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Body in Soul's Possession
Editor's Note: Matthew Carnicelli, the author of the Democracy Cell Project's exclusive series examining the intersection of religion and politics, returns from sabbatical this Sunday with an open letter to New York Times columnist, David Brooks. This letter was composed in direct response to Brooks' June 12, 2005 column: "The Wisdom We Need to Fight AIDS".
The URL for Brooks' original column is:
http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/06/12/opinion/edbrooks.php.
Dear Mr. Brooks,
In his 1958 novel, "A Mixture of Frailties", Robertson Davies offered a contemporary definition of chastity as "body in soul's possession". Whether one is describing the tragedies of AIDS devastation in sub-Saharan Africa or that of the bare-backers of Fire Island and Key West, Davies' definition strikes me as one that is as relevant as any in our time.
People of good will - be they straight or gay, or politically liberal or conservative, or be they traditionally religious, or spiritual and secular, or secular and ethical - are largely in agreement that the hyper-sexuality of our era is simply unsustainable. But the vexing question we must answer is how we go about transforming this situation.
Your colleague Nicholas Kristof wrote a column a few weeks back in which he noted that in El Salvador only 4% of first time sexual partners use condoms. Kristof further noted that the Catholic Church had used its influence in that nation to push through a law requiring a warning be printed on every package of condoms, asserting that rubbers did not offer protection against the spread of AIDS. He reported in another recent column how some of the deeply religious women of South and Central America that he had spoken to were as up-in-arms over the contraceptive policies set forth by the old men of the Vatican as any college-educated American woman.
There's a common thread that connects the sewing of so many shrouds: men telling women what to do with their bodies; men forcing themselves on vulnerable women in Asia, Africa, and Central and South America; men showing so little regard for their own lives that they increasingly return to unprotected sex, or actively seek to infect each other as a form of initiation (as documented in Louise Hogarth's powerful film, The Gift).
While I don't want to discount your conclusion that an appeal to a "transcendent set of ideals" would help, I do want to make the point that the AIDS crisis is ultimately a crisis perpetuated by men. Our gender certainly appears to have lost its way.
I'd further argue that this phenomenon extends far beyond the realm of sexuality, to the realm of war and peace. The loudest advocates for the war in Iraq were men who never saw a day in battle, yet had little problem discounting the hard earned experience and wisdom of men who did. From my reality-based perspective, I am forced to conclude that these advocates' initial enthusiasm was nothing more than posturing, bluster, and machismo - attitudes not far removed from that of the man who, in an age of AIDS, convinces his partner that there's no need this time for use of a condom. This kind of mindless bravado and deadly self-deception, be it in the cause of immediate sexual gratification or gratuitous wars of liberation, hardly strikes me as a shining example of healthy male behavior.
So, yes, I agree that an appeal to a "transcendent set of ideals" is in order. Men are in crisis, and men need to be healed. Our gender needs to collectively discover new models for empowered masculine behavior. We need to become strong enough in our psyches to allow women to emerge as true partners, and exert full dominion over their bodies. We need to loosen the tie between our sexuality and our egos, and instead acquaint ourselves with the ideal of an inner marriage between head and heart - or as Davies phrased it, "body in soul's possession".
If the men alive today accomplished nothing but this, then the spread of AIDS would surely end in our lifetime. And the sacrifice of everyone who died as a result of this terrible plague would have not been in vain - since the world their suffering brought into being would be a far, far better place than the one they left behind.
Sincerely yours,
Matthew Carnicelli
for the Democracy Cell Project
http://hijackingcatastrophe.org/downingstreet/
OT but go here and listen.
"We need to loosen the tie between our sexuality and our egos, and instead acquaint ourselves with the ideal of an inner marriage between head and heart - or as Davies phrased it, "body in soul's possession"."
Oh Matt, if only....
That may be one the absolute best sentences you have ever crafted--and one of the truest. Gives me chills.
Matt:
After reading your column, the only thing I could come up with is disgust and fury. And rage at the pin-headedness of policy-makers who have no sense of long-term connection of their plans with the outcomes. For them, its to garner votes amongst the far right-wing Christian conservative bloc.
For the rest of the world, tts about de-stabilization.
You subjugate and objectify women, make them property, take away their individuality, and soon enough social and cultural infrastructures breaks down. You take down the women, you weaken them, you impoverish them, they sicken and die. Families fall, villages fall, states fall.
That has become a global fact.
In Africa, the slow response to the AIDS epidemic has decimated once-interdependent economies. This leaves communities ripe for more insurgencies, and rebellions caused by unstable economies. And now the latest in a long string of disasters--the selling of children as sex slaves to assure non-AIDS infected sex. Now children are dying more quickly than ever.
In Eastern Europe, women and young girls are sold for prostitution, the proceeds of which purchase weapons or drugs or both--and no one has control over the buyers. In Southeast Asia, the sex trade industry includes the sale of children. With this caravan of human cargo comes AIDS.
The response now must be globally rapid and encompassing. Our representatives must stop the distraction of accusing Kofi Annan in the food for oil scandals, and focus on what we need to have done in the world. But as usual, trivia obscures our vision while people die.
Extorting other countries battling AIDS by preaching the morality of abstinence prior to financial aid is putting a finger in a dike that has long since burst on all sides. We've long lost our usefulness and our compassion, and this kind of aid ends up meaning absolutely nothing.
Matt:
Each word of truth that you utter is like rotating another ring on a giant cosmic lock that will one day unleash the power that we have given away to those who use it against us. Your words not only empower, they inspire.
AIDS is not going to disappear until we start healing ourselves from the inside out . You are highly effective at reconnecting the bridges that repugnicans and theocrats have become so adept at disconnecting for us in order to serve their personal agendas.
Sadly, our political leaders lack the compassionate and informed insight that you clearly possess in abundance.
The biggest travesty is that your voice of freedom is not reaching over the airwaves to an even greater number of souls that need to hear your alarm clock and awaken from their slumber before they collectively slip into a coma.
You are a national treasure and a patriot in the truest sense.
Conyers vs. The Post
John Nichols The Nation Jun 18
There is painful irony in the fact that, during the same month that the confirmation of "Deep Throat's" identity has allowed the Washington Post to relive its Watergate-era glory days, that newspaper is blowing the dramatically more significant story of the "fixed" intelligence the Bush administration used to scam Congress and U.S. allies into supporting the disasterous invasion and occupation of Iraq.
Last week, when the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, Michigan Democrat John Conyers, chaired an extraordinary hearing on what has come to be known as the "Downing Street Memo" -- details of pre-war meetings where aides to British Prime Minister Tony Blair discussed the fact that, while the case for war was "thin," the Bush administration was busy making sure that "the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy" -- the Post ridiculed Conyers and the dozens of other members of Congress who are trying to get to the bottom of a scandal that former White House counsel John Dean has correctly identified as "worse than Watergate."
Post writer Dana Milbank penned a snarky little piece that, like similar articles in the New York Times and other "newspapers of record," displayed all the skepticism regarding Bush administration misdeeds that one might expect to find in a White House press release.
To his credit, Conyers hit back.
In a letter addressed to the Post's national editor, the newspaper's ombudsman and Milbank, the veteran House member was blunt.
snip~
The years of the Bush presidency will be remembered as a time when American media, for the most part, practiced stenography to power -- and when once-great newspapers became little more than what the reformers of another time referred to as "the kept press."
The Conyers letter, like the thousands of communications from grassroots activists to media outlets across this country pressing for serious coverage of the "Downing Street Memo" and the broader debate about the Bush administration's doctoring of intelligence prior to the launch of the Iraq war, is an essential response to our contemporary media crisis. That it had to be written provides evidence of just how serious that crisis has grown.
continue~ http://tinyurl.com/8efla
Calls for withdrawal will grow
MSNBC analyst says Bush administration in a tough position in Iraq
MSNBC June 17, 2005
With the first bipartisan call for a timetable for U.S. troops to leave Iraq coming this week and no end in sight to continued attacks by Iraqi insurgents, MSNBC's Randy Meier spoke with terrorism analyst Juliette Kayyem on Friday about the military's current strategy in Iraq and how it may change in the coming months.
Kayyem, who is Executive Director of the National Security Program at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, said the combination of an insurgency that is not united in its goals or beliefs and too few troops in place to keep the average Iraqi safe has created a difficult scenario for the Bush administration.
"The (U.S.) strategy originally was to get rid of Saddam Hussein. Now it's not quite clear what the strategy is anymore. What does it mean to stay the course? You have a strategy that is sort of amorphous in Iraq right now," Kayyem said.
Kayyem noted that with the U.S. battling not one insurgency, but hundreds of different groups, including Sunnis, Shias and Kurds.
"Their complaints are against the U.S. presence there, so you have this combination of not enough troops and not enough folks to protect the security of the average Iraqi, and an insurgency that is increasing. It's just an explosive situation, which we're seeing just about every single day now."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8256887/
Alexander,
But it's not just "republicans" who are doing this. Truly! The conservative democrats and moderates who sit by and refuse to speak and refuse to act are everybit as wrong as those strong-arm theologians.
My daughter gets very upset about "politics" because people use a broad paint brush to call "all republicans" names (like thugs or rethugs, etc) and all democrats names (like wingnuts etc) and in a way, she is slightly right. (She'll be thilled to know I've given her that much credit!)
The point is that the individual who represents us must stand up and tell us from his/her heart what they stand for and how they will vote. But when we blast all people as "dems" or "rethugs" we lose touch with all the individuals who make us each party.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that each person, regardless of party affiliation, needs to stop voting the party line and instead vote for the people in their district who trusted them and empowered them.
It's time for our calls to say, "listen to us...listen to what this community wants...and stop listening to what the party leader tells you to vote."
Posted by: Fe at June 14, 2005 05:53 PM
Very well stated!!!
To your last paragraph I would add: Bu$hCo has also denied funds for contraception if they mention abortion as one of the viable options for unwanted pregnancies. That is a disastrous policy, given the fact that in some of the worst places where people are starving, young girls trade sex for food, and invading armies also rape girls and women and leave them not only pregnant but infected with AIDS. Then there's that myth the uneducated men have that sex with a young virgin will cure them of AIDS.... One would think even the most ignorant of men would know that couldn't be true!
IMHO, men who rape girls and women (and men who molest boys) should be castrated for the simple reason their DNA is not worth passing on to future generations when legislators - supposedly educated men, no less - force women into bearing a child as a result of rape when they put all kinds of strings on what should be a medical decision made only by the girl/woman it affects. So much for "good christian values."
From previous thread:
Posted by: DiAnne at June 19, 2005 10:50 AM
DiAnne - At least you're in MN when the weather is nice for a change! :-) Enjoy!
I agree with you about the faux patriotism and the faux religious "values" and belief. Jumping on the bandwagon of either for the sake of "doing the in thing" is reverting to an adolescent mindset. Given the current pResident's values and mental state, it seems apt.... the bully leading those who willingly keep themselves ignorant is sheer stupidity. I'm afraid I'm not much on bandwagon anything, having learned long ago to think for myself - a practice that is anathema for the more extreme versions of fundamentalilst "christianity" practiced nowadays (most especially because I'm a woman, and the fundamentalists seem predisposed to misogyny!).
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20050619/pl_nm/usa_politics_biden_dc
Sen. Biden says intends to seek presidency
From previous thread:
Some of the worst crimes against humanity are when religious peoples are given real Political power, and bring their beliefs to bear on the decisions of State. I wonder how much of Iraq is affairs of state, and how much is fundamentalists bending the presidents ear.
Posted by: Toolmaker at June 19, 2005 12:03 PM
I'd venture to guess most of the Iraq policy is (1) finishing his daddy's war and one-up-manship because he's not limiting the time our people are in Iraq like his daddy did, so now he's completing a political coup at the same time; and (2) straight out of the PNAC policies as stated on their web site. We are only in Iraq so Bu$hCo can control the flow of oil in Iraq. The government that is being set up is a puppet government, and we all know it. The fundies were/are being used as a tool to divide and conquer, and being led by a dry alcoholic is just not the smartest thing the fundies could ever allow. I suspect the fundies see it as a way to gain control of the political situation in this country, and they will all wake up sadder but wiser in the future. But the "issues" the fundies continually yap about are a good diversion for people to write about at nauseating length, and it keeps people's minds off of what's going on behind closed doors in this administration. MSM is the other diversion with infotainment news (who really cares about the newest gossip about who's engaged?). The fundies are being used for diversionary purposes, no two ways about it. (Give the people bread and circuses....)
Studying comparative religions is fascinating. Also, I'm sure most "good christians" who disparage the pagans do not realize how many pagan practices were incorporated into the early Catholic church, which then were also adopted by most Protestant religions, all on the orders of an early pope who told the proselytizing priests to build churches on sites of pagan religious sites and adopt and adapt pagan ritual into the early church practices so it would be easier to gain converts to Christianity, not to mention the one bit where it was written that people were to be kept uneducated because ignorant people were easier to control... and that's all documented from early writings of various popes. But then, the fundamentalists don't want people to be educated anyway, so they will never find out about what happened historically to get them to the point they are now at in their religion.... It's all a brand of bandwagon christianity I just cannot respect. They don't even know their own historical origins. If they did study history, or if they could analyze anything philosophically, they wouldn't be one of the crowd, and risk being shunned by the people they now call 'friends.' One of my philosophy profs cautioned students that they could not use religion and an 'appeal to authority' logic regarding religion in essays because one cannot prove God. He was the prof for a philosophy class on Ethics (among others I took from him), and that was an amazing class.
Politics... now that's something one can analyze, write out in detail, and plot day by day, month by month.... And this current administration has been doing some very illegal, unethical, and immoral things since before the Selection of 2000 which have led us to where we are today.... Since the old Kerry blog and reading background information, those of us who are aware of all the ugliness and secrecy of this administration and everything that has been documented since before the 2000 campaign (and I'm sure there are documents that we won't know about until after the next election), and now the documents in the form of the Downing Street Memos that should have made everyone who was duped by the lies mad as hell have been released..., and the whole thing screams of grounds for impeachment!!!
Biden just said he was running for president. I'm not quite sure what I think of that. he supported that awful bankruptcy bill...
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=politicsNews&storyID=8831200
Nonny O
The weather was very hot here yesterday (Twin Cities) but today it was glorious. There is more of a breeze.
I had lunch with my rightwing Republican sister-in-law that we've been estranged from, and now she needs hearing aids for a severe hearing loss. It was a rude awakening for her that the government won't pay a cent for them. They will cost $2200/ear. We didn't really talk about politics other than that (other than some things that slipped out that I didn't take the bait for), but I did point out also that the government talks alot about prescription drugs but not much about prevention - maybe companies are making money off the drugs. She actually agreed with that. I also paid the tab and there was no argument about that. It was good for me to make the effort though - it's a start maybe.
Tonight I'll have dinner with my Republican uncle who used to take me to the MN Republican convention and was friends with Harold Stassen when I lived with him for awhile after high school. Now he sends anti-Cheney emails! My dad has been gone for several years, so it's nice to have this "Father figure" on Father's Day.
Here is a good email from home (Seattle)- from the father in the most potent political father-son combination I can think of (& on Father's Day):
The Tide has turned!-Uplifting sign of the country waking up
I went to go hit a bucket of golf balls today. (Beautiful day, 85 and sunny).
The place I go to is inhabited by crusty old men who scratch a lot and talk s#$% all day long. This is their retirement. I know this place to be pretty conservative so I just go to hit a bucket and not chew the fat.
Today I'm walking in to get my bucket and I hear one dude telling another in his heavy southern drawl "did you see the thing on C-SPAN with this COnyers feller?" That's all I needed. I spent the next 45 minutes telling them about the petition, the work that's been going on for weeks, and so on. They had a lot of questions and I was able to fill in some gaps in their information. There
were other people listening and chiming in. Out of the 6 or 7 people there NOT ONE defended Bushit. Not one. Even guys who by looking at them you know are Republicans were piling on. They didn't know how much Halliburton has stolen, as
an example of information that they still don't have. When I started to walk away and start hitting golf balls...
...Here it comes.....
The guy I originally started talking to says "I think there's gonna be an impeachment".!!! EVERYONE ELSE WAS NODDING THEIR HEADS IN AGREEMENT.
I was floored...and then I was giddy...then I nailed 80 out of 90 golf swings.
--I called home to wish my husband Happy Father's Day. I guess he & my son are having an Alfred Hitchock Film Festival tonight on the side of the garage: Vertigo, North by Northwest, Psycho. (Irrelevant but typical)
This is sad but funny too...
with a hat tip to Technosailor for pointing it out:
Q: "What do you think about Amnesty?"
A: "Well, she's pretty hot. I mean, I don't know if I'd ask for her number or anything..."
Chip Franklin's Curb Your Intelligence this week asks this and other questions such as "What's a Gitmo?" to demonstrate just how stupid people really are..."
http://wbal.com/stories/articlefiles/31884-6-07-06%20GITMO%20Curb.mp3
Our social system is rooted in religious teachings; patriachal systems, subjugating women, ruling over the house, etc etc etc. Society murdered women as witches not long ago, because the Church said it was the word of God.
This is the cause of these issues. Its no accident that we are seeing increasing violence towards women, and a general breakdown across the board in most Nations. The Patriarchal Religious system does not work, it never has. The underlying problem with Humanity is we do not remember our mistakes, it is our Doom. We make the same ones over and over again.
The answers are buried in our past. The measure of a Man is Simple;
He stands tallest when he bends over to pick up a child.
A Man provides for his Family the greatest when he Truly Loves the Mother of his children.
A Man places his Familys needs ahead of his own, He leads by Deed as well as words.
His greatest treasure in life sleeps cradled in his arms at night.
A Husband would kill himself than bring dishonor upon his Wife or her Family.
These are thousands of years old, taken from many cultures. They were far more succesful than our own.
BTW,
The witch hangings ended in Salem when the last witch accused named the governors wife as being a witch. Shrewd Move, the hangings ended immediately. When power is threatened, the silly social issues stop. There is a lot to learn from this smart womans political understanding.
I wonder if any of BushCo still believe in the "mandate"?
Interesting aside: There's no mention of Karl Rove or Karen Hughes in this article-- They seem to avoid the public spotlight when the Shrub's not looking so great (unless, of course, they identify a new evil opponent & stage a character assassination)
___________________
Bush fighting to regain confidence of Americans
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=615&e=2&u=/nm/20050619/pl_nm/bush_dc
Five months after starting his second term with high hopes, President Bush is struggling to regain the confidence of Americans concerned about the direction of the Iraq war and the U.S. economy.
With his job approval rating slumping to 42 percent in a poll by The New York Times and CBS News, down from 51 percent in the aftermath of the November election, Bush has begun an effort to refocus his presidency -- a move welcomed by anxious Republicans.
"I think Bush is in the process of regaining his footing, and focusing on real dinner-table issues," Republican consultant Scott Reed said.
snip [[ List of causes: Bush focus on SS, Terri Schiavo, fillabuser fight, judicial nominees, Bolton nomination ]]
Some Republicans believe those issues proved to be a distraction from Bush's agenda and showed he was out of touch. [[ Well... ]]
snip
The White House is now scrambling to right the ship.
snip
"It's a minor problem," said Republican consultant Charlie Black. "But it would help to have the job approval over 50 percent. It helps on the Hill to give your people confidence and let the Democrats think twice before they oppose you."
Republicans on Capitol Hill welcomed the White House's announcement Bush would "sharpen his focus" on Iraq and the economy.
"We believe that that is the best approach, to talk about family pocketbook issues and refocus our message on why we have troops in Iraq," said Ron Bonjean, spokesman for House Speaker Dennis Hastert of Illinois.
snip
[[On Iraq]]
The theme will be to reassure Americans the war has been worth it and to urge patience in the goal of getting Iraqis trained sufficiently to allow U.S. troops to come home.
The Times/CBS poll said only 37 percent approved of Bush's handling of Iraq, down from 45 percent in February, while 51 percent thought the United States should have stayed out of Iraq, a slight drop from findings throughout the spring.
snip
Reed said, "Bush's standing can and will recover by using the bully pulpit effectively, which only one end of Pennsylvania Avenue can truly utilize."
&more...
When power is threatened, the silly social issues stop.
Posted by: Toolmaker at June 19, 2005 03:05 PM
Beautifully stated!!! :-) You must have some very strong women in your life who have earned your respect, or some very smart men who know how to respect women.
I'm not saying all women deserve respect across the board, just as not all men deserve respect across the board (and we know which politicians do not deserve respect). Women have horrid examples of what not to be in the likes of Condisleazy and her ilk.
But there are plenty of other women and men to admire in this world, and many are found on this blog......
Best quote of the day so far: "When power is threatened, the silly social issues stop."
The guy I originally started talking to says "I think there's gonna be an impeachment".!!! EVERYONE ELSE WAS NODDING THEIR HEADS IN AGREEMENT.
I was floored...and then I was giddy...then I nailed 80 out of 90 golf swings.
Posted by: DiAnne at June 19, 2005 02:45 PM
I hope so!!! :-) If MSM would only listen to John Conyers (a man who deserves our respect for several reasons already - I hope he has a fantastically good father's day), and not miss his point, or the points of so many other people who were at the hearing, it would be so nice!!! Bu$hCo should have been imeached years ago!
Nothing like a good mood or a bad mood to hit golf balls with deadly accuracy, eh?!? Thanks for talking to those fellows and setting them straight!!! :-)
Great letter Matt! Welcome back from your sabbatical, it is wonderful to have you back.
Yes indeed. Real men don't strut. They don't abuse power, either. I agree with you, real character isn't afraid of sharing power, and it loves to build up another. Interesting thought that the real crisis isn't the disease that manifests itself in physical illness. It is the disease that lies in the deep crevasse that exists between the head and the heart. Why is it that so many men are afraid to marry the two?
~**~ ~**~ ~**~ ~**~ ~**~ ~**~ ~**~ ~**~ ~
Well, well, well.....Is the worm turning?
All your posts are wonderful, every where we look Shrub is in trouble. Looks like Iraq may not be the only quagmire this administration has to worry about.
It is a joy to turn on CNN the past two days. They aren't having any trouble now telling how low Bush's poll numbers are, and how many Republicans are jumping ship. T'was just 8 short months ago and "everybody" just loved George. The same Republicans that are jumping ship now over the same issues that existed 8 months ago were vigorously defending Bush and the Republican party line then. For some reason, many of them have "seen the light" in the past few weeks. Why, some of them are even saying President Bush doesn't have a "grasp on reality". This is my first go round with watching this kind of thing happen right before a congressional election year. They took all old George was willing to give, and left him in the dust. (Et tu', Brute'?)
In the meantime, I am doing the happy dance. Skippity- do- dah, skippity- aye. Shuffle shuffle, tap tap.
~**~ ~**~ ~**~ ~**~ ~**~ ~**~ ~**~ ~**~ ~
Toolmaker,
We need to have a talk. Can you meet me sometime in the Kazbah? (IRC?)
Bush wounded by anger over war
Tony Allen-Mills, Washington
The Sunday Times - World UK
INCREASING American concern about the conduct of the war in Iraq has forced President George W Bush to sideline some of his domestic priorities in favour of a new public relations drive to bolster confidence in the coalition effort.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-1659988,00.html
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Republican senators challenge Bush's Iraq optimism
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Bush needs to tell Americans the nation faces "a long, hard slog" in Iraq, a key Republican senator said on Sunday, and another said the White House was "disconnected from reality" in its optimism over the war.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20050619/pl_nm/iraq_usa_dc
Nonny, what i dont understand is how few people use those examples in history.
Mr. Schiavo has Jeb Bush breathing down his neck again. Mr. Schiavo has nothing more than ask jeb bush about his affair with the former playboy bunny. Jeb will shut his mouth immediately. If power comes after you, you go after it. Jeb has a lot more to lose than Mr Schiavo at this point. Stand up and fight back.
The Downing street memo....print the damn thing. Makes posters out of it. Make placemats out of it. Make bumper stickers..."Have you read your memo today?" Hand out buttons, make commercials..Memo today, Invasion tommorow. Make it the centerpiece of the Evening news.
Take the fight to them and stop sitting on our hands waiting for something to happen. I know political theory is to let them continue hurting themselves, but they are controlling the game board as well. We need to take control away from them.
Conyers needs more support, more facts, more people standing with him. And stop broadcasting strategy 48 hours before they do it. Thats a little shortsighted, and why the GOP scheduled meetings to interrrupt the hearing.
We had a Sitting president go through impeachment proceedings for using bad judgement with an Intern. nobody died, no laws were broken, president clinton did not plunge the Nation into massive debt or lead us into Historic Strategic Disaster.
We are actually debating what this White House did is impeachable?
The Blood of 1,700 Brave American Soldiers demand it. The arms and legs of 12,000 more american soldiers left in Iraq scream for justice. The blood of tens of thousands of Innocent Iraqis cry just as loud.
We are torturing innocent people, we have suspended our Constitution, This white house is breaking laws....and we need to ask for a room to hold hearings..?? To even respond is laughable.
TAKE the Damn room. Take a Room, invite the press, Invite worldwide press, and initiate impeachment proceedings to remove this administration before even worse damage is done.
Geez whiz, Bu$h-stupidity strikes again!
Bush Remarks May Have Spurred Iran Voters
By BRIAN MURPHY, Associated Press Writer
1 hour, 6 minutes ago
TEHRAN, Iran - Iran's spy chief used just two words to respond to White House ridicule of last week's presidential election: "Thank you." His sarcasm was barely hidden. The backfire on Washington was more evident.
The sharp barbs from President Bush were widely seen in Iran as damaging to pro-reform groups because the comments appeared to have boosted turnout among hard-liners in Friday's election — with the result being that an ultraconservative now is in a two-way showdown for the presidency.
"I say to Bush: `Thank you,'" quipped Intelligence Minister Ali Yunesi. "He motivated people to vote in retaliation."
Bush's comments — blasting the ruling clerics for blocking "basic requirements of democracy" — became a lively sideshow in Iran's closest election since the 1979 Islamic Revolution. And they highlighted again the United States' often crossed-wire efforts to isolate Iran.
Bush described the election as an exercise in futility because Iran's real power rests with the non-elected Islamic clerics, who can override the president and parliament. Many agree with that description of a regime that allowed just eight presidential candidates from more than 1,000 hopefuls.
snip~
But the harder the United States pushes, even with the best of intentions, the more ground it has seems to lose among mainstream Iranians, who represent possible key allies against the Islamic establishment, say some analysts of Iranian politics.
"Unknowingly, (Bush) pushed Iranians to vote so that they can prove their loyalty to the regime — even if they are in disagreement with it," said Hamed al-Abdullah, a political science professor at Kuwait University.
In 2002, most Iranians were indignant when Bush placed their nation in an "axis of evil" with North Korea and Saddam Hussein's Iraq. Since then, U.S.-led pressure over Iran's nuclear program has put even liberal Iranians on the defensive.
Bush's pre-election denunciations seemed to do the same. Iranian authorities claim Bush energized undecided voters to go to the polls and undercut a boycott drive led by liberal dissidents opposed to the Islamic system.
The unexpectedly strong turnout — nearly 63 percent — produced a true surprise in the No. 2 finish of hard-line Tehran Mayor Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, He will face the top finisher, moderate statesman Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani, in a Friday runoff.
Rafsanjani, Iran's president in 1989-1997, has said he is open to greater dialogue with the United States.
But Ahmadinejad offered no such opening after the vote was tallied Saturday, and he could take a harsher stance toward the United States and its concerns — especially accusations that Iran is secretly seeking nuclear arms. Iran denies the charges and puts them down to U.S. anger with the clerical regime.
"You only have to look at the comments" by Bush to understand that he "seeks hostility" against Iran, Ahmadinejad said.
The conservative hard-line Iranian newspaper Kayhan wrote: "People crushed the U.S. comments and wishes under their feet."
But even many opponents of the Islamic establishment objected to Bush's tone and timing.
The president's words sounded too much like the pre-war rhetoric against Saddam, and many on-the-fence voters were shocked into action, said Abdollah Momeni, a political affairs expert at Tehran University.
"People faced a dilemma," Momeni said. "In people's minds it became a choice between voting or giving Bush an excuse to attack."
continue~
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050619/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iran_bush_backfire
Posted by: Toolmaker at June 19, 2005 05:33 PM
Well, IMHO, the many reasons this administration should have been impeached (or fired, if appointed) have not lacked since the Selection of 2000, and more reasons were added when the e-voting machines malfunctioned in key states (again) in 2004. It was never a debatable topic as far as I was concerned; everything that's come out since the 2004 "election" (he was NOT RE-elected - he wasn't elected the first time; he was put in office by the Supreme Court decision!) just reinforces my opinion that the last two elections were rigged, stolen, or otherwise taken from Democrats. Period. Add the other things on top of that that are crimes and now the memos are coming out and a few people are finally paying attention (albeit belatedly in MSM print at least), and it still spells I M P E A C H M E N T to me....
Our senators and reps erred greatly by giving the little monster the power to declare war after 9/11. Too much power in the hands of a nitwit has cost many, many thousands of people their lives. They owe every one of us an apology before they stand a chance of being elected again.....
The Beginning of the End?
by Katrina vanden Heuvel Sunday, June 19, 2005 by The Nation
"We see this as the beginning of the end," said Tom Andrews, a former Democratic representative from Maine who is executive director of the antiwar group Win Without War. "It's the very beginning of a new wave of activism on this war. There's a real sense that something is beginning to move." --Los Angeles Times, Friday June 17, 2005
Earlier that day, a friend and longtime antiwar activist left me a voice mail message. Just ten days earlier he told me that he was more depressed about our politics than at anytime in the last 40 years. "Hello, this is..." he said. "I was in Washington yesterday at the rally and at the Conyers hearings. And since I laid a heavy statement on you last week, I just wanted to make a correction. It's finally over. My despair is over. Something has happened these last ten days that has revived the antiwar issue. It has to do with public opinion polls and casualties and Republicans like Walter Jones and more Democrats standing up. I won't say how optimistic I am. But something is coming together--you can feel it."
You can feel it.
continue~
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0619-32.htm
Ken Sanders | High Crimes and Misdemeanors
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/061905F.shtml
Memogate Finally Covered by AP
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/061905Z.shtml
Robert Fisk | We Are All Complicit
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/061905C.shtml
Stirling Newberry | The Queen and the Soldier
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/061905A.shtml
Climate-gate: New Leaked Memos
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/061905X.shtml
Iraq war started too early
Attacks preceded congressional OK
Paul Rogat Loeb / SFChronicle
Sunday, June 19, 2005
It's bad enough that the Bush administration had so little international support for the Iraqi war that its "coalition of the willing" meant the United States, Britain, and the equivalent of a child's imaginary friends.
It's even worse that, as the British Downing Street memo confirms, the administration had so little evidence of real threats that officials knew from the start that they were going to have to manufacture excuses to go to war. What's more damning still is that they effectively began this war even before the congressional vote.
snip~
If coverage of the Downing Street memo continues to increase, I suspect the administration will try to dismiss it as mere diplomatic talk, just inside baseball. But officials weren't just manipulating intelligence so they could attack no matter how Saddam Hussein responded. They weren't just bribing would- be allies into participation.
They were already fighting a war they'd planned long before. They just didn't bother to tell the American public.
continue~
http://tinyurl.com/aacx4
responding to WaPo Dana Milbank:
Bush's WMD 'Joke': Is the Media Still Laughing?
A brief comment at a forum in Washington this week resurrects one of the most shameful episodes in recent media history: The night a roomful of journalists laughed along with a president making fun of the bogus threat that led to a costly war.
By Greg Mitchell
(June 18, 2005) -- Dana Milbank of The Washington Post, in a column on Friday, suggested that the congressional forum the previous day on the Downing Street memos was something of a joke. In his opening sentence he declared that House Democrats “took a trip to the land of make-believe” in pretending that the basement conference room was actually a real hearing room, even importing a few American flags to make it look more official.
Oddly, he seem less interested in the far more serious “make-believe” that inspired the basement session: the administration’s fake case for WMDs in Iraq that has already led to the deaths of over 1,700 Americans and tens of thousands of Iraqis. No, Milbank used the valuable real estate of the Post--its only coverage of the event--to mock Rep. John Conyers, who arranged the meeting, and his “hearty band of playmates.”
This fun-loving “band” included a mother who had lost her son in Iraq.
snip~
I was reminded of all this at the Thursday forum when former CIA analyst Ray McGovern, after cataloguing the bogus Bush case for WMDs and the Iraqi threat, looked out at the cameras and notepads, mentioned the March 24, 2004 dinner, and acted out the president looking under papers and table for those missing WMDs. “And the media was all yucking it up….hahaha,” McGovern said. “You all laughed with him, folks. But I’ll tell you who is not laughing. Cindy Sheehan is not laughing.”
This was the woman sitting next to him whose son had been killed in Iraq. “Cindy’s son,” McGovern added, “was killed 11 days after the show put on by the president…after that big joke.”
Dana Milbank, who seems to like a good laugh, did not mention this in his story the following day.
continue~
http://tinyurl.com/8pztk
Dianne:
1) Can't beat that-on the ground organizing while preparing your swing at the range. We should all be talking politics as much as possible whenever possible (within social reason). You never know who DOESN'T know.
2) What a great idea to have a Hitchcock Film Festival on the side of the garage!
Truth,
Truthfully, I'm too disappointed that they are only NOW stating the truth about Bush's rosey glasses. They needed to stand up and be heard well back in October and September last year. Now, they have let the murderer go on for another 4 years when before this they could have held him accountable and help all of us and the world too.
Clinton slams Guantánamo
By Lionel Barber and Paul Taylor in New York
Published: June 19 2005
Bill Clinton has become the most prominent figure so far to add his voice to criticisms of the US prison camp at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba.
In an interview with the Financial Times, the former president called for the camp, set up to hold suspected terrorists, to “be closed down or cleaned up”.
continue~
http://news.ft.com/cms/s/9189fb54-e0f1-11d9-a3fb-00000e2511c8.html
McCain disputes Cheney on Iraq
Senator calls on White House to stop predicting successes
Sunday, June 19, 2005
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Sen. John McCain disagreed Sunday with Vice President Dick Cheney's assertion that the insurgency in Iraq is in its "last throes," and called on the Bush administration to stop telling Americans victory is around the corner.
"What I think we should do," McCain told NBC's "Meet the Press," "is wait until we achieve the successes, then celebrate them, rather than predict them. Because too often that prediction is not proven to be true."
In an interview on CNN's "Larry King Live" that aired last week, Cheney said he expected the war would end during Bush's second term, which ends in 2009.
"The level of activity that we see today from a military standpoint, I think, will clearly decline," Cheney said. "I think they're in the last throes, if you will, of the insurgency." (Full story)
Asked Sunday whether he agreed with the comment, McCain replied, "No, but I do believe that there are some signs which can be viewed as hopeful."
Read more... http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/06/19/mccain/index.html
Posted by: sparrow at June 19, 2005 08:23 PM
Hi Sparrow!!!!
Are you home?? I bet you had a GREAT time, huh!
Missed you.
Hey, I LOVED your reporting on the Rainbow Coalition/Push Convention. We could feel your energy. Can't wait to hear more.
Well, you know how it is. People were scared of terrorists and scared of going to hell last year.
Maybe they are waking up to the fact that we are already in hell with this administration leading us, and the "terrorists" are under their noses.
So, the cowards coasted into another year at the expense of the electorate. Now the tide is turning a bit, and they cut bait and run. Throwing kindling on the fire. Some "leadership".
~ ~ ** ~ ~
Anyway, I am ready to give 'em hell this week. I hope we have some good projects awaiting us.
Toolmaker got me fired up:
"The Downing street memo....print the damn thing. Make posters out of it. Make placemats out of it. Make bumper stickers... "Have you read your memo today?" Hand out buttons, make commercials..Memo today, Invasion tommorow. Make it the centerpiece of the Evening news."
~snip~
TAKE the Damn room. Take a Room, invite the press, Invite worldwide press, and initiate impeachment proceedings to remove this administration before even worse damage is done.
~snip~
Posted by: Toolmaker at June 19, 2005 05:33 PM
Besides which I have just had ENOUGH.
In a Military Stronghold, a War Hawk Circles Back By Paul Richter Times Staff Writer
Sun Jun 19, 7:55 AM ET
JACKSONVILLE, N.C. — With its sprawling military bases and huge population of military retirees, eastern North Carolina has believed in the Iraq war, and sacrificed for it, like few other regions.
But as summer heat has settled over the piney lowlands in recent days, a debate has unexpectedly come to life about a U.S. mission that is two years old and counting.
New doubts and divisions have come into view.
It started this month, when Republican Rep. Walter B. Jones, an original supporter of the war, said he had lost confidence in the effort and would sponsor legislation calling on the administration to more clearly define how, and when, it intended to bring the war to a close.
Coming from the staunch conservative who renamed French fries "freedom fries" on congressional menus, the announcement shocked many.
Back home, his change of heart brought denunciations and stirred trouble for Jones within his local Republican Party.
But it also became clear that others in North Carolina's 3rd Congressional District were uneasy about the war, for one reason or another.
Service members' families, watching violence surge, fear it will drag on indefinitely. Others worry it is damaging the military — or that it has been prosecuted foolishly.
Jones "was right to go after the administration," said retired Marine Col. Jim Van Riper, a veteran of Vietnam and Desert Storm who supported the U.S. presence in Iraq but faulted the war plan. "Rumsfeld and the neo-cons have fouled it up from the beginning."
The debate is occurring in a place where support for the military is apparent to the most casual visitor. The highways around Jacksonville, near the entrance to the Marines' huge Camp Lejeune, are lined with car dealerships, military surplus stores, barber shops and other businesses festooned with American flags. Signs urge Americans: "Honk for the Troops" and "Pray for Our Heroes."
As tobacco farming has declined in recent decades, the military has become more important as a part of the local economy. About 60,000 retirees live in the 3rd District, which in addition to Camp Lejeune is home to the Marine Corps Air Station in Cherry Point, Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, and New River Marine Corps Air Station.
But these days, residents' anxieties, as well as their pride, are near the surface.
In the steamy parking lot of Jacksonville's Wal-Mart, Christy May, the wife of a Marine serving in Iraq, loads plastic summertime toys for her kids into the trunk of her car. She said she thought it would be a mistake to set a fixed time for withdrawal.
"History shows that it wouldn't make sense for us to walk away all of a sudden," said May, 42, of Jacksonville.
But she also acknowledges that she and her husband, a supply and logistics specialist, are split over whether the United States should be there at all. May is particularly anxious on this day, because her husband told her that insurgents had blown up his unit's communications hardware, forcing the Marines to travel by ground convoy rather than in aircraft. "I'm really worried about him today," she said.
Nearby, Kerri Hassell of Jacksonville, a 32-year-old single mother of three, said she was worried about the effect the war had on a number of close friends who were Marines, including one who was godfather to her children. She said she knew three young Marines who were about to leave the service. All have doubts about continuing the war, she said.
"Every one wants it to end," said Hassell, a community college student with a hairdressing business. "They don't know why they're over there."
In her view, "the government uses the word 'terror' and it just sends us all into a frenzy."
At the same time, the many in the area who support a continued U.S. effort have been outspoken, and the debate has seeped into local levels of government.
Joe McLaughlin, a former Army Ranger who sits on the Onslow County Board of Commissioners, has proposed having the county board officially declare its opposition to a fixed withdrawal date. He is pressing to have the board vote on the issue at a meeting Monday.
"The worst thing we can do is to announce that we're going to pull out by a certain date," said McLaughlin.
Tuesday, McLaughlin called for Jones to resign his post over his proposal; later in the week, he reconsidered and withdrew that request.
McLaughlin's stance split the county commissioners. The board's chairman, Lionell Midgett, argued that picking a fight with Jones could backfire when the area needed federal money for dredging a wetland or help in fighting a proposal to cut back military facilities.
Martin Aragona Sr., the county Republican chairman, said he had been polling members of a key party committee to decide how to respond to Jones' proposal. He said all those he'd reached wanted to take a position strongly opposing Jones. "This is not the time to be second-guessing the commander in chief," Aragona said.
Retired Army Maj. Gen. Hugh R. Overholt, who practices law in nearby New Bern, describes himself as a strong supporter of Jones who "has some concerns" about setting a fixed date for withdrawing from Iraq.
But Overholt, a former judge advocate general of the Army, said he was concerned about what the fight had been doing to the military, both the reserves and the active-duty force.
"I'm very concerned about our force," he said. The administration should do what's required and "get it over as soon as possible."
The signs of anxiety in North Carolina's military heartland come at a time when national polls suggest that more Americans are turning against the war as the insurgency flares and costs to taxpayers show little sign of abating.
Meanwhile, a U.S. Congress that has been reluctant to challenge the administration on the war is suddenly pressing for answers. Jones was joined last week by a bipartisan group in favor of a proposal that would require the White House to submit a plan for withdrawal by the end of the year and to begin troop reductions by October 2006.
In some ways, Jones' own history shows what makes the issue so tough for people in his district.
The son of a 14-term House member, Jones has built his congressional career in large part on advocacy for the military. He voted to authorize the war, displays pictures of the dead outside his Capitol Hill office, and has written condolence letters to the families of hundreds of service members. The anguish of the families was a major reason he turned against the war.
"After 2 1/2 years, it's right to take a fresh look," he told reporters Thursday. "We have a right to ask, 'What are the goals?' "
The doubts are part of the discussion in other parts of Jones' district, including the resorts on the Outer Banks of North Carolina, an area that includes many wealthy areas and newcomers from the North. Sometimes, arguments here head in a different direction.
Jack Ubert, a retiree from Amityville, N.Y., who owns a home on the beach in well-off Emerald Island, N.C., admires Jones for "taking a pretty tough stance." Yet he fears that in the end the United States will "probably not win anything" from the Iraq fight — "like in Vietnam."
"Saddam deserves whatever he gets," said Ubert, but added: "I was never sure why we had to go in there and dictate to them. It's just like with nuclear weapons: We think we're the only ones who should have them. We want to make all the rules."
The debate is intensifying in North Carolina, as it is in other parts of the country.
"Members are hearing more from people who are patriotic and really want to see this thing turn out right, but are worried about how long it's going to go on," said Rep. Jim Kolbe (news, bio, voting record) (R-Ariz.). "They don't see that light at the end of the tunnel."
Some congressional strategists said that while they still didn't expect large numbers of Republicans to break with the president over the war, there was a palpable nervousness as members looked to next year's midterm elections and worried that opinion might be shifting.
Lawmakers want the administration to lay out specific goals they can point to as a way to reassure uneasy constituents, said one Republican strategist.
"You're hearing from some members, 'We don't know what these [upcoming] milestones and markers are,' " said David Winston, a GOP pollster who advised the congressional Republican leader. What they are seeking is "not so much an exit strategy, but the sequence of things that are going to move us closer to safety and security."
While the public's deepening pessimism is beyond dispute, it is not clear whether the country has reached a turning point, as it did with the Vietnam War in 1968.
Andrew Kohut, director of the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, said polls were showing that people were paying close attention to developments in Iraq, and that the number of people who preferred withdrawal was steadily rising.
"What I see in Iraq is a steady drip, drip, drip of eroding support for the war as the casualties mount and the instability continues," Kohut said.
Yet he noted that Pew research showed that 52% said the troops should stay, and he said the polls could still move in a more favorable direction. Other polls are more pessimistic.
"I don't think opinion is entrenched," Kohut said. "There is still a public capacity to rethink Iraq."
In North Carolina, public opinion is anything but entrenched. Andrew deGrandpré, city editor of the Daily News of Jacksonville, said that although the city's bonds with the military made it distinctive, the sentiments resembled the uneasy national conversation.
"I think deep down this place is a lot like any other in America, and people have been debating the war and the human cost that's being paid," DeGrandpré said. "Nobody wants to back out … but these questions are out there."
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050620/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iran_elections
Vote-Rigging Feared in Iran Election
Excerpt:
Bush denounced the election a day before voting, saying it was designed to maintain power in the hands of an unelected few who denied ballot access to more than 1,000 potential candidates. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice repeated that criticism Sunday, noting that women were not allowed on the ballot.
"I just don't see the Iranian elections as being a serious attempt to move Iran closer to a democratic future," she said on ABC's "This Week."
My query: How would they know what a rigged election looked like unless they had previously participated in a rigged election and knew what to look for...???
Hello All,
First of all, I hope all the fathers and father-figures had a good day and were sufficiently honored for their contributions.
Today we met ABQ John and his sons. John is a great dad-type--a twinkle in the eye, and a wide scope of attention, all the while noting everything they say...
We went to the FDR Memorial and the Vietnam Wall, along with Mark Brisky--both were moving remnders of how our country has had vision and solved problems, and how we have also made terrible mistakes and caused more problems than we have solved.
We saw many notes to lost fathers at the Wall. Some of these were heart-breaking--photos of graduations and weddings and grandchildren never seen..."I HATE WAR", FDR said, and we could not imagine our current president thinking it, much less saying it.
Tonight we went out to dinner with my parents. My Dad is 82 and he moves slowly these days, but he still has a twinkle in his eye, and a wide scope of attention, and he listens to what we say...
At the end of the day--now--I want to conclude this comment with a note to my husband, the father of two beautiful girls, the step-father of one wonderful boy, and the father of the Kerry-Edwards blog and the DCP, initiator, innovator, co-parent, and supporter of truth and justice:
Happy Father's Day to the man who is simply, my hero.
Karen
Am excited you met ABQ John and say "hello Coyote" to Mark Brisky if you see him!
I saw my uncle, who is so like my dad, & so politically aware now. We've come full circle from the days when I lived there the summer after high school & we agreed on everything!
I'm off to North Dakota in the morning and if all goes well, might get to see Truth Will Prevail.
& I'll also go to my father's grave.
Happy Father's Day to Dick also. I would like to wish my husband Ken a Happy Father's Day. I know I can't reach him, as he, my son and friends are out in the yard having their Alfred Hitchcock film festival! Happy Father's Day to my friend Bert (Mpls Vets for Peace), as this is the lst time I'd met his 2 sons & what a great family!
I meant to say DISagreed with everything, re my uncle (Vietnam era)
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050619/ap_on_re_us/sexual_literacy
Groups Gather for Human Sexuality Summit
Norman Solomon | The Killing Street Memo
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/061705K.shtml
Public Broadcasting Funds May Be Halved
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/061705N.shtml
P.S. Don't forget to call your representative and let them know your views about cutting funding for PBS. I know the news part is going heavily conservative, but kids need the educational programming.....
Hi DiAnne, Karen, Truth Shall Prevail, everyone -- :)
I've been busy and haven't had an opportunity to post lately, but I just wanted to say that on holidays I often have a lonely type feeling, but tonight I was reading your messages and they were so warm and so familiar and so wonderful and it just made me feel ~good~ (for lack of a better word). :) I know I may sound nutty, but this feels much like a family in many ways and I love hearing the simple, yet special, news like how Karen spent the day, or DiAnne's family watching movies on the garage (I love Hitchcock films!!!). Anyway - I loved seeing the updates on how you guys are doing....stay well, safe, and have a great week! :)