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Richard Clarke in "Against All Enemies" paints a picture of wrong-headed leadership making bad judgment calls.  Given the Bush objectives, however, this can all be seen as good judgment, casting an entirely different light on 9/11: It worked, didn't it?  If the 9/11 Commission is to get to the heart of the matter, it cannot ignore this aspect.  

Condoleezza Rice protests vigorously that the Bush team was doing everything it could to attack Al Qaeda, and it is within this arena that Clarke's criticism is contained.  This is a debate about covering the dump to halt a plague of rats.  The homeowner 9/11 survivors are all for that, but they want to know how the rats got into their house to kill the baby, and no one wants to talk about that.  They put up a clamor and a study commission is created to find out.  The question still hangs: How did the rats get in?  

AUSTIN, Texas -- O Karl Rove, Karl Rove, birder thou never wert. If George W. Bush loses the election narrowly in November, put it down to the birders. You read it here first. What was Rove thinking when he allowed William Haynes II to be nominated to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit?

            There are all the usual reasons for rejecting a Bush judicial nominee -- he's only tried one case; no understanding of the Constitution; author of the "enemy combatant doctrine" that allows American citizens to be held in prison without trial, without counsel and without knowing the charges against them. But the fatal faux pas is the feather-blowing tale of Haynes' role as the top Defense Department lawyer in the case of the Migratory Bird Treaty Act.

As a student, I often worry about just what kind of jobs will be out there when I get out of college.  Many young people with college degrees are working dead-end jobs with no benefits and very low pay.  Many more have no jobs at all.  In fact, a recent study has shown that for the first time in decades, the unemployment rate for college graduates is actually higher than that of high school dropouts.  John Kerry realizes this and that’s why he has created a plan to restore and create 10 million new jobs in the first term of his presidency.  While that is easier said than done, he has a set of new and innovative plans to accomplish this such as expanding the New Jobs Tax Credit to restore jobs that have been lost overseas as well as cutting off all tax incentives for companies that ship profits and jobs overseas and cutting the corporate tax rate by 5% to help jumpstart the economy.  We need to ship products overseas, not profits and jobs and John Kerry has a real plan to end this real problem of outsourcing and the job drain.

Bryan Thompson

Is anyone investigating this "accident"?  I hope you will have some updates for those of us who remember the Karen Silkwood story only too well--and others.  Thanks for the Bob Fitrakis stories.

Joyce Chumbley

Editor's note: To read more about Athan Gibbs and electronic voting, visit www.freepress.org/columns/display/3/2004/853 or www.freepress.org/columns/display/3/2004/834.

Dr. Bob Fitrakis:

I have just run across your article entitled "Death of a patriot: No more" from March 17, 2004.  As a professional in the computer industry for twenty years, I must take exception to some of the claims made by ignorant people in the Democratic and Republican camps who know little, if anything, about computers.

You quote Gibbs as saying "Inevitably, computers mess up".  That is an interesting statement and is clearly used to stir up sentiment without offering any context for the statement whatsoever.

Let's look at that a moment.  If computers "mess up", then it is safe to say that, as one can simply observe from life around them in general, people mess up more than computers.  The facts show that computers only do what people tell them to do, and they do it exactly many millions of times per second.  Computers simply are not known to make any mistakes, while people do all the time.

You are listed as supporters of Al Awda, assoicated with Islamofascist terrorists,as a supporter and you BLATENTLY lie about groups supporting them

SHAME ON YOU; DEATH OR JAIL FOR ALL TERRORISTS, THEIR SUPPORTERS, DRUG DEALERS, COMMUNISTS AND SOCIALISTS TOO THAT SUPPORT THESE TERRORISTS BECAUSE YOU ARE PROMOTING TERRORISM UPON THE EARTH.

A CURSE ON YOU AND THOSE WHO SUPPORT YOU INCLUDING UP TO THE VATICAN AND ALL OTHER DRUG DEALERS

YOU MUST BE HAPPY WITH YOURSELVES KNOWING YOU CONTRIBUTE TO THE MURDER OF INNOCENT CIVILIANS

Also from GreenGrow:

NO TO LEGALIZATION OF TRAVEL TO CUBA HAVENT YOU READ THE STATE DEPTS SPONSORS OF TERRORISTS LIST NUMNUTS?

The Trail of the Catonsville Nine has been out of print for 15 years, and the new edition includes Robin Andersen's preface and essay that brings the play's ideas and themes up to date including an analysis of the media coverage of the war in Iraq.

Poetry and documentarian Lynn Sachs with footage from Investigation of a Flame

The new edition includes Berrigan's original introduction, and additional materials by Robin Andersen and James Marsh that bring its ideas and themes up to date in the context of the war in Iraq.

On May 17, 1968, at the height of the Vietnam War, nine men and women entered a Selective Service office outside Baltimore. They removed military draft records, took them outside, and set them afire with napalm.

The Catholic activist involved in the protest against the war included Daniel and Philip Berrigan; all were found guilty of destroying government property and sentenced to three years in jail.

The Great Lakes are a national treasure critical to the public health, economy and quality of life in Illinois. However, the Lakes are threatened by serious ecological threats resulting in beach closings, fish that are unsafe to eat, lower water levels, and the loss of healthy shorelines.

Right now, Congress and the Bush administration have a historic opportunity to restore the health of the Great Lakes by funding Great Lakes restoration. It is critical that we generate public support from Great Lakes states like Illinois to convince our leaders to invest in the future of our region.

Please take a moment to urge EPA Administrator Mike Leavitt to fund Great Lakes restoration. Then, ask your family and friends to help by forwarding this e-mail to them.

To take action, click this link or past it into your browser: pirg.org/alerts/route.asp?id=687&id4=OHFreep

Background

Finally a reason to get excited, as we now have before us an electable candidate worthy of taking on George W. Bush and his coterie of neoconservatives next November. Well, at least that's what the scared liberals out there would have us believe. But John Kerry is neither electable nor exciting. He is a Zionist sympathizer who supports Bush's "road map for peace" in Israel and Palestine, as well as a corporate Neoliberal, who voted in support of NAFTA, normalized free-trade with China, and the US's $17.9 billion dollar "aid" package to the IMF.

I want to thank Bob Fitrakis for putting the truth out there to the American public about the agenda of the right to alter our elections secretly via paperless electronic voting machines.

I am an activist that opposed evm's in Arkansas for almost a year, and was successful in persuading our Secretary of State to file the waiver under the HAVA Act, delaying the implementation of these machines until 2006.  Secretary Blackwell's insistence to purchase Diebold machines despite the fact that he also requested the waiver is highly suspect to say the least.

I work with activists in other states, including Ohio, to stop the purchase of paperless electronic voting machines.  I have never encountered anyone so headstrong to bring disaster on his election process as Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell.  This man is unyielding in his stance on Diebold, despite computer security reports, computer scientist's expert opinions on these machines and the general distrust of these machines by his constituency.  I ask what's the rush and why the hurry?  He filed the waiver which delays the machines until 2006.