The Image Makers. Assigned to propagate politics and expand monopolies.

This is the historical stock prices of CCU (a Texas based company) - the history of Clear Channel Communcations reached an all time high in stock prices in the year 2000. But the most interesting aspect of the influence of Bush's FCC is the return of dividends to stockholders after this company became the Bush/Cheney/Powell darling.



The fines by the FCC of CBS was simple vicious by Powell to leverage over CBS and any other media service when he realized 'granting favors' didn't necessarily mean having control.

...The flash of flesh had been so fleeting that many viewers weren't sure of what they had seen until it was confirmed by newspaper, radio and Internet accounts the next day. Others wanted to get a second look. This half-time show instantly became the most-replayed television segment ever on the millions of TiVo digital video recorders.
At the Federal Communications Commission, then-Chairman Michael Powell was outraged. (click here) The following morning he got on the phone with Mel Karmazin, then the chief operating officer at CBS. Powell expected better of what was once dubbed the nation's "Tiffany Network."
Ten days earlier, after the expenditure of considerable effort and energy on the part of Powell, Viacom (CBS's corporate parent at the time) had been freed from having to divest ownership of several local broadcast stations thanks to legislation allowing networks to own stations constituting up to 39 percent of the country's television viewership. The provision had been attached to a budget bill signed by President Bush.
"CBS deeply regrets the incident that occurred during the Super Bowl halftime show," Karmazin said in a statement. "We attended all rehearsals throughout the week, and there was no indication that any such thing would happen." Yet happen it did, and spokespeople for CBS, for MTV, for Jackson and for Timberlake spent the next several days blaming each other for what did happen.
A presidential election has come and gone, and there is a new chairman at the FCC and new top officials at CBS. Thanks to the Timberlake-Jackson incident, indecency fines were raised 10-fold in a law Bush signed in June 2006. Also, CBS has been split off from MTV, which remains part of Viacom Inc., now a separate company from the broadcaster....


"Clear Channel (click here) will do anything they can, threaten me, go to my clients directly, anything to get control of the markets. . . . They're a clear example of what can happen with deregulation. They've ruined radio, as far as I'm concerned. And now they're licking their chops to be able to control more of what the public sees and hears." – An anonymous ad agency owner, Salon.com, Feb. 19, 2003 (click here)






...There is a chain of human sympathy against suffering in the world which goes something like this: If a steamroller were headed straight for a Labrador retriever, a human baby, a member of the Swedish bikini team, Karl Rove, and an iguana, and you could save all but one of these people/creatures, which would you sentence to a future as an organic pancake? It’s a tough call, of course, but all an iguana eats is leafy vegetables, whereas Karl Rove will steal your soul and send your children to die in Iraq. (Besides, he wasn’t very interested in saving much of anything when Katrina steamrolled the Gulf Coast.)...(click here)

The image making of Karl Rove is infamous. It entailed daily dispatches from the President's assistant to media, the infrastructure of the Bush Administration and personal visits to nearly anyplace within the government structure to control the Bush image, expand the influence of media in promoting Republican candidates thoughout the country and simply be a burden to any 'entity' that wasn't a political party asset. Karl Rove was a power broker. He was given free rein to do as he pleased with the infrastructure of the USA government and his 'image agenda' was facilitated by more power brokering by Michael Powell at the FCC.

Rove's goal was/is to great a Republican haven from sea to shining sea and Powell's was to facilitate that reality no matter what it took.

That is abuse of government. Abuse of power. However one wants to put it. Bush and Cheney allowed 'tinkering' within the infrastructure of the USA government to promote the Republican Party without consideration of laws or understood proprieties by the American people. This administration threw ethics out the door and sought to override any decency of moral conduct not legislated. In other words, where laws didn't exist because it was unconscionable to venture into improprietized power brokering, this administration did it freely, with complete conscious and with the permission of their Christian Right extremists to make the USA their privatized nation and holy glory wagon.

Any level of government relies on the moral character of elected officials to carry out business of government. It is impossible to legislate ever aspect of behavior of any official. Due to that fact administrations that are moralless, as the Bush administration is, can be harnessed for 'free will' authority to dismantle the USA Constitution. The checks and balance built into the Constitution is supposed to stop it's own demise at the hand of corruption.

No laws again? The Bush/Cheney White House is a fain for offending the decency of the USA where weak or absent statutes lie.

Patrick Fitzgerald

It started with : “The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa .”

Ms. Valerie Plame and Ambassador Joseph Wilson are still waiting for the country to exert legislative power to change the reality of this 'imbalance' of power.

What I Didn't Find in Africa (click here)

By JOSEPH C. WILSON 4TH
Published: July 6, 2003
Did the Bush administration manipulate intelligence about Saddam Hussein's weapons programs to justify an invasion of Iraq?
Based on my experience with the administration in the months leading up to the war, I have little choice but to conclude that some of the intelligence related to Iraq's nuclear weapons program was twisted to exaggerate the Iraqi threat....

This editorial was another item swept under the Bush/Cheney White House by outing a CIA agent in political retribution. There isn't anything else to say. The Cheney office was intent on invading Iraq. They outed Plame. This was a purely political act and Richard Cheney blatantly stood in ridicule of the USA Constitution to insure his poitical standing. There was no law to stop a highly manipulative Vice President and his staff to mount a dogmatic attack on a very valuable CIA agent. Nothing was to stop the Iraq War and the Cheney Executive Office would insure it. This act coming of the Veep's office is conclusive evidence of the intent of Cheney to engage in an oil war, to protect himself from the anger of Halliburton stockholders. His priorities are directly involved here. To simple to see.

And the pardon alone indicates Bush gave permission to all that resulted.

Opinion The Growing Politicization of America's Intelligence Services (click here)

Valerie Plame Wilson Thu Oct 25, 9:47 PM ET
Now on the fourth day of my book tour for Fair Game and I am delighted because I have been given abundant opportunity to discuss something I feel passionately about: the politicization of our intelligence services. There has been an increasing trend to allow politics to spill over into the world of intelligence and I believe that it degrades the intelligence mission, its product, and is detrimental to our national security. Americans of all political stripes want to know that whatever intelligence lands on the president's desk is devoid of ideological taint and political pressure. As we now know, Vice President Cheney and his then Chief of Staff Scooter Libby made an unprecedented number of visits to CIA Headquarters in the run-up to the Iraq war to meet with analysts. Apparently, the vice president kept asking the same questions until he began to hear the answers he wanted. Although there might not have been overt pressure to slant intelligence toward the administration's stance on Iraq and its perceived WMD threat, the very fact that the vice president had taken time out of his day, come into Headquarters and asked a certain line of questions invisibly and insidiously has the effect of conveying a high level of dissatisfaction with what the CIA has already produced. CIA analysts are not dumb....

Bush uniquely selective with pardons (click here)
By: Andrew Glass

Oct 9, 2007 08:23 PM EST

Over the years, the courts have checked the executive power of nearly every president, including George W. Bush. But in devising an interlocking web of checks and balances, the Framers also gave presidents a powerful tool to check the courts: the power to pardon offenders. Bush has used this power in both a stingy and a haughty way.
The Constitution gives presidents the “power to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, except in cases of impeachment.” A reprieve — like the one Bush issued in July to I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, the former vice presidential honcho — reduces the severity of a punishment without removing the guilt. A full pardon erases both. (Technically, what Bush did is known as a “remission,” since he eliminated Libby’s prison sentence in its entirety.)...

Time to impeach, then convict Bush (click here)

George W. Bush has done what no power on Earth could do -- brought our country to its knees. The American spirit is low. People are shaking their heads and asking what has happened to such a great nation. One federal initiative after another has gone wrong.
Bush's unnecessary attack on Iraq was a colossal mistake unrivaled in American history.
Never before have we attacked a sovereign nation for such unsubstantiated reasons. His poor judgment has caused death, injury and untold misery for millions upon millions of people. For what?
Our meddling has only made us more enemies. World opinion of our country has plummeted to an all-time low.
The whole initiative was based upon slanted information at best and, at worst, lies....

Just because there 'seem's to be a gap in USA law when atrocities occur, doesn't mean people can't be held for the occurrence.

The Bush/Cheney Executive Branch dismissed The Geneva Conventions. They then sought to be pandered to by the United Nations as the anarchic Iraq was abandoned for containment of the USA. It is arguable the atrocities of Bush and Cheney at the cost of the people within Iraq, even today, are facilitated by other nations to encapsule the USA in an unwinnable war until the people to the USA come to their senses. But, either way, many nation's globally have made huge strides in nuclear capacity as well as national wealth while allowing the USA to flounder in Iraq and come to it's own demise under an Executive Branch more intent on the politics of the day rather than the reality of their complete and absolute blunders.

If Bush and Cheney were removed from office either through impeachment or resignation, it would have reopened the possibility of international reassessment of the best outcome of the Iraqi people. But, with Neocons at the helm of the military might of the USA, there was no choice by any other nation than to allow containment in an endless war.

CBS wins Peabody for Abu Ghraib report (click here)
Producer was later fired; 'Daily Show' also wins
NEW YORK - CBS News won a Peabody Award on Thursday for its report on abuse at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, a story anchored by Dan Rather and produced by Mary Mapes, who was later fired by CBS for her role in the story about President Bush’s military service.....

There were deaths at Abu Ghraib. Deaths. Yet, the Bush Executive Branch walked way clean as whistle.

US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld came under fire on August 24, 2004 from a high-level inquiry into the Abu Ghraib prison scandal but a U.S. military judge ruled he did not have to testify at a trial arising from the abuse of Iraqi prisoners. A four-member panel headed by former Defense Secretary James Schlesinger(L) issued a report accusing the chain of command from Rumsfeld down of leadership failures that created conditions for the abuse late last year that sparked anti-American outrage across the world. Panel members Schlesinger Air Force General Charles Horner(C) and Former U.S. Representative Tillie Fowler are seen at the Pentagon Tuesday. [AP Photo]

Along a prison walkway, a hooded detainee seems to havecollapsed with his wrists handcuffed to the railings.

Abuse Of Iraqi POWs By GIs Probed (click here)
60 Minutes II Has Exclusive Report On Alleged Mistreatment
April 28, 2004

(CBS) Last month, the U.S. Army announced 17 soldiers in Iraq, including a brigadier general, had been removed from duty after charges of mistreating Iraqi prisoners. But the details of what happened have been kept secret, until now. It turns out photographs surfaced showing American soldiers abusing and humiliating Iraqis being held at a prison near Baghdad. The Army investigated, and issued a scathing report. Now, an Army general and her command staff may face the end of long military careers. And six soldiers are facing court martial in Iraq -- and possible prison time. Correspondent Dan Rather talks to one of those soldiers. And, for the first time, 60 Minutes II will show some of the pictures that led to the Army investigation....

CBS broke the story to the public after having allowed the Executive Branch time to digest it and while waiting for a response. None came. The nation again turned to 'cleaning up the mess of Bush's Executive Branch, circumventing the demands of the USA Constitution for impeachment due to high crimes and misdemeanors' and all Schlesinger could do was stipulate there were no policy issues or laws broken.

That is more than outrageous. People died in a prison overseen by the USA with it's own military after taking occupation of Iraq, illegally at that, and there was absolutely no way of holding those in the Executive Branch accountable?

There is no decency in this Executive Branch or with Republican legislators. None. The 'idea' Iraqis died for no reason, when they should have been treated humanly and taught justice without torture and intimidation has lead to more than hatred of the military occupation of the USA.

"There was sadism on the night shift at Abu Ghraib, sadism that was certainly not authorized," Schlesinger said. "It was kind of 'Animal House' on the night shift.

Schlesinger noted, however, that there was "no policy of abuse."

Bush's Spying Hits Americans Abroad

Bush Lets U.S. Spy on Callers Without Courts (click here)
...Under a presidential order signed in 2002, the intelligence agency has monitored the international telephone calls and international e-mail messages of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people inside the United States without warrants over the past three years in an effort to track possible "dirty numbers" linked to Al Qaeda, the officials said. The agency, they said, still seeks warrants to monitor entirely domestic communications....

The New York Times broke the story regarding a direct assault on the American people by the Bush White House and it has remained a complete and absolute insult to the ability of the Intelligence Departments of this country.

The USA has retreated into 'picking up' after Bush and Cheney messes lead by the former majority judiciary Chair Senator Arlen Spector. It's treason. Bush and Cheney cry about having to face securing the USA without adequate laws. Yet, immediately after September 11, 2001 there were three laws passed to allow greater control of the circumstances of the USA. Through political intimidation, as a nation looked for a president that would stop al Qaeda, the Policy of Pre-Emption was passed, along with two other disasterous legislation. Yet, there was no insight by Bush and Cheney regarding FISA? Sure there wasn't.:

December 20, 2005 (click here)
"The fat's in the fire," Mr. Specter said. "This is going to be a big, big issue. There's a lot of indignation across the country, from what I see."

December 23, 2007 (click here)
...Congressional aides from both parties said Thursday that their leaders were weighing a number of options for further inquiries into the matter. In the Senate, Mr. Specter and Mr. Roberts were said to be talking with Senator Bill Frist of Tennessee, the Republican leader, about a possible division of labor between their committees. But they said it was unlikely that any hearings would be held until Congress convenes again in late January....

December 31, 2007 (click here)
...Questions about the surveillance operation are likely to be central to a Congressional hearing planned by Senator Arlen Specter, the Pennsylvania Republican who heads the Judiciary Committee. Mr. Specter, like some other Republicans and many Democrats in Congress, has voiced deep concerns about the program and Mr. Bush's legal authority to bypass the courts to order domestic wiretaps without warrants....

January 12, 2007 (click here)
...Senator Arlen Specter, a Pennsylvania Republican and the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, has scheduled open hearings, and the Senate Intelligence Committee has said it plans closed hearings.
The president's legal justification for the N.S.A. program has gotten mixed reviews, ranging from enthusiastic to skeptical to scathing.
This week, Representative Jane Harman of California, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, released a 14-page legal analysis she had requested from a former C.I.A. general counsel, Jeffrey H. Smith, now a Washington lawyer.
Although recognizing the president's assertion that his power as commander in chief justifies warrantless surveillance, Mr. Smith called that case "weak" in light of the language and documented purpose of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978, which requires warrants.
Mr. Smith also wrote that the Congressional resolution authorizing military force against those who carried out the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks "does not, in my view, justify warrantless electronic surveillance of United States persons in the United States."
"The president was correct in concluding that many of our laws were not adequate to deal with this new threat," Mr. Smith wrote. "He was wrong, however, to conclude that he is therefore free to follow the laws he agrees with and ignore those with which he disagrees."

March 8, 2006 (click here)
G.O.P. Senators Say Accord Is Set on Wiretapping
WASHINGTON, March 7 — Moving to tamp down Democratic calls for an investigation of the administration's domestic eavesdropping program, Republicans on the Senate Intelligence Committee said Tuesday that they had reached agreement with the White House on proposed bills to impose new oversight but allow wiretapping without warrants for up to 45 days....
...It is not clear whether all the Republican critics will back the deal. Senator Arlen Specter, the Pennsylvania Republican who is chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, has said Congress should seek a court ruling on the legitimacy of the program in addition to new oversight.
In a separate Senate committee hearing on Tuesday, Mr. Specter said, "We're having quite a time in getting responses to questions as to what has happened with the electronic surveillance program."
He said he put the administration "on notice" he might seek to block its financing if Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales did not give more information.
Mr. Specter said in statement later that he hoped for a solution that would avoid resorting to such an extreme action.

April 1, 2005 (click here)
...Senator Arlen Specter, Republican of Pennsylvania and chairman of the committee, insisted on a serious inquiry into the censure proposal. And Mr. Specter made no secret that he relished another chance to raise questions about the secret wiretapping program, run by the National Security Agency, noting that his committee had held four hearings on the subject.
"I thought they would attract more attention," he said.
Several Republicans argued that whatever the legal status of the spying program, it did not deserve punishment because, unlike Nixon, Mr. Bush had acted in good faith....

So, in a very short period of time, Bush and Cheney with the cooperation of Hayden, spy ILLEGALLY on the American people. There is FISA. It states clearly the conditions for wiretapping to prevent invasion of privacy. The Bush/Cheney administration deliberately breaks the law and then terrifies the USA into giving up it's own Constitution through a party so corrupt on it's intent to 'deal power and might' that there is no choice but for Americans to let their spine slip in accepting the criminality in the White House for the sake of their own security. This act, by Spector and the majority Republicans set the stage for a 'mind think' in the populous of the USA that is corrupt, biased and highly judgemental. Today the 'political mind speak' reverberates in words of justified corruption. When the Executive Branch should have been facing impeachment, they were met with a party willing to place the Constitution as a 'figure head' to what they now call democracy while taking away precious freedoms of the American people. It's outrageous and unconscionable. Arlen Spector's march into hell was amazing to witness.

March 6, 2006 (click here)
...Mr. Specter then loyally produced a bill that actually grants legal cover, retroactively, to the one spying program Mr. Bush has acknowledged. It also covers any other illegal wiretapping we don't know about — including, it appears, entire "programs" that could cover hundreds, thousands or millions of unknowing people.
Mr. Specter's bill at least offers the veneer of judicial oversight from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. A far more noxious proposal being floated by Senator Mike DeWine, Republican of Ohio, would entirely remove intelligence gathering related to terrorism from the law on spying, known as the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act....

Spying on Americans (click here)
Sunday, December 18, 2005; Page B06
IN THE WAKE of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the New York Times reported last week, President Bush authorized the National Security Agency to conduct electronic surveillance of hundreds of U.S. citizens and residents suspected of contact with al Qaeda figures -- without warrants and outside the strictures of the law that governs national security searches and wiretaps. The rules here are not ambiguous. Generally speaking, the NSA has not been permitted to operate domestically. And the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) requires that national security wiretaps be authorized by the secretive FISA court. "A person is guilty of an offense," the law reads, "if he intentionally . . . engages in electronic surveillance under color of law except as authorized by statute" -- which appears, at least on its face, to be precisely what the president has authorized.
Mr. Bush, in his weekly radio address yesterday, defended his action, chastised the media for revealing it, and suggested both that Congress had justified this step by authorizing force against al Qaeda and that such spying was consistent with the "constitutional authority vested in me as commander in chief." But there is a reason the CIA and the NSA are not supposed to operate domestically: The tools of foreign intelligence are not consistent with a democratic society....

The Downing Street Memo...

...resulted in a baseless invasion into Iraq of which was stated recently by David Grange, "...we did Iraq 'on the cheap'..." His statement was made following the annoucement by the World Court stipulating Blackwater would be investigated for human rights abuses in the unwarranted killing of innocent iraqis. Blackwater to date states it has all it's shootings recorded 'in the record.' Did anyone count their bullets and their guns? No. Then what are they offering as defense to the statement they can account for all their shootings?

WMD were never found by David Kay. They were never discovered by the UN Inspectors prior to the invasion. They were never there. Ever. No ability to reconstitute any nuclear capacity. Nothing. The munition bunkers of Saddam Hussein which could have easily caused another war, at the time of invasion were still locked and sealed by flimsy UN wire seals. It was the USA military that recklessly removed the seals for the press to view.

We never belonged in Iraq.

We don't still.

Still yet another 'Bush Imposed' policy that is supposed to be welcome by the Shi'ite authority in Baghdad. There is no way. There is no trust between Sunnis and Shi'ites and why? Because the streets of Baghdad belong to the Shi'ites. They have removed Sunnis from neighborhoods in a methodical fashion only to face the return of Sunnis? You gotten be joking here. The Shi'ites are more in fear of retribution for the removal of Sunnis from Baghdad neighborhoods today then when Saddam was in power. There ain't no way, peace between the ethnicities will culminate in a family picture in front of the USA Embassy. No way. The Partitioning of Iraq into provinces will ensure 'boundary lines of hate and mistrust.' It will end the violence between the ethnicities long enough from them to have two generations pass before they will cooperate as a country again. Two generations will have to pass (40 years) before the ethnic divide of Sunnis, Shi'ites and Kurds will begin to heal. Two. Two generations of peaceful divide, before a truce will ever manifest in that country.

Iraq Hampers U.S. Bid to Widen Sunni Police Role (click here)
...But now that the Americans are trying to institutionalize the arrangement by training the Sunnis to become police officers, the effort has been hampered by halfhearted support and occasionally outright resistance from a Shiite-dominated national government that is still inclined to see the Sunnis as a once and future threat....

Sorry, if there is overuse of The New York Times archives but it's quick and easy and their archives are extensive.

Funding for the Iraq War.

What funding?

The troops have to be redeployed out of Iraq to facilitate a reduction in fire power. The rebuilding of the holy lands of Islam will ensue when neighboring countries can help supply materials to the craftsmen left in Iraq. The religion of the people must be returned to them as soon as possible. It is my demand that if the USA is to assist Iraq from now forward, it will by proxy through the support of other nations. The USA has done such extensive damage to that country and pending determination regarding genocide of multi-faceted dimensions that any relationship between Iraq and the USA should be banned while support is provided through trust funds placed in Saudi Arabia, Kurdistan and through the UN while humanitarian aid is distributed through Iran.


On War Funding, Democrats Have a Day of Disagreement (click here)
Three prominent Congressional Democrats on Tuesday sought to step up criticism of the White House over the rising cost of the Iraq war. The chairman of the House Appropriations Committee said that he would block President Bush's request for nearly $200 billion in supplemental financing for war operations, and that the government should levy a war surtax to cover costs....

I have yet to understand how we allowed George Walker Bush the right to state, “The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa .”; while looking the other way at a memo that literally indicts the Bush/Cheney White House of treason to commit high crimes and misdemeanors while abusing the military powers of the USA to run wars for profit in closed contracts to cronies. People have died in large number in Iraq. They have been refugeed. They suffer more today at the hand of the USA's inability to rebuild and return fuction to medical facilities while the people of Iraq wallow in poverty. And we are all supposed to look the other way when Republican candidates and presidential hopefuls state the USA will continue it's presence in Iraq? You've got to be joking !




The Downing Street Memo, July 2002:
There was a perceptible shift in attitude. Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy.

Life in the USA is not supposed to be a trick or treat. The USA is supposed to have clear paths and ultimate goals that lead to resolve of problems, not, demonstrations of power to intimidate into fear nations of people. This is a Halloween tribute to the Trickery of the George Walker Bush Administration.

It's Sunday Night

"Immaculate Deception" by Black Sabbath

In The Daylight, Comes Darkness, On The Verge Of
Night A Fear Is Born,

Sweeter Than The Dream, The Reality Of You,
Immaculate, Deception.

From The Spirit Runs Poison, And The Wheel Of
Fortune Is Ever Still,

Sweeter Than The Light, The Darkness Of Your Soul,
Immaculate, Deception.

Something Has Touched, The Spirit Inside,
Once There Was Love Now There's A Void.

Night Of Deception, Ghost In My Mind,
Am I Bewitched, Slave To Desire.

It's Knowing That Time Keeps Rolling On, Night After
Day, Day After Night,

It's Knowing That Feeling Of Coming Home, To Where
My Spirit Lies.

It's Knowing That Feeling Of Coming Home, To Where
My Spirit Lies.

I won't be back online until the early hours of Monday morning. Probably around 1 AM or so.

I value all those that come to visit this blog and especially those that do on a regular basis. I'll tell you how much I value all of the readers, I rarely miss an opportunity to communicate on a regular basis. It has a priority. Okay?

On several occassions I have referred to a sister of mine that has a brain tumor. She was diagnosed 23 years ago. That is just amazing to realize the 'perfected' care she has received all those years to realize she still lives on her own and communicates clearly with as good a cognition as anyone else.

She does have brain injury from the past surgeries and radiation and as a result she tends to see life differently. She never obsesses about her illness and tends to deny it. She doesn't like to be confronted with her tumor on a regular basis and our parents, although much older, chronically obsess over it. Do to that fact she distances herself from the family.

I call her, just to chat, regularly. She rarely returns calls because she feels any information shared with the family leads to more questions of which she could not care less she has answers to give us. But, in the past two weeks she has returned my calls. Her birthday is today and I think she feels a little lonesome for the only sister she values as a support to her view of life without a tumor presence.

So.

I am traveling about 4 hours to visit with her today, take her to dinner and a show, then to return to my purpose here which is to return the country I love back it's reputation and grandeur with safety to citizens, including environmental and conservation morality, and economic goals that are mostly motivated in local initatives including enhancing education.

I intend to pursue a short Halloween dialogue on the misdirection of our nation and the way ahead to 'take back our country.'

Until then...

Morning Papers - It's Origins

The Rooster
"Okeydoke"

An Anti-Cyclonic Vortex could become a major storm - 12 hour loop

This NOAA satellite image taken Saturday, October 27, 2007 at 2:15 PM EDT shows some clouds in the eastern Caribbean Sea associated with a tropical disturbance that has some chance for further development over the next few days. This area will continue to be monitored. (AP Photo/ Weather Underground)

Tropical depression forms in Atlantic (click here)
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
This NOAA satellite image taken Saturday, October 27, 2007 at 2:15 PM EDT shows some clouds in the eastern Caribbean Sea associated with a tropical disturbance that has some chance for further development over the next few days. This area will continue to be monitored. (AP Photo/ Weather Underground)
MIAMI -- The 16th tropical depression of the Atlantic hurricane season formed Saturday, prompting storm warnings in Haiti and a watch in Cuba.
Forecasters at the National Hurricane Center in Miami said the depression could bring 6 to 10 inches of rain to Hispaniola and slightly more rain to Jamaica and southeastern Cuba. If the depression becomes a tropical storm it would be named 'Noel.'
A tropical storm warning was in effect for the southwestern peninsula of Haiti from the Haiti-Dominican Republic border westward to Port-au-Prince, meaning tropical storm conditions are expected within the next 24 hours.
The government of Cuba also issued a tropical storm watch for the provinces of Granma, Santiago de Cuba and Guantanamo, meaning tropical storm conditions are possible, generally within 36 hours.
At 2 a.m., the storm was located about 185 miles south-southeast of Port-au-Prince, according to the National Hurricane Center. It was moving west-northwest near 7 mph. Maximum sustained winds were near 35 mph.
The depression was expected to move to the northwest over the next 24 hours, bringing the depression near the southwestern peninsula of Haiti on Sunday.
Forecasters added tropical storm conditions were possible along the south coast of the Dominican Republic from Barahona westward to the Haiti-Dominican Republic border. Rain of between 3 and 5 inches was expected over Puerto Rico during the next 24 hours, forecasters said.

October 28, 2007

0630z

UNISYS Water Vapor GOES East Satellite

A Middle East Peace is still long time in the offing. The issues over Jerusalem alone will take half a lifetime to resolve.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert (right) of Israel greeted Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas yesterday in Jericho, the first visit by an Israeli prime minister to Palestinian territory in seven years. "I am delighted to see you," Olmert said. The leaders met for three hours. (Omar Rashidi/Palestinian Press Office via Getty Images)

Seattle Post Intelligencer

Pakistan's Bhutto visits ancestral home
By STEPHEN GRAHAM
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
GARHI KHUDA BAKSH, Pakistan -- Former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto went to her ancestral village Saturday amid tight security and sprinkled flower petals on her father's tomb on her first trip to provincial Pakistan since the bloody assassination attempt against her nine days ago.
She vowed to fight Islamic extremism - a call that came as pro-Taliban militants in another corner of the country executed 13 captives in response to a military assault against their leader.
Bhutto returned on Oct. 18 from an eight-year exile to a massive welcome rally in Karachi, shattered by a suicide bombing that killed 143 people. She has since been largely confined to her residence in that city, but eager to start her campaign for parliamentary elections slated for January.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1104AP_Pakistan.html



Inside rebel Pakistan cleric's domain
By RIAZ KHAN
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
SWAT, Pakistan -- Long-haired militants with assault rifles and walkie-talkies guard the approach to the stronghold of Maulana Fazlullah, the radical cleric whose mission to spread fundamentalist Islam has provoked a bloody showdown with Pakistan's government.
Beyond the checkpoint, down a narrow track winding through orchards and by the clear blue waters of the Swat River, an Associated Press reporter was granted access to a sprawling seminary beyond state control, behind the new front line in Pakistan's faltering campaign against Islamic extremists.
Inside is a mosque and a maze of dozens of rooms, many still under construction. A shop sells audio cassettes of speeches by Fazlullah, who has earned the nickname "Mullah Radio" for his pirate FM broadcasts urging followers to wage holy war against America and its allies.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1104AP_Pakistan_Militant_Domain.html



Thousands call for swift end to Iraq war
By JASON DEAREN
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
SAN FRANCISCO -- Thousands of people called for a swift end to the war in Iraq as they marched through downtown on Saturday, chanting and carrying signs that read: "Wall Street Gets Rich, Iraqis and GIs Die" or "Drop Tuition Not Bombs."
The streets were filled with thousands as labor union members, anti-war activists, clergy and others rallied near City Hall before marching to Dolores Park.
As part of the demonstration, protesters fell on Market Street as part of a "die in" to commemorate the thousands of American soldiers and Iraqi citizens who have died since the conflict began in March 2003.
The protest was the largest in a series of war protests taking place in New York, Los Angeles and other U.S. cities, organizers said.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1110AP_Iraq_War_Protest.html?source=mypi



Many Democrats opposed to war with Iran
By ANNE FLAHERTY
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
WASHINGTON -- Still reeling from the fallout of authorizing the Iraq war five years ago, congressional Democrats are determined to put themselves early on record as opposing military action in Iran.
In recent days, many Democrats have gone to great lengths to denounce President Bush's strategy on Iran, including his decision to label Tehran's Quds military force as a terrorist group and his statement that a nuclear-armed Iran could lead to "World War III."
Democrats also are jumping on Bush's latest war spending request as proof that the White House is considering airstrikes on Iran's underground uranium enrichment facilities. Bush wants $88 million to continue developing a "bunker-busting" bomb designed to destroy deeply buried targets such as those in Iran.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1153AP_War_Politics.html



Iraqi women serve as Ramadi police
By KIM CURTIS
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
RAMADI, Iraq -- The women received their first paychecks a few weeks ago - about $500 for a month's work as police officers. They paid rent, bought food, wiped out debts. But the seemingly simple transaction has left at least one woman in fear for her life, another threatened with divorce.
The strict tribal and religious culture of Iraq's particularly in its western Anbar province, strongly discourages women from working outside the home and brings shame on men who allow it.
"Right now, our province is safe and peaceful. But anything could shake that up and we could be in danger," says Genan, a 37-year-old mother of three who's also seven months pregnant.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1107AP_Iraq_Women_Police.html



Giuliani's strong suit is common touch
By MARIANNE MEANS
SYNDICATED COLUMNIST
WASHINGTON -- Politics, as life itself, is often unfair.
The latest to be bitten by this unforgiving beast is the precarious Republican presidential frontrunner, Rudy Giuliani. His image as a tough guy who can actually run things is constantly reinforced by old television clips of his bold leadership striding through in New York City following the 9/11 attack on the Twin Towers. The horrific attack that day in 2001 is the centerpiece of his presidential campaign.
The memory has been stirred anew by the California firestorm, another tragedy of enormous scope handled by local officials with considerable authority and efficiency. Rudy, of course, had no hand in the addressing the California crisis, which Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and local officials had well in hand. They had prepared for such a problem -- imagine that! Still, it was a reminder that tough guys finish first. Sometimes. Then came his confession that he's rooting for the Boston Red Sox in the World Series. For a former New York mayor and lifelong Yankee fan, this is unforgivable.
For New Yorkers, it's a tremendous gaffe. It's far worse than Giuliani's support of abortion rights is to religious conservatives. "Traitor" cried the Daily News. "Red Coat: Yank fan Rudy pulls for Bosox" screamed the New York Post. "He may as well have joined Al-Qaida, as far as everyone is concerned," opined comedian Jimmy Kimmel on a daytime talk show.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/336993_meansonline27.html



Religion doesn't confer right to discriminate
By D. PARVAZ
P-I COLUMNIST
Two bills -- HR 3685 and 3686, which should be one bill -- seek to give gays, lesbians, bisexuals and the transgendered protection from discrimination in the workplace. Naturally, President Bush indicated that he'll veto the bills (assuming they go that far), a move groups such as Conservative Women for America applaud. A statement from the administration (on 3685) indicates that his main issue with the bill is that it "is inconsistent with the right to the free exercise of religion as codified by Congress in the Religious Freedom Restoration Act." So, being a Christian means you get to deny people jobs based on what goes on in their pants when they're not at work?

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/parvaz/337025_parvaz27.html



Burmese desperate for health care
By MARGIE MASON
AP MEDICAL WRITER
MAE SOT, Thailand -- They travel for days though checkpoints, across dangerous roads and past Myanmar's bribe-hungry soldiers to make it to the Thai border. They're not refugees fleeing the junta - they simply want to see a doctor.
Myanmar has one of the world's worst health care systems, with tens of thousands dying each year from malaria, tuberculosis, AIDS, dysentery, diarrhea and a litany of other illnesses.
While there are hospitals in the impoverished Southeast Asian nation also known as Burma, only a few can afford to pay hospital workers the various "fees" in the tightly controlled nation fueled by corruption.
"Even if you use the toilet in the hospital you have to pay money," said a 70-year-old man from Phyu Township, who journeyed two days by bus to see a doctor at the Thai border town of Mae Sot and have a cataract removed. He declined to give his name for fear of reprisals.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1104AP_Myanmar_Health_Crisis.html



Israeli party threatens to quit gov't
By LAURIE COPANS
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
JERUSALEM -- A key partner in the coalition of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert warned Sunday that he would withdraw from the government if an upcoming Israeli-Palestinian meeting includes negotiations on core issues of the conflict.
The threat by Deputy Prime Minister Avigdor Lieberman limits Olmert's ability to maneuver in the talks with the Palestinians, which have been renewed in recent months after seven years of fighting. A withdrawal of Lieberman's Israel Beiteinu Party from the coalition would weaken Olmert politically.
The Palestinians are demanding that the U.S.-sponsored conference to be held by the end of the year include talks on the major hurdles preventing a final peace agreement, including the fate of Jerusalem, Palestinian refugees and the borders of a Palestinian state.
While Lieberman's threat was not new, he has been making it more leading up to the meeting.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1107AP_Israel_Politics.html



Israel moves maneuvers away from Syria
By MATTI FRIEDMAN
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
JERUSALEM -- Israel has decided to move an upcoming military exercise off the disputed Golan Heights to avoid further heightening tensions with neighboring Syria, defense officials said.
The border has been jittery since Sept. 6, the date of a mysterious raid by Israeli jets on a target in Syria's north.
Next week's military maneuver was scheduled to be held partially on the Golan Heights, which Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 Mideast War.
Israel sent messages reassuring Syria that the exercise signaled no aggressive intentions, the officials said. But this week, the military decided to hold the exercise solely in northern Israel and not on the Golan Heights because of concerns it might unsettle the Syrians, they said.
The officials spoke Thursday on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to divulge details of the military's decision to the media.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1107AP_Israel_Syria.html



From Haaretz

Pictures suggest construction of Syrian nuclear reactor was underway in 2001
By Haaretz Staff
Pictures released on Friday by a satellite imagery company suggest that the construction of the suspected Syrian nuclear reactor attacked by the Israel Air Force on September 6 was underway as early as 2001, the New York Times reported on Saturday.
The images, released by the U.S.-based company GeoEye, were taken in September 2003. Senior U.S. officials and independent analysts who examined the pictures said that they suggest work had begun on the site as early as two years before the photographs were taken, according to the report.
Numerous foreign media reports have suggested the IAF bombed a partially-constructed nuclear reactor on the bank of the Euphrates River in northeast Syria, some 90 kilometers from the Iraq border.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/917474.html



Livni heads to China in drive against Iran nuclear program
By Barak Ravid, Haaretz Correspondent, DPA and Haaretz Staff
Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni set out for China on Saturday night for a visit that is part of a broader Israeli effort to press world leaders on Iran's nuclear program.
Livni is expected to tell Chinese officials that if the international community turns a blind eye to Iran's nuclear designs, there will be dire consequences for the struggle between the extremists and the moderates in the Middle East and, as a result, for the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
China, a permanent member of the UN Security Council, is staunchly opposed to stepping up the sanctions against Iran, an important trading partner.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/917472.html



Women will get abortions, legal or not, so keep it safe
By KATHA POLLITT
GUEST COLUMNIST
For years feminists and abortion rights supporters have pointed out that women have abortions whether or not the procedure is legal.
That was true here before Roe v. Wade, and it is true today in countries where abortion is restricted or banned. The difference is that when abortion is legal it is a remarkably safe procedure; when it is illegal, women are injured, women die, children are left motherless. (True, these are already existing, sinful children, not embryos or fetuses, but still.) This simple public health argument has gotten lost in a thicket of theology, sexual morality, "family values," politics, spin and outright disinformation. The coat hanger has become a political cliché, a relic of the '60s, like the peace sign. Oh, that old thing.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/337039_focus28.html



Climate Change (part I): Age of mega-fires
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER EDITORIAL BOARD
Today, California's burning. Tomorrow, who knows? The wildfires and the unprecedented evacuations are a phenomenon that is likely to grow across the West as unchecked climate change wreaks havoc with temperature and precipitation patterns.
As with hurricanes, science won't tell us whether global warming causes any specific fire. But the evidence about the trend is clear.
Earlier this year, a study in Science found hotter, drier temperatures have increased the number of Western forest fires, their size and the period of each year when fires were a threat. On CBS' "60 Minutes" last weekend, study co-author Tom Swetnam said the long-term effects of frequent, huge fires could kill half of the forests. CBS aptly titled the piece, "The Age of Mega-Fires."
So far, California's response seems to be better than anything in Louisiana during Hurricane Katrina. But the longer-term burden on Californians, emotionally and physically, is going to be huge. Federal taxpayers will also carry a good deal of extra load.
And it's not like California, its neighboring states or any of us in the West can expect the threats to ease. A 2006 study on global warming's impacts for Washington found the state already is fighting more forest fires per year. It predicted the state's direct costs would rise 50 percent by the 2020s. That doesn't include the loss of timber. Philip Mote, the state climatologist, has said insurance companies are paying attention to the Western risks.
Unfortunately, the Western side of the state also is likely to see more problems with flooding. Ironic though it might be, that fits all too well with the theory that climate change is likely to cause more extreme weather events.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/336685_fired.html



Sudan pledges Darfur cease-fire at talks
By ALFRED DE MONTESQUIOU
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
SIRTE, Libya -- Sudan's government committed to a cease-fire in Darfur at the start of peace talks Saturday, but mediators and journalists outnumbered the few rebels who did not boycott the U.N.-sponsored negotiations, reducing hopes for an end to the fighting.
The large government delegation said its cessation of hostilities was a sign of goodwill for negotiations aimed at ending over four years of fighting in the western Sudanese region. But the pledge was not matched by the rebels, whose main leaders all refused to attend the talks.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1105AP_Darfur_Peace_Talks.html



Heavy fighting shakes Somali capital
By SALAD DUHUL
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
MOGADISHU, Somalia -- Insurgents and government-allied forces battled with machine guns, mortars and rocket-propelled grenades Saturday in the heaviest fighting to hit Somalia's capital for months, leaving at least seven people dead and dozens others wounded, witnesses and health officials said.
Islamic fighters briefly occupied a police station in south Mogadishu, before heading back out of the area, chanting "God is great," witnesses said. Witnesses said at least seven people including a woman had died in the heavy fighting between insurgents, government troops and government-allied Ethiopian forces.
At least 35 people wounded in the fighting were being treated at Mogadishu's Medina Hospital, said Tahir Mohammed Mahmoud, an administrative assistant. He said it was the worst fighting, and heaviest day for hospital admissions, for at least four months in the war-scarred city.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1105AP_Somalia.html



Rains flood capital of Congo, 30 die
By EDDY ISANGO
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
KINSHASA, Congo -- Heavy rains swelled into a torrent of water that swamped Congo's sprawling capital, killing 30 people in less than 24 hours, the government said Friday.
The death toll was likely to rise, an official at Congo's humanitarian affairs ministry said, because relief workers have not been able to reach many flooded neighborhoods.
"Thirty dead and about a hundred injured have been registered," said Serge Mulumbe, the humanitarian affairs ministry official.
The heavy rain started falling Thursday in the Central African city and continued into the early hours Friday.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1105AP_Congo_Flooding.html



7 held in plan to fly children from Chad
By ABAKAR SALEH
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
N'DJAMENA, Chad -- Seven crew members of a plane contracted to fly more than 100 children out of Chad were detained, authorities said Saturday, and Chad's president promised punishment for anyone involved in a plan to spirit the children to Europe.
President Idriss Deby traveled Friday to the eastern city of Abeche where 103 children were being cared for after authorities arrested nine French citizens, who had attempted to fly them to France. The French aid group L'Arche de Zoe, or Zoe's Arc, said it had arranged French host families for the children. It said they were orphans from Sudan's Darfur region.
But the head of UNICEF France, Jacques Hintzy, said Saturday that many of the children appeared to be from Chad, not Sudan. He also said the children were given bandages to provide the impression their evacuation was health-related, though none was injured.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1105AP_France_Darfur_Children.html



Argentine first lady likely to take over
By NIKO PRICE
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina -- President Nestor Kirchner and his wife are poised to launch a new political dynasty Sunday in an election that promises to replace him with her.
Argentines are grateful to Kirchner for engineering a recovery from a 2001 economic crisis that savaged the middle class, and that has translated into such broad support for his wife, Sen. Cristina Fernandez, that she will likely avoid a second round.
Argentine law prevents more than two consecutive terms, but a husband-and-wife team could alternate in power for as long as their support continues.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1102AP_Argentina_Election.html



I realize the traditional American Dream is to take nothing and make a million only to sell it to a greater entity of wealth, but, I wish local authorities would continue to exist over energy resources. When large corporations take over energy franchise, the opportunity for deterioration of seeking alternatives could be threatened while opting for fuels less environmentally friendly. I don't believe in large corporations when it comes to handling energy needs of communities. I believe the best chance alternatives have to be broadly used is for community commitment and control. There is no advantage to rate stability when large corporations seek to control energy sources. Alternatives are best managed by local authority. The advantage to incorporation with larger energy companies is reducing some management infrastructure. Those jobs don't need to be eliminated, they need to remember who they are serving.



Puget Sound Energy to be sold
Private investors would provide $5 billion infusion for projects
By DAN RICHMAN
P-I REPORTER
An agreement to sell Puget Sound Energy to a group of private investors would give the state's largest gas and electricity supplier a $5 billion cash infusion to satisfy renewable-resource laws, strengthen its network against storm damage and accommodate the region's growing population, the company said Friday.
Bellevue-based Puget Energy said its board has agreed to sell the utility to New York-based Macquarie Consortium, an association of six investment groups and pension funds. The consortium has offered $30 per share in cash, a 25 percent premium over Thursday's closing price.
Stephen Reynolds, chairman, president and chief executive of PSE and its parent holding company, said the purchase would result in no rate increases, layoffs, changes in management or alterations to union relationships or benefits plans. The utility's headquarters will remain in Bellevue, and he will continue as its leader.
Reynolds said being freed from the need to raise money through equity offerings will help the utility comply with Proposition 937, a state renewable-energy initiative that he said effectively has required it to install a new wind farm every other year and a gas-fired power plant in the alternate years.

PUGET ENERGY AT A GLANCE
Holding company for Puget Sound Energy
Headquarters: Bellevue
PSE service area: 6,000 square miles, mostly Western Washington
Service area population, 2006: 4 million
Customers: 1 million electricity; 721,000 natural gas
PSE employees: 5,200
Puget Energy 2006 net income: $2.2 million, or $1.88 per share. Revenue: $2.9 billion. Assets: $7.1 billion
Incorporated: 1997. Grew by acquisitions and mergers, starting by acquiring a gaslight provider founded in 1873
P-I reporter Dan Richman can be reached at 206-448-8032 or danrichman@seattlepi.com.
Soundoff (42 comments)

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/business/336982_pse27.html?source=mypi



The Jordan Times

Hundreds treated for suspected food poisoning
Children Saturday receive medical treatment at a hospital in Amman, referred from Jerash where around 300 people were hospitalised for poisoning, which health officials attributed to either bad food or contaminated water (Reuters photo by Mohammad Hamed)
By Hani Hazaimeh
JERASH - Ambulances Saturday evening were lining at the entrance of Jerash Public Hospital to transport to Amman and other cities scores of people suffering fever and diarrhoea, initially blamed on food poisoning.
By Saturday evening, an official toll estimated the number of people suffering from the symptoms at around 300, all from Sakeb village in the northern Jerash Governorate.
However, some village residents said they believed the number to be much higher. Others also said they suspected contaminated water was the reason for the outbreak, not hummos sold at a nearby restaurant as first believed by the authorities.
As a precautionary measure, authorities closed down the restaurant near the village, 18km to the west of the Greco-Roman city of Jerash, and were testing samples of water, food and excrement.
Health Minister Salah Mawajdeh told The Jordan News Agency, Petra, that final results are expected to be out in two days. Tests were being conducted to detect salmonella, shigella or cholera.
Mawajdeh said that 90 per cent of the people treated for the symptoms had eaten hummos from the restaurant in question, two kilometres outside Sakeb, adding that by yesterday afternoon, 70 cases were referred to hospitals in Amman and the northern region.
But some residents interviewed by The Jordan Times said they did not believe bad hummos was the prime suspect. Mohammad Hamdan, who rushed his seven children to the hospital (they were later taken to the army-run Al Hussein Medical Centre (HMC) in Amman), said they did not have any hummos over the past two days.
Another Sakeb resident, Mamdouh Ayasrah, said he was busy moving furniture to a new house, where he and his bride would get married and had almost nothing but water and drinks over the past days. Ayasrah, who, with the rest of his 11-member family, were also referred to HMC, also said they suspected water contamination.
Tamer Ayasrah said his two-month-old cousin was among the cases. “Do not tell me that this infant had hummos.”
People from the village interviewed by The Jordan Times at the public hospital said that the restaurant was too small to sell this huge number of meals. Besides, in a village like Sakeb, inhabited by around 20,000, hummos is not a common dish.
They pointed out that the water network in the village is 40 years old and worn out.

http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=3191



Authorities to arrange independent monitors’ visits to polling centres
AMMAN (JT) - The government will arrange for NGOs to visit polling centres to enable them to oversee the elections, Prime Minister Marouf Bakhit announced yesterday.
The premier recently voiced support for the participation of NGOs in monitoring the November 20 parliamentary polls, saying in an interview with Jordan Television’s 60 Minutes news show earlier this month that the government had no objection to independent group participation.
The government will allow NGOs to visit ballot centres and get acquainted with government procedures, he said in previous remarks.
NGOs, reacting to Bakhit’s announcement, demanded more involvement in monitoring the polls. But the law allows only representatives of candidates to stay in the polling and vote counting centres.

http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=3192



Turkey threatens incursion after Iraq talks fail
SIRNAK (Reuters) - Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan threatened on Saturday to order an incursion into northern Iraq against Kurdish guerrillas after the failure of talks with Iraq aimed at averting a cross-border raid.
"The moment an operation is needed, we will take that step," Erdogan told a large flag-waving crowd in Izmit. "We don't need to ask anyone's permission."
The talks collapsed late Friday after Ankara rejected proposals by Iraqi Defence Minister General Abdul Qader Jassim for tackling guerrillas based in northern Iraq as insufficient and because they would not yield results quickly enough.
Turkey has massed up to 100,000 troops, backed by fighter jets, helicopter gunships, tanks and mortars, on the border for a possible offensive against about 3,000 rebels using Iraq as a base from which to carry out attacks in Turkey.

http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=3197



Israel plans to 'isolate Gaza 100 per cent'
OCCUPIED JERUSALEM (AFP) - Israel plans to paralyse the infrastructure of the Gaza Strip in every possible way and separate itself completely from the Palestinian territory in the long term, a minister said on Saturday.
"We want to separate ourselves from the Gaza Strip at the level of its infrastructure in every way possible," Deputy Defence Minister Matan Vilnai told Israeli public radio.
On Thursday, Defence Minister Ehud Barak announced that Israel would start periodic electricity cuts and limit fuel deliveries to the Strip because of the continued firing of rockets by militants.
But Vilnai said these measures were not really because of the rocket firing "but really to achieve the separation of this territory, which was approved in principle two weeks ago by the Israeli government, and whose application had only been delayed for a simple legalistic check". In September, the security Cabinet decreed the Gaza Strip "a hostile entitY". It has been controlled completely by Hamas since mid-June when the Islamist movement ousted security forces loyal to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and the Fateh Party.
"Long term we want to separate ourselves from this territory, 100 per cent," said Vilnai, adding that at the moment Israel was providing all the fuel that the Gaza Strip needed, as well as two-thirds of its electricity supplies.

http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=3196



In it together
Israeli ministers say they want to separate themselves completely from the Gaza Strip and paralyse the infrastructure of the tiny plot of land that so obsesses the world.
There is little surprising in the hostile and inhuman talk Israeli officials deploy when talking about the fate of the nearly 1.5 million people in Gaza. The excuse, as usual, is Israeli security, but, while not entirely to be dismissed, cutting of water supply and electricity and stopping trade cannot possibly be a proportionate response to homemade rockets.
A better bet is for Gaza to be allowed some kind of normal existence. It cannot be expected that Israel will work too hard towards this, but the country should at least help facilitate it, i.e., by allowing trade to cross borders and allowing the border to Egypt to be opened.
In addition, the international community can play an important part. Whether under Hamas or after a final agreement is finally nailed, Gaza needs to develop in certain ways. There are huge deposits of natural gas under Gaza’s seabed that need to be extracted which can bring as much as $1 billion to the strip’s economy while, at the same time, leaving the strip energy independent. Water and sewage treatment plants are a must, as is a serious infrastructure that can prepare the strip to join the world.
All these are projects for peace and it really doesn’t matter under whom they are started or completed. Gaza is home to 1.5 million people. These people do not deserve to suffer arbitrary collective punishment because Israel wants to maintain its occupation and because the world cannot distinguish between legitimate resistance and terrorism.

http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=3172



Reconciling rights
Walid M. Sadi
Herouxville is a tiny little Francophone municipality in Quebec, Canada, nestled between Montreal and Quebec City. It made history last January when it adopted a “code of life” for new immigrants, especially Muslims who would opt to live there.
In actual fact, only one Muslim family lives in that town.
The ground rules spelled out in the code touch a variety of subjects ranging from gender equality and diet to religious freedom and lifestyles.
Although the Herouxville initiative is not likely to spread across Quebec Province, much less across the rest of the Canadian provinces, it still raises issues of deep concern for nations that attract immigrants of different races and cultures.
At issue for most of these countries is the so-called issue of identity, which means that countries that receive and welcome immigrants have a vested right, and even the obligation, to preserve their identity and culture. Immigrants are expected to assimilate or at least integrate with their host societies.
At issue also is the right of the new immigrants to enjoy their own religious, culture and even language, and not be forced to endorse the culture of their new homeland.

http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=3175



America’s self-defeating hegemony
By Francis Fukuyama
When I wrote about the “end of history” almost twenty years ago, one thing that I did not anticipate was the degree to which American behaviour and misjudgements would make anti-Americanism one of the chief fault lines of global politics. And yet, particularly since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, that is precisely what has happened, owing to four key mistakes made by the Bush administration.
First, the doctrine of “preemption”, which was devised in response to the 2001 attacks, was inappropriately broadened to include Iraq and other so-called “rogue states” that threatened to develop weapons of mass destruction.
To be sure, preemption is fully justified vis-à-vis stateless terrorists wielding such weapons. But it cannot be the core of a general non-proliferation policy, whereby the United States intervenes militarily everywhere to prevent the development of nuclear weapons.
The cost of executing such a policy simply would be too high (several hundred billion dollars and tens of thousands of casualties in Iraq and still counting).
This is why the Bush administration has shied away from military confrontations with North Korea and Iran, despite its veneration of Israel’s air strike on Iraq’s Osirak reactor in 1981, which set back Saddam Hussein’s nuclear programme by several years.

http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=3174



Peace Through Sport
Creating community ambassadors for peace
AMMAN (JT) - Leadership, motivation, vision and planning were the key words for Day 6 of Peace Through Sport which is holding its inaugural pilot camp in Amman, according to a statement from the Peace Through Sport. The initiative is the vision of its founder and chairman HRH Prince Feisal, president of the Jordan Olympic Committee, and has brought together 70 leaders of youth from seven countries and four religions. It aims to use sport as a vehicle for building bridges within divided communities. After five days of practical and fun sporting activity combined with serious classroom lectures, the pilot camp’s progress has been staggering. Internationally renowned academics in the field of promoting peace through sporting activity shared their knowledge with the delegates on how to become leaders within their own communities. One of the key objectives of Peace Through Sport is for the delegates to be able to return home and to share the knowledge and skills they have learned. The seeds planted by this initial training camp in Amman will grow across the world. Following a day of intensive and fruitful lectures and debate, delegates enjoyed a game of basketball after learning new skills taught to them by national coaches. They were also taught drills on using basketball to bring youngsters together. The Peace Through Sport pilot camp will run until October 31. Today the camp relocates to Petra and then Wadi Rum for an overnight stay.

http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=3181



ASE hosts Council of Federation of Arab Stock Markets
AMMAN (JT) - The Council of the Federation of Arab Stock Markets recommended activating the role of the general secretariat and formulating a mechanism for cooperation among financial securities establishments.
Hosted by the Amman Stock Exchange (ASE), the council of the federation also recommended strengthening contacts among companies operating in the field of financial services in Arab countries through conducting training courses and meetings and focusing on financial securities-related issues.
ASE Chairman Mohammad S. Horani stressed the importance of such gatherings within the drive to achieve the goals of the federation and to arrive at a fair and transparent environment in Arab stock exchange markets.
Horani emphasised the need for eliminating obstacles that preclude the exchange of securities among markets, achieving conformity among laws and regulations of Arab bourses and providing for further exchange of expertise in line with the federation’s objectives.
In his capacity as chairperson of a committee entrusted by the federation with amending its basic statute and activating its role, Amman bourse Chief Executive Officer Jalil Tarif briefed the participants on the committee’s achievements.

http://www.jordantimes.com/?news=3178


continued...

The Evil United States of America

The letter was addressed to Major General Barbara Fast, commander of Fort Huachuca, who has served as the head of all military intelligence in Iraq during the atrocities of the notorious US-administered Abu Ghraib prison.

Fr. Steve Kelly and Fr. Louie Vitale speak at anti-torture rally outside Ft. Huachuca (click here) shortly before approaching the fort's gatehouse with the intent to speak to enlisted personnel and deliver a letter to Major General Barbara Fast.

From "The Jordan Times," an ally.

...“The US authorities have described Camp 6 as a ‘state of the art modern facility’ which is safer for guards and ‘more comfortable’ for the detainees. However, Amnesty International believes that the conditions, as shown in photographs and described by detainees and their attorneys, contravene international standards of humane treatment.
In some respects, they appear more severe than the most restrictive levels of ‘super-maximum’ custody on the US mainland, which have been criticised by international bodies as incompatible with human rights treaties and standards.”
One thing is definitely clear. As far as the security agencies are concerned, such people deserve to be treated only as terrorists and they don’t even have the right to protest against such treatment.
What is sadder is that it is happening at the hands of the US, the leader of the free world. Many in the world still look up to the US with respect and admiration, but are not sure anymore how far it remains committed to its own founding principles.

Wildfires devastate Southern California's crops

A sky crane helicopter being used for the fire fighting effort scoops up water from the 9th hole at the TPC Valencia golf coarse in Valencia, Calif., as smoke rises from the Stevenson Ranch fire north of Los Angeles, Monday, Oct 22, 2007. As wildfires were charging across Southern California, nearly two dozen water-dropping helicopters and two massive cargo planes sat idly by, grounded by government rules and bureaucracy.

...''This situation here is the worst I've seen in terms of impact on individuals, families, homes, businesses,'' said Charley Wolk, who's been farming in San Diego County for 35 years, and now manages hundreds of acres of mostly avocados, citrus and flowers....

...until tomorrow...

Greater evaporation as a result of global warming

Warning signs today


Greater evaporation as a result of global warming
could increase the risk of wildfires.


The 1999-2002 national drought was one of the three most extensive droughts in the last 40 years


Warming may have lead to the increased drought frequency that the West has experienced over the last 30 years.


The 2006 wildland fire season set new records in both the number of reported fires as well as acres burned. Close to 100,000 fires were reported and nearly 10 million acres burned, 125 percent above the 10-year average.


If warming continues to exacerbate wildfire seasons, it could be costly. Fire-fighting expenditures have consistently totaled upwards of $1 billion per year.


FEMA blasted for 'news' conference (click here)
Agency employees, not reporters, asked questions at the event. Homeland Security calls the lapse 'offensive and inexcusable.'
By Jordy Yager, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer October 27, 2007
WASHINGTON — No one had any hard questions for the deputy administrator of FEMA, an agency deeply tarnished by its delayed action after Hurricane Katrina, when he held a news conference Tuesday to talk about the California wildfires."Are you happy with FEMA's response so far?" someone asked....



California Wildfires Cause Air Pollution (click here)
It appears that the Southern California wildfires have caused quite a bit of damage to the air quality as much of the air is now polluted and actually quite dangerous.
Health officials are urging that the elderly and people who have breathing problems to stay inside due to the polluted air caused from the falling ash of the fires.
Over 12 fires still rage on in California as the South Coast Air Quality Management District continues to get calls asking what they should do about the immense amount of pollution.
Soot particles have caused the air quality to go way down to unhealthy levels.
Agency spokesman Sam Atwood stated "Our answer is to use common sense. If you can see smoke or falling ash, that means it's time to start curtailing your outdoor activity."
Hospitals are expected to be seeing morme and more people come in with breathing problems in the coming days.
Health experts are stating that the most dangerous aspects of the wildfire are the fine particles which the eye cannot see. These can get into the lungs and cause diseases such as asthma to worsten.