The Politics of Brownwood Gas ? We're/You're getting screwed !

From The Dallas Morning News
Letters for Tuesday
05:10 AM CST on Tuesday, January 31, 2006

Nobody lobbies for us

Re: "Who lobbies for the not-so-special folks?" by Steve Blow, Sunday Metro.
Who lobbies for the not-so-special folks? Nobody. We are left with editorials, letters to the editor, senators and representatives, and marches on everything from city hall to Washington. None puts money into the pockets of our representatives and, therefore, it's like whistling in the wind. When there is no money, there is no lobby, no matter how right the cause.
Take, for example, the Medicare prescription drug plan. It is the greatest example of lobbying by the pharmaceutical and insurance industries, and the victims are old people. Isn't America great? Two powerful industries ripping off seniors with congressional approval.

Robert Medlin, Forney

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Letters for Wednesday
05:34 AM CST on Wednesday, February 1, 2006

Investing in gas tanks
Re: "Exxon Mobil – $36.1 billion profit – Oil giant posts the biggest gain ever for any company, but ad campaign calls it moderate," Tuesday news story.
This headline reminded me of a recent comment by a conservative radio show host. He said we should stop whining about gas prices and start investing in energy companies.
Not all of us make millions spending our days pontificating on the radio, nor do we have enough money to pay off our legislators to do what's right for America and abolish our dependence on foreign oil. We are at the mercy of politicians and huge conglomerates that have those resources to maintain their stranglehold on us.
The vast majority of working Americans need to keep the $63 it would cost to buy one share of Exxon and use it to fill up our tanks so we can make it to work tomorrow – if we're lucky enough to have jobs.
Patrick McCauley, Flower Mound
source: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/opinion/letters/stories/DN-wedletters_0201edi.ART.State.Edition2.13658a5e.html
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next time you fill up with gas

remember this...

Who Killed Brownwood's Lawrence Earl Jackson ?

In ACU visit, journalist discusses investigating Klan crimes

By Brian Bethel / Reporter-News Staff Writer
January 31, 2006

Journalist Jerry Mitchell said that during the civil rights era, the newspaper where he now works was probably ''one of the most racist papers around.''
''If there was any kind of black-on-white violence in the entire world,'' said Mitchell, who joined the Jackson, Miss., Clarion-Ledger in 1986, ''they would put it on the front page. They referred to civil rights activists as communists. They used the term 'monkeys.'''
Speaking to an audience Monday at Abilene Christian University, Mitchell, 46, said his work at the Clarion-Ledger now serves as a counterbalance to the newspaper's former supremacist stance.
Mitchell's yen for ferreting out a good story has helped put four Ku Klux Klansmen in jail, all for crimes committed decades ago.
His writings have earned him 15 awards, and a portrayal in the 1996 Rob Reiner film, ''Ghosts of Mississippi,'' based on a case he investigated.
Mitchell's reporting helped convict Edgar Ray Killen, who orchestrated the June 21, 1964, killings of civil rights workers Michael Schwerner, James Chaney and Andrew Goodman.
Seeing such cases brought to justice gives Mitchell a sense of personal satisfaction and stronger personal connections to God, whom he feels has helped direct his work through the years.
Mitchell's work uncovering civil rights cases began in 1989 after seeing the film, ''Mississippi Burning.''
Mitchell began looking into the Mississippi Sovereignty Commission, a ''state segregationalist spy agency,'' he said.
He discovered that while Mississippi was busy prosecuting Byron De La Beckwith for the 1963 death of noted civil rights activist Medgar Evers, forces within the State Sovereignty Commission secretly assisted the defense.
Their goal? Get Beckwith acquitted. The case ended in a hung jury, twice.
Mitchell, intrigued by his findings, wrote a story that led to the victim's widow asking for the case to be reopened.
Beckwith was found guilty in 1994. He was sentenced to life in prison after a remarkable set of coincidences, including the location of photographs of the crime scene and additional testimony, which included information that he allegedly bragged about the crime at a Ku Klux Klan rally.
Such happenings convince Mitchell a divine power was at work.
''How else could that have all happened?'' he asked.
Since then he has been instrumental in cracking a variety of other cases, from the fatal firebombing of NAACP leader Vernon Dahmer in 1996 to the 1963 bombing of a Birmingham church that killed four girls.
Throughout his professional career, Mitchell's willingness to get close to his sources on both sides - Klansmen apparently like to eat barbecue and catfish - as well as to constantly check statements against reality, has served him well.
In the church bombing case, Mitchell destroyed the defendant's alibi with a simple bit of investigation.
Bobby Cherry claimed that he had hurried home to watch wresting on television and thus couldn't have been responsible for the church bombing. A check of the Birmingham News television archives showed that there no wrestling on television that evening.
''In fact, there hadn't been wresting on television for years,'' Mitchell said.
Throughout his time as an investigative writer, Mitchell has received a few threats against both himself and his family.
But he believes both in his work and in his spiritual commitment to the truth.
''I think sometimes in our post-modern society, we tend to think that people are able to have their own version of the truth,'' he said. ''But there are some cases where there is an absolute truth, and that is what must be pursued.''

Contact Wellness Writer Brian Bethel at 676-6739 or bethelb@reporternews.com.
source: http://www.reporter-news.com/abil/nw_ed_coll_univ/article/0,1874,ABIL_7950_4428616,00.html

Rest In Peace Coretta Scott King

The King Center...

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Rights leader Coretta Scott King dies
Tue Jan 31, 2006 11:12 AM ET

Coretta Scott King passes away
by Karen Jacobs
ATLANTA (Reuters) - Coretta Scott King, who surged to the front of the fight for racial equality in America after her husband Martin Luther King Jr. was murdered in 1968, died at age 78, friends and family said on Tuesday.
"Her daughter was with her at the time she passed, probably about 1 to 1:15 this morning," said Bishop Eddie Long of the New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Lithonia, Georgia, the pastor of King's youngest child Bernice.
Andrew Young, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and a close friend of the King family, told reporters she died in California.
King suffered a debilitating stroke and heart attack in August. She was last seen in public on January 14 at a dinner marking the Martin Luther King Jr., holiday, where she received a standing ovation from the 1,500 people in the crowd.
Her steely determination, grace and class won her millions of admirers inside and outside the civil rights movement.
Rep. John Lewis, a Democratic congressman from Georgia and civil rights leader, said her death was "a very sad hour."
"Long before she met and married Dr. King, she was an activist for peace and civil rights and for civil liberties," he told CNN.
At the White House, Dan Bartlett, counselor to the president, told Fox television: "President Bush and first lady Laura Bush were always heartened by their meetings with Mrs. King. ... President and Mrs. Bush are deeply saddened by today's news."
Sen. Edward Kennedy, a Democrat from Massachusetts, called King "a driving force, not just for the civil rights movement, but for the great march toward progress."
Coretta Scott King played a back-up role in the civil rights movement until her husband was assassinated on a Memphis motel balcony on April 4, 1968.
Mrs. King, who was in Atlanta at the time, learned of the murder in a telephone call from the Rev. Jesse Jackson, a call she later wrote, "I seemed subconsciously to have been waiting for all of our lives.

to read the entire article please go to: http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=domesticNews&storyID=2006-01-31T161224Z_01_N31367618_RTRUKOC_0_US-KING.xml

Yet Another Veteran running as a Democrat !

Hooah...

Follow the Money !

Exxon profit tops $10 billion, capping record year
Mon Jan 30, 2006 11:34 AM ET

By Deepa Babington

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM.N: Quote, Profile, Research), the world's largest publicly traded oil company, on Monday reported a quarterly profit of $10.7 billion, capping a year of record earnings dominated by surging oil and gas prices.
The results pushed up Exxon's profit for the year to a staggering $36.13 billion -- bigger than the economies of 125 of the 184 countries ranked by the World Bank. Profit rose 42 percent from 2004.

source: http://today.reuters.com/news/newsarticle.aspx?type=businessNews&storyid=2006-01-30T163413Z_01_WAA000163_RTRUKOC_0_US-ENERGY-EXXON-EARNS.xml&rpc=23
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Companies Backing Republicans With Donations Outperform S&P 500

Dec. 13 (Bloomberg) -- One of the best indicators of superior returns on U.S. stocks during President George W. Bush's first term was contributions to Republican candidates.

The 50 companies that most favored Republicans with their political donations delivered an average 44 percent return on investment over the last four years, while the Standard & Poor's 500 Index fell 4.1 percent, assuming dividends were reinvested.

The companies, including railroad Union Pacific Corp., insurer Cigna Corp. and communications equipment maker Harris Corp., push an agenda that in many areas parallels Bush's: pared- down regulations, favorable tax codes, and a curb on lawsuits.

``This is stunning proof of how the biggest political donors don't just buy access, they buy corporate profits,'' said Kevin Phillips, 64, a political adviser to former President Richard M. Nixon and author of the 1969 book ``The Emerging Republican Majority,'' which predicted the party would come to dominate presidential politics. ``It just gives other companies further incentives for comparable donations.''

Union Pacific, which has returned 29 percent since the end of 2000, benefited when the Republican-controlled Congress eliminated a 4.3 cent a gallon tax on diesel fuel in October. That will help the biggest U.S. railroad save $60 million a year. Cigna, the fourth-biggest U.S. health insurer, has posted a 45 percent gain since Bush signed the Medicare bill last year that created a $410 billion drug benefit administered by insurers. Since 2000 the company is down 35 percent.

More Than $100,000

In the 2004 election, 102 companies donated more than $100,000 through their political action committees -- known as PACs -- and gave at least 70 percent of their money to Republicans. Including dividends, the group has returned an average 19 percent this year, compared with gains of less than 9 percent in the S&P 500 and Russell 1000 indexes. Political action committees pool donations from company executives and managers, redistributing that money to federal candidates.

Thirty-seven of the top 50 corporate donors to Republicans in the 2000 and 2004 cycles, including Dearborn, Michigan-based Ford Motor Co., Stamford, Connecticut-based International Paper Co. and Irving, Texas-based Exxon Mobil Corp., are manufacturers, agribusinesses, utilities, transportation or natural resource extractors.

source: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000176&sid=as7352FoeMnw&refer=us_elections
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Political donations info:

follow the money...

" Bush "and the people around him believe that if you tell people the same story over and over again they'll believe it,"

Many regular Americans don't share Bush's assessment of economy
By Mark Silva
Chicago Tribune

ST. LOUIS — Angie Totten was 19 when she started on the night shift at Ford Motor Co. She met her husband on the mini-van assembly line. They had two children. In the good years, with overtime, they made close to $100,000 a year.
Now Totten, 39, and husband Jeff, 40, have no clue about the future for them or their kids, ages 9 and 7. The Tottens, along with more than 1,300 others, lost their jobs last week when Ford announced it would idle the old Hazelwood assembly plant outside St. Louis in March and close it in 2008.
It is against a backdrop of bad news from U.S. manufacturing giants such as Ford and General Motors — companies that once empowered an American middle class and now struggle for survival — that President Bush will deliver his State of the Union address Tuesday.
The president will trumpet the nation's economic successes, with unemployment down and productivity up, crediting his tax cuts and calling on Congress to make them permanent. But the gap between the president's view and that of many working Americans is a yawning one, and quite apparent in this once proud but dramatically shrunken middle-American city where good-paying work is hard to find.
Throughout Missouri and across the nation, people tell pollsters that the economy they confront every day is not so promising and they see little hope for improvement. New jobs may be opening in America, people on the streets of St. Louis say, but those jobs don't carry the wages and benefits that make for a comfortable living.
"I know 1,300 people who would disagree with Bush's view of the economy," said Angie Totten, seated at the smoky Hazelwood Bowl, across from the Ford plant where an SUV painted in an American flag motif revolves on a turntable.
That countervailing view is supported in numerous national surveys, including a poll published Friday by the Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg News Service that found only 37 percent of Americans approving of the president's handling of the economy.
The perception gap could make it difficult for Bush to secure support for the agenda he unveils Tuesday night, including proposals to make health care more affordable.
Bush "and the people around him believe that if you tell people the same story over and over again they'll believe it," said Totten, who voted against Bush. "There is so much that's construed as truth. But it's not real."
Across Missouri, few more people are employed today than when Bush became president — 2.86 million in January 2001 and 2.88 million in December 2005, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The agency counts 36,000 more people as unemployed — 155,500 across Missouri in December. The population has grown by about 160,000, roughly 3 percent, since 2000.
And for those working, the increasing cost of health insurance — or absence of insurance — weighs heavily, as do the regular reports of major companies abandoning their pension plans.
Bush touts a national unemployment rate of 4.9 percent, the lowest in three years. "Our economy is growing, it is strong," Bush said last week, acknowledging too "that it is changing" and that American workers must vie for business "in a competitive world."
Bush inherited a recession, says Al Hubbard, his chief economic adviser. But Bush pressed for tax cuts in 2001 and 2003 "and the results have been spectacular," he says: "4.5 million new jobs have been created. Productivity is at record levels."
To press that case, Bush recently campaigned for his tax cuts in the burgeoning northern Virginia exurb of Loudoun County, where unemployment is 2 percent, the lowest in the state.
"We have plenty of business in this area. The problem is finding the work force," said Charles Kuhn, president of JK Moving and Storage, where Bush staged his appeal. Kuhn is happy to credit the president — since Bush took office, his company's revenue and profits have doubled, his employment of 509 people has gone up by 161 percent.
But that area is riding a trend bigger than any tax cut: a housing explosion fueled by the growing federal government and tech industry. Loudoun County already had the fastest-growing employment among all major counties in the nation, 12 percent in one year before Bush's election.
In the old urban enclave of St. Louis, in contrast, unemployment runs at 8.3 percent in a shrunken city of about 345,000 that has lost nearly two-thirds of its population since the 1950s with an exodus of the auto, airplane and shoe manufacturing that once made it hum.
Here and nationally, experts say, the government and many prominent economists gloss over how many people have stopped looking for work and how many are "underemployed," working below their ability in the low-wage and often no-benefit jobs of a burgeoning service economy.
Nationally, the government reports 4.1 million people are working part-time, unable to find full-time work. Another 1.6 million are "marginally attached" to the work force — they had looked and not found work last year but hadn't searched recently — including 451,000 "discouraged workers" who have quit looking.
For many, the average weekly wage also has failed to keep pace with inflation; While average earnings were up 3.1 percent last year, they effectively declined by 0.4 percent. Add to that the rising costs of health care, fueling a car and heating a home, and take-home pay has diminished further.
"I don't think the average person is seeing the economy in such great shape," said Ken Warren, a political scientist at St. Louis University. "They are seeing it in terms of what they pay for gas, they're seeing it in terms of what they pay for health care. Bush can talk about an upturn. There are indicators that show there is an upturn. But these aren't things that people deal with every day."
The problem for Bush is evident in polls. Just 34 percent of Americans surveyed by the Pew Research Center earlier this month rated the economy as good or excellent, and 64 percent called conditions fair or poor.
St. Louis, of course, has its particular problems. Calvin Miller, who once ran five dry-cleaning shops in St. Louis, pulled out years ago and has settled in Granite City, Ill.
"It got so complicated — robberies, break-ins," Miller said. "Pistols, I didn't mind. But shotguns, I didn't like."
A city that was home to nearly 1 million in the early 1950s now appears barren in many places, with the baronial lion statuaries at the manses of Hortense and Lenox Place standing as reminders of a lost past.
Now the biggest employers are hospitals and universities.
"How far can your economy travel on that?" asked Joseph Heathcott, professor of American studies at St. Louis University. "Not to mention what the average worker in a hospital is making compared to what workers made on the assembly line."
The average wage of health-care support workers is $12.50 an hour, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports. Assembly-line workers at Ford made $26 an hour here.
Angie Totten, who started part-time at Ford to get a foot in the door in 1985, started at $10.90 an hour. As a team leader in the body shop last year, she was making $27 an hour.
Last week, she and fellow workers were called into the plant, following weeks of pre-Christmas layoffs, for a Detroit-based video feed to announce closings eliminating up to 30,000 jobs companywide by 2010.
"We've kind of really dodged the bullet for a long time," Totten said. They had been warned of the eventual closing in 2002, she said, and "I was holding out hope that these words wouldn't come.

source: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politics/2002770594_webecon29.html

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Bush Speaks...

What role did Religion play in this ?

Mom accused of child killings left notes
06:59 PM CST on Sunday, January 29, 2006
Associated Press
Paula Eleazar Mendez
DE QUEEN, Ark. - A mother accused of smothering her three young children left notes that officials say could help determine what led to the killings, and her priest said Sunday that she had expressed "tremendous remorse."
Paula Eleazar Mendez, 43, was in a county jail Sunday after being treated at a hospital for swallowing a toxic substance.
She had collapsed as officers arrived at her home Saturday morning in response to a telephone call from the children's father in New York. Inside the home, the officers found the bodies of the children, ages 6 to 8, lying side by side on a bed, said Chris Brackett, an investigator with the Sevier County Sheriff's Office.
"I do not believe there is any dispute as to who killed these three children, and therefore who will be charged," prosecutor Tom Cooper said. "However, we have not determined at this time the particular homicide charge or punishment we will be seeking."
The notes found in the house may help officials better understand what led to the killings, De Queen Police Chief Richard McKinley said, though he declined to disclose their contents.
A family priest who visited Mendez in a hospital Saturday night described a woman experiencing profound sorrow.
"She has tremendous remorse. She is deeply sorry," the Rev. Salvador Marquez-Munoz said Sunday before entering St. Barbara Catholic Church for Mass. "She asked for our prayers and forgiveness because she is realizing how much she has hurt the community, as well."
He identified the children as 8-year-old Elvis and 6-year-old twins, Samanta and her brother Samuel.
Autopsies were planned to determine whether the children had been poisoned or smothered, as their mother told police, Cooper said. The children's faces were not covered when police found them.
Cooper said an emergency room doctor told him Mendez had not ingested enough of the toxic substance to kill herself. Her arraignment is expected Monday, McKinley said.
In the house's yard Sunday was a seven-foot pile of burned papers. A page in a religion book bore the words "vamos a celebrar" — Spanish for "let's celebrate." A child's handwriting was scrawled in blue ink across some papers, and there were charred letters from a labor union in New York City.
The priest said Mendez, who moved to the United States from Mexico 10 years ago, had lived in New York until last summer, when she moved with her children to De Queen because wanted them to live in a safer environment.
He described her as a quiet, devout woman concerned about her children's welfare. She was not working, and her husband was supporting the family with a job in New York, he said. She and the children never missed Sunday services and attended religious education classes.
Mendez seemed "very loving," said M. Rocio Maya, 29, who attended the Mass and said that she had known Mendez for a few months. Maya said that she never saw Mendez strike her children and that she drove them to school, rather than allow them to ride a bus.
The children's father, Arturo Morales, 37, had planned to buy a house in De Queen with Mendez and move there for good, said Maya's husband, Juan Mosqueda.
Morales was to arrive in De Queen before a funeral was to be set.
source: http://www.wfaa.com/sharedcontent/dws/wfaa/latestnews/stories/wfaa060129_mo_momletter.502da701.html

Religion and the Love of Money !

Evangelists set to testify - in federal court
On eve of fraud trial, Christian investors say they were betrayed
08:19 AM CST on Monday, January 30, 2006
By TIM WYATT / The Dallas Morning News
When Gregory Setser's import empire came crashing down two years ago, little was left to pay back hundreds of investors and church groups who funded his International Product Investment Corp. with at least $160 million.
Big-name evangelists and everyday churchgoers are among those who were invited to invest in a plan to import cheap, foreign-made goods for pre-arranged sales to retailers like Garden Ridge, Kmart, Michaels and Pier 1.
But what remained after the Securities and Exchange Commission shut the company down serves as testament to the lavish California lifestyle of Mr. Setser, a former Canton, Texas, ceramic merchant.
Paid for by thousands of evangelical Christians:
A 100-foot yacht moored off Mexico, a private plane and helicopter parked at a Los Angeles airport, and a quartet of well-furnished homes in nearby Rancho Cucamonga.
This morning, jury selection is set to begin in a downtown Dallas federal courtroom to decide if the 49-year-old Mr. Setser, four family members and a German business associate carried off a massive Ponzi scheme from 2000 to 2003 that used religion as part of its sales pitch.
"That was the biggest betrayal of the whole thing," said investor Helen De Lemos of Houston. "The Christian affiliation was the big reason we took the risk in the first place."
Ms. De Lemos said she and her husband lost about $30,000 investing in an IPIC venture in July 2003. They were drawn into the venture through a friend at church, who also lost his investment before the SEC shut down International Product Investment Corp.
"It sounded a little funny at first, but with a Christian organization we thought we could take that risk and maybe God would watch over it," Ms. De Lemos said.
Efforts to contact Mr. Setser in Canton, where he has been on home detention and electronic monitoring since early 2004, were unsuccessful. He and four other family members, including his wife and two adult children, have denied any wrongdoing.
The Trinity Foundation, a group that regularly blasts so-called prosperity gospel taught by many televangelists, has noted a growing trend in what's come to be called religious affinity fraud.
"It's part and parcel of the whole prosperity gospel deal," said the group's founder, Ole Anthony. "People like Setser get connected and close to spiritual leaders, who make money on the first one or two levels of a scheme, and that gets approval of the fraud to believers," he said.
Over 100 witnesses
Court records suggest a complicated, confusing trail of Setser family spending and business deals that used IPIC money to pay for their homes, cars, a family member's wedding – even cosmetic surgery – instead of building its import business.
Lawyers on both sides of the criminal case filed thousands of pages of documents, and called for more than a hundred witnesses to stand by to testify in U.S. District Judge Barbara Lynn's court. The trial could last for up to six weeks.
Among those who may be called to testify are evangelists Benny Hinn of Irving, Fort Worth's Kenneth Copeland and Florida-based Reinhard Bonnke of Christ For All Nations. Authorities believe they were duped by IPIC's scheme when the company paid them "profits" that turned out to be money taken in from new investors. In a Ponzi scheme, money from new investors is used to pay off old investors.
If convicted, the six defendants, each charged with 22 counts, could face statutory sentences of up to 45 years in prison.
Jurors may hear more than a simple accounting of how and where all the money may have gone.
Prosecutors plan to introduce evidence from court records filed last week that Mr. Setser and two family members threatened at least four people who may be called to testify against them.
In court records filed last week, prosecutor Jeff Ansley's filing wrote: "Gregory Setser threatened to have [the witness] and his family killed if he ever 'crossed' Setser.
"On numerous occasions, Setser claimed to [witness] that he had connections to organized crime, including the Mafia," Mr. Ansley wrote.
Another witness was told that he needed to be careful because he was being watched, and a third witness told authorities that "anyone who went against them in this case ... was going to go down," the document states.
The filing did not cite an exact time the threats were made, only that one threat was made after the Setser family members were indicted. No further charges of witness tampering have been folded into the criminal case.
Prosecutors also hope to introduce attempts by three Setser family members to bring in new investors in a diamond project linked to the United Nations – long after their criminal indictment. The family would also get access to large stashes of money in offshore banks after the trial, according to court records.
Prosecutors also plan to tell jurors that all five Setser family members under indictment failed to file individual income tax returns since 1999.
Regardless of the outcome, those who lost money with IPIC have only a slim chance of collecting full restitution.
Mr. Setser promised investors returns of 25 to 50 percent in two or three months' time. Other investors were promised 6 or 7 percent returns each month for allowing IPIC or its subsidiaries to manage their money.
According to court documents and interviews, goods were imported, including toys, knickknacks, decorative ironwork for gardens and electric scooters. Showcases were built in Los Angeles and Panama to allow IPIC employees to display to prospective investors warehouses stockpiled with mountains of cheaply bought bounty.
But such goods were "rarely" really purchased from abroad for resale to retailers as promised, according to Dennis Roossien, a court-appointed Dallas attorney who has spent more than two years tracking and selling off the remnants of IPIC to repay investors.
"It was simply stated that Setser and IPIC wanted to share the extraordinary blessing bestowed upon them with other like-minded Christian organizations," Mr. Roossien wrote in court documents.
His investigation involved a cadre of lawyers and forensic accountants who scanned bank accounts and offices from California to New York to Germany and Panama.
"Very little capital appears to have been used to purchase merchandise," he wrote.
Investors who could prove they gave IPIC money claimed about $35 million in losses, but prosecutors believe IPIC took in at least $160 million – no one knows for sure. The Setser family did not cooperate.
By last summer, Mr. Roossien's investigation had spanned the globe, but only a little more than $12 million was found to return to investors.
Documents show that almost $2 million came from investors who voluntarily paid back early "profits" IPIC had given them after the investors learned the money was really just new investor money.
Mr. Roossien also recovered about $6 million by selling Mr. Setser's personal estate – which traced back to IPIC investor money.
Mr. Roossien never found any accounting by the Setsers of what was actually owed investors, should their business plans have actually worked.
Last summer, Mr. Roossien asked a federal judge to allow him to approve refunds to be mailed out this fall – when all is said and done payouts could be as little as 15 cents on the dollar.
Some items worthless
The rest of the missing IPIC money appears to have been squandered in grandiose, incomplete business ventures doomed to lose money – or that would have required millions more in capital before they could be sold, court documents allege.
Much of the product lines actually purchased by the Setsers were part of the "elaborate sets" and couldn't be resold or were worthless, Mr. Roossien wrote.
Like the condoms and the corn liquor.
IPIC funds paid for millions of condoms from Brazil and thousands of liters of corn liquor from the U.S. – all found in a warehouse in Central America.
"No one other than Gregory Setser appears to know how he envisioned selling the liquor or the condoms or why they were located in Panama," Mr. Roossien told the judge.
Ms. De Lemos remembered that her investment involved buying a large shipment of latex condoms for a stateside buyer.
"I'm surprised to learn they ever bought any," Ms. De Lemos said. "I thought it was just another empty promise.
"Now, we can sort of laugh about it," she said. "It wasn't our life savings, but when you think about some who put in retirement savings, it's not funny at all."
E-mail twyatt@dallasnews.com
WHAT IMPORT INVESTMENT COMPANY BOUGHT
Court-appointed lawyer Dennis Roossien has spent more than two years compiling a list of assets paid for by investors in International Product Investment Corp. Here's a partial list of what was found:
50,000 liters of corn liquor made in the U.S. and stored in a Panamanian warehouse, but no liquor sales permit for Panama.
7 million latex condoms from Brazil with a December 2004 expiration date.
A 108-acre coffee plantation in western Panama bought for $200,000 that had yet to yield a bean.
A $1.2 million paint factory in Panama that never sold or manufactured anything.
Equipment for a bottling plant in Ensenada, Mexico, that sat in shipping crates.
A bottled water company with a few pallets of stock for show – plans called for Panamanian tap water to be used as its source.
A $1.2 million "start-up" Internet service provider that never started up.
A worthless Tasmanian oil and gas project.
A record company to "ignite the singing career" of a Setser daughter. It lost $780,000.
450,000 gallons of obsolete, expired paint in a California warehouse used as a prop for investor pitches that cost $3 a gallon to dispose of under state law.
Hundreds of boxes of cheap toys from China with no interested buyers lined up.
A large extrusion machine that was bought despite its inventor's admissions that it didn't work.
An inoperable concrete building-block plant that never formed one concrete block.
Half ownership in an idle, steam-generated power plant near San Francisco that would cost millions more to be recommissioned, and required $6,000 a month to monitor.
source: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/DN-setser_30met.ART.North.Edition2.91540bb.html

Black history vital in battling evils of racism

Letters to the editor
San Angelo Standard Times
January 23, 2006

Editor:
Black History Month, celebrated throughout the month of February, focuses on the rich contributions that black Americans have made to the development and culture of our country.
Feburary is set aside to honor our black American ancestors and their accomplishments.
We pause during this month to recognize their greatness, their significant contribution to our culture and to build new bridges of understanding, appreciation and respect.
During Black History Month, people with roots in the African continent find a new sense of pride in their history and culture.
A people without a history are a people without an understanding of who they are. The possession of one's own history is the first step in an appreciation of one's culture.
The history of black American people in America is a poignant one. Black Americans must never forget their roots nor fail to cherish the memories of their forebears, men and women who suffered indignities beyond comprehension to people with white skin.
What has often blocked the full expression of the black American culture and heritage is racism.
Sadly, racism still remains a part of the American landscape. Racism dulls the conscience, blinds reason, wounds the will, stifles creativity and erodes charity. Racism operates silently in strategies of self-interest and in structured patterns of discrimination.
Because racism is fundamentally a moral evil against the nature of the human person, its elimination requires ultimately a moral solution.
Black History Month reminds us that racism will be eliminated only when human beings acknowledge and respect all other human beings as persons made by God in the divine image and likeness.

The Most Rev.
Michael Pfeiffer,
Catholic Diocese of San Angelo

source: http://www.sanangelostandardtimes.com/sast/news_opinion_letters/article/0,1897,SAST_10318_440840

Baptists wage internal battle

From the Dallas Morning News
12:00 AM CST on Saturday, January 28, 2006
By RACHEL ZOLL / Associated Press
After purging liberals from their ranks, Southern Baptist conservatives who won control of their denomination are now taking aim at each other.
The Rev. Wade Burleson, a Baptist leader from Oklahoma, says fellow conservatives who crusaded to elect only leaders who believe the Bible is literally true are carrying their campaign too far, targeting Southern Baptists who disagree with them on other issues. These leaders, he wrote on his blog, are "following the same battle plan conservatives used to defeat liberalism," and have started a "war" for the future of the SBC.
Mr. Burleson's postings may have already cost him a leadership role in the denomination. Trustees of the Southern Baptist international missionary agency took the first step this month toward ousting him from their board, accusing him of "broken trust" for writing about a meeting on his Web site. The seemingly minor conflict has broader significance.
Southern Baptists are trying to reverse several years of stagnation in membership growth, partly through an ad campaign called "Caring People" that is meant to soften their image. Complaints of hardball church politics would undermine that effort.
"Conservatives who loved the battles of decades past have fallen victim to a crusading mentality of bloodthirst," Mr. Burleson wrote. "Since all the liberals are gone, conservative crusaders are now killing fellow conservatives."
Mr. Burleson first rankled the board over an obscure policy change: Trustees of the International Mission Board voted in November to bar future missionaries from using a "private prayer language," or speaking in tongues in private. Previously, missionaries were discouraged from speaking in tongues publicly, but their private prayer was not monitored.
The practice is common among Pentecostals, whose spirited brand of Christianity is spreading rapidly throughout countries where Southern Baptist missionaries work, and in the United States. Many conservative Protestants, however, reject the practice.
Still, Mr. Burleson viewed the ban on speaking in tongues privately as a dangerous effort to vet conservatives for purity, and said so on his blog. "Sadly, the Southern Baptist Convention is now moving toward a time when everyone must look the same, talk the same, act the same, believe the same on the nonessentials of the faith, or else you will be removed as 'not one of us,' " he wrote in a Dec. 10 entry.
About a month later, trustees voted him out.
Delegates to the annual Southern Baptist gathering in June will decide whether to approve his removal from the board, which guides the work of more than 5,000 missionaries worldwide.
Just two years earlier, a leading Baptist conservative had warned about the very infighting that Mr. Burleson is describing. The Rev. Morris Chapman, president of the Southern Baptist Executive Committee, said conservatives must realize they have won the battle with liberals over biblical inerrancy and should now stop fighting. "I am concerned now that we have affirmed by vigorous endeavor that Southern Baptists are people of the Book, that we will develop a censorious, exclusivistic, intolerant spirit," he said in a speech at the denomination's annual meeting. "If this occurs, we will be the poorer for it."
The convention is in transition, Mr. Chapman said by phone recently. "It is not uncommon for some who are accustomed to being in a crusade to have difficulty deciding when that period of time has concluded," he said.
The Rev. Bill Leonard, dean of Wake Forest Divinity School in North Carolina and a critic of the conservative takeover, said the Southern Baptists are burdened by competing goals – attracting new members, while creating strict boundaries between the convention and other Christians – that end up making them appear "mean."
"The Southern Baptist leadership is so ideologically driven that it's almost impossible for them not to continually draw lines and narrow the boundaries," he said.
"In the early stages, this was publicly evident with the moderates and liberals. Now, when the convention meets annually in June, you wonder who they're going to throw out this year. There's always somebody."
Mr. Burleson said he has received hundreds of e-mails and letters from around the world in response to his blog postings and that "99 percent of them are very positive."
He said he was "deeply hurt" by the trustees' actions, but as a matter of conscience will continue to warn about what he sees as a dangerous trend throughout the 16.4 million-member denomination.
"If the crusaders sheath their sword, I promise, I will sheath mine. I do not want to fight my fellow conservatives," Mr. Burleson wrote on his blog.
"However, the stakes of this war are too great to roll over without a fight. This war is about the future of our convention."
source: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/religion/stories/DN-baptists_28rel.ART.State.Edition1.22cdab92.html

Brownwood Religion ? Michael Bell would be welcomed at our table !

New Texas Baptist leader has long spoken out against injustice

11:12 AM CST on Friday, January 27, 2006
By SELWYN CRAWFORD / The Dallas Morning News
FORT WORTH – The Rev. Michael Bell's approach to life is alarmingly simple.

DARON DEAN/DMN
The Rev. Michael Bell, preaching at Greater St. Stephen First Baptist Church, is well known for his social activism in Tarrant County.
"Either you're a prophet, or you're nothing," the pastor of the Greater St. Stephen First Baptist Church.
And it's clear that Dr. Bell sees himself as a prophet – for minority schoolchildren when he thinks they're being treated unfairly, for those who seek justice in the courts, for the members of his Fort Worth congregation and for the 2.5 million Texas Baptists he now leads.
In November, the 54-year-old pastor was elected president of the Baptist General Convention of Texas, the first African-American to lead the group in its 120-year history. He succeeded the group's first Hispanic president, the Rev. Albert Reyes of San Antonio.
The Rev. Charles Wade, executive director of the BGCT, said Dr. Bell's race isn't, and never should have been, an issue.
"It may be a novelty to others, but for us, it was just a process we found very natural," said Dr. Wade, the former pastor of First Baptist Church in Arlington.
"It should have happened sooner, but we're glad it happened now. This isn't artificial. Michael served on the executive board for a long time ... and he had earned the respect of key people across the state."
But not enough, apparently, to keep his nomination from going unchallenged – a fact that upset some of his supporters. It's been customary for the Baptist General Convention of Texas to elect its president without opposition. Dr. Bell found himself with an opponent, a white minister from Brownwood. (Dr. Bell won by a 4-1 margin.)
DallasNews.com/extra
Baptist General Convention of Texas official Web site
David Currie, executive director of Texas Baptists Committed and the man who nominated Dr. Bell for president, said he didn't think the opposition effort was racially motivated.
"The person who ran against him did not run against Michael," he said. "He was going to run regardless of who was running. He was making a protest about something else. He just picked an inappropriate time to protest."
Protesting to make a point is nothing new to Michael Bell. Throughout the 1990s, he took part in a number of high-profile actions to draw attention to what he and others perceived as injustices.
He first gained widespread attention in 1993, when he led a group of pastors to the Tarrant County Justice Center after an all-white jury gave a white man, Christopher Brosky, probation for killing a black man.
Dr. Bell demanded to meet with the judge in the case. The judge asked his colleagues what he should do. They told him to meet with Dr. Bell – and quickly.
Eventually, the Tarrant County district attorney's office retried Mr. Brosky in Galveston on conspiracy charges in connection with the case. He was convicted and sentenced to 40 years in prison.
"When Brosky was given that [original probated] sentence, I could not help but do what I felt I was supposed to do," Dr. Bell said in a recent interview.
"Did I receive threats? Yes. Was I the object of ridicule and negative press? Yes. Did I do what I believe God would have had me do? Yes.
"The only thing I regret is that we didn't move sooner," he said with a faint smile.
The Rev. Howard Caver, pastor of Fort Worth's World Missionary Baptist Church, has known Dr. Bell for 20 years. He was the one who sought out Dr. Bell's leadership in the Brosky case.
"He gets the attention of people because of his forthrightness," said Mr. Carver. "He doesn't run away from a fight."
In 1996, Dr. Bell and others began protesting what they said were inequities in how minority youngsters were being educated by the Fort Worth Independent School District. In particular, Dr. Bell criticized the district's magnet school program, which he said favored white students.
Dr. Bell said he and others tried to get district officials to listen, first at school board meetings, then by picketing at district headquarters and then at the magnet schools.
Those actions, he said, went practically unnoticed.
"When we were out at the magnet schools ... the police would just drive by and wave at us."
So the protesters moved to Tanglewood Elementary School, a wealthy, predominantly white school on the city's southwest side. Soon Dr. Bell was drawing comparisons to Dallas County Commissioner John Wiley Price – and in Fort Worth's easy-does-it atmosphere, that wasn't a good thing.
But his protests made Tanglewood parents press the district to resolve the issue. The school board agreed to changes in the magnet program that Dr. Bell said make it more equitable.
Judy Needham, the longtime Fort Worth school trustee whose district includes Tanglewood, said she's known Dr. Bell for years and is convinced that he only wanted what was best for the city's schoolchildren.
"I found him to be very honorable," she said. "He's very caring. He's very straightforward.
"We came to be good friends, and I admire him for what he's done."
Dr. Bell was born in Marshall, Texas, and raised in Fort Worth. He returned to Marshall to get his bachelor's degree in social studies from Wiley College in 1973 and eventually got a master's degree in interdisciplinary studies from the University of Texas at Tyler in 1981. (His doctorate in ministry is from the Interdenominational Theological Center and Morehouse School of Religion in Atlanta.)
But he said his true education came in the mid-1970s, when he moved to Washington to get his first master's degree, in divinity, at Howard University.
"When I was in D.C., I heard everybody," he said. "I heard Jesse Jackson in a revival before he was Jesse Jackson. Ben Chavis Muhammad [the former NAACP executive director] was a classmate of mine at Howard. There was nobody who was anybody that we didn't hear about. So when you get in that kind of environment, you can't help but be inspired."
Dr. Bell took over at Greater St. Stephen in 1985, when the church had fewer than 40 members and met in a rickety building on East Berry Street. Now it has 800 members. The church is still on Berry, but it meets in much more pleasant quarters, a newer building across the street from the old one. Community activism remains a staple.
The inspiration to get involved in the social fabric of the community continues to mold Dr. Bell today.
"When injustice goes on, or there's a lack of fairness, or people are being denigrated, then what does the church do? We do what Jesus would do," he said.
"Our responsibility is to make a redemptive difference. If we fail that, we fail our assignment."
It is that zeal, Dr. Wade said, that will make his friend the perfect president for the BGCT.
"I think he is already and will be a very popular, appreciated leader," Dr. Wade said. "Wherever he goes, people who don't know him learn to admire and appreciate him."
He said Dr. Bell's forthrightness and integrity, combined with his conciliatory skills, could be helpful if new opportunities arise for the Texas convention to work with the national Southern Baptist Convention leadership. The Baptist General Convention of Texas is the largest state group within the SBC, but the national group's leaders are generally far more conservative, theologically and politically, and the Texas group has distanced itself from them in recent years.
"We are seeking to do the work of God and we are working with all Baptists who want to work with us," Dr. Wade said.
"He recognizes things that are wrong, and he is committed to making them right as best he can. But in the midst of it, it's about love. He's trying to do something to help people because he cares for them."
It's that care, combined with Dr. Bell's concern for justice, that drew Melanie Harris to Greater St. Stephen a few months ago.
"It was the activist spirit aligned with the gospel of Jesus Christ that led me to join with Pastor Bell," said Dr. Harris, an assistant professor of religion and ethics at Texas Christian University.
"He's the perfect example of one who embraces scholarship and activism with the core of the gospel message. He's a caring and loving pastor, a pastor who cares about you Sunday to Sunday. In this day and time, it's hard to find a pastor like that."
E-mail scrawford@dallasnews.com
THE REV. MICHAEL BELL
Born: March 17, 1951, Marshall, Texas
Occupation: Minister of the Gospel; senior pastor, Greater St. Stephen First Baptist Church, Fort Worth
Family: Wife, Mary Louise; children, "grown and gone"
Education: Bachelor of science, Wiley College, 1973; master of divinity, Howard University, 1976; master of arts, University of Texas at Tyler, 1981; doctor of ministry, Interdenominational Theological Center and Morehouse School of Religion, 1985
Favorite Bible verse: John 9:4 ("I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work.")
If I weren't a preacher, I'd be: A professor of criminal justice
Religious leader I most admire: The late Leon Wright, New Testament professor, Howard University
Political leader I most admire: Martin Luther King Jr.
My friends know they can count on me to: Be honest with them
No matter how hard I try, I cannot: Sing
My greatest weakness: Not stopping to enjoy the moment
My greatest strength: My ability to stay focused
I hope to be remembered for: Making a difference in the lives of my community and of people, period
New Year's resolution I haven't kept: Get more rest
Favorite food: Seaweed
Favorite book: The Art of War
I've always wanted to visit: Africa
I wish I could: Do a better job of helping our children.
I drive: A 1996 Jetta
My radio is tuned to: The Oasis
It would surprise people to know that my CD collection includes: Electric Ladyland by Jimi Hendrix
Athlete I idolized as a kid: Jim Brown
I get angry when: People are treated inhumanely
WHOLE LOTTA BAPTISTS
As president of the Baptist General Convention of Texas, the Rev. Michael Bell leads the largest state group within the Southern Baptist Convention.
Here's a look at its size and reach:
•2.5 million members
•5,700 churches
•Nine universities
•Five medical centers
•Four children's homes
•Texas Baptist Men, a
relief organization that responds to disasters around the world
•The Baptist Standard, a biweekly newspaper
•BaptistWay Press, which supplies free and low-cost resources to churches across the state
SOURCE: The Baptist General Convention of Texas
source: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/religion/stories/012806dnrelbell.1f63c705.html
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What role does/did Brownwood religion play in these cases ?

From Abilene to Dallas, Car Lovers in the News !

From Todays Abilene Reporter News

Car owners strive for perfection at World of Wheels auto show

By LLuvia Mares / Reporter-News Staff Writer
January 28, 2006
With all the bright and shiny colors, visitors to the 27th annual World of Wheels custom car show at the Abilene Civic Center may need sunglasses.
Local contestants with fancy vehicles are going head-to-head with national and world circuit champions for money, prizes and awards. The show has 80 entries.
A.J. Evans, World of Wheels assistant, said contestants compete in three categories: contemporary (vehicles built in last 10 years); custom (a highly modified vehicle); and restoration (a classic car restored with original parts).
Evans said entries include high-tech hot rods, futuristic custom vehicles, lowriders and pickups and motorcycles.
He said even a fingerprint or smudge can make a difference in winning or losing.
Although the displayed vehicles will never touch the street, Evans said International Show Car Association (ISCA) judges require all entries to be in good running order. Large mirrors are placed underneath the vehicles to show judges that all the nuts and bolts are in the right place.
Sixteen-year-old Abilene High School student Telissa Vita will be among the competitors at the show.
Her newly restored black 1982 Camaro Z28 - which was a gift from her parents to keep racing in the family - will be on display.

Details
What: World of Wheels
Where: Abilene Civic Center, 1100 N. 6th St.
When: 10 a.m.-10 p.m. today, noon-7 p.m. Sunday
How much: $9.95 adults, $3.95 children
source: http://www.reporter-news.com/abil/nw_local/article/0,1874,ABIL_7959_4422950,00.html
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From todays Dallas Morning News:

Alternate route
09:05 AM CST on Saturday, January 28, 2006
By TERRY BOX / The Dallas Morning News
When was the last time you saw a grease-smudged gay guy tending to a finicky four-barrel carb on a vintage Cadillac convertible?
That long, huh? Well, it's not an unusual sight at the Classic Chassis Car Club of Dallas.
"Our being mostly a gay club is not something we want to throw in anyone's face," said John McCall Jr., president of the club. "Vintage cars are vintage cars. But for most people, this is eye-opening because they don't think gay people work on cars."
At least 25 members – about a fourth of the club – do their own restoration work. Many others handle repairs and maintenance on their cars, said Mr. McCall, a 44-year-old attorney and Dallas native who grew up around cars.
And since the most popular cars in Classic Chassis tend to be good old American '60s land yachts – chrome-and-fin Caddys, Lincolns, Buicks, Chryslers and Imperials – the members get regular opportunities to test their wrenching skills.
Formed 14 years ago, the club initially met monthly at Prince Burgers on Lemmon Avenue. Many of the original members belonged to traditional Cadillac or Lincoln or Packard clubs – organizations formed around one brand of car.
"With some of those clubs, the members were 20 years older" than the founders of Classic Chassis, Mr. McCall said. "They got a little tired of trips to Branson."
The fact that most of the members are gay is essentially an aside. Early club members were gay, and that attracted more gay members, he said, but there is no "gay car agenda," he said. The club includes a few lesbian couples and some straight married couples, too.
"Vintage cars are vintage cars no matter who you are," Mr. McCall said.
Mostly, it's a club for enthusiasts with unusual, even quirky cars. Besides the heavy representation of big '60s boulevard kings, club vehicles range from a 1958 Buick Special to a '62 Maserati Spyder, '72 AMC Matador and Mr. McCall's very rare 1974 Cadillac Fleetwood station wagon.
The group is big on presentation when it goes to shows.
"We display our cars with luggage and photos and facts about the cars," he said. "We do more than just park them."
The club's next big event – beside its monthly meetings – is a parade for the Swiss Avenue Home Tour in May.
Classic Chassis recently published its first calendar – featuring cars in local settings – and has a Web site, www.classicchassis.com.
Even better, the club stages a demolition derby every two or three years.
"We get 10 old cars that nobody would want and have some fun," he said.
"I don't know that we're considered unusual in the gay community," Mr. McCall said. "There's a gay everything at this point. There are just a lot of people like myself who enjoy getting grease under our fingernails."
E-mail tbox@dallasnews.com
source: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/classifieds/news/automotive/classics/stories/DN-BCGayclub_28bus.State.Edition2.23eae3.html
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The Road to the Texas Governors Mansion meanders through Brownwood Texas !

The following Candidates for Texas Governor have been interviewed on KXYL 96.9 FM. Kudos to KXYL (ouch, that hurt !) for bringing these candidates to the Brownwood airwaves. I will update this list after each candidate makes their appearance on the Brownwood airwaves of KXYL.

Here are the links to the candidates websites in the order they have been heard on KXYL:

Independent Kinky Friedman...

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Democrat Chris Bell...

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Republican Rhett Smith...

Rhett,

Karl Rove Tactics ?

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Democrat Rashad Jafer...

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Republican Star Locke...

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Libertarian James Werner ...

Border Security & Reactionary Republican Rick Perry Response: Order Investigation !

Border incident sparks outrage
Lawmakers urge troops after police encounter well-armed smugglers
08:30 AM CST on Wednesday, January 25, 2006
By DAVID McLEMORE / The Dallas Morning News
A West Texas standoff along the Rio Grande between U.S. law enforcement officers and heavily armed Mexican drug smugglers in military-style clothing prompted congressional demands Tuesday for an international investigation and a call for deployment of U.S. troops to the border.
The incident, which occurred Monday on U.S. soil at an isolated river crossing about 50 miles east of El Paso, is the latest involving armed incursions along the U.S. border with Mexico.
And it comes less than a week after Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff called a California newspaper's account of such border incursions "overblown."
The incident Monday involved an encounter between two Hudspeth County Sheriff's Department deputies and three Department of Public Safety troopers and 10 heavily armed drug smugglers at an area about 50 miles down the river from El Paso.
to read the entire article please go here:http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/012506dntexborder.122f59ab.html
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Perry visits Texans serving in Middle East
4 governors on trek to gain insight and boost troops' morale
08:32 PM CST on Tuesday, January 24, 2006
By PETE SLOVER / The Dallas Morning News
AUSTIN – Under a wartime veil of secrecy, Gov. Rick Perry has been visiting Texas troops in Iraq and the Middle East, officials announced Tuesday.
"In addition to raising spirits of the men and women who are fighting abroad, this mission is intended to give the state governors who are the commanders in chiefs of the Guard units a first-hand perspective of the war on terror," said Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, who announced the trip and is acting governor until Mr. Perry returns home Sunday.
The governor's journey began Sunday with a trip to the Pentagon, where he was he briefed and met with Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. That night, he and three other governors boarded a government plane to Kuwait, where they arrived Monday night.
Also on the trip, being provided by the Defense Department, were Republican Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and Democratic Govs. Dave Freudenthal of Wyoming and Jim Doyle of Wisconsin.
The governors dined Monday evening with troops at Camp Arifjan, the massive staging base south of Kuwait City.
Mr. Perry and the others flew to Iraq on Tuesday. They stopped in Tikrit, site of Saddam Hussein's largest palace complex, before heading 90 miles south to Baghdad for meetings and briefings from military officials and U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad.
"I think we're making great progress, and the American people need to understand that it's going to take a while," Mr. Perry said in a television interview from Iraq.
Mr. Perry met with Texas-based Guard units and members of the 4th Infantry Division based in Fort Hood, Mr. Dewhurst said.
Officials would not give details of the governor's itinerary, citing security concerns.
Mr. Perry's re-election opponents, usually quick on the rhetorical trigger, displayed caution when asked about the trip. They expressed support for the troops and steered clear of criticism – for the most part.
Independent gubernatorial candidate Kinky Friedman issued a statement poking fun at Mr. Perry's internationalism and his recent round of campaign ads.
"Our response is, 'We're proud of Gov. Perry and his efforts to resolve the conflict in Iraq,' " the statement said, going on to borrow the governor's trademark commercial kicker. "How about you?"
Staff writer Karen Brooks contributed to this report.
E-mail pslover@dallasnews.com
source: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/texassouthwest/stories/012506dntexperry.350c9313.html
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Inquiry launched

Monday's incident was not the first face-to-face confrontation for Hudspeth County deputies. In November, deputies responded to assist Border Patrol agents at the border town of Fort Hancock where they encountered six men in military uniforms attempting to carry a load of marijuana over the river.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials said Tuesday they have launched an inquiry into the Monday incident and asked Mexican authorities for a thorough investigation and full answer on what happened.
Customs "is coordinating closely with the appropriate federal, state and local authorities," said Kristi Clemens, Customs' assistant commissioner for public affairs. "The U.S. government is also discussing the matter with the government of Mexico and is asking for a thorough investigation and response. We take very seriously and investigate fully any alleged incident of criminal activity, threats against our agents or possible incursions."


Gov. Rick Perry also has ordered an investigation, spokeswoman Kathy Walt said.

to read the entire article please go here:http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/012506dntexborder.122f59ab.html

A $22 billion gift from the GOP to the insurance industry

by Joe in DC - 1/24/2006 08:03:00 AM

The GOP's culture of corruption is alive and well and costing American billions and billions:
House and Senate GOP negotiators, meeting behind closed doors last month to complete a major budget-cutting bill, agreed on a change to Senate-passed Medicare legislation that would save the health insurance industry $22 billion over the next decade, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.

The Senate version would have targeted private HMOs participating in Medicare by changing the formula that governs their reimbursement, lowering payments $26 billion over the next decade. But after lobbying by the health insurance industry, the final version made a critical change that had the effect of eliminating all but $4 billion of the projected savings, according to CBO and other health policy experts.

source: http://americablog.blogspot.com/

Republican Theme Song: It's raining men (w/ money) !

COMMENTARY - Bookman: In Republican Washington, it's raining money
Jay Bookman, COX NEWSPAPERS
Tuesday, January 24, 2006

Just as sharks are drawn by blood, lobbyists swarm to money. So it tells you something about Republican Washington that the number of lobbyists registered to do business in that town has more than doubled in just five years, from 16,342 in 2000 to 34,785 last year.

What caused such a dramatic increase? It's pretty simple: When you start passing out money by the wagonload, you draw a crowd. And in the past five years, the federal government has become quite the friendly place for Gucci-loafered special pleaders, especially those bearing campaign checks and airline tickets to luxury golf destinations. In effect, the doors to the federal chicken coop have been flung wide open, and the predators have descended en masse.

If you think that's an exaggeration, here are a few more numbers to digest:

First, $193 million. That's the amount being spent per month by special interests wining, dining and seducing federal officials. Again, that's per month, and there's no sign that money is being wasted.

Then there's 13,997. That's the number of pork projects that individual members of Congress slipped into spending bills last year without debate, without discussion — without any process or discipline whatsoever. By comparison, the number of pork projects in 1995 — the first year the Republicans held control of Congress — was 1,439, according to Citizens Against Government Waste.

Do the math — in barely a decade, the number of pork projects grew almost ten-fold. No wonder lobbyists are in a feeding frenzy.

I can't imagine how such a record could be defended. At best, you could spin it by saying that the Republicans are governing by biblical principle, just as they promised. They're telling lobbyists: "Ask, and thou shall receive."

As the pork numbers demonstrate, some of the plunder has come in the form of million-dollar contracts steered by congressmen to companies that have treated them extra nice.

In other cases, though, special interests have been handed entire government agencies. Take the mining industry, which has been particularly generous in its campaign donations and lobbying. The Bush administration has rewarded that kindness by ceding control of the Mine Safety and Health Administration. It appointed a mining executive to head the agency, blocked proposals to improve mine safety, cut fines assessed for safety violations and slashed the number of mine safety inspectors. Given that arrangement, the Sago mine tragedy that killed 12 miners comes as little surprise.

And all across government, the story is repeated. Last week, an inspector general announced that the agency charged with ensuring competition in the meatpacking industry hadn't pursued a case since 1999. Top agency management was refusing to let investigators do their work and were even making up phony investigations to hide their inactivity.

Then there's the administration's botched Medicare prescription drug benefit. During the drafting of that bill, it was almost impossible to distinguish between pharmaceutical lobbyists and government officials, because both shared the same primary goal: Protect at all costs the interests of the drug companies, which the final bill did very well. The goal of creating a drug benefit that would actually meet the needs of senior citizens while protecting taxpayers was purely secondary, and it shows in the final product.

Tax cuts — hundreds of billions of dollars worth of tax cuts, mostly handed out to those rich and powerful enough to hire lobbyists — have been another form of plunder. Because of those cuts, taxes collected by the federal government now amount to less than 17 percent of our gross domestic product, easily the lowest ratio in at least 40 years.

That has allowed Washington Republicans to assure folks back home that they're staying true to their small-government roots, but the image is an utter fraud. While they're passing hefty tax cuts, they're also sending government budgets through the roof. Nondefense spending has risen faster in the last five years than at any time since the '60s, a fact that ought to outrage any true conservative. With that record, the GOP has forfeited any claim whatsoever to be the party of fiscal restraint or small government.

In fact, in just a few short years, the party that used to complain bitterly about free-spending liberals and a corrupt Congress has made the party of LBJ and FDR seem like a tight-fisted paragon of moral virtue. It would be funnier if it weren't so tragic.

source: http://www.statesman.com/opinion/content/editorial/stories/01/24bookman_edit.html

Brownwood: God's many mind-readers !

COMMENTARY

The Boston Globe: God's many mind-readers

Tuesday, January 24, 2006
New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin had a different purpose but the same technique as the Rev. Pat Robertson when he invoked God's wrath as the cause of human suffering. God's name is being taken in vain by those who would inflate their importance or diminish their failings.

Robertson said early this month that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's stroke was divine retribution for Sharon's plan to cede some land to Palestinians. Robertson had to apologize when his remarks caused an uproar in Israel and the United States. He sounded like a caricature of a biblical prophet when he claimed to be able to discern the will of God.

Robertson's remarks recall the Rev. Jerry Falwell, who claimed the Sept 11. attacks were partly the fault of "the pagans and the abortionists and the feminists and the gays and the lesbians" whom God was angry with. Like Robertson, Falwell was using the deity to promote his political views.

Nagin has other uses for God. "As we think about rebuilding New Orleans, surely God is mad at America," the mayor said last week. "He's sending hurricane after hurricane after hurricane. . . . Surely he's not approving of us being in Iraq under false pretenses. But surely he is upset at black America, also."

If God is intent on wreaking havoc on the Gulf Coast, as Nagin suggested, who could blame the mayor if the response to the disaster was ineffective or if rebuilding plans haven't advanced very far? God, it would seem, is being used as a shield for individual shortcomings.

Nagin was speaking at an event commemorating the accomplishments of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. "I just want to do God's will," King said on the night before he was murdered.

King tried to live out his belief in God without claiming to have a direct line to the deity. Those who think they know the divine might better show it by their actions to help others, not by invoking his name as a punishment or excuse.

source: http://www.statesman.com/opinion/content/editorial/stories/01/24god_edit.html

What Brownwood's Pontificating Patriots "are not" talking about !

Halliburton cited in Iraq contamination
Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., speaks to members of the North Dakota House of Representatives at the Capitol in Bismarck, N.D. in this Jan. 31, 2005 file photo. Dorgon is scheduled to chair a senate Democrats hearing on the possible use by American troops of contaminated water in Iraq. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid, File)
By Larry Margasak, Associated Press Writer | January 22, 2006
WASHINGTON --Troops and civilians at a U.S. military base in Iraq were exposed to contaminated water last year and employees for the responsible contractor, Halliburton, couldn't get their company to inform camp residents, according to interviews and internal company documents.
Halliburton, the company formerly headed by Vice President Dick Cheney, disputes the allegations about water problems at Camp Junction City, in Ramadi, even though they were made by its own employees and documented in company e-mails.
"We exposed a base camp population (military and civilian) to a water source that was not treated," said a July 15, 2005, memo written by William Granger, the official for Halliburton's KBR subsidiary who was in charge of water quality in Iraq and Kuwait.
"The level of contamination was roughly 2x the normal contamination of untreated water from the Euphrates River," Granger wrote in one of several documents. The Associated Press obtained the documents from Senate Democrats who are holding a public inquiry into the allegations Monday.
Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., who will chair the session, held a number of similar inquiries last year on contracting abuses in Iraq. He said Democrats were acting on their own because they had not been able to persuade Republican committee chairmen to investigate.
The company's former water treatment expert at Camp Junction City said that he discovered the problem last March, a statement confirmed by his e-mail the day after he tested the water.
While bottled water was available for drinking, the contaminated water was used for virtually everything else, including handwashing, laundry, bathing and making coffee, said water expert Ben Carter of Cedar City, Utah.
Another former Halliburton employee who worked at the base, Ken May of Louisville, said there were numerous instances of diarrhea and stomach cramps -- problems he also suffered.
A spokeswoman for Halliburton said its own inspection found neither contaminated water nor medical evidence to substantiate reports of illnesses at the base. The company now operates its own water treatment plant there, spokeswoman Melissa Norcross said.
A military medical unit that visited Camp Ramadi in mid-April found nothing out of the ordinary in terms of water quality, said Marine Corps Maj. Tim Keefe, a military spokesman. Water-quality testing records from May 23 show the water within normal parameters, he said.
"The allegations appear not to have merit," Keefe said.
Halliburton has contracts to provide a number of services to U.S. forces in Iraq and was responsible for the water quality at the base in Ramadi.
Granger's July 15 memo said the exposure had gone on for "possibly a year" and added, "I am not sure if any attempt to notify the exposed population was ever made."
The first memo on the problem -- written by Carter to Halliburton officials on March 24, 2005 -- was an "incident report" from tests Carter performed the previous day.
"It is my opinion that the water source is without question contaminated with numerous micro-organisms, including Coliform bacteria," Carter wrote. "There is little doubt that raw sewage is routinely dumped upstream of intake much less than the required 2 mile distance.
"Therefore, it is my conclusion that chlorination of our water tanks while certainly beneficial is not sufficient protection from parasitic exposure."
Carter said he resigned in early April after Halliburton officials did not take any action to inform the camp population.
The water expert said he told company officials at the base that they would have to notify the military. "They told me it was none of my concern and to keep my mouth shut," he said.
On at least one occasion, Carter said, he spoke to the chief military surgeon at the base, asking him whether he was aware of stomach problems afflicting people. He said the surgeon told him he would look into it.
"They brushed it under the carpet," Carter said. "I told everyone, 'Don't take showers, use bottled water."
A July 14, 2005, memo showed that Halliburton's public relations department knew of the problem.
"I don't want to turn it into a big issue right now," staff member Jennifer Dellinger wrote in the memo, "but if we end up getting some media calls I want to make sure we have all the facts so we are ready to respond."
Halliburton's performance in Iraq has been criticized in a number of military audits, and congressional Democrats have contended that the Bush administration has favored the company with noncompetitive contracts.
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On the Net:
Senate Democratic Policy Committee: http://democrats.senate.gov/dpc/
Halliburton: http://www.halliburton.com
source: http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2006/01/22/halliburton_cited_in_iraq_contamination/

Bush's America !

Posted on Fri, Jan. 20, 2006
U.S. accused of spying on those who disagree with Bush policies
BY WILLIAM E. GIBSON
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
WASHINGTON - While the White House defended domestic surveillance as a safeguard against terrorism, a Florida peace activist and several Democrats in Congress accused the Bush administration on Friday of spying on Americans who disagree with President Bush's policies.

Richard Hersh, of Boca Raton, Fla., director of Truth Project Inc. of Palm Beach County, told an ad hoc panel of House Democrats that his group and others in South Florida have been infiltrated and spied upon despite having no connections to terrorists.

"Agents rummaged through the trash, snooped into e-mails, packed Web sites and listened in on phone conversations," Hersh charged. "We know that address books and activist meeting lists have disappeared."

The Truth Project gained national attention when NBC News reported last month that it was described as a "credible threat" in a database of suspicious activity compiled by the Pentagon's Talon program. The listing cited the group's gathering a year ago at a Quaker meeting house in Lake Worth, Fla., to talk about ways to counter military recruitment at high schools.

Talon is separate from the controversial domestic-surveillance program conducted by the National Security Agency. Bush has acknowledged signing orders that allow the NSA to eavesdrop without the usual court warrants, prompting an outcry from many in Congress.

Bush plans to tour the NSA on Wednesday as part of a campaign to defend his handling of the program.

"This is a critical tool that helps us save lives and prevent attacks," White House spokesman Scott McClellan said on Friday. "It is limited and targeted to al-Qaida communications, with the focus being on detection and prevention."

The Defense Department's Talon program collects data from a wide variety of sources, including military personnel and private citizens, Pentagon spokesman Greg Hicks said.

"They are unfiltered dots of information about perceived threats," Hicks said. "An analyst will look at that information. And what we are trying to do is connect the dots before the next major attack."

To Hersh and some members of Congress, the warrant-less surveillance and Talon are all a part of domestic-spying operations that threaten civil liberties of average Americans and put dissenters under a cloud of suspicion.

"Neither you nor anybody in that (Quaker) church had anything to do with terrorism," said Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Fla. "The fact is, the Truth Project may have a philosophy that is adverse to the political philosophy and goals of the president of the United States. And as a result of that different philosophy, the president and the secretary of defense ordered that your group be spied upon.

"There should not be a single American who today remains confident that it couldn't happen to them."

source: http://www.bradenton.com/mld/bradenton/news/politics/13675006.htm

Brownwood Texas & Wayward Christian Soldiers

Sunday January 22, 2006

Brownwood says thanks to military

By Steve Nash — Brownwood Bulletin

Symbols of triumph and patriotism mixed with the tears of sacrifice as Brownwood honored the nation’s military Saturday — first in a joyful downtown parade, then in an emotional ceremony in the Brownwood Coliseum.
The posting of the colors, a somber rendition of “Taps” and a rifle salute were among events interwoven among speeches in the coliseum from politicians and military men. Speakers offered tribute to the family of Marine Lance Cpl. Mario Castillo of Brownwood, who was killed in Iraq in June 2005, and a street sign commemorating a portion of Main Street as “Lance Corporal Mario A. Castillo Memorial Street” was unveiled.
And while legislators and military men — some of them succumbing to tears — praised the accomplishments of the military in Iraq, Afghanistan and in previous wars, they returned to the theme of sacrifice, saying it is the cost of liberty.
“You can’t ask for a more wonderful turnout from a community,” Sgt. Erik Llano of Ford Hood’s 21st Cavalry Brigade said after the ceremony.
Another 21st Cavalry soldier, Sgt. 1st Class Dave Thomas, said, “This is great support, sir — nice turnout. I didn’t expect so much.”
Saturday’s event, dubbed the “Day of Honor,” was intended to honor Brownwood’s service members who have just retuned from active duty, as well as veterans of previous wars and those currently serving in Iraq or Afghanistan.
Marching on a crisp, windy day, members of the Pecan Valley Detachment of the Marine Corps League led off the parade starting at the coliseum, followed by a 21st Cavalry Brigade marching band that chimed out patriotic songs. Three retired brigadier generals from Brownwood — Dan Locker, Leroy Thompson and Stephen Korenek — rode in the parade.
Spectators — many waving American flags — lined the parade route and cheered and applauded as floats or vehicles with military themes rolled by.
The coliseum ceremony began with opening remarks by master of ceremonies and Brown County Judge Ray West, who said citizens must not forget that “what our honorees have done, they have done for us. ... All of our honorees have secured our future.”
After West’s remarks, footsteps of four members of the Marine Corps League Color Guard echoed across the coliseum as they marched to the front to post the colors. After a prayer by Father Nelson Koschesky, Bill Fishback sang The National Anthem.
Then, an appreciative coliseum crowd heard speeches by Col. Greg Brockman, commanding officer of the 21st Cavalry Brigade (Air Combat); state Rep. Jim Keffer; Bob Ogg, commandant of the Pecan Valley Detachment of the Marine Corps League; Dr. Jim Hays, a retired Texas National Guard colonel; state Sen. Troy Fraser; Dr. Dan Locker, retired Air Force brigadier general; and U.S. Rep. Mike Conaway.
After one of the speeches, Babs Shields of the Military and Family Support Group lit a candle in honor of area servicemen who have died in the military, followed by a moment of silence.
“ ... We love your recognition of our service to our country,” Brockman said. “Soldiers stand a little taller on hearing words of gratitude. ... So thank you, Brownwood. Your appreciation for the military and our service is, itself, a great service to our nation.”
Keffer read letters from U.S. Senators Kay Bailey Hutchison and John Cornyn thanking the military for its service and sacrifice.
Keffer said he brought greetings from Austin.

“My definition of Austin sometimes is, “10 square miles surrounded by reality,” Keffer said. “This is reality, and this is where the rubber meets the road.”

Ogg recounted some of the battlefields of World War II, Korea and Vietnam, and spoke of Castillo, saying he had a warrior and “one of our brothers. ... Some gave some. Some gave all. Mario gave all.
“He is gone. He is not forgotten. Semper fidelis, semper fidelis,” Ogg said, repeating the Latin phrase for “always faithful,” the Marine Corps’ motto.

Hays said the nation is fighting “a different kind of war” that started before Sept. 11, 2001. Hays described it as a war between the United States and radical Islamics and is “a war for the survival of our Judeo-Christian ethics, our way of life, our religion. We cannot lose this war.”

After Ogg spoke, the candle-lighting and a rifle salute from American Legion Post 196 were held.
Then it was Fraser’s turn at the microphone. “I am struck today, that as I stand here, I am standing in the shadow of freedom,” he said.
Fraser conveyed greetings from Texas Gov. Rick Perry and thanked Castillo’s family for his willingness to serve his country and sacrifice his life.
Locker introduced his 91-year-old veteran father, Braswell, and said Americans are free because of the resolve of the nation’s military. Without that resolve, Locker said, Americans could be speaking a different dialect today — German or Russian.
Locker said it’s better in Iraq with Saddam Hussein out of power, and listed some of the accomplishments in Iraq that including improvements to education and infrastructure, that, he said, are seldom reported in the press.
The resolve, Locker said, is learned in home, school and church, and is “the resolve to be free, to teach patriotism and to give up our sons and daughters, if necessary, for the cause of patriotism.”
The time came for the unveiling of the street sign and dedication to Castillo. Borrowing a phrase from Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, Brownwood City Manager Kevin Carruth said it was important to remember those “who gave the last full measure of devotion.”
As members of the Castillo family sat a few feet away, Bulletin Associate Publisher Bill Crist unveiled the sign.
Conaway, emotional following the Castillo dedication, struggled to find his voice.
“Twenty-one hundred families have been asked to do something the rest of us haven't been asked to do,” he said, referring to the approximate number of American military casualties in the Iraq war.
Conaway listed accomplishments in Iraq and Afghanistan, saying “we will win this war. We’re going to finish that fight. ... A simple ‘thank-you’ seems awfully shallow, but it’s the best we can do.”
Just before the ceremony concluded with Maj. Kenn White, operations officer for the 3rd Battalion, 112th Armor, 56th Brigade Combat Team, presenting a certificate and an American flag the City of Brownwood.
Then, the Marine Corps Color Guard retrieved the colors.
After the ceremony, Castillo family members gathered around the street sign honoring Mario.
“What can you say?” Castillo’s widow, Angela, said, simultaneously smiling and wiping tears from her eyes. “(The tribute) makes it a little easier.”

She said her tears weren’t just tears of sadness, but were also tears of happiness.
source: http://www.brownwoodbulletin.com/articles/2006/01/22/news/news01.txt
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Published on Sunday, January 22, 2006 by the International Herald Tribune

Wayward Christian Soldiers
by Charles Marsh

In the past several years, American evangelicals - and I am one of them - have amassed greater political power than at any time in our history. But at what cost to our witness and the integrity of our message?
Recently, I took a few days to reread the war sermons delivered by influential evangelical ministers during the lead up to the Iraq war.
In that period, from the fall of 2002 through the spring of 2003, many of the most respected voices in American evangelical circles blessed President George W. Bush's war plans, even when doing so required them to recast Christian doctrine.
Charles Stanley, pastor of the First Baptist Church of Atlanta, whose weekly sermons are seen by millions of television viewers, led the charge with particular fervor. "We should offer to serve the war effort in any way possible," said Stanley, a former president of the Southern Baptist Convention. "God battles with people who oppose him, who fight against him and his followers."
In an article carried by the convention's Baptist Press news service, a missionary wrote that "American foreign policy and military might have opened an opportunity for the Gospel in the land of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob." Both Franklin Graham, the son of Billy Graham, and Marvin Olasky, the editor of the conservative World magazine and a former advisor to Bush on faith-based policy, echoed these sentiments, claiming that the American invasion of Iraq would create exciting new prospects for proselytizing Muslims.
Tim LaHaye, the co-author of the hugely popular "Left Behind" series, spoke of Iraq as "a focal point of end-time events," whose special role in the earth's final days will become clear after invasion, conquest and reconstruction. Jerry Falwell declared that "God is pro-war" in the title of an essay he wrote in 2004.
The war sermons rallied the evangelical congregations behind the invasion of Iraq. An astonishing 87 percent of all white evangelical Christians in the United States supported the president's decision in April 2003.
Recent polls indicate that 68 percent of white evangelicals continue to support the war. But what surprised me, looking at these sermons nearly three years later, was how little attention they paid to Christian moral doctrine.
Some tried to square the U.S. invasion with Christian "just war" theory, but such efforts could never quite reckon with the criterion that force must only be used as a last resort.
Some preachers tried to link Saddam Hussein with wicked King Nebuchadnezzar of Biblical fame, but these arguments depended on esoteric interpretations of the Old Testament.
The single common theme among the war sermons appeared to be this: Our president is a real brother in Christ, and because he has discerned that God's will is for our nation to be at war against Iraq, we shall gloriously comply.
Such sentiments are a far cry from those expressed in the Lausanne Covenant of 1974. More than 2,300 evangelical leaders from 150 countries signed that statement, the most significant milestone in the movement's history.
Convened by Billy Graham and led by John Stott, the revered Anglican evangelical priest and writer, the signatories affirmed the global character of the church of Jesus Christ and the belief that "the church is the community of God's people rather than an institution, and must not be identified with any particular culture, social or political system, or human ideology."
Unlike the Pope John Paul II, who said that invading Iraq would violate Catholic moral teaching and threaten "the fate of humanity," or even Pope Benedict XVI, who has said there were "not sufficient reasons to unleash a war against Iraq," Stott did not speak publicly on the war. But in a recent interview, he shared with me his abiding concerns.
"Privately, in the days preceding the invasion, I had hoped that no action would be taken without United Nations authorization," he told me. "I believed then and now that the American and British governments erred in proceeding without UN approval."
Stott referred me to "War and Rumors of War," a chapter from his 1999 book, "New Issues Facing Christians Today," as the best account of his position. There he wrote that the Christian community's primary mission must be "to hunger for righteousness, to pursue peace, to forbear revenge, to love enemies, in other words, to be marked by the cross."
What will it take for American evangelicals to recognize our mistaken loyalty? We have increasingly isolated ourselves from the shared faith of the global Church, and there is no denying that our Faustian bargain for access and power has undermined the credibility of our moral and evangelistic witness in the world.
Charles Marsh, a professor of religion at the University of Virginia, is the author of ''The Beloved Community: How Faith Shapes Social Justice, from the Civil Rights Movement to Today.''

© 2006 The International Herald Tribune
source: http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0122-26.htm
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January 20, 2006
latimes.com : Print Edition

She's on Activist Duty Now
Mary Ann Wright quit a 30-year Army and diplomatic career in protest of the Iraq war. She's now a soldier for the antiwar movement.

By Elizabeth Mehren, Times Staff Writer

KEENE, N.H. — In a dingy meeting room with walls the color of day-old oatmeal, 40 people in plastic chairs formed a ragged circle. Sharing first names, they went around the room: teachers, students, nurses and at least three active-duty service members. They had come to hear about military buildups around the world, but what they really wanted to do was hash out their feelings about the Iraq war.
Fred wanted to know what to tell his 10th-grade grandson, who already worried that he would be sent to Iraq. Catherine questioned whether the high school students she counseled should believe the promises they heard from military recruiters. Army veteran Tom asked if conditions for the troops were as bad as he had heard.
Finally, the circle ended with Ann. With her smiling sincerity and sleek hairdo, she looked like she belonged on the suburban charity circuit. Not hardly: As an Army colonel and diplomat, Mary Ann Wright served her country for more than 30 years in some of the most isolated and dangerous parts of the world — then quit because she felt she could not defend this war.
"I resigned when the Iraq war began in March 2003 because I felt the policies of this administration were making the world more dangerous," Wright said. "I felt it was an illegal war and I could not be a part of it."
For more than two years, this unlikely activist has carried her message to small audiences, arguing that the war has increased animosity toward the United States. Wright is part of a tiny network of individuals who crisscross the country to speak out against the Iraq war.
Ron Kovic, a disabled Vietnam veteran from Redondo Beach, pulls out his bullhorn at rallies in Los Angeles, San Francisco and Washington. Michael Berg, whose civilian contractor son Nicholas Berg was beheaded in Baghdad in 2004, said he was so "obsessed" with ending the war that he once gave the same speech 16 times in seven days.
These independent antiwar speakers often appear on platforms arranged by peace groups. Like Wright — a member of Diplomats and Military Commanders for Change and Veterans for Peace — some belong to organizations. But as they address rallies, student groups and whoever else invites them, they represent only themselves. They pay their own expenses and do not accept speakers' fees.
"That would be obscene," said former California state Sen. Tom Hayden, a freelance antiwar speaker.
Wright, 59, brings a distinctive perspective. "I come at this as a foreign service professional," she said. "This is not a political rant. This is a well-reasoned argument of why I thought it was necessary to resign."
Even those who dislike her views do not dispute her right to contest U.S. policy. Lt. Col. Ellen Krenke, a Pentagon spokeswoman, noted that Wright was now a private citizen. "The 1st Amendment, that's what we're fighting for," Krenke said. "She is basing her views on what she has experienced — and she has obviously had a wide and expansive career."
James Jay Carafano, a national security analyst at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, said he didn't think Wright had special credibility because she spent time in uniform. But, he said, "This is how democracies wage war. In every war, you are going to find people who don't like it."
Operating out of the limelight, activists such as Wright are influencing public opinion about the war, said Bill Dobbs, communications director of United for Peace and Justice, an antiwar coalition in New York. "Their impact is subtle, but they must get serious credit," he said.
No one was more surprised than Wright to find herself among war opponents. She had been part of the system since she was 20, after she heard an Army recruiter's pep talk at the University of Arkansas. Wright was one of two daughters of a Bentonville, Ark., banker who gave Sam Walton a loan that helped launch his Wal-Mart empire.
Her career options in the 1960s were largely limited to being a teacher, nurse or homemaker, but Wright wanted something different. Mostly, she wanted out of Arkansas. "The recruiter made it sound glamorous: 'Join the Army, see the world,' " she said. "So that is what I did."
She saw the Army as an escape, not a career path. But the structure of the military suited her. Starting with her first posting at San Francisco's Presidio during the Vietnam War — followed by a stint at a NATO station in the Netherlands — Wright loved being in the Army.
She served 13 years on active duty, broken up over several tours, and 16 years in the Reserves. She never saw combat, though she was stationed in Grenada, Somalia, Nicaragua and Panama. She earned two master's degrees and a law degree while in the Army. In the early 1980s, she began trying to open up new military assignments for women.
Retired Brig. Gen. Pat Foote said she expected to see maybe a dozen women in uniform when she attended one of the "women in the military" meetings Wright organized at Ft. Bragg, N.C. Instead, she said, "I was amazed; there were over 200 women in the room."
Foote said she was neither surprised nor troubled by Wright's transformation. "If you want a point of departure on Ann, it is that she is one of the most ethical and principled human beings I have ever met," Foote said. "When she went into government service, she did it as a public servant. She did it because she felt it was the right thing to do to help her country. She is a patriot."
When she requested an embassy posting in 1987, Wright was told that the Army's defense attache program was not open to women. Her response was to leave the Army — giving up a likely promotion to general — to switch to the foreign service.
She rose swiftly, landing assignments in Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Micronesia, and earning a heroism award for evacuating U.S. citizens during a coup in Sierra Leone. In 2001, she was part of the first team of diplomats to reopen the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan.
"As a diplomat, Ann had an absolutely phenomenal career," said F. Allen "Tex" Harris, a retired senior foreign service officer who worked with Wright. "She had abilities, background and luck. The luck is that she served in several posts where things went crazy, and she was given an opportunity to show her capability."
Wright was second in command at the U.S. Embassy in Mongolia when she heard that large numbers of U.S. troops were being sent to the Middle East. Before long, she and other diplomats began receiving cables from Washington, threatening to cut off development funds for the countries where they were posted "if our country was not part of the coalition of the willing," Wright said.
In 2003, Wright awoke at 3 each morning in Mongolia to watch BBC news on her satellite TV. "In the pit of my stomach, I became convinced that there was no way in the world that going to war in an oil-rich country in the Middle East was going to make the world safer," she said.
Writing her three-page resignation letter to then-Secretary of State Colin L. Powell made her so stressed that medics thought she was having a heart attack.
"This is the only time in my many years serving America that I have felt I cannot represent the policies of an administration of the United States," she wrote.
She was one of three top diplomats to quit on grounds that the war was a foreign policy debacle, halting what Harris called "an odds-on" candidacy to head an embassy.
While serving in such places as Honduras, Panama and Grenada, Wright said, she justified her sometimes questionable work — in support of Nicaragua's Contra rebels, for example — on grounds that it provided humanitarian aid.
"But when you really look at the long arm of it, I should have resigned earlier," she said.
Wright left with no plan for the future. She owned an apartment in Hawaii, and thought she might retreat there to watch the whales. When a Washington think tank asked her to be on a panel about "risky diplomacy" weeks after her resignation, Wright surprised herself by coming out with a fully formed thesis about the strategic shortcomings of the Iraq war. Soon she was fielding invitations to talk about U.S. foreign policy.
She traveled all over the U.S. — even to Europe — enjoying the fact that her government pension was financing her antiwar activities. She became a perpetual houseguest, sleeping on pull-out couches in remote outposts such as this western New Hampshire college town.
She began to have fun. In Dover, Del., the young Republican club at Wesley College denounced her as a "Bush basher" who had no place at the small Methodist school. (She spoke there anyway, and about 100 people turned out in a room where 50 chairs had been set out.)
In August, Wright spent 26 days outside President Bush's ranch in Crawford, Texas, protesting alongside Cindy Sheehan, who lost her son in the war and who vowed not to leave Crawford until Bush met with her. There, Wright became known as the commandant of "Camp Casey," the protest encampment named after Army Spc. Casey Sheehan.
At Keene State College here, Wright began by describing her Army career, but quickly turned her focus to the Iraq war. She talked about U.S. soldiers whom she said lacked adequate equipment, who operated out of "four huge military bases that have been constructed like little Americas, in a country that does not have enough sewage or electricity for its own people." She discussed what she called excessive involvement by civilian contractors, along with the prospect that U.S. soldiers will return from Iraq with mental and emotional problems.
Offering advice on protest techniques, she said: "I am a brand-new person to this. But it sure seems to me that the physical acts get a lot of attention."
Wright spoke with pride about being ejected from a Senate hearing last fall after excoriating the witness, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice: "You, the Senate, were bamboozled by the administration on Iraq and you cannot be bamboozled again! Stop this woman from killing!"
Within seconds a guard was escorting her out of the room. Wright slipped her arm through his elbow and walked out as if he were her date.
She has heard nothing from Washington officials: "They just ignore me."
But Tom Stockton, 35, paid careful attention as Wright addressed the gathering here that was part of a larger conference on globalization. Stockton, an education student, spent nine years in the Army.
"The protesting part kind of bothers me," he said. "But the message she is portraying is a good message. She is talking about the impossible situation our military is in trying to fight this war. Usually, the issues of the soldiers are not being addressed, so it is good to hear from an insider — who is now an outsider."
Keene State education professor Susan Theberge said the audience left inspired because of Wright's ability to connect with her listeners.
"She was on the inside, and so she really understands what's going on. And yet she gave up all that power and privilege," Theberge said. "To me, that is the definition of what an active conscience is. And that is her real draw."
After decades of government service, Wright, in turn, has found a new community. The Army officer and diplomat is at home among Americans who are anguishing about this war. "We are on the same sheet of music," she said, adding that she would continue to make her voice heard, as long as the war goes on.

source: http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/front/la-na-wright20jan20,1,6568937,full.story?coll=la-headlines-frontpage&ctrack=1&cset=true
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From the Dallas Morning News
Letter to the Editor

Letters on Points
10:24 AM CST on Sunday, January 22, 2006

Enough bashing Democrats

I have learned from recent features in Points that intellectuals (who, by the way, are always liberals) are always wrong in their predictions and thus should be ignored; people who defend this country only vote Republican; and, most recently, that Democrats must be from another planet as they are the sole practitioners of character assassination in Washington.
That last one is especially stunning. I understand that no one remembers Lee Atwater, but Karl Rove is still smearing people left and right.
Meanwhile, I see no feature articles about a ruling party more fiscally irresponsible than a drunken sailor, an administration that plays fast and loose with the rules and wants to take away rights for some nebulous war on terror and little commentary about a corrupt Congress.
Stop the charade. Go ahead and rename your Sunday opinion section "Republicans Good, Democrats Bad." Are you guys the print medium for the Fox News Channel?
Brandon Scott, Flower Mound

source: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/opinion/letters/stories/DN-3ponpoints_0122edi.ART.State.Edition1.3e68322.html

WACO: Save yourself for Kinky !

Waco to get a little 'Kinky' tonight

By Dan Genz
Tribune-Herald staff writer
Saturday, January 21, 2006

Kinky Friedman is visiting Zack & Jim's Waco 100 country music concert tonight at the Heart O' Texas Coliseum to trumpet an unusual campaign message as he runs for governor as an independent: Don't vote.

Or, as the cigar-smoking musician and mystery writer puts it, Friedman wants voters this spring to "Save yourself for Kinky."

Friedman must convince Texans not to vote in the March 7 primary because state election laws require him to collect 45,540 signatures from registered voters who do not vote in the March 7 primary in order to put his zany name on the ballot in November.

With a rival candidate, state Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn, also needing signatures to qualify for the November election as an independent, there will be plenty of competition for signatures, which cannot be collected until at least March 8 and must be filed by May 11.

"This is going to be the wildest voter drives you've ever seen," said Mary Duty, a Waco teacher and restaurant owner organizing local support for Friedman's campaign.

With doors opening at 6 p.m. and music starting at 7, Friedman is expected to attend all night and will be selling his campaign paraphernalia, including clothing and action figures, at the site.

Although Friedman's quirkiness and lack of political background make him a long shot to defeat incumbent Republican Gov. Rick Perry, Duty said those factors also are part of his popular appeal.

"This is the first person who's going to go to the governor's mansion based on T-shirt sales and support from friends in the entertainment business," Duty said. "He's not part of the in crowd in Austin. I think a lot of people want somebody who's new and fresh."

dgenz@wacotrib.com 757-5743
source: http://www.wacotrib.com/news/content/news/stories/2006/01/21/kinky.html
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Friedman makes gubernatorial campaign stop in Waco

By Tim Woods Tribune-Herald staff writer
Sunday, January 22, 2006

Waco got a little Kinky on Saturday night. Friedman, that is.

Kinky Friedman, the country musician turned mystery novelist turned politician, made an appearance at a concert featuring Kevin Fowler and Mark Chesnutt at the Heart O' Texas Coliseum promoting his campaign to become Texas' next governor.

As he addressed the crowd, Friedman made it clear that he is a spiritual man.

“If you don't like Jesus, go to hell,” he proclaimed to a raucous reception. Friedman went on to state that a musician can run government better than a politician because even though he might not get up as early in the morning, he'll be up late at night.

Friedman knows the task ahead is no small one and said the first thing he needs to accomplish is to get enough people not to vote in the March 7 primary so he can collect the necessary 45,540 signatures to get his name on the November ballot.

“The good news is, there's not that many people that vote in the primary anyway,” Friedman said. “If you vote in the primary, you're not eligible to sign the petition. I think Texas is the only state that has that law. That law just helps the incumbent, that's all it does. It just makes it harder for an independent to get on the ballot.”

If Friedman is able to get his name on the ballot, and then get elected, he leaves no doubt that major changes would be in store. He said that Texas needs a non-career politician in office.

“Between (Gov. Rick) Perry and (rival candidate, state Comptroller Carole Keeton) Strayhorn, you've got 57 years in politics,” Friedman said before the concert. “They've really played Texas like a cheap violin. They've put Texas on eBay. They've sold us out and I want to take Texas back off of eBay and give it back to the people.”

Friedman lamented the state of education in Texas and said one of the first things he would address as governor would be getting teachers on a pay scale at least commensurate with the national average in an effort to improve the standing of Texas' public school system.

“I would like us to be first in something other than executions,” he said.

“We have to get rid of teaching for the test and appoint some people (to state educational leadership positions) that have been inside of the classroom,” Friedman said, referring to the standardized Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills test.

It was clear at Saturday's event that if Friedman is able to get his name on the ballot he will garner at least some support from area residents. Some supporters at Saturday's concert said that even if they don't vote for him, they would like to have Friedman on the ballot to spur discussion of major issues.

“I think he has some interesting philosophies and would like to hear what he has to say,” said Lenny Lawson, 34, a custom hatter from Waco. “I'd examine what was said and I'd like to hear some more of his views. I don't think he's as radical as some people make him out to be.”

Ricky Rasberry, of Waco, said that he would gladly cast his vote for Friedman.

“Hell yeah, I'd vote for him,” he said. “The government is out of control. They're crooked and we need a common person in there.”

Friedman's Lampasas campaign coordinator, Cody Newman, said that people he has spoken with have taken kindly to the idea of at least having more options on November's ballot.

“Everybody I have talked to thus far has been very, very keen to the idea of (Friedman running for governor),” Newman said.

twoods@wacotrib.com

757-5721
source: http://www.wacotrib.com/news/content/news/stories/2006/01/22/20060122wackinkyfriedman.html

Who was Douglas Barber ?

read and listen here...

QUOTE

"All is not okay or right for those of us who return home alive and supposedly well. What looks like normalcy and readjustment is only an illusion to be revealed by time and torment. Some soldiers come home missing limbs and other parts of their bodies. Still others will live with permanent scars from horrific events that no one other than those who served will ever understand." ~Iraq Vet Douglas Barber, 2005

....and in Brownwood, "they" would have ___________ ?

done the same ?...

Wonder how Murtha would be received in Brownwood Parade by Brownwood's "Extremist Republican operatives" ?

Dallas Morning News Editorial

A Slap in the Face of Troops

Attacks on Rep. Murtha hit a new low

12:00 AM CST on Saturday, January 21, 2006

Once a backbencher and camera-shy politician, Rep. John Murtha seems to regularly be in the headlines these days. As most of you remember, it all started a couple of months ago when the Pennsylvania Democrat – a former Marine and decorated Vietnam veteran – called for the withdrawal of troops from Iraq.
White House spokesman Scott McClellan shot back by comparing the congressman to filmmaker and anti-war activist Michael Moore and saying Mr. Murtha belongs to the extreme liberal wing of the Democratic Party.
Given Mr. Murtha's strong record of military support, the criticism quickly backfired. President Bush was later publicly calling Mr. Murtha "a fine man and a good man."
But that didn't stop the attacks – and now an archconservative Web site has set the new bar for low blows in the Murtha story.
Cybercast News Service is calling for the congressman to open his military records and is questioning whether the hawk deserves his two Purple Hearts. These accusations actually are old news and can be traced back to political opponents more than a decade ago. They were previously put to rest by an official letter from Marine Corps headquarters.
James Webb, a secretary of the Navy in the Reagan administration and a veteran himself, criticized this smear campaign in a recent column in The New York Times, writing, "Extremist Republican operatives have inverted a long-standing principle: that our combat veterans be accorded a place of honor in political circles.
"This pattern of denigrating the service of those with whom they disagree risks cheapening the public's appreciation of what it means to serve and in the long term may hurt the Republicans themselves," Mr. Webb continued.
Questioning whether Mr. Murtha deserved his 1967 medals because his injuries weren't sufficiently serious is a slap to all service members, as it implies that their loyalty to this country is measured by how badly their bodies are physically hurt.
Disgusting.
You can debate the war on issues, but to discredit one of the few politicians who personally know what it means to sacrifice in times of war sends the wrong message to those serving now.
source: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/opinion/editorials/stories/DN-murtha_21edi.ART.State.Edition1.22d6cb0a.html
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Saturday January 21, 2006
Op Ed from the Brownwood Bulletin

Saturday’s ceremonies will be special

Saturday’s Day of Honor promises to be one of the most significant events of its type to be held in Brownwood in months. Perhaps only the August 2004 parade to mark the mobilization of area members of the 21st Cavalry can compare. But Saturday’s schedule could, and Saturday’s schedule schould, be even greater.

That’s because this program is designed to be a celebration and a day of appreciation for all members of military service in addition to those who have recently seen duty in Iraq and Afghanistan and have returned home. Many friends of loved ones of Brownwood area residents remain overseas, or are in the midst of fulfilling other assignments vital to the nation’s security interests. They will be an important part of all those who will be honored on Saturday.

Planners for this party have pulled out all the stops. As a story in today’s Bulletin explains, three retired military generals now living here are planning to participate — Brigadier General Dan Locker, (United States Air Force), Brigadier General Leroy Thompson, (United States Air Force/Texas Air National Guard) and Brigadier General Stephen Korenek (United States Army/Alaska Army National Guard). So are three key lawmakers who represent this area — state Rep. Jim Keffer, state Sen. Troy Fraser and U.S. Congressman Mike Conaway.

These busy individuals have found time in their schedules to make a priority of publicly saying “thank you” to our military service men and women. The citizens of this area should do the same, because they are among the millions of Americans who through the generations have enjoyed the benefits secured by this country’s armed forces.

Brownwood has a long history of patriotism, and that sentiment has been proven for years by its residents’ willingness to not only serve their country, but also to support those who do. But the Brownwood ceremony goes even further than that. The families of service men and women will also be singled out, because they share the sacrifices and worries carried by those who are in the service.

It promises to be a special day, indeed — a genuine Day of Honor.

Brownwood Bulletin

source: http://www.brownwoodbulletin.com/articles/2006/01/20/op_ed/editorial01.txt

The Texas Condition: "What we're seeing develop in the marketplace is the haves and the have-nots,"

Haves, have-nots split housing market
Smaller mortgages falling to foreclosures as high-end sales climb
11:20 PM CST on Friday, January 20, 2006
By BRENDAN M. CASE, STEVE BROWN and IEVA M. AUGSTUMS / The Dallas Morning News
In a healthy local housing market, a sign of trouble has appeared: More people are losing their homes to foreclosure than at any time since the Texas real estate bust of the 1980s.
The causes run from bad luck to bad financial decisions: job loss, divorce, a health crisis, skyrocketing energy bills, out-of-control credit card debt, or a mortgage payment that turned out to be unaffordable.
Fourth-quarter Home Sales
Price by percentage change
Sales by percentage change
But there also seems to be a sharpening contrast between real estate markets at either end of the economic ladder.
As residential foreclosures jumped 30 percent from a year ago in North Texas, the average mortgage on foreclosed houses fell to $129,000, compared with almost $146,000 a year ago.
Meanwhile, home sales set records last year, with a strong 20 percent increase in sales of homes priced over $400,000. But there was a 4 percent decrease in sales of homes priced below $110,000.
"What we're seeing develop in the marketplace is the haves and the have-nots," said Craig Jarrell, who heads up the Dallas operations of Pulaski Mortgage Co.
"Either you've got money and you've got a job and you're buying a new house and you're rocking along," he said. "Or you're underwater and can't buy a new house, and can't afford the one you're in and you're going into foreclosure."
source: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/012106dnbushousing.21943f21.html

Sounds like Brownwood Republican Talk ? How very "Moral" !

January 19 -25, 2006

Foul mouth

Jack Abramoff has pleaded guilty to corruption charges in a scandal sweeping Capitol Hill. These excerpts from heavily redacted documents recently posted online by the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, at indian.senate.gov, show Abramoff enjoyed talking trash.

• "Hey bitch, I am ready fo yo ass, but yu a big time faggot and afraid of a real man!" -- Jan. 7, 2003, e-mail from Abramoff challenging his business partner, Michael Scanlon, to a game of racquetball

• "We'll find out who they are and make sure our friends crush them like bugs." -- Nov. 12, 2003, e-mail from Abramoff to former Christian Coalition leader Ralph Reed, who was curious about unknown American Indian lobbyists

• "BN had a great time and is very grateful, but is not going to mention the [golf] trip to Scotland for obvious reasons. He said he'll show his thanks in other ways, which is what we want." -- Aug. 10, 2002, e-mail in which Abramoff apparently references Rep. Bob Ney, R-Ohio, who this week stepped down from his post as leader of the House committee controlling disclosures of lobbying practices

• "The f'ing troglodytes ..." -- Dec. 17, 2001, e-mail from Abramoff to Scanlon referring to members of Michigan's Saginaw Chippewa Indian tribal council

• "I think he could fuck us a lot worse than we could fuck him" -- Feb. 23, 2002, e-mail from Abramoff regarding Deputy Interior Department Secretary James Griles, who allegedly worked inside the department to advance Abramoff's aims

• "You iz da man! Do you hear me?! You da man!! How much $$ is coming tomorrow? Did we get some more $$ in?" -- March 18, 2002, e-mail from Abramoff to Scanlon

• "I'm just surprised I am not under 'dead, disgraced or in jail.'" -- June 26, 2001, e-mail by Abramoff to an associate noting the release of an alumni guide for a law firm where he once worked

-- Compiled by Michael de Yoanna
http://www.csindy.com/csindy/2006-01-19/news4.html
----------
Some more of those good ole Republican Values ?

yeah right !...

--------------

Bush often met with, and praised, corrupt lobbyist
By DOUG THOMPSON
Publisher, Capitol Hill Blue
Jan 18, 2006, 07:24

Although White House spokesliar Scott McClellan claims lobbyist/crook du jour Jack Abramoff only met with administration staff two or three times, the scandal ridden buyer of influence enjoyed frequent private meetings with President George W. Bush, who referred to Abramoff as “one of this administration’s greatest friends.”

In a town where money buys influence and access, it would have been highly unusual for one of the top fundraisers for the Bush White House to not have had meetings with the President.

McClellan, in a carefully-worded response to reporters Tuesday, said his personal investigation into the matter revealed that Abramoff may have had two “private staff level meetings” at the White House. This is the same Scott McClellan who claimed he investigated the Valerie Plame leak and told reporters that neither Vice President Dick Cheney nor anyone on his staff had any involvement in that scandal. Then Cheney’s chief of staff, Scooter Libby, got slapped with an indictment for giving the info to the press.

McClellan, as skilled a liar as anyone who has stood before the press and misled reporters on behalf of a President, fails to mention Abramoff’s frequent visits to the President’s ranch in Crawford, Texas, the private meetings that the lobbyist arranged with the President on the 2004 campaign trail and at the Republican National Convention that year.

White House visitor logs are not public record and the Bush administration keeps separate logs of visitors to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and other locations like Camp David or the President’s home. In addition, logs can – and often are – revised when scandal erupts.

But Abramoff, who raised more than $100,000 for Bush in the last campaign, promised big time donors face time with the President and delivered on those promises during the convention. In addition, he traveled to Bush’s ranch in Texas with his co-conspirator in crime, former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay.

A former DeLay staffer who is cooperating with the investigation into both Abramoff and the disgraced GOP leader’s activities, has told investigators that Abramoff and DeLay visited Bush at his ranch on at least four occasions in 2003 and 2004.

It is common for big money contributors to get personal meetings with the President. At the GOP’s annual Presidential Dinner in Washington, those who pony up at least $25,000 are hustled into a room before the dinner for time and photo ops with the President.

Abramoff kept a photo of himself with Bush, shot at the Crawford ranch, in his office in Washington. The autograph from Bush said “to my great friend Jack.”

Dale Knally, a campaign worker in the 2004 Bush-Cheney re-election campaign, recalls a meeting between Bush and Abramoff during a campaign stop in Florida.

“He put his arm around Abramoff and told us that ‘this man is one of this administration’s greatest friends,’” Knally recalls. Knally declined a job in the Bush administration and returned to school after the election and remembers some in the campaign privately calling Abramoff a “sleazeball.”

“That campaign taught me that I never wanted anything to do with the Bush administration or politics again,” Knally said. “No matter how many showers I took, I couldn’t wash away the stench.”

source: Capital Hill Blue Jan 18, 2006

Kinky's Run For Governor Of Texas

Kinky's Run For Governor Of Texas

Jan. 20, 2006
Kinky Friedman (CBS)

(CBS) A former pro wrestler became a governor. An action-movie star not even born in the United States did, too.

But can a Jewish country singer who is not exactly a rock star and who has no political experience get elected in a state like Texas in 2006?

Kinky Friedman thinks he can and tells 60 Minutes correspondent Morley Safer why this Sunday, Jan. 22, at 7 p.m. ET/PT.

Friedman's perceived drawbacks are also the assets he thinks will work with voters.

"Politics is the only field in which the more experience you have, the worse you get," he tells Safer. "And I think that musicians can better run this state than politicians. And, hell, beauticians can better run the state than politicians."

When reminded that musicians are often associated with "bad habits," Friedman counters with his trademark humor.

"Ok, so we're not going to get a lot done early in the mornings," he says. "But you know what (musicians) are? They're honest. They're honest. And I want people, in (my) administration that don't care about the Republicans and don't care about the Democrats, but care about Texas."

Democrats, Republicans — they’re all the same to Friedman, who is running as an independent.

"The Democrats and Republicans are the same guy admiring himself in the mirror," Friedman says. "And if an alternative is on that ballot in Texas, I guarantee you, Texans are going to take it. The politicians don't know this yet, but the people do."

Friedman was a country singer who earned enough attention with controversial songs like "They Ain’t Making Jews like Jesus Anymore" to appear on tour with Willie Nelson and Bob Dylan.

His gubernatorial campaign is getting attention, too. In part, that's because Friedman has never learned to censor himself or tailor his political opinions to a party line. His platform is a welter of contradictions: he believes in school prayer and gay marriage, he’s campaigning as a champion of Texas teachers, and wants to find a creative way to solve Texas's border problems with Mexico.

In the past, Friedman has earned some strange looks with his irreverent humor, at times comparing himself to Jesus Christ.

"Well, I just said that — that Jesus and I were both Jewish and that neither of us ever had a job, we never had a home, we never married and we traveled around the countryside irritating people," Friedman says. "Now, if that's comparing myself to Jesus — I don't really think it is. But, the Jesus in my heart is a Jesus with a sense of humor. And, personally, I think he'd be enjoying my campaign as much as anybody right now."

But a Jewish jokester elected governor in the Bible-belt state of Texas? "Absolutely," Friedman tells Safer. "Listen — I tell people, trust me, I'm a Jew, I'll hire good people."

source: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/01/19/60minutes/main1221449.shtml

Bush's Texas " Turd Blossom " Reappears !

Bush's Texas " Turd Blossom " Reappears !
Originally uploaded by photosteve.

"Terrorism is terrorism, no matter what the motive."

11 People Indicted in Ecoterrorism Plot
By MARK SHERMAN
The Associated Press
Friday, January 20, 2006; 2:17 PM

WASHINGTON -- Eleven people were indicted in a series of arsons, claimed by the radical groups Earth Liberation Front and Animal Liberation Front, in five Western states, the Justice Department said Friday.

The 65-count indictment said the suspects are responsible for 17 incidents in California, Colorado, Oregon, Washington and Wyoming, including sabotaging a high-tension power line, in a conspiracy that dates back to 1996. The indictment was returned Thursday by a federal grand jury in Eugene, Ore., and unsealed Friday.

"The indictment tells a story of four-and-a-half years of arson, vandalism, violence and destruction claimed to have been executed on behalf of the Animal Liberation Front or Earth Liberation Front, extremist movements known to support acts of domestic terrorism," Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said at a news conference Friday.

Appearing with Gonzales, FBI Director Robert Mueller declared, "Terrorism is terrorism, no matter what the motive."

"There is a clear difference between constitutionally protected advocacy ... and violent criminal activity," Mueller added.

"It is one thing to write concerned letters or to hold peaceful demonstrations," Mueller said. "It is another thing entirely to construct and use improvised explosives to harass and intimidate victims by destroying property and to cause millions of dollars in losses by acts or threats of violence."

Eight defendants have been arrested. Three people remain at large, and are believed to be outside the United States, according to a statement from the Justice Department.

In Eugene, two defendants, Jonathan Christopher Mark Paul, 39, and Suzanne Nicole "India" Savoie, 28, were both ordered held without bail, pending further hearings.

A criminal complaint filed in federal court in Eugene accused Paul, a firefighter, of setting firebombs that burned down a horse slaughterhouse in 1997. The ALF claimed responsibility for that fire, which caused an estimated $1 million in damage.

Savoie, who works in a group home for the developmentally disabled, is accused of serving as a lookout for a fire in 2001 that destroyed offices of a lumber mill. The ELF claimed responsibility for that fire.

The other defendants are Joseph Dibee, Chelsea Dawn Gerlach, Sarah Kendall Harvey, Daniel McGowan, Stanislas Meyerhoff, Josephine Overaker, Rebecca Rubin, Darren Todd Thurston and Kevin Tubbs.

Dibee, Overaker and Rubin have not been arrested. The other six were arrested in December.

Using improvised incendiary devices made from milk jugs, petroleum products and homemade timers, they carried out attacks between 1996 and 2001, the indictment alleged. Targets included U.S. Forest Service ranger stations, U.S. Bureau of Land Management wild horse facilities, lumber companies, meat processing companies, a ski area and the power line, the indictment said.
source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/20/AR2006012000740_pf.html
--------------
" Terrorism is terrorism, no matter what the motive." FBI Director Robert Mueller

...........as it relates to Brownwood's Terrorists

..........

Brownwood Texas: Small Town Press, Parades, PTSD and "Honoring the Troops" !

Friday January 20, 2006

Op Ed: Letters To The Editor

Comparison ignores MLK’s non-violent stance

To the editor,

The Bulletin’s recent editorial (Jan. 15) on the parades for Unity Day, Jan. 16, and the Day of Honor, Jan. 21, found a common theme in these events, namely Americans’ ongoing struggle for freedom. The Bulletin concluded that both events honor citizens who deserve our recognition and thanks for the risks they took and the price they paid to win and keep freedom.

This apparently unifying conclusion neglects an important distinction between the two events, because the non-violent civil disobedience of Martin Luther King, and the state-sanctioned violence of the military represent diametrically opposed approaches to the process of winning and keeping freedom. Martin Luther King, following in the footsteps of Buddha, Jesus, Thoreau, and Gandhi, relied on a moral power derived from his faith. The U.S. military, in its current incarnation, following in the footsteps of the great empires (Babylonian, Roman, British, Soviet), maintains its sole superpower status and “spreads freedom” through the modern technology of war.

Furthermore, equating non-violent protesters and the armed agents of the state as “freedom fighters” overlooks the reality that they have often been on the opposing sides of conflict. Martin Luther King and the civil rights movement faced the state-sanctioned violence of the police. The U.S. military itself, its policies, its bases, and weapons systems, have all been the object of repeated non-violent protests.

The non-violent and violent approaches to winning and keeping freedom have coexisted throughout history. Both have precedents for success and failure. The whole subject is vast, and obviously can’t be covered in a letter such as this. Ultimately, however, countries choose whether to be violent, or non-violent, just as we do individually. These days in America, and especially in Texas, the violent approach seems to be in favor, though showing signs of strain, as the Iraq, Afghanistan, and Palestine wars drag on and on and on, with no end in sight.

It seems to me that the non-violent and violent approaches really embody two different visions of how life on earth was meant to be: peaceful, lush, abundant, and cooperative, or warring, barren, scarce, and competitive. I know which one sounds better to me. That’s why I have joined the Green Party USA, the only political party I know of that supports both non-violence and ecological wisdom.

For now, the Warriors seem to be in power, and Warriors have one function: to make war. But what say we the people? Who among us can make peace as profitable as these wars have become?

Enjoy the parades!

Daniel Graham
Brownwood

source: http://www.brownwoodbulletin.com/articles/2006/01/20/op_ed/letters%20to%20the%20editor/letter01.txt
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Friday January 20, 2006
News

Parade to feature three retired generals

By Bill Crist — Brownwood Bulletin

It’s not often that a parade in a community the size of Brownwood features three retired generals. Saturday’s Day of Honor parade will not only feature that many, but each of the men also call Brownwood home. Brigadier General Dan Locker, (United States Air Force), Brigadier General Leroy Thompson, (United States Air Force/Texas Air National Guard) and Brigadier General Stephen Korenek (United States Army/Alaska Army National Guard) are all scheduled to ride in Saturday’s parade and take part in the ceremony.

“Brownwood is very fortunate to have three general officers from the armed forces living in town. This is an extremely prestigious rank which very few ever achieve,” Dr. Steve Kelly, one of the event’s organizers, said. “We are extremely honored that they each have chosen to take part in Saturday’s Day of Honor.”

source: source: http://www.brownwoodbulletin.com/articles/2006/01/20/news/news01.txt
------------------
Brownwood PTSD

go here...

"He's bad for our air, bad for our children, bad for our country." and "He's" a Texas Republican !

By ANGELA K. BROWN
Associated Press Writer
FORT WORTH, Texas — About 50 people showed up at the train station Friday afternoon to protest U.S. Rep. Joe Barton's weekend campaign fund-raising trip to San Antonio for supporters on a chartered train.

Holding a sign that read, "All Aboard the Gravy Train," Anna Brosovic said she was concerned because Barton, the chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, seemed to be surrounding himself only with the wealthy and influential.

"Joe Barton's little trip epitomizes the culture of corruption that has taken over the Republican Party since they swept into power," said Brosovic, of Arlington, a Democrat who lives in Barton's district. "It's democracy for sale."

Barton and most of his supporters boarded the train before protesters arrived. Other groups of protesters planned to meet the train as it stopped later in Austin and San Antonio.

No one from Barton's campaign immediately returned calls seeking comment Friday. But the Barton camp has said chartering a train from Fort Worth-based Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp. was no different than any other high-dollar fundraiser.

The cost was $2,000 per individual or $5,000 per political action committee, according to Barton's campaign, which released few details about the trip. Information on the trip's cost and who attended will be included in campaign finance reports due to be filed with the Federal Election Commission by Feb. 23.

Iraq war veteran and college professor David T. Harris, the Democrat running against Barton in November for congressional District 6, said the trip was in poor taste in light of the federal bribery investigation stemming from the work of disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff.

"I don't think there's anything underhanded, but it's bad timing," Harris said.

Barton became Texas' most powerful member of Congress after U.S. Rep. Tom DeLay left his job as House majority leader following his September indictment on money laundering and conspiracy charges. Barton's committee has broad jurisdiction over government and federal programs and is considered one of the most powerful in the House.

Barton, first elected to Congress in 1984, has faced a growing number of critics in recent years, including some environmental groups that have dubbed him "Smokey Joe."

Many of the protesters who held signs and booed when the train pulled away don't live in Barton's district. But they said they were concerned about his influence in the House.

"People should be voting him out of office," said Hadi Jawad, co-founder of the Crawford Peace House. "He's bad for our air, bad for our children, bad for our country. He's ascending in the Republican Party as a power broker."
___
On the Net: Rep. Joe Barton's campaign: http://joebarton.com
David T. Harris: http://www.followmetodc.com

source: http://www.wacotrib.com/news/content/gen/ap/TX_Barton_Train.html
-------------------
Here, take a deep breath with the folks northeast of Brownwood

go here...

"This is not a Republican administration, not in my view. This is a radical administration."

Breaking Ranks
Larry Wilkerson Attacked the Iraq War. In the Process, He Lost the Friendship of Colin Powell.
By Richard Leiby
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, January 19, 2006; C01

In an overheated old schoolroom in Washington, Larry Wilkerson, a retired Army colonel, is doing his best to impose military discipline on 25 pupils as they prepare to attack a mountain of pizza, cupcakes and cookies. It is the year-end party for Macfarland Middle School's Colin L. Powell Leadership Club, a tutoring and mentoring program that Wilkerson oversees as a volunteer. Striding before his charges in smart burgundy suspenders, the colonel -- everybody here calls him the colonel -- makes a point about duty:

"If you're not attending the meetings, you aren't a member of the club. It's as simple as that." He rebukes a boy who has shown up for the party but otherwise been scarce. "You know how I'll feel if you don't come to subsequent meetings," Wilkerson warns, "and you don't want to get me angry."

Then he drops the bluff demeanor and authorizes the kids to start chowing down. "Try to keep as much as you can off the floor," he says in a Southern accent softened by frequent chuckles. For the next hour he circulates through the room, greeting each student by name -- Jamie, Angela, Trevon, Tanya -- encouraging them to keep their grades up, prodding them to complete their community-service projects, inquiring about sometimes precarious home lives.

Since 1998, Wilkerson has devoted himself to helping at-risk children at Macfarland in the name of Colin Powell, whom he refers to as "my boss" and "the general." Wilkerson works tirelessly to keep them in the club and to secure scholarships for them at private high schools.

Yet these days he and Powell are estranged: This program represents the last remnant of a long, deep friendship between them. Like ex-spouses in an uneasy detente, "we decided we'd just communicate over the kids," says Wilkerson, sounding pained by the situation.

The split came as both men left the administration -- Powell as secretary of state, Wilkerson as his chief of staff -- after working side by side for 16 years. Wilkerson, a once-loyal Republican with 31 years of Army service, has emerged in recent months as a merciless critic of President Bush and his top people, accusing them of carrying out a reckless foreign policy and imperiling the future of the U.S. military.

"My wife would probably shoot me if I headed to the ballot box with a Republican vote again," he says. "This is not a Republican administration, not in my view. This is a radical administration."

Wilkerson calls Bush an unsophisticated leader who has been easily swayed by "messianic" neoconservatives and power-hungry, secretive schemers in the administration. In a landmark speech in October, Wilkerson said: "What I saw was a cabal between the vice president of the United States, Richard Cheney, and the secretary of defense, Donald Rumsfeld, on critical issues that made decisions that the bureaucracy did not know were being made."

to read the entire article please visit source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/18/AR2006011802607_pf.html
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Friday January 20, 2006

Parade to feature three retired generals

By Bill Crist — Brownwood Bulletin

It’s not often that a parade in a community the size of Brownwood features three retired generals. Saturday’s Day of Honor parade will not only feature that many, but each of the men also call Brownwood home. Brigadier General Dan Locker, (United States Air Force), Brigadier General Leroy Thompson, (United States Air Force/Texas Air National Guard) and Brigadier General Stephen Korenek (United States Army/Alaska Army National Guard) are all scheduled to ride in Saturday’s parade and take part in the ceremony.

to read the entire article please visit: http://www.brownwoodbulletin.com/articles/2006/01/20/news/news01.txt
--------------------
Published on Thursday, January 19, 2006 by TomPaine.com
Hiding Behind the Troops
by David Corn

When the CIA tried to hit Ayman Zawahiri, Al Qaeda's No. 2, with a missile fired from a Predator drone and ended up killing more than a dozen civilians as well as four or so people later identified as "foreign terrorists" in a Pakistani village near the border of Afghanistan, that was dumb. When George W. Bush did not quickly apologize, offer compensation to the victims and announce there would be an immediate investigation, that was also dumb. For with this strike, the Bush administration essentially aided the enemy, who now can point to this episode as proof that Bush does not give a damn about innocent Muslim lives (which is what many people in the Arab world already suspect).

And this botched operation has severely undermined the Pakistani government of Gen. Pervez Musharraf, revealing how Bush treats his friends and allies in the war of terrorism. Moreover, actions like this can lead one to wonder if Bush really means it when he says—as he has frequently—"We believe in the dignity of every human life." If that were indeed the case, then wouldn't he be all broken up over the Pakistani civilians blown to pieces by the CIA missile? Hunting mass-murdering terrorists who live among civilians is indeed hard and nasty work, which most people find morally justifiable. ("We have to do what we think is necessary," John McCain declared on Sunday.) Then let's be frank. Those who are willing to target a neighborhood in a far-away village—hoping to kill a terrorist but knowing that innocent human beings may well also be smashed to bits—do not really believe in the dignity of every human life. They are willing to trade certain lives (of nameless people who happen to be villagers in a remote spot) for the results they seek. The cost-benefit analysis may be defensible; in all wars, non-combatants are killed. But please, let's not kid ourselves. Bush and his commanders in the war on terrorism are willing to waste non-terrorists to kill terrorists. Right or wrong, that is not caring about the dignity of every life.

Now by writing this, I hope I am not violating Bush's standards for acceptable debate. After years of ignoring or deflecting criticism of his actions in Iraq and of his conduct of the so-called war on terrorism, Bush in recent months has taken a different tack. He has admitted mistakes were made—by others, not him—regarding the WMD intelligence. (This can be categorized as a Doh!-like concession.) And he has said that criticism of him is not out of bounds, as long as it's the right sort of criticism and doesn't, for instance, raise questions about his motives.

Last week, speaking at a Veterans of Foreign War convention, Bush made this point once again—and the next day added an electoral twist. Before the supportive crowd, he said:

We must remember there is a difference between responsible and irresponsible debate—and it's even more important to conduct this debate responsibly when American troops are risking their lives overseas. The American people know the difference between responsible and irresponsible debate when they see it. They know the difference between honest critics who question the way the war is being prosecuted and partisan critics who claim that we acted in Iraq because of oil, or because of Israel, or because we misled the American people. And they know the difference between a loyal opposition that points out what is wrong, and defeatists who refuse to see that anything is right.

I recall there were plenty of Bush supporters who never missed the chance to question Bill Clinton's motives whenever he fired a shot overseas. Remember the real-life claims of Wag the Dog ? GOP opportunism notwithstanding, what's wrong with questioning Bush's motives or arguing the case that he misled the public to win support for the invasion of Iraq? It's understandable that Bush himself may not enjoy such criticism. But he's not king—at least not yet, despite all the legal memos written by his Justice Department and counsel's office claiming that he can do anything he wants to and avoid (that is, break) any law while he is pursuing his commander-in-chief duties in the war on terrorism. (See the memo, "The Unitary Executive and Finding Big Brother (Implied) in the U.S. Constitution.") And recent polls have indicated that more than half of Americans believe that Bush deliberately overstated the threat from Iraq prior to the war. His motives are already under suspicion. Perhaps the American people, as Bush suggests, do know the difference between responsible and irresponsible rhetoric.

But apparently he doesn't want them to talk about it. Before the VFWers, he went on:

When our soldiers hear politicians in Washington question the mission they are risking their lives to accomplish, it hurts their morale. In a time of war, we have a responsibility to show that whatever our political differences at home, our nation is united and determined to prevail. And we have a responsibility to our men and women in uniform—who deserve to know that once our politicians vote to send them into harm's way, our support will be with them in good days and in bad days—and we will settle for nothing less than complete victory.

Note the sleight of hand. Accusing Bush of misleading the nation on the reasons for war is, he says, equal to questioning the mission. In a sense, he might be right about that. It certainly is saying that the cause for which Bush has sent American men and women to the death is not what Bush claimed it to be. But here he is trying to hide behind the troops. Attack me, and you're undermining them. It's cowardly. But it sure is in sync with his l'etat-est-moi view. In this case, it's l'armee-est-moi . This is not the only spin option available to Commander Bush. He could have as easily said:

"I know there are folks out there saying mean things about me and my decision to invade Iraq. Well, fire away. I'm fair game. I can take it. But whatever anyone thinks of me and the war, I know we all agree that we should do whatever can for the troops—and that even my critics are with me on that."

That might be how a uniter-not-a-divider would put it. But not Bush. Speaking the next day in Louisville, Ky., he was asked by a seven-year-old, "How can people help on the war on terror?" Bush replied,

One way people can help as we're coming down the pike in the 2006 elections, is remember the effect that rhetoric can have on our troops in harm's way, and the effect that rhetoric can have in emboldening or weakening an enemy.

So if the war in Iraq becomes an issue in this year's congressional elections, the White House is all set to point an accusatory finger and scold, "Partisan lips sink ships." It's their counterattack, and Bush has started test-driving it-in a pre-emptive fashion. Four years ago, as I wrote about recently , Bush campaigned for GOP candidates and claimed that Democrats were "not interested in the security of the American people." Nowadays, the president is suggesting that he would view similarly harsh rhetoric directed toward him (as opposed to the Democrats) as an attack on "the mission" and a threat to the troops. I might consider suggesting that rank hypocrisy is at work and that only not-to-be-trusted scoundrels shield their political backsides with the troops. But I don't want to embolden the enemy.

David Corn writes The Loyal Opposition twice a month for TomPaine.com. Corn is also the Washington editor of The Nation and is the author of "The Lies of George W. Bush: Mastering the Politics of Deception" (Crown Publishers). Read his blog at http://www.davidcorn.com.
source: http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0119-26.htm
---------------------
Published on Friday, January 20, 2006 by the Associated Press

Mood of Republicans Worry GOP Activists
by Ron Fournier

A growing number of Republican voters are frustrated by congressional spending and scandal, according to GOP leaders from across the country who worry that an "enthusiasm deficit" could cost the party control of Congress in November.

Some rank-and-file Republicans wonder what happened to the party that promised to reform Washington after taking control of Congress in 1994 for the first time in 40 years.

"We've seen the enemy, and he is us," said Tom Rath, a Republican National Committee member from New Hampshire describing the sentiments of some GOP voters. "We have to get back to the basics. Let's talk about small government and reduced spending, and don't let the Democrats take those issues."

to read the entire article please visit: http://www.commondreams.org/headlines06/0120-01.htm
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From Good, To Bad, To Ugly : A Universal Story that starts locally !

‘San Saba Mob’ program topic

By Candace Cooksey Fulton — Brownwood Bulletin

This 1898 photo depicts local officials who worked with Rangers to break the notorious San Saba Mob. Standing, left to right, are Ranger Dudley Barker of Co. “C”; Ranger Edgar T. Neal of Co. “E”; Ranger John R. Bannister, famous Texas Ranger of the 1870s; Deputy Sheriff George Batton of Brown County; and an unidentified man. Those seated, left to right, include District Attorney for Brown County Walter Early, and Brown County Sheriff Charley Bell. Photo courtesy of 1959 November - December issue of “True West Magazine”

Ross J. Cox Sr. will share tales and details of the infamous — and notorious — “San Saba Mob” of the late 19th century this afternoon in a program for the Brown County Historical Society.

Cox, a Texas Department of Public Safety highway patrolman stationed in San Saba and a historian, has spent most of a decade researching the San Saba Mob and the Texas Rangers sent to quell their murderous and vigilante efforts. That research was compiled into a double-volume book titled “The Texas Rangers & The San Saba Mob.”

The program is scheduled for 4 p.m. today in Room 136 of Newman Hall on the Gen. Douglas MacArthur Academy of Freedom campus of Howard Payne University. The event is hosted by the Brown County Historical Society and the Brownwood Genealogical Society.

Though known as the “San Saba Mob,” the story has a strong Brown County connection, Cox said.

“The story actually begins in Brown County (now Mills County) at Williams Ranch. In 1869, a wealthy group of cattlemen came together to create a force to deal with cattle rustling. Most of the members came from San Saba, Mills, Brown and McCulloch counties,” Cox said.

“Over time the organization changed leadership and evolved into a sinister force, which encompassed moonlight meetings, secret assassinations, a

ritual and strict rules of membership. By 1896, the Mob had assassinated so many people in the area that the Rangers were called in to put it down.”

Cox said politics of the day made it no easy task to quell the Mob, because, Mob membership reached deep into local courthouses involving elected officials including sheriffs and judges. Indictments were nonexistent, Cox said, because Mob members infested the grand juries. Governor Sul Ross even sent the district attorney at the time to the area to secretly investigate and his investigation led to the call for Texas Ranger enforcement Cox said.

“When the Rangers arrived, they were witness to a mass migration of people fleeing for their lives,” Cox said. “They had been ordered out, and left behind their property and livestock.”

Cox said it took the Rangers nearly two years to finally break the Mob, which they were able to do with the help of a brilliant district attorney and the courage of a few brave witnesses. Also, he said, key to the story is the recount of the three “Great San Saba Murder Trials,” held in Austin in 1897.

“These were bigger than O.J. Simpson,” Cox said. “More than 200 witnesses appeared in each case, with only about 40 testifying for the state. After the fireworks

cleared, only one man was ever convicted for any of the numerous assassinations.”

Books will be available for sale, $35 a copy, at the program today. Anyone, who would like a copy of the book but cannot attend today’s program, may contact Cox by phone at (325) 372-4190 and make arrangements to order a copy. No admission will be charged for the program.

source: http://www.brownwoodbulletin.com/articles/2006/01/19/news/news04.txt
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Note from Steve: Knowing Texas political History, guess "The San Saba Mob" were Democrats then and would be Republicans now ?

Eminenet Domain in the hands of Republican Rick Perry !

Tuesday, May 03, 2005

AP on anti-TTC rally

The AP wire:
About 250 farmers and ranchers rallied at the Capitol today to protest Governor Rick Perry's Trans Texas Corridor.
Critics say the highway project will gobble up the property of rural land owners.
Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn joined the demonstrators and called Perry's associates "land-grabbing highway henchmen."
She also called the governor's plan the "Trans Texas Catastrophe."
...
Spokesman Robert Black also says Strayhorn in the past has supported toll roads.
RG Ratcliffe has this in the Chron:
Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn got farmers, ranchers and small-business owners whipped into a frenzy at a Capitol rally Tuesday as they called for Gov. Rick Perry's impeachment over the land-condemnation provisions of his Trans-Texas Corridor plan.
"Perry and his hand-picked highway henchmen say we have a choice: no roads, slow roads or toll roads," Strayhorn said. "I say to Governor Perry and his highway henchmen: Hogwash. Vote our way today for freeways."

- posted @ 4:08 PM permalink
source: http://perryvsworld.blogspot.com/

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Trans-Texas Corridor
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

This article or section contains information about a planned or expected future road.
It may contain information of a speculative nature and the content may change dramatically as the road's construction and/or completion approaches and more information becomes available.
The Trans-Texas Corridor (TTC) is a transportation network in the planning and early construction stages in the U.S. state of Texas. The concept uses swaths of land up to 365 m (1,200 ft) wide to carry parallel links of expressways, rails, and utility lines. The expressway portion would be divided into two separate elements: truck lanes and lanes for passenger vehicles. Similarly, the rail lines in the corridor would be divided among freight, commuter, and high-speed rail. Services expected to be carried in the utility corridor include water, electricity, natural gas and petroleum, plus fiber optic lines and other telecommunications services.

Some of the highways that will be incorporated into the TTC plan include Interstate 35 and Interstate 69.

The system has been criticized for a number of reasons. Among the most significant is the fact that the TTC will be extremely expensive. Additionally the system will require about 23,300 km² (9,000 square miles) of land to be purchased or acquired through the state's assertion of eminent domain. Environmentalists are concerned about the effects of such wide corridors, and private land owners have expressed disgust at the idea that their land may be seized and in turn be sold in exclusive agreements to other developers in order to help pay for the transit links.

To help pay for building the roads and rails, the highways will be toll roads. The current 6,400 Km (4,000 mile) plan has a projected cost of about US$183 billion.

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trans-Texas_Corridor

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City Council limits eminent domain
January 19, 2006

The San Angelo City Council this week made it more difficult for future councils to condemn property in the city for private investors.
Council members wanted to limit the power of eminent domain after a U.S. Supreme Court decision last year that set precedent for similar takings.
The ordinance must be approved at the Feb. 7 council meeting for it to take effect. It mirrors a state statute already on the books that prohibits cities from taking land for private investors, but council members said they wanted to act in good faith for residents concerned about property rights.
City ordinances can be overturned by future councils.
source: http://www.sanangelostandardtimes.com/sast/news_local/article/0,1897,SAST_4956_4399149,00.html
---------------
for those on the airwaves of KXYL (Brownwood Talk Radio) who want to lay eminent domaine abuse at the feet of "Liberals", read the following excerpt from
Bush and the Seven Deadly Sins
by Mina Hamilton
Dissident Voice
May 29, 2003

" Back in 1989, Bush hauled in the moolah on the stadium built in Arlington, Texas for the Texas Rangers. What's interesting about this one is that the Texas legislature passed a bill allowing the private corporation that owned the Rangers to exercise eminent domain, normally a power reserved for public entities.

We're all pretty familiar with condemnation for public projects. It's what the Army Corps of Engineers does to build flood-control dams or Municipalities do to construct water mains or Highway Authorities do to obtain rights-of-way. In the Texas Rangers case the condemnation was on behalf of a handful of private individuals, one of whom was George W.

This surprising form of socialism with baseball teams condemning private property for new stadiums is now quite common in the US. It had a particularly sordid ring in the Texas deal.

This private corporation condemned not only enough land for a spanking new baseball stadium, but also took an additional 300 acres - yes 300 acres - of surrounding land for commercial development. Arlington residents floated most of the package with jacked-up taxes. These paid for the bonds needed to buy the land. It seems that our no-tax President wasn't ideologically opposed to increasing taxes if it padded his own bank account.

The padding was generous: Bush made out like a bandit with his initial investment of $640,000 zooming to a cool $15.4 million in 1998 when he sold out. (4)

A similar type of socialism for the rich is planned for Iraq. US taxpayers fund the war, George's cronies and benefactors mop up on juicy reconstruction contracts and then the CEO's of Halliburton, Bechtel, and other post-Saddam beneficiaries direct vast sums back into the Bush/GOP campaign war chest. "

source: http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Articles5/Hamilton_Bush-7Sins.htm

As it relates to The Brownwood PTSD Media Blackout: Remember, it's about the parades, yellow ribbons and homemade desserts !

Blogged by Brad on 1/18/2006 @ 11:22am PT...

COST OF WAR: The Words of U.S. Army Specialist Douglas Barber...
May He Finally Rest in Peace.
Yesterday, I wrote about the suicide of Specialist Douglas Barber, an Iraq War vet who suffered from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) upon returning home from fighting on behalf of this country. A man who put his life on the line for this country, but who was unable to receive adequate help from the Veteran's Administration as run (and facing deep cutbacks) by George W. "Support the Troops" Bush.

Here is an email posted on SCOOP, from Barber, as written in January of 2005.
He had a difficult time getting people to listen to him while he was alive. Perhaps some of us can try to listen to him now that he's dead, so that perhaps his death will not be in vain.
In his email, Barber describes what many families go through when they witness their sons and daughters coming home in flag-draped coffins, hidden from view by the Bush Administration. And, even more telling in this case, some of the horrors veterans suffering from PTSD face once back on the homefront. Here's a few grafs...
All is not okay or right for those of us who return home alive and supposedly well. What looks like normalcy and readjustment is only an illusion to be revealed by time and torment. Some soldiers come home missing limbs and other parts of their bodies. Still others will live with permanent scars from horrific events that no one other than those who served will ever understand.
We come home from war trying to put our lives back together but some cannot stand the memories and decide that death is better. They kill themselves because they are so haunted by seeing children killed and whole families wiped out.
...
Still others come home to nothing, families have abandoned them: husbands and wives have left these soldiers, and so have parents as well. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder has become the norm amongst these soldiers because they don't know how to cope with returning to a society that will never understand what they have had to endure to liberate another country.
PTSD comes in many forms not understood by many: but yet if a soldier has it, America thinks the soldiers are crazy. PTSD comes in the form of depression, anger, regret, being confrontational, anxiety, chronic pain, compulsion, delusions, grief, guilt, dependence, loneliness, sleep disorders, suspiciousness/paranoia, low self-esteem and so many other things.
See his full post for some of the specific personal issues that Barber faced as he wrestled with his PTSD demons.
But then, he goes on to finish with some words for all of the Wingnuts out there who make this sort of disaster possible. Those who, from the comfort of their million dollar homes and multi-million media contracts, distort the cost of this war to sell it as "a noble cause," as if it's a Made-in-America product we can all be proud of and ought to promote to every corner of the earth. Those who bang on a political drum to give the death and destruction of others a "positive" spin for their own personal benefit. Those who gain from the nameless, faceless deaths of real heroes who -- unlike the media-politico scoundrels -- will never benefit by having their contracts renewed, their books promoted to the Best-Seller lists, or see offers for multi-thousand dollar speaking fees. Those who haven't the first clue of what heroes like Barber faced in order to make the lives of such Chickenhawks so cozy and swell. Those like Rush and Sean and O'Reilly who, in Barber's own words are "nothing but dirt under every soldier's boots!"
All of that, even as Barber's death, along with countless others, won't even rate to make the Pentagon's ever-growing list of U.S. Troops Killed in Iraq or Afghanistan, or even seem themselves added to the scores of thousands listed on the Injured Lists.
I'll let Barber finish out this post...
Talk show hosts like Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly, Rush Limbaugh and so many others act like they know all about war; then they refuse to give any credence to soldiers like me who have been to war and seen the brutality of war. These guys are nothing but WEAK SPINELESS COWARDS hiding behind microphones while soldiers come home and are losing everything they have.
I ask every American who reads this e-mail to stand up for the soldier who has given their everything for this country to stand up to these guys in the media; ask them why they don't pick up a weapon and follow in the steps of a soldier. Send this e-mail to as many people on your e-mail lists and ask them to do the same.
There needs to be a National awareness for every Veteran who has ever served in any war. Send e-mails to the Big Mouths on TV and ask them to have soldiers like me on their programs. I am asking you as Americans to BOYCOTT every TV show or host/journalist that refuses to tell the real truth.
THIS IS A PERSONAL CHALLENGE TO BILL,SEAN AND RUSH TO HAVE ME ON YOUR PROGRAM TO SET THE RECORD STRAIGHT. Otherwise you are nothing but dirt under every soldier's boots!
SPC. Douglas Barber

source: http://www.bradblog.com/archives/00002297.htm

Ex-EPA Chiefs Blame Bush in Global Warming

By JOHN HEILPRIN, Associated Press Writer 2 hours, 13 minutes ago
WASHINGTON - Six former heads of the Environmental Protection Agency — five Republicans and one Democrat — accused the Bush administration Wednesday of neglecting global warming and other environmental problems.
"I don't think there's a commitment in this administration," said Bill Ruckelshaus, who was EPA's first administrator when the agency opened its doors in 1970 under President Nixon and headed it again under President Reagan in the 1980s.
Russell Train, who succeeded Ruckelshaus in the Nixon and Ford administrations, said slowing the growth of "greenhouse" gases isn't enough.
"We need leadership, and I don't think we're getting it," he said at an EPA-sponsored symposium centered around the agency's 35th anniversary. "To sit back and just push it away and say we'll deal with it sometime down the road is dishonest to the people and self-destructive."
All of the former administrators raised their hands when EPA's current chief, Stephen Johnson, asked whether they believe global warming is a real problem, and again when he asked if humans bear significant blame.
Agency heads during five Republican administrations, including the current one, criticized the Bush White House for what they described as a failure of leadership.
Defending his boss, Johnson said the current administration has spent $20 billion on research and technology to combat climate change after President Bush rejected mandatory controls on carbon dioxide, the chief gas blamed for trapping heat in the atmosphere like a greenhouse.
Bush also kept the United States out of the Kyoto international treaty to reduce greenhouse gases globally, saying it would harm the U.S. economy, after many of the accord's terms were negotiated by the Clinton administration.
"I know from the president on down, he is committed," Johnson said. "And certainly his charge to me was, and certainly our team has heard it: 'I want you to accelerate the pace of environmental protection. I want you to maintain our economic competitiveness.' And I think that's really what it's all about."
His predecessors disagreed. Lee Thomas, Ruckelshaus's successor in the Reagan administration, said that "if the United States doesn't deal with those kinds of issues in a leadership role, they're not going to get dealt with. So I'm very concerned about this country and this agency."
Bill Reilly, the EPA administrator under the first President Bush, echoed that assessment.
"The time will come when we will address seriously the problem of climate change, and this is the agency that's best equipped to anticipate it," he said.
Christie Whitman, the first of three EPA administrators in the current Bush administration, said people obviously are having "an enormous impact" on the earth's warming.
"You'd need to be in a hole somewhere to think that the amount of change that we have imposed on land, and the way we've handled deforestation, farming practices, development, and what we're putting into the air, isn't exacerbating what is probably a natural trend," she said. "But this is worse, and it's getting worse."
Carol Browner, who was President Clinton's EPA administrator, said the White House and the Congress should push legislation to establish a carbon trading program based on a 1990 pollution trading program that helped reduce acid rain.
"If we wait for every single scientist who has a thought on the issue of climate change to agree, we will never do anything," she said. "If this agency had waited to completely understand the impacts of DDT, the impacts of lead in our gasoline, there would probably still be DDT sprayed and lead in our gasoline."
Three former administrators did not attend Wednesday's ceremony: Mike Leavitt, now secretary of health and human services; Doug Costle, who was in the Carter administration, and Anne Burford, a Reagan appointee who died last year.
___
On the Net:
EPA: http://www.epa.gov
source: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060118/ap_on_go_ot/global_warming

The " S S Perry " : A Sinking Boat ?

The " S S Perry " : A Sinking Boat ?
Originally uploaded by photosteve.

Texas Republicans: Birds of a Feather & Hubris !

Jan. 16, 2006, 10:47PM

Lobbyist for state tied to Abramoff
Boulanger is the second hire linked with controversy

By R.G. RATCLIFFE
Copyright 2006 Houston Chronicle Austin Bureau

AUSTIN - Todd Boulanger, who once worked closely with confessed
influence peddler Jack Abramoff, now heads a group lobbying Congress
for Texas under a $330,000 state contract.

Boulanger and his firm, Cassidy & Associates, were hired by the Texas
Office of State-Federal Relations under a contract approved by Gov.
Rick Perry, House Speaker Tom Craddick and Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst.

This is the second time the state has hired as a congressional lobbyist
someone with connections to the lobbying controversies surrounding
former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Sugar Land.

to read the entire article please visit: http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/metropolitan/3591440
--------------
Opinion | 1/18/06
Viewpoint: Texas pride or is it hubris?
Article Tools: Page 1 of 1

Gov. Rick Perry has been governor for six years now and he wants the job for a full decade.

And what key issue does Perry believe he needs to be reelected - again - to accomplish? If you consult his advertising campaign, the answer is clear - nothing. Texas is perfect as is.

If you surf over to one of Perry's campaign Web sites, www.proudoftexas.com, you'll find him smirking - cross-armed and hair moussed - and explaining the reason he deserves to spend a decade as governor.

"I have never been more proud to call myself a Texan. When you consider all the great contributions Texans make every day - in the classroom, in research labs, on the athletic field or on the battlefield - what's not to be proud of?"

Certainly individual Texans engage in selfless acts of courage, win awards and participate in noble and honorable activities every day. Unfortunately the state government, the part of Texas Perry actually has (some) control over, has quite a bit "not to be proud of."

The state's school finance system has been declared unconstitutional and hasn't been becoming any less unconstitutional since Perry released his glorious plan to fix it in the spring of 2004.

But the list of things we shouldn't be proud of doesn't stop there.

Texas ranked eighth in primary and secondary syphilis rates in 2004. It ranked fifth in teenage pregnancies. It ranked first in teenage births.

According to the Centers for Disease Control, 30.7 percent of Texan adults are uninsured, the highest rate in the nation in 2005. Additionally, 22.6 percent of Texas children are uninsured, again that's the highest rate in the nation.

According to the American College of Emergency Physicians, Texas was given a 'C' on its Emergency Care Report Card. In the same study, Texas received a 'D' for its emergency medicine system. Texas also ranked 44th (out of 50) in its number of board certified emergency physicians.

But it's not all bad.

Texas no longer has the poorest county in the nation. Starr County has moved from being the poorest county to the third poorest county. Congrats, Rick!

These statistics may paint an overly pessimistic view of Texas, but politics should be about finding problems and solving them. One would think that with problems this numerous, Perry would be talking about how to make Texas better instead of gloating that it's the best. Maybe instead of pretending all things in the Lone Star State are rosy, Perry should roll up his finely starched sleeves and propose solutions to this state's growing problems.

source: http://www.dailytexanonline.com/media/paper410/news/2006/01/18/Opinion/Viewpoint.Texas.Pride.Or.Is.It.Hubris-1434509.shtml?norewrite&sourcedomain=www.dailytexanonline.com
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Texas Dems Criticize Contract With Lobbyist

By APRIL CASTRO
Associated Press Writer
January 18, 2006, 11:59 PM EST

AUSTIN, Texas -- Democrats in the Texas Legislature called on the governor Wednesday to cancel a contract with a lobbyist that they contend was used to funnel taxpayer money into Republican campaigns.
The office of Gov. Rick Perry called the allegations a "baseless, partisan move" and defended the lobbying program as nonpartisan.
Drew Maloney, a former chief of staff to embattled Rep. Tom DeLay, was one of two lobbyists hired by the Texas Office of State-Federal Relations in 2003 to represent the state's interests in the nation's capital.
Once awarded his $180,000-a-year contract, Maloney made more than $75,000 in contributions to Republican campaigns, both nationally and in Texas, according to campaign finance documents culled by Democrats.
Maloney could not be reached for comment.
The Republican-led Legislature approved spending $1.1 million on the contracts. The contracts expire next year.
"It's unbelievable to find, in effect, laundering taxpayer money to put in the coffers of Republican politicians in the state of Texas. It's an outrage, and it's unbelievable," said state Rep. Jim Dunnam, a Democrat. "Why do we spend 1.1 million state tax dollars on lobbyists when Texas is home to 32 congressmen and women, two senators and the president of the United States?"
Perry spokeswoman Rachel Novier credited the lobbyists with a $5 billion increase in federal funds in state coffers.
Maloney was a key figure in 2002 fundraising that has led to criminal charges against DeLay and two of his associates, who are accused of improperly using corporate money in Texas campaigns.
By law, corporate money can be used only for administrative expenses in political campaigns in the state.
source: http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-ap-texas-lobbyist,0,1681517.story?coll=sns-ap-nation-headlines

Kinky Friedman on the Brownwood Airwaves ?

from Kinky's Website:

Kinky Hits the Airwaves

Catch Kinky on the radio this afternoon from 5:00-6:00 p.m. on KXYL 96.9 in the Brownwood, Abilene, San Angelo, Ranger and Brady areas.
Kinky will spend a full hour with hosts Sam Coursey and James “JR” Williams on “The Other Side of the News.” If you live in the area and would like ask the future governor a question, you can call the studio at 325-646-1055 or 800-966-1055.

If you live in the Austin area, tune in to KLBJ 590 AM with Dudley & Bob tomorrow morning between 8:30-8:45 a.m. We’ll keep you posted on further interviews.

Stay tuned, Texas!

to visit Kinky's site

go here...

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Kudos to KXYL for bringing Kinky to the airwaves of Central Texas. Looking forward to hearing from all the Candidates running for the Governor of Texas on KXYL.

QUOTE

"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." ~Martin Luther King Jr., Letter from Birmingham Jail, April 16, 1963”

Calling a Spade a Spade !

Candid candidate: Hackett calls ’em like he sees ’em
Sunday, January 15, 2006
JOE HALLETT

The tip-off that a politician is about to speak gobbledygook is when he or she says, "I’ll be candid with you."

Except for Paul Hackett, and he says, "I’ll be candid with you" a lot. But rather than spewing mindnumbing nothingness, this politician and lawyer actually is candid to a fault.

For four of us from The Dispatch public-affairs team who met him for the first time last week, Hackett’s candor was extra sugar in our coffee. It was easy to see why the 43-year-old Democratic upstart from Cincinnati almost won election to Congress against impossible odds last November in southern Ohio’s overwhelmingly Republican 2 nd District.

And it was easy to see why Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., had recruited the strappingly handsome, 6-foot-4 Marine who had spent seven months in 2004 fighting insurgents in Ramadi and Fallujah to run against Republican Sen. Mike DeWine this year. Then, unexpectedly, Rep. Sherrod Brown of Lorain changed his mind and figured 2006 is his year to beat DeWine. Everyone expected Hackett to be a good soldier and run for a second-string office. But there was no putting the genie back into the bottle. Hackett’s congressional run had made him a folk hero among Democratic bloggers and the money was pouring in. Brown would get a fight in the May 2 primary. "We’re at the point where we’ve raised enough money that we’ve got overhead covered through the primary," Hackett said. "So, anybody who thinks we’re going away before the primary is delusional. It’s not going to happen. It’s not my style." Nor is gobbledygook his style. An hour spent with Hackett foretells that candor will be his friend and enemy before the campaign is finished, captivating voters with his simple eloquence and repelling them with unthinking insults.

Hackett said he and Brown probably agree on nine out of 10 issues, except the extent of 2 nd Amendment rights. Hackett grew up hunting, he relied on guns in Iraq and he has a concealed-carry permit (he wasn’t packing at our coffee klatch). Rather than restricting gun access for lawabiding citizens, Hackett wants the laws enforced and the cops fully funded "to make sure that the men and women who break the laws with guns are prosecuted so they quit screwing up our right to enjoy them."

Hackett said he opposes capital punishment – too much risk of executing an innocent person – for everybody except the fool who violates his family and home.

"Break into my house, we won’t have to worry about the application of the death penalty. It’s going to be a simple 911 call: Come pick up the body."

With succinct coherence, Hackett said: "I’m pro-choice, I’m pro-gayrights, I’m pro-gun-rights. Call me nuts, but I think they’re all based on the same principle and that is we don’t need government dictating to us how we live our private lives."

Asked to define being pro-gayrights, Hackett said anybody who tries to deny homosexuals the same rights, including marriage, as every other citizen is un-American. Are you saying, he was asked, that the 62 percent of Ohioans who voted in November 2004 to constitutionally deny same-sex marriages are un-American?

"If what they believe is that we’re going to have a scale on judging which Americans have equal rights, yeah, that’s un-American. They’ve got to accept that. It’s absolutely un-American."

Hackett called DeWine a "professional politician" who "is all over the map on issues," and who’s afraid to stand up to the "radical religious fundamentalists" controlling the GOP. At that point, Hackett’s candor went on steroids.

"The Republican Party has been hijacked by the religious fanatics that, in my opinion, aren’t a whole lot different than Osama bin Laden and a lot of the other religious nuts around the world," he said. "The challenge is for the rest of us moderate Americans and citizens of the world to put down the fork and spoon, turn off the TV, and participate in the process and try to push back on these radical nuts – and they are nuts." So much for gobbledygook. Joe Hallett is senior editor at The Dispatch.

jhallett@dispatch.com
source: http://www.dispatch.com/editorials-story.php?story=dispatch/2006/01/15/20060115-B5-02.html
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Depleted uranium: Dirty bombs, dirty missiles, dirty bullets
A death sentence here and abroad

by Leuren Moret

At an April press conference, a group of New York Army National Guard vets raised their hands when asked if they have health problems. The soldiers, all from the 442nd Military Police Company, are complaining of headaches and fatigue after what they think is exposure to depleted uranium during their recent tour in Iraq.

“Military men are just dumb stupid animals to be used as pawns in foreign policy.” - Henry Kissinger, quoted in “Kiss the Boys Goodbye: How the United States Betrayed Its Own POW’s in Vietnam”

Vietnam was a chemical war for oil, permanently contaminating large regions and countries downriver with Agent Orange, and environmentally the most devastating war in world history. But since 1991, the U.S. has staged four nuclear wars using depleted uranium weaponry, which, like Agent Orange, meets the U.S. government definition of Weapons of Mass Destruction. Vast regions in the Middle East and Central Asia have been permanently contaminated with radiation.
And what about our soldiers? Terry Jemison of the Department of Veterans Affairs reported this week to the American Free Press that “Gulf-era veterans” now on medical disability since 1991 number 518,739, with only 7,035 reported wounded in Iraq in that same 14-year period.
This week the American Free Press dropped a “dirty bomb” on the Pentagon by reporting that eight out of 20 men who served in one unit in the 2003 U.S. military offensive in Iraq now have malignancies. That means that 40 percent of the soldiers in that unit have developed malignancies in just 16 months.
Since these soldiers were exposed to vaccines and depleted uranium (DU) only, this is strong evidence for researchers and scientists working on this issue, that DU is the definitive cause of Gulf War Syndrome. Vaccines are not known to cause cancer. One of the first published researchers on Gulf War Syndrome, who also served in 1991 in Iraq, Dr. Andras Korényi-Both, is in agreement with Barbara Goodno from the Department of Defense’s Deployment Health Support Directorate, that in this war soldiers were not exposed to chemicals, pesticides, bioagents or other suspect causes this time to confuse the issue.
This powerful new evidence is blowing holes in the cover-up perpetrated by the Pentagon and three presidential administrations ever since DU was first used in 1991 in the Persian Gulf War. Fourteen years after the introduction of DU on the battlefield in 1991, the long-term effects have revealed that DU is a death sentence and very nasty stuff.
Scientists studying the biological effects of uranium in the 1960s reported that it targets the DNA. Marion Fulk, a nuclear physical chemist retired from the Livermore Nuclear Weapons Lab and formerly involved with the Manhattan Project, interprets the new and rapid malignancies in soldiers from the 2003 war as “spectacular … and a matter of concern.”
This evidence shows that of the three effects which DU has on biological systems - radiation, chemical and particulate – the particulate effect from nano-size particles is the most dominant one immediately after exposure and targets the Master Code in the DNA. This is bad news, but it explains why DU causes a myriad of diseases which are difficult to define.
In simple words, DU “trashes the body.” When asked if the main purpose for using it was for destroying things and killing people, Fulk was more specific: “I would say that it is the perfect weapon for killing lots of people.”
Soldiers developing malignancies so quickly since 2003 can be expected to develop multiple cancers from independent causes. This phenomenon has been reported by doctors in hospitals treating civilians following NATO bombing with DU in Yugoslavia in 1998-1999 and the U.S. military invasion of Iraq using DU for the first time in 1991. Medical experts report that this phenomenon of multiple malignancies from unrelated causes has been unknown until now and is a new syndrome associated with internal DU exposure.
Just 467 U.S. personnel were wounded in the three-week Persian Gulf War in 1990-1991. Out of 580,400 soldiers who served in Gulf War I, 11,000 are dead, and by 2000 there were 325,000 on permanent medical disability. This astounding number of disabled vets means that a decade later, 56 percent of those soldiers who served now have medical problems.
The number of disabled vets reported up to 2000 has been increasing by 43,000 every year. Brad Flohr of the Department of Veterans Affairs told American Free Press that he believes there are more disabled vets now than even after World War II.
They brought it home
Not only were soldiers exposed to DU on and off the battlefields, but they brought it home. DU in the semen of soldiers internally contaminated their wives, partners and girlfriends. Tragically, some women in their 20s and 30s who were sexual partners of exposed soldiers developed endometriosis and were forced to have hysterectomies because of health problems.
In a group of 251 soldiers from a study group in Mississippi who had all had normal babies before the Gulf War, 67 percent of their post-war babies were born with severe birth defects. They were born with missing legs, arms, organs or eyes or had immune system and blood diseases. In some veterans’ families now, the only normal or healthy members of the family are the children born before the war.
The Department of Veterans Affairs has stated that they do not keep records of birth defects occurring in families of veterans.
How did they hide it?
Before a new weapons system can be used, it must be fully tested. The blueprint for depleted uranium weapons is a 1943 declassified document from the Manhattan Project.
Harvard President and physicist James B. Conant, who developed poison gas in World War I, was brought into the Manhattan Project by the father of presidential candidate John Kerry. Kerry’s father served at a high level in the Manhattan Project and was a CIA agent.
Conant was chair of the S-1 Poison Gas Committee, which recommended developing poison gas weapons from the radioactive trash of the atomic bomb project in World War II. At that time, it was known that radioactive materials dispersed in bombs from the air, from land vehicles or on the battlefield produced very fine radioactive dust which would penetrate all protective clothing, any gas mask or filter or the skin. By contaminating the lungs and blood, it could kill or cause illness very quickly.
They also recommended it as a permanent terrain contaminant, which could be used to destroy populations by contaminating water supplies and agricultural land with the radioactive dust.
The first DU weapons system was developed for the Navy in 1968, and DU weapons were given to and used by Israel in 1973 under U.S. supervision in the Yom Kippur war against the Arabs.
The Phalanx weapons system, using DU, was tested on the USS Bigelow out of Hunters Point Naval Shipyard in 1977, and DU weapons have been sold by the U.S. to 29 countries.
Military research report summaries detail the testing of DU from 1974-1999 at military testing grounds, bombing and gunnery ranges and at civilian labs under contract. Today 42 states are contaminated with DU from manufacture, testing and deployment.
Women living around these facilities have reported increases in endometriosis, birth defects in babies, leukemia in children and cancers and other diseases in adults. Thousands of tons of DU weapons tested for decades by the Navy on four bombing and gunnery ranges around Fallon, Nevada, is no doubt the cause of the fastest growing leukemia cluster in the U.S. over the past decade. The military denies that DU is the cause.
The medical profession has been active in the cover-up - just as they were in hiding the effects from the American public - of low level radiation from atmospheric testing and nuclear power plants. A medical doctor in Northern California reported being trained by the Pentagon with other doctors, months before the 2003 war started, to diagnose and treat soldiers returning from the 2003 war for mental problems only.
Medical professionals in hospitals and facilities treating returning soldiers were threatened with $10,000 fines if they talked about the soldiers or their medical problems. They were also threatened with jail.
Reporters have also been prevented access to more than 14,000 medically evacuated soldiers flown nightly since the 2003 war in C-150s from Germany who are brought to Walter Reed Hospital near Washington, D.C.
Dr. Robert Gould, former president of the Bay Area chapter of Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR), has contacted three medical doctors since February 2004, after I had been invited to speak about DU. Dr. Katharine Thomasson, president of the Oregon chapter of the PSR, informed me that Dr. Gould had contacted her and tried to convince her to cancel her invitation for me to speak about DU at Portland State University on April 12. Although I was able to do a presentation, Dr. Thomasson told me I could only talk about DU in Oregon “and nothing overseas … nothing political.”
Dr. Gould also contacted and discouraged Dr. Ross Wilcox in Toronto, Canada, from inviting me to speak to Physicians for Global Survival (PGS), the Canadian equivalent of PSR, several months later. When that didn’t work, he contacted Dr. Allan Connoly, the Canadian national president of PGS, who was able to cancel my invitation and nearly succeeded in preventing Dr. Wilcox, his own member, from showing photos and presenting details on civilians suffering from DU exposure and cancer provided to him by doctors in southern Iraq.
Dr. Janette Sherman, a former and long-standing member of PSR, reported that she finally quit some time after being invited to lunch by a new PSR executive administrator. After the woman had pumped Dr. Sherman for information all through lunch about her position on key issues, the woman informed Dr. Sherman that her last job had been with the CIA.
How was the truth about DU hidden from military personnel serving in successive DU wars? Before his tragic death, Sen. Paul Wellstone informed Joyce Riley, R.N., B.S.N., executive director of the American Gulf War Veterans Association, that 95 percent of Gulf War veterans had been recycled out of the military by 1995. Any of those continuing in military service were isolated from each other, preventing critical information being transferred to new troops. The “next DU war” had already been planned, and those planning it wanted “no skunk at the garden party.”
The US has a dirty (DU) little (CIA) secret
A new book just published at the American Free Press by Michael Collins Piper, “The High Priests of War: The Secret History of How America’s Neo-Conservative Trotskyites Came to Power and Orchestrated the War Against Iraq as the First Step in Their Drive for Global Empire,” details the early plans for a war against the Arab world by Henry Kissinger and the neo-cons in the late 1960s and early 1970s. That just happens to coincide with getting the DU “show on the road” and the oil crisis in the Middle East, which caused concern not only to President Nixon. The British had been plotting and scheming for control of the oil in Iraq for decades since first using poison gas on the Iraqis and Kurds in 1912.
The book details the creation of the neo-cons by their “godfather” and Trotsky lover Irving Kristol, who pushed for a “war against terrorism” long before 9/11 and was lavishly funded for years by the CIA. His son, William Kristol, is one of the most influential men in the United States.
Both are public relations men for the Israeli lobby’s neo-conservative network, with strong ties to Rupert Murdoch. Kissinger also has ties to this network and the Carlyle Group, who, one could say, have facilitated these omnicidal wars beginning from the time former President Bush took office. It would be easy to say that we are recycling World Wars I and II, with the same faces.
When I asked Vietnam Special Ops Green Beret Capt. John McCarthy, who could have devised this omnicidal plan to use DU to destroy the genetic code and genetic future of large populations of Arabs and Moslems in the Middle East and Central Asia - just coincidentally the areas where most of the world’s oil deposits are located - he replied: “It has all the handprints of Henry Kissinger.”
In Zbignew Brzezinski’s book “The Grand Chessboard: American Primacy and Its Geostrategic Imperatives,” the map of the Eurasian chessboard includes four regions strategic to U.S. foreign policy. The “South” region corresponds precisely to the regions now contaminated permanently with radiation from U.S. bombs, missiles and bullets made with thousands of tons of DU.
A Japanese professor, Dr. K. Yagasaki, has calculated that 800 tons of DU is the atomicity equivalent of 83,000 Nagasaki bombs. The U.S. has used more DU since 1991 than the atomicity equivalent of 400,000 Nagasaki bombs. Four nuclear wars indeed, and 10 times the amount of radiation released into the atmosphere from atmospheric testing!
No wonder our soldiers, their families and the people of the Middle East, Yugoslavia and Central Asia are sick. But as Henry Kissinger said after Vietnam when our soldiers came home ill from Agent Orange, “Military men are just dumb stupid animals to be used for foreign policy.”
Unfortunately, more and more of those soldiers are men and women with brown skin. And unfortunately, the DU radioactive dust will be carried around the world and deposited in our environments just as the “smog of war” from the 1991 Gulf War was found in deposits in South America, the Himalayas and Hawaii.
In June 2003, the World Health Organization announced in a press release that global cancer rates will increase 50 percent by 2020. What else do they know that they aren’t telling us? I know that depleted uranium is a death sentence … for all of us. We will all die in silent ways.
To learn more
Sources used in this story that readers are encouraged to consult:

American Free Press four-part series on DU by Christopher Bollyn.
Part I: "Depleted Uranium: U.S. Commits War Crime Against Iraq, Humanity,"
http://www.americanfreepress.net/html/depleted_uranium.html

Part II: "Cancer Epidemic Caused by U.S. WMD: MD Says Depleted Uranium Definitively
http://www.americanfreepress.net/html/cancer_epidemic_.html

Part III: "DU Syndrome Stricken Vets Denied Care:
Pentagon Hides DU Dangers to Deny Medical Care to Vets",
http://www.americanfreepress.net/html/du_syndrome.html

Part IV: "Pentagon Brass Suppresses Truth About Toxic
Weapons: Poisonous Uranium Munitions Threaten World",
http://www.americanfreepress.net/html/pentagon_brass.html

August 2004 World Affairs Journal. Leuren Moret:
"Depleted Uranium: The Trojan Horse of Nuclear War,"
http://www.mindfully.org/Nucs/2004/DU-Trojan-Horse1jul04.htm

August 2004 Coastal Post Online. Carol Sterrit: "Marin
Depleted Uranium Resolution Heats Up - GI's Will Come Home To A Slow Death,"
http://www.coastalpost.com/04/08/01.htm

World Depleted Uranium Weapons Conference, Hamburg, Germany, October 16-19, 2004:
http://www.uraniumweaponsconference.de/speakers.htm

International Criminal Tribunal for Afghanistan.
Written opinion of Judge Niloufer Baghwat:
http://www.mindfully.org/Reform/2004/Afghanistan-Criminal-Tribunal10mar04.htm

"Discounted Casualties: The Human Cost of Nuclear War" by Akira Tashiro, foreword by Leuren Moret,
http://www.chugoku-np.co.jp/abom/uran/index_e.html

Leuren Moret is a geoscientist who has worked around the world on radiation issues, educating citizens, the media, members of parliaments and Congress and other officials. She became a whistleblower in 1991 at the Livermore Nuclear Weapons Lab after experiencing major science fraud on the Yucca Mountain Project. An environmental commissioner in the City of Berkeley, she can be reached at leurenmoret@yahoo.com.

source: http://www.sfbayview.com/081804/Depleteduranium081804.shtml
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Brownwood Camp Bowie...

QUOTE

" Military men are just dumb stupid animals to be used as pawns in foreign policy." ~Republican Henry Kissinger, quoted in “Kiss the Boys Goodbye: How the United States Betrayed Its Own POW’s in Vietnam”

Martin Luther King Jr

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Oh yeah, Republicans are all about this kind of affirmative action !

Initiative fortified ties to lobbyists
'K Street Project,' now mired in scandal, aimed to ensure GOP control
12:00 AM CST on Sunday, January 15, 2006
By ALLEN PUSEY / The Dallas Morning News
WASHINGTON – In 1995, they named it the "K Street Project," a kind of affirmative action for Republican lobbyists, a program to expand GOP influence in the influence business.
The idea was to pressure those who lobby Congress – the trade associations, industry groups and high-dollar law firms – to help cement newly gained Republican control. They were asked to hire Republicans, fund GOP political initiatives and dramatically curb their support of Democrats.
But the K Street Project, now mired deeply in a lobbying scandal, could well undo the continuing Republican majority it was once designed to ensure.
Republican strategist Grover Norquist conceived it after the GOP took over the House. Fast-rising Texas congressman Tom DeLay embraced it. And Jack Abramoff, a lobbyist superstar, became the program's archetype.
"What the Republicans need is fifty Jack Abramoffs," said Mr. Norquist back then, explaining the aims of the K Street Project to The Washington Post. "Then this becomes a different town."
Mr. Abramoff recently pleaded guilty to conspiracy and fraud charges. His campaign contributions, lavish golf trips, sinecure jobs and expensive meals for congressmen and their staffers are the focus of a criminal investigation – which has implicated several former members of Mr. DeLay's staff and at least one Republican congressman.
Mr. DeLay, who had ridden the K Street Project to an 11-year tenure as a senior Republican leader, lost that power this month when a rebellion by GOP colleagues forced him to concede his post as House majority leader.
DeLay spokesman Kevin Madden said the K Street Project has been valuable on its own terms.
"It [the Republican revolution] was about transforming the culture of Washington. Changing things is more than changing the 435 people in office [in the House]. You have to change the culture that surrounds it," he said. "And I think it's succeeded to the extent that we've had legislative success."
Though little known outside Washington, the project has become an issue, even among Republicans. Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio, one of the candidates to replace Mr. DeLay as majority leader, has vowed that if elected, "There will be no longer be a K Street Project, or anything else like it."
Democrats have long made the project the centerpiece of their charge that Republicans have fostered a "culture of corruption." In 2000, they filed a federal racketeering lawsuit against Mr. DeLay over his demands of lobbyists. The suit was later dropped.
Paul Weyrich, head of the conservative Free Congress Foundation, said Democrats could capitalize on ethics issues, even though a number of their own party have been identified as recipients of Mr. Abramoff's largesse.
"Rightly or wrongly, Republicans seem to be held to a higher standard," Mr. Weyrich said.
Though Mr. Abramoff and his clients were generous to both parties, records show he favored Republicans. Between 1999 and 2005, Abramoff-related entities gave more than $4.4 million to more than 300 lawmakers, including $1.5 million to Democrats, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.
In its heyday, the K Street Project – so named for the downtown Washington corridor on which many lobbying firms have offices – was regarded as both networking and extortion, depending on your point of view. Either way, it is seriously big business.
Though dependable figures are difficult to come by, the 13,500 active registered lobbyists reported fees of more than $2.1 billion for their work in 2004, according to the consumer group Public Citizen. Because of their influence on legislation, lobbying firms often compete for former congressmen and their staffers, both for their grasp of the process and their personal relationships on Capitol Hill.
They lobby not only for Wal-Mart and Halliburton and Exxon, but the Catholic Church and the Girl Scouts, dispensing insight, information and suggestions. They also give money to lawmakers for their campaigns, charities, pet projects and defense funds.
Republicans argue that the project was made necessary by 40 years of a Democrat-dominated Congress. Most Washington lobbying firms were populated with Democrats at the time the K Street Project began, and the newly elected Republican majority wanted access to the high-paying jobs and campaign cash.
Mr. DeLay was unapologetic for that.
"We're just following the old adage of punish your enemies and reward your friends," he told The Post in 1995.
What differed from past practice by Democrats was the efficiency Mr. DeLay and Mr. Norquist brought to the process. Contributions and party affiliations were compiled into a database that Mr. DeLay could consult when lobbyists came to call. Lobbyists and their firms were rated "friendly" or "unfriendly" or "neutral."
A Web site posted job openings, and an e-mail service blasted Republican résumés.
"The K Street Project brought a partisanship to lobbying that just wasn't there before," said Larry Noble, a former Federal Election Commission general counsel who now heads the Center for Responsive Politics. "They didn't just want campaign contributions for Republicans, they wanted firms to stop giving to Democrats. And that was something new."
The program was wildly successful – too successful, according to critics – cementing the relationship between big money and party politics.
to read the entire article visit http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/washington/stories/DN-kstreetdog_15nat.ART.State.Edition1.3ed6901.html

All Aboard: Texas Republican Joe Barton, Pollution and Lobbyists !

Washington Leaderboard: We grade your representatives

08:47 PM CST on Saturday, January 14, 2006

Iraq. Terrorism. Deficits. Katrina. Immigration. Social Security.
It's the job of the elected officials you send to Washington to solve such problems. And it's the job of the editorial board to provide you information on how successfully President Bush, our senators and the North Texas congressional delegation tackled the tasks at hand.

That's the goal behind our third annual Washington Leaderboard.
What did each elected official do that met the bar in 2005?
Where did each fall short? And what should each attempt in 2006 ?

JOE BARTON (R) District 6

What he did: Increased his clout within the elite group of committee chairs that runs the House. The Ennis Republican used his post as head of the Energy and Commerce Committee to try to control Medicaid's growth, improve U.S. refinery capacity and pass an energy bill that nudges conservation but rewards producers.

What he didn't do: Get with the program to overhaul the Wright amendment so North Texans have more transportation options. He also didn't end his guerrilla warfare against cleaning up North Texas' air, which included amendments that would have let this region postpone its pollution battle. He so aggressively interrogated scientists who've warned about global warming that even the GOP chair of the science committee complained.

What he needs to do next: Use his committee to crack down on Medicaid fraud. Get a better handle on the Green Revolution before Great Britain and other countries race past us in the contest to fuse environmentalism with growth. Keep an open mind about the Wright amendment.
source: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/opinion/editorials/stories/011506dnedileader.304f0b6.html
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Todd J. Gillman:
Barton invites lobbyists all aboard
12:06 PM CST on Sunday, January 15, 2006
WASHINGTON – Despite recent hand-wringing over lobbying abuses, U.S. Rep. Joe Barton has no qualms about spending next weekend with lobbyists and other high-dollar backers. He's got a special time planned for anyone willing to spend $2,000 for a seven-hour private train ride Friday from Fort Worth to San Antonio.
"During the ride, we'll have lots of time to talk, play some Texas Hold 'Em, and enjoy some great down home Texas food," reads the glossy, six-panel invitation to "Joe Barton's 2006 Texas Train Ride." "This is about as good as it gets."
In San Antonio, donors will have brunch Saturday with the Ennis Republican, chairman of the powerful Energy and Commerce Committee and – since former Majority Leader Tom DeLay's fall from grace – the top-ranking Texan in the House. He and his guests will also have cocktails, an evening tour of the Alamo, dinner and breakfast on Sunday.
"Man, sounds like fun," said Craig McDonald, director of Texans for Public Justice. "Don't you usually give 'em just one chicken dinner? That's a pretty good return for $2,000."
He and other government watchdogs called the event remarkable for two reasons: the extended face time with Mr. Barton, and the timing, as Congress' image reels and GOP leaders develop plans to control the damage.
"It's an ingenious way to shake down money from the lobby and for the lobbyists to get almost 48 hours of uninterrupted attention from the chairman," said Tom Smith, executive director of Texas Public Citizen. "It certainly shows Barton's insensitivity to issues of propriety."
Barton campaign manager Craig Murphy was unapologetic.
"It's just a normal fundraiser," he said. "You've got to have a fundraiser if you're going to raise money and have a campaign. Everybody does it."
Lawmakers are always seeking more enticing formats than the typical stand-up cocktail party. Golf outings have been popular. Some offer ski trips or fishing excursions.
With 132 takers, the train ride will gross more than a quarter of a million dollars – far more than most lawmakers can command in one shot. But Mr. Barton's panel has jurisdiction over nearly half the issues Congress controls – such as oil policy, pro baseball, Medicare and environmental regulation.
Mr. Barton suffered a minor heart attack last month and recovered quickly. Elected with Mr. DeLay in 1984, he trails Rep. Ralph Hall in seniority by four years. But Mr. Hall was a Democrat until 2004. And with Mr. DeLay's fall amid allegations of corruption, Mr. Barton has emerged as de facto leader of Texas GOP members, urging them last week with mixed success to back Rep. Roy Blunt's bid for majority leader.
Powerful as he is, Mr. Barton is Texas' only chairman – a far cry from the influence Texas enjoyed for most of the past quarter-century. Democrat Jim Wright served as majority leader and speaker. Republican Dick Armey was majority leader from 1994 until three years ago. Mr. DeLay served as majority whip under him, then as majority leader for the last three years.
Redistricting forced out ranking Democrats on three committees. If Republicans can hang on to the majority, two more could be chairmen by this time next year.
Mr. Hall is in line to take over the Science Committee, and Rep. Lamar Smith of San Antonio is the top contender for the Judiciary Committee.
Just kidding
There's no nastier name one Democrat can call another these days than "Friend of Tom."
Former Rep. Ciro Rodriguez of San Antonio, touting the endorsement of former Sen. Bob Krueger in his bid to unseat Laredo Rep. Henry Cuellar, alleged that his opponent had a "tight relationship with Tom DeLay, from the favors he did as Rick Perry 's secretary of state to hosting fundraisers for DeLay's legal defense fund."
Mr. Cueller did serve the GOP governor. He did stump for President Bush.
And after ousting Mr. Rodriguez by a few dozen votes in 2004, he has voted with Mr. DeLay's side more often than nearly any other Democrat.
But host a DeLay fundraiser? Not true, as Rodriguez media consultant James Aldrete acknowledged after an inquiry.
"I inserted it from memory," he said. "I'm going to back off on that."
Todd J. Gillman covers Congress and the Texas delegation.

E-mail tgillman@dallasnews.com
source: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/politics/national/stories/DN-texwatch_15nat.ART.State.Edition2.3f3ab6b.html
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Joe Barton's Republican Politics and Midilothian Pollution issues.

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Republican Values !

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Abramoff and Republican "Family Values" ?

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SEPTEMBER 17 - 23, 2004
Don’t Mess With Texas
Gay governors, oil money, KKK fish camps and Karl Rove
by Lou Dubose

In the early ’90s, before we learned Governor Ann Richards was a lesbian, only the political cognoscenti in Texas knew Karl Rove’s name. Richards lost to George W. Bush in 1994, though before the race began, she had approval ratings in the 70s. She made the mistake of underestimating Bush, dismissing him with her signature-mark humor. She also underestimated Rove. And probably never believed he would dare to out her. The fact that she was a grandmother and a heterosexual provided her a false sense of security.
It didn’t stop Karl Rove then. And the truth is not something that is likely to get in Karl Rove’s way now. The campaign tactics Rove developed in the state that serves as the national proving ground for bad politics and policy suggest that there’s more to come for disabled swift-boat veteran John Kerry. And that he’d better respond, before he’s an entry in Politicalgraveyard.com.
East Texas was the political nut the Republicans had tried for years to crack. Culturally conservative, Christian, racially divided, yet historically Democratic in voting habits, Republican strategists saw it as a place where only African-Americans should have been voting Democratic. It was also the field-and-stream playground of the Dallas Social Registry. The Republican governor who preceded Richards, the owners of The Dallas Morning News, and the most prominent members of the old Dallas oil oligarchy weekended there at a racially exclusive fin-and-feather camp called the Koon Kreek Klub. The pun involving “coons” and KKK was hardly accidental, and provides some insight into the raw racial politics of the region.
George W. wasn’t a KKK fisherman. But he had a weekend place at the nearby Rainbow Club, which is as segregated as the old-line Koon Kreek, where memberships were no longer available when he showed up in Dallas. But the Bush family has never been racist. So it was unlikely that George W. would have agreed to play the race card. The queer card is another matter. That’s the card the Bush campaign played when a highly regarded Republican whom Karl Rove had helped elect to the state Senate spoke out about the sexual orientation of some women close to Governor Richards. “It’s simply not part of their culture, and frankly not part of mine,” the senator said of his East Texas constituents, “that [homosexuality] is something we encourage, reward, or acknowledge as an acceptable situation.” On the other side of the state’s Pine Curtain, the suggestion that the governor had gay associates was enough to create real doubts among voters. A whispering campaign that raised questions about Richards’ sexual orientation closed the deal.
No one ever traced the character assassination to Rove. Yet no one doubts that Rove was behind it. It’s a process on which he holds a patent. Identify your opponent’s strength, and attack it so relentlessly that it becomes a liability. Richards was admired because she promised and delivered a “government that looked more like the people of the state.” That included the appointment of blacks, Hispanics, and gays and lesbians. Rove made that asset a liability.
What worked to defeat Ann Richards in 1994 worked to defeat John McCain in 2000. As with John Kerry, McCain’s strength was his stature as a war hero. When he defeated George W. Bush in the New Hampshire Republican primary, the campaign moved to South Carolina — where Bush had to win to regain his credibility. In South Carolina, with its large population of veterans, McCain was attacked for his strength. The Republican senator faced a whispering campaign that implied that the time he spent as a prisoner of war in Vietnam had broken him, made him so mentally unstable he was unfit to be president. An ad campaign accused him of abandoning his Vietnam veterans after he returned home. Push polls raised the issue of his mental stability. He lost and never recovered.
Rove insisted he had nothing to do with it. Yet when Dallas Morning News reporter Wayne Slater reported that the attack on McCain was similar to what Rove had done to Ann Richards six years earlier, and to the Texas Democratic attorney general two years after that, Rove publicly confronted him, shouting and shoving on the tarmac in front of the campaign plane.
The White House is not subject to the Freedom of Information Act. So no reporter will have access to Karl Rove’s phone logs and appointment calendars, to prove the nature of his involvement with the Swift Boat Veterans’ attack on John Kerry. But few in Texas who pay attention to politics harbor any doubt that the Swift Boat attack against John Kerry is the work of the Bush political consultant with an office in the West Wing. The unanimous consensus of his political biographers — Jan Reid and me, who wrote Boy Genius, and Slater and Jim Moore, who wrote Bush’s Brain — is: Rove did it.
It’s the total Rove package. When a race is close, launch a collateral attack against your opponent’s greatest asset. (It’s best if it is tied to some truth: Richards had appointed two lesbians to positions of real power. McCain had been a POW in Vietnam. Kerry had served on a swift boat.) Keep your own candidate aloof from the controversy. Be persistent; if your opponent is explaining his position, he’s losing. And leave no fingerprints.
And denials notwithstanding, Karl Rove is always in complete charge of every detail and decision of his candidate’s campaign. Richards would never have been attacked without Rove’s plan to do so. McCain would have never been attacked without Rove’s direct participation in the planning. John Kerry would never have been attacked by Bush campaign surrogates unless Karl was in the deal.
Then there is the money.
Rove started his political career in Texas by building the first big Republican Party donor database, at a time when all the statewide offices and the Legislature were in Democratic hands. By 2000, Rove’s donor database and brilliant (if ruthless) campaign tactics had eliminated the last Democrat from statewide office. He did it in the Wild West of campaign finance, where anyone can write a check for any amount and the Texas sky is the limit. Now we learn that the first big funder of the Swift Boat ads was Bob Perry, who provided an early $200,000. Perry was the campaign treasurer for Bill Clements, the retired Republican governor who is probably fishing at the Koon Kreek Klub today. Rove ran Clements’ campaign — and pulled off a remarkable last-minute comeback in the polls by finding a bugging device in his own office and claiming that it was placed there by his Democratic opponent (though it was later traced back to Rove himself). Although he only recently made the national news, Perry is the godfather of modern Republican Texas, a Houston homebuilder who contributed $5.2 million to the state’s Republican candidates and political action committees since 2000 (according to Texans for Public Justice, which tracks political spending in the state).
Last week the other boot dropped. Texas oilman and corporate raider T. Boone Pickens contributed $500,000 to the Swift Boat campaign against John Kerry. Pickens is a seasoned Bush donor and a charter member of Team 100 — donors who contributed $100,000 each to Bush Sr.’s 1988 presidential campaign.
Pickens was here long before the Bushes arrived; he met Poppy Bush in the ’50s, when Bush showed up in West Texas to make his fortune in the oil patch. Rove came later. After reports in the Washington Post about an FBI examination into his clandestine school for young Republicans, Rove was investigated by the senior George Bush, then the Republican Party chairman cleaning up after Watergate. Bush concluded his inquiry and offered Rove a job in Houston.
It wasn’t virtue that Bush was rewarding.
Funny how things work out sometimes.

source: http://www.laweekly.com/ink/printme.php?eid=56843

Republican Playbook: Does it begin locally ?

" We have known for years that this represents the Republican playbook - never admit a problem and present a united public front, one that presents a rosy picture even in the face of bad news. The constitution describes a government for the people - the republicans present us with a government for themselves. "

source: http://dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/1/15/11146/6433

Arms trade may have Richardson link

Exclusive: Accountant in federal inquiry denies helping sell weapons to thugs worldwide
11:55 PM CST on Saturday, January 14, 2006
By RANDY LEE LOFTIS / The Dallas Morning News
First of two parts
On a warm and windy Tuesday last spring, armed federal agents assembled for an early-morning raid on suburbia.
When the order came, some headed to a small, nondescript accounting firm in Richardson where a candy dish tempted visitors and a framed print of the Declaration of Independence hung on the wall.
Others went to a modest brick home with a nice lawn, a 5-year-old Mercedes E20 in the garage, and a movable basketball goal in the back.
The agents, some from the FBI and others from the Treasury Department, carried a three-page letter that a federal official in Washington had secretly signed four days earlier.
It declared in hazy, bureaucratic language that Richard Ammar Chichakli – 47, U.S. citizen, decorated Army veteran, certified public accountant, small-time entrepreneur, self-described conservative Republican, Christian, 19-year Richardson resident, youth soccer coach, suburban dad and, he says, an innocent man – was actually someone far different.

Richard Chichakli
The letter said Mr. Chichakli was part of the world's most notorious network of illicit gunrunners, people willing to arm anybody who would wire cash to faraway bank accounts or launder diamonds or timber on the global black market.
The network's secret customers, the government said, included diamond-hunting rebel gangs with a lust for rape, slaughter and mutilation. One of them was Sierra Leone's Revolutionary United Front, which in 1998 carried out a terrorism campaign called Operation No Living Thing – as in, don't leave any.
Another was the RUF's sponsor, Charles Taylor, the former Liberian president charged with crimes against humanity – including, his 2003 indictment says, "unlawful killings, abductions, forced labor, physical and sexual violence, use of child soldiers, looting and burning of civilian structures." Now ducking trial in Nigeria, he is said to be a continuing threat to the region's peace and stability.
to read the entire article please visit http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/011506dnprochick.2d4095d.html
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What do you know about Robert Taylor and US Christian Leader Pat Robertson ?

read more here...

Steves' Deli: " It starts with the salt " !

Steves' Deli: " It starts with the salt " !
Originally uploaded by photosteve.

Republican Bullys: Not limited to the Texas Panhandle !

Back on the Texas Ballot: GOP should get out of the bullying business
Dallas Morning News Editorial
07:01 AM CST on Friday, January 13, 2006

The Supreme Court of Texas nailed the state Republican Party on some ballot chicanery yesterday involving a state House district in the Panhandle.
Two reasons people as far away as Dallas should care: (1) GOP leaders got caught meddling in a local election, and (2) the court has revived the candidacy of an education-friendly challenger to the status quo.
A few days ago, party officials did seven-term Rep. David Swinford a big favor by knocking his opponent off the ballot. That opponent, longtime Amarillo school board member Anette Carlisle, had joined a statewide slate of education-friendly candidates out to shake the House leadership's stubborn resistance to giving public schools a big boost in funding. Her campaign against Mr. Swinford, one of House Speaker Tom Craddick's lieutenants, was a challenge as well to one of the most powerful Republicans in Texas.
Perhaps that was why the state GOP tried to use a bizarre interpretation of the Texas Constitution to jettison Ms. Carlisle. The official rationale was the state's ban on legislative service for those already holding "lucrative office." Strange, but Ms. Carlisle's service on the school board is not rewarded with pay. Her board's reimbursement of travel expenses is hardly lucrative in any common-sense interpretation, an argument the Supreme Court apparently bought in ordering Ms. Carlisle back on the ballot yesterday.
Republicans statewide might wonder why leaders, in their pro-Swinford ruling, apparently abandoned their traditional neutrality in intramural primary face-offs. Party members also might wonder why at least seven other school board members remained on the primary ballot. (Two of those, incidentally, are targeting incumbents who angered Mr. Craddick by refusing to hew the party line on a crucial education vote last year.)
The ballot shenanigans should concern any party member who thinks the GOP has no business trying to prevent voters from deciding between candidates' competing philosophies.
The Supreme Court ruling keeps alive a candidacy that could amount to a referendum on the House's hard line against compromise with the Senate on badly needed new money for schools. The attempted power play against the challenge is proof of the stakes involved.
source: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/opinion/editorials/stories/DN-swinford_13edi.ART.State.Edition1.1db5e35e.html

QUOTE

" Change and growth take place when a person has risked himself and dares to become involved with experimenting with his own life. " ~Herbert Otto

Brownwood Brokeback: Will straight men watch this movie ?

AP: Do you think straight men will watch this movie ?

Proulx: They are watching this movie. Of course, why wouldn't they watch it? Straight men fall in love. Not necessarily with each other or with a gay man. My son-in-law, who prides himself on being a Bud-drinking, NRA-member redneck, liked the movie so much he went to it twice. Straight men are seeing it, and they're not having any problem with it. The only people who would have problems with it are people who are very insecure about themselves and their own sexuality and who would be putting up a defense, and that's usually young men who haven't figured things out yet. Jack and Ennis would probably have trouble with this movie.

read interview here...

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Who are the " Jack and Ennis' " of Brownwood ?

where would they hang out and who would they bash ?...

"Red State" Brokeback !

Posted on Sat, Jan. 14, 2006

`Brokeback' may herald acceptance of gay marriage

By Sue Hutchison - Mercury News
If you are looking for a cultural signpost to the future of gay marriage, you need look no further than the reaction to the saga of love-struck cowboys. Never mind that ``Brokeback Mountain'' has a good chance to corral more than its share of major awards at the Golden Globes ceremony on Monday. The big news is that the film is being embraced even in red states.
There were early signs that this might happen when ``Brokeback'' played to big crowds in December at the cineplex in Plano, Texas. This month, according to the Dallas Morning News, the film has more than quadrupled the number of theaters where it's playing, to 269 screens, and its audiences have increased by more than 60 percent. We're talking about audiences in the heart of the Midwest and in the South -- not exactly the demographic you'd expect to warm to a tale about gay Marlboro men.
Universal love story
But that's the power of a beautifully filmed love story. The appeal is universal. As tragic on-screen lovers go, Ali MacGraw and Ryan O'Neal have nothing on the two ``Brokeback'' cowboys. No wonder it seems to be turning into a date movie -- for heterosexuals.
When Ann Davidson went to the film in Palo Alto recently, she saw what appeared to be mostly heterosexual couples in the audience, many of whom were middle-aged. It was the same for Mary Ann Woodall when she saw it at Santana Row in San Jose and for Joyce Miller when she saw it at the PruneYard in Campbell.
``I think this will be a turning point for people who have not thought about gay and lesbian relationships,'' said Davidson, whose son is gay. ``They will be moved by the power of this film without any labels being attached to it.''
Davidson, Woodall and Miller have a special interest in ``Brokeback Mountain'' because they are members of the South Bay chapter of PFLAG, or Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays. They say the time is right for a movie to bust through the stereotypes of gays as urban interior decorators and drag queens. It's time to see gay relationships portrayed as simply human, not as a ``lifestyle'' or an ``issue.''
Story rings true
Miller, whose son is gay, runs a PFLAG support group for straight men and women divorced from gay spouses, and she said the film really hit home: ``This movie may be the best way for people to see that denying others the right to love who they want to love causes major collateral damage.''
Meanwhile, gay-marriage bans continue to lose traction. A recent California poll showed a trend toward more approval of gay marriage, with as many people for it as against it. That's a significant change from only five years ago, when a clear majority opposed it. Polls also show that people under 30 are far more accepting of gay marriage.
But if you really want to get a sense of the inevitability of gay marriage, just go to your local theater and check out the response to ``Brokeback Mountain.'' When I saw it last month, with a crowd that appeared to be all heterosexual couples and families, I went through an entire purse-packet of Kleenex. And I wasn't the only one.
I thought about cowboy Ennis Del Mar's line when he tried to explain to Jack Twist, the love of his life, why they could never be together: ``If you can't fix it, you gotta stand it.''
They had to stand for being kept apart, but the time is coming when even cowboys like Jack and Ennis won't have to stand for it anymore.
Sue Hutchison's column appears Tuesdays and Saturdays. Contact her at shutchison@mercury news.com.
source: http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/entertainment/13626084.htm

Housing Diversity: Brownwood Texas & Prospect Colorado

read more here...

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How about a flock of Yurts Brownwood ?

read more here...

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read more here...

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read more here...

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read more here...

Brownwood Military Support: Diverse Groups and Diverse Showings of Support !

21st Cavalry enjoys meal, Brownwood’s hospitality
By Candace Cooksey Fulton — Brownwood Bulletin

Robert Porter, right, representing the Brownwood business community and the “Brownwood Mafia,” presents Col. Gregory Brockman, the commanding officer of the 21st Cavalry, a marble plaque bearing the Brownwood Reunion “Feels Like Home” logo. to be affixed to the pedestal, presented in November and sitting in Brockman’s Fort Hood office. The pedestal was made to serve as a stand for the trophy awarded to the 21st Cavalry by the Brownwood Mafia in 1986. Photo by Candace Cooksey Fulton

For the third month in a row, the 21st Cavalry from Fort Hood, on a training mission at the National Guard Armory, “chowed down” on real home cooking.
“It’s kind of hard to say thanks enough,” said Col. Gregory Brockman, the commanding officer of the 21st Cavalry. “Every time we come it just gets better and better. You feed us, you give us gifts and we appreciate it. We don’t know how to say ‘thanks’ enough.”
Wednesday’s meal of chicken breasts and gravy, green beans and potato casserole — real home cooking — was eaten with relish and plenty of compliments from the camo-clad diners. When the Military Family Support Group learned last November the 21st Cavalry troops would have a week of training at the National Guard Armory one week a month for six months, they began a “welcome to Brownwood effort” they hoped would translate into making Brownwood “feel like home” for the troops.
Some of the diners said on Wednesday that Brownwood not only “felt like home,” the food was better than home. Members of Southside Baptist Church prepared the meal, complete with a 6-foot-long table laden with homemade desserts, and for the other meals, Brownwood Janitorial contributed the paper and plastic ware. The Military Family Support Group and Republican Women helped serve.
Near the conclusion of the meal, Brad Locker made a few welcoming remarks, explaining to the troops that the ties in Brownwood are in strong support of those serving in the military.
“We want to do what we can to facilitate making your lives a little easier and your stay here as enjoyable as it can be,” Locker said.
And, to complete the gift of a pedestal designed to hold the trophy presented to the 21st Cavalry in 1986 by the Brownwood Mafia, Robert Porter presented Brockman a marble plaque bearing the Brownwood Reunion “Feels Like Home” logo to be affixed to the pedestal.
source: http://www.brownwoodbulletin.com/articles/2006/01/12/news/news02.txt
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Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY)
1st-term Democrat from New York.

Letters To Leaders
All messages are published with permission of the sender. The general topic of this message is Defense/Military:
Subject:
Can you help this Texas Soldier in Need

To: Sen. Hillary Clinton
June 30, 2005

Dear Senator, We are asking that you please see what you can do to help this soldier and his family. The following story was thankfully published in the Fort Worth Star Telegram:

Posted on Sun, Jun. 26, 2005
A war within
A GI's story illustrates the challenges the military faces in delivering mental health services to troubled soldiers
By Chris Vaughn
Star-Telegram Staff Writer
BROWNWOOD - Pfc. Jacob Hounshell wrote his goodbye on notebook paper, wrapped it around a photo of himself in uniform, left it on his bed and climbed into his pickup. ¶ He was supposed to be heading back to Fort Hood. But he had no plans to make it that far. He'd already figured out what he would do -- drive as fast as he could into an oncoming 18-wheeler. ¶ Less than three months after returning from a 14-month hitch in Iraq, Hounshell had come undone.
He could barely remember the excitement he carried to Iraq in early 2004. He was an excellent soldier, by most accounts, even though he was only 18 when he left. On one memorable night, his quick thinking helped his platoon defeat a group of insurgents in Baghdad.
Today, the same soldier, now 20, is wanted for desertion, a particularly loathsome act during wartime and one that could bring a prison sentence.
Hounshell's problems began after he returned to Texas in late February. He couldn't sleep, often wandering through Killeen's all-night Wal-Mart. He had panic attacks and sometimes exploded in anger at the slightest change in plans. He played chicken with other drivers on Central Texas highways.
When he asked the Army for help, he said, he was greeted mostly with indifference.
"I told them numerous times, 'I'm having problems here. I'm seeing ... [things] at night.' They didn't take it seriously," he said. "They did the minimum thing they had to do."
Finally, in May, at the end of an emergency leave, he vowed never to go back to Fort Hood.
It was May 15 when he wrote the suicide note. His mother found it before he could leave the driveway. She jumped in the pickup and wouldn't let him leave.
His family is desperate to get him help, but they have no idea where to turn.
"We're not trying to hurt our soldiers overseas, and we didn't want this fight with the Army," said his mother, Bobbie Hounshell. "But my son had problems when he came home, and all he was told was, 'Drive on.' "
rest of the story @ http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/news/state/11990650.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
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On behalf of The Brownwood Human Rights Committee and other concerned residents of Central Texas, I urge you to help this family, and our neighbors, who are in need.

Regards,
Steve Harris
Brownwood Human Rights Committee

brownwood , TX
source: http://www.congress.org/congressorg/bio/userletter/?id=10902&letter_id=373757776
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Congress set to OK Waco's PTSD study tonight

By Dan Genz Tribune-Herald staff writer
Sunday, December 18, 2005

Waco's congressman dubbed 2005 a "win-win year" for the embattled Waco Veterans Affairs Hospital as Congress tonight neared passage of a defense appropriations bill that includes $3 million for a joint study of post traumatic stress disorders.
Funding for the study, which would be conducted by the local hospital, the Olin E. Teague Veterans Center in Temple and nearby Fort Hood, would come just a month after Congress awarded the 73-year-old Waco facility the distinction of being the first "Center of Excellence" for mental health.
It was a distinction that local hospital supporters and civic leaders sought fervently, along with a renewed focus on mental health problems spurred by war in Iraq. They hope to enhance the local VA hospital at a time when federal officials contemplate downsizing or even closing it.
The PTSD program's funding is part of $10.9 million for the Waco VA and area defense programs in the final 2006 Defense Appropriations bill, which is expected to pass the U.S. House tonight.
The bill, which has already been approved by a conference committee made up of members from both chambers, is expected to easily pass the Senate and be signed into law by President Bush.
U.S. Rep. Chet Edwards, D-Waco, who secured the local funding, said it was crucial as the war on terrorism continues. Pentagon studies suggest 17 to 19 percent of Iraq war veterans face mental health issues and up to 3 percent show full symptoms of PTSD, he said.
"To me, the real significance, and I've talked to VA people about this, it's a culmination of what Sen. (Kay Bailey) Hutchison wrote and I supported in the House to give a 'Center of Excellence' designation for the Waco VA, plus now, right on top of that, a $3 million research project for PTSD for the Waco VA to work directly with Fort Hood," Edwards said.
The congressman said the combination "sends a real clear message to the VA leadership that we want the VA's resources (in Waco) better utilized and not shut down." He said shuttering the 127-acre facility would be "a tragic mistake."
to read the entire article please visit http://www.wacotrib.com/news/content/news/stories/2005/12/18/20051218wacbooker.html?cxtype=rss&cxsvc=7&cxcat=11
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AP Enterprise: Soldiers Beef Up Humvees

By RYAN LENZ and JASON STRAZIUSO, Associated Press Writers 2 hours, 10 minutes ago

TIKRIT, Iraq - Soldiers exposed to Iraq's increasingly lethal roadside bombs, which can rip through armored Humvees, are drawing on wartime experience and stateside expertise to protect their vehicles with stronger armor and thermal detection cameras.
The upgrades are being done by individual soldiers and units as the Pentagon decides how Humvees should be changed, and follow public criticism of the Bush administration for not armoring all Humvees ahead of the war.
Nearly three years after rolling into Iraq in trucks covered in many instances only by canvas roofs, the 101st Airborne Division's 3rd Brigade is adding extra layers of armor to its Humvees.
Col. Michael Steele, the brigade's commander, said he ordered the improvements because the insurgents' roadside bombs — known to the military as "improvised explosive devices" — have become bigger and harder to detect.
"The responsibility of the commander is to figure out what we need to respond to this evolving threat. The easiest, the fastest and most appropriate answer is add additional armor," Steele said.
to view the entire article please visit http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060113/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_super_humvees
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Pentagon to families: Go ahead, laugh

By Gregg Zoroya, USA TODAY Fri Jan 13, 6:45 AM ET

When the stress of the war in Iraq becomes too severe, the Pentagon has a suggestion for military families: Learn how to laugh.
With help from the Pentagon's chief laughter instructor, families of National Guard members are learning to walk like a penguin, laugh like a lion and blurt "ha, ha, hee, hee and ho, ho."
No joke.
"I laugh every chance I get," says the instructor, retired Army colonel James "Scotty" Scott. "That's why I'm blessed to be at the Pentagon, where we definitely need a lot of laughter in our lives."
to read the entire article please visit http://news.yahoo.com/s/usatoday/20060113/pl_usatoday/pentagontofamiliesgoaheadlaugh
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Guardsmen Sue for Post-9/11 Expenses

By JAY LINDSAY, Associated Press Writer Wed Jan 11, 11:57 AM ET

BOSTON - A group of National Guard soldiers who were ordered to protect possible targets after the Sept. 11 attacks sued the federal government Wednesday, seeking tens of millions of dollars in expenses they say were never reimbursed.
The soldiers, from Massachusetts and New Hampshire, say they traveled hundreds of miles to security postings and used their own money to pay for food and lodging with the expectation that they would be reimbursed.
But the soldiers say in their complaint that their requests for compensation were repeatedly denied and they eventually were told, "If you don't like the arrangement, we'll make sure you get taken off this mission."
In the lawsuit, the plaintiffs argue that federal law provides military personnel with a travel and transportation allowance while away from home on active duty.
The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court by four soldiers but seeks to include hundreds of other guardsmen as a class action. It names the U.S. Department of Defense and the Massachusetts National Guard and seeks $73 million in unpaid expenses.
A spokeswoman for the Pentagon referred all calls to the Department of Justice, where a spokesman did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment.
A call to a Massachusetts National Guard spokesman was not immediately returned.
The plaintiffs are Steven Littlefield of Plymouth, Wayne Gutierrez of New Bedford, Louis Tortorella of Brookline, N.H.; and Joseph Murphy of Derry, N.H. All but Tortorella are still in the National Guard. The areas they patrolled included Boston's primary water supply.
source: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060111/ap_on_re_us/guardsmen_lawsuit
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Three Years Later, the Armor is On the Way

Posted by Paul Rieckhoff
10:30 AM Jan 13, 2006

On Thursday morning the Army announced that it will be ordering 230,000 sets of ceramic plates to supplement the body armor it has provided to Soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. This was in response to a Pentagon study that determined the armor, if it had been issued when this war began, would have saved hundreds of lives.
More accurately, it was in response to the subsequent front-page story in the New York Times about the Pentagon study.
This is becoming something of a trend. Remember when Spc. Wilson embarassed Donald Rumsfeld with a question about the lack of Humvee armor? What does it say about the state of affairs when the only thing that lights a fire under Washington's ass is an embarrassing story in the newspaper?
Nothing good, so let's fix it. The way to do that is by demanding accountability from Congress, the Pentagon and the White House. Why has it taken this long to get lifesaving equipment to our Troops in harms way? Our men and women in uniform deserve a thorough and transparent investigation, and someone must be held accountable, or it's bound to happen again.
The Senate Armed Services Committee, under the leadership of Sen. John Warner, took the first steps in that process by convening a committee briefing yesterday, inviting Pentagon officials up to the Hill to explain the situation as they saw it. The result was the Army's announcement today that it will now be ordering the latest body armor for all Troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Unfortunately, it's going to take at least a year to get that new gear into the field. To put it another way, these are conversations that needed to happen a year before we committed our Troops to this war, instead of nearly three years into it.
Earlier in the week, here at IAVA, we sent a letter to Senator Warner, asking him to convene full hearings to explore the body armor problems and demand accountability. The briefing was a good start, and he deserves credit for taking the lead (albeit belatedly), on this issue, even though his office declined our offer to send a couple of IAVA member veterans up to the Hill to offer their firsthand accounts.
But the real work still lies ahead. Senator Warner and the rest of the Armed Services Committee must not let this issue disappear. There has still been no investigation into why it took three years for the Pentagon to finally act on the body armor problems, and no one has been held accountable for this flagrant example of bureaucracy at its worst. If Congress can hold televised hearings on steroids in baseball, then it can probably find the time to hold hearings on this.
For the Troops in the field, doing your job is a matter of life and death. You're looking out for the guy next to you, if only because you hope he's doing the same for you. It should be no different for every other part of the military supply chain and chain of command. If our Troops don't see that Congress, the Pentagon and the White House are committed to accountability on all levels, then all that talk of supporting the Troops is exactly that. Just talk.

source: http://www2.operationtruth.com/blog/comments.jsp?blog_entry_KEY=20542&t=
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Note from Steve: My Letter to the Editor in the Abilene Reporter News in response to their PTSD story and Letters to the Editor that followed the story.

Good reporting
November 22, 2005

I would like to thank you for your front page Nov. 13 reporting of returning U.S. military personnel who are in desperate need of medical services related to post-traumatic stress disorder.
I believe you should be commended for your comprehensive coverage which included interviews and information from Lt. Col. Scott R. Bleichwehl of the Fort Hood Public Affairs Office, Billy Murphey of the Brown County Veterans Service Office, Veterans Administration, Amer ican Psychological Association, Associated Press, Military.com. as well as the Hounshell family.
I would like to close with this:
''Research has already demonstrated that military service in Iraq and Afghanistan, like service in past combat zones, is having an adverse effect on the mental health of our men and women in uniform. More than one million men and women in uniform have rotated through combat in Iraq and Afghan-istan, and estimates of those affected by PTSD could be as high as one-in-five. Moreover, recent Government Account-ing Office reports indicate that Veterans Administration and the Department of Defense do not have the capacity to meet the increasing mental health needs of returning war veterans.''
Source: www.optruth.org.

Steve Harris
Brownwood
source: http://www.reporter-news.com/abil/op_letters_editor/article/0,1874,ABIL_7984_4257524,00.html
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Posted 1/12/2006 8:53 PM Updated 1/12/2006 9:00 PM

For lack of body armor, troops die. Why the delay ?

After Army and Marine Corps generals were summoned Wednesday to a closed-door briefing on Capitol Hill, the brass emerged with vows to improve body armor for all U.S. troops in Iraq. (Related: Opposing view)
That's good to hear, but shouldn't it have happened sooner?
Members of Congress were reacting to a newly reported analysis by the Armed Forces Medical Examiner, which concluded that 80% of the fatal injuries to Marines in the study might have been prevented by additional armor coverage. Side armor, a special concern, is just beginning to arrive in Iraq.
The armor situation fits a deadly pattern of blunders by the war's architects. The quick invasion of Iraq happened as planned, but — as former Iraq civilian administrator Paul Bremer acknowledges in his new book — the Bush administration didn't anticipate the widespread and lethal insurgency that followed.
source: http://usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2006-01-12-our-view_x.htm
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Clinton seeks inquiry into body armor study

January 9, 2006, 2:38 PM EST
WASHINGTON (AP) _ Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton urged Congress Monday to re-examine the Pentagon's standards for soldiers' body armor in Iraq, after a new study found most fatal torso wounds to Marines would have been prevented or minimized with more protection.
The New York Democrat said the as-yet-unreleased report by the Armed Forces Medical Examiner should spur greater scrutiny by the Senate Armed Service Committee and the investigative arm of Congress.
The results of the study were disclosed last week. It examined 93 fatal wounds to Marines from the start of the Iraq war in March 2003 through June 2005. The study concluded most of those injuries might have been prevented or minimized if they had been wearing improved body armor.
"With U.S. troops risking their lives daily in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, we owe it to them to make sure they have the best equipment possible," Clinton wrote to committee chairman John Warner.
source: http://www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/newyork/ny-bc-ny--iraq-bodyarmor0109jan09,0,440523.story?coll=ny-region-apnewyork
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U.S. Department of Defense

Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense (Public Affairs) News Release

On the Web:
http://www.defenselink.mil/releases/2005/nr20050613-3683.html

IMMEDIATE RELEASE June 13, 2005 DoD Identifies Marine Casualties
The Department of Defense announced today the death of two Marines who were supporting Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Lance Cpl. Mario A. Castillo, 20, of Brownwood, Texas

Lance Cpl. Andrew J. Kilpela, 22, of Fowerville, Mich.

Both Marines died June 10 as a result of an explosion while conducting combat operations in Saqlawiyah, Iraq. They were assigned to 2nd Combat Engineer Battalion, 2nd Marine Division, II Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Lejeune, N.C.
source: http://www.defenselink.mil/releases/2005/nr20050613-3683.html
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read more here...

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Veterans take on new battle: run for office - 'Fighting Dems' see options in the war against terrorism
By Bryan Bender, Globe Staff | November 27, 2005

PHILADELPHIA -- Bryan Lentz, toting an Army-issue duffel bag, slips into the booth.
Over the din of a bustling downtown coffee shop, the 41-year-old infantry officer and lawyer leans across the table, and outlines his latest mission.
''You either have to buy into the rhetoric or stand up. I am standing up."
Lentz, who as a major in the 82d Airborne helped to rebuild the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, is running for Congress. He is one of at least nine veterans vying to become the first soldiers of the post-9/11 military to be elected to the House of Representatives, according to party leaders.
They say their experience makes them well-suited to help successfully extricate the United States from Iraq and to more effectively fight the war on terrorism, which they fear is being lost in the Muslim world's court of public opinion.
Eight of the nine are running as Democrats. At least three are lawyers. Most went to the front lines from the Reserves or the National Guard. Some have been recruited for office by party leaders; others say they are trying to get the national parties to pay attention to them.
But they are all running on their wartime experience and against the prevailing political hierarchy in Washington -- both Republican and Democrat.
They are expected to inject a pivotal voice into the debate next year, a midterm election season that is likely to focus heavily on security issues such as US involvement in Iraq and homeland defense.
''We will have a very strong voice and instant credibility," said Tim Dunn, a Marine Corps lieutenant colonel and a Deomcrat who served in Iraq and is now running in North Carolina's Eighth District, a seat held by four-term Republican Robin Hayes. ''We bring to the table the experience and the knowledge gained through our service, whether active duty or Reserve, so that when these decisions are made in the future we have people who can stand up and ask the right questions. People will listen to us."
The veterans are running in Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina, Texas, Maryland, and Minnesota. More are likely to announce as the primary season heats up, party officials predict.
Several are seeking to defeat first-term incumbents in highly competitive districts. Others face an uphill battle, including Lentz, who is seeking to unseat 10-term Republican Curt Weldon in the Philadelphia suburbs of Bucks County.
Using their wartime service to burnish their credentials, most are banking on voters' disillusionment with the war in Iraq to catapult themselves into the House, where Republicans now hold a narrow majority.
Their views on Iraq are not universal. Some believe a withdrawal is necessary. Others say more troops are needed. Lentz, for one, says the key to success in Iraq is a nationwide rebuilding effort that includes cracking down on US war profiteers.
But they all agree that US policy needs an overhaul.
''Being a military veteran is not a prerequisite for serving in Congress, but I can ask the penetrating questions," said David Ashe, 36, a major in the Marine Corps Reserve who was the deputy legal counsel to a three-star general in Iraq, and who is running in a three-way Democratic primary in Virginia's heavily military Second District. The seat is now held by a first-term Republican, Thelma Drake, who defeated Ashe by 10 percentage points in 2004.
US military conflicts have historically molded new breeds of veterans who return to join the political fray. Many of them have had an enduring impact.
In 1946, when the World War II generation entered politics, two neophytes, John F. Kennedy and Richard M. Nixon, came to define their parties for a generation. Since, leading presidential contenders such as George McGovern, Robert Dole, and George H.W. Bush all held up their service in World War II as a key selling point.
More than three decades after he was the first Vietnam veteran elected to Congress, Representative John Murtha of Pennsylvania was still shaping the debate this month when the senior Democrat stirred up Washington with a call for a withdrawal from Iraq.
But the number of lawmakers with military experience has dropped dramatically since Murtha was first elected in 1974, when nearly 80 percent of members of Congress had served in uniform.
Now, less than 30 percent in Congress have military experience, according to congressional statistics.
Veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan are hoping to make their own mark in 2006, an election season the liberal web log DailyKos.com has already labeled the ''year of the veteran."
''The fact that so many are running as Democrats is a reflection of the public disillusion with the powers that be," said Michael Duga, a Democratic strategist. ''Who best to speak for the military on an exit strategy than guys who have been there?"
They all speak from experience. Patrick Murphy, a 32-year-old former Army captain and West Point professor, helped train the Iraqi Civil Defense Corps.
A self-described progressive, he is running in Pennsylvania's Eighth District, in the Philadelphia suburbs, a seat now held by freshman Republican Michael Fitzpatrick.
''Those in power are arrogant and don't want to listen to the experts," said Murphy. ''We can speak truth to power."
Andrew Duck, 43, is running in rural Maryland's Sixth District, a seat held by seven-term Republican Roscoe Bartlett. Describing himself as a Democrat who is opposed to abortion, the former Army intelligence officer still works in the Pentagon as a contractor.
''I am very proud I helped get rid of Saddam Hussein, but I am also embarrassed at how badly we have messed it up since then," he said in a recent interview in a pizza shop near the Pentagon.
''People say there wasn't a plan. I know there was a plan," Duck said. ''Our problem was we were told [by Pentagon leaders] we can't use it."
Duck, who served as an intelligence liaison officer between ground forces in Iraq, believes the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, detainee prison camp is illegal and should be closed. But he said what ''broke the camel's back" was seeing firsthand the failure to provide adequate armor to protect US troops from insurgent attacks.
Indeed, others cite what they consider to be incompetent leadership as pushing them into politics.
''We were paying Iraqis 20,000 dinars a month and the looters were paying them 20,000 dinars a night," Ashe said in a telephone interview from his headquarters.
''I had a street-level view of the failures of postwar planning. We failed in setting up a bureaucracy, let alone a democracy."
Their concerns extend beyond Iraq. Chris Carney, a lieutenant commander in the Naval Reserve running in Pennsylvania's 10th District, said he has seen leaders mismanage the war on terror.
Carney, who was a senior Pentagon counterterrorism adviser, said: ''I have come to realize our country is no safer than it was before 9/11. We need to be spending far more resources in homeland security than we have been."
Tim Walz, a 41-year-old school teacher and 24-year veteran of the National Guard who was called up to active duty after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, said he has decided to run in Minnesota's First District, a seat held by six-term Republican Gil Gutknecht, because of what he sees as ''the politicization of the military and politicians using them as a backdrop."
The Democratic candidates, labeled the ''Fighting Dems" by liberal Internet bloggers, say they are hoping to pool their resources and to rely on their collective power and influence to raise money and gain nationwide media attention.
''They are becoming an entity in and of themselves, almost a caucus," said Duga, the Democratic strategist.
Carl Forti, a spokesman for the National Republican Campaign Committee, said he believes most recent veterans are running as Democrats because the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee ''is seeking to find as many vets as possible to run."
He said the Republicans, on the other hand, are looking for the best candidates, whether military veterans or not.
At least one new veteran will be appearing on the ballot as a Republican. In Texas's 17th Congressional District, now filled by an eight-term Democrat, Chet Edwards, 33-year-old Van Taylor, a Marine Corps major who led reconnaissance missions during the invasion of Iraq, is running in the GOP primary.
''It can only help to send people to Washington who have firsthand experience in the war on terror," Taylor said of his campaign effort.
''After 10 years in the Marine Corps I've learned a lot about the military and the war on terror," said the Harvard graduate, experience he said will be useful for ''many years to come."
Regardless of political party, most say they are running against the current political order, which they believe has failed to collaborate on a unified strategy.
''Both parties have pursued policies of division, and there is this gaping whole in the middle where I think most Americans reside," said Carney, who until recently served as an adviser to the deputy defense secretary's office, and who now is vying to unseat four-term Republican Don Sherwood.
''Those people need to be represented," he said. ''I don't know how we go from a country as united as it was on Sept. 12, 2001, to one as divided as we are today. That is what is propelling me in this race."

Bender can be reached at bender@globe.com.
source: http://www.boston.com/news/politics/us_house/articles/2005/11/27/veterans_take_on_new_battle_run_for_office?mode=PF
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From the Dallas Morning News
Letters to the Editor

Veterans run as Democrats
Re: "Warriors vote Republican," by Robert D. Kaplan, Jan. 8 Points.
Let's forgive Mr. Kaplan for his lack of foresight last fall when he wrote this article. He could not have foreseen the administration's feeble hurricane response, Tom DeLay stepping aside, Jack Abramoff admitting guilt and an escalating Iraqi civil war.
Warriors may vote Republican, but far more veterans are running for Congress as Democrats in 2006 than as Republicans. I'm one of them.
The Democrats call themselves "The Band of Brothers," and those elected will invite all congressional veterans into their caucus to work in a "bipartisan way," returning our country to the world leadership position it held before 2001.
Dan Dodd, McKinney
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Re: "Warriors vote Republican," by Robert D. Kaplan, Jan. 8 Points.

Mr. Kaplan seems to glorify the attitude that warfare is a satisfying outlet for many Republicans. He says that the soldiers are not concerned with such petty concerns as what would be the best way to actually accomplish a desired goal.
No, it's enough to fight. Who cares if we're right?
Sorry, but I do not believe warfare is a satisfying avenue for personal validation. It's unfortunate that we can't overcome human nature, because if there weren't millions of soldiers perfectly willing to kill unquestioningly for a misguided leader, warfare as we know it wouldn't exist.
Misguided leaders become a threat not by themselves, but because they have power over thousands of willing soldiers who carry out their orders. Soldiery is merely a tool that I prefer not to romanticize.
Jeremy Lyon, Mesquite
source: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/opinion/letters/stories/DN-3ponpoints_0115edi.ART.State.Edition1.3e6ff92.html

'Brokeback Mountain' hits Abilene screens today

By Robert Denerstein / Scripps Howard News Service
January 13, 2006

Director Ang Lee's ''Brokeback Mountain'' - the story of two gay ranch hands beautifully played by Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal - seems to be on its way to crossover heaven, boasting surprising commercial success and gaining increasing recognition as a pop-cultural phenomenon.

Consider: Over the important Christmas weekend, ''Brokeback's'' per-screen average of $13,599 topped that of ''King Kong'' ($9,305).
In its first 10 days, the Focus Features release earned $2.5 million in 69 locations throughout the nation, according to Box Office Mojo, a Web site that tracks sales.
As of Jan. 2, the movie's domestic take had topped $15 million - and that is without having landed in cities such as Abilene yet (the film opens here today).
Dollars aside, ''Brokeback'' seems to have set off national buzz alarms. A recent Sunday edition of The New York Times carried no less than three ''Brokeback'' stories in different parts of the paper.
But wait ... there's more:
During an end-of-year panel on Fox News, commentator Juan Williams, who has worked for NPR and The Washington Post, predicted that ''Brokeback'' would ''sweep'' this year's Oscars, thus setting off some ''conservative alarms.''
Could be: The movie already has earned seven Golden Globe nominations, including one for best picture, and discussions about the movie aren't likely to abate as Focus continues to release the movie across the country.
The film tells an interesting story well, but its traction with mainstream audiences may result from the fact that the movie does as much to reflect prevailing American mythology as challenge it.
The movie represents an amazing balancing act; it may be about homosexual characters, but it's also shot through with a rugged and familiar romanticism that draws strength from strongly expressed individualism. The sorrow of ''Brokeback'' is palpable, but it's steeped in a gritty Western spirit that knows how to tough things out.
As Ennis Del Mar, the character played by Ledger, says at one point, ''If you can't fix it, you've got to stand it.''
There's not a big-screen cowboy from John Wayne to Clint Eastwood who couldn't have made that line work. Gay or straight, cowboys don't whine. They suffer in silence.
To further ease potential audience anxieties, the sex scenes are tame, at least by the more explicit standards of the gay movies that play the nation's art houses. Lee leaves no doubt that Jack and Ennis are lovers, but he's not using their sexuality in ways that audiences might interpret as ''defiant.''
Because Lee's impulses are artistic rather than propagandistic, the movie's themes have been broadened to include ruminations on the contemporary West and the devastations that result from clinging to romantic illusions.
First, the West: Taking its cue from the Annie Proulx short story on which it's based, ''Brokeback'' (with credit due to screenwriters Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana) is imbued with an important understanding: The West is both burdened and buoyed by its mythology. Ennis and Jack not only long for one another; they yearn for their time on Brokeback Mountain, where they had the space to be free.
Let's face it: Ennis and Jack wouldn't totally fit into the society that was developing around them even if they were straight. Their attitudes and modes of expression - and even their physical postures - suit Western landscapes. They certainly don't suffer from any macho deficits. It may not seem like it at first, but on reflection, Ennis and Jack fit into the romanticized outcast mode that's also a part of Western lore.
So are we in new territory? Have mainstream audiences shown a sudden tolerance for gay characters? It has happened before. ''La Cage Aux Folles'' (1978) was considered something of a landmark, but it was defined by a giddy, silly spirit that threatened no one. ''Philadelphia'' (1993) had Tom Hanks and a certifiable aura of class, but it arrived with more fanfare than ''Brokeback'' and was regarded by some as more of a disease-of-the-week movie than a gay movie.
It's too early to tell whether ''Brokeback'' signals a cultural shift or just a middlebrow ratification of more avant-garde cultural rumblings. Will the movie help topple walls of resistance and aid those who want to see gay marriage legalized? And what happens if ''Brokeback,'' as some commentators have predicted, wins the Oscar for best picture?
Safe to say we're in a stay-tuned moment in popular culture.

source: http://www.reporter-news.com/abil/et_movies/article/0,1874,ABIL_7914_4384469,00.html

What part of "Purchased" do the Republican Callers to KXYL "Not" Understand ?

Surge in Sale of Disposable Cell Phones May Have Terror Link
Phones Can Be Difficult or Impossible to Track; Large Quantities Purchased in California, Texas
By BRIAN ROSS and RICHARD ESPOSITO

Jan. 12, 2006 — Federal agents have launched an investigation into a surge in the purchase of large quantities of disposable cell phones by individuals from the Middle East and Pakistan, ABC News has learned.
The phones — which do not require purchasers to sign a contract or have a credit card — have many legitimate uses, and are popular with people who have bad credit or for use as emergency phones tucked away in glove compartments or tackle boxes. But since they can be difficult or impossible to track, law enforcement officials say the phones are widely used by criminal gangs and terrorists.
Digital Revolution
"There's very little audit trail assigned to this phone. One can walk in, purchase it in cash, you don't have to put down a credit card, buy any amount of minutes to it, and you don't, frankly, know who bought this," said Jack Cloonan, a former FBI official who is now an ABC News consultant.
Law enforcement officials say the phones were used to detonate the bombs terrorists used in the Madrid train attacks in March 2004.
"The application of prepaid phones for nefarious reasons, is really widespread. For example, the terrorists in Madrid used prepaid phones to detonate the bombs in the subway trains that killed more than 200 people," said Roger Entner, a communications consultant.
150 Phones in One Sale, 60 Phones in Another
The FBI is closely monitoring the potentially dangerous development, which came to light following recent large-quantity purchases in California and Texas, officials confirmed.
In one New Year's Eve transaction at a Target store in Hemet, Calif., 150 disposable tracfones were purchased. Suspicious store employees notified police, who called in the FBI, law enforcement sources said.
In an earlier incident, at a Wal-mart store in Midland, Texas, on December 18, six individuals attempted to buy about 60 of the phones until store clerks became suspicious and notified the police. A Wal-mart spokesperson confirmed the incident.
The Midland, Texas, police report dated December 18 and obtained by ABC News states: "Information obtained by MPD [Midland Police Department] dispatch personnel indicated that approximately six individuals of Middle-Eastern origin were attempting to purchase an unusually large quantity of tracfones (disposable cell phones with prepaid minutes attached)." At least one of the suspects was identified as being from Iraq and another from Pakistan, officials said.
"Upon the arrival of officers, suspects were observed moving away from the registers — appearing to evade detection while ridding themselves of the merchandise."
Other reports have come in from other cities, including Dallas, and from authorities in other states. Authorities in Pennsylvania, New York and other parts of Texas confirmed that they were alerted to the cases, and sources say other jurisdictions were also notified.
The growing use of the throwaway cell phones has been cited by President Bush as an important justification for expanding the wiretap laws under the Patriot Act.
"Law enforcement officials can now use what's now called roving wiretaps, which will prevent a terrorist from switching cell phones to get a message out to one of his buddies," Bush said on April 20, 2004.
Legitimate Uses May Have Spurred Sales, Too
Law enforcement sources say it is possible some large purchases that have been identified as being sent to the Middle East could have been sent for resale in a sellers' market for handsets, or simply given to friends and relatives. Officials are also investigating these possibilities.
Managing the complex balancing of these two issues — significant and legitimate uses and their potential for misuse has been an ongoing dilemma for law enforcement.
For now, both intelligence officers and bomb technicians have been monitoring reports of large-quantity purchases.
Some such purchases may have innocent explanations, but even law enforcement officials themselves say disposable phones are sometimes their own phones of choice when operating in hostile environments. The CIA recently used them in a kidnapping in Milan, Italy. Italian authorities were able to track the telephones. But they mostly tracked them to a dead end — the false identities in which they were purchased.
Possible purchasers of disposable cellular phones could also include political extremists, terrorist supporters, sympathizers or others simply shaken by the recent revelations of the spy agency's widespread monitoring of calls, including calls to and from the United States to foreign countries.
Police Report Identifies Terror Links
The Midland, Texas, arrest report police also identified the individuals as linked to a terror cell:
"Evasive responses provided by the subjects, coupled with actions observed by officers at the onset of the contact prompted the notification of local FBI officials to assist in the investigation," the report said. "Upon the arrival of special agents, and as a result of subsequent interviews, it was discovered that members of the group were linked to suspected terrorist cells stationed within the Metroplex.
Law enforcement officials have not elaborated on the information in the report or specified which terrorist group the individuals were allegedly linked to.
In addition, special agents reported that similar incidents centering on the large-scale purchases of tracfones had been reported throughout the nation — identifying individuals of Middle-Eastern descent as the purchasers."
ABC News is working to confirm the details in the police report.
"Upon conclusion of the initial investigation, three of the suspects were taken into custody on immigration violations, with one individual arrested for possession of marijuana — the drug having been discovered during the search of the group's vehicle. Also found within the green 2002 Kia van were additional cell phones, the total believed to be approximately 60."
FBI officials told ABC News that while the cases may wind up in the hands of Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, the FBI would benefit from any intelligence gleaned and would take the lead if a solid terrorist connection emerged.
ABC News' Jill Rackmill contributed to this report.
source: http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/Investigation/story?id=1499905

Where there's vision !

Where there's vision !
Originally uploaded by photosteve.

A New Spine For The Media: Does it apply to Brownwood Media too ?

read more here...

KXYL and Faye Hardin Interview: Pat Robertson and Sparkling Diamonds !

Very interesting interview on this mornings show @ KXYL ( Brownwood Talk Radio ). She agreed with Pat Robertson's recent comments regarding Israel Prime Minister Areiel Sharon. It was obvious to me that it was all about her as she closed her interview saying if listeners wanted to give to the Jews, here orgazination was the one ! Kind of the " my way or the highway " or " I know best " mantra of so many on the right side of the political spectrum in America ! Call KXYL and request the taped interview and listen for yourself.

read more here...

UPDATE 1.13.2005: Now that Pat Robertson has apologized for his comments, will Faye Hardin return to the airwaves of KXYL and give her opinion of his apology ? Is Pat's apology tied to a love of money and greed ? Since Faye is an "outspoken" supporter of Pat Robertson, will Faye also speak to the issue of the "sparkling" diamonds ( she mentioned all the tourist trade in Israel ! ) and speak of Pat Robertson's Diamond Mines in South Africa ?

decide for yourself...

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Christian Zionist support - a mixed blessing

SAMUEL G. FREEDMAN , THE JERUSALEM POST Jan. 10, 2006
On a summer evening in 2002, the Zionist Organization of America held its annual banquet, the occasion for bestowing its Israel Friendship Award. The honor went to Rev. Pat Robertson, the television evangelist and political activist who was perhaps the most visible public face of Christian Zionism.

At that particular moment in time, one could argue, Jews in both Israel and America could not afford to be especially finicky in choosing their allies. In the aftermath of the bloodiest month of suicide bombings during the Aksa intifada, the IDF had invaded and reoccupied the West Bank in early April, earning the predictable international condemnation. The chorus only grew in response to the reports, ultimately discredited, that Israeli troops had massacred hundreds of Palestinian civilians in Jenin.

So not only were the geopolitical right-wingers on hand that night in suburban Chicago, led by Morton Klein, the Zionist Organization of America's president. Not only were those Jews involved in building a political coalition with evangelical Christians, such as Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein. So was David Roet, the deputy consul-general of Israel in the Midwest, embodying the government of Ariel Sharon.

Three-and-a-half years and a disengagement from Gaza later, Robertson's honor stands as vivid evidence of why Jews ought to treat Christian Zionism with equal measures of gratitude and wariness. As an axiom I learned from a community organizer puts it, "No permanent friends, no permanent enemies."

By now, most sensate Jews have heard of Robertson's comments last week on his television show, The 700 Club. Likening Sharon's incapacitating stroke to Yitzhak Rabin's assassination, Robertson explained, "He was dividing God's land. And I would say, 'Woe unto any prime minister of Israel who takes a similar course to appease the EU, the United Nations or the United States of America.' God says, 'This land belongs to me. You better leave it alone.'"

THE STATEMENT is as illuminating as it is repugnant, and what it illuminates is the contingency of Christian Zionist support. By its very theological absolutism, Christian Zionism amounts to a very unreliable partner. As long as Israeli Jews play their ordained role in the eschatological plan, resettling the entire Land as a precondition for the Second Coming - when, by the way, they presumably will either become Christians or die as heathens - the Pat Robertsons will remain steadfast. Should the actually existing Israel make compromises on territory in order to preserve a Jewish majority and create a more secure border, enter the avenging hand of the Almighty.

Long before gloating over Sharon's collapse, Robertson had more than amply demonstrated his penchant for outrageous and offensive rhetoric, comparing feminists to witches, for instance, and urging the assassination of the leftist leader of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez. In a 1993 interview with the columnist Molly Ivins, nearly a decade before the Zionist Organization of America saw fit to fete him, Robertson had the audacity to compare the Nazi extermination of European Jewry to what American liberals were doing to evangelical Christians.

"It's no different," he said. "It is the same thing. It is happening all over again."

This penchant for noxious rhetoric typifies other mainstays of Christian Zionism. Rev. Jerry Falwell, like Robertson one of the most prominent figures in the Religious Right, infamously blamed the September 11 attacks on "the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians" as well as "all of them who have tried to secularize America."

Words like that tend to take a wee bit of the satisfaction out of hearing Falwell say, "To stand against Israel is to stand against God."

I am hardly arguing for Jewish Zionists to spurn their Christian comrades. The emergence of philo-Semitism among evangelical Christians represents a welcome and reassuring reversal both of a longtime strain of anti-Jewish sentiment among fundamentalist Christians and of the currently trendy support for disinvestment from Israel by traditionally liberal mainstream Protestant denominations. Christian Zionists have worked closely and admirably with American Jews on calling international attention to the genocide in Darfur. Personally, I will always remember the sight of several dozen Christians on a solidarity mission to Israel in a departure lounge at Newark airport, as footage of the Dolphinarium suicide-bombing showed on the CNN monitors. There was scarcely an American Jew booked on that flight.

MEANWHILE, Robertson has apologized for his remarks about Sharon, just as he has apologized for similar effusions in the past. Several leaders of the National Association of Evangelicals have taken pains to distance themselves from Robertson, implying that his ilk is losing influence and passing from the Christian scene. For their part, Israelis may be inclined to shrug off Robertson's comments as they have shrugged off similar calumnies from Rabbi Ovadia Yosef.

For Jews who think God cried when Gush Katif was evacuated, and for Jews who share the puritanical social agenda of the Religious Right, Christian Zionism is an uncomplicated asset. For the rest of us, the common-sense centrists in Israeli and American Jewry who saw in Ariel Sharon the expression of our beliefs, the passion of Pat Robertson must be, if you'll forgive the phrase, a mixed blessing.

The writer is a professor of journalism at Columbia University. His most recent book is Who She Was: My Search for My Mother's Life.
source: http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull&cid=1136361054526

Cornbread: Sugar/No Sugar ? Both Ways ?

Corn bread ignites debate even as it soothes the soul
Is the sugar in corn bread a cultural thing? Or does it just make it taste better ?

07:42 AM CST on Wednesday, January 11, 2006
By BILL MARVEL / The Dallas Morning News

Asking a Southerner about sugar in corn bread is like asking a Texan about beans in chili. Be prepared for at least an argument, and maybe a fight.

KYE R. LEE / DMN
Most restaurant corn bread contains a noticeable amount of sugar. Many Southern cooks don't use sugar at all. Click here for recipes.
Atlanta-born John Egerton, author of Southern Food: At Home, on the Road, in History, is a strict constructionist. "My mother made corn bread almost every day," he says. "I don't associate sugar with corn bread."
On the other hand, food writer Matthew B. Rowley waffles.
"Bristles are raised when you introduce sugar into corn bread," he says. "People say, 'That's a Yankee aberration.'"
Not quite true, he says. "I have found plenty of Southerners will admit they add sugar.
"But it's not yellow cake."
Adrian Miller, who is writing a book on African-American cooking, sees in the dispute the outlines of class and racial differences.
"A lot of people think I'm crazy, but I've been looking at cookbooks by African-Americans, and a lot call for sugar to be added to corn bread," he says.
"That's supposed to be a no-no. But if you talk to them, they'll say, 'Yeah, I'll put a little bit of sugar in.'"
He has a theory: "Folks who used white corn meal, which tended to be sweeter, may have thought sugar was redundant. Yellow corn meal is less sweet; it's thought of as inferior. Poor whites and blacks would have used more yellow meal."
But Dr. Jessica Harris doubts the corn-bread theory.
"To my taste buds, yellow corn meal is a little more sweet," she says. "I am not of the little-pinch-in-cornmeal school.
"There are two schools of African-American cooking, the purist school, and the embellishment school. My mother was a purist. The embellishment school is, 'If they're good this way, if we put this and this on them, they'd be better.'
"I think they're just separate traditions."
The whole argument may be moot, anyway, says Damon Lee Fowler, whose New Southern Baking offers recipes for corn bread with scallions, bacon drippings, onions, assorted herbs. But not sugar.
"Corn bread with sugar is coming to be universal," he says. Almost all restaurant corn bread is sweetened, "because they have to appeal to the broadest tastes."
E-mail bmarvel@dallasnews.com
source:http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/fea/taste/stories/011106dnlivnf_cornbread.f85929d.html

It's all local ! Isn't it ?

Rise and Fall of True Believers
by Robert Scheer

Oh what a tangled web these no-longer-young Republicans weave when first they practice to deceive! The plumb line that runs down through the cesspool of the festering Abramoff-DeLay scandal is the conceit that the scions of the Reagan Revolution, a generation of young Republican activists summoned by God and party, were morally superior creatures, who had only pure ideological motives for cutting the country's social-safety nets in the name of "small government."

More than two decades before he pleaded guilty to felonies in two jurisdictions, Jack Abramoff was the hard-nosed chairman of the College Republicans, and his lieutenants were Harvard graduate Grover Norquist, who rose to political power as president of the American Taxpayers Association, and a young Georgia student named Ralph Reed, who would later become the face of the Christian Coalition. "Today, our party readies itself to mount the wave of the future," Abramoff sermonized as a 25-year-old at the Republican National Convention in 1984, as cited in Mother Jones magazine. "Will we ride that wave to glory, or will it send us crashing ashore? If we're the party of tax cuts, and not the party of 'ifs' and 'buts,' then we're riding our wave. ... If we try to outspend big fat Tip O'Neill, or rush to Geneva to cut a deal, we'll crash ashore."

Now, however, Abramoff has crashed and he threatens to take down DeLay, who announced last week he will not attempt to regain his GOP leadership post in the House, even as he continues to fight his own indictment in Texas, which an all-Republican appeals court has just refused to dismiss. Meanwhile, two others who came up through the ranks of Republican youthful activism, Edwin A. Buckham and Brent Wilkes, can now be added to the web -- growing with each new indictment and investigative news article -- of DeLay-affiliated lobbyists, politicians and public officials who employed or benefited from a series of what appear to be front groups, slush funds and political money-laundering operations.

Wilkes is up to his eyeballs in the case of disgraced Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-San Diego), who pleaded guilty in December to accepting $2.4 million in bribes from defense contractors trying to sell stuff to the Pentagon. Wilkes, in turn, was a client of Buckham, a key figure at the center of an influence-peddling investigation into his work at the phony front organization, the U.S. Family Network, which serviced Abramoff's clients.

On Monday, Buckham announced that due to recent bad publicity, his prominent Alexander Strategy Group (ASG) lobbying firm was shutting down. It was ASG that paid Delay's wife at least $115,000 in consulting fees while selling the company's widely proclaimed access to her super-powerful husband. The lobby firm also provided office space to "Americans for a Republican Majority," Delay's fund-raising organization. No surprise, then, that when Wilkes wanted to gain influence in Congress in support of his quest to get the Pentagon to invest in products he was selling -- but for which the Pentagon's inspector general found no real demand -- he turned to ASG, paying at least $630,000 for the firm's services. President Bush, as he did with Enron and its politically well-connected execs, is reportedly looking to distance himself from these big-time GOP players going down like a house of cards in a Category 5 hurricane.

And, as with Enron, where company chief Kenneth "Kenny Boy" Lay was tight with Bush and a key financial supporter of his campaigns, such protests will ring hollow to those paying attention because of the perpetrators' prominent work on the president's campaigns, transition teams, fundraising and even in his administration. Abramoff was a "patron" fundraiser for the Bush 2004 campaign, and served on the Department of the Interior transition team, while Wilkes served as Bush's California campaign finance co-chair.

The scope of the scandal swirling around DeLay was perhaps best described by former Republican House Majority Leader Dick Armey, now a lobbyist: "Tom DeLay sent Buckham downtown to set up shop and start a branch office on K Street," Armey told the New York Times, referring to the row of lobby firms famously headquartered there. "The whole idea was: 'What's in it for us?' "

Sounds accurate enough. But Armey's candid comment begs the question of why he and others in the Republican establishment didn't blow the whistle on this operation before the indictments came down. After all, bilking the Pentagon for millions, bribing officials and breaking campaign-finance laws is hardly small potatoes.

What irony that those once young Republicans, who hectored their elders about being more vigilant in defending the nation's taxpayers and security forces, should now end up accused with deeply betraying both.

Published on Wednesday, January 11, 2006 by the San Francisco Chronicle
source: http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0111-27.htm

The " Pat Roberston Attitude " over the Brownwood Airwaves

Israel Suspends Contact With Pat Robertson

JERUSALEM, Jan. 11, 2006 (AP)
(AP) Israel has suspended contact with evangelist Pat Robertson for suggesting Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's stroke was divine punishment for withdrawing from the Gaza Strip.
The controversy has cast doubt on plans for a Christian tourism center that would showcase the growing flow of money and influence from U.S. church groups.
The decision, announced Wednesday by Israeli officials, does not affect other Christian groups that also consider it their spiritual duty to support Israel as fulfillment of biblical prophecy.
Israeli leaders see the Christian allies as tireless lobbyists in Washington and elsewhere. The evangelicals also funnel millions of dollars each year to Jewish settlers in the West Bank and _ before last year's pullout _ the Gaza Strip.
Tourism Minister Abraham Hirchson said he gave instructions to "stop all contact" with groups associated with Robertson. Last week, Robertson implied Sharon's massive stroke was a blow for "dividing God's land" with the withdrawal from Gaza and four West Bank settlements.

source: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/01/11/ap/world/mainD8F2OIKG0.shtml
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Note from Steve: The same viewpoint was expressed over the airwaves of Brownwood Talk Radio (KXYL) by a regular female caller to the show ( she's a Minister ? ). For me, This goes back to what Brownwood's Republican Congressman, Mike Conaway's Chief of Staff Jeff Burton, said in his email to me " they think they can do or say anything in the name of GOD " and " it's scary on your end of the district " as it relates to the "Religious" folks (Republicans) in the Brownwood area and the District ! Pat's comments remind me so much of Brownwood's Legendary Talking Head and Republican Spokesperson/ Moralist, James Williamson, who for ten years over the Brownwood airwaves told his "flock" how immoral the Democrats and Liberals (Cockroaches James ?) are and how upright and moral (superior ?) the Republicans and Conservatives are. James, your BS is being unmasked on a daily basis, even if your "sheep" aren't talking about it on locaI talk radio ! I think this calls for a reading of Carl Sandburg's " Billy Sunday " and a hot cup of Fair Trade Coffee in a Brokeback Mountain Tin Cup ! Does anyone know why Hal Lindsey was removed from TBN ? James ,did you and your fellow GOP moralists do it for the votes ? Hal, who was it you said was " as full of crap as a Christmas Turkey " ? I think maybe your own words could apply to you and other "players" like you !

Follow the links here

read it here...

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Scandal after Scandal erupting in the Religious Right/Republican Party ! Just take a look at the names.

read it here...

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Kinky Friedman, "Independent" Candidate for Texas Governor sums it up pretty well for me:

“I'm angry at politicians who use Jesus Christ as a marketing tool” ~ Kinky Friedman - Candidate for Texas Governor - DMNews October 24, 2005

and I don't think Kinky had the Democrat's in mind when he said this !
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read it here...

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read it here...

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So many Billy Sunday's !

read it here...

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Wolves in Sheeps Clothing ? Why are the Brownwood Airwaves so silent on all of this ? You know why ! It would expose over 10 years of lies coming out of the mouths of Religious moralists transmitting from Brownwood Texas !

Wednesday, 01/11/06

Brentwood man arrested, accused of raping, sexually abusing 2 sons
Incidents allegedly took place in 5-year period

By MITCHELL KLINE Staff Writer
BRENTWOOD — A Brentwood man was arrested yesterday on charges of raping and sexually abusing two of his children over the course of five years.
The 50-year-old man is being held at the Williamson County Jail in lieu of posting $500,000 bail. A court date had not been set yesterday.
The two children, boys ages 12 and 16, have been removed from the home, according to police.
The Tennessean does not identify victims of rape without their consent.
Because the children have the same last name as the suspect, the newspaper is not identifying the defendant. The case, which was investigated by Brentwood Detective David O'Neil, was presented to a Williamson County grand jury on Monday. The grand jury returned a 10-count indictment, charging the defendant with eight counts of rape of a child, one count of rape and one could of aggravated sexual battery, District Attorney General Ron Davis said.
The charges stem from incidents that allegedly occurred between September 2000 and December 2005.
O'Neil said the defendant, who is married, has four other children — two of whom are adults.
"At this point we have no reason to believe there are any other victims," O'Neil said.
Allegations of rape and abuse were brought forth by one of the victims, police said. On a mid-December day, a Brentwood patrol officer was called to the family's home to help resolve a domestic issue, O'Neil said. One of the boys told the officer that he and his brother had been abused.
Attempts to reach the defendant's attorney were not successful. A male who answered the phone at the defendant's Brentwood home hung up on a reporter after asking, "What is this regarding?"
The suspect is involved in the Christian book-publishing industry, according to police and numerous Web sites.
Marita Littauer, president of CLASServices, a New Mexico-based company which coordinates Christian writers conferences, said she knew the defendant on a "professional level."
"I seriously question the charges," Littauer said. "I cannot believe they are accurate."
Davis and O'Neil said few details would be released about the case because they do not want to identify the victims. •

source: http://tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060111/COUNTY09/601110410/1006/NEWS
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Pastor Propositions Plainclothes Officer In Motel

January 5, 2006 11:02 a.m. EST

Ayinde O. Chase - All Headline News Staff Writer
Oklahoma City, OK (AHN) - Reverend Lonnie Latham, leader of the Southern Baptist Convention, has been arrested in a motel parking lot on a lewdness complaint. The Reverend Latham propositioned a plainclothes policemen investigating the area where male prostitutes allegedly frequent.
Latham preaches to the congregation at the South Tulsa Baptist Church and is on the executive committee of the Southern Baptist Convention. In the past, he has been a vocal opponent against homosexuality and same-sex marriage.
After posting bond, Latham issued a statement that he was set up, and was in the area ministering to people.

source: http://www.allheadlinenews.com/articles/7001769206
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Who would "get this" in Brownwood ? Hit's too close to Home ? Blinded by their hate !

read it here...

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read it here...

There is Hope for the United States: Republicans evaluating their Leadership !

Republicans think they have too much power
by kos
Wed Jan 11, 2006 at 03:36:35 PM PDT

Man, what does it say about Republicans when they themselves admit they suck at governing?

Flake:
"We simply have too much power," says Rep. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., speaking of lawmakers' ability to target tax dollars for particular projects, contractors or campaign donors. "We Republicans have abused that power badly over the past several years."
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Boehner:
Boehner, in a 37-page document delivered to GOP members, said that despite accomplishments, the House GOP seems to be "on a losing streak."

"We seem adrift, uncomfortable with our ability to reach big goals and unsure about what we stand for as a conference. Lacking a common vision that expresses our hopes for what America can still become and our shared commitment to realizing those hopes, we've fallen into a dangerous and demoralizing cycle of the status quo, where we struggle instead of strive," Boehner wrote.
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Lungren:
It is no longer good enough, [Dan] Lungren said, for the party to have a temporary leadership structure. "The real question right now is: How do we show the American people we know how to be a majority party?" he said.

Lungren, a former prosecutor, said he decided to support a leadership election after talking to people in his district and to Republicans outside Congress whom he said expressed shock about the Abramoff scandal.

"I've heard disappointment more than anything else," Lungren said. "There is an undercurrent that things have gotten out of sorts."

source: http://dailykos.com/

" I asked what Brownwood was known for, and the baristas struggled to come up with anything."

go here...

Brokeback Mountain -Brownwood to Austin: The theatre was full of couples !

It's a date: 'Brokeback' romance draws couples
By Marco R. della Cava, USA TODAY

In four weeks, Brokeback has recouped its modest budget (south of $20 million) and is now in 120 diverse markets. "We're doing huge grosses in places like Fort Worth and Cleveland," hardly gay capitals, says James Shamus, chief of distributor Focus Features.
One fan says Brokeback Mountain's Heath Ledger "makes being a cowboy look awesome again."
He says exit polls indicate that the longer the movie remains in a city, "the number of women attending with their (male) significant others goes up dramatically."
Still, the film's subject matter can be a tough sell. Comedian Larry David joked in a New York Times commentary that "cowboys would have to lasso" him into the theater, because he's sure the voice in his head would say, " 'You like those cowboys, don't you? They're kind of cute.' "
David Fone of San Diego had "no desire to see the film," but, like many men, was lured by Brokeback's stellar reviews celebrating characters whose sexual orientation takes a back seat to their humanity. Fone acknowledges he "grimaced" during the love scenes but "enjoyed (the film) thoroughly."
So did Linda Rodriguez of Los Gatos, Calif.: "Somewhere during the movie I forgot that it was about two gay cowboys and found it to be a very tragic and touching love story, and my boyfriend agreed."
Anna-Marie Ganje of Minneapolis went with her husband; the film "haunted" them for days. "If you're open-minded, you know that love between two people is love," she says. (Related story: Brokeback selling well in the heartland)
The movie has emerged as a test of hipness for straight men, says Andrea Miller, founder of relationship magazine Tango: "The coffee dates after this movie surely are filled with intense conversations that get into areas of vulnerability, and women love that in a man."
And, some men insist, they're up for the challenge.
"Give us straight guys some credit. Not all of us are homophobic and turned off by films that deal with relationships," says Adam Robinson of Washington, D.C. "Occasionally I love to see things blow up, but we're not all 13-year-old boys anymore. Plus, there's nothing wrong with a non-sexual crush on (Brokeback co-star) Heath Ledger. He makes being a cowboy look awesome once again."
During filming of the cowboys' final meeting, there was evidence the story would appeal to a broad audience. "Ang suddenly noticed everyone was crying," Shamus says. "This was the crew, folks who are just there to do a day's work. Right then, we thought, 'We have something here.' "
source: http://www.usatoday.com/life/movies/news/2006-01-09-brokeback-date-movie-main_x.htm?csp=34
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New KXYL Theme: Can't we all get along ? After years...

.......of demonizing Democrats, Liberals, and Moderate Republicans, there seems to be a movement afoot to "play nice" at KXYL 96.9 FM (Brownwood Talk Radio). Let's talk football, lets swap recipes, let's let bygones be bygones etc. etc. etc. ! Now, after years of telling us how moral, ethical, and trustworthy the Republicans are, the Brownwood airwaves are being sanitized of the talk that exposes the corruption, indictments, cronism, etc. that that is currently being exposed in the Republican party.
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January 10, 2006, 8:16 a.m.
The Abramoff Scandal (R., Beltway)
It’s the Republicans, stupid.

Republicans are looking for "their" John McCain. The popular Arizona maverick is already a Republican, of course. But the GOP needs a McCain in the "Keating Five" sense. Back in 1990, Senate Democrats roped McCain into the scandal over savings and loan kingpin Charles Keating on tenuous grounds, just so not all the senators involved would be Democrats.
The GOP now craves such bipartisan cover in the Jack Abramoff scandal. Republicans trumpet every Democratic connection to Abramoff in the hope that something resonates. Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.), took more than $60,000 from Abramoff clients! North Dakota Democratic Sen. Byron Dorgan used Abramoff's skybox! It is true that any Washington influence peddler is going to spread cash and favors as widely as possible, and 210 members of Congress have received Abramoff-connected dollars. But this is, in its essence, a Republican scandal, and any attempt to portray it otherwise is a misdirection.
Abramoff is a Republican who worked closely with two of the country's most prominent conservative activists, Grover Norquist and Ralph Reed. Top aides to the most important Republican in Congress, Tom DeLay (R., Tex.) were party to his sleazy schemes. The only people referred to directly in Abramoff's recent plea agreement are a Republican congressmen and two former Republican congressional aides. The GOP members can make a case that the scandal reflects more the way Washington works than the unique perfidy of their party, but even this is self-defeating, since Republicans run Washington.
Republicans must take the scandal seriously and work to clean up in its wake. The first step was the permanent ouster of Tom DeLay as House Republican majority leader, a recognition that he is unfit to lead as long as he is underneath the Abramoff cloud. The behavior of the right in this matter contrasts sharply with the left's lickspittle loyalty to Bill Clinton, whose maintenance in power many liberals put above any of their principles. Next, Republicans will have to show they can again embrace the spirit of reform that swept them to power in 1994.
To this end, GOP lawmakers are rushing to introduce lobbying reform. Anything that increases transparency is welcome. But lobbying reform's animating pretense is that lawmakers are all upstanding — until they come under the corruptive spell of lobbyists. In every transaction, however, there has to be a willing buyer and seller.
There are two deeply rooted sources of corruption in Washington. One is that many members of Congress believe that they would be making much more than their $160,000-a-year salaries if they were in some other line of work. This sense is compounded when they watch their former 30-year-old aides go to work on K Street for $300,000 a year. This is how someone like Tom DeLay — otherwise a conviction politician — justifies playing the best golf courses in the world on someone else's dime and getting special interests to funnel easy money to his wife.
It will be a sign that Congress has learned something if it bans all privately funded travel. If a trip is truly educational and necessary, the public should fund it; if, on the other hand, a member of Congress wants to enjoy fine resorts, he should quit, practice law (or whatever), and earn the income to support his desired lifestyle.
The other problem is that Washington makes obscure decisions that enrich small groups of people. Most everyone in Washington supports making these decisions because it increases his or her power. But if Congress really wants to lessen the malign influence of lobbyists, it should reform the inherently corruptible process whereby the Interior Department recognizes new Native American tribes so they can mint money by opening casinos, and end the practice of "earmarking" federal dollars for local and special-interest projects. It's no accident that Abramoff saw the business potential in both of these processes.
Of course, making these sort of changes would be painful. That's why it is tempting for Republicans to look for a John McCain instead.
source: http://www.nationalreview.com/lowry/lowry200601100816.asp
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Conservatives call for return to core Republican principles
By Edward Alden in Washington
The Financial Times
Published: January 10 2006 19:45 | Last updated: January 10 2006 19:45

With Republicans embroiled in an influence-peddling scandal that could threaten their control of Congress, the biggest pressure for reform is coming from lawmakers who charge that the party’s woes have come from abandoning its core conservative principles.
Jeff Flake, an Arizona Republican congressman who co-led the petition drive that helped oust Tom DeLay, the House majority leader, said in an interview yesterday: “We don’t just need a new majority leader, we need a course correction.
“A lobbyist can’t be corrupt unless he has somebody to bribe, and we’ve created a culture that just breeds corruption,” he charged.
While the Republicans captured the House of Representatives in 1994 following a popular backlash against perceived corruption in the Democratic party, the party’s conservative critics say it has now fallen prey to the same Washington culture. A group of more than 100 members organised as the Republican Study Committee is hoping to use the leadership race to rein in what they see as runaway government spending championed by Mr DeLay and his allies.

to read the entire article please visit: http://news.ft.com/cms/s/cf26b6b2-820b-11da-aea0-0000779e2340.html
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are you a "frustrated Democrat, angry independent or disaffected Republican" ?

go here...

Rest in Peace Foy Valentine

Foy Valentine: Southern Baptist who fought for racial equality
06:49 AM CST on Tuesday, January 10, 2006
By SAM HODGES / The Dallas Morning News

Foy Valentine was a white Texan who, during the 1960s and '70s, forced fellow Southern Baptists to confront their denomination's racist past and move toward integration.
Dr. Valentine, who died this weekend at 82, led the Southern Baptist Convention's Christian Life Commission – the denomination's public policy arm – for nearly 30 years.
He was a moderate often at odds with Southern Baptist conservatives. He stirred the pot not just on race, but on church-state separation, abortion and other controversial issues.
A pioneering Baptist ethicist, Dr. Valentine kept on his desk an engraved copy of his motto for half a century – "Helping changed people to change the world."
Dr. Valentine died at an area hospital after suffering a heart attack in his North Dallas home.
"Foy Valentine was one of the most influential Baptists of the 20th century," said Phil Strickland, director of the Baptist General Convention of Texas' Christian Life Commission. "He was always long on insight and long on courage."
Share your thoughts with Dr. Valentine's family Sign our Guestbook | View our Guestbook
Richard Land is a Baptist conservative who succeeded Dr. Valentine. (The agency has been renamed the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission.) Dr. Land has led the denomination to a stronger anti-abortion position and what moderate critics say is a less-strict position on the separation of church and state.
But Dr. Land, too, paid tribute to Dr. Valentine in a written statement released Monday.
"While Dr. Valentine and I had significant differences of opinion on many issues, all Southern Baptists will be forever in his debt for his courageous and prophetic stance on racial reconciliation and racial equality in the turbulent middle third of the century," Dr. Land said.
Dr. Valentine grew up in the East Texas town of Edgewood, in Van Zandt County. In the 1940s, he earned an undergraduate degree at Baylor University and a master's and doctorate at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. There he studied with the renowned Baptist ethicist T.B. Maston, whom he acknowledged as a key influence.
Also in the '40s, Dr. Valentine spent a summer at Koinonia, a pioneering interracial farming community in south Georgia run by Clarence Jordan, a white Baptist theologian.
"We worked in the peanut patches," Dr. Valentine recalled in an essay. "We cut some wood. We gathered wild grapes. We visited with the neighbors. We made ice cream. We studied the Greek New Testament. We took an occasional sashay into town. We worked at improving race relations. We had some kind of a wonderful, rip-roaring, rousing, delightful time."
After seminary, Dr. Valentine served as a Baptist pastor in Texas. Then in 1953, he was named executive director of the Christian Life Commission of the Baptist General Convention of Texas, the largest state group within the Southern Baptist Convention. Seven years later, he moved to Nashville to lead the SBC's Christian Life Commission.
Through much of that time, he endured criticism within the denomination and the threat of budget cuts for his agency for his writing, speaking and organizing on behalf of improved race relations.
Toby Druin, editor emeritus of the Texas Baptist Standard newspaper, recalled as a young Baptist journalist attending a 1968 conference on race organized by Dr. Valentine. There, Mr. Druin heard from black civil rights leaders, including Bayard Rustin.
"It made me a better person and a better Baptist," Mr. Druin said.
Dr. Valentine was just as forceful on church-state separation issues and served as president of Americans United for Separation of Church and State. He also took what Baptist historian Barry Hankins called a moderate position on abortion rights in the 1970s.
"He's a hero to the moderates and progressive types because of his taking stands against segregation, long before it was in vogue to do so," said Dr. Hankins, a Baylor professor and author of Uneasy in Babylon: Southern Baptist Conservatives and American Culture. "He was one of the villains of the conservatives because of the abortion issue."
Dr. Valentine returned to Texas after retiring from the SBC in 1987 and continued to write prolifically on applied ethics. The author of several books, he also founded a Christian ethics center, now housed at Baylor, and Christian Ethics Today, a bimonthly magazine that has grown to more than 4,000 subscribers.
With folksy lyricism, he wrote often for that journal, quoting Shakespeare and Willie Nelson, and opining on everything from ethics to the joys of grandparenthood to the age-prolonging power of banana pudding topped by nutmeg and Blue Bell ice cream. He wrote nostalgically about his rural East Texas upbringing and about the solace he felt in his cabin retreat in New Mexico.
Dr. Valentine paid to have a collection of his columns published, with copies going to subscribers and other supporters of Christian Ethics Today. But the book – Whatsoever Things Are Lovely – proved to be a surprise hit, with readers gladly paying for extras, said Joe Trull, editor of the magazine.
"I just had an e-mail from someone wanting 25 copies," he said.
Dr. Valentine is survived by Mary Louise Valentine, his wife of 58 years; his daughters Jean Valentine, Carol Valentine and Susan Brown; and five grandchildren.
A memorial service will be at 2 p.m. Wednesday at Park Cities Baptist Church, near Northwest Highway and Preston Road. Burial will be in Edgefield.
E-mail samhodges@dallasnews.com

source: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/obituaries/stories/DN-valentineob_10met.ART.State.Edition2.e404571.html
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Note from Steve, this is a man that has my admiration. He stood when it was not politically correct to do so. Example: "He's a hero to the moderates and progressive types because of his taking stands against segregation, long before it was in vogue to do so," said Dr. Hankins, a Baylor professor and author of Uneasy in Babylon: Southern Baptist Conservatives and American Culture.

Brownwood's "Niagara Falls"

Brownwood's "Niagara Falls"
Originally uploaded by photosteve.

and Football was the topic of discussion on the airwaves of Brownwood Talk Radio !

White House Admits U.S. Leader In Iraq Wanted More Troops

POSTED: 3:00 pm EST January 9, 2006
UPDATED: 3:23 pm EST January 9, 2006

WASHINGTON -- The Bush administration has acknowledged that its top civilian official in Iraq once called for tripling U.S. forces there.
In a new book, Paul Bremer -- who headed the U.S.-led coalition for 13 months -- says he urged Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld in May 2004 to deploy 500,000 troops.
But White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan said Bremer's view was just one among many and ultimately, it was left to U.S. commanders to decide.
Administration critics -- including some leading lawmakers -- were outspoken in saying a much bigger U.S. contingent was needed to put down the insurgency.
source: www.wesh.com
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DNC: Pentagon Study Links Fatalities to Body Armor
1/9/2006 3:20:00 PM

WASHINGTON, Jan. 9 /U.S. Newswire/ -- The New York Times this weekend published a report on a secret Pentagon study showing that approximately 300 hundred American soldiers killed in combat in Iraq could have survived if the Pentagon had provided them with sufficient body armor, the Democratic National Committee said today. The report found that up to 80 percent of the Marines killed from upper torso wounds could have been saved if troops had been provided with additional protection that commanders in the field began requesting "almost from the beginning" of the war.
The report also found that, because the Pentagon failed to provide the requested body armor, troops desperate for protection began "hanging their crotch protectors under their arms" and buying their own sets as early as early as Fall 2003.
--
The following is an excerpt from the article:
Pentagon Study Links Fatalities to Body Armor
By Michael Moss
New York Times
January 7, 2006
A secret Pentagon study has found that as many as 80 percent of the marines who have been killed in Iraq from wounds to the upper body could have survived if they had had extra body armor. Such armor has been available since 2003, but until recently the Pentagon has largely declined to supply it to troops despite calls from the field for additional protection, according to military officials.
The ceramic plates in vests now worn by the majority of troops in Iraq cover only some of the chest and back. In at least 74 of the 93 fatal wounds that were analyzed in the Pentagon study of marines from March 2003 through June 2005, bullets and shrapnel struck the marines' shoulders, sides or areas of the torso where the plates do not reach.
Thirty-one of the deadly wounds struck the chest or back so close to the plates that simply enlarging the existing shields "would have had the potential to alter the fatal outcome," according to the study, which was obtained by The New York Times.
For the full report, click here: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/07/politics/07armor.html?8bl
source: http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=59026
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Sen. Clinton seeks inquiry into body armor study
January 9, 2006, 2:38 PM EST

WASHINGTON (AP) _ Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton urged Congress Monday to re-examine the Pentagon's standards for soldiers' body armor in Iraq, after a new study found most fatal torso wounds to Marines would have been prevented or minimized with more protection.
The New York Democrat said the as-yet-unreleased report by the Armed Forces Medical Examiner should spur greater scrutiny by the Senate Armed Service Committee and the investigative arm of Congress.
The results of the study were disclosed last week. It examined 93 fatal wounds to Marines from the start of the Iraq war in March 2003 through June 2005. The study concluded most of those injuries might have been prevented or minimized if they had been wearing improved body armor.
"With U.S. troops risking their lives daily in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, we owe it to them to make sure they have the best equipment possible," Clinton wrote to committee chairman John Warner.
The study found that of the 93 Marines who suffered fatal injuries, 74 of them were bullet or shrapnel wounds to shoulders or torso areas unprotected by traditional ceramic armor plating.
The report highlights the debate, even within the military, about how much armor troops should be wearing. Some soldiers complain the current armor reduces their mobility, and say they would rather wear less, not more.

source: www.newsday.com
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U.S. Soldiers Question Use of More Armor
By RYAN LENZ
Associated Press Writer

January 8, 2006, 12:43 AM EST

BEIJI, Iraq -- U.S. soldiers in the field were not all supportive of a Pentagon study that found improved body armor saves lives, with some troops arguing Saturday that more armor would hinder combat effectiveness.
The unreleased study examined 93 fatal wounds to Marines from the start of the Iraq war in March 2003 through June 2005. It concluded 74 of them were bullet or shrapnel wounds to shoulders or torso areas unprotected by traditional ceramic armor plating.
Soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division's 3rd Brigade "Rakkasans" are required to wear an array of protective clothing they refer to as their "happy gear," ranging from Kevlar drapes over their shoulders and sides, to knee pads and fire-resistant uniforms.
But many soldiers say they feel encumbered by the weight and restricted by fabric that does not move as they do. They frequently joke as they strap on their equipment before a patrol, and express relief when they return and peel it off.
Second Lt. Josh Suthoff, 23, of Jefferson City, Mo., said he already sacrifices enough movement when he wears the equipment. More armor would only increase his chances of getting killed, he said.
"You can slap body armor on all you want, but it's not going to help anything. When it's your time, it's your time," said Suthoff, a platoon leader in the brigade's 1st Squadron, 33rd Cavalry Regiment. "I'd go out with less body armor if I could."
The study and their remarks highlight the difficulty faced by the Army and Marine Corps in providing the best level of body armor protection in a war against an insurgency whose tactics are constantly changing.
Both the Army and the Marines have weighed the expected payoff in additional safety from extra armor against the measurable loss of combat effectiveness from too much armor.
According to a summary of the Armed Forces Medical Examiner's study obtained Friday evening by The Associated Press, the 93 Marines who died from a primary lethal injury of the torso were among 401 Marines who died from combat injuries in Iraq between the start of the war and June 2005.
A military advocacy group, Soldiers for Truth, posted an article about the study on its Web site this week. On Friday evening, The New York Times reported in its online edition that the study for the first time shows the cost in lives lost from inadequate armor.
Autopsy reports and photographic records were analyzed to help the military determine possible body armor redesign.
Of 39 fatal torso wounds in which the bullet or shrapnel entered the Marine's body outside of the ceramic armor plate protecting the chest and back, 31 were close to the plate's edge, according to the study, which was conducted last summer.
Some soldiers felt unhappy that ceramic plates to protect their sides and shoulders were available, but not offered, when they deployed for Iraq in September.
"If it's going to protect a soldier or save his life, they definitely should have been afforded the opportunity to wear it," said Staff Sgt. Shaun Benoit, 26, of Conneaut, Ohio. "I want to know where there was a break in communication."
Others questioned the effectiveness of additional body armor.
"It's the Army's responsibility to get soldiers the armor they need. But that doesn't mean those deaths could have been prevented," said Spc. Robert Reid, 21, of Atlanta.
Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., who was in Iraq on Saturday, said military leaders told him that body armor has improved since the initial invasion in 2003 and that the military hoped to gradually transition to the improved armor.
The debate between protection versus mobility has dominated military doctrine since the Middle Ages, when knights wrapped themselves in metal suits for battle, said Capt. Jamey Turner, 35, of Baton Rouge, La., a commander in the 1st Squadron, 33rd Cavalry Regiment.
The issue comes up daily on the battlefield in Iraq, and soldiers need to realize there is no such thing as 100 percent protection, he said.
"You've got to sacrifice some protection for mobility," he added. "If you cover your entire body in ceramic plates, you're just not going to be able to move."
Others in the regiment said the issue of protecting soldiers with more body armor is of greater concern at home than among soldiers in Iraq, who have seen firsthand how life and death hang on a sliver of luck when an improvised explosive device hits a Humvee.
"These guys over here are husbands, sons and daughters. It's understandable people at home would want all the protection in the world for us. But realistically, it just don't work," said Sgt. Paul Hare, 40, of Tucumcari, N.M.
* __
AP Military Writer Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this
source: http://www.newsday.com/news/politics/wire/sns-ap-iraq-body-armor,0,2973731.story?coll=sns-ap-politics-headlines

Depleted Uranium: ......and if this were going on in Brownwood today,

would the groups doing the challenging for accountability be labled WACKOS over the talk radio airwaves ? You can count on that and then they would change the topic post haste !

Vol. 11, Issue 6 - Friday, January 6, 2006

GROUPS ACCUSE ARMY OF MISLEADING PUBLIC
Uranium revelation upsets isle activists
Army e-mails detailing the presence of spent metal at Schofield are troubling, critics say

By Rosemarie Bernardo
rbernardo@starbulletin.com

SEVERAL environmental and native Hawaiian groups are accusing the Army of misleading the public after the groups discovered that a heavy metal known as depleted uranium was recovered at Schofield Barracks' range complex.
During a news conference yesterday, the groups said the Army has repeatedly assured the public that the heavy metal was never used in Hawaii.
"These recent revelations, then, indicate that the Army is either unaware of its DU (depleted uranium) and chemical weapons use or has intentionally misled the public. Both possibilities are deeply troubling," said Kyle Kajihiro, program director of the American Friends Service Committee and member of DMZ-Hawaii/Aloha Aina.
Some members of the various groups read about the depleted uranium in e-mails detailing documents submitted in federal court in December, showing that heavy metals were found at Schofield Barracks' range complex area during clearing efforts.
The e-mail was submitted as part of an ongoing discovery process. At the end of November, attorneys representing the 25th Infantry Division filed a motion in federal court to amend a 2001 settlement so soldiers can resume live-fire training at Makua Valley. The motion is scheduled to be heard Monday.

URANIUM AT SCHOFIELD
The clearing was being done to prepare for the expansion of additional training space and the construction of a rifle and pistol range for a new Stryker brigade combat team.
Depleted uranium is a byproduct of radioactive enriched uranium and has been used by the U.S. military in bullets and other weapons designed to pierce armor. Some researchers suspect exposure to depleted uranium might have caused chronic fatigue and other symptoms in veterans of the first Gulf War, but there is no conclusive evidence it has.
In a letter sent yesterday to Maj. Gen. Benjamin Mixon, commanding general of the 25th Infantry Division, Kajihiro wrote that several groups were outraged by the use of the uranium, which they say poses a public health hazard even in small amounts.
During community discussion on the Stryker Brigade environmental impact statement in 2004, Army officials assured the public that depleted uranium was never used in Hawaii, Kajihiro said.
Fifteen tail assemblies from spotting rounds made of D-38 uranium alloy, also called depleted uranium, were recovered in August by Zapata Engineering, a contractor hired by the military to clear the Schofield Barracks' range impact area of unexploded ordnance and scrap metal, according to a news release from the 25th Infantry Division.
In an e-mail dated Sept. 19, a contractor told an Army official at Schofield: "We have found much that we did not expect, including recent find of depleted uranium. We are pulling tons of frag and scrap out of the craters in the western area to the point where it has basically turned into a manual sifting operation. Had this not been a CWM site, we would have moved mechanical sifters in about 5 weeks ago but the danger is just too high."
Dr. Fred Dodge, Waianae resident and member of Malama Makua, said, "DU is a heavy metal similar to lead. It can be toxic particularly to the kidneys," and could cause lung cancer if the metal in dust form is inhaled.
But U.S. Army Garrison Hawaii officials said the recovered depleted uranium has low-level radioactivity and does not pose a threat to the public.
The tail assemblies are about 4 inches in length and an inch in diameter. Army officials said they are from subcomponent remnants from training rounds associated with an obsolete weapon system that was on Oahu in the 1960s.
"The Army has never intentionally misled the public concerning the presence of DU on Army installations in Hawaii. This is an isolated incident and should not be considered as an attempt to misinform the public," Col. Howard Killian, commander of the U.S. Army Garrison Hawaii, said in a written statement.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Article URL: http://starbulletin.com/2006/01/06/news/story06.html
© 1996-2006 The Honolulu Star-Bulletin | www.starbulletin.com
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Este informe no está disponible en español.
CHICAGO SUN-TIMES

Stop This Senseless Bombing
BY JUAN ANDRADE

June 24, 2001
Copyright © 2001 CHICAGO SUN-TIMES. All Rights Reserved.

When I was a little boy growing up in the small town of Brownwood, located deep in the heart of Texas, kids usually made toys to play with or searched for things that looked like toys with which to play. In retrospect I would say we were extremely creative. Not everything worked. One day my oldest brother Daniel got the bright idea to build a wooden boat. We weighed it down so much we could hardly carry it. As soon as the boat hit the water it sank so fast we jumped in just to ride it down to the bottom.

One day we learned a hard lesson that not everything we found was a toy. A friend of mine, Robert Gill, found an object that somehow had ended up in his backyard. The object appeared to be a metal canister, and little Robert took a hammer and tried to take it apart by pounding just below the tip. He never got to see what was inside. A blow from the hammer struck the canister in just the right spot and Robert's body was blown to bits. He had been playing with a bomb.

How could this happen? The answer was Camp Bowie, located just outside our city limits and home to an armored division during World War II. Central Texas was ideal for tank and other heavy armored equipment training. The area is sparsely populated and the nearest towns were 40 to 50 miles away. For nearly 50 years I've often wondered if anyone thought about how the countless number of unexploded bombs could endanger the lives and safety of innocent civilians later, especially little ones like Robert.

As far as I'm concerned, Vieques Island is today's Camp Bowie, only worse. Puerto Ricans who live on the island say that the island is littered with thousands of unexploded bombs dropped on them from Navy planes. The U.S. Navy has been using Vieques, population 9,300, as a practice bombing range for 60 years. The statistics are staggering. According to Village Voice reporter Lenora Todaro, the Navy dropped 20,000 pounds of live explosives, including napalm, on Vieques in 1994. The Navy has admitted that in 1998 it dropped 273 radioactive depleted uranium shells on Vieques and accidentally dropped 263 more in 1999. They are believed to contribute to the development of cancer and leukemia, and only 56 were retrieved. The Navy has also admitted to discharging environmental pollutants at a percentage well above the legal limit: arsenic, 6.6 percent; lead, 105 percent, and cadmium, 240 percent. The incidence of cancer, scleroderma, lupus, thyroid deficiencies, and asthma is far higher on Vieques than on the Puerto Rican mainland. What is even more distressing is that there is not a single hospital on Vieques.

The continued bombing of Vieques is senseless and should be stopped immediately. The Clinton administration agreed to accept the results of a vote by Viequenses on whether or not to allow the bombing to continue in November 2003. That was dumb. Of course they are going to vote to stop the bombing. But not being one to be out-dumbed, now President Bush has unilaterally decided to order the Navy to stop bombing Vieques, also in November 2003.

What's with 2003 anyway? The speculation is that Bush is afraid that Vieques will turn Puerto Rican voters against his brother, who is seeking re-election as governor of Florida next year. The experts are also saying that Bush (the president) must improve on his 35 percent share of the Latino vote. Good luck. Next to African Americans, Puerto Ricans are the most loyal Democrats of all ethnic or racial minority groups in America. Trust me: It is no coincidence that 57 African American and Hispanic members of Congress, led by Illinois Rep. Luis Gutierrez, have called on the president to stop the bombing now.

One last thing. What was even more incredible was Bush's reasoning for ordering the bombing to cease in 2003. ''These people are our friends and neighbors, and they don't want us there,'' he said. Friends and neighbors? Good God, Puerto Ricans are citizens of the United States! We have occupied their land for 101 years. We made them U.S. citizens in 1917. But never in 100 years have we treated Puerto Ricans with the dignity and respect they deserve. The status of Puerto Rico can be decided later, but protracted colonialism should not be an option. For starters, we should stop the bombing immediately if not sooner.

Juan Andrade is president of the U.S. Hispanic Leadership Institute, a national organization based in Chicago.

source: http://www.puertorico-herald.org/issues/2001/vol5n26/StopSenselessBomb-en.shtml
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Reporter-News Archives
Tuesday, January 26, 1999

Live WWII shell found in Brownwood

BROWNWOOD -- A World War II-era shell found by children in the backyard of a Brownwood home was safely detonated by a Fort Hood bomb squad.
The 22-inch long, 5-inch diameter shell was found Saturday evening in the 1000 block of Avenue C. Brownwood police called Fort Hood officials.
The bomb squad took the shell to Camp Bowie Military Reservation, where it was detonated Sunday, police said. The explosion could be heard across southern Brownwood, prompting a number of residents to call 911.
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Star-Telegram | 09/30/2003 | LETHAL LEGACY
... which emitted a puff of smoke to show where the bombs hit, Condike ... The other Texas
sites are Camp Barkley in Abilene, Camp Bowie in Brownwood, Camp Howze in ...
www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/news/6896369.htm - 41k - Supplemental Result - Cached - Similar pages
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Texas Monthly August 2001: Bomb Scare
... He calmly discussed the potential for unexploded bombs while alarmed ... two high-priority
areas in Texas—the former Camp Bowie, near Brownwood, and the ...
www.texasmonthly.com/mag/issues/2001-08-01/ reporter2.php?click_code=3c892459190533f05bea5235897b333e - 30k - Supplemental Result - Cached - Similar pages
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Region 6: South Central
Serving Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Texas and 65 Tribes
EPA Home > Region 6 > Base Closures > EPA Innovates to Meet Environmental Challenge

In the News - Base Closures

EPA Innovates to Meet Environmental Challenge
EPA is developing partnerships, fostering new ideas and technologies, and promoting public participation to address environmental concerns at a growing number of closed military facilities.

As military bases are closing nationwide, property is being returned to local communities for economic development. In the EPA’s south central region, the list includes Carswell, Bergstrom, Kelly and Reese Air Force bases, Dallas Naval Air Station and Red River Army Depot in Texas, England Air Force Base in Louisiana, the Army’s Fort Chafee and Eaker Air Force Base in Arkansas, and Fort Wingate Army Depot in New Mexico.

In the same five states, add over 900 formerly used defense sites (also known as FUDS) once owned by the Department of Defense, many of which are still polluted. EPA and its local, state and federal partners have plenty of work to do.

Many Facilities Are Polluted

After years of Cold War activities, when environmental issues took a back seat to national security, some closing bases and former defense sites were left with environmental problems. Michael Overbay, a senior project officer at EPA-Dallas, says some sites are polluted with hazardous waste, unexploded bombs and artillery shells, and a variety of toxic materials, including radioactive waste. Sometimes, ground water in the area may be polluted.

But Overbay also says EPA and the military services are acting to address the problem. In fact, the south central EPA region is the first in the nation to complete an independent inventory and screening of its former defense sites. The agency currently is working with the states and the military services to prioritize for cleanup approximately 40% of sites that have some type of pollution problem.

Innovations and Partnerships

By getting communities involved, local partnerships are being created that lead to faster site assessments, cleanups and redevelopment. Base cleanup teams and restoration advisory boards have led to quick successes like Bergstrom and England Air Force bases.

Other fast-track sites include:

• McGregor Naval Weapons Industrial Reserve Plant in Texas near Waco - The Navy is now cleaning up the property so it can be turned over to the city of McGregor for use as an industrial park. Pollution includes perchlorate, a chemical used in rocket fuel and explosives that can contaminate water. EPA, the state and the Navy are working together to ensure all drinking water sources in the area are protected.

• Brooks Air Force Base in San Antonio - Congress authorized a special City-Base Pilot Project, which allows Brooks to give land to the city of San Antonio even though the Air Force continues to operate there. Mostly office parks are involved, which the city can redevelop. EPA and Texas have worked together to speed up the review process. Final transfer of the land took place in July.

• Camp Bowie in Brownwood, Texas - The former World War II Army training camp closed in 1946. A medical center, industries, parks and a sports complex now are located on portions of the site. But other parts of the 123,000-acre site still may pose a risk from unexploded artillery shells. EPA, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and their partners are using local historical records to limit the scope of the investigation. Work began this spring.

• Southwestern Proving Ground near Hope, Arkansas. - The Army used the site from 1942 to 1945 to test small arms ammo, mortars, rockets, grenades, and up to 500-pound bombs. Unexploded ordnance remains dangerous despite being almost 60 years old. In the past few years more than 8,000 explosives have been removed, much of it from areas near homes. New technology developed at the site will help workers at other sites find explosives faster.

Cleanups also are progressing well at other former defense sites like Walker Air Force Base near Roswell, New Mexico, and Camp Swift at Bastrop, Texas. Members of the local Redevelopment Advisory Board at Roswell tell the Army Corps of Engineers they are especially pleased with recent cleanup progress.

Progress at cleaning up closed bases and former military sites depends on priorities and money. So many sites are polluted, cleanups will take many millions of dollars. So sites must be prioritized according to risk to the public and prospects for redevelopment to help the community.

Most of the sites drew little attention for almost half a century. Now, the Corps of Engineers, EPA, and the states are joining forces to focus attention on the high priority sites.

With limited funding for cleanups, the future challenge is enormous. But Overbay believes, by strengthening existing partnerships, further streamlining cleanups, and getting more return on each dollar spent, the partners will meet the challenge.

source: http://www.epa.gov/Arkansas/6xa/base_innovates.htm
----------------

Brownwood SUPERFUND sites:

BROWNWOOD 3M COMPANY BRADY HWY US HWY 377 TXD001806868

BROWNWOOD ADAMS CHEMICAL AND WEED CONTROL W COMMERCE ST(HWY 84/67) TXD981058878


BROWNWOOD ADAMS FLYING SERVICE BOWIE VILLAGE #53 TXD981047244

BROWNWOOD BAYOU PECAN CO 5MI.N.OF CITY OFF HWY 183 TXD060154820

BROWNWOOD BIG RIG FERTILIZER, INC E HWY 377, 2.5 MI E FM 2525 TXD040930331

BROWNWOOD BROWNWOOD CITY OF LDF-TX BRICK CO. APPX 5 MI SW ON INDIAN CRK RD TXD980697742
SITE
BROWNWOOD BROWNWOOD GAS & ELECTRIC CO. CORNER OF SHARP & SAN JACINTO TXD981916513


BROWNWOOD CAMP BOWIE INDUSTRIAL PARK LANDFILL END OF HOOVER ST TXD980696504

BROWNWOOD PHILLIPS DRISCO PIPE INC CAMP BOWIE RD TXD047102868

BROWNWOOD POTTERDS INDUSTRIES, INC. 2 MI W OF HWY 279 ON CITY RD 102

source: Jonathan Campbell, Health Consultant
Natural Therapies for Chronic Illness & Health Maintenance
http://www.cqs.com/super_tx.htm
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Note from Steve, this is an example of what the Partisan Hacks on local talk radio cannot change nor stop. Independent thinkers of all stripes often work together on enviromental issues. Below is an example of such work going on. I stand in solidarity with Independent thinkers and also loved living and working in Puerto Rico ! Enviromental issues are universal and personal !
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The Hartford Courant

A Victory For Grass-Roots Activism On Vieques
By Juan Figueroa

May 30, 2003
Copyright © 2003 The Hartford Courant. All rights reserved.

The bombing of Vieques, Puerto Rico, has ended. Attempts to stop the bombing began immediately after the United States expropriated two-thirds of the fully inhabited Puerto Rican island in the 1940s to use for target practice by the U.S. Navy and its allies.

The Navy's withdrawal this month was accomplished, in part, by the first successful effort to link an island injustice with stateside local grass-roots activism and the Puerto Rican/Latino leadership here. This successful link could serve as a model for handling future island issues. A good place to retest the model is with the cleanup of Vieques and securing reparations for its residents.

``Todo Puerto Rico Con Vieques'' was the broad-based island coalition that brought together estadistas, independentistas and estadolibristas seeking an end to the bombing -- a small miracle in itself given the unforgiving nature of partisan politics in Puerto Rico.

The coalition also brought together the diverse religious and civic sectors on the island. This effort was replicated in the states in places with high concentrations of Puerto Ricans. ``Todo'' coalitions were organized in Connecticut and other states. These coalitions were critical in providing effective grass-roots activism, mobilizing hundreds of thousands of people who, in turn, were successful at educating the press, politicians and key allies in the states.

These coalitions complimented a very determined Sila Maria Calder0n, governor of Puerto Rico, and her efforts to persuade the White House and Congress to stop the bombing of Vieques. More important, however, these local U.S. efforts engaged key stateside Puerto Rican leaders and U.S. institutions.

The most significant individual to join this effort was Dennis Rivera, president of the very powerful health care workers union in New York, Local 1199. The issue was popular with his members (I rode on a packed 1199 bus to a D.C. demonstration) and with the many Puerto Rican voters that Rivera has registered to vote over the years.

Rivera was instrumental in mobilizing a range of influential stakeholders, including two U.S. presidents (Clinton and Bush) as well as scores of members of Congress. He used his considerable political capital with President Clinton (who set a framework for the Navy's departure) and was instrumental in recruiting New York Gov. George Pataki, who, in turn, proved a key influence with the Bush White House.

Rivera also recruited well-known environmental lawyer Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and the U.S.-based Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund to sue the Navy. He engaged civil rights leader the Rev. Jesse Jackson (whose wife, Jacqueline, was arrested in Vieques and served eight days of a 10- day prison sentence for ``trespassing'' in Vieques to protest the Navy bombings) and other key African American leaders.

Rivera and Kennedy themselves served 30 days in a federal penitentiary in Puerto Rico for peaceful acts of civil disobedience. They joined scores of doctors, lawyers, farmers, fishermen, teachers, politicians and religious leaders who were also arrested for peaceful acts of civil disobedience.

The cumulative effect of this joint U.S. and island activism and consequent press coverage elevated Vieques to cause celebre status in the United States and kept the pressure on the Navy. None of this was possible but for the courage of the people of Vieques and the many Puerto Ricans who, over the years, joined their cause.

The fishermen of Vieques, in particular, played a key role in this effort and in the events that followed the April 19, 1999, accidental killing of a civilian, Roberto Sanes Rodriquez, by an errant Navy bomb in Vieques. Those individuals sacrificed much at a time when the issue was not well-known outside Puerto Rico.

Now that the bombing has ended, it is time to repair the damage inflicted upon the people of Vieques and their environment. It is not only fair but consistent with reparations the U.S. military has made to victims of other military exercises such as nuclear testing. This will require a great deal of money and political will, and the Pentagon should assume full responsibility. (Parts of the island are heavily contaminated, and its residents are 27 percent more likely to have cancer.) The Kennedy/PRLDEF lawsuit could serve as the insurance policy for this to happen.

Juan A. Figueroa is president of the Anthem Foundation, a health care foundation based in New Haven. His column appears every month.

source: http://www.puertorico-herald.org/issues/2003/vol7n27/VicGrRtsVq-en.shtml
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More Background info here:

go here...

Jerry Rivera: Watch the "Puerto Rico" Video Here

watch & listen here...

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Brownwood - Puerto Rico...

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go here...

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go here...

QUOTE

" I always knew this was going to be coming. Greed will always surface," tribal Gov. Art Senclair said. "I think right now it's just the top of the iceberg. It's going to be a domino effect . . . once (Abramoff) starts naming names." ~ Abramoff schemes scar tribe in Texas
Lobbyist's casino scam drained Tiguas' cash, left taint of scandal By Chuck Lindell AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Sunday, January 08, 2006

Question: Wonder if Barbara, William, Robert & Joan would move to Brownwood !

Dallas Morning News Letters to the Editor

Strayhorn is too late ...

When Carole Keeton Strayhorn (Democrat, Republican and now independent) decides who and what she is – and actually has a plan in which she can realistically promise to accomplish those things (this time, for real, for sure) – I may listen.
But I will not listen to 10 months of bashing Rick Perry (Democrat, now Republican) because she has nothing else to promote herself. All that I see now is a desperate, conservative, political opportunist in disguise.
Unfortunately, she has started too late against a statewide, county-by-county, highly organized group of Kinky Friedman supporters. Some may not agree with the beginnings of what we have heard of his platform, but at least what we have heard is a logical, reasonable and realistic way to fix the things wrecked or ignored during the Perry administration.
Today, Texans have no choice for their leadership except paper or plastic. Political parties are for sale to the highest bidder, and lobbyists control the legislative agenda.
As Kinky says, "The career politicians are keeping the elevator at the penthouse floor and not sending it down for the rest of us."
Barbara Haas, Highland Village
-------------------
... or part of 'dream team' ?

Good for Carole Keeton Strayhorn for running as an independent for governor! Now it's time for Kinky Friedman to change his strategy and focus on the lieutenant governor's spot!
It would be a healthy change for everyone. Come on, Kinkster, admit it. Do you really want to show up for work every day? Vote for the Tough Grandma and the Jewish Cowboy: a "Dream Team" for sure !

William Bain, Dallas
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Throw all the bums out

Re: "Our Resolve – We'll keep pushing forward on tough issues," Sunday Editorial.
The legislators who are calling us WASPs – whiny ass school people – should not go into special session on school finance. They have proven repeatedly that they are not capable of solving the problem.
I hope the whiny ass school people defeat them in their primaries and send them home to stay. These same people calling us WASPs are going to be on the campaign trail telling us how important we are and how important education is – the same bunch who went through two regular sessions and two special sessions and we still don't have a raise or school finance bill.
They do not deserve to be in public office and certainly do not deserve our votes.

Robert Medlin, Forney
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I'm ready for some change

Re: "Texas leaders should be wary of voters," by Marcus Rasco, Dec. 31 Letters.
I could not agree more. I've been a Republican since I was old enough to vote (back in the '60s), and this election will find me voting for some Democrats or independents. I was so disappointed in our legislators last summer and the summer before. It is difficult for me to comprehend their lack of urgency in this school finance matter.
I will retire in 18 months and leave the state, no longer able to pay the high property taxes on my reduced income. That is disgraceful.

Joan Couch, Plano
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source: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/opinion/letters/stories/DN-3ptexasvote_0108edi.ART.State.Edition1.3e63b23.html

Some more of those Good Ole Republican Values ?

A Donor Who Had Big Allies
DeLay and two others helped put the brakes on a federal probe of a businessman. Evidence was published in the Congressional Record.
By Richard A. Serrano and Stephen Braun
Times Staff Writers

January 8, 2006

WASHINGTON — In a case that echoes the Jack Abramoff influence-peddling scandal, two Northern California Republican congressmen used their official positions to try to stop a federal investigation of a wealthy Texas businessman who provided them with political contributions.
Reps. John T. Doolittle and Richard W. Pombo joined forces with former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay of Texas to oppose an investigation by federal banking regulators into the affairs of Houston millionaire Charles Hurwitz, documents recently obtained by The Times show. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. was seeking $300 million from Hurwitz for his role in the collapse of a Texas savings and loan that cost taxpayers $1.6 billion.
The investigation was ultimately dropped.
The effort to help Hurwitz began in 1999 when DeLay wrote a letter to the chairman of the FDIC denouncing the investigation of Hurwitz as a "form of harassment and deceit on the part of government employees." When the FDIC persisted, Doolittle and Pombo — both considered proteges of DeLay — used their power as members of the House Resources Committee to subpoena the agency's confidential records on the case, including details of the evidence FDIC investigators had compiled on Hurwitz.
Then, in 2001, the two congressmen inserted many of the sensitive documents into the Congressional Record, making them public and accessible to Hurwitz's lawyers, a move that FDIC officials said damaged the government's ability to pursue the banker.
The FDIC's chief spokesman characterized what Doolittle and Pombo did as "a seamy abuse of the legislative process." But soon afterward, in 2002, the FDIC dropped its case against Hurwitz, who had owned a controlling interest in the United Savings Assn. of Texas. United Savings' failure was one of the worst of the S&L debacles in the 1980s.
Doolittle and Pombo did not respond to requests for interviews last week. They publicly defended Hurwitz at the time, saying the inquiry was unfair. Hurwitz's lawyer said Friday that the FDIC had been overzealous. This summer, a judge in Texas agreed and awarded Hurwitz attorney fees and other costs in a civil suit he filed. "They sought to humiliate him," U.S. District Judge Lynn N. Hughes, said in the ruling. The government is appealing the decision.
In key aspects, the Hurwitz case follows the pattern of the Abramoff scandal: members of Congress using their offices to do favors for a politically well-connected individual who, in turn, supplies them with campaign funds. Although Washington politicians frequently try to help important constituents and contributors, it is unusual for members of Congress to take direct steps to stymie an ongoing investigation by an agency such as the FDIC.
And the actions of the two Californians reflect DeLay's broad strategy of cementing relationships with individuals, business interests and lobbyists whose financial support enabled Republicans to extend their grip on Congress and on government agencies as well. The system DeLay developed and Abramoff took part in went beyond simple quid pro quo; it mobilized whatever GOP resources were available to help those who could help the party.
In the Hurwitz case, Doolittle and Pombo were in a position to pressure the FDIC and did so. Pombo received a modest campaign contribution. In another case, Pombo helped one of Abramoff's clients, the Mashpee Indians in Massachusetts, gain official recognition as a tribe; the congressman received contributions from the lobbyist and the tribe in that instance.
Andrew Wheat, research director for Texans for Public Justice, a nonpartisan electoral reform group based in Austin, put it this way: "DeLay and Hurwitz seem like natural allies in that they have geographic and ideological proximity. Mr. Hurwitz is a guy who has a reputation of being willing to pay to play. And DeLay likes to play that game too, so there's a natural affinity."
DeLay announced Saturday that he was giving up his efforts to regain the majority leader position. He was majority whip when he first became involved in helping Hurwitz.
In the Abramoff scandal, members of Congress allegedly did favors for the politically connected lobbyist's clients — including Indian casinos — and received campaign contributions and lavish free entertainment. Last week, the lobbyist pleaded guilty in separate cases in Miami and Washington in a deal that government investigators hope will lead to more prosecutions. Others involved have also made deals to cooperate, and Washington is braced for new criminal charges to come.
The episode involving Hurwitz and the two California congressmen took place with little public notice just before the Abramoff scandal began to escalate. The Sacramento Bee published a story when Doolittle inserted FDIC investigative documents into the Congressional Record, noting that it occurred at a time when Congress was distracted by the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and the anthrax episode.
But what lay behind Doolittle's action, and the actions of Pombo and DeLay, did not become clear until recently, when the government documents and copies of letters between the congressmen and FDIC officials were obtained by The Times.
J. Kent Friedman, the general counsel for Hurwitz's vast Houston-based holding company, said last week that the FDIC was overzealous in its dealings with his boss.
"Their case was weak from the start. They had a terrible case," Friedman said. He said anyone trying to connect the congressmen to the fact that the case fell apart would be "attempting to put a bow on a pig."
The Texas S&L in which Hurwitz held a controlling interest of about 25% collapsed in 1988 as part of a financial fiasco that took federal regulators years to untangle. The investigation of Hurwitz began in 1995 and continued for about seven years before it was dropped.
After DeLay's 1999 letter attacking the investigation failed to dissuade the FDIC, Doolittle weighed in with a statement on the House floor in 2001, saying the FDIC investigators were "clearly out of control" and should have "dropped the case, period."
Pombo, in his own 2001 floor statement, suggested that the banking regulators were using strong-arm methods against Hurwitz, or what Pombo called "tools equivalent to the Cosa Nostra — a mafia tactic."
Doolittle, 55, an eight-term congressman, represents California's fourth district, the Sierra Foothills region and the eastern suburbs of Sacramento. He has a consistent conservative voting record, opposing gun control and abortion and siding with property rights, timber and utility interests against environmental groups.
By 2000, he had grown close to DeLay, working with the Republican leader to oppose proposed changes to campaign finance law and restrictions on fundraising. When DeLay was indicted in Texas last year, Doolittle distributed about 100 lapel pins in the shape of tiny hammers as a tribute to the man nicknamed the "Hammer" for his ability to pound congressional Republicans into line.
Doolittle also was closely aligned with Abramoff. Records show that Abramoff gave Doolittle tens of thousands of dollars in contributions and employed the congressman's wife for other fundraising activities.
Pombo, the son of cattle ranchers, plays up his cowboy roots, often appearing in his district wearing a ranch-hand's hat and ostrich-skin boots. Forty-five years old, a seven-term congressman, he represents the fertile farming expanse of the Central Valley.
He had impressed DeLay with his fundraising prowess, garnering about $1 million for his 2002 House reelection, which he won easily.
And not long after his role in helping Hurwitz, the GOP House caucus — led by DeLay — helped get Pombo elected chairman of the Resources Committee over several more senior Republicans.
Hurwitz has been a prolific campaign donor since the early 1990s.
He has contributed personally and with funds provided by his Houston-based flagship company, Maxxam Inc., through subsidiaries such as Kaiser Aluminum, and through a company political action committee, Maxxam Inc. Federal PAC.
In the last three federal elections cycles, those entities have given about $443,000 in political contributions — most of it to conservative politicians, including President Bush, for whom Hurwitz pledged to raise $100,000 in the 2000 campaign and also helped during that year's vote tally deadlock in Florida.
Hurwitz has been generous with DeLay too.
Starting in the 2000 election cycle, the businessman and his committees have distributed at least $30,000 to DeLay and his federal causes, including $5,000 for his current legal defense fund in the Texas money-laundering case.
Hurwitz also contributed $1,000 to Pombo for his 1996 reelection campaign. And through the Maxxam PAC, Hurwitz gave Doolittle $5,000 for his 2002 reelection campaign and then followed up with $2,000 more for his 2004 race.
When DeLay went to bat for Hurwitz, he was particularly critical of reported internal government discussions that would have pressed Hurwitz to settle his obligations for the collapsed S&L by selling the government vast forest areas and redwood trees in Northern California near Scotia. The forest land was owned by Hurwitz's Pacific Lumber company
"I am extremely concerned," DeLay told then-FDIC Chairwoman Donna A. Tanoue, "about the apparent abuse of governmental power and what appears to be misconduct in the form of harassment and deceit on the part of government employees."
Tanoue responded by telling DeLay "we can assure you that the FDIC lawsuit against Mr. Hurwitz was not filed for political reasons."
The investigation pressed on, and a year later the House Resources Committee, which had jurisdiction because of the forest area, set up a special Headwaters Forest Task Force and launched its own review. Doolittle was appointed task force chairman, and Pombo one of its members.
Duane Gibson, the committee's general counsel who later went to work for Abramoff, was named the chief investigator. They immediately subpoenaed internal records from the FDIC and the Office of Thrift Supervision, which also had responsibilities for S&Ls.
Both agencies were wary and, although complying with the subpoenas, repeatedly urged the lawmakers not to make the documents public or share them with Hurwitz.
William F. Kroener III, general counsel at the FDIC, warned the committee that Hurwitz and his lawyers were not entitled to see many of the documents.
Kroener told the panel that, should the material end up in their hands, it "could significantly injure our ability to litigate this matter and reduce damages otherwise recoverable to reimburse taxpayers."
Carolyn J. Buck, chief counsel at the Office of Thrift Supervision, also wrote the committee emphasizing that "we note our objection to any publication or release of these documents."
The task force was set up for six months, and disbanded in December 2000. It held one hearing, and called FDIC and Office of Thrift Supervision officials as witnesses.
At that hearing, Tanoue defended the FDIC's investigation.
"I have listened to and considered the arguments made directly to me by representatives of Mr. Hurwitz," she testified. "However, I have found no compelling reason to take the extraordinary step of … taking this case out of the hands of the judicial system."
Kroener testified that the FDIC was not interested in a trees-for-debt swap, saying his agency "has expressed its preference for a cash settlement."
Six months later, in June 2001, Pombo submitted a portion of the subpoenaed documents that filled 14 pages in the Congressional Record.
Six months after that, in December 2001, Doolittle did the same, even though he was no longer a member of the committee. And his submission was much larger — filling 111 pages.
The documents were so voluminous that Doolittle and Pombo had to pay a total of about $20,000 from their congressional accounts to cover the extra printing costs.
The FDIC was outraged over the documents' release.
Its chief spokesman, Phil Battey, said in a statement to the Sacramento Bee at the time that the publication of the materials was a "subordination … and a seamy abuse of the legislative process."
Not long afterward, the FDIC dismissed its case, and the Office of Thrift Supervision settled with Hurwitz for about $200,000 in administrative costs.

*
Times staff writer Ted Rohrlich contributed to this report.
source: http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-banker8jan08,0,1764103.story?coll=la-home-nation

" philo-Semitism ": Yes, it's being poured on thick in Brownwood !

Among Evangelicals, A Kinship With Jews Some Skeptical of Growing Phenomenon
By Alan Cooperman Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, January 8, 2006; A01

DANVILLE, Va. -- Everyone who worships at the Tabernacle quickly learns three facts about its deeply conservative pastor. He comes from a broken home. He rides a canary-yellow Harley. And he loves the Jews.
There is some murmuring about the motorcycle. But the 2,500 members of this Bible-believing, tradition-respecting Southern Baptist church in southern Virginia have embraced everything else about the Rev. Lamarr Mooneyham.
Out of his painful childhood experiences, Mooneyham, 57, preaches passionately about the importance of home. Out of his reading of the Bible, he preaches with equal passion about God's continuing devotion to the Jewish people.
"I feel jealous sometimes. This term that keeps coming up in the Old Book -- the Chosen, the Chosen," says the minister, who has made three trips to Israel and named his sons Isaac, Jacob and Joseph. "I'm a pardoned gentile, but I'm not one of the Chosen People. They're the apple of his eye."
Scholars of religion call this worldview "philo-Semitism," the opposite of anti-Semitism. It is a burgeoning phenomenon in evangelical Christian churches across the country, a hot topic in Jewish historical studies and a wellspring of support for Israel.
Yet many Jews are nervous about evangelicals' intentions. In recent weeks, leaders of three of the nation's largest Jewish groups -- the Anti-Defamation League, the American Jewish Committee and the Union for Reform Judaism -- have decried what they see as a mounting threat to the separation of church and state from evangelicals emboldened by the belief that they have an ally in the White House and an opportunity to shift the Supreme Court.
"Make no mistake: We are facing an emerging Christian right leadership that intends to 'Christianize' all aspects of American life, from the halls of government to the libraries, to the movies, to recording studios, to the playing fields and locker rooms . . . from the military to SpongeBob SquarePants," the ADL's national director, Abraham H. Foxman, said in a Nov. 3 speech.
Julie Galambush, a former American Baptist minister who converted to Judaism 11 years ago, has seen both sides of the divide. She said many Jews suspect that evangelicals' support for Israel is rooted in a belief that the return of Jews to the promised land will trigger the Second Coming of Jesus, the battle of Armageddon and mass conversion.
"That hope is felt and expressed by Christians as a kind, benevolent hope," said Galambush, author of "The Reluctant Parting," a new book on the Jewish roots of Christianity. "But believing that someday Jews will stop being Jews and become Christians is still a form of hoping that someday there will be no more Jews."
The result is a paradox -- warming evangelical attitudes toward Jews at a time of rising Jewish concern about evangelicals -- that could be a turning point in the uneasy alliance between Jewish and Christian groups that ardently back Israel but disagree on much else.
The Rev. Donald E. Wildmon, chairman of the evangelical American Family Association, warned in a Dec. 5 radio broadcast that Foxman was "in a bind" because the "strongest supporters Israel has are members of the religious right -- the people he's fighting."
"The more he says that 'you people are destroying this country,' you know, some people are going to begin to get fed up with this and say, 'Well, all right then. If that's the way you feel, then we just won't support Israel anymore,' " Wildmon said.
Philo-Semitism is far from universal among the 60 million to 90 million U.S. adults who identify themselves as born-again or evangelical Christians. But it has strong roots, not only in the Hebrew scriptures shared by both faiths but also in the belief that today's Jews and Christians have common antagonists, such as secularism, consumerism and militant Islam.
In his sermons, Mooneyham returns again and again to God's promise to Abraham in Genesis 12: "I will bless those who bless you, and curse him who curses you."
It is a theme echoed in many conversations at the Tabernacle, a plain red-brick church in a community that has seen one factory after another close, yet where the congregation made a Christmas offering of $25,000 to help pay for the immigration of Russian Jews to Israel.
"I believe everyone in this church felt it was the best thing we've ever done with missionary money, to help the Jewish people go home," said Dorothy Pawlowski, 72, who tithes to the church.
And it is a message being passed to the next generation. On Thursday nights, J.J. Vogltanz, a deacon, uses a Christian textbook to lead his three home-schooled children in science experiments designed to illustrate Bible verses. One of the first things he taught them about Jesus, he said, was that "he was a Jew."
Asked whether he also taught his children that the Jews rejected Jesus, Vogltanz, 34, paused. "I'm not sure it's constructive to assign blame," he said.
Mark A. Noll, a professor of Christian thought at Wheaton College, a center of evangelical scholarship in Illinois, said evangelicals are beginning to move away from supersessionism -- the centuries-old belief that with the coming of Jesus, God ended his covenant with the Jews and transferred it to the Christian church.
Since the 1960s, the Roman Catholic Church and some Protestant denominations have renounced supersessionism and stressed their belief that the covenant between God and the Jewish people remains in effect.
Evangelicals generally have not taken that step, but "among what you might call the evangelical intelligentsia, questions of supersessionism have come onto the table," Noll said. "It's in play among evangelicals in the way that it was in mainline Protestantism and Catholicism -- but wasn't among evangelicals -- 30 or 40 years ago."
At Fuller Theological Seminary, an evangelical training ground in Pasadena, Calif., President Richard J. Mouw hosted a kosher breakfast for 20 rabbis a week before Christmas. "More and more, we're inviting Jews as guest lecturers," Mouw said. "We're looking at rabbinic literature and how we can better understand the Bible through rabbinic eyes. That's a real push for us."
Jacques Berlinerblau, a visiting professor of Jewish civilization at Georgetown University, said the rise of philo-Semitism in the United States has led Jewish scholars to look back at previous periods of philo-Semitism, such as in Amsterdam in the mid-17th century. He said revisionists are increasingly challenging the standard "lachrymose version" of Jewish history, questioning whether persecution has been the norm and tolerance the exception, or vice versa.
Still, some Jews think that philo-Semitism is just the flip side of anti-Semitism.
"Both are Semitisms: That is, both install the Jews at the center of history. One regards this centrality positively, the other regards it negatively. But both are forms of obsession about the Jews," said Leon Wieseltier, a Jewish scholar and literary editor of the New Republic.
The Southern Baptist Convention, to which the Tabernacle belongs, passed a resolution in 1867 calling on its members to convert Jews and renewed that call as recently as 1996. Its former president, Bailey Smith, declared in 1980 that "God Almighty does not hear the prayer of a Jew," and it currently supports about 15 congregations of messianic Jews, who are popularly associated with the organization Jews for Jesus.
So Mooneyham has a ready answer for Jews who doubt his motives: "I think they have a right to be suspicious of just about everybody, given the history."
He also has a personal story. The pivotal moment of Mooneyham's childhood came at age 7 when his parents, in the middle of a divorce, took him and his three sisters to a church parking lot in Burlington, N.C., and parceled them out to relatives for a few weeks. Those few weeks turned into years. The family never came together again.
Nearly 45 years later, the pastor was watching television before a Sunday morning church service when he came upon an infomercial by Rabbi Yechiel Z. Eckstein, founder of a group called the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews. Eckstein was standing in Israel with an elderly woman from Russia who said she was finally home.
"She started crying, he started crying, and I started crying," Mooneyham said. "Then I said, 'Lord, help me, because I'm really going to throw my congregation a curveball today. We're going to help Jews -- we're not going to witness to them, we're just going to help them. Because I know what home means.' "
Since that day five years ago, according to Eckstein, the Tabernacle has sent more than $175,000 to the fellowship, which has a donor base of 400,000 Christians and has contributed more than $100 million to Israeli causes.
"I can only say that what we've done should speak for itself, because we've given and we've asked nothing in return," Mooneyham said. "And that's the way it will stay."

© 2006 The Washington Post Company
source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/07/AR2006010701267_pf.html

CNN's Blitzer & DNC's Dean interview .....

watch & listen here...

* Nailed it, to a Capital T !

* "Both outsiders and sometimes Texans themselves, often seem to expect if not prefer the stereotypes instead of the actual complexity and diversity of Texans." Don Graham
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From the Washington Post
New in Paperback
Sunday, January 8, 2006; BW12

The myth of rugged Western masculinity so vital to television truck ads -- and American presidents -- has taken a few hits lately. Turns out cowboys can be gay ("Brokeback Mountain"), prospectors can be criminals ("Deadwood"), and most settlers didn't know what the heck they were doing (historical record). But myths die hard, as three new paperbacks demonstrate.

On January 1, 1870, 10-year-old Adolph Korn was kidnapped by Apaches while he was tending sheep with his twin brother along the Llano River in the Texas Hill Country. The stepson of a former German confectioner who was barely scraping by as a shepherd, Korn was restored to his family three years later. But afterward, writes Scott Zesch in The Captured: A True Story of Abduction by Indians on the Texas Frontier (St. Martin's, $14.95), "he refused to sleep indoors. For a while, he even lived in a cave like a wild man. He ate raw meat. Now and then he took his rifle and disappeared into the hills for several days, never explaining his absences when he returned." Zesch, a descendant of Korn, sets out to unearth the story of this boy who left his heart with the Apaches who captured him. Along the way, he discovers that Korn's story is far from unique: Many children were stolen from white settlers in the area, often adopted into Indian families and even trained to be warriors for the tribe. Interweaving Korn's story with those of other white Indians, as they came to be called, Zesch tells a compelling tale of desperate life on the frontier. "If western movies have underplayed the harsh living conditions . . . they've also exaggerated the bravery and self-reliance of the farmers who lived there," writes Zesch. "When Indians came around their homesteads, the settlers . . . seldom stood and fought to defend their homes if they had a chance to hide or escape."

The mountain men lionized in Win Blevins's Give Your Heart to the Hawks: A Tribute to the Mountain Men (Forge, $14.95) would probably have sympathized with poor Alfred Korn. Originally published more than 30 years ago, Give Your Heart mourns the loss of those who "outside the authority of any sheriff, beyond the help of the U.S. cavalry or anyone else back in the States, all the way off the map . . . rode, walked, floated, and crawled virtually every inch of the West. They learned the plains down to the last buffalo wallow, the mountains down to the last side canyon, the deserts to the last hidden spring." Blevins, a novelist, has taken their stories -- all fully documented, he says -- and dramatized them. The reader can get a sense of what it felt like to be John Colter -- who had traveled with Lewis and Clark -- as he ran naked from Blackfoot warriors, eventually walking 250 miles in 11 days without food to safety. Pretty bad, but Hugh Glass topped him by crawling 300 miles after a grizzly mauled him and his companions abandoned him for dead. Blevins's mountain men are nearly supernatural not only in their survival skills but also in their ability to "look at a trail and tell which tribe made it, how many of them there were, what mission they were on, whether they were going to it or returning from it . . . and where they were now." Only the settling of the West could bring these men down.

No matter how settled and civilized Texas gets, though, it will always resist the dimming of its myths. "Both outsiders and sometimes Texans themselves," writes Don Graham in the introduction to Lone Star Literature: A Texas Anthology (Norton, $19.95), "often seem to expect if not prefer the stereotypes instead of the actual complexity and diversity of Texans." Graham, a literature professor at the University of Texas at Austin, aims to remedy the situation with a sweeping collection of work from 20th-century Texas writers. It's an impressive group. Larry McMurtry, whose well-received Crazy Horse: A Life (Penguin, $13) has just been released in paperback, makes an appearance with an excerpt from his novel The Last Picture Show . Mary Karr, Katherine Ann Porter, Dagoberto Gilb, Rick Bass and Donald Barthelme also contribute. The book is roughly organized by geography. In the western section, O. Henry spins a tale about the legislature trying to buy some homegrown art, while the southern section includes a snippet from Robert A. Caro's The Years of Lyndon Johnson: The Path to Power about the hard lot of a Texas farm wife. There's also a collection of pieces on the Kennedy assassination -- Joe Bob Briggs's "How I Solved the Kennedy Assassination" is particularly noteworthy -- and another about Latinos along the Mexican border, which features Sandra Cisneros's chattily tragic " La Fabulosa : A Texas Operetta." All in all, the anthology is as broad and deep as the great state itself.

-- Rachel Hartigan Shea
source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/05/AR2006010501695_pf.html

" Wounded "

watch & listen here...

Comanche County Carolyn and The Politics of Pollution ! I agree with Carolyn.

" To Carolyn Smith’s mind, it’s all just common sense. She isn’t an expert on environmental regulation or federal law. But she says it’s clear that 4,000 cows are too many for an area the size of Wildcat Dairy on an already-polluted river. "We’re not getting any help from the TNRCC–they appear to be caught between the politicians and doing their jobs," she says. "The water situation is going to affect everyone. People better make themselves aware of it or we’re going to be in trouble." She pauses and adds, "We’re already in trouble." "

read more here...

What the Big Country Partisan Republicans "are not" talking about on the Talk Radio Airwaves !

January 6, 2006
Extra Armor Could Have Saved Many Lives, Study Shows

By MICHAEL MOSS
A secret Pentagon study has found that at least 80 percent of the marines who have been killed in Iraq from wounds to their upper body could have survived if they had extra body armor. That armor has been available since 2003 but until recently the Pentagon has largely declined to supply it to troops despite calls from the field for additional protection, according to military officials.
The ceramic plates in vests currently worn by the majority of military personnel in Iraq cover only some of the chest and back. In at least 74 of the 93 fatal wounds that were analyzed in the Pentagon study of marines from March 2003 through June 2005, bullets and shrapnel struck the marines' shoulders, sides or areas of the torso where the plates do not reach.
Thirty-one of the deadly wounds struck the chest or back so close to the plates that simply enlarging the existing shields "would have had the potential to alter the fatal outcome," according to the study, which was obtained by The New York Times.
For the first time, the study by the military's medical examiner shows the cost in lost lives from inadequate armor, even as the Pentagon continues to publicly defend its protection of the troops. Officials have said they are shipping the best armor to Iraq as quickly as possible. At the same time, they have maintained that it is impossible to shield forces from the increasingly powerful improvised explosive devices used by insurgents. Yet the Pentagon's own study reveals the equally lethal threat of bullets.
The vulnerability of the military's body armor has been known since the start of the war, and is part of a series of problems that have surrounded the protection of American troops. Still, the Marine Corps did not begin buying additional plates to cover the sides of their troops until this September, when it ordered 28,800 sets, Marine Corps officials acknowledge.
The Army, which has the largest force in Iraq, is still deciding what to purchase, according to Army procurement officials. They said the Army is deciding between various sizes of plates to give its 130,000 soldiers; the officials said they hope to issue contracts this month.
Additional forensic studies by the Armed Forces Medical Examiner's unit that were obtained by The Times indicate that about 340 American troops have died solely from torso wounds.
Military officials said they had originally decided against using the extra plates because they were concerned they added too much weight to the vests or constricted the movement of soldiers. Marine Corps officials said the findings of the Pentagon study caused field commanders to override those concerns in the interest of greater protection.
"As the information became more prevalent and aware to everybody that in fact these were casualty sites that they needed to be worried about, then people were much more willing to accept that weight on their body," said Major Wendell Leimbach, a body armor specialist with Marine Corps Systems Command, the marine procurement unit.
The Pentagon has been collecting the data on wounds since the beginning of the war in part to determine the effectiveness of body armor. The military's medical examiner, Craig T. Mallak, told a military panel in 2003 that the information "screams to be published." But it would take nearly two years.
The Marine Corps said it asked for the data in August 2004; but it needed to pay the medical examiner $107,000 to have the data analyzed. Marine officials said funding and other delays resulted in the work not starting until December 2004. It finally began receiving the information by June 2005. The shortfalls in bulletproof vests are just one of the armor problems the Pentagon continues to struggle with as the war in Iraq approaches the three-year mark, The Times has found in an ongoing examination of the military procurement system.
The production of a new armored truck called the Cougar, which military officials said has thus far withstood every insurgent attack, has fallen three months behind schedule. The small company making the truck has been beset by a host of production and legal problems.
Meanwhile, the Pentagon is still relying on another small factory in Ohio to armor all of the military's principal transport truck, the Humvee, and it remains backlogged with orders. The facility, owned by Armor Holdings, increased production in December after reports in The Times about delays drew criticism from Congress. But the Marine Corps said it is still waiting for about 2,000 of these vehicles to replace other Humvees in Iraq that are more lightly armored, and does not expect final delivery until June.
An initiative begun by the Pentagon nearly two years ago to speed up production by having additional firms armor new Humvees remains incomplete, Army officials said.
Body armor has gone through a succession of problems in Iraq. First, there were prolonged shortages of the plates that make the vests bulletproof. This year, the Pentagon began replacing the plates with a stronger model that is more resistant to certain insurgent attacks.
Almost from the beginning, some soldiers asked for additional protection to stop bullets from slicing through their sides. In the fall of 2003, when troops began hanging their crotch protectors under their arms, the Army's Rapid Equipping Force shipped several hundred plates to protect their sides and shoulders. Individual soldiers and units continued to buy their own sets.
The Army's former acting secretary, Les Brownlee, said in a recent interview that he was shown numerous designs for expanded body armor back in 2003, and instructed his staff to weigh their benefits against the perceived threat without losing sight of the main task: eliminating the shortages of plates for the chest and back.
Army procurement officials said that their efforts to purchase side ceramic plates have been encumbered by their much larger force, and that they wanted to provide manufacturers with detailed specifications. Also, they said their plates will be made to resist the stronger insurgent attacks.
The Marines said they opted to take the older version of ceramic to speed delivery. As of early last month, officials said marines in Iraq had received 2,200 of the more than 28,000 sets of plates that are being bought at a cost of about $260 each.
Marine officials said they have supplied troops with soft shoulder protection that can repel some shrapnel, but remain concerned that ceramic shoulder plates would be too restrictive. Similarly, they said they believe the chest and back plates are as large as they can be without unduly limiting the movement of troops.
The Times obtained the 3-page Pentagon report after a military advocacy group, Soldiers for the Truth, learned of its existence. The group posted an article about the report on its website earlier this week. The Times delayed publication of this article for more than a week until the Pentagon confirmed the veracity of its report. Pentagon officials declined to discuss details of the wound data, saying it would aid the enemy.
"Our preliminary research suggests that as many as 42 percent of the Marine casualties who died from isolated torso injuries could have been prevented with improved protection in the areas surrounding the plated areas of the vest," the study concludes. Another 23 percent might have been saved with side plates that extend below the arms, while 15 percent more could have benefited from shoulder plates, the report says. In all, 526 marines have been killed in combat in Iraq. A total of 1,706 American troops have died in combat.
The findings and other research by military pathologists suggests that an analysis of all combat deaths in Iraq, including those of Army personnel, would show that 300 or more lives might have been saved with improved body armor.
Military officials and defense contractors said the Pentagon's procurement troubles have stemmed in part from miscalculations that underestimated the strength of the insurgency, and from years of cost-cutting that left some armoring firms on the brink of collapse as they waited for new orders.
To help defeat roadside ambushes, the military in May 2005 contracted to buy 122 Cougars whose special V-shaped hull helps deflect roadside bombs, military officials said. But the Pentagon gave the job to a small firm in South Carolina, Force Protection, that had never mass-produced vehicles. Company officials said a string of blunders has pushed the completion date to June.
A dozen prototypes shipped to Iraq have been recalled from the field to replace a failing transmission. Steel was cut to the wrong size before the truck's design drawings were perfected. Several managers have left the firm.
Company officials said they also lost time in an inter-service skirmish. The Army, which is buying the bulk of the vehicles, asked for its trucks to be delivered before the Marine vehicles, and company officials said that move upended their production process until the Army agreed to get back in line behind the marines. "It is what it is, and we're running as fast as we can to change it," Gordon McGilton, the company's chief executive, said in an interview at its plant in Ladson, S.C.
On July 5, two former employees brought a federal false claims case that accuses Force Protection of falsifying records to cover up defective workmanship. They allege that the actions "compromise the immediate and long term integrity of the vehicles and result in a deficient product," according to legal documents filed under seal in the United States District Court in Charleston and obtained by The Times.
The legal claim also accuses the company of falsifying records to deceive the military into believing the firm could meet the production deadlines. The United States Attorney's office in South Carolina declined to comment on the case. The Marine Corps says the Justice Department did not notify it about the case until December.
Force Protection officials said they had not been made aware of the legal case. They acknowledged making mistakes in rushing to fill the order, but said there were multiple systems in place to monitor the quality of the trucks, and that they were not aware of any deficiencies that would jeopardize the troops.

source: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/06/politics/06cnd-armor.html?ei=5088&en=b13c10bd70ee9190&ex=1294203600&adxnnl=1&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss&pagewanted=print&adxnnlx=1136614547-Sff9aADqptj3GedL6jeGlA

* Russell Hall: Tonights Last Caller on Brownwood's KXYL ?

* Russell Hall, of Brownwood, according to his call on tonights KXYL "Other side of the News" Program does not like my Blog(soapbox) and the contents. My guess is that Mr Russell Hall ( Still a Security Guard at HPU ? ) did not like our ability to track down the shinangians at COB website ( where his name/voice was implicated ) by the "then" website administrator John Ivy !
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Definition of Scandal - A scandal involves widely publicized allegations of wrong-doing, disgrace or moral outrage. A scandal may be based on reality, or the product of false allegations. source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scandal
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You will find documentation, sources and links noted in the posts found at Steve's Soapbox ( so you can do your own research and come to your own conclusions ie: free will ! ). Yes, there are plenty of SCANDALS posted ! Contrary to what many have heard on the Brownwood airwaves for the last ten years ( James Williamson on KXYL and KPSM - News and Views ), there are plenty of SCANDALS on the right side of the aisle ! It's just been cloaked by Brownwood's Legendary Talking Head and Brown County Republican Spokesperson, James Williamson. You know, he's the "Christian" who refers to folks he disagrees with as " COCKROACHES " !
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From the Waco Tribune Herald :

What if Mark Twain was a blogger ?

Carl Hoover Tribune-Herald entertainment editor
Sunday, January 08, 2006

" Think of a blog – short for Web log – as an online, interactive journal with links that can take the reader to interesting, curious, funny or infuriating places on the Internet. "
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- 30 -

Take a Deep Breath !

January 6, 2006

An Air That Kills: How the Asbestos Poisoning of Libby, Montana Uncovered a National Scandal (Hardcover)
by Andrew Schneider, David McCumber

In a week in which so many BuzzFlash readers purchased "Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room," we thought we'd offer another riveting insight into corporate corruption, the story of the asbestos poisoning of Libby, Montana.
When Bush touts his snake oil poison of industries regulating themselves, remember what Erin Brockovich uncovered, remember Love Canal, remember the toxic pollution Diane Wilson found in the shrimp harvesting water's of her Texas town.
And Bush, of course, as an afternote, had the EPA cover up the release of asbestos into NYC air as the result of 9/11.
The book jacket tells you that this is, in part, "the story of Gayla Benefield, a former honky-tonk singer and bartender turned activist, who has sixty-two family members dead, dying, or in danger from asbestos poisoning." That's because "over the period of six decades, thick waves of asbestos dust -- created by corporate mining activities -- have turned the once pristine town of Libby, Montana, into the worst of America's killing fields."
We have government regulations because companies are not to be trusted. Their interest is, for most large corporations, profit and share price, not the health and well-being of their workers of the communities in which they do business. As we witnessed in the West Virginia mining disaster this week, a hands-off approach by government can be deadly. And this intrepid journalistic unraveling of the deadly tale of Libby, Montana, is further proof that we are all at risk when large companies are let run loose.
This is really a tale about corporate murder, corporate greed, and corporate evasion of responsibility.
The publisher describes "An Air that Kills" as "the horrifying true story of the decades-long poisoning of a small town and the definitive exposé of asbestos in America -- all told by the prize-winning journalists who broke it.
"This is the story of miners who were unaware of the toxins they took into their lungs, then brought home in their clothes-infecting their families. It is the story of the ongoing use of asbestos in products ranging from insulation to cat litter. It is the story behind the George W. Bush administration's successful campaign to cover up the full extent of the post-9/11 asbestos problem in Lower Manhattan. But it is also the story of the townspeople and government workers who took on the government in Washington to demand justice for those who died-and those who are still dying-of preventable exposure to asbestos."
Grace Corporation is the villain in this book, but it could be Halliburton, it could be Enron, it could be -- well -- just fill in the blank.
Terrorists may have killed many Americans and foreigners on 9/11, but every day the Bush Administration is letting large corporations get away with murder.
This is one heck of a compelling, extremely well-documented, and strongly written story about the devastation caused in one red-state community by a company that knowingly let the bodies just keep piling up.
Next week, we will be offering a DVD, "Blue Vinyl," about similar neglect in the vinyl industry, although not on as massive as scale as the asbestos corporate murder story.
A reader on another website praised "An Air that Kills": "The story is one of deception, corruption and greed on the part of Big Business, in this case the mining business. The owners and executives misled their workers, investors and the government agencies that regulated them into turning a blind eye to the dangers of asbestos in their products.
"While the deception of the miners in Libby was unconscionable, the book goes on to document the Bush White House withholding information that the air in and around the World Trade Center was not healthy! Can you imagine, after a tragedy like the WTC disaster, that your own government, that you rallied round to give support, would turn on you and withhold information that the air that you breathe is full of cancer causing dust? Which tragedy is worse?
"The book is truly a must-read."
Due to a special purchase, BuzzFlash is able to offer the hardcover edition of an "Air that Kills" under the original retail price, including shipping and handling.

source: http://www.buzzflash.com/reviews/06/01/rev06003.html
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Texas Republican Values ?

go here...

Brownwood Texas Evangelicals: What does the Bible say about global warming ?

Evangelicals direct clout at global warming
By MARK BIXLER
Cox News Service
Tuesday, December 27, 2005
What does the Bible say about global warming ?

Some evangelical Christian leaders hope to answer that question next year with a statement on climate change that could lend moral authority and political power to a smaller number of environmentalists pushing the issue.
It's a sign that U.S. evangelicals are flexing political muscles strengthened in battles over domestic issues such as abortion, gay rights and school prayer on a broader array of topics, from human rights and religious freedom to global poverty and AIDS — issues on which they've already scored legislative victories in Washington.
The climate change statement, being crafted by several evangelical leaders nationwide, could call for curbs on emissions of greenhouse gases. It also could put evangelicals — who make up 1 in 4 voters and are a key support base for President Bush, with 78 percent of white evangelicals voting for him last year — at odds with the White House and business interests that form another key Republican constituency.
The emerging debate among evangelicals on "creation care" — as they dub environmental stewardship — may also sharpen differences within a group sometimes perceived as monolithic.
About 70 percent of white evangelicals favor Republicans, while 83 percent of black evangelicals lean Democratic, according to a poll done last year by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research, a Washington consulting firm.
Yet opinions vary on a number of issues.
The National Association of Evangelicals, which says it represents 30 million people in 45,000 churches, has recently accused the president of doing too little to stop mass killings in Sudan's Darfur region. It backs the International Criminal Court, which Bush opposes.
The movement's grass-roots strength enhances its lobbying efforts in Washington despite smaller budgets and staffs than other lobbyists, said the Rev. Richard Cizik, the association's vice president of governmental affairs.
"We go to members of Congress and say, 'You want to be on the right side of history? Then join us. You want to do something to save people's lives, such as in Darfur? Then join with us,' " he said. "We're not buying support with favors. We're saying 'Do what's right.'"
He said he recently discussed a "conservative environmental" idea with Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.).
Two prominent evangelicals — former President Jimmy Carter and Jim Wallis, founder of a Christian magazine — landed on bestseller lists this year with critiques of the Iraq war and other Bush initiatives.
Evangelicals do not always speak with one voice, of course. Richard Land, head of Southern Baptist Convention's public-policy arm, warned that the emphasis on climate change and the International Criminal Court puts the National Association of Evangelicals "in danger of being out of touch with ... large segments of their constituency."
The White House has gone to great lengths to court evangelicals. Shortly after Bush took office, he initiated weekly conference calls for a handful of evangelical leaders to talk politics with White House aides.
It's a change of pace for Land, who participates in the calls. He said President Ronald Reagan's advisers usually returned his calls and he often got through to the first President Bush's aides, but the Clinton White House "wouldn't even take our calls" after relations deteriorated.
"In this administration," he said, "they call us."
Land said recent topics of the calls included the Iraq war, AIDS in Africa and killings in Sudan.
The Bush presidency has given evangelicals access to power in an era of heightened awareness of world affairs among all Americans, an interest triggered by globalization and the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, said John Green, senior fellow at the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. He described an "unusual moment when just about all religious communities in the United States are interested in foreign policy."
For much of the last century, a strain of isolationism permeated the evangelical world view, particularly in rural churches, said Allen Hertzke, a University of Oklahoma professor of religion and politics. He sees the evangelical engagement as a natural progression by some elements of the movement that advocated for abolition of slavery, for women's suffrage and for Prohibition.
During the Cold War, evangelicals supported Israel and opposed communism, lobbying Congress to admit Soviet Jews as refugees. In the early '90s, around the time of the Soviet Union's fall, the evangelical focus on domestic priorities like abortion began to change with a realization that domestic battles had yielded few substantive victories, Cizik said.
The shift also came amid growing awareness of what Hertzke calls a "tectonic shift," with 60 percent of the world's 2 billion Christians living in Africa, Asia or Latin America, compared with 20 percent in 1900. One reason for the awareness: A boom in short-term mission trips that put U.S. churchgoers in contact with counterparts in poorer nations.
That rings true with Dr. Walter McBride of Marietta's Eastside Baptist Church, who said he senses increased global awareness in his church.
"There are so many people who are hurting and being abused all over the world," said McBride, a 68-year-old retired physician who has gone on mission trips to Nigeria, the Philippines and Russia.
In the mid-1990s, evangelicals focused on persecuted Christians in places such as Algeria, Iran, Pakistan and Sudan at the urging of Michael Horowitz, a former Reagan administration official who became so influential in evangelical circles that a Baptist magazine named him one of its 10 prominent Christians in 1997, though he's Jewish.
Evangelicals helped pressure Congress to pass the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998, which led the State Department to monitor religious freedom worldwide.
Then, evangelicals joined feminists to support the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000. It seeks to help girls and women smuggled into the country and forced into prostitution.
Meanwhile, evangelicals in Bush's Texas hometown worked for peace in Sudan with human rights advocates, civil rights and Jewish leaders. The work led to the Sudan Peace Act of 2002, which pressured Sudan's Muslim regime to negotiate with a non-Muslim rebel group. They signed a peace deal this year, though the regime is now blamed for killings of Muslims in Darfur.
Last year, evangelicals helped secure passage of the North Korea Human Rights Act, which pressured the Communist regime for reforms and set aside millions of dollars to aid North Korean refugees.
Definitions of "evangelical" can be fluid, with some mainline Protestants holding evangelical beliefs. Scholars say evangelicals emphasize a personal conversion experience, share their faith and see the Bible as the authoritative word of God.
Their growing chorus has made them a lobby group with real clout even among politicians used to dealing only with the power-brokers and elites of the secular establishment.
"What's in a church bulletin has become more important than what's in the New York Times in terms of getting some members of Congress' attention," Hertzke said.

source: http://www.oxfordpress.com/news/content/shared/news/nation/stories/12/NATEVANGELICAL1227a_5REP.html
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read more here...

Bipartisan Reaping of What We've Sown ?

Letters to the Editor - Dallas Morning News

I guess the votes stand ...
It's one thing for Rep. Tom DeLay – and all the other representatives and senators – to give the money they got from lobbyist Jack Abramoff to various charities, but it's too late to take back the votes that dirty money bought.
And if you don't believe that lobby money buys votes, you are naïve beyond belief.
Sydney Kay, Dallas


... but this time, a probe
Re: "Unchecked greed – It's high time to clean House – and Senate," Wednesday Editorials.
"[M]ake no mistake about it, this is by and large a Republican scandal." Maybe so. We'll see.
But note that this is a GOP administration and Justice Department going after this corruption.
By contrast, where was the Clinton Justice Department when campaign money was coming into Democrat coffers from China? That was never aggressively pursued, now was it? In fact, whatever happened with all that?
Nothing. Everyone involved fled the country. End of story.
That won't happen this time. And you can thank President Bush and the Republicans for that.
Rick Atkinson, McKinne

source: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/opinion/letters/stories/DN-friletters_0106edi.ART.State.Edition1.1daaf7e8.html

Big Counry Faith Lines & Fire Lines: Diversity of Faith & Compassion crosses all "Man Made" Lines !

More than $94,000 donated to Cross Plains
People all over U.S. sent money after fire

By Celinda Emison / Reporter-News Staff Writer
January 6, 2006

Donations have been pouring in from all over the U.S. to help victims of the Cross Plains fire, in which hundreds of residents lost everything.
Fire relief donations deposited at Texas Heritage Bank of Cross Plains had reached more than $94,000 by Thursday, according to President David Estes.
City officials estimated a total of $4.1 million in damages. The majority of the damage was to the homes of uninsured residents. Rebuilding and repairing could cost more than $10 million.
Estes explained that all donations go into the city's United Fund and are designated for fire relief. The United Fund was set up in 1961 to assist Cross Plains residents who are in need.
''It has been a very humbling experience to see the generosity of people,'' Estes said. ''It's overwhelming.''
On Wednesday night, the Cross Plains city council approved a slate of names to serve on a committee to oversee the distribution of the donations. The committee will consist of seven to nine members.
Estes said he plans on having the committee formed by next week. Once the committee is in place, members will begin the needs assessments.
''We are working with the Red Cross and the city on the process victims will go through to get the funds,'' said Estes, who will serve on the committee. ''We want to do this as expeditiously as possible.''
Estes said his bank also is helping customers affected by the fire by giving small no-interest loans, deferring payments or restructuring an existing loan.
''We're trying to step up to the plate and help any way we can,'' he said.

Contact Brownwood staff writer Celinda Emison at (325) 641-8804 or emisonc@reporternews.com.
source: http://www.reporter-news.com/abil/nw_local/article/0,1874,ABIL_7959_4367433,00.html
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Buddhist group to give money to fire victims in Cross Plains

The Dallas branch of a Buddhist relief foundation is distributing $ 300.00 Friday to each Cross Plains household lost in the December 27 wildfires. Nearly 120 homes were lost.
The money will be given in the form od debit cards from 4 to 7 pm at the Cross Plains Community Center, 108 N. Beech Street.
Fire victims will receive their debit cards after a letter of support is read from Master Cheng Yen, founder of the Taiwan Buddhist Tzu-Chi Foundation. The foundation has helped with other disasters, including the recent hurricanes.
So far 36 Cross Plains fire victims have returned application forms for the money, but more are expected to apply said Hank Tzeng. who is with the foundation.

Abilene Reporter News Friday January 6,2006 page 2aa
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Maybe the Dallas Buddhist read the story (below) in the Dallas Morning News and responded to show their support in the rebuilding effort of Cross Plains !

Fire out, ire rising in Cross Plains
Dallas paper takes heat over disaster coverage

By Sidney Levesque / Reporter-News Staff Writer
January 6, 2006

Residents say the reports of Cross Plains' death are greatly exaggerated, but they have the town smoldering all over again.
The burned Callahan County town is fuming after numerous Dallas Morning News articles mentioned Cross Plains in an expiring state.
The newspaper has reported that half the buildings in Cross Plains are gone, that the city's future is in doubt, and that it might end up dying like other small towns because of the Dec. 27 wildfires that burned 7,665 acres and killed two people.
''I don't know where they are getting it from. It's not coming from anybody at the school or anybody in town,'' said Jimmie Cearley, principal of the Cross Plains High School.
Even the Baptist preacher referred to the coverage in his Sunday sermon, vowing to prove the Dallas Morning News wrong and bounce back strong, said Mayor Ray Purvis.
A Dallas Morning News editor defended the coverage of the fires.
''We're just reporting what happened there, and what people said about that,'' said Mike Drago, the newspaper's Texas & Southwest editor.
Since the beginning of the wildfires, residents have asserted they will rebuild.
The city of 1,068 people 47 miles southeast of Abilene lost 116 homes in the blaze. City leaders say that represents 20 percent of the 580 or so structures in Cross Plains, not half as the Dallas Morning News reported Saturday.
Drago investigated the discrepancy and agreed to run a correction today.
''They need to get the facts straight on it, or as straight as they can get it,'' said Mayor Purvis.
Saturday's story caused ire in Cross Plains for other reasons. For one, the headline read, ''Cross Plains' future in doubt after deadly fire.'' The article went on to say the city was ''lost'' after the fire spread.
Drago said the word ''lost'' was used figuratively.
The article neglected to say that the school and nearly every business in town were saved.
The story quoted Jim Compton, director of the West Central Texas Council of Governments in Abilene, as saying many people may relocate.
''Something like this could destroy the town, absolutely,'' the newspaper quoted Compton.
Compton said this week his quotes were correct, but he has a positive outlook for Cross Plains, and the Dallas Morning News painted a negative one. He said he is considering complaining to the newspaper.
Cearley, the high school principal, said several residents have called the Dallas Morning News to complain about recent stories.
Drago said he was not aware of any complaints about the coverage and that the newspaper had handled the fire ''compassionately.''
An article Tuesday said the fires ''destroyed much of Cross Plains,'' but it was Thursday's editorial about small towns dying that was the last straw for many residents.
The opinion piece lumped Cross Plains with two tiny communities that suffered from recent wildfires.
''The Talmud teaches that to destroy a single life is to destroy a universe,'' the editorial said. ''You might say the same thing about the death of the small Texas towns of Cross Plains, Ringgold and Kokomo, all of which were either badly damaged or wiped off the map by the vast lakes of fire blowing this winter across the tinderbox prairie.''
Cross Plains residents bristled at the idea their town will die from the fire.
''It totally won't wipe out the town,'' Cearley said firmly.
Contact Sidney Levesque at levesques@reporternews.com or 676-6721.
source: http://www.reporter-news.com/abil/nw_local/article/0,1874,ABIL_7959_4367109,00.html

Brownwood: As it is !

Brownwood: As it is !
Originally uploaded by photosteve.

....and in Brownwood, what would have happended to the Chief ? and the reporter ?

FB chief suspended over racial comment
Job applicant didn't hear slur; city will review hiring practices
07:58 PM CST on Thursday, January 5, 2006
By STEPHANIE SANDOVAL / The Dallas Morning News
Farmers Branch Police Chief Jimmy Fawcett has been suspended for 10 days without pay for making a racial slur about people of Vietnamese heritage last month in front of six officers who had convened to interview job applicants.
The suspension started Thursday, according to a written statement from the city.

Jimmy Fawcett
"He also has apologized to the six people that were in the room," city spokesman Tom Bryson said Thursday.
Chief Fawcett, who acknowledged making the "inappropriate comments," did not return phone calls this week seeking comment.
The chief also is required to continue counseling with an organizational psychologist that began last month, according to the statement.
The incident has prompted the city to review the department's hiring practices.
The remark was made Dec.14, the day six job applicants were to face an interview board made up of department employees ranging from an administrative assistant to deputy chief. One of the applicants is Vietnamese-American. Neither he nor any of the other applicants were in the room when the comments were made, the city said.
Mr. Bryson said the city does not have a copy of the complaint because it was made orally. The city would not disclose the name of the complainant.
Jennifer Nguyen, grand public relations officer for the Vietnamese American Community of Greater Dallas and a member of the Vietnamese American Media Association, on Wednesday had called only for a public apology by the chief.
But the punishment handed down by the city manager is "fair enough," Ms. Nguyen said.
She said she hopes Asian-Americans realize that the comments reflect only on the chief, and not on the department or the city.
However, Ms. Nguyen said, ethnic slurs by such a high-ranking city official could hinder efforts to involve Asian-Americans in the city, Ms. Nguyen said.
"The Asian community just held a big banquet in September 2005, and for the very first time some members from the City Council attended, and we were so thrilled to welcome them with open arms, and now this is happening," she said. "So I'm afraid the Asian community is going to shy away and go back to themselves and not want to associate with American people anymore."
Chief Fawcett is a 32-year department veteran and has been chief for 15 years. He had an unblemished record before the incident, the city said.
Before beginning his law enforcement career in Sherman in 1971, he served in the Navy for four years, including assignments in Vietnam, Japan, the Philippines and Korea, according to his biography.
Chief Fawcett is also fifth vice president of the International Association of Chiefs of Police and is slated to become president in 2010. He holds a Master Certificate from the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement Officer Standards and Education, a bachelor's degree from Abilene Christian University and an associate degree from Grayson County Junior College.
Three of the department's 100 employees – sworn officers and civilians – are Asian-American, Mr. Bryson said.
According to the 2000 census, about 3 percent of the city's population is Asian-American.
E-mail ssandoval@dallasnews.com
source: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/010606dnmetfbchief.4a20788b.html
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Was GOP "Reporter" Jeff Gannon in Cross Plains too ?

" And at many press conferences — especially ones involving national political figures — questions aren’t so much questions as political or philosophical statements by the reporters. "

Above Quote from Brownwood Bulletin Reporter, Steve Nashs', Thursday January 5, 2006 Column:
Op Ed: Columnists
Residents handle tragedy with typical West Texas fortitude — Steve Nash
I wondered what they must’ve thought of us as we followed Texas Gov. Rick Perry through the activity center of the First Baptist Church in Cross Plains.

to read Steve's entire colums please go to www.brownwoodbulletin.com
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Who is Jeff Gannon ? I think Nashs' quote from above describes Jeff Gannon to a T ! Read up and listen for yourself !

read more here

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read more here

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White House Press Whores ?

Top 10 media stories

But liberals ain't funny.
illustration by Doug Potter

1) White House Press Relations, Take 1: Paying off commentators. Issuing a White House press credential to a former gay escort working for a Texas-based Web site subtly titled GOPUSA. All in all, it was a lousy year for the White House's attempt to manipulate the press. But it didn't get any worse than press secretary and former Austinite Scott McClellan trying to defend his Ron Ziegler-esque assurance that absolutely, positively no White House staffer had anything to do with telling the press that Valerie Plame, wife of former ambassador and White House critic Joe Wilson, was a CIA agent.

source:

read more here

QUOTE

" The arrogance that brought Republicans into power is arrogance that will take them out of power, and that's what you see more of on the Hill, " ~a Republican corporate lobbyist told The Hill / source: http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0105-34.htm

Kinky Friedman: " We have a government of the money, by the money and for the money. ... That's not the American dream."

Friedman says he welcomes Strayhorn's candidacy
By KELLEY SHANNON
AP Political Writer
AUSTIN — Republican Carole Keeton Strayhorn's decision to run for Texas governor as an independent candidate doesn't seem to be worrying the original independent in the race, humorist Kinky Friedman.
"There's plenty of room in the hot tub, and she's welcome," Friedman said Wednesday of the woman who calls herself "one tough grandma."
Friedman, also a mystery writer and musician, predicted he and Strayhorn each will collect the 45,540 signatures needed to get on the ballot as independent candidates in November.
"Our people are going to be with us, and her people are going to be with her, and there's plenty of them," Friedman said in a telephone interview with The Associated Press from his ranch near Kerrville.
There are 12.5 million registered voters in Texas. Those who sign ballot petitions for Strayhorn and Friedman this spring cannot have voted in the March 7 Republican or Democratic primary or a primary runoff.
Republican Gov. Rick Perry is the front-runner by far in the GOP primary now that Strayhorn, the state comptroller, has bowed out. He faces only little-known opposition. Former congressman Chris Bell and former Texas Supreme Court Justice Bob Gammage are vying for the Democratic nomination.
If Strayhorn and Friedman are both on the ballot, Texas voters will be well served by the additional choices, Friedman said.
"Anything will be better than the last governor's race," he said, pointing out that only 29 percent of the voting age population went to the polls in November 2002.
Before Strayhorn made her announcement, she called Friedman to warn him. She told him she respected what he had done and they talked about how they might work together "down the road," Friedman said, though he didn't elaborate.
"I've always thought that she was pretty spunky," Friedman said. "I like her spirit."
Strayhorn spokesman Mark Sanders said the two "had a very pleasant conversation."
"They wished each other the best of luck and that was it," he said.
Friedman, in the AP interview, pointed out some differences between him and Strayhorn, the main one being that she is a longtime politician and he's not.
"She has a lot of money, I think. We don't. Of course, the governor does," Friedman said, referring to Perry's campaign war chest. "We have a government of the money, by the money and for the money. ... That's not the American dream."
Friedman said he has run only once before for political office, for justice of the peace in Kerr County in 1986, a race he lost.
Texans are supporting his run for governor, he said, because he tells the truth and doesn't pander to people. He compares Republicans and Democrats to the gangs "the Crips and the Bloods."
Friedman said central issues in his campaign are education and improving life along the Texas-Mexico border. He said he wants Texas to stop "teaching to the test," meaning curriculum geared to state-mandated standardized tests now common in public school classrooms.
Describing himself as "anti-politician," he also said he intends to appoint competent people to state boards and commissions, not people who've donated campaign money.
"It doesn't take a genius to see that these politicians have played Texas like a cheap violin," he said.
Friedman said he believes Strayhorn probably saw that his independent candidacy was catching on and decided to run independently, too.
"What we're doing is what Sam Houston fought for — a truly independent spirit in the state that has been slumbering for maybe 147 years," he said.
Houston was the last independent to win a race for Texas governor.
___
Kelley Shannon has covered politics and government in Austin since 2000.
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January 4, 2006 - 3:01 p.m. CST
source: http://www.statesman.com/news/content/gen/ap/TX_Governor_Kinky.html

Anti-Gay Baptist Pastor Arrested on lewdness charge: Does this surprise you ?

Tulsa Pastor Arrested In OKC On Lewdness Charge

POSTED: 4:03 pm CST January 4, 2006
UPDATED: 4:29 pm CST January 4, 2006
Email This Story | Print This Story
OKLAHOMA CITY -- An executive committee member of the Southern Baptist Convention was arrested on a lewdness charge for propositioning a plainclothes policeman outside a hotel, police said.
Lonnie Latham, senior pastor at South Tulsa Baptist Church, was booked into Oklahoma County Jail Tuesday night on a misdemeanor charge of offering to engage in an act of lewdness, police Capt. Jeffrey Becker said. Latham was released on $500 bail Wednesday afternoon.
Latham, who has spoken out against homosexuality, asked the officer to join him in his hotel room for oral sex. Latham was arrested and his 2005 Mercedes automobile was impounded, Becker said.
Calls to Latham at his church were not immediately returned Wednesday.

When he left jail, he told Oklahoma City television station KFOR:
"I was set up. I was in the area pastoring to police."
The arrest took place in the parking lot of the Habana Inn, which is in an area where the public has complained about male prostitutes flagging down cars, Becker said. The plainclothes officers was investigating these complaints.
The lewdness charge carries a penalty of up to one year in jail and a $2,500 fine.
Latham is one of four Southern Baptist Convention executive committee members from Oklahoma.
He spoke out last year against a measure, ultimately approved by voters, to expand tribal gaming.
He has also spoken out against same-sex marriage and in support of a Southern Baptist Convention directive urging its 42,000 churches to befriend gays and lesbians and try to convince them that they can become heterosexual "if they accept Jesus Christ as their savior and reject their 'sinful, destructive lifestyle."'
The Southern Baptist Convention is the nation's largest Protestant denomination.

source: http://www.channeloklahoma.com/news/5845859/detail.html
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watch video here

Native American News

SH's Indian Roots
Originally uploaded by photosteve.

Top US Indian court upholds first gay marriage
Wed Jan 4, 2006 7:53 PM ET

By Adam Tanner

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - The top court of the Cherokee Nation has declined to strike down a gay marriage in what is seen as a pioneering case in American Indian country, the couple and officials said on Wednesday.

Cherokee tribal members Kathy Reynolds, 29, and Dawn McKinley, 34, married in May 2004 in Oklahoma, just weeks after the city of San Francisco ignited a national debate on gay marriage by briefly allowing same-sex couples to wed.

Gay rights advocates say the pair are the first registered same-sex marriage in Indian country.

Because tribal law at the time allowed same-sex marriages, a tribal clerk gave them a wedding certificate. But members in the Tribal Council sued, saying the marriage would damage the reputation of the Cherokees, and the law was later changed.

In a December 22 decision announced on Wednesday, the Judicial Appeals Tribunal of the Cherokee Nation, the tribe's highest court in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, rejected the request for an injunction against the marriage.

"Members of the Tribal Council, like private Cherokee citizens, must demonstrate a specific particularized harm," the court ruled. "In the present case, the Council members fail to demonstrate the requisite harm."

Historians say Native American culture before the arrival of European settlers tolerated homosexuality, although the settlers' religious teachings ultimately turned the tribes against it.

"Since the tribe has become so Westernized and adopted Christian religions and European ways, they strayed away from traditional Cherokee values of indifference," Reynolds told Reuters. "Cherokees are very private where they respect each other and respect how they live."

Reynolds, a graduate student, said she had lived together with McKinley, who works in the retail industry, for four years before they opted to wed. Both women said their friends and family welcomed their decision although tribal officials disapproved.

FEDERAL GOVERNMENT

"We really thought our tribe would be accepting of us," Reynolds said. "That hasn't proven to be the case."

Added McKinley: "Because of their law we were able to get married, but now they want to say that it is not family values or that it is bothering them."

McKinley said the couple did not marry to make a point, but because of love. "It's exciting and it's scary at the same time," she said of their pioneering status.

The lawyer for the Tribal Council, Todd Hembree, said the tribe would no longer fight the marriage. "As far as the Tribal Council is concerned, that is the end of the legal proceeding," he said in an interview on Wednesday.

He said it was also possible that the U.S. government would have to recognize the marriage because of the sovereign status of Indian tribes, which could, in theory at least, make them eligible for federal tax benefits denied to date to gay couples.

Lena Ayoub, an attorney who represented Reynolds and McKinley, said the federal government has not recognized any same-sex state marriages to date and called the federal obligation to recognize sovereign tribal marriage "a very complicated area of the law."

The largest Indian reservation, the Navajo Nation, also banned gay marriage last year.

source: http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=domesticNews&storyID=2006-01-05T005317Z_01_KWA503169_RTRUKOC_0_US-RIGHTS-GAYS-CHEROKEES.xml&archived=False

" I think that she was living out the fantasy life that she really wanted "

January 4, 2006
latimes.com : California

Extradition Sought in Man's Death
San Diego prosecutors request the return of a Marine sergeant's wife arrested in Florida on suspicion of poisoning her husband.

By Tony Perry, Times Staff Writer
SAN DIEGO — Prosecutors are seeking the extradition of a woman in Florida accused of poisoning her husband — a Marine sergeant — and then using his life insurance to pay for breast enhancement and a libertine lifestyle.
Cynthia Sommer, 32, moved to Florida from San Diego in 2002 with a new boyfriend, an ex-Marine, just weeks after an autopsy performed by a military pathologist found that her husband had died of a heart attack.
Further toxicology tests determined that Sgt. Todd Sommer, 23, had died of acute arsenic poisoning. The tests were ordered by the military and confirmed by civilian experts.
Todd Sommer was stationed at Marine Corps Air Station Miramar when he died Feb. 18, 2002, after complaining of nausea for several days.
His widow was arrested in Palm Beach County, Fla., in late November 2005, shortly after new tests and an additional investigation were completed.
"This is the coldest homicide I've had, in terms of being absolutely coldblooded," Deputy Dist. Atty. Laura Gunn said.
Sommer, being held in a West Palm Beach jail, is resisting the extradition attempt. A hearing is set for today.
San Diego prosecutors have filed for special circumstances — murder by poisoning — which could lead to the death penalty, if Sommer is convicted.
Court documents filed by prosecutors allege that Sommer was eager to get her husband's life insurance of more than $250,000 and the monthly survivor payments of nearly $1,900. The couple had a son and she had three other children from a previous marriage.
In an interview conducted by Naval Criminal Investigative Service agents, Sommer said her husband had been nauseated and vomiting for a week before his death. Sommer's "close proximity to the victim allowed for the type of access required to facilitate acute arsenic poisoning," an investigator wrote.
Sommer's neighbor on the Miramar base told the investigators that after Todd Sommer's death, his wife threw a series of loud parties and showed the results of her breast augmentation, which had cost $5,400.
"Cindy's excuse for the lifestyle she started living after [her husband's death] was that he was very strict. He didn't like for her to go out partying [or] staying out with her friends," a family friend told investigators.
"Todd also didn't want her to get her breasts enlarged, so I think that she was living out the fantasy life that she really wanted," the friend said, according to court documents.
Sommer also paid to have her name listed on an Internet service that provides an "adult dating community focused on sexual discovery."
Court documents portray Sommer as a dissatisfied employee of a sandwich shop, heavily in debt and unhappy with having to care for four children. Before moving to San Diego, she was investigated by child welfare workers in North Carolina in 2001.
After her breast surgery, Sommer began a relationship with another Marine, Ross Ritter, who was later discharged from the Marine Corps. Sommer had her furniture shipped to his home in Florida at government expense, court records show.
The same day that she was arrested on suspicion of first-degree murder, Ritter was taken into custody on an unrelated drug charge.
There does not appear to be a connection between Ritter and Todd Sommer's death, and no further indictments are expected in the case, Gunn said.

source: http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-wife4jan04,0,7942434.story?coll=la-home-headlines&track=morenews
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Note from Steve: I wonder what her email trail looks like ?

Brownwood Texas: Watts going on @ Watts Communications ?

read more here

Sowing the Seeds: Money, Politics, Corruption, Scandals

You think elected leaders learn this behaviour inside the Beltway ? Blame it on Washington ? Please ! Everything begins and ends locally !

read more here...

Jack Attack: for your listening pleasure !

listen here...

QUOTE

" When you get certain candidates that seem to intimate they hold a higher moral position than others, it becomes a real problem and this may just be one step in a line of difficulties for him. " ~Greg Hecht, commenting on former Christian Coolition leader Ralph Reed's involvement with Abramoff - http://www.ledger-enquirer.com/mld/ledgerenquirer/news/local/13541538.htm

" “Bush Hater” is a term invented by people who didn’t like being called “Clinton Haters” because it was true"

"Bush Hater" - "Clinton Hater"...

Texas Republican DA Rick Roach: A bigger fool or Hypocrite ?

you decide !

read it here...

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read more here...

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read more here...

Below quote Posted for MADCOW who calls in to Brownwood Talk Radio about the injustice she suffered in West Texas at the hands of elected leaders ( Republican hands ? )

" The criminal justice system in Texas is so cracked it makes an armadillo look smooth.”

Dallas Morning News Editorial, March 20, 2003.

Texas: Where it's illegal to milk another man's cow ! Male Horses too ?

Will Texas get Kinky ?

He's the Jewish cowboy turned thriller writer who's hoping his outrageous charm and up-beat policies will help him pull off the biggest upset in American politics since Arnie won California. Robert McCrum joins Kinky Friedman on the trail for Governor of Texas

Sunday November 27, 2005
The Observer

Kinky Friedman once wrote a song entitled 'They Ain't Making Jews Like Jesus Any More'. He is also the author of a series of comic mystery novels starring a detective named Kinky Friedman. During his forties (he is now 61), he was still living with his parents, a pet armadillo and a colony of hummingbirds.
A Texas Jew, Friedman claims he was 'born in a manger, died in the saddle and came back as a horny toad'. Now he is doing the most outrageous thing in his long, outrageous career: he's running as an independent for governor of Texas. In the Lone Star State, home of LBJ and the power base for three Bush presidencies, this almost passes for normal. In the Seventies, one gubernatorial contender, Stanley Adams, reportedly listed his occupation as 'alleged white-collar criminal'. Further back, in the Twenties, it was Ma Ferguson, the first woman to occupy the governor's mansion, who declared, during one of the state's perennial Hispanic language debates, that 'If English was good enough for Jesus Christ, it's good enough for Texans.' Ma Ferguson was a simple, God-fearing soul, but scarcely a match for Governor W Lee 'Pappy' O'Daniel, who campaigned for office on the 10 Commandments with the words, 'I don't know if I'll get elected, but boy, it sure has been good for the flour business.'
Friedman doesn't have a lot to say about flour, but he is the only candidate to have come out for gay marriage, casino gambling and compulsory prayer in schools. His campaign staff sell bumper stickers bearing the legend 'My Governor is a Jewish Cowboy'.
In Texas, old-world courtesy and Bible-based respectability rub alongside brash Dallas caricatures. This is the state where it is illegal to milk another man's cow; which once banned the entire Encyclopaedia Britannica because it contained a formula for home-brewed beer; but where the average ranch is smaller than 200 acres. For every big-hatted oilman there's a sober, independent-minded citizen worrying about education and prayer in schools.
Texas is part of Bush's America, supplying many of the young men getting killed in Iraq, and disdainfully apart from it. Friedman's campaign enjoys the informal support of Bill Clinton (a fan of his novels) and George W Bush (a fan of his music). In April 2002, during the socalled Council of War between Bush and Blair in Crawford, Texas, the conversation turned from Baghdad and Gaza to Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys. According to Sir Christopher Meyer's gossipy memoirs, DC Confidential, Laura Bush cheerfully informed the dumbstruck British contingent that she was a fan of Friedman and his song 'Proud to be an Asshole from El Paso'. There is a chance - just a chance - that a year hence, during the mid-term elections, middle America will have become a good deal more familiar with Friedman's outrageous lyrics, and with his role as a national court jester.
'So why are you running?' asks talk-radio shock jock Don Imus. 'I need the closet space,' replies the candidate, standing defiantly by the Alamo. Swarthy and piratical, with crinkly, dyed-black hair, and often chomping on an unlit Montecristo cigar, Kinky claims to have just two outfits. In the week I spent on his campaign trail, I saw only one: a black cowboy hat, a black shirt, apparently cut from roofing felt, a long black 'preacher's coat', easifit blue jeans and brown boots. He stomps up to the microphone like a kid in oversize hand-me-downs.
Today, he's fundraising with the former champion wrestler and ex-governor of Minnesota, Jesse 'The Body' Ventura, on Willie Nelson's private golf course just outside Austin. While we wait for the event to get under way, Kinky instinctively repeats a Willie Nelson joke. 'This man says to his best friend, "I think my wife is dead." Best friend: "You think? Don't you know?" "Well," says the man. "The sex is the same, but there's an awful lot of dishes to wash."' The country and western star, the former wrestler and the candidate pose for the cameras. Ventura is happy to swing a club, but equally happy to speculate at length about the assassination of JFK (he has a theory about this). Weird as it seems, it is no stranger than the journey Friedman has made to arrive at this defining moment in Bush's America.
Richard Friedman was born in Chicago in 1944, the son of east European immigrant educators who, in 1952, set up a summer camp in the east Texas hills, a much loved liberal haven for generations of mainly Jewish kids. He wrote his first song, 'Old Man Lucas', when he was 11. Last month, when I heard him perform it at the Texas Book Festival, pursued by a film crew from Sixty Minutes, half the audience happily sang along with him: 'Old Man Lucas, Had a lot of Mucus, Hangin' right out of his nose ...' Kinky has a place in their hearts and minds. People stop him in the street to declare their support, and to tell him they've been a lifelong fan.
From Echo Hill, he went to the university of Texas in Austin, the state capital and a place known for its hospitality to eccentrics. Appropriately, Friedman, the quirky kid with the Jewish afro - which he describes as 'a Lyle Lovett starter kit'- now became Kinky, or The Kinkster. He is the kind of man who can cheerfully refer to himself in the third person.
Graduating from Austin in a haze of drugs and alcohol - 'a happy childhood is the worst possible preparation for life,' he says - he joined the Peace Corps, and headed off to Borneo 'to help people who'd been farming successfully for more than 2,000 years to improve their agriculture'. Alone in the jungle, he dreamed up the idea of a band called Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys. It had always been his dream, he says, to be a country music star.
The original Jewboys, a band with a social conscience and satirical instincts - 'the demented love child of Lenny Bruce and Bob Wills', Friedman says - were indeed all Texas Jews. Their outrageous brand of musical humour and spliffed-up amateurism quickly caught the eye of the music press: 'Band of Unknowns Fails to Emerge' quipped Rolling Stone. Not for long. Who could ignore songs like 'Get Your Biscuits in the Oven and Your Buns in the Bed'? Soon, the Jewboys were performing in Nashville at the Grand Ole Opry. 'Sold American', a reflective and wistful number, made the charts. Kinky toured with Bob Dylan in the Rolling Thunder Revue, while the Jewboys played with Willie Nelson, Jerry Lee Lewis and Billy Joel, causing trouble wherever they went. There were death threats in New York and Nacagdoches, police protection from enraged feminists at the University of Buffalo, and a lot of mutterings in the conservative Texan backwoods. But as the Seventies drew to a close, the job of irritating the hell out of American audiences was wearing thin. It was time for Kinky to reinvent himself again.
So in 1984, flat broke, Friedman wrote a crime mystery, Greenwich Killing Time, with a detective named Kinky Friedman and characters such as Little Jewford, Cleve and Ratso, band members moonlighting in his imaginative world, much as some now figure in his campaign. His musical friends pitched in to praise his work. 'Kinky Friedman,' said Willie Nelson, 'is the best new thriller writer since Dashiell whatshisname.'
With two further 'Kinky Friedman mysteries' (Armadillos and Old Lace and A Case of Lone Star) he built a reputation across the English-speaking world, particularly in Australia. 'Kinky, Mozart, Shakespeare,' rhapsodised Joseph Heller, in an allpurpose quote, 'with what can I compare them?' It's a good question. Ask Kinky to define himself now and he will say something like he's 'a dealer in hope'. Cheering people up is his forte, but he has struggled to find an audience big enough to equal his ambitions. Throughout the Eighties he wrangled with his creative identity, but never quite hit the big time.
When his mother died in 1985, he returned to Echo Hill to live with his father and work with the kids in his parents' summer camp. His father died in 2002, but he often quotes him: in one pitch to Texas voters, he said, 'Treat adults like children and children like adults.' That's appealing to him, too: there's a Peter Pan side to Friedman, I think, connected to an inner despair that comes into its own when he steps into the limelight. But who exactly is his audience cheering? It's not always obvious.
Deep down, in a part of himself he does not visit too often, Friedman nurtures an ambition to perform his own bizarre brand of public service, in which conventional wisdom is flouted, political opportunism scorned, truths told fearlessly, and the weary and apathetic electorate is cheered up.
Occasionally, Kinky suffers a spectacular smash. In 1986 he ran for justice of the peace in Kerrville, near Echo Hill, and lost badly. 'I couldn't decide whether to kill myself or get a haircut,' he remembers. 'There must be a place in politics for a man of my talents.' Maybe he should run for mayor of Austin? And then - eureka ! - what about governor of Texas? 'That might be therapeutic. When I meet a potential voter,' he says, 'I'm good for precisely three minutes of superficial charm.' He was certainly looking for a new distraction, and jokes now that 'by the time you've written your 17th mystery novel, if you ain't crazy there's something wrong with you. If you happen to be your own main character, it tends to be even worse.'
If he went into Texas politics, there'd be no problem about being his 'own main character', starring in his own movie. And so, on 3 February this year, the anniversary of his father's death, he stood by the Alamo and announced he was running. His campaign slogan was: 'Why The Hell Not?' Some Texans thought it might just catch on.
The same idea occurred to Bill Hillsman, a political advertising wizard who had served Jesse Ventura's campaign for governor of Minnesota in 1998. Hillsman looked at the poll numbers, did some calculations, and offered his services. He was followed by former US senator Dean Barkley, another Ventura campaign veteran who is now Kinky's campaign manager, and Reid Nelson, a seasoned political fighter whose task is to lick the campaign's many young volunteers into shape and build a viable independent network across Texas. Paul Begala, President Clinton's former political adviser, reckons this is a crack team. It will need to be. Texas is an electoral elephant trap, bigger than France and the Low Countries combined, with a long and colourful history of gerrymandering and vote-rigging. Molly Ivens, the Texas commentator, says that, 'If you can't take their money, screw their women, drink their alcohol and vote against them anyway, you don't belong in the [Texas] legislature.'
Texas representatives are drawn from 254 state counties, some as sparsely populated as Loving, West Texas (67 souls), others as dense as Harris County (2 million). From Big Bend to the Panhandle, the rampant Republicans, split between governor Rick Perry and Carole Keeton Strayhorn (slogan: 'One Tough Granma'), already have statewide organisations in place, ready to march into battle.
Even the much diminished Democrats will want to mount a Stop Kinky effort. What's more, Kinky has, in effect, to fight the campaign twice over. First, to qualify as an independent gubernatorial candidate, Texas law states he must collect 50,000 signatures from registered voters. But every signature must be notarised, and there are bizarre restrictions on those entitled to sign. For example, anyone who has already voted in the state primary election is ineligible, and all bona fide signatures have to be collected within eight weeks.
Hardly surprising, then, that in nearly 150 years there has never been an independent candidate for governor. Texans like their politics like their football: two sides slugging it out for supremacy, with no interference from outsiders.
After the eight-week petition drive, which starts in March 2006, and assuming he gets on the ballot, Friedman's campaign will take place in the autumn, with polling day 6 November. Kinky, who believes he will not only get on the ballot but go on to win, refers to 7 November 2006 as 'Texas Independence Day'.
That's still a distant prospect. Political campaigns in the US typically cost tens of millions of dollars, with fortunes squandered on the 'air war' - cut-throat television advertising. The Texas Republican war chest is vast; at the moment, Kinky's campaign is a shoestring effort, backed by a shampoo millionaire named John McCall and financed by the sale of T-shirts, books and bumper stickers. Incredibly, against all the odds, on the road, when it's going well, Kinky's campaign looks like a winner.
He's currently touring the state, like the old rocker he is, in a beat-up SUV, driven by Jeff 'Little Jewford' Shelby, his amanuensis, fixer and buddy, drumming up support.
At the Marriott Sugarland Hotel in Fort Bend, outside Houston, the chamber of commerce is solidly Republican. This is the home turf of Tom DeLay, the Republican senator under indictment for campaign finance violations. Kinky has been invited to address the local Chamber of Commerce.
For a Jewish cowboy who's pro gay marriage, this is the lions' den, but Kinky gets a big Texan welcome: bone-crushing handshakes, shrieks of excitement, requests for autographs and pictures. Two middle-aged women with big hair and industrial-strength jewellery squeeze either side of the candidate with cries of 'Let's make a Kinky sandwich.'
Little Jewford rolls his eyes, while the candidate remains impressively courteous, tipping his hat in a way calculated to melt the coldest Republican heart, and repeats his campaign mantra: 'I just want to work for the people of Texas.'
Inside, Kinky steps up to the microphone and wows the chamber with a wellrehearsed mix of Texas nationalism ('Folks, I agree with Davy Crockett...'), self-deprecating jokes ('As the man said, "You may not be worth a damn, but you're better than what we've got"'), appeals to the maverick spirit of Texas ('Every Texan is an independent at heart'), and cracks about his golfing prowess ('The only two good balls I ever hit were when I stepped on the garden rake').
The audience is charmed. When the (not very difficult) questions come from the floor, Kinky is light on policy, heavy on optimism and good ideas. Will he sign a bill for school reform? 'I will sign anything except [pause] bad legislation.' When they ask a tricky question, he replies, 'Trust me, I'm a Jew: I'll hire good people,' a line which always gets a big hand. He winds up the session - 'May the God of your choice bless you' - and the Fort Benders sail out into the noonday sun, floating on air.
The man at my table leans across and confides, 'We need someone to shake things up.' But he won't say who he'd vote for, or even if he'd sign Kinky's petition.
Kinky seems elated, but on the road to another event, in San Antonio, his inner demons resurface: 'Can we take a chance on someone who makes jokes?' he muses aloud. What about his 'negatives'? He has referred to African-Americans, Hispanics, Jews, feminists and homosexuals in the most unflattering, satirical terms. 'It's all in the songs,' says Little Jewford, wearily. 'It's all out there.' 'Well, at least I don't have legal problems,' says Kinky, looking on the bright side.
Little Jewford, who is at the wheel, reckons that the Republican attack will come if and when Kinky gets on the ballot. To attack him before then would be to legitimise a candidacy that right now is off the radar. He and Kinky speculate about the line of a possible attack. The books and the songs are bursting with sensationally inappropriate material that, taken out of context, could be Swiftboated against him. Kinky reckons that an attempt to demonise him might backfire. Texans like a tough fight, but not a vicious one.
When he's on a roll, Kinky's opponents might seem to have their work cut out. Sometimes, venturing into deep Republican territory to sell his 'message of hope', Kinky's outrageous charm plays well with Texans of every stripe. He's one of them, and they love it. At the San Antonio Rotary Club, there's another vast ballroom, another sea of salad and steak, more bootlace ties, belt buckles the size of licence plates, and faces the colour and texture of rare steak. When Kinky has finished, the crowd rises in a spontaneous ovation. Campaign manager Dean Barkley, watching from the sidelines, can hardly conceal his glee. He knows that Kinky is polling at 18 per cent. Conventional wisdom says that to double that figure by election day is within the realms of the possible. In a three-way race (Republican-Democrat-Independent), a share of the vote in the high 30s would give Kinky a stunning victory, and the keys to the governor's mansion.
Just down the road, another rally in a downtown bar provides a chilling comeuppance: the draughty saloon offers a trestle table loaded with posters, CDs and books, some campaign staff hovering expectantly - and a handful of bored-looking barflies. A woman in a shapeless blue dress tells Kinky she wants a governor with whom she can discuss animal welfare. 'You're a cat lover, right?'
The candidate's mood plunges and team Kinky has to beat a retreat before the event turns sour. Kinky does not like it when his campaign looks like the joke his enemies fervently hope it to be.
As Little Jewford drives us out of San Antonio, chastened by the voters' indifference, Kinky Friedman reflects that Bill Clinton's advice was 'Stay positive and stay humorous.' Ex-governor Jesse Ventura, a committed Kinky supporter, puts it another way: 'Be yourself, then you don't have to remember who you are.'
The Kinky Friedman who is emerging in the course of this bizarre campaign is possibly a more serious figure than many Texans have bargained for, a man with a passion for the political limelight, and a determination to win. In explanation of this, Friedman describes how, a few summers back, on holiday in Cabo San Lucas, he faced death by drowning. 'That clarified a few things in my head,' he says. 'It was time to get serious.'
And then he likes to tell the story of performing with Little Jewford in a Donegal bar. After the set was over, an Irishman pulled him aside. 'You're not really a musician,' he said. 'You're a politician.'

source: http://books.guardian.co.uk/departments/crime/story/0,6000,1651461,00.html
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Milking a male horse ?

say what ?

She'd get an "On-air" tongue lashing from Brownwood's Propoganda Minister !

Published on Tuesday, January 3, 2006 by CommonDreams.org
My Mother: Former Chair of the Local Republican Party, Now Screaming Progressive
by Missy Comley Beattie

Kentucky is the Bluegrass State. It’s where I was born and lived until leaving for college. My mother was Chair of the local Republican Party at a time when Republicans were scarce there. Now the state is glaringly, blindingly red.
Mother made national news years ago when she took issue with the county judge, a Democrat, meeting with him in his office to demand that campaign signs for Democrats be removed from the courthouse lawn. The law was clear that these signs were not allowed within a certain distance of the building. The judge argued but soon acquiesced and my mother was declared the victor. She’s always spoken her mind.
Our house was political. Hosting receptions for gubernatorial candidates, Mother would introduce them to local business owners. She organized teams to call registered Republicans, urging them to vote. Back then, this effort hardly made a dent.
Even we children were summoned to duty—handing out brochures. I remember when some anonymous caller phoned and wanted to know if the “little Nazis” would be out on the streets again with their propaganda.
Election night was always exciting. The telephone spent little time on its cradle as person after person called to discuss returns.
My mother was born into a staunchly Republican household. Accepting her family’s views, she lived and breathed conservatism: “I remember as a child, talking politics with Democrats, taking issue with their positions,” she told me. “I loved this debate.”
Still, she admitted that even while local Chair, she examined the candidates and didn’t always vote a straight Republican ticket.
And, then, at some point, Mother began to study the policies of the parties. Gradually, she came to the realization that progressive politics reflected her beliefs—that social programs for the poor benefited everyone. She decided that her religious convictions also turned her away from the “right” and into the light:
We have to take care of our poor. The Republican Party cuts taxes for the wealthy and either under-funds or eliminates government organizations that help the poor and middle class. Also, the Civil Rights Movement was a huge wakeup for me.
During the 2000 presidential campaign, Mother didn’t think either candidate was solid (she thought Al Gore relinquished himself to his handlers) but she recognized Gore’s foreign policy expertise. “It’s not just Bush’s lack of experience,” she said. “He can’t pronounce countries or their leaders’ names.” Actually, both my mother and father thought Bush lacked the intelligence necessary for the task.
After 9/11 when Americans were thirsty for revenge, both of my parents were dismayed that the president continued to build a case against Iraq. My mother had just read Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the Unites States, a book she recommends to all who want to be knowledgeable about the roots of terrorism. It’s her hope that Americans will engage in the reality of our tyrannical foreign policy. “Our image was damaged before the presidency of George Bush,” she says. “But he’s accomplished its destruction.”
When people say they like Bush because he’s tough, Mother lets them know that toughness and a disregard for truth are a dangerous combination. She tells them this war has created more and more young men and women who are eager to volunteer for suicide missions against Westerners.
Both of my parents are appalled by the corruption of this administration and that so many Americans continue to support a president who has no regard for our Constitution.
When my nephew was killed in Iraq on August 6, 2005, my parents agreed to be interviewed by local television anchors and newspapers. They declared: “George Bush killed our grandson.” They never wanted their grief to be so public, but they needed to make a statement. They hoped to prevent others from hearing the unthinkable—the words that changed their lives forever. Tragically, more than 300 troops have died since Marine Lance Cpl. Chase Comley was killed. I worry about my mother. Anguished over the senseless loss of her grandson and the continued deaths not only of our troops but of Iraqi citizens, my mother’s face is etched with grief.
My mother believes that if Bush hadn’t been handed the election by the Supreme Court and, instead, Al Gore had taken the oath of office as president, a country having no connection to that Tuesday in September would not be on the brink of civil war and our own society would not be so bitterly divided.
And Chase would be with us, living the life he loved, and joining us at family gatherings. His absence hits my mother in wave after wave of disbelief.
Still, neither of my parents feel any loyalty to the Democratic Party right now. In fact, they see very little leadership in Congress. My father complains that there are few statesmen. Both find it reprehensible that only five members of Congress went to the Congressional Reading Room to examine the documents stating evidence for the invasion of Iraq. Mother says if more of our elected officials had children in the military, we’d have seen the scrutiny that something as crucial as war deserves and less support for giving George Bush the authority to go to war.
My mother is articulate and courageous, unwavering in her beliefs that we are led by the worst president in our history. Even though her spirit is fractured, she’ll continue to speak with a steady voice against this administration and its war. Her heart is shattered, and I know in mine that my parents, both in their 80’s, will not be with us long enough, even if they live another 20 years, for the time to heal their pain.

Missy Beattie lives in New York City. She's written for National Public Radio and Nashville Life Magazine. An outspoken critic of the Bush Administration and the war in Iraq, she has participated in many peace marches, including the Cindy Sheehan rally in DC. She completed a novel last year.

source: http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0103-34.htm

QUOTE

“He has given us higher property taxes, bigger government, higher insurance rates, toll roads, has abandoned our border and ignored our broken schools.” ~Texas Comptroller & Republican Carole Keeton Strayhorn (Candidate for Texas Governor) Comments on Texas Governor, Republican, Rick Perry - AP Jan. 02, 2006

WARNING: Republicans at Work Spreading their BS ! Beware the Wolves !

what kind of values are these ?

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Yes, the Bi-partisan BS is being spread over the Brownwood airwaves too !

digby 2:14 PM Comments (15) | Trackback (0)

Bipartisan BS
by digby

The media is working hard to make this into a bi-partisan scandal but that is simple bullshit. Ed Henry on CNN, for instance, couldn't stop talking about Byron Dorgan being implicated in this scandal. I don't know if Dorgan's going to be swept up, but let's just say that if he is he probably deserves it because he would be the stupidest man in the world. He's the top Democrat on the Indian Affairs Committee and even Steno Sue writes:
Dorgan has asked some of the toughest questions in the committee hearings probing the $82 million Abramoff and Michael Scanlon charged their tribal clients.
I suppose some people would think this is a normal thing for a man on the take to do, but I would suggest that it's unlikely. Here's a good rundown on the Dorgan connection (and the media's predictably bad reporting on it) from Media Matters.
Fasten your seatbelts. The press is surely under tremendous pressure from the Republicans to report this as a bi-partisan scandal and they are already buckling under. But that doesn't change the fact that this is a GOP operation from the get --- and they know it.
I wrote a piece a few months back about Abramoff and his two college Republican lieutenants Ralph Reed and Grover Norquist called Nixon's Babies in which I discussed just how important Abramoff is to the "movement." And I highly recommend reading Nina Easton's Gang of Five: Leaders at the Center of the Conservative Ascendacy Anybody who looks at Jack Abramoff and sees anything but a hard core GOP influence peddler who was paid very well to finance the GOP machine is either a shill or a fool.
I just saw CNN's Henry again say that this was a bi-partisan scandal and that Democrats were going to find it very hard to make the "culture of corruption" charge. This was not "he said/she said" --- he was editorializing in his piece and his opinion is either uninformed, myopic or biased. This piece was followed by another from William Schneider in which he helpfully points out that while the public indicates that it thinks Democrats are less corrupt than Republicans that's only because the public understands that it's because the Republicans are in power and have more opportunity.
Bullshit. The reason people think this is because every few years we find out that Republicans leaders have no respect for the law. It's like clockwork. If they aren't selling themselves outright to big business on the floor of the congress they are claiming the constitution allows them to break any law they choose. Just in the past couple of weeks we've had news reports about legal trouble for corrupt Republicans George W. Bush, Ken Lay, Tom DeLay, Bill Frist, Karl Rove, Scooter Libby, Duke Cunningham, Ralph Reed and Jack Abramoff. Lot of dots there. Is it too much trouble for the media to connect them?
This characterization of the scandal as being "bi-partisan" is typical bad mainstream journalism, particularly the emphasis they are placing on the very small handful of Democrats who've even been mentioned (much less included in any legal procedings.) Not only are they creating some equity and illegality where none exists, by doing it they are missing the real story, as usual.
This isn't a story about power corrupting or about a few bad apples. This is about a corrupt political machine --- a system of money laundering and public corruption on behalf of one political party. It's about a party that has used every tool at its disposal to legally and illegally enrich itself and enhance its power. It's right there. It's unravelling before our eyes.
And all Dana Bash and Ed Hanry can say is that Jack Abramoff lent his skybox to Democrats and Republicans alike. Which he did. He lent it 1% of the time to Democrats and 99% of the time to Republicans. That makes all of them equally corrupt.

source of above post: http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_01_01_digbysblog_archive.html#113632625570231458
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say what ?

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Religious Right for sale ?

Wolves in sheeps clothing ?

Republican Values and Morality ? The walk does not match the talk !

Here are the details that you're not hearing from the Republican owned talk radio transmitter in Brownwood Texas !

Unraveling Abramoff
Key Players in the Investigation of Lobbyist Jack Abramoff
Compiled by washingtonpost.com
January 3, 2005


The Players | Timeline | Follow the Money | The "A" Team | Post Coverage

Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff agreed on Tues., Jan. 3 to plead guilty to fraud, public corruption and tax evasion for his role in the purchase of a fleet of Florida gambling boats from a businessman who was later killed in a gangland-style hit. Other efforts he took to funnel money to support causes of interest to his clients are also being probed. Post reporters Susan Schmidt and James V. Grimaldi have written several stories about the Abramoff Affair and key players are listed below.

The Players

Jack Abramoff | Michael Scanlon | Adam Kidan | Ben Waldman | Konstantinos "Gus" Boulis | Grover Norquist | Ralph Reed | Italia Federici | Rev. Louis P. Sheldon | David H. Safavian | J. Steven Griles | Rep. Robert Ney (R-Ohio) | Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) | Sen. Conrad Burns (R-Mont.) | Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) | Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) | Tony C. Rudy

Jack A. Abramoff: Up until 2004, Jack Abramoff was one of the most influential lobbyists in Washington. He leveraged his close ties to Republican and conservative leaders, including then–House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas), to collect tens of millions of dollars from clients such as casino-rich Indian tribes. He treated lawmakers and their aides to lavish trips, meals and tickets to sporting events, and directed the tribes to donate millions of dollars to political candidates and parties. Now he is at the center of one of the widest-ranging federal corruption investigations in decades.

Prosecutors are investigating whether Abramoff defrauded the tribes and are probing his links to Congress and government officials. In a related matter, Abramoff agreed to plead guilty to three criminal charges on Tuesday, Jan. 3 for allegedly defrauding lenders in his 2000 purchase of SunCruz casinos, a fleet of gambling boats. The former lobbyist also agreed to cooperate with federal investigators in Washington. His partner in the Florida deal, Adam Kidan, has agreed to plead guilty and testify against Abramoff. Abramoff's Washington partner, public relations executive Michael Scanlon, has already pleaded guilty to conspiracy to bribe public officials and also will testify against Abramoff.

Born in Atlantic City, N.J., Abramoff, 46, graduated from Brandeis University and Georgetown University Law Center. He was a leader of the College Republicans where he met Kidan; anti-tax crusader Grover Norquist; and Ralph Reed, the former head of the Christian Coalition who now is a Republican candidate for lieutenant governor in Georgia.

The lobbyist has said, "I can't imagine there's anything I did that other lobbyists didn't do and aren't doing today."

Michael Scanlon: A former press secretary to Rep. Tom DeLay, Scanlon pleaded guilty on Nov. 22, 2005, to conspiring to bribe a congressman and other public officials. Scanlon, 35, and Abramoff allegedly plotted to defraud Indian tribes and bribe government officials, taking in tens of millions of dollars.

According to court records, Scanlon and Abramoff concocted a scheme to "corruptly offer and provide things of value, including money, meals, trips and entertainment to federal public officials in return for agreements to perform official acts." Scanlon is expected to testify about gifts he and Abramoff offered to Rep. Robert W. Ney (R-Ohio) "in exchange for a series of official acts," according to court records.

Ben Waldman: A former Reagan administration aide, Waldman joined Abramoff and Kidan in purchasing SunCruz Casinos. Records show that Waldman and Kidan faxed copies of a purported wire-transfer document in order to prove they had paid a promised $23 million to the owner of SunCruz. Abramoff and Kidan have been indicted on charges of fraud after an investigation determined the wire-transfer document was a fake. Waldman has not been indicted in the case.

Adam Kidan: Kidan, a New York City businessman who had owned the Dial-a-Mattress franchise in Washington, was indicted in August 2005 on fraud charges related to the 2000 purchase of SunCruz Casinos with Abramoff. According to court records, the SunCruz purchase hinged on a fake wire transfer for $23 million intended to persuade lenders to provide financing to Kidan, Abramoff and Ben Waldman, who were purchasing a 90 percent share of the company. Each of the six counts in the indictment could bring a punishment of as much as five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

Grover Norquist: Founder and president of the conservative lobbying group Americans for Tax Reform, Norquist allegedly allowed Abramoff to route money through the group in order to whip up opposition to an anti-gambling bill. If the bill had passed, Abramoff's client, a company that wanted to sell state lottery tickets online, would be out of business. Norquist has known Abramoff since their days in the College Republicans.

Konstantinos "Gus" Boulis: A Greek immigrant who started the Miami Subs restaurant chain and the Florida-based SunCruz Casinos, Boulis was killed in February 2001, just months after selling a 90 percent share of his gambling business to Abramoff's group.

Boulis was forced to sell the casino business, which included 11 ships that sailed from nine Florida ports and Myrtle Beach, S.C., because he purchased his fleet before he became a U.S. citizen, which violated the Shipping Act. The Justice Department worked out a settlement that allowed Boulis to sell the business at market value. Through his lawyer, he connected with Abramoff's group. Federal investigators allege Abramoff and Kidan defrauded lenders when making the purchase and the two were indicted in August. The business went bankrupt just months after Boulis's execution-style death, which went unsolved until November 2005 when three men were indicted on charges of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit first-degree murder.

Ralph Reed: Best known as the first executive director of the Christian Coalition during the early 1990s, Reed is now a Republican candidate for lieutenant governor of Georgia. In 1981 he worked as an intern for Abramoff, the newly elected chairman of the College Republicans National Committee. Abramoff promoted Reed in 1983, appointing him to succeed Grover Norquist as executive director of the organization. Reed left the Christian Coalition in 1997 and started a political consulting firm in Georgia.

E-mails released by federal investigators in June 2005 suggest that Reed secretly accepted payments from Abramoff to lobby against Indian casino gambling and oppose an Alabama education lottery at the same time that Abramoff was being paid to promote Indian casino gambling. Additional e-mails released in November 2005 show that Reed also worked for another Abramoff client seeking to block a congressional ban on Internet gambling. Reed has said he did not know the funds came from pro-gambling sources.

Italia Federici: Federici is president of the Council of Republicans for Environmental Advocacy. Over three years, Abramoff directed Indian tribes he represented to contribute about $500,000 to her group. Federici had a personal relationship with J. Steven Griles and e-mails show that Abramoff sought to use this connection to secretly help him lobby the Interior Department and obtain inside information affecting his tribal clients.

Federici's organization was co-founded by Gale A. Norton before she joined the Bush administration as Interior secretary. In one e-mail, Abramoff told a colleague that Federici's group was "our access to Norton." In combative testimony before the Senate Indian Affairs Committee on Nov. 17, 2005, Federici maintained that she was manipulated by Abramoff.

Rev. Louis P. Sheldon: Sheldon is the founder of the Traditional Values Coalition that represents a number of conservative Christian churches. Sheldon's organization, which has protested loudly against gambling, allegedly accepted money from an online lottery firm, eLottery, to help in the company's $2 million pro-gambling campaign. The company needed help defeating an anti-gambling bill and checks and e-mails obtained by The Post show that Abramoff recruited Ralph Reed to join Sheldon in the effort to pressure members of Congress.

Sheldon told The Post that he could not remember receiving eLottery money and that he was unaware that Abramoff was involved in the campaign to defeat an anti-gambling bill. Sheldon received at least $25,000 from eLottery; Abramoff is known to have referred to him as "Lucky Louie."

David Safavian: Safavian, who once worked with Abramoff, worked in the White House until he was arrested Sept. 19, 2005, for allegedly lying to investigators in the probe of the lobbyist's activities.

Until his resignation, Safavian was the top administrator at the federal procurement office in the White House Office of Management and Budget, where he set purchasing policy for the entire government. The FBI alleges that Safavian made repeated false statements to investigators about a golf trip with Abramoff to Scotland in 2002, when Safavian was chief of staff at the General Services Administration. Investigators contend that he concealed his efforts to help Abramoff acquire control of two federally managed properties in the Washington area.

J. Steven Griles: Griles was deputy secretary of the Interior Department from July 2001 to January 2005. E-mails released by congressional investigators show he had numerous meetings, telephone calls and other contacts with Jack Abramoff concerning the lobbyist's tribal clients. According to the e-mails, Griles advised Abramoff how to get members of Congress to pressure the department and provided him information about Interior decision-making. The e-mails show Abramoff tried to influence Griles through Italia Federici, head of the Council of Republicans for Environmental Advocacy.

In testimony before the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, Griles denied having any special relationship with Abramoff. Since leaving office, Griles has joined former White House national energy policy director Andrew Lundquist and former House member George Nethercutt (R-Wash.) to form the political lobbying firm of Lundquist, Nethercutt & Griles, LLC.

Rep. Robert Ney (R-Ohio): Ney, 51, was subpoenaed in early November by the federal grand jury investigating Abramoff's lobbying activities. The lawmaker is under scrutiny because of alleged favors he performed for Abramoff and Scanlon, including introducing legislation, putting two statements into the Congressional Record, contacting federal officials to influence decisions and meeting with Abramoff's clients.

A spokesman for Ney, who has served as chairman of the House Administration Committee since January 2001, said that the lawmaker was defrauded by Scanlon and Abramoff and his official actions had nothing to do with improper influence. Ney has represented Ohio's 18th congressional district since 1995.

Rep. Thomas DeLay (R-Tex.): DeLay was one of the most powerful leaders on Capitol Hill before he was indicted on campaign finance charges in September 2005 and temporarily resigned as House majority leader. Abramoff, whom DeLay once called "one of my closest and dearest friends," held fundraisers for the congressman and arranged for DeLay to accompany him on a luxury golf trip to Scotland and a trip to the Northern Mariana Islands. Abramoff also maintained close ties with DeLay aides.

DeLay and two of his associates were indicted on charges of criminal conspiracy and money laundering in relation to fundraising and spending in the 2002 Texas legislative races. The lawmaker is vigorously challenging the Texas campaign finance case, which he says was filed against him by a prosecutor with close ties to Democrats. On Dec. 5, 2005, a judge dropped a conspiracy charge against DeLay, but let stand money laundering charges.

A native Texan, DeLay holds a biology degree from the University of Houston and owned a pest extermination company before seeking public office. He was elected to the Texas State House in 1978 and went to Congress six years later, becoming majority leader in 2002.

Sen. Conrad Burns (R-Mont.): Burns, chairman of the Senate Interior Appropriations subcommittee, pressured the Bureau of Indian Affairs to award a $3 million grant to the Saginaw Chippewas of Michigan – a client of Abramoff's – despite objections from Interior Department officials. On Dec. 17, 2005, the senator returned $150,000 in contributions he received during the past five years from Abramoff, his associates and their tribal clients. Two of his staffers left to work as lobbyists with Abramoff during that same time period. Burns, who has said his actions were consistent with his support for Indian tribes, was first elected to the Senate in 1988.

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.): As chairman of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, McCain launched an investigation into Abramoff's activities after Washington Post stories in 2004 detailed the lobbyist's dealings with tribes and secret kickbacks to Scanlon. The hearings may help McCain, a likely contender for the Republican presidential nomination in 2008, reinforce his image as a Washington reformer and a proponent of campaign finance reform.

Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.): Dorgan, ranking Democrat on the committee, has pursued the probe even as he has received attention for his previous links to Abramoff. Dorgan met with one of Abramoff's associates and pushed legislative language urging government regulators to decide whether one tribal client of Abramoff deserved federal recognition. On Dec. 12, 2005, Dorgan announced he would return $67,000 in donations he received from Indian tribes represented by Abramoff.

Tony C. Rudy: A former top aide to House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.), Rudy was central to Abramoff's efforts to scuttle an anti-gambling bill in July 2000. He e-mailed Abramoff internal congressional communications and advice, according to documents and the lobbyist's former associates.

Rudy went to work for Abramoff when the lobbyist moved to a new law firm, Greenberg Traurig LLP, in January 2001. Abramoff also arranged for a client, eLottery, to pay $25,000 to a Jewish foundation that hired Rudy's wife, Lisa, as a consultant, according to documents and interviews. Months later, Rudy himself was hired as a lobbyist by Abramoff.

During his tenure as a congressional aide, Rudy received favors from Abramoff, including several trips paid for by eLottery. Rudy also accompanied DeLay to Scotland in 2002 for a trip, now under investigation, arranged by Abramoff. Abramoff listed Rudy as a financial reference in his purchase of SunCruz, an offshore gambling enterprise. That transaction ultimately led to the indictment of Abramoff and a business partner on charges that they had forged a $23 million wire transfer. Rudy has declined to comment on his involvement in any of these investigations.

source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/custom/2005/12/23/CU2005122300939.html#burns
---------------
It's not a Republican scandal, it's the Republican Party
by kos
Wed Jan 04, 2006 at 11:24:36 AM PDT

The Bow Tie makes sense:


So it was with not all that much surprise that I read Lou Sheldon's name again recently, in a story about disgraced lobbyist and admitted felon Jack Abramoff. According to the Washington Post, Sheldon allegedly took money from an Abramoff client called eLottery and in return pressured members of Congress to defeat an anti-gambling bill. Sheldon was joined in this by former Christian Coalition head Ralph Reed, another longtime Abramoff friend.

The usual good government types will point to the Abramoff scandal as yet another reason we need tougher campaign finance laws and more stringent ethics rules in Washington. Maybe they're right. But there's a deeper kind of corruption here.

Why were supposedly honest ideological conservatives like Sheldon and Reed and anti-tax activist Grover Norquist involved with Jack Abramoff in the first place? [...]

Weirdos and charlatans and self-interested hacks like Lou Sheldon and Grover Norquist have long discredited the conservative ideas they purport to represent. Their political allies in Washington and Congress may be tempted to defend them. I hope they don't. We'll all be better off when they're gone.


The problem for principled conservatives (and I'm still not sure whether Tucker Carlson is one of them) is that they've lost representation in DC. The Republican Party isn't mired in scandal, it IS the scandal -- the system of bribery, kickbacks, and scams that fuel its massive money machine and influence peddling racket.

It's great business, no doubt. The numbers don't lie. But it's not good for America, and it clearly doesn't represent honest conservative thinking.

Ten years. That's all it took for Republicans to go from outsider reformers to the most corrupt machine in recent history and perhaps ever (the historians can debate that point). Remember, it was DeLay who once said:


The time has come that the American people know exactly what their Representatives are doing here in Washington. Are they feeding at the public trough, taking lobbyist-paid vacations, getting wined and dined by special interest groups? Or are they working hard to represent their constituents?


That was 1995. But it wasn't even four years later that:


... the former House majority leader or his associates have visited places of luxury most Americans have never seen, often getting there aboard corporate jets arranged by lobbyists and other special interests.


DeLay has been the biggest power in DC for a decade, reshaping the Republican Party and the DC power structure (e.g. K Street) to suit the financial and influence needs of his machine.

The Republican Party is now corrupt to its core. It can't even blink without breaking a law or ethical guideline. The tendrils of the corruption seep all the way into the deepest corners of Congress and the White House (let's not forget David Safavian and Susan Ralston).

And there's the genius of the polarization that Republicans engineered in this country the last two decades. The more conservatives are conditioned to hate Democrats, the less likely they are to defect no matter how much Republicans stray from their core principles, and no matter how much corruption, greed, mismanagement, abuse of power, and death they preside over. And by controlling the entire machinery of government, they can whitewash any real investigations into those abuses.

Hence there are no checks and balances in place to prevent and punish these abuses. Not from the party's supporters, not from the party itself, and not from the government. All that's left is the criminal justice system, and it's shaping up to be boom times for prosecutors, investigators, and defense lawyers in our nation's capital.

The Stakeholder has more.

source: http://www.dailykos.com/
source:

A Brownwood ASS Whooping on the airwaves of KXYL

Did you hear the "On Air" Ass Whooping this morning on the Brownwood airwaves of KXYL. ? Phil Watts, KXYL owner, came on the air of the morning show and let the two hosts ( JC and Jessee ) have a tounge lashing about the responsibility of the Talk Radio Station as it relates to their, and their callers, "on air" criticisms of Brownwood Republican Congressman Mike Connaway and other Elected Republican Leaders. Phil spoke to the issue of Brownwood / Brown County already having a "Black Mark" for not voting with the majority of the District in favor of Mike Connaway. Did Phil speak to this issue when Brownwood's previous Congressman, Democrat Charlie Stenholm, was contiounsly attacked and demonized on the KXYL airwaves on a near daily basis ? Phil seemed to have given Brown County Republican Spokesperson and Talking Head, James Williamson, Carte Blanche when it came to attacking the Democrats ! I guess things are getting pretty serious when the "Republicans" are calling in and challenging their own party and its leadership on the airwaves of Central Texas via KXYL ! Now I better understand why the KXYL afternoon hosts, Republican J R Williams and Democrat Sam Coursey, keep their distance from all of the Republican Scandals, Corruption, and Immorality that is being uncovered across the country. I guess they don't want to be publicly spanked by Phil !

Call KXYL and request a tape of this mornings tape. Did KXYL owner Phil Watts infer that Republicans would treat Brownwood differently when they are challenged ? Is this a subtle version of BLACKMAIL ? Is this a Republican Value ?

twisted logic: honor the fallen by killing another 2,000 troops in a broken policy ?

A Life, Wasted
Let's Stop This War Before More Heroes Are Killed
By Paul E. Schroeder

Tuesday, January 3, 2006; Page A17

Early on Aug. 3, 2005, we heard that 14 Marines had been killed in Haditha, Iraq. Our son, Lance Cpl. Edward "Augie" Schroeder II, was stationed there. At 10:45 a.m. two Marines showed up at our door. After collecting himself for what was clearly painful duty, the lieutenant colonel said, "Your son is a true American hero."
Since then, two reactions to Augie's death have compounded the sadness.
At times like this, people say, "He died a hero." I know this is meant with great sincerity. We appreciate the many condolences we have received and how helpful they have been. But when heard repeatedly, the phrases "he died a hero" or "he died a patriot" or "he died for his country" rub raw.
"People think that if they say that, somehow it makes it okay that he died," our daughter, Amanda, has said. "He was a hero before he died, not just because he went to Iraq. I was proud of him before, and being a patriot doesn't make his death okay. I'm glad he got so much respect at his funeral, but that didn't make it okay either."
The words "hero" and "patriot" focus on the death, not the life. They are a flag-draped mask covering the truth that few want to acknowledge openly: Death in battle is tragic no matter what the reasons for the war. The tragedy is the life that was lost, not the manner of death. Families of dead soldiers on both sides of the battle line know this. Those without family in the war don't appreciate the difference.
This leads to the second reaction. Since August we have witnessed growing opposition to the Iraq war, but it is often whispered, hands covering mouths, as if it is dangerous to speak too loudly. Others discuss the never-ending cycle of death in places such as Haditha in academic and sometimes clinical fashion, as in "the increasing lethality of improvised explosive devices."
Listen to the kinds of things that most Americans don't have to experience: The day Augie's unit returned from Iraq to Camp Lejeune, we received a box with his notebooks, DVDs and clothes from his locker in Iraq. The day his unit returned home to waiting families, we received the second urn of ashes. This lad of promise, of easy charm and readiness to help, whose highest high was saving someone using CPR as a first aid squad volunteer, came home in one coffin and two urns. We buried him in three places that he loved, a fitting irony, I suppose, but just as rough each time.
I am outraged at what I see as the cause of his death. For nearly three years, the Bush administration has pursued a policy that makes our troops sitting ducks. While Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that our policy is to "clear, hold and build" Iraqi towns, there aren't enough troops to do that.
In our last conversation, Augie complained that the cost in lives to clear insurgents was "less and less worth it," because Marines have to keep coming back to clear the same places. Marine commanders in the field say the same thing. Without sufficient troops, they can't hold the towns. Augie was killed on his fifth mission to clear Haditha.
At Augie's grave, the lieutenant colonel knelt in front of my wife and, with tears in his eyes, handed her the folded flag. He said the only thing he could say openly: "Your son was a true American hero." Perhaps. But I felt no glory, no honor. Doing your duty when you don't know whether you will see the end of the day is certainly heroic. But even more, being a hero comes from respecting your parents and all others, from helping your neighbors and strangers, from loving your spouse, your children, your neighbors and your enemies, from honesty and integrity, from knowing when to fight and when to walk away, and from understanding and respecting the differences among the people of the world.
Two painful questions remain for all of us. Are the lives of Americans being killed in Iraq wasted? Are they dying in vain? President Bush says those who criticize staying the course are not honoring the dead. That is twisted logic: honor the fallen by killing another 2,000 troops in a broken policy?
I choose to honor our fallen hero by remembering who he was in life, not how he died. A picture of a smiling Augie in Iraq, sunglasses turned upside down, shows his essence -- a joyous kid who could use any prop to make others feel the same way.
Though it hurts, I believe that his death -- and that of the other Americans who have died in Iraq -- was a waste. They were wasted in a belief that democracy would grow simply by removing a dictator -- a careless misunderstanding of what democracy requires. They were wasted by not sending enough troops to do the job needed in the resulting occupation -- a careless disregard for professional military counsel.
But their deaths will not be in vain if Americans stop hiding behind flag-draped hero masks and stop whispering their opposition to this war. Until then, the lives of other sons, daughters, husbands, wives, fathers and mothers may be wasted as well.
This is very painful to acknowledge, and I have to live with it. So does President Bush.

The writer is managing director of a trade development firm in Cleveland.
source:http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/02/AR2006010200974.html

Candy Barr, former Brownwood resident, dies

Candy Barr, famous exotic dancer, dies at age of 70
By Celinda Emison / Reporter-News Staff Writer
January 1, 2006

Candy Barr, who made headlines as a burlesque dancer and for her drug arrests before living quietly near Brownwood, died of pneumonia Friday at a Victoria hospital. She was 70.
Barr was born Juanita Dale Slusher, on July 6, 1935, in Edna.
She rose to fame in the late 1950s as a burlesque dancer at The Colony Club in Dallas. She also performed Los Angeles and Las Vegas, making her one of the most well-known exotic dancers in the country. At one point, Barr earned $2,000 a week.
Her sister, Kay Slusher Anderson, 77, of Houston, said Barr had been a recluse for the past three years, living in a small house in Morales, 11 miles north of her hometown of Edna.
''I am proud to be her sister,'' she said. ''She deserves the recognition. She was the most famous dancer ever.''
Gloria Carver (formerly Gloria Orr) was Barr's friend for more than 40 years and helped her after she moved to Brownwood.
''There will never be another one,'' she said of her friend. ''She was beautiful.''
Barr was associated with a host of famous characters. Among them was Dallas nightclub owner Jack Ruby, who was found guilty of shooting and killing Lee Harvey Oswald, the man suspected of assassinating President John F. Kennedy. An appeals court overturned Ruby's conviction, but he died before a new trial could begin.
At 16, Barr starred in one of the most famous stag movies, ''Smart Alec,'' made in 1951.
Barr was known for her choreography and even trained actress Joan Collins for the 1960 movie ''Seven Thieves.''
However, her rising career would be interrupted in 1959 when Barr was sentenced to 15 years in prison by a Dallas judge for possessing less than an ounce of marijuana. She was paroled after serving three years and four months.
In 1967, Barr moved to Brownwood. In 1970 she was indicted on charges of marijuana possession in Brownwood, but the charges were dismissed.
A book of her poetry titled ''A Gentle Mind Confused,'' was a testament to her belief in God and was published in 1971.
''She felt Jesus was her best friend and saved her from many a terror,'' Carver said.
In 1976 at the age of 42, she was on the cover of Texas Monthly and in 2001 granted the magazine her last known interview.
She eventually fell out of the public eye, and moved from her home at Lake Brownwood to her hometown of Edna in 1992.
Officials at Slavik Funeral Home in Edna confirmed the death, but said there was no funeral service scheduled for Barr. Her body was cremated and a private family service will be held later. The family requests that memorials be made to the Brown County Humane Society.
According to Abilene Reporter-News files, Barr was married four times, and had at least one child, a daughter.

source: http://www.reporter-news.com/abil/nw_obituaries/article/0,1874,ABIL_7967_4355994,00.html

HAPPY NEW YEAR