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Putting
Abu Graib in Perspective
ATROCITIES IN IRAQ SHOCK AND SICKEN THE WORLD!
Iraqis poke at the charred remains of the body of an American who
was victim of an explosion set by terrorists
Iraqis hang the destroyed body of an American after an explosion set
by terrorists.
Bodies recovered from a mass grave buried in 1991 by Saddam
Hussein's killers after the first Iraq war
A woman mourns after attempting to identify loved ones slaughtered
by Saddam Hussein's thugs after the first Iraq war.
The bodies of Iraqis retrieved by Americans, laid out for
identification by Iraqi relatives.
Lest we forget that this is war; lest we forget
what the Iraqis have done to Americans and to Iraqis, among others.
The 9/11 legacy: An
instant messaging company, Odigo, claims it received two messages
warning of an attack on the World Trade Center just two hours before
planes flew into the buildings on September 11th, 2001. Those
two employees who received the message were in Israel, where the
company maintains offices, though the company is based in the US.
According to Haaretz.com, Odigo officials have been cooperating with
the FBI, providing the originating address of the instant messages.
Independence Grows:
Fewer than 75-percent of American voters are calling themselves
either Republican or Democrat. And the majority of losses
from the major political parties in the past 12 years have been from
the Democratic Party, according to new data from Ballot
Access News. The percentage of the voting population who call
themselves either Independent or members of minor, sometimes
obscure, parties now exceeds 25-percent for the first time in more
than 75 years. The information comes from 30 areas in which people
register by party on registration forms. In 1992, the polling places
registered 48-percent Democrat, 34-percent Republican; but currently
only 42-percent are registered as Democrat, a loss of six-percent,
while 33-percent register as Republican, a loss of one-percent.
A bill
co-sponsored in the House and Senate would put the brakes on
activist judges: The "Constitutional Restoration
Act" would draw on Article
III, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution, which authorizes Congress
to limit the jurisdiction of the U.S. Supreme Court and other
federal courts. The bill would prohibit
federal courts -- including the Supreme Court -- from ruling in
cases affecting government officials who acknowledge God "as
the sovereign source of law, liberty or government."
TREND: A GEOPOLITICAL
MESS. The elimination last
week by Israel of a HAMAS cleric -- a man who to many in the Islamic
world was a revered guru -- has hit the geopolitical balance in the
Middle East very hard. His death is of more significance than the
average Westerner can conceive. There will likely be intense
repercussions during the coming weeks, as terror groups have vowed
revenge via assassinations, bombings and general mayhem.
The
relationship between China and Taiwan is heating up daily; Taiwan
with it's disputed election and political turmoil, China with it's
intent to see a calm Taiwan or consider an invasion.
In
Iraq, terrorists seem to be flocking to the cities to create chaos,
while Coalition (mostly American) troops are being killed along with
Iraqi citizens and insurgents.
The
price of gasoline is escalating rapidly to record levels, led by low
inventories and the price of a barrel of oil approaching $40. This
is apparently setting off a new trend of inflation, which will
likely cause the Federal Reserve to begin raising interest rates
soon. Meanwhile, should the price of gas begin to approach $3 a
gallon in some areas of the US, there will be a major wave of anger
from the American public -- and a widely depressing effect on
business expansion.
Meanwhile, there appears to be some unusual pressure on commodities
and currency, especially in the US and Europe. Money is still
flowing into the Euro, but at a slower pace than in recent months,
while there seems to be some hoarding of the dollar, especially
overseas, indicating perhaps some geopolitical fear of reprisals for
the killing of the HAMAS leader last week.
And then, some religious leaders are watching Israel very closely
because of reports that some Palestinians may be intent on blowing
up the Temple Mount, perhaps the most important religious structure
in the world. At the same time, the Israeli government appears ready
to continue it's hardest stance yet when dealing with Palestinians
and terrorists.
The world is watching as the US election process proceeds, while
there is a general consensus that Democratic presidential hopeful
John Kerry -- even with a running mate such as Hillary Clinton --
doesn't possess the skills to unseat President Bush, who in turn is
under fire for his approach to the war on terror and the US economy,
as if any president can singlehandedly control the economy.
"May you live in interesting times," remember, was an
apocryphal Chinese curse.
Osama bin Laden's terrorists claim
to have nuclear weapons --
specifically so-called "suitcase nukes," the miniaturized
nuclear bombs of minimum strength that can be carried in very large
briefcase-like containers. A number of websites have speculated
about al Qaeda's acquisition of such weapons for years now; most in
the know believe such weapons -- available on the black market --
have intricate, coded trigger mechanisms that make it almost
impossible for terrorists to operate. It is possible, however, for
terrorists to hire former Soviet scientists to teach the operation
of such small nukes, according to one al Qaeda mastermind.
In an interview to be
aired Monday on Australian TV, a Pakistani journalist says he"s
interviewed al Qaeda's number two man, Ayman al-Zawahri, who claims
that "if you have $30 million, go to the black market in
central Asia, contact any disgruntled Soviet scientist, and a lot of
... smart briefcase
bombs are available. They have contacted us, we sent our people
to Moscow, to Tashkent, to other central Asian states and they
negotiated, and we purchased some suitcase bombs," according to
Pakistani journalist Hamid MIr.
It was 911 days after 9/11:
More than 200 people are dead in Madrid, Spain after a terrorist
attack. The near-simultaneous bombing of trains also left more than
1500 people injured. Spain has blamed the local terrorist
organization ETA for the biggest terrorist attack on a European city
since World War II, but a group claiming to be acting for al-Qaida
said it was behind the blasts. Most ominously, the group claims a
terror assault dubbed "Winds of Black Death" will soon be
made on the US. The letter threatening the US attack has not been
authenticated.
The use
of chemical weapons and the destruction it caused in Kurdish
villages by Saddam Hussein was described in a report by the
Physicians for Human Rights called "Winds of Death:
Iraq's Use of Poison Gas Against Its Kurdish Population." A
plane flown into a chemical plant might release a lethal black
plume. On the other hand,
the specific name anthracis of bacillus anthracis derives from the
Greek word meaning coal, referring to the black skin lesions on the
victims. (PHXNews)
A new cookbook by an ex-felon collects recipes of last meals
requested by death row inmates just before their executions.
Called Meals To Die For, it's written by Brian Price, who until last
year was serving time in Texas for abduction of his brother in law
and a sexual assault on his ex-wife. A choice recipe among the 42
last meals in the book: "Old Sparky's Genuine Convict
Chili," which comes in hot or hotter versions dubbed
"5,000-," "10,000-" or "20,000-volts."
Hilarious:
Faxes coming in across America from the "North American
people's polling company of Canada" read: "The Bush
Administration is now starting to back track (sic) on it's
claims that Saddam Hussein had and was ready to use weapons of mass
destruction. Under increased pressure, the administration, weapons
experts and even CIA intelligence chiefs are claiming intelligence
may have been wrong. Although the Bush Administration claims the
intelligence they presented to Congress and to the public was
correct, critics suggest that within political and
counter-intelligence circles it was widely known, Saddam had no
weapons of mass destruction and believe the administration may have
known this all along."
The fax then asks you
to call a 900 number to register your opinion, which "will
be presented to Congress and the Bush Administration." Calls
"to these numbers cost $3.95 a minute, a small price for
greater democracy"! Calls take approximately 2 min. in
standard mode...
AN INTERESTING IF TWISTED EMAIL to
TheLatest.Net: "Thoughts On the Coming 'Discovery' of Bin
Laden" -- a spam -- claims
"the announcement of Bin
Laden's capture will be the death-knell for the 2004 Democratic
campaign...So Democrats must have a pre-emptive strategy in place;
the most obvious being, early in the game, to accuse the White House
of sitting on Bin Laden for political gain...
"Republicans," the
email says, are "waiting for the right moment" politically
to announce the capture of bin Laden!
"Republicans are
playing a deadly game of attrition -- death by a thousand tiny cuts,
so to speak: extreme gerrymandering in Texas, the recall of a
governor in California, the installation of inauditable, easily
'preprogrammed' DRE e-vote machines in as many counties as will
allow them to be stuffed down their throats, relentless and bloody
character assassinations in a bought-and-paid-for Murdoch-dominated
media empire, absentee ballots counted by an untouchable firm in
Kuwait, stacked courts ready to deliver decisions for which 2000's
Gore vs. Bush set the precedent."
"WE MUST NOT
LOSE," the spam continues, because "our very liberties
hang in the balance!"
THE ORTERO MESA UNDER SEIGE
SAYS HISPANICS: Even though many Latinos don't like being
called "hispanics," we received an email from Stephen
Capra of the New Mexico Wilderness Alliance, saying the Bush
administration is facing a "rebellion" by New Mexico
residents for its plans to open up part of the 1.2 million acres of
Chihuahuan Desert grassland known as the Otero Mesa -- a
"rebellion" led by "hispanics." The Alliance
claims the land is being opened up by the Bureau of Land Management
for oil and gas drilling, thereby spoiling land and endangering the
water siphoned from a nearby aquifer. The BLM is proposing to open
the lands to oil and gas development by the Harvey E. Yates Company
and other energy interests.":Over the past two election cycles
the Yates Oil Companies and family members have contributed over
$200,000 to the Republican Party and various GOP candidates --
outpacing giving even by the Republican Campaign Committee of New
Mexico."
DUMBTH: Dentists remind us --
if you have a case of sore throat or strep, throw away your old
toothbrush or at least buy a new one, use it and thoroughly clean
the old toothbrush. Continuing to use the same toothbrush during a
bout with a throat problem will just extend the life of the problem.
A lifetime of psychiatry may not
be necessary: Therapy for years may be a waste of time,
according to Colorado psychologist Dr. Bernard Bloom, who says that
often one session does the job. While a therapist-patient bond can
be important, Blooms says one session is plenty for the patient to
become wiser about himself, but therapists can't make as much money
as when patients become regular visitors.
Cruelty to animals extends to
rats: Recent actions by the People for Ethical Treatment of
Animals (PETA) reminds us of Takoma Park, Maryland, where city
officials tried a few years ago to get rid of a burgeoning
population of rats by giving away sticky rat traps. Rats would get
caught in the goo on the traps and starve to death, but PETA thought
that "inhumane." To be fair, PETA noted that squirrels and
birds could get caught in the traps. Yeah, we can put a man on the
moon, but we can't make a squirrelproof rat trap.
The Japanese invention that
somehow never caught on in America: Underwear you don't have to
change for days. See, it has three legs so you just take it off
nightly, then the next day rotate it 120 degrees. Invented in 1986,
the revolutionary underwear boasted six full days of wear: when each
leg has had two wearings, you turn the underwear inside out and
rotate it again each day. At the end of six days it's ready to be
washed. (Whether it needs it or not.)
A British woman burned up $4,700
in pound banknotes in her microwave oven, forgetting her
boyfriend had stashed a wad of cash in there for safe keeping.
"The sprouts were done to a turn, but the cash was black
ash," Jane Butlin said from their home in Paignton, England.
Furnishing shop manager Darryl Hayes was too late to bank his
weekend receipts and decided to use the microwave as a hiding place,
but it was a disaster when his fiance decided to heat up some
Brussels sprouts.
Label on a can of air freshener:
"Bring the clean, natural freshness of a country meadow
indoors!" Turn the can around and it states: "Warning:
Inhaling the contents can be harmful or fatal."
Our little website TheLatest.Net
is now in its fifth year; that's no comparison to those sites
that go back well into the 90s, but we've been here steadily,
covering events since the Clinton administration, and here we intend
to remain. In the years we've lost most of our staff but gained a
lot of experience, thanks to events and circumstance. Thanks, most
of all, to you for dropping in and letting us be part of your life.
We hope we'll continue to merit your dropping in as often as you
want to sample the views on the news of the American political
Independent. |
