George, G-d and Jesus

First a sort of disclaimer... I was raised as a protestant but gravitated to Judaism as a teen and during my adulthood made the label official...I say this only to show I am familiar with both religions.

George claims to be a Christian and to have found g-d but in so doing he has skipped away from the bible [if not run away] - at least the parts of the bible that speak of Jesus. Like so many right wing people of all persuasions, he has picked and chosen his way around the "old" testament [to use the common lingo] and ignored the "new."

Jesus was a Jew and I do think he would be astounded to see what some people do in his name. And those pickers thru of the old testament ignore all the years of rabbinical debate over many of the issues they raise...pretending instead to stick to the "original" concepts..

Hmmm....for starters there are many "versions" of bibles - sort of depends on who translated them and when the translating was done...so what is original? I have seen the portions of the Dead Seas Scrolls that are in the museum in Jerusalem and they ain't in English! And certainly not the version by King James or any of the other modern translations either.

We know George does not read so we can expect that he has been only given the briefest of summaries of bits and pieces of the bible - much like the DVD he got of the hurricane Katrina. He seems to have missed the parts that speak to treatment of the poor and loan sharking..and behaviors akin the credit cards and bankruptcy.

I don't have a problem with religious persons - I just do not want them telling me what to believe and especially when they have chose to ignore more appropriate parts of the bible than they spout off about.

To be continued....

George and Hitler

Over the past week I have been debating this "article" but I can no longer let it sit in my head... When I lived in D.C. I never went to the Holocaust Museum as I knew it was a depressing trip - so one did not go when it was cold, rainy, or if one was not in a very upbeat mood. When I was hanging around D.C. before my move West, there was a bright warm sunny Fall day and my friend and I went! It was still depressing but we made it through and then went immediately to a more joyful exhibit at another museum...

What was most depressing was the reading of the museum exhibits about the rise of Hitler....and in my head transposing Bush for Hitler...it was scary - well now it's only gotten worse...

Here are examples from the museum website http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en


"After a suspicious fire in the Reichstag (the German Parliament), on February 28, 1933, the government issued a decree which suspended constitutional civil rights and created a state of emergency in which official decrees could be enacted without parliamentary confirmation."


"In the first months of Hitler's chancellorship, the Nazis instituted a policy of "coordination"--the alignment of individuals and institutions with Nazi goals. Culture, the economy, education, and law all came under Nazi control. The Nazi regime also attempted to "coordinate" the German churches and, although not entirely successful, won support from a majority of Catholic and Protestant clergymen."

chilling...but it gets worse

There was a propaganda machine, Hitler saw himself outside the legal state and made his own "rules," criticism was suppressed and well we know what happened to Jews and others...

When anyone who is not a Republican likens Bush and the Repugs to Hitler - there is an outcry from the Repugs... Why - because they KNOW IT IS TRUE..But the propaganda machine whines and whines until some weak kneed person apologizes...

Well readers - we are living in a similar time here - corporations have all the power, poor people and minorities take back seat to tax cuts for the wealthiest of citizens, corruption and cronyism are rampant, the courts will soon be turning into more propaganda machines and citizens will lose what few rights they have not already lost under the ruse of the "war" on terrorism...

Beware - we are already living in fascist country "the united states of corporations."

Is John Conyers the only one willing to speak truth to power????

Amid the criminal negligence that is New Orleans - please do not forget the criminal outing of a CIA agent - or the criminal acts taking place in Iraq, etc. And the shrubbies said Sadaam is evil? Take a long look in the mirror George, Karl, Dick and the rest of you!


News from Congressman John Conyers, Jr., Michigan, 14th District; Ranking Member, U.S. House Judiciary Committee; Dean, Congressional Black Caucus:

H. Res. 420, Resolution of Inquiry to Attorney General Regarding CIA Leak

We are here because the Bush administration refuses to police itself in the midst of criminal and ethical misconduct. We are here because this Congress continues to turn a blind eye to the wrongdoing of this administration. In July 2003, over two years ago, a Bush administration official committed one of the most serious breaches of national security in recent history by disclosing to the press the identity of an undercover Central Intelligence Agency operative. Even worse, it likely was done for political reasons, to retaliate against the operative's husband for successfully challenging the President's claim that Iraq had sought nuclear material in Africa.

The purpose of this resolution is to get to the bottom of what happened and why the Justice Department slow-walked the investigation at the beginning. We know that, despite urgent pleas from the CIA for a criminal investigation into the leaker, the Justice Department and White House dragged their feet. The Department waited three days before notifying the White House of the breach and subsequent investigation. The White House, then waited eleven hours before telling staff to preserve evidence.

Despite these serious irregularities, early last year, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle rejected this same measure. They apparently did not believe that the Judiciary Committee, whose job it is to police the Justice Department, should look into a national security breach and delayed investigation.

There have been significant developments in the case since that time that I believe should lead them to support it this time. First, for the past two years, the White House has denied that any of its top officials, namely Deputy White House Chief of Staff Karl Rove, vice presidential Chief of Staff I. Lewis Libby, or National Security Council official Elliot Abrams, were involved in any way in the leak of Mrs. Wilson's covert identity. We now know that both Karl Rove and Lewis Libby spoke to reporters about Mrs. Wilson's identity.

Second, when the Justice Department first started investigating, the President made it clear that he would fire anyone involved in the leak. But when it became clear that his top political advisor, Mr. Rove, was implicated, he changed his ethical standards. This past July, the President said he would fire someone only if that person "committed a crime," raising the bar for firing someone like Mr. Rove.

Further, we now know that then-Attorney General John Ashcroft insisted on being briefed on Department interviews of Mr. Rove that were conducted in connection with the leak. He did so despite his long-standing ties to Mr. Rove; Mr. Ashcroft had paid Mr. Rove almost $750,000 for work on several campaigns. That Mr. Ashcroft eventually recused himself demonstrates there were conflicts of interest with his continued involvement.

It is time for Congress to exercise its duty to oversee the Executive Branch. Some will claim that we should not look into a matter that is being investigated by the Justice Department. That is not and has never been our standard. This year alone, Congress has held hearings on allegations of criminal misconduct in the United Nation's Oil-for-Food Program; the same misconduct being reviewed by the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York. Congress also has been looking into the Jack Abramoff scandal at the same time as the Justice Department.

Let us not forget the endless hearings in this Committee and others on alleged Clinton-Gore campaign finance violations, the Whitewater claims, and Clinton White House Travel Office firings. These were matters all under Justice Department review at the time of our hearings.

Finally, I must remind my colleagues of the numerous House and Senate hearings on Watergate that were simultaneous with the Justice Department's own investigation.

I urge my colleagues vote "Yes" on this resolution.

From BuzzFlash

If you have not read this afternoon's BuzzFlash read this:

So, Mr. And Ms. Mainstream Media, how much longer will you allow Karl to feed your fears and keep you under his thumb? -- A BuzzFlash Reader's Open Letter to the MSM

A BUZZFLASH READER CONTRIBUTION

Dear Washington Press Corps and All Mainstream Media,

For five years Karl Rove has used and abused you; using you to spread his "talking points" (read: Propaganda), and abusing you by threatening your job, your family and your reputation if you don't comply with and promote the Party line. And for five years, you've enabled this sick relationship with your acquiescence. Most of the country has watched in horror as you slowly lost your self-respect, your integrity, and finally, any pretense of basic journalistic practices. Despite millions of emails, letters, faxes, phone calls and protests by concerned Americans begging you to report the truth about the war on Iraq, you instead marched in lockstep with the murderous Bush regime and actually promoted their lies. Your complicit actions have directly resulted in the slaughter of thousands of innocents in Iraq and around the world. Your lazy, sloppy non-reporting is your personal contribution to the deaths of American soldiers. You have blood on your hands. Oh, yes you do.

com·plic·it (k&m-'pli-s&t) adj.

Associated with or participating in a questionable act or a crime; having complicity: newspapers complicit with the propaganda arm of a dictatorship.

Read the rest here - could not have said it better myself!


http://www.buzzflash.com/contributors/05/09/con05324.html

Memo to the shrub

You don't get to keep the land of New Orleans because you were criminally negligent.. and besides it is not yours...

So help the survivors and for gods sake stop calling them refugees - they are AMERICAN citizens- they may be black and we know you don't like that - but tough - they get to go back home to New Orleans - you don't get to give it to your cronies!

Anyone else thinking this was planned in advance? Hmmm waterfront mansions? And now I am very seriously thinking that this administration knew about the attacks on September 11th and allowed them to happen - they just did not think it would get as bad as it did - and besides they get to pardon each other for all the crimes being committed...

C'mon congress- get some backbone - these people need to be put in jail!!!