions, treason and sent them to prison for life or the guillotine. Here, we turn the other cheek and make excuses for them. The greedy people are in control and they still think they can benefit by this man. They refuse to believe what is right in front of their eyes.

Many of this is coming to light now. One thing that has come of all this, is that with the advent of computers, history will one day expose the whole truth. It may take a few hundred years, but I feel (I pray) it will happen. We have never left the dark ages, we are still burning the wrong people at the stakes.

I hope the people of this country, and I include the FBI, the CIA, the SECRET SERVICE, the MILITARY, the POLICE and all of the innocent boys who are indoctrinated into the service, will soon realize that they are all being used and that it is morally wrong to allow that type of leadership to go on. We are all of this planet. Shouldn’t we help each other along the path, must we cause suffering for so many, for the benefits of a few?

SOME OF THE FEW:

If we could research the pasts of some of these men as the CIA and the FBI can research your past, I believe these would be some of those men. As I research those times, I will add more names.

IN THE BEGINNING: John Davison Rockefeller, John Pierpont Morgan, John Deere, Charles Goodyear, George Westinghouse, Henry Ford, Harry Chandler (Los Angeles Times - read Page 80, second paragraph of "The great Los Angeles Swindle" by Jules Tygiel - University of California Press) and more

LATER: Joseph Kennedy, George Bush Sr., and more

The queen of France, Marie Antoinette, was sent to the guillotine in 1793 due to a revolt in 1789 by the Parisians over their bad treatment by the government.

An inept ruler, King Charles X (1757-1836) inspired resentment in the French middle class and its press, especially against ultra-royalist advisers; when he directed his reactionary favorite Jules de Polignac (1780-1847) to form a new ministry, the Chamber of Deputies hotly objected. Charles' angry dismissal of the chamber (1829) turned an attempt to curb a hated functionary into the total collapse of the regime. An 1830 French election revealed even greater opposition in the chamber, and Charles again dismissed it as he and Polignac published the "July Ordinances," which established strong press controls and reduced the electorate. As usual, the Parisians revolted and blockaded the streets on July 27, 1830; among those manning the barricades were army units and former members of the National Guard disbanded in 1827. Charles acted too late in annulling the new ordinances and dismissing Polignac (July 30, 1830); the minister was arrested and condemned to life imprisonment and later (1836) amnestied. Charles fled, then abdicated in favor of a grandson; the rebels, divided into republicans favoring the Marquis de Lafayette (1757-1834) and monarchists desiring the conservative Duke of Orleans, Louis-Philippe (1773-1850), argued among themselves until the dismissed bourgeois legislature declared the throne vacant and proclaimed Louis-Philippe king. His ineptness and rightist actions led his "July Monarchy" to the French revolution of 1848 and the Second Republic.

Like the French revolution of 1830, a conservative minister was the focus of resentment in France in 1848, but this later revolt also included working-class members angry at the government's failure to relieve the depression of 1846-47. The offending minister was Francois Guizot (1787-1874); the unpopular monarch was King Louis-Philippe (1773-1850). France's opposition parties, forbidden direct campaigning for a forth-coming election, instead wittily held a "banquet campaign"; when their most important gathering, slated for February 22 in Paris, was forbidden by the king and Guizot, the Parisians gathered in force at the banquetting place, and street fighting erupted. At its worst on February 23, 1848, when some government troops opened fire while others laid down their arms or joined the rebels, the revolution forced the dismissal of Guizot and, the next day, the abdication of Louis-Philippe. A provisional government, the Committee of Public Safety, guided by Alhonse de Lamartine (1790-1869), was established by the Chamber of Deputies; it declared the Second Republic and tried to meet all demands, setting up national workshops, declaring a right-to-work law, and calling for national elections. The revolution had been generally local; the French national response was predominantly moderate. An executive committee, again including Lamartine, replaced the provisional government and attempted to meet the new public resentment (May 1848). It dissolved the national workshops... It also produced a very democratic constitution. In new elections, the French Assembly changed its balance again, monarchists outnumbering radicals five to two and moderates six to one. The revolution was now defunct, and the republic was soon to wither. Prince Louis Napoleon (1808-73), long a Bonaparte claimant and a conservative, was elected president in December 1848.

WAR!

03/26/2003
War has come to us. It was predicted by some a long time before Bush said he would run for president. I heard fear in people, who said they knew he was going to run for president. I didn't laugh because these were responsible people who had their fingers on the pulse of this nation.
       A year or so later, when I heard he planned to run, I remembered my friends warnings. They said he was evil, coming to take over. So far their predictions have come true. I fear for and pray for our troops over there, who are blindly doing his bidding.
        I fully support our troops, as does all Americans. I don't support any government, who puts our children at risk in a war for power and wealth, using terrorism as a guise to do as they please.
       When will we learn??

08/12/04
Because of Hitler there was a terrible war.
Hitler's comments after the first British bombs were dropped on Berlin.
"Last night the enemy dropped bombs on Berlin - So be it. If the British Air Force drops two or three or four thousand kilograms of bombs, we will drop a hundred and fifty, a hundred and eighty, two hundred thousand, three hundred thousand, four hundred thousand kilograms and more in a single night. If they say that they will carry out large scale attacks on our cities, we will blot out theirs. We shall stop the handiwork of these night pirates, so help us God. The hour will come when one of us will crack - and it will not be National Socialist Germany.

What will George Bush, Jr. say when the Untied states is bombed because of his actions? Hitler brought it to Germany, Is Bush bringing it to the United States?

Bush Family Values