"... an incomplete, oversimplified and possibly untrue version of events there that raises new questions about the accuracy of the administration's statements about Iraq."::::::::
DIANE'S NEWS CLIPS begins here :)~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~> Excerpted from: http://www.truthout.org BUSH LEAVING OUT IMPORTANT DETAILS ON IRAQ http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011507B.shtml President Bush and his aides, explaining their reasons for sending more American troops to Iraq, are offering an incomplete, oversimplified and possibly untrue version of events there that raises new questions about the accuracy of the administration's statements about Iraq. --- New Law Could Subject Civilians to Military Trial http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011507E.shtml Private contractors and other civilians serving with US troops in Iraq and Afghanistan could be subject for the first time to military courts-martial under a new federal provision that legal scholars say is almost certain to spark constitutional challenges. --- FOCUS | Libby Trial Full of Political Intrigue http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011507Z.shtml Former White House aide Lewis "Scooter" Libby goes on trial on Tuesday on charges of perjury in a case that has all the elements of a political thriller. The tale involves a spy's blown cover, the US administration's preparations for war in Iraq and elaborate intrigue among Washington's power brokers. --- The New York Times | Busywork for Nuclear Scientists http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011507A.shtml The New York Times writes: "The Bush administration is eager to start work on a new nuclear warhead with all sorts of admirable qualities: sturdy, reliable and secure from terrorists. To sweeten the deal, officials say that if they can replace the current arsenal with Reliable Replacement Warheads (what could sound more comforting?), they probably won't have to keep so many extra warheads to hedge against technical failure. If you're still not sold, the warhead comes with something of a guarantee - that scientists can build the new bombs without ever testing them." --- Stacy Bannerman | Iraq Vets Call on Congress to End War http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011507C.shtml An anti-war organization launched by a 22-year-old Marine and a 29-year-old sailor has accumulated 1,028 signatures from active-duty and Reserve troops calling for an end to the war in Iraq, which has lasted nearly four years. The signatures will be delivered to lawmakers on January 16th. --- Paul Krugman | The Texas Strategy http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011507F.shtml Paul Krugman writes: "Hundreds of news articles and opinion pieces have described President Bush's decision to escalate the Iraq war as a 'Hail Mary pass.' But that's the wrong metaphor. Mr. Bush isn't Roger Staubach, trying to pull out a win for the Dallas Cowboys. He's Charles Keating, using other people's money to keep Lincoln Savings going long after it should have been shut down - and squandering the life savings of thousands of investors, not to mention billions in taxpayer dollars, along the way." --- Cheney Defends Efforts to Obtain Financial Records http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011507G.shtml Vice President Dick Cheney yesterday defended efforts by the Pentagon and the CIA to obtain financial records of Americans suspected of terrorism or espionage, calling the practice a "perfectly legitimate activity" used partly to protect troops stationed on military bases in the United States. But the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee expressed concern over the expansion of the military's domestic intelligence collection efforts and said his committee would investigate how the Pentagon was using its authority. --- Michael T. Klare | Is Energo-Fascism in Your Future? http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011507H.shtml Michael T. Klare writes: "It has once again become fashionable for the dwindling supporters of President Bush's futile war in Iraq to stress the danger of 'Islamo-fascism' and the supposed drive by followers of Osama bin Laden to establish a monolithic, Taliban-like regime - a 'Caliphate' - stretching from Gibraltar to Indonesia. While there may indeed be hundreds, even thousands, of disturbed and suicidal individuals who share this delusional vision, the world actually faces a far more substantial and universal threat, which might be dubbed Energo-fascism, or the militarization of the global struggle over ever-diminishing supplies of energy." _________________________________ http://www.monbiot.com THE DARKEST CORNER OF THE MIND US interrogators have devised a new form of torture. It debases the democracy they claim to be defending. By George Monbiot. Published in the Guardian 12th December 2006. After thousands of years of practice, you might have imagined that every possible means of inflicting pain had already been devised. But you should never underestimate the human capacity for invention. United States interrogators, we now discover, have found a new way of destroying a human being. Last week, defence lawyers acting for Jose Padilla, a US citizen detained as an "enemy combatant", released a video showing a mission fraught with deadly risk taking him to the prison dentist. A group of masked guards in riot gear shackled his legs and hands, blindfolded him with black-out goggles and shut off his hearing with headphones, then marched him down the prison corridor(1). Is Padilla really that dangerous? Far from it: his warders describe him as so docile and inactive that he could be mistaken for "a piece of furniture". The purpose of these measures appeared to be to sustain the regime under which he had lived for over three years: total sensory deprivation. He had been kept in a blacked-out cell, unable to see or hear anything beyond it. Most importantly, he had no human contact, except for being bounced off the walls from time to time by his interrogators. As a result, he appears to have lost his mind. I don't mean this metaphorically. I mean that his mind is no longer there. The forensic psychiatrist who examined him says that he "does not appreciate the nature and consequences of the proceedings against him, is unable to render assistance to counsel, and has impairments in reasoning as the result of a mental illness, i.e., post-traumatic stress disorder, complicated by the neuropsychiatric effects of prolonged isolation." ...snip.... ..................snip................. He is unlikely to be the only person subjected to this regime. Another "enemy combatant", Ali al-Marri, claims to have been subject to the same total isolation and sensory deprivation, in the same naval prison in South Carolina(3). God knows what is being done to people who have disappeared into the CIA's foreign oubliettes. That the US tortures, routinely and systematically, while prosecuting its "war on terror" can no longer be seriously disputed. The Detainee Abuse and Accountability Project (DAA), a coalition of academics and human rights groups, has documented the abuse or killing of 460 inmates of US military prisons in Afghanistan, Iraq and at Guantanamo Bay(4). This, it says, is necessarily a conservative figure: many cases will remain unrecorded. The prisoners were beaten, raped, forced to abuse themselves, [snip] Full article: http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2006/12/12/1035/ _________________________________ NOTE from Diane: Lou Dobbs is funny, shaking his head like a defective Bobble Doll over Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Hugo Chavez combining forces. Imagine that, Ahmadinejad and Chavez working up a plan to thwart America's 'leaders' from expanding their dream of a recycled Third Reich, which goes without saying, includes dominion over the Middle East and Latin America. Imagine that! The Terror ... of Ahmadinejad and Chavez ! _________________________________ http://www.counterpunch.org NOMADS BEWARE! "The most dangerous foreign policy blunder in this country since Vietnam, if it's carried out!" By Alexander Cockburn A make-or-break speech by a beleagured American president is usually preceded by a demonstration of American might somewhere on the planet and the run-up to Bush's address Wednesday night was no exception. The AC-130 U.S. gunship that massacred a convoy of fleeing Islamists on Somalia's southwestern border, apparently along with dozens of nomads, their families and livestock, was deployed on its mission on Sunday, to make timely newspaper headlines indicative of Bush's determination to strike at terror wherever it may lurk. Moral to nomads: when the US president schedules a speech, don't herd, don't go to wedding parties, head for the nearest cave. http://www.counterpunch.org/cockburn01132007.html _________________________________ http://jablankfort@earthlink.net Hear Chalmers Johnson on US's Militarized Empire On Wednesday, January 10, I interviewed Chalmers Johnson, author or Sorrows of Empire, regarding his article in the January issue of Harper's "Republic or Empire," in which he discusses how Keynesian military spending is driving the US economy and how, given the indebtedness which it is incurring, it is inevitably doomed to collapse. Click on > AUDIO: http://www.radio4all.net/proginfo.php?id=21330 JB _________________________________ Missed? Dept Clouds of Death by Timothy V. Gatto Chemtrails are not contrails. They are filled with blood cells, heavy metals, fibrous strands and many other nasty things that are sprayed in our atmosphere almost 24 hours a day. Nobody knows why, and the government denies it. http://snipurl.com/17jqg _________________________________ Submitted by: http://eddiestinson@gmail.com What Makes Sammy Run? Uri Avnery "I DON'T care about the principles! All that I want is that my wife can live with me and that we can raise a family!" cried out the engaging young man on the TV talk show. Sammy is an Arab citizen from Acre, studying for a doctor's degree at Haifa University. Something terrible happened to him: he fell in love with the wrong woman - a Palestinian from Jenin in the occupied territories. He had met her by accident in Ramallah, obtained for her (on false pretences, he admits) a permit to stay in Israel for one day and married her. Since then he can visit her only once every few weeks in Jenin. ..................snip................... The freedom of love and marriage is one of the basic human rights. Its denial to 1.4 million Israeli citizens, solely because they are Arab, is a severe violation of the international Bill of Rights that has been signed by Israel. It also attacks the roots of Israeli democracy. ..................snip................... ISRAEL'S ARAB citizens suffer discrimination in almost all spheres of life. The list, which is no secret, would fill several pages. Just as examples: the education system spends on an Arab child one fifth of what it spends on a Jewish one. The health system spends on an Arab citizen much less than on a Jew. Almost all Arab local councils are bankrupt, one of the reasons being that the government pays them per capita much less than Jewish councils. An Arab citizen cannot get land from the Land Authority, which holds almost all the land in Israel. Not to mention the built-in official discrimination of the Law of Return and the Law of citizenship. ..................snip................... Israeli democracy is faced with a choice between two alternatives: [snip] Full article >> http://zope.gush-shalom.org/home/en/channels/avnery/1167562574 _________________________________ Jackson: Beverage industry fed us sweetened research > http://snipurl.com/17lj7 Austin American-Statesman (subscription) - Austin,TX,USA I don't blame scientists, but are scientists asking questions differently when food industry or commercial interests are paying for it and when renewal of a ... _________________________________ http://www.mg.co.za | http://www.cspinet.org | http://www.cubacentral.com _________________________________ ********** Test drive Vista ********** Windows Vista for consumers will launch in less than three weeks. The operating system has been in the works for more than five years. And the hype is mounting. Many people will upgrade as soon as possible. Others will probably wait until they need a new machine. But I suspect most people are undecided. Vista does offer some important improvements over XP. Many tasks have been simplified. And it has a sleek new look. But you may want to research Vista before upgrading. Well, Microsoft has a guided tour on its site. It will show you the new features and let you experience Vista. To run the test drive, you must use Internet Explorer. Plus, you need to download and install an ActiveX control. TO VISIT TODAY'S COOL SITE, GO HERE: http://www.windowsvistatestdrive.com Be sure to listen to me Monday through Friday. Use my map to find me near you http://www.komando.com/listen/index.aspx _________________________________ eHEALTHY NEWS Have You Heard This Vaccine Warning on Your Radio? - Highly entertaining and informative audio clip on this important topic. http://snipurl.com/17gio ----- Money Mastery -- Play the $100-Bill Game - This simple technique will change your limiting beliefs and flow with money. Use this technique to open new avenues of money to flow to you. http://snipurl.com/17giq ----- Test Tube Burgers by 2009? - Will you soon be eating lab-grown ground beef that smells and tastes like the real thing? http://snipurl.com/17giw _________________________________ VIDEO: http://media.putfile.com/STONER-Jack-In-The-Box-15 | 1:20 _________________________________ NationalGeographic.com http://lava.nationalgeographic.com/pod/ _________________________________ NASA Astronomy picture of the day http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html _________________________________ If you don't get everything you want, think of the things you don't get that you don't want. ~ Oscar Wilde _________________________________ Link to: http://Diane's News Clips http://www.opednews.com/author/author2300.html?entry=diary
