Ancient Text Reveals The Coming Of The “ANNTI-COULTER”

Polly,

I raise the martini glass and pledge--with spike heels and wily ways, we will trap and dispose of the annti-coulter.

yours in training,

karen

I'm with you all the way Poliseye. Yes, the prophesy does indeed show the darkness which has enveloped us is going to be revealed by the forces of light. Glad to be on your side.

well I'm off to celebrate Passover with my family... we will say like we do every year: "now we are slaves, next year may we truly be free."

We are slaves to silence, to the belief that there is nothing one individual can accomplish, to those who are apathetic, those who would preserve the status quo or move backwards, and those who try to label us. But through the hard work we all do here for democracy every day, next year we will truly be free!

That is a version of the Rapture that I can live with.

Oncall,

Right! (As long as Karen and Polly can assure me that the spike heels are OPTIONAL.)

Bob, you ever-sweet man, the spike heels are ONLY for the forces of evil.

You have always been a force for good...

The Inter-American Telecommunication Commission meets three times a year in various cities across the Americas to discuss such dry but important issues as telecommunications standards and spectrum regulations. But for this week's meeting in Guatemala City, politics has barged onto the agenda. At least four of the two dozen or so U.S. delegates selected for the meeting, sources tell TIME, have been bumped by the White House because they supported John Kerry's 2004 campaign.

The State Department has traditionally put together a list of industry representatives for these meetings, and anyone in the U.S. telecom industry who had the requisite expertise and wanted to go was generally given a slot, say past participants. Only after the start of Bush's second term did a political litmus test emerge, industry sources say.

The White House admits as much: "We wanted people who would represent the Administration positively, and--call us nutty--it seemed like those who wanted to kick this Administration out of town last November would have some difficulty doing that," says White House spokesman Trent Duffy. Those barred from the trip include employees of Qualcomm and Nokia, two of the largest telecom firms operating in the U.S., as well as Ibiquity, a digital-radio-technology company in Columbia, Md. One nixed participant, who has been to many of these telecom meetings and who wants to remain anonymous, gave just $250 to the Democratic Party. Says Nokia vice president Bill Plummer: "We do not view sending experts to international meetings on telecom issues to be a partisan matter. We would welcome clarification from the White House."

The thing about this is just the escalation in the degree to which they will stifle opposition. What does the Telecom conference have to do with being a Republican? Why does it matter who the people in the conference voted for in the Fall?

But more importantly, where will it end? We already know they screen for Bush events, and they weed out or force opposing voices to resign in their lower ranks. They are rushing to fill the courts with conservatives, purge the CIA of opposition, put conservatives into every powerful position in the government and the world; the World Bank, the UN Ambassador, the Secretary of State. Moderate voices who step out of line are viciously atacked.

So is this new development going to be an official policy? Will Democrats not be allowed to any government conferences? Will Democrats or non-Republicans be kept out of every government position and even out of physical presence of the government? Do Americans care about this?

Time Article

Check this out. I found this site, not too long ago..... I have to make a call to my broker tomorrow morning :-)

You could say the Rapture index is a Dow Jones Industrial Average of end time activity, but I think it would be better if you viewed it as prophetic speedometer. The higher the number, the faster we're moving towards the occurrence of pre-tribulation rapture.

Rapture Index of 85 and Below: Slow prophetic activity
Rapture Index of 85 to 110: Moderate prophetic activity
Rapture Index of 110 to 145: Heavy prophetic activity
Rapture Index above 145: Fasten your seat belts

http://www.raptureready.com/rap2.html

In appreciation of Justice Sunday, I call on all DCP members to unite by watching Deadwood tonight on HBO.

Has anybody heard or read anything about the mega propaganda show from today?

I think it's happening as we type.

Ideological stormfront brewing here...Langone is a member of the "bipartisan" Center for Strategic and International Studies . these people made Democratic donations.

Langone, on the other hand, has solidly supported red outfits like Merrill-Lynch, Bear Stearns Cos. Inc., JPMorgan Chase & Co., and Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. to his army in this battle for control of your 401k's "with nearly all of them willing to discuss the idea further".

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=509&ncid=749&e=2&u=/ap/20050424/ap_on_bi_ge/nyse_langone

Dicks on the irc, so anyone here, lets talk there!

Welcome to Deadwood Sunday...dedicated to the proposition that the West wasn't won, it was stolen!

(Unlike these Neocons, I prefer to face the truth.)

Troubles Mount for Bush White House - Agenda Bogs Down

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0423-07.htm

GEE WIZ- Maybe the Mid term Elections in 2006 will be more interesting!!!

(submitted by Alan C, Seattle)

Sparrow

I know that McCaw Cellular CEO was a huge Bush Supporter. In the Seattle area, the only place Bush dared to go was McCaw's house - across the lake in Bellevue. There were even protesters in Kayaks.

Bush keep intimating that those who didn't or don't do things his way will be punished (ie. there will be political repercussions).

From the looks of news stories, doesn't seem like Bolton made a very good impression on the numerous talk shows he was on today. Also sounds like Frist's talk was pretty lukewarm - he didn't mention religion really & laid it out as though each Senator should vote promptly and should not deliberate or spend time considering whether the judge in question was appropriate or not. He made it sound like he respected the balance of power between the three branches of government, but he doesn't.

Next Saturday on HBO - Henry V as Franklin Roosevelt.

One small step for Capitalism with a Human Face, one large step for American Democracy.

Kenneth Brannagh is Franklin Roosevelt, in Warm Springs.

Frist Initiative Creates Rift in GOP

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=2026&ncid=2026&e=3&u=/latimests/20050424/ts_latimes/fristinitiativecreatesriftingopbase

Frist's Justice Sunday was quite the PR move. He garnered LOTS of media attention this weekend, more than the president and vice president, in fact. (Where the heck is Cheney lately?). This is more attention than he has ever gotten in one instance,for absolutely nothing. From the recaps I've read he backed down for the most part from his original message and tried to present himself as reasonable. This isn't about judges, this is all about Frist running for president in '08 which the newscast I saw did manage to point out. So where does this leave Frist? Isn't he concerned about being out there for '08 too soon? That never goes well. Although he'll never admit it, Frist is also positioning himself for Plan B: A possible vice presidency. ACK!!!!! (Had to get that out. :) )

However, maybe he has learned from the previous cycle that a senator that's not nationally known will have to waste lots of time introducing him or herself to the public. By showboating now, and up until the '08 primaries, Frist cuts down his needed "intro" time.

Or is Frist simply acting as a front man for ShrubCo with the hopes of getting a return favor (ahem...help in winning the WH in 08). All very scary, imo. IMO, Frist is auditioning for ShrubCo help plain and simple.

Frankly, I can't imagine Frist actually winning the presidency. But then again,I would have never thought Shrub would be president either.

This place is getting more and more surreal by the day.

More endtime hysteria.....
The NBC Revelations series promo show the mother of "God's Child" of course the mother has blonde haor and blue eyes. What makes folks assume Christ would be of European dissent? This is what pissed me off with Mel Gibson's movie. Jesus looked like surfer dude Jeff Spiccoli from fast Times at Ridgemont High (role played by Sean Penn). Give me a break. Jesus probably looked more like Khadfhi than a surfer dude. I wondere if they would have portrayed Jesus as he really looked, would all the fundies been breaking their necks to get there. Absolutely NOT.

In another inexplicable example of placating to the fanatical, NBC is running a special on does the devil really exist? As a Christian, this to me would be exactly what the devil would want: Free promotion and distraction from all of his evil doings here and around the world. Hello????Can we focus on the wars going on around the world. The famines, genocides,ooh how about finding out where Osama's been hidin'? What about picking back up on the Guckert Story. More in depth on DeLay and his evil doings.

The devil. Give me a break.

Okay--get your barf bags handy. Here's the link to Frist talking to the American Taliban.

http://frist.senate.gov/index.cfm?FuseAction=Speeches.Detail&Speech_id=189

By the way--there is a video clip on that link, but no way, no how, not now, not ever am I going to play it.

Tutter-
Don't blame you. I can barely tolerate Frist in news soundbites and those are usually snuck up on me. But I refuse to purposely sit and listen to that clown.

Also, I was looking at one of the Sunday talking head shows and Dems really need to stop feeding the RNC machine by playing along and calling Frist's group Christians conservatives. Most of these folks are hardly true Christians. Fanatic right wingers is more like it. We need pundit media training pronto!

Blech. Just saw a clip on my local news of Jeb kissing the new Pope's ring. GAG ME!

http://rawstory.com/exclusives/byrne/secret_service_gannon_424.htm

Secret Service records raise new questions about discredited conservative reporter
By John Byrne| RAW STORY Editor
Advertisement
READ THE DOCUMENTS

In what is unlikely to stem the controversy surrounding disgraced White House correspondent James Guckert, the Secret Service has furnished logs of the writer’s access to the White House after requests by two Democratic congressmembers.

The documents, obtained by Rep. Louise Slaughter (D-NY) and Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) through a Freedom of Information Act request, reveal Guckert had remarkable access to the White House. Though he wrote under the name Jeff Gannon, the records show that he applied with his real name.

Gannon’s ready access to President Bush and his work for a news agency that frequently plagiarized content from other reporters and tailored it to serve a conservative message may raise new questions about the White House’s attempts to seed favorable news coverage. Democrats have sought to paint Guckert in the context of other efforts by the Administration to “plant” positive spin by paying for video news releases and columnists to espouse their views.

Posted by: tutterfly at April 24, 2005 10:50 PM

Right now, there are 46 vacancies on the federal bench. Four of the appeals court vacancies are in the region that serves my home state of Tennessee.

Those four nominees have been waiting a combined thirteen years for a vote on the Senate floor. Thirteen years!

That statement got me to wondering what happened to the judges that Clinton nominated for those seats? Is it possible that Sen. Fristian voted against those judges?

Florida, You're right about not calling them Christians. And they're not really conservatives, either. They're fanatical, extremist, and reactionary.

Amy
I think they're homophobes.

Homophobia and what is behind it:

http://www.bidstrup.com/phobia.htm

OT but I thought it is funny:

David Borowitz
The Borowitz Report

BUSH ADMITS HE NO LONGER UNDERSTANDS HIS SOCIAL SECURITY PROPOSAL

Orders Worldwide Manhunt to Find Someone Who Does

During a speech in Flint, Michigan today, President Bush sent shockwaves through the debate about Social Security by admitting that he no longer understands his own proposal for revamping the nation's retirement program.

The Flint speech had been billed as a pep rally of sorts for the president's ambitious Social Security overhaul, which made his candid admission that he could not "make heads or tails of the darned thing" all the more surprising.

"I have read it over and over and over again, and I've got to tell you, I do not have a clue what it means," Mr. Bush told his audience, many of whom audibly gasped. "I had an easier time figuring out The Da Vinci Code."

At the White House, spokesman Scott McClellan acknowledged that Mr. Bush's bafflement over his own Social Security proposal may push back implementation of the controversial plan: "According to current estimates, it is highly unlikely that the president will actually understand this plan any time before the year 2029."

To speed up that timetable, Mr. McClellan said that Mr. Bush is ordering a worldwide manhunt to find someone who can understand his Social Security proposal and explain it to him "as soon as possible."

"And if that person turns out to be Osama bin Laden, we'll be killing two birds with one stone," Mr. McClellan added.

Elsewhere, in a sign of improving relations between the two countries, India and Pakistan announced today that they would transform the disputed region of Kashmir into a gigantic calling center to handle customer service questions from U.S. computer users.

Homophobia and what is behind it:

http://www.bidstrup.com/phobia.htm

Posted by: DiAnne at April 24, 2005 11:41 PM

Thanks DiAnne, you are always resourceful.

Great essay that especially pokes the Christian aspect of homophobia. Even though none of the Christians I know will buy into the "separation of church and state" stuff.

However, I still would like to see some great argument about homophobia based on non-Christian value systems. Christianity will explain the Korean homophobia to me (the worst of Asian homophobia), but it won't explain Chinese, Vietnamese, and other Asian homophobias I also know and experience here in SoCal.

Chuck in Oakland to All:

Keep up the good work everybody! Too busy to peruse these days, but just scanning this thread I can see everyone's still got their eyes on the ball.

Chuck in Oakland (next stop Phoenix -- I love this country)

Ally
You may find this interesting - touches on cultural difference in homophobia. You may need to scroll down - several short articles, maybe relevant. I think alot of it is "fear of the unknown."
Also, "Homophobia elected Bush" article (the lst one)

http://www.samarmagazine.org/archive/article.php?id=179
http://www.colorq.org/Artcles/2000/asianover.htm

Chuck
Happy trails!

Chuck in Oakland for DiAnne:

Thanks! I was doing the dishes with my brother-in-law the other night up in Portland and KGON was doing as Steve Miller half-hour (or something) and, of course, "I went from Phoenix Arizona all the way to Tacoma...." Well, unfortunately, Tacoma's a little north of my itinerary but all the same, "I'm so glad I'm living in the USA...."

Sorry that was sort of frivilous. Just glad to be back and glad, on this road trip, that my old '92 Honda Civic still gets almost 40 mpg on the highway! National energy Manhattan Project! Please! And I work in the oil business!

Chuck in Oakland

Marines From Iraq Sound Off About Want of Armor and Men
By MICHAEL MOSS

On May 29, 2004, a station wagon that Iraqi insurgents had packed with C-4 explosives blew up on a highway in Ramadi, killing four American marines who died for lack of a few inches of steel.

The four were returning to camp in an unarmored Humvee that their unit had rigged with scrap metal, but the makeshift shields rose only as high as their shoulders, photographs of the Humvee show, and the shrapnel from the bomb shot over the top.

"The steel was not high enough," said Staff Sgt. Jose S. Valerio, their motor transport chief, who along with the unit's commanding officers said the men would have lived had their vehicle been properly armored. "Most of the shrapnel wounds were to their heads."

Among those killed were Rafael Reynosa, a 28-year-old lance corporal from Santa Ana, Calif., whose wife was expecting twins, and Cody S. Calavan, a 19-year-old private first class from Lake Stevens, Wash., who had the Marine Corps motto, Semper Fidelis, tattooed across his back.

They were not the only losses for Company E during its six-month stint last year in Ramadi. In all, more than one-third of the unit's 185 troops were killed or wounded, the highest casualty rate of any company in the war, Marine Corps officials say.

In returning home, the leaders and Marine infantrymen have chosen to break an institutional code of silence and tell their story, one they say was punctuated not only by a lack of armor, but also by a shortage of men and planning that further hampered their efforts in battle, destroyed morale and ruined the careers of some of their fiercest warriors.

The saga of Company E, part of a lionized battalion nicknamed the Magnificent Bastards, is also one of fortitude and ingenuity. The marines, based at Camp Pendleton in southern California, had been asked to rid the provincial capital of one of the most persistent insurgencies, and in enduring 26 firefights, 90 mortar attacks and more than 90 homemade bombs, they shipped their dead home and powered on. Their tour has become legendary among other Marine units now serving in Iraq and facing some of the same problems.

"As marines, we are always taught that we do more with less," said Sgt. James S. King, a platoon sergeant who lost his left leg when he was blown out of the Humvee that Saturday afternoon last May. "And get the job done no matter what it takes."

For more (it's a long piece), go to:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/25/international/middleeast/25marines.html

The Oblivious Right
By PAUL KRUGMAN

What's going on? Actually, it's quite simple: Mr. Bush and his party talk only to their base - corporate interests and the religious right - and are oblivious to everyone else's concerns.

SNIP

But Americans are feeling a sense of dread: they're worried about a weak job market, soaring health care costs, rising oil prices and a war that seems to have no end. And they're starting to notice that nobody in power is even trying to deal with these problems, because the people in charge are too busy catering to a base that has other priorities.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/25/opinion/25krugman.html?th&emc=th

Posted by: DiAnne at April 25, 2005 01:38 AM

Thank you again for the great readings! They certainly were very interesting and eye-opening.

I still think many of these articles were founded on political correctness; Asian homophobia is real and serious thanks to the influence of Confucianism (which set strict gender roles) in many of the countries before the Europeans even arrived. The most tolerant Asian countries - Thailand and Japan - were the least Confucian.

But those articles did have a point; even Confucianism didn't do as much damage as Western influences did. It was the British who outlawed hijras in India, for example. (Interestingly, in today's world it's the British who have the most liberal gender definition laws.) And the Asian-American communities, which certainly are more Westernized and Christianized than their homelands, are definitely more homophobic.

There is still a range of acceptance though. San Jose, California, you can tune into a Vietnamese-language radio station and get gay-themed programming one hour a week. Come down to Los Angeles though, and you have several Korean-language stations that broadcast Christian propaganda at least 8 hours a day - and would be boycotted and shut down immediately by their listeners if any of them dared to follow the Vietnamese station's example.

Chuck,

Enjoy your trek through these United States, and spread the words about DCP if you can! :)

Ally
I think the difference with the Korean community was due to Christian missionaries (Korean war era) - I've heard that before.

Just think - Reverend Moon is from Korea, & so connected with the right wing. It's unfortunate.

I've heard that Thailand doesn't have a Victorian morality. Sure they don't even like heterosexual couples to show public affection, but there you do constantly see couples of the same gender who are friends who are holding hands in public and arms around each other - also in Japan.

& in Bangkok, people didn't seem prudish at all (of course, there is all the exploitation of the sex trade, so hard to measure).

I agree with you that some of the articles which found Asians (various groups) less homophobic may have been based somewhat on political correctness.

On the right, in the fundamentalist Christian community, I always think in terms of patriarchy. "Pro-life" (anti-abortion), to me, has nothing at all to do with the fetus. It has to do with keeping women barefoot & pregnant & under men's thumbs. The homophobia I suspect is related to fears about their own masculinity & also a desire for control. One article touched on that.

The most repulsive part of all is trying to legislate the behavior of others. You know how little kids are told to keep their hands to themself? Well these social conservatives ought to remember several Bible passages that talk about hypocrisy. (Don't worry about the sliver someone else has when you have a giant board stuck in you - doesn't it say something like that? LOL)

God - someone was on my bus with a Tim LaHaye "Left Behind" book. I was horrified - I thought I lived in a "safe" neighborhood. Won't they be surprised when they think they're being "raptured" & they end up in the "bad place?"

"The Senate Foreign Relations Committee plans to present John Bolton with more written questions about his behavior and practices as a State Department official. (Move America Forward, which ran radio in Ohio totaling, it says, tens of thousands of dollars, has abruptly reversed course and pulled the ads, citing an unspecified briefing from a close associate of George Voinovich.)"

Sounds like Voinovich knows something about Bolton that is even starting to scare off the neocons.

And this one will have everyone talking: California Supreme Court Justice Janice Rogers Brown "told an audience Sunday that people of faith were embroiled in a 'war' against secular humanists who threatened to divorce America from its religious roots, according to a newspaper account of the speech," reports the Los Angeles Times'

Isn't Brown one of the extremist judges Bush is tryng to push through. Religious people are at war...? Sounds like taliban. Sounds like they are pushing for religious tyranny.