t r u t h o u t | Police Break Down Doors in Night Raid on Protesters' Meeting

The Peninsula On-line: Qatar's leading English Daily

The Peninsula On-line: Qatar's leading English Daily

Russia threatens to supply Iran with top new missile system as 'cold war' escalates - Telegraph

Our leaders are idiots.

Goodbye - by Charley Reese

Of All the Reasons McCain’s Palin Pick is Awful, Evidence of Her Abuse of Power is the Worst | This Can't Be Happening!

The Neocon mafia is running amok in the McCain campaign. The same gang of Israel-centered foreign diplomacy is determining the vice presidential slot. Here is an excerpt of Dave Lindorff's latest: We have seen over these past eight years just what abuse of power can do to destroy democratic government and a free society. So now we have Gov. Palin, whom evidence suggests may have abused her power as governor of Alaska to fire the state’s public security director after he blocked her efforts to destroy the career of a low-level state trooper who happened to be her former brother-in-law, because she wanted to avenge a sister engaged in an ugly post-divorce custody dispute. Published allegations would show that both Gov. Palin’s husband Todd Palin, and members of her staff, repeatedly called and harangued state Public Safety Director Walt Monegan, who says he was “pressured” to fire the brother-in-law, Officer Mike Wooten. ... [end of excerpt] If that isn't enough read
Evidence of Her Abuse of Power at This Can't Be Happeing!

The Tilting Yard - WSJ.com

Thomas Frank, author of the best-selling "What's the Matter with Kansas" is making the rounds promoting his new book "Wrecking Crew: How conservatives rule". He is also a columnist for the Murdoch business vehicle, the Wall Street Journal. Here he comments on a recent Wichita tour date in his native state, Kansas. [excerpt] Rarer still is it to find a Republican lawmaker with Mr. Swenson's beliefs. He dislikes our current president, he tells me, for building the infamous prison at Guantanamo Bay, for the Iraq war, and for "wanting to obliterate Social Security." John McCain, for his part, "has values that are being driven by corporate America." Bill and Hillary Clinton fare little better: "I don't think I'll ever forgive the Clintons for what they did as far as free trade goes." ... Even on the abortion question, where Mr. Swenson's views are more conventionally conservative, he takes a social-democratic tack, claiming that nations with universal health care and paid family leave have lower abortion rates. When I remark on how strange all this sounds coming from an elected GOP official, he reminds me that the authors of the 1931 Davis-Bacon Act, which ensures a "prevailing wage" for workers on federal projects, were both Republicans. Frank is off on qualifying state Representative Swenson as a political rarity, it would be more accurate to qualify Mr. Swenson as an intelligent Republican who remembers the radical history of the republican movement, Free State, anti-slavery and to the revolutionaries of the Enlightenment the ancient head choppers of France. Maybe Mr. Frank needs to spend more time reading the Flyer to not be so surprised at the political winds changing back home. The complete essay is at: The Tilting Yard - WSJ.com

A short history of getting robbed, the GOP and dirty politics - Robert Parry

Don't blame the youthful revolutionaries outside the convention walls of Denver. Look no further than the history of the GOP's dirty tricks to find how Obama may yet be defeated. [excerpt] ... Barack Obama made it across the tightrope of the Democratic National Convention, gaining solid endorsements from Bill and Hillary Clinton and giving a rousing speech before some 80,000 supporters at Invesco Field in Denver. But now comes the time when the Republicans win elections. ... Read more at: Consortiumnews.com

ACLU protests conditions at Gitmo on the Platte : The Rocky Mountain News

More details tonight from Denver demonstrators and friends on Radio Free Kansas [excerpt] They also were kept hand-cuffed in pairs, even after they were put in cells, he said. "Even more shocking, however, was that deputies refused to release persons from flexi-cuffs for the purpose of using the bathroom," Pendergrass said. "Thus arrestees that had to use the restroom were forced to do so while flexi-cuffed to another person." ... Read more at: The Rocky Mountain News

Police continue repressive tactics in Denver

Tom Eley reports from WSWS: [excerpt] In the two days since Denver police—acting at the direction of U.S. Secret Service—attacked and jailed nearly 100 peaceful protesters outside the Democratic National Convention, the virtual militarization of Denver has continued. In total, over 130 protesters have now been imprisoned. As late as Tuesday afternoon, fifteen hours after the arrests, about 60 protesters were still being held at a makeshift detention center, sarcastically called “Gitmo on the Platte” by protesters, as well as in a downtown city jail. By Wednesday most of those detained had been released after posting a $500 bond. The protesters were processed in specially-created kangaroo courts dubbed “DNC Courts.” Read more

Dr. Bill Roy: "Unfettered presidential government, lawless execution""

The Land Institute - These revolutionary times

Bill Vitek writes: "I am not prone to tirades or radical behavior. I have never participated in a public protest and refuse to sign most petitions. In the classroom I offer both sides of an issue. I have a stable job and hope to someday spend the money collecting in my retirement account. In British America in 1775 I would have been a loyalist. But as an applied philosopher — I know that sounds like an oxymoron — poking around modern civilization's foundation and plumbing for two decades, I see cracks and leaks growing, and ever faster. I see that the past half-century's wonderful ride, an amazing and blazing run on the carbon bank of coal, oil and natural gas, is sputtering out. But not before we clog our carbon sinks, particularly the atmosphere, triggering global climatic disruption that is already under way. ..." Read all of Bill's piece, get his email at the Prairie Writers Circle

The Land Institute - Prairie Festival 30, September 26-28, 2008

Registration required, in advance, but their Friday evening barn dance is available for a "free will donation" and a song - for that night. Kansas Flyer readers should strongly consider attending the dance and travel in a posse, sharing rides.

Democratic Convention meets with Obama campaign in crisis

Patrick Martin writes: "The first two days of Democratic National Convention have been dominated by a sense of foreboding and unease, with mounting concern that the Obama campaign is losing ground in the polls, and that the divisions opened up in the primary contest between Obama and Senator Hillary Clinton have not healed, but rather have begun to fester. The Obama campaign has suffered a palpable loss of political momentum which elaborate attempts at media stagecraft—the candidate’s trip to the Middle East and Europe, the hype over the vice-presidential selection process, the convention itself—have so far failed to reverse. Polls show a tightening race between Obama and his Republican rival Senator John McCain, despite overwhelming popular hostility to the Bush administration and the Republican Party. ..." Read this article at the World Socialist Web Site

Dennis Kucinich: "Wake Up America"

He was speaking to everybody, but the DNC leadership isn't listening to him. The vast majority of Republican Busheviks are brain-dead, flopped on the couch drinking beer and gooned out on the prospects of poking the next girl at the church social. They either will vote for Alzheimer Billy Goat McCain, or stay at home stockpiling ammo against the coming "Nigrah President." We'll be eating dirt for years to come because no one cares, but the oligarchs, the corporations, i.e. the real American Idols who are busy bamboozling the billions (including the Busheviks) with plastic gewgahs and shiny widgets. The looting will continue, the "Green New Deal" will be locked up with the utility monopolies, Big Oil. Autonomy against the autokracy will be the planet's only life support until many forms of local revolutions pop up from the grassroots. Kucinich's one five minute powerful talk - did nothing, the hollow Empire is hungry, for more imperialist war and conquest.

Russia Today : "Blitzed Ossetian city hosts classical concert"

US supplied bombs destroyed a parliament building - democracy? Many thanks to our international readers who sent along these links to my readers in Kansas and beyond. The United States supplied weaponry to the Georgian military forces should be banned. [excerpt] "The principal conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra and artistic director of the Mariinsky Theatre, Valery Gergiev, has led a concert in Tskhinvali. The performance was staged next to the destroyed parliament building in the bombed-out capital of South Ossetia." Read the article and listen to the concert in two parts at: RussiaToday

German Coalition Sues Bayer Over Pesticide Honey Bee Deaths | CommonDreams.org

Worldwide colony collapse from pesticide laced seeds.

Petraeus Book 'Endorsement' Draws Fire

[excerpt] The book is "Under Orders: A Spiritual Handbook for Military Personnel," by Army Chaplain (Lt. Col.) William McCoy, and according to Petraeus' published endorsement of the work, "it should be in every rucksack for those times when soldiers need spiritual energy." But the endorsement - which has spurred a demand by a watchdog group for Petraeus' dismissal and court martial on the grounds of establishing a religious requirement on troops - was a personal view never intended for publication, the book's author now says. ..." Read more

Constantine's Sword DVD released Sept. 12, 2008

"No War is Holy." - one of the most important documentaries of the year about one man's attempt to "explore the roots of religious violence." More information here .

THE FUTURE THAT NEVER COMES; THE PAST THAT NEVER WAS; THE PRESENT INSCRUTABLE

Remembering When the Government Was at Least Approachable | This Can't Be Happening!

Our world, a Nation without empathy. We must remain in joyful embrace of the Hard Gravel Roads ahead, in the small places that still exist.

If you missed Dave Lindorff on Radio Free Kansas during last Sunday's Stakeout, you missed some smart and entertaining fun. After reading his latest today I felt it necessary to stake out some claim to a place where the government, the cops and the people are in Dave's terms "at least approachable." The amiable claim can still be made of Jefferson county, Kansas and pretty much other remote bastions of the last of Front Porch America. I can recount many examples, where life in and around the Kansas small towns makes still for a neighborly existence, despite our tortured past as a settler state based on dislocating the original Native Americans, a delusional bliss still abides here. Faced with the horror of the creation of what Mr. Lindorff writes of where, "Today the White House is a bunker. Federal police carry assault weapons. Snipers man the roof of the White House. People who write letters of complaint to minor federal officials can end up being strip-searched and arrested. ..." I take the joyful embrace of the reality of a difficult struggle. Read of some days gone by before the modern Empire of America largely evolved into a permanent Terror Police State. It is happening now at: This Can't Be Happening!

Robert Parry: "What a McCain Victory Would Mean" - Consortiumnews.com

[excerpt] "... In judging the shape of a future John McCain presidency, there are already plenty of dots that are easy to connect. They reveal an image of a war-like Empire so full of hubris that it could take the world into a cascade of crises, while extinguishing what is left of the noble American Republic. ..." Read more at: Consortiumnews.com

American News Project: "Police Trap Peaceful Protesters in Denver"

Flash News Alert ...



Warning: some graphic language and images.
Outside the Convention ... protest park encircled, "trapped" during breakout, tear gassed, arrested
"On the street" audio clips and scheduled interviews with observers, news releases from participating groups and more tonight on Radio Free Kansas... beginning at 10pm (central).

Confrontation at the DNC « Kasama

Alex Jones Confronts Neocon Michelle Malkin in Denver Video

12min 55sec - Fox News agent gets called out ... on Denver Video

Police spray protesters with pepper spray - The conventions- msnbc.com

Daily Kos: Cindy Sheehan's Phone Bugged at DNC Hotel

Hilarious comments, but Sheehan is no "nutjob" - she's a mad muthah willing to be an honest independent. More than most citizens of the United States of Amnesia can say. It's a matter of bringing the country together, in order to form a more perfect police state, that Sheehan's Phone Bugged at DNC Hotel is the current bi-partisan issue to reach "across the aisle" on.

Electric Politics |

Werther's Law: Or Joe Biden and the Iron Law of Adverse Political Selection Digging in, the fascinating writer Werther re-appears at George Kenney's outstanding web site. [excerpt] "Why do politicians make disastrous decisions with the consistency of iron filings obeying a magnet? Decisions that in retrospect (and frequently in prospect) seem doomed to failure? After 9/11 did it make any sense when, after coming close to the point of capturing Osama bin Laden, the U.S. government began pulling troops, materiel, and intelligence assets away from the hunt in order to invade a country which had nothing to do with Osama?" ... Read on at: Electric Politics Werther's Law

David Sirota: "The Conquest by Presidentialism" : Information Clearing House

Exclusive to Tom Feely's web site [excerpt] You have to hand it to John McCain -- his campaign ads are (inadvertently) the most incisive commentary on the death of Jeffersonian democracy ever broadcast. Superficially, they lambaste Barack Obama's worshipful crowds and messianic promises that a heavenly "light will shine down" on his candidacy. But what the ads really lampoon is what Vanderbilt professor Dana Nelson calls presidentialism: our paternalistic view that presidents are godlike saviors -- and therefore democracy's only important figures. "The once-every-four-years hope for the lever pull sensation of democratic power blinds people to the opportunities for democratic representation, deliberation, activism and change that surrounds us in local elections," she writes in her new book, "Bad for Democracy: How the Presidency Undermines the Power of the People." ... Read more at: Information Clearing House

DNC Disruption 08 » Monday Call to Action

Recreate68» Days of Resistance — August 24-28

DNC: Inside the Protest Zone Reveling in a turnout that began as hundreds and swelled into at least a thousand protesters | FortCollinsNow.com

Protesters confront Fox News reporter : The Rocky Mountain News

Ward Churchill forced into confrontation with reporter, video included, Recreate68 activist and leaders stopped it. Read more at: The Rocky Mountain News

The Colorado Independent » Two people arrested after DNC protest

A sigh of relief after Day One of protests : Editorials : The Rocky Mountain News

CQ Politics | Broad Array of Protesters Seek Both To Influence and Infuriate

Protesters march at Democratic National Convention - Breaking News From New Jersey - NJ.com

Now it's "massive" and protest delegates are arriving from around the country...

Anti-War Protesters Greet Convention Goers in Denver - Fox News Puke

Numbers underestimated, out of context quotes, not fit for your Mother-in-law to consider, even if she is hiding in the basement in fear of North Korean missile launches. Buy your "Free Ann Coulter" buttons here and little else.

AFP: Security net drops on Denver for Democrat jamboree

[excerpt] ... "The fascist direction this country has taken should be brought to a halt and it can only be done by conscious activism, by people living in this country saying we will no longer go along with the things done by the Bush administration," activist Debra Sweet, director of the World Can't Wait activist group, told AFP.... Read more

Loserville: Obama Is Channeling Kerry and Gore | This Can't Be Happening!

Dave Lindorff will be appearing tonight in a recorded interview (Saturday, Aug. 23rd) and has this published in the Op-Ed of the influential San Francisco Chronicle daily newspaper. I ran it just a few days ago. Hot damn, we in the bizness. Check it out and the link to the Chronicle piece at: This Can't Be Happening!

The Real News: Series on Economics and the New Left in China

Full Spectrum Dominance: "McCain: 'We are all Georgians now'" WTF?

Rory Winter: "Democracy? Shamocracy!" | Foreign Press Foundation

CJOnline Blogs - Dr. Bill Roy: Remedy is there, if we have sense to take it

Dr. Bill Roy: "Americans masochistically accept health care costs rising at a rate twice the increase in the gross domestic product.These costs have increased from 7 percent of the GDP in 1970 to 15.6 percent of a much bigger GDP today, but Americans have been carefully taught to fear universal health care. ..." Read it at the Topeka daily newspaper, where he is flogged, flamed and criticized by Know Nothing hypocrites. Click here.

The Manhattan Mercury.com - News Article "Anti-NBAF group states its case"

100,000 signatures delivered to Pelosi - Kucinich calling for one million.

Chicago's "This is Hell"

MUST LISTENING!

This is Hell! broadcasts live this Saturday beginning at 9 AM (US central). You can also hear us live online via WNUR's web site (http://www.wnur.org) under the heading, "Listen Online." Click the title line above for downloading instructions.

The Saturday guest: James K. Galbraith, author of the new book, "The Predator State: How Conservatives Abandoned the Free Market and Why Liberals Should Too" (Free Press). Go ahead and email them any comments on their show, suggestions for future guests, events you'd like them to post, or news stories you'd like to share with the listeners, by clicking here.

A Must Read for Kansas Republicans: Jason Leopold's " McCain's Ties to Neocon Hard Lines" at Consortiumnews.com

Either presidential candidate may mean another stupid, budget busting, economically destructive "long war" for our children and our childrens' children. Don't buy into the Washington DC military-industrial racket. Read this article -- "Randy Scheunemann, one of John McCain’s top foreign policy advisers, represents a key link in neoconservative strategy that seeks simultaneously to remove hostile regimes in the Middle East and to box in Russia through an expanded NATO that incorporates former Soviet bloc countries. Scheunemann has come under scrutiny in recent weeks for his past lobbying work on behalf of the government of Georgia, even while he was advising McCain who vowed to bar lobbyists from his campaign. ..." more at Consortiumnews.com Also this weekend on Radio Free Kansas a special broadcast with investigative reporter, Joe Lunaria on Scheunemann's blatant conflicts of interests and his numerouse conspiracies to have our children killed in foreign lands. Listen in starting at 10pm (central) this Friday night.

The green-eyed monster called Envy is destroying Kansas.

And we'll still vote for them ...



And think getting rich is glorious, knowing you'll never get there. America's middle class is disappearing while you watch this video.

Loserville: Obama Is Channeling Kerry and Gore | This Can't Be Happening!

Dave Lindorff is giving us the very nasty tasting spoonful of medicine and there's no sugar with it: "Well, it’s happened, and it’s no surprise. Barack Obama, the prospective Democratic presidential candidate, has managed to turn a 5-8 point lead over prospective Republican opponent John McCain into a 7-point deficit—a double-digit slide—in just two and a half months following a campaign that had voters really excited over his candidacy. ..." Read it and weep if you must at: This Can't Be Happening!

Michael Winship: "The Limits of American Power" at Consortiumnews.com

Jim Slattery sends debate letter to Sen. Pat Roberts

Good Kansans don't support unjust wars and oppose torture.



Jim is taking the fight to Sen. Roberts.
Read his letter here.

40 Years is Long Enough

The Boeing Circus ... 40 Years is Long Enough

America on the Couch

Exclusive to Information Clearing House: "Even stanch conservatives are in a daze from the daily overload of bad news. Former basketball superstar Charles Barkley summed it up best when he was asked what political party he belonged to. He answered, 'Well, I used to be a Republican, until they lost their minds.'" ... Read Mike Whitney

Double Standards in the Global War on Terror : Information Clearing House

The clock is ticking ... No NBAF in Kansas!


It's coming to Kansas? [excerpt] One theory has long been that whoever committed the anthrax outrages was intent on drawing attention (and probably funding) to further research and development of U.S. bio-war “defenses.” If so, then, what a remarkable success! In the years since the attacks occurred, funding has flooded into such labs, whose numbers have grown strikingly. On September 11, 2001, reports the Washington Post, “there were only five ‘biosafety level 4′ labs — places equipped to study highly lethal agents such as Ebola that have no human vaccine or treatment — a Government Accountability Office report stated last fall. Fifteen are in operation or under construction now, according to the report. There are hundreds more biosafety level 3 labs, which handle agents such as Bacillus anthracis, which does have a human vaccine.”

The few hundred people at work in the U.S. bio-defense program before 9/11 have swelled to perhaps 14,000 scientists who have “clearances to work with ‘select biological agents’ such as Bacillus anthracis — many of them civilians working at private universities” where, according to experts, “security regulations are remarkably lax.” And don’t forget the Army’s own billion-dollar plan to “build a larger laboratory complex as part of a proposed interagency biodefense campus at Fort Detrick.” We’re talking about the place where, as Ivins’s crew was evidently nicknamed, “Team Anthrax” worked and whose labs are reputedly “renowned for losing anthrax.” In these same years, according to the New York Times, “almost $50 billion in federal money has been spent to build new laboratories, develop vaccines and stockpile drugs.” Some of this money was pulled out of basic public health funds which once ensured that large numbers of people wouldn’t die of treatable diseases like tuberculosis and redirected into work on the Ebola virus, anthrax, and other exotic pathogens. ... [end excerpt]

Six days to call in your opposition to NBAF coming to Manhattan, Ks. .... the clock is ticking.

Read more ... Double Standards in the Global War on Terror

Paul Craig Roberts: Are You Ready for Nuclear War?

A former Republican that worked in the Reagan White House: "If you desire to be poor, oppressed, and eventually vaporized in a nuclear war, vote Republican. ..." Kansans, why did he write this? Read Paul Craig Roberts and find out.

US Town Turned Into An Open-Air Prison

Iowa is the test case and anti-immigrant hysteria is now policy. The money is in bigger and bigger private security contractors, prisons and airplanes; not in sealing the borders. Note that this article first appeared in Canada. Read it here at: CommonDreams.org

How Anti-Intellectualism Is Destroying America | | AlterNet

A forward from another Dear Reader which begs the question, "What makes intellectuals so gawd awful important?" Terence McNally interviews Susan Jacoby, from the introduction: "Sad but true: Intelligence is a political liability in the US. Author of The Age of American Unreason Susan Jacoby explains why. ..." Read it at: AlterNet

John McCain's Party of Hate: Consortiumnews.com

Editor Robert Parry's note: "To many Americans who expected better from John McCain, the surprise of Campaign 2008 is that the Republicans are operating almost exactly the same as they have in previous presidential election cycles -- relying on personal attacks, wedge issues, tough-guy talk, and media complacency. In this essay, former Democratic congressional aide Brent Budowsky ponders this disturbing reality ..." Read it at: Consortiumnews.com

Preindustrial workers worked fewer hours than today's

A Dear Reader forwards an appropriate post for this weekend's repast. Linked courtesy Ran Prieur's formidable all - original web site. Think about this one the next time you accelerate on the commute to work: Preindustrial workers worked fewer hours than today's

Saturday Night Prime Suspect: "Brad Friedman of Brad's Blogs"

Electile Dysfunction?
Homicidal Fox News Fanatics?
Hear it all, Tonight on Radio Free Kansas!

Tonight in addition to fantastic local musical line-ups I'll be running a hot and at times hilarious interview recorded Friday afternoon with the talented man who is behind the enormously popular Brad's Blog, Brad Friedman.

Some things about him: "... [H]e's broke stories on his blog including "The White House Website Scrubbing", the "Tom Feeney/Clint Curtis/Yang Enterprises Vote-Rigging Scandal", the story of the phony GOP front group, "American Center for Voting Rights", the E-Voting Machine "Sleepover" controversy in San Diego's Busby/Bilbray U.S. House Special Election, numerous explosive exclusives on whistleblowers such as FBI translator Sibel Edmonds, along with his well-respected, and widely-touted continuing coverage of various Electronic Voting Machine companies like Diebold, ES&S, Sequoia and many of the others who are rapidly helping to destroy American democracy. He has filed, literally, thousands of stories on issues of Election Integrity and Electile Dysfunction since at least November 3rd, 2004. His expertise in such matters has earned him invitations to address the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC) in D.C., the Texas State Legislature and many other governmental and non-governmental organizations."

Word has it he's traveling to Denver for the big convention soon, so catch him before the riot cops catch him. Tonight beginning at 10pm (central) on Radio Free Kansas.

Mary Pitt: "The Ed McMahon Example"

My pards at the Fightin' Cock all sit up and sqawk when this tough old bird sings! Read the latest from Mary Pitt, now appearing at Discomfit Magazine. [excerpt] "This morning, August 18th, the news was blaring from CNN and MSNBC: Donald Trump Bails Out Ed McMahon! The story that followed told us that poor ole Ed had fallen ill, was having a hard time financially and was in danger of losing his home. ..." She's tells it like it is at: Discomfit Magazine.

`Imminent' Threats Should Be a Belli Laugh | This Can't Be Happening!

The brazen and pathetic attempts from the White House Rose Garden and McCain's campaign to re-start a Cold War with Russia is enough of a laugh for a Saturday morning hangover. Oh, that hurts! And Dave Lindorff is making me laugh, too! "Amid all the talk about Bush/Cheney administration conspiracies to forge documents or engage in “false flag” tactics in order to “get the war on” against Iraq, and about similar current efforts to get a new war going against Iran, lost has been the fact that many of the things that the administration falsely claimed as casus belli actually don’t even qualify, whether they were true or not. ..." Don't die laughing, read the rest at: This Can't Be Happening!

No NBAF in Kansas

Were you out on the town last night?
My shows are archived to fix that problem. The segment is permalinked just click, Bio-terror lab (part two) which features recorded interviews with Bill Dorsett, Manhattan, Ks.; Bill McKellar, Buttner, N. Carolina, Joseph Medamen, as well as other audio clips from citizens in North Carolina stopping the lab there. Read No NBAF in Kansas and voice your opposition.

Patrick Martin: "Gunman murders Arkansas Democratic Party chairman"

Mr. Martin, a correspodent for the authoritative World Socialist Web Site is scheduled for a recorded interview to be aired this weekend about the right-wing attacks in America and the controversy surrrounding Dr. Bruce Ivins suicide and anthrax. Listen in to Radio Free Kansas beginning at 10pm, Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

The BRAD BLOG : Exclusive: Death Threats Against Obama and 'Traitorous Liberals' Posted On Rightwing O'Reilly Contributor's Website

Brad Friedman, blogger extraordinaire, is scheduled this weekend for a recorded interview on his recent Guardian UK article on the anthrax attacks and Dr. Bruce Ivins, on Radio Free Kansas.

T.G.I.F. courtesy Chris Chandler's Road Show and Rabble Rouse Radio

Who said weekends at home are boring?

Renegade radio is about to take another Great Leap Forward ...

I'll be playing a debut of Chandler's music on Radio Free Kansas tonight before our NBAF line-up of speakers beginning at 10pm (central). Many thanks to the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) affiliate, Missouri's Rabble Rouse Radio for the introduction to Chris and his remarkable work. Mr. Chandler will be appearing there this coming Monday. Click the link, for program schedule details.

Blogtalkradio has for too long been dominated by the right-wing with the faux conservatism of the Republican Party, embodied in its channel "Heading Right", this week they announced a new channel called "Heading Left" and where do you think it's going? Correct, straight to the Democrat Party being led by the neo-liberal wing of Big Business. It is no more "heading left" than the neocons are non-interventionists.

It's time for independent free thinking people to get together, just as hundreds of thousands are mobilizing for the two major political conventions coming in the immediate days and weeks ahead.

Radio Free Kansas is expanding to a full weekend of two-hour segments; beginning each week with TGIF at 10pm, Saturday Prime at 10pm and Sunday Stakeout at 10pm - all in preparation for the upcoming political conventions. Each night we'll have some interesting conversations, some recorded and some live, and the best homegrown music from all around the heartland.

Feel free to join us and call in. Yeah, that's right - be free and independent, even if you have to stay at home.

Information Clearing House: Russian Triumph as Saakashvili's Gamble Fails

The Empire of the Wild West is over and all the media hoopla from a White House Rose Garden, or ships hauling food will not matter one bit - Bush, the cowboy afraid of horses, cannot do one damn thing, except engage in a mad bombing of Iran. Here a writer I always enjoy reading, Gwynne Dyer from New Zealand writes: "The three-day war in South Ossetia is settled, and the Georgians have lost. There may be some more shooting yet, but it is now clear that Georgia will never regain control of the rebel territories of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.Also that President Mikhail Saakashvili has handed Russia a major victory, and that Georgia's hopes of joining NATO are gone. Pretty impressive work for one long weekend. ..." And a big hat tip to Tom Feely's Information Clearing House for finding this international gem. Read more

Tomgram: Andrew Bacevich, The Lessons of Endless War

A Reader has passed along this notice from the above link: "Andrew Bacevich will discuss his new book -- and the limits of American power in the Bush era -- for a full hour on "Bill Moyers Journal," Friday, August 15th. Don't miss it. ..." It will be better than listening to more supernationalistic guttral chants of "U.S.A., U.S.A., U.S.A." at the international Olympics in totalitarian China. Read more advanced studies at: The Lessons of Endless War

Georgia/Russia Conflict Forced Into Cold War Frame

A forward link from a reader lays bare the use of media in shaping the framework: "U.S. corporate media frequently evoked the Cold War as a key to understanding the conflict between Russia and Georgia over South Ossetia. This was certainly true of the media themselves, which generally placed black hats or white hats on the actors involved depending on whether they were allied with Moscow or Washington. ..." Read more at: F. A. I. R.

Once again: government, media silent on right-wing role in US anthrax attacks

An excellent background article from 28 November, 2001 that will be pertinent to Radio Free Kansas listeners this weekend. Read some of what we'll be discussing at: World Socialist Web Site

Paul Craig Roberts: "President Bush, Will You Please Shut Up?"

What to do when Auntie Em and Uncle Red just don't get it? Well duhhhh .... give Rush "lint brain" Limbaugh $400 million and let him tell'em how to think!

I have finally came to the painful conclusion that many of my Republican friends and relatives do not understand or care to fathom what a neo-conservative is, or how they have been fooled into thinking that the Republican Party is republican, anymore. Reluctantly I witness that they no longer sit on the front porch and read or listen and talk to their radical friends and relatives anymore. They have become a new form of 21st century dumbed down zombie news consumers, like many of their "liberal" counterparts. Here is the former Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration, an Associate Editor of the Wall Street Journal editorial page and Contributing Editor of National Review, maybe, just maybe and it's a big maybe ... they will read this guy. [excerpt] "The neoconned Bush Regime and the Israeli-occupied American media are heading the innocent world toward nuclear war. Back in the Reagan years the National Endowment for Democracy was created as a cold war tool. Today the NED is a neocon-controlled agent for US world hegemony. Its main function is to pour US money and election-rigging into former constituent parts of the Soviet Union in order to ring Russia with American puppet states. ..." Surely, my Republican relatives, friends and neighbors can understand when to say, "President Bush, Will You Please Shut Up?"

Hard News: IRAQ: U.S. Blamed for Increasing Iranian Influence

Dahr Jamail's outstanding reports come from the ground level. Bookmark, read and support this web site at: Hard News

Truthdig - Don’t Cage Dissent

Amy Goodman reports on police state tactics developing at the upcoming national political conventions: [excerpt] "... Former FBI agent Mike German is now a national-security-policy counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union. He said, “It’s unclear who is actually in charge and whose rules apply to the information that’s being collected and shared and distributed through these fusion centers.” Maryland State Police were recently exposed infiltrating groups like the Baltimore Coalition Against the Death Penalty. German explains how police expand “beyond normal law-enforcement functions, and start becoming intelligence collectors against protest groups. ..." Read more at: Truthdig

OnlineAthens.com | News | NBAF hearing in Athens the last 08/10/08

Anthrax Case Renews Questions on Bioterror Effort - The New York Times | AthensFAQ

Electric Politics | Torture, TV, and the Banality of Tony Scalia

Yes folks even my clod-hopping, Olympic fixated neighbors know we now live in a "commie" i. e. totalitarian society. What do we know? One of my favorite writers pops up at George Kenney's excellent web site. Read "Werther" at: Electric Politics

US anthrax scare: Why the silence on right-wing terrorism?

My oh my, how soon we forget. An early article with a familiar slant today in light of the suicide of Dr. Bruce Ivins, the history of attacks on women's clinics is erased from the collective memory. The question is still as pertinent as this old 2001 article by Patrick Martin: US anthrax scare: Why the silence on right-wing terrorism?

This War Report Has Been Approved by Your Government | This Can't Be Happening!

This report by Dave Lindorff has been approved by the Ministry of Propaganda: "We Americans got a graphic illustration of the demise of any independent American corporate news media these past few days as the coverage on TV and in print was saturated with reports about John Edwards’ infidelity and, equally important, Russia’s invasion of Georgia. ..." Read more of Dave's uncensored report at: This Can't Be Happening!

Tomgram: Andrew Bacevich, The American Military Crisis

The "military industrial complex" - pouring our hard cash into the Pentagon's black hole.

An enlightening forward from a reader where Editor Tom Engelhardt finds our Orwellian Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, quoting Leon Trotsky at West Point concerning a "long war" strategy. [excerpt] "... If you thought for a moment that in the next presidency some portion of those many billions of dollars now being sucked into the black holes of Iraq and Afghanistan was about to go into rebuilding American infrastructure or some other frivolous task, think again. Just read between the lines of that new national defense strategy document where funding for future conventional wars against "rising powers" is to be maintained, while funding for "irregular warfare" is to rise. The Pentagonization of the U.S., in other words, shows no sign of slowing down. ..." [end excerpt]

Then follow through at this same post and examine the distinguished military writer Andrew Bacevich's (who lost his son in the phony 'Long War') ripping on the arrogance of Max Boot in praising US military doctrine. [excerpt] "... Boot dubbed this the Doctrine of the Big Enchilada. Within a year, after U.S. troops had occupied Baghdad, he went further: America's army even outclassed Germany's Wehrmacht. The mastery displayed in knocking off Saddam, Boot gushed, made "fabled generals such as Erwin Rommel and Heinz Guderian seem positively incompetent by comparison."
All of this turned out to be hot air. If the global war on terror has produced one undeniable conclusion, it is this: Estimates of U.S. military capabilities have turned out to be wildly overstated. The Bush administration's misplaced confidence in the efficacy of American arms represents a strategic misjudgment that has cost the country dearly. Even in an age of stealth, precision weapons, and instant communications, armed force is not a panacea. Even in a supposedly unipolar era, American military power turns out to be quite limited. ..." [end excerpt]
Image tip to the late Stanley Kubrick ... we surely must still love Dr. Strangelove and his bombs.
Read more of The American Military Crisis at Tom's Dispatch.

Robert Parry: "Neocons Now Love International Law"

One of the first independent investigative news sites on the internet, Bob Parry's Consortium News reports: "It’s touching how American neoconservatives who have no regard for international law when they want to invade some troublesome country have developed a sudden reverence for national sovereignty. ..." U.S. neoconservatives who despise international law when it gets in their way suddenly feel differently as they condemn Russia for violating Georgia's sovereignty, writes Robert Parry. He stays on top of the stories behind the news, so you don't have to, consider a financial donation today at: Consortiumnews.com

American News Project: "Iran, Israel and the New Neocons"

Click for video.

The Real News: "Naomi Klein on China and the Olympics"

The Real News on PBS Foreign Exchange

Editor-in-Chief Paul Jay on contemporary corporate news media ...



Absolute must viewing and great to see The Real News get out there.

Robert Parry: "WPost Admits Bungling Obama Quote"

"The Washington Post’s ombudsman says the newspaper’s original source for a quote that was used to portray Barack Obama as a megalomaniac now disputes the Post’s negative interpretation that has spread across cable TV, the Internet and even into a John McCain attack ad. ..." Read more at: Consortiumnews.com

F.B.I. Says It Obtained Reporters’ Phone Records - NYTimes.com

"WASHINGTON — The Federal Bureau of Investigation said Friday that it had improperly obtained the phone records of reporters for The New York Times and The Washington Post in the newspapers’ Indonesia bureaus in 2004. ..." Read more at: NYTimes.com

Link TV: "Where is Osama bin Ladin?"

Georgia and Russia | War erupts in Georgia | Economist.com

The heat is on ...
Reading like a front-line intercept from a diplomat's dispatch bag the influential UK's Economist passes the skinny: [excerpt] "Russia’s broader aim may be to try to roll back the advance of pro-Western forces in its “near abroad” by highlighting the West’s inability to help Georgia. The hotting up of Georgia’s conflicts coincided with Kosovo’s declaration of independence, recognised by much of the West, and American pressure for the expansion of NATO to Georgia and Ukraine. That move has been stymied, mainly by Germany; Georgia was promised eventual NATO membership but no firm plan. Though Georgia has become a vital corridor for oil and gas exports to Europe, this has not brought the support that its leaders had expected. A lame-duck American administration has been able to do little, though Georgians hope a presidential-election victory by John McCain, an ardent supporter, may change their fortunes. ..." Read the complete text here.

Reader forward: "Latest GOP fundraising scam"

Danny Schechter's News Dissector

"The Russians are coming, the Russians are coming!"

A fence leaping forward from a reader.

Schechter quotes extensively from Sam Gardiner's most recent and hottest. Also details of an Iranian 180 mile cruise missile.

Headline: "US Supported Troops Propel Georgian Assault; May Have Provoked Russians"


Comment from another reader, "References to The Guns of August are not ill considered."

An extended excerpt is also posted at Storming Heaven's Gates.

Impeaching the Commando | Truth Spring

Anwaar Hussein writes: "There is no disputing the fact that the Commando in the President House, General (Retired) Musharraf, is the most out of favor man in the country right now. That is why an overwhelming majority of the peoples’ elected representatives has resolved it is time for him to go. ..." Read more of Impeaching the Commando here.

TheMercury.com - News Article

Manhattan daily newspaper reporter, Bill Felber, sends breathless dispatch from Flora, Miss. for "Manhattan, Flora and San Antonio, 3-dog fight?" on NBAF site fight. It's a sports event now. Mindless Chamber of Commerce boosterism enthralls a population of economically desperate areas strapped with rising energy and food prices. Elected officials in a "three-way dog fight" treat federal pork as a trigger for endless growth. Hurricanes, tornados and other natural calamities will never deter our drive for recognition. Little wonder that last Spring's twister blew through KSU campus, removing the roof off the nuclear reactor building, that the school could barely afford the deductible on the insurance. Would our elected officials and large corporations sell us a poisoned bill of goods? Would we invade a country that had nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks based on their lies? Kansas will be after NBAF site approval a permanent "flyover" zone. Read TheMercury.com - News Article and pssssst .... do something.

TheMercury.com - News Article

Mass hysteria for federal pork in Mississippi selection for NBAF, news report courtesy Manhattan's daily newspaper. The West Nile Virus epidemic began at Plum Island, NY in 1999, what will it be called when another pathogen spreads across the Ol' Mississip River Delta? TheMercury.com - News Article

TGIF post from a reader...

Bush Tours America To Survey Damage Caused By His Disastrous Presidency

Anthrax Suspect's Abortion Stance Eyed As Motive : NPR

NPR's usual light step on the issue - headline the term "eyed" it's only possible, nothing too strange here, high level security scientist has been bonkers for years. Follow the links offered on the court documents once you wallow through the milk toast writing from the nation's liberal radio. Just another "Right to Lifer" sincere, a good family man - pillar of the community, just one more bad apple gone off his knocker over abortion. Read the emails the mad scientist sent his friend. Nothing dangerous here. Those poor Christian warriors sitting in jail, they're all innocent little lambs "doing the Lord's" work.

Robert Parry: "Why McCain May Well Win"

Someone has to say it. Robert Parry does: [excerpt] "Just because Obama gets more coverage than McCain – the centerpiece of the Republican complaint – doesn’t mean that the press favors Obama, anymore than the fact that Bill Clinton got lots of coverage in 1998 over the Monica Lewinsky scandal meant that the press was favoring him. Indeed, there have been repeated examples of media double standards working against Obama. ..." Read Parry's media analysis and make a donation at: Consortiumnews.com

Wayne Madsen Reports: "Fort Detrick Scientist "Commits Suicide" as Anthrax investigation closes in"

The tangled webs around the bio-weapons research labs - shoddy shipments, snitches, and more. We want it all in Kansas. Under the guise of "jobs, jobs, jobs" our elected officials are selling a dangerous bill of goods at Kansas State University. Read more

Marching Off Into Tyranny : Information Clearing House

Paul Craig Roberts writes: [excerpt] "Many Americans lack the mental and emotional strength to confront the facts. ..." There's something to this guy, Read more

Working Poor Unready to Revolt : Information Clearing House

Joel S. Hirschhorn writes: "Once upon a time when governments no longer served most of their citizens it was the most economically disadvantaged that could be counted on to rebel against tyranny and injustice. Times have changed, for the worse, despite the spread of democracy. Here we are with a two-party plutocracy that preferentially serves corporate and wealthy interests and lets the middle class suffer and sink. Plausibly, the middle class is unready to revolt because it still maintains a relatively good standard of living despite rising economic insecurity. But what about the lowest 40 percent of Americans that are the working poor? ..." Read more

Someone wants him to “shut up”

The influential and important Information Clearinghouse published by Tom Feely has some strange things happening. Read: Someone wants him to “shut up” Thanks to Jason Miller at Thomas Paine's corner for the forward and link.

Police block food supplies to power station protesters - Environment - The Independent

A U. K. controversy is developing into a major battle. Note the police tactics, later today, the camp was raided against the non-violent resistance of the campers, and key leaders were swept up.

Ron Suskind: The Forged Iraqi Letter: What Just Happened?

This is a journalistic bombshell and Suskind is already receiving calls to repress the results of his investigation. Here is a critical excerpt: "... The Iraq Intelligence Chief, Tahir Jalil Habbush -- a man still carrying a $1 million reward for capture, the Jack of Diamonds in Bush's famous deck of wanted men -- has been America's secret source on Iraq. Starting in January of 2003, with Blair and Bush watching, his secret reports began to flow to officials on both sides of the Atlantic, saying that there were no WMD and that Hussein was acting so odd because of fear that the Iranians would find out he was a toothless tiger. The U.S. deep-sixed the intelligence report in February, 'resettled' Habbush to a safe house in Jordan during the invasion and then paid him $5 million in what could only be considered hush money. ..." Think about that for a moment. And to add insult to ruin - the Bush administration ordered a fraudulant letter to be written and circulated. Guess what letter that was? Read a short post about The Forged Iraqi Letter

Eddie Glenn: "Mr. President, pull my finger!"

A Blue Barn favorite ....

Obama is Right: It's Easy to Reduce the Nation's (and Your Own) Fuel Bill Dramatically | This Can't Be Happening!

"I have a 2001 Honda Civic CX. Just like most Americans, I have for years been racing that car around ignoring speed limits, accelerating out of intersections, racing ahead at light changes as if I were coming out of starting blocks, ignoring things like checking my tire pressure, and so on. Two weeks ago, though, I read about eco-driving, and thought I'd give it a try. ..." Read more!

Anthrax Suspect’s Death Is Dark End for a Family Man - NYTimes

"Kansas - Don't Spoil It."

This article is pretty substantial with multimedia presentations, including the psychiatrist's court session seeking a retraining order from a local court. It begs the question for Kansans, the place where the largest domestic terrorist bomb, and most lethal, was made ... do we need a facility similar to where this guy worked here?

Thomas Frank: "Follow This Dime: Why Misgovernment Was No Accident in George W. Bush’s Washington"

Thomas Frank, the author of What’s the Matter with Kansas?, is the founding editor of The Baffler, a contributing editor at Harper’s, and, most recently, a columnist for the Wall Street Journal. His WSJ columns can be read at his website.

Click the title line (above) to read an essay adapted from the August 5th release of his most recent book The Wrecking Crew: How Conservatives Rule Metropolitan Books.

Thomas Frank grew up in Mission, Ks; and now lives, of course, in Washington D. C.

Henk Ruyssenaars: "Lockerbie Fake Goes On: Bush Signs Compensation Law"

Now appearing at Storming Heaven's Gates! Senior correspondent, Henk Ruyssenaars writes from The Netherlands a controversial send-up on the Lockerbie jet plane scandal.

A good news day at the Blue Barn HQ?

Life is better at Blue Barn News Central, with air conditioning and new recording gadgets, but not this good let's ......



Parental Advisory: Explicit language with big words and sexual connotations. This message approved by Kinky Kansas Republicans "Ralph Nader for President!" Committee. T. Boone Picknose, Treasurer

Dave Lindorff: The Cheney Doctrine

Or, "Shoot your friends, first." Dave comments on recent disclosures to New Yorker magazine journalist Seymour Hersh that Cheney and others discussed using Navy Seals disguised as Iranians to broaden the Gulf War. [excerpt] "... Who gets tricked by all these mad schemes? Not the Iranians, or in the earlier instance, the Iraqis. They know they aren’t attacking American forces. No. It’s us, the American people, who are being tricked. Cheney knows that most Americans think the idea of attacking Iran—especially when we’re five years into an interminable war in Iraq and seven years into another war in Afghanistan, neither of which has an end in sight—is really, really stupid. ..." Read more of The Cheney Doctrine

Truthdig - Reports - A War of Self-Destruction

Chris Hedges writes and cites experts on the economic and political consequences of an attack on Iran. Read A War of Self-Destruction and what an empire hellbent on global domination could mean for us in the belly of the beast, without resistance.

Scientific Savvy? In U.S., Not Much - New York Times

"Jobs, jobs, jobs ... Bring'em on!"

How dumb are we about basic science? [excerpt] " ... Dr. Miller's data reveal some yawning gaps in basic knowledge. American adults in general do not understand what molecules are (other than that they are really small). Fewer than a third can identify DNA as a key to heredity. Only about 10 percent know what radiation is. One adult American in five thinks the Sun revolves around the Earth, an idea science had abandoned by the 17th century. ..." [excerpt end] And based on the lack of opposition to coal fired electrical plants, and bringing federal bio-terror research labs (NBAF) to Kansas, a majority live here. Read more about the survey and the methodology of Dr. Miller. Click here.

Science & Environmental Health Network - Precautionary Principle

Is another Bruce Ivins lurking in a biolab? - NYTimes.com

In Kansas we want all the NBAF mad scientists we can get. "Jobs, jobs, jobs ... Bring'em On!" Where have we heard that before?

Associated Press: "The High Cost of Moving Bio-terror Research Lab"

No NBAF web site

Here is a grassroots web site opposing the building of NBAF on the mainland, U. S. A. It is full of information and news of grassroot resistance. Be sure to scroll down and down and down, this is really amazing considering the total lack of awareness and opposition in Kansas. Click the title line, above, or
here.

Johann Hari: The WMD that really should be worrying us - Johann Hari, Commentators - The Independent

In the UK thousands are mobilizing to stop construction of 7 new coal fired electrical generating plants, click the headline title above to read about it. In Kansas House Speaker Melvin Neufeld vows to bring back legislation mandating contruction of two similar plants during the next legislative session and both, Governor Sebelius and Speaker Neufeld, have endorsed the construction of a monstrous National Agricultural and Biological - "defense" Facility (NBAF) along the campus of Kansas State University. Our leaders, such as Sen. Pat Roberts seem hell bent on sending us to our deaths, sooner rather than later. We must organize a determined resistance.

Companies Tap Pension Plans To Fund Executive Benefits - WSJ.com

The golden parachutes thrown to the corporate pigs get bigger when kept in the back of the plane, in the workers' tax-free pension pile. Throwing them out the escape hatch when the plane starts crash diving makes for a softer landing, but only for the corporate pigs. An entertaining article from a Dear Reader.
Read it now!

Support independent investigative journalism. Support Consortium News!

Pinon Canyon Expansion Opposition Coalition - Home

Jobs, jobs, jobs - to kill and die for in Kansas.

A forward link from one of our listeners from last Saturday Late Night's Radio Free Kansas segment. A coalition of forces forming in Colorado against expanding a military base might be something to learn from here in Kansas.

The radical expansion of the military industrial complex into our daily lives in America, is growing, and has less to do with national defense and more to do with maintaining a bloated expensive monster of a "standing army."

George Washington is turning over in his grave.

Related: A National Biological Agricultural - defense Facility is slated to come to one of six inland locations in the United States. Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius has issued an executive order supporting it. She appointed 50 member "task force" for placing the sites in Leavenworth or Manhattan, Ks.

A web site by a "consortium" has been thrown up to show support for it. Strangely, the same site cannot cite what specific individuals and organizations are supporting this very real animal death mill.

The recent public hearings in Manhattan, Ks. and the obvious bias expressed by Kansas State University in favor of placing a germ warfare toxic storage site, including anthrax, in a population center should be of some concern to all.

Why would KSU throw down with a "media relations" web page like this? Click here.

Good Monday morning, "Stand Up!" - Flobots

Hat tip to Kasama, "travel lightly!"

Hundreds of banks will fail, Roubini tells Barron's | Markets | Bonds News | Reuters

Bill Moyers Journal: Bill Moyers talks with Thomas Frank: Web Exclusive

The author of "What's the matter with Kansas?" (Metropolitan Press) discusses his new book "The "Wrecking Crew" and it's subject of corruption in the DC beltway. Moyers asks a great "Question from Hell" of former native Kansan Thomas Frank with, "Are you Rupert Murdoch's fig leaf?" Great stuff. Read it here.

James Abourezk: Lies the Oil Companies Peddle

Hear this segment of Radio Free Kansas "Saturday Late Night" (Aug. 3, 2008) where George Kenney conducts a quick 22 minute interview with Mr. Abourezk or go directly to the permalink on Kenney's fantastic Electric Politics web site, here. Here is his latest common sense article in Counterpunch.

Daniel Nocera describes new process for storing solar energy

Hot link from MIT News, includes videos, click the headliner (above) and the complete article as it originally appeared with the professor click here.

The Real News: "What if Sadr wins the Basra elections?"

Link TV: August 1st, 2008 programming from the Middle East

Robert Parry: " McCain, Anthrax & the Afghan Blunder" - Consortiumnews.com

Robert Parry has a very interesting weekend release: "The scene of John McCain – during the anthrax attacks in October 2001 – opining to David Letterman that Iraq might be responsible underscores McCain’s central role in what may go down as one of the biggest strategic blunders in U.S. military history, the premature pivot from Afghanistan to Iraq. ..." Parry delivers a refreshing wake-up tonic to remind us during these dog days of Summer ... how faulty our collective memories have been in America since 9/11. Read more at: Consortiumnews.com

Devvy Kidd -- The Case for Hanging Errant Public Officials

Tough talking, draped in red, white and blue, here is a series of patriotic columnists sent along as a forward by a reader who seems to not note the Tory ties they have to the monster conservative mainstream media moguls. The pitch goes something like this, "There's plenty of oil in dem thar hills, climate chaos and global warming is a figment of yer imagination." Yes Auntie Em, even the Republicans have misfits. Read of The Case for Hanging Errant Public Officials or try the more blatant "fear the commie bogey-man, fear them for they are everywhere."

Barbara L. Minton: "Crisis Looms as Corporations Seize Control of Commodities"

Maybe, for farmers in India today, but will it come to America? How long did the Great Depression last?

Making Capitalism More Creative - TIME

Here you have it, unvarnished, cleaned up, greenwashed and lobbed like a lime-green meringue pie at the loonie left. Bill Gates broadcasts THE SOLUTION with: "There's much still to be done, but the good news is that creative capitalism is already with us. Some corporations have identified brand-new markets among the poor for life-changing technologies like cell phones. Others — sometimes with a nudge from activists — have seen how they can do good and do well at the same time. To take a real-world example, a few years ago I was sitting in a bar with Bono, and frankly, I thought he was a little nuts. It was late, we'd had a few drinks, and Bono was all fired up over a scheme to get companies to help tackle global poverty and disease. He kept dialing the private numbers of top executives and thrusting his cell phone at me to hear their sleepy yet enthusiastic replies. As crazy as it seemed that night, Bono's persistence soon gave birth to the (RED) campaign. ..." Read it and have a great weekend! It's all together at, click TIME

Alice Cherbonnier: "Tax-Factless Wall Street Journal-omics" - Consortiumnews.com

A long op-ed in Rupert Murdoch's Wall Street Journal trashes Barack Obama's tax plan -- and does so in a highly misleading way, observes Baltimore Chronicle managing editor Alice Cherbonnier. Now appearing at Consortiumnews.com

Iraq Veterans Against the War: "Active Troops: You are not alone"

Now appearing on Radio Free Kansas tonight, a special visit with Mattis Chiroux of Iraq Veterans of War, at the launch of their "State of the Union" tour. The show begins at midnight (central) tonight, don't miss it! Follow the Flyer as we follow their tour in the coming weeks. Read their latest press release at Discomfit Magazine, click here.

Dr. Bill Roy: "Big Wind, Big Medicine comes to Kansas""

Dr. Bill writes of an upcoming meeting at the Bob Dole center on the campus of University of Kansas in the context of today's health care crisis. He begins: "The Robert J. Dole Institute of Politics will present a program entitled "Reforming the U.S. Health Care System: Supporting the Role of Individuals." The by invitation only event runs from 12:30 to 5:00pm Monday the 4th, and Senator Dole will preside over a series of panels consisting of mostly Midwestern academics, foundation gurus, and health administrators. ... " Read more at Discomfit magazine.

Also, for further study in the background, a forward from a reader about Switzerland's health care system, as broadcasted this week on National Public Radio. Click here.

Jason Leopold: " Justice Probe Still Threatens Gonzales" - Consortiumnews.com

[excerpt] "Former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales will face new legal jeopardy when the Justice Department’s Inspector General issues his next report on how the Bush administration let politics influence prosecutorial judgments, says ex-U.S. Attorney David Iglesias. ..." Consortiumnews.com

Link TV: "The oil 'haves' and 'have nots'"

Jonathan Cook: Group fighting against ‘quiet ethnic cleansing'

Direct from Nazarath, Jonathan Cook writes: [excerpt] "... 'Illegal building is simply a pretext for destroying Palestinian families’ homes and lives,' said Jeff Halper, head of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD). ... 'The demolitions are part of a policy to stop the natural expansion of Palestinian communities in and around Jerusalem, freeing up the maximum amount of land for use by Israeli settlers,' Mr Halper said. 'The demolitions increase the pressure on Palestinians to move into the West Bank, so that they will lose their residency rights in the city.' ...” Read more.

American News Project: "Where is Karl Rove?" (pt. 3)