Local Fox TV covers Voter Outrage

Color me shocked.
I wish I had been the one they booted out, but alas, I was not there.
I might have used the phrase "fucking up democracy, or "shredding any hope of democracy" rather than "subverting democracy."

(For a little less anger, and a little more clarity, visit TERRYFACEPLACE )

Ok, here goes---

"...a packed Supervisors in a mid-morning meeting with numerous public comments taking on the supervisors for approving secret vote counting, buying millions more in machines the day before this public comment, and being unresponsive to polls stating that over 80% of San Diegans want a transparent voting system....

FOX TV Expose of E-Voting Official Corruption!!

Voter Outrage

Voting Groups Want Former Diebold Saleswoman Ousted from San Diego Elections Job
By Kim Zetter May 22, 2007 8:52:34 PMCategories: E-Voting, Election '08

Two voting groups descended on San Diego's board of supervisors today to protest the recent appointment of former Diebold saleswoman, Deborah Seiler, as the county's new registrar of voters. They also want Seiler's new assistant registrar, Michael Vu, ousted due to controversies surrounding his tenure as elections director in Ohio. Vu resigned as elections director from Cuyahoga County, Ohio, last year after two of his staff members were convicted of rigging the 2004 presidential recount and after reports revealed numerous problems with the way elections were administered during his time on the job...

The fishwrap covered it
Who are they sleeping with at Diebold, or do they just like fucking US?

A quickie from San Diego CityBEAT
NEWSY BITS
Stories for those who like 'em short

And my favorite, with the quote from the dingbat who is supposed to be representing ME in this corrupt county:

..and Supervisor Pam Slater-Price lashed out.

"Excuse me please," Slater-Price said. "During the time you were speaking, we did not boo, hiss, catcall or laugh. That is very rude and totally unacceptable behavior."...

Protesters criticize county elections hirings
By: GIG CONAUGHTON - Staff Writer

"Oh, how wude dose pwotewsters ahwew."

Whassamatter princess, nobody ever been honest with you about how they don't like stolen/rigged elections?

Is There a Docu in the House? Moore Unspools a Second Opinion

I'll go see Sicko before I give this silly, snippy article a whole lot of my energy.

Health care is something that I happen to care about. The uninsured get screwed on their healthcare bills here in California , and a hell of a lot of people don't have any health care coverage in this country. Medical expenses are cited as reasons for filing banckruptcy in about half the cases.

more effing voting stuff

UC Pivotal in State Voting System Review
By David Harvey
Staff Writer

May 21, 2007 — California Secretary of State Debra Bowen's intensive review of voting systems began last week as part of her quest to assess the state's voting methods before the February 2008 primary elections

...An exception to the Sacramento testing will be the network used by Los Angeles County, which is considered a vendor because of its custom voting system.

"The issue with Los Angeles County is that all votes go to a hunking mainframe computer, so it's not possible to test that system here," Bowen spokeswoman Nicole Winger said.

Voting machine vendors briefly delayed the tests by voicing concern about the guidelines of Bowen's planned review....

local information:

Voter Oppression Moves to San Diego!
June Caldwell
May 21, 2007

The public had a chance to speak this about this this morning at 9 am. I've been looking for information online for a couple hours now ( as of12:05 PM 5/22/2007). I couldn't find much. Thank God for the local Air America Radio affiliate or we might now know anything that was going on in this town. Not that the powers that be want us to be informed, involved citizens.

S 1348, Immigration bill

Go here and click on the radio button that says Bill Number, type in the search box S 1348.

I'm no lawyer, but I'm having trouble finding any harsh punishment for employers of "undocumented workers." Maybe I'm just cynical enough to think that there will always be a market for counterfeit green cards.

Maybe that's because it looks to me like the only real change is a national database.

Wonder if ChoicePoint will get the contract?

Has anybody ever seen the amazing amount of incorrect information about themselves, purchased from private information database holding companies that employers actually use in their hiring process?

I have.

I laughed my ass off.

Kuwait ends dinar-dollar link

And other things going on in the Middle East.
When Hugging Is a Crime
Posted on May 21, 2007 foxnews.com
Taking the plunge: In this “before” shot, Nilofar Bakhtiar prepares to skydive for a charity—an unlikely setting for a career-busting faux pas.

Nilofar Bakhtiar, Pakistan’s federal minister for tourism, is in hot water with clerics in her home country for hugging a skydiving instructor who guided her through a tandem parachute jump for charity last month. Now, after striking such an “obscene” pose, she’s had to resign from Pakistan’s Cabinet.

Chief Rabbinate Finalizes Ban on Christian Women's Conference

OPT: ‘Femicide’ on the rise in conflict zone
RAMALLAH, 7 March 2007 (IRIN) - Three Palestinian women were shot dead in the northern Gaza Strip last month – rumours say it had to do with ‘honour’.

Iraq: 'Honour Killing' of teenage girl condemned as abhorrent
Posted: 02 May 2007
17-year-old Kurdish girl stoned to death


Nice. What a neighborhood. What are we doing over there again? Oh yeah, oil.

We do not want this type in our neighborhood either.

Mother-In-Law 'Plotted Honour Killing'
Monday, 14th May 2007, 14:05
Category: Crime and Punishment

Husband of 'honour killing' teenager arrested on suspicion of murder
14.05.07

Update at 1:02 PM 5/23/2007:


'Troubling' views on suicide bombings
78% of U.S. Muslims opposed, but young adults are less sure
Matthai Chakko Kuruvila, Amr Emam, Chronicle Staff Writers
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
About 1 in 4 young adult American Muslims says suicide bombings against civilian targets "to defend Islam" can be justified rarely, sometimes or often, according to a new Pew Research Center poll -- a finding that disturbed American Muslim leaders and thinkers across the country...

Sheriff's woes, electronic voting, pests included in county budget

By: GIG CONAUGHTON - Staff Writer
(North County Times) Last modified Monday, May 21, 2007 12:02 PM PDT

SAN DIEGO -- The Sheriff's Department is still having a hard time finding new deputies. Construction has dried up in the unincorporated areas of the county. A freeze has been lifted for local prosecutors. Electronic voting appears to be here to stay. And destructive insects could have a tougher time getting into San Diego County in the coming year.

Methinks Gig has a sense of humor to mention electronic voting and in the next sentence, bugs.

But wait, there's more humor here:

...More electronic voting machines

Also likely to get an increase is the county's fund for voting machines.

Electronic voting machines have stirred some controversy with a minority of election watchers. But the San Diego County registrar of voters office is expecting its budget to jump from $15.53 million to $25.26 million, in part because the county intends to buy more electronic voting machines.

The county agreed to buy 10,200 Diebold TSX "touch screen" voting machines for $31 million in 2003, and used those machines in November's elections...

Nifty toys

for Israel:


Notice the lack of interest in telling the American people what was passed in their Congress' appropriations bill on Thursday:

israel missile google search

Al Jazeera front paged it.

Israel lobby done good... again.

And as a super-duper added bonus for us here in San Diego there's this:

The move was spearheaded by Duncan Hunter of California, the senior Republican senator on the House Armed Services Committee and a candidate for his party's 2008 presidential nomination.


Hhhnnaaaappy.

Death Toll for Contractors Reaches New High in Iraq

...At least 146 contract workers were killed in Iraq in the first three months of the year, by far the highest number for any quarter since the war began in March 2003, according to the Labor Department, which processes death and injury claims for those working as United States government contractors in Iraq.

That brings the total number of contractors killed in Iraq to at least 917, along with more than 12,000 wounded in battle or injured on the job, according to government figures and dozens of interviews...

...A top security industry official said he was told recently by American military and contracting officials that 50 to 60 percent of all truck convoys in Iraq were coming under attack. Previously, he said, only about 10 percent had been hit...


U.S Fatatlities confirmed by the DoD

This war sucks. Actually, all war sucks.

You expected me to make some smart-ass remark about Blackwater or DynCorp ?

Ring of Fire with RFK Jr. and Mike Papantonio

I like this show. I always learn something, and the bonus is I generally love the bumper music.

Today's show.

Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog.

American history, if you can handle the truth

The Secret Government: The Constitution in Crisis
By Bill Moyers
This is the full length 90 min. version of Bill Moyer's 1987 scathing critique of the criminal subterfuge carried out by the Executive Branch of the United States Government.

Ron Paul on Blowback
By Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.
05/17/07

Nerve Gas May Have Harmed Troops, Scientists Say (Gulf War I)
By IAN URBINA
05/17/07

I dunno what the fuck is going on with comments. Between Haloscan and Blogger I'm starting to get irritated with the whole thing. I did not delete commments, but the link disappeared. I'm not a geek.

Frontline Spying on the Homefront

No surprise here. I knew all this shit was going on in 2003 after I got into a nasty e-mail exchange with an asinine Reich-wing mil-blogger. Some really weird shit went on for a couple of weeks. Nothing like that ever happened in my life before this period. Nothing since.

Fucking ratbastard. I didn't even know what a fucking blog was before that. The local newz thought he was fabulous. I thought he was a dick. Now if you'll excuse me I need to go shut my head up by sitting in front of the boob tube. It's what I do on Thursdays.

Blackwater

Potrero Mounts Up - Taking a Stand
by: Lucas O'Connor
Sat May 12, 2007 at 21:44:23 PM PDT

The link to the UT article and the comments that the UT chose to publish are telling.
The article was a bit irritating, but I expect that from the fishwrap. This comment started out with a jaw-dropper:

"I am mystified by the hostility in some of the comments..."

ewh wha?
Especially in a military town.

Let's review.

Accountable

Unaccountable

Private security company seeking to establish training camp near San Diego
Last modified Sunday, May 13, 2007 1:00 AM PDT
By: North County Times Wire Services -

Locals Against Training Camp In East County
POSTED: 10:15 am PDT May 12, 2007
UPDATED: 11:07 am PDT May 12, 2007

Addicted

"America is addicted to oil."

Click on pics for articles.



Speaking of addictions, what have we here?

Afghanistan's child opium addicts
By Zeina Khodr in Badakshan (Potentially, craploads of them )

Wanna know what else is in Afghanistan?

Private Military Corporations

Part 4-The legal issues around mercenaries

A Tangled Web: A History of CIA Complicity in Drug International Trafficking

The Dark Alliance Gary Webb's Incendiary 1996 SJ Mercury News Exposé

I swear some shit never changes.

movies and reading

Watched The Great Gatsby (Redford version) with a friend. I've never read the book and he said that he wanted to read it again. I rolled my eyes and said "Oh look , rich people people behaving badly and getting away with it, how original." The woman Gatsby was in love with reminded me of Paris Hilton, brainless and rich and pretty, so what? Uninteresting to other women, that's for sure . Frankly, I hated the character, and ever since Rosemary's Baby, and knowing she was married to somebody three times her age and then to Woody Allen, Mia Farrow makes my skin crawl. No, I don't want to read the book, the dialogue in the movie was ridiculous. Why torture myself twice?

Anyway, I sort of wondered out loud why I don't read much fiction any more. I'm reading Colby Buzzell's "My War, Killing Time in Iraq." I'm only about 75 pages in but so far I love it. This kid cracks me up. There's some really funny stuff in it and he's from California. I'm from the suburbs in San Diego and this town is one big military base. I get it...


What I don't get is this:
White House: 3.5 percent pay hike unnecessary
By Rick Maze - Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday May 16, 2007 17:34:13 EDT

... Update: 170 pages in I have the same love-hate thing going that I've always had with military guys. Maybe that's because some of them treat the local girls like whores, even when they aren't. The military trains misogynists. Military towns train misandrists.


Update 2 3:19 PM 5/18/2007 Finished the book. Immediately heard Randi Rhodes talking about this:
VA bonus recipients sat on boards that oversaw payments By HOPE YEN
Associated Press Writer
Thursday, May 17, 2007

and this:

Troop Pay Raise That Bush May Veto Amounts To $6/Month To Average Soldier In Iraq

*sigh*

effing voting machines

I used the term "Trojan horse" the other day. I was joking, sort of.

Brad tells us today about a worm and the Sarasota election.

highlights from GOP debate

First meet the GOP debate moderator from Faux Newz.

Then watch it over at BradBlog.

Nuff said.

Let the bullshit begin

Hagelberg! Bloomha! For '08! Maybe
BLOG Posted 05/14/2007 @ 10:42am
(the Nation)

"If You Want To Win An Election, Just Control The Voting Machines"
Published on Friday, January 31, 2003 by CommonDreams.org
by Thom Hartmann

So, Ok then, we're all set up in San Diego:
DRE Sales Rep. New San Diego Registrar of Voters
Monday, 14 May 2007, 12:43 pm

So, between the Trojan horses in the Registrar of Voters office, the overabundance of RepugnantThuglicans and the brainwashed, militarised pro-war morons in this county I smell a winner, and it ain't the rest of us.

Happy Mother's Day (snark)

So today we celebrate mother's ability to squirt out brats. Silly, if you ask me, because every mammal has that ability. In the US these brats use up a disproportionate amount of the world's natural resources. On Mother's Day we go to church and then to brunch to celebrate being born in this country of abundance.

So, ok, let's look at other places on the planet and see how they are dealing with (frankly) an overabundance of human life on the planet.

I noticed that the Pope was in Brazil this week.


The kids there want to be able to use birth control. I think that this picture of the Pope's face plastered everywhere would be pretty good birth control, don't you? Dude is seriously scary looking.

For some reason, I thought that Islam forbid the use of birth control. Not so according to Ayatollah Al-Sistani:

Ayatollah Al-Sistani's Missionary Work
Eschewing politics, he uses the Internet to spread his ideas

I'm not thrilled with the thought of more and more of this---
ENVIRONMENTAL REFUGEES: PART 16--NEXT ADDED 100 MILLION AMERICANS

But Alexander Cockburn seems to think that that the global warming scares are the work of more old, powerful, rich white guys trying to get richer.

Fuck him. Global warming is here and is affecting crops. Crops affect population growth.

Economic theory and population growth are really incompatible when you look at finite resources.

Doha debate, & other interesting stuff

Doha debate

God, I hate Martin Indyk. What a tool. I hope he's well paid, because he's one hell of a pit bull. He makes me sick. If you think that anyone who criticizes Israel has hope of a national political career in the United States, you have your head up your ass.

Calif. Web Site Outsources Reporting
(AP) - PASADENA, Calif.-The job posting was a head-scratcher: "We seek a newspaper journalist based in India to report on the city government and political scene of Pasadena, California, USA."

A reporter half a world away covering local street-light contracts and sewer repairs? A reporter who has never gotten closer to Pasadena than the telecast of the Rose Bowl parade?

The California Supreme Court Decides an Important "Prior Restraint" Case, but Misses the Important Judge/Jury Distinction
by Vikram David Amar
Friday, May. 11, 2007

DOCUMENTS LINKED TO CUBAN EXILE LUIS POSADA HIGHLIGHTED TARGETS FOR TERRORISM

Luis Posada Carriles is proof to the rest of the world that the US is hypocritical regarding terrorists.

Thanks to ICH for this fabulous quote:
"The country is headed toward a single and splendid government of an aristocracy founded on banking institutions and monied corporations, and if this tendency continues it will be the end of freedom and democracy, the few will be ruling and riding over the plundered plowman and the beggar.... Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)

A Nation in Silent Anger

A Nation in Silent Anger

By Manuel Valenzuela

Reverberations
05/09/07 "ICH " -- - Can you hear that deep, silent anger inside you, pounding like a heavy iron fist on a wooden door, banging relentlessly every time you notice the America of your dreams vanish more each and every day, instead becoming a most unwelcome nightmare that you are impotent to wake up from? Can you feel the hollow pain in your bones, the restlessness running through your veins every time another freedom is gutted or another right is eviscerated, every time your government climbs one more step up the stairwell of corporatism?..

Maintaining a sense of humor, and even hope has been difficult for me. This piece explains why.

Defense Appropriations Subcomittee hearing

Ok, this is the worst attempt at "live blogging" that I've ever seen. Well, not really live blogging, just streaming it and attempting to type what I'm hearing. Yes, I mean what you're going to read on this page right here. It's bad, I'll leave it just to remember how bad it is, but if you want to know what I was watching Here is a portion of it. Not the Jeremy Scahill part.
Update: Here is Jeremy.
Click here for Kos diary

Hat tip to the fabulous Terry

Appropriations Subcomittee hearing. Basically it's about what's going on with contracting out in Iraq?

scroll down and click on webcast

I'm watching now.

(Terry watched it also, & she's much more calm about the whole thing .)

Fucking amazing, nobody knows who Aegis is.

Betcherass they don't.

Jeremy Scahill is coming up.

05/10/07
Defense Subcommittee
Contracting Out
10:00 AM, 1:30 PM 2359 Rayburn House Office Building

DoD contractor costs are 75% higher than they were in 1996? Am I hearing that correctly? Jeebus.

126,000 contractors in Iraq? (Did I Hear That Correctly?)

10:50 AM 5/10/2007 PST Scahill's up

1400 dead and wounded contractors as of Dec 06

48,000 private security contractors in Iraq with better weapons, better equipment.

Slang in Iraq is called "going Blackwater" for soldiers leaving military service for better pay with private contractors.

Contractors act like rock stars and are unaccountable.

Congress is asking a reporter for information on these contractors? (DIHTC?)

10:50 AM 5/10/2007 (pst) Robert Greenwald is up. On private contractors in Iraq.

He's talking about "burn pits"

Oh. My. God. Who is this asshole rednecked dickhead "conservative" attacking Scahill and Greenwald?

Ooops, found him. Rep. Jack Kingston (R) from GA


money from GD mil contractor fer ole Jack Hmmmm, Jack attacked Jeremy, for not being in Iraq since 2003. Wonder if Ole Jack went there & had Blackwater perteck him?

11:52 AM 5/10/2007 omigod omigod omigod, right now I want to punch that rednecked idiot, Kingston, yapping about all the money made in Hollywood...Does this guy have a button that you push somewhere on him and he spews talking points?
11:59 AM 5/10/2007 show's over, but before it cut off I spied Kingston hightailing it down to talk to Greenwald and Scahill he was laughing. I hope somebody out there is geekier than me and uploads this soon.

Watching the tube last night

Secrets of the Dead Headless Romans 2007-05-09

Secret Files of the Inquisition 2007-05-09

Brutality, torture, and control of the people through religious bullshit. Sounds like No Se Nada Torquemada and the Bush regime .

Torquemada speak, Blusestate live blogs

I'm getting more cynical every day

Fort Dix terrorist plotters. FBI affadavit. (20 pages on Smoking gun dot com)
Sting. You gotta read this thing.


Cheney's pesky reporters are sent to the basement in the Green Zone.

Global power

EU/US Merger: New Global Order By Stealth
Few notice huge shift towards globalization as frothing masses distracted by climate change debate
By Steve Watson
05/06/07 "Infowars"


German police in G8 protest raids
Wednesday, 9 May 2007, 13:43 GMT 14:43 UK
German police have launched a series of raids against alleged left-wing militants suspected of planning to disrupt a G8 summit next month.

The German police have used a law on suspicion of terrorism (the so-called section "129a") to raid and search private homes and social centres all over Germany. Police's motives appear to be suspicion of "building a terrorist network to prevent the G8 from happening".


Sounds like the thought police at work, and what's this?
Teenagers at the J-8 will be close to the G-8(location)at the same time?

Morgan Stanley and UNICEF Announce U.S. Delegates to the 2007 Junior 8 Competition (WebWire) 5/9/2007 1:36:28 PM
For 2007, the German G8 Presidency and the regional government are hosting the J8 Summit in Wismar, Germany, from June 3-9, 2007. The Summit will be attended by 64 young people from the G8 countries selected by a joint process developed by Morgan Stanley and UNICEF, and 10 young people from other parts of the world selected by UNICEF.

The G8 summit will be held in Heiligendamm from 6 to 8 June 2007. Online accreditation is now possible.

And a little something to show that the pharmaceutical companies have the Senatorial testicles firmly in hand, still.

Senate Vote Upholds Drug Import Limits
By ROBERT PEAR
Published: May 8, 2007

Connect the goddamn dots fer Christsake

Failed states and the upcoming third world shithole called los Estados Unidos

Amero Google search

I'm not in the mood to sift through it and make a decision on what might be legitimate information It's hot and dry. My least favorite weather and I'm doing laundry. There is no shade from here to the laundry room. Ugh

Chevron seen settling case on Iraq oil
By Claudio Gatti and Jad Mouawad Published: May 8, 2007
Chevron, the second-largest American oil company, is preparing to acknowledge that it should have known kickbacks were being paid to Saddam Hussein on oil it bought from Iraq as part of a defunct United Nations program, according to investigators.

I keep hoping, but then I continue reading:

The admission is part of a settlement being negotiated with United States prosecutors and includes fines totaling $25 million to $30 million, according to the investigators, who declined to be identified because the settlement was not yet public.

I'm sort of watching the complaints about the National Guard being unable to respond to natural disasters here in the US because of Iraq deployments, and the loss of equipment as a result of

This is chaos by design. The people in power want corporations to rule, and one world government. World Fascist Government. The private corporate militias are getting lots of experience in Iraq, where planned chaos is working just fine if you want to plunder.

Or legally plunder.

Who's gonna report on it?

Update (from Wayne Madsen

May 8, 2007 -- Neo-con election engineering: the "new math":

France: Nicolas Sarkozy 53% Segolene Royal 47%
Mexico: Felipe Calderon 35.88% Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador 35.31%
USA: George W. Bush 50.7% John Kerry 48.3%
Peru: Alan Garcia 53.2% Ollanta Humala 46.8%
Costa Rica: Oscar Arias 40.5% Otton Solis 40.2%
Colombia: Alvaro Uribe 62% Carlos Gaviria/Horacio Serpa 34% (Only 43% of eligible voters cast ballots)
Italy: Romano Prodi 49.81% Silvio Berlusconi 49.74% (Karl Rove and other manipulators failed to take into account the votes of Italians voting abroad, pre-election polls showed Prodi leading 52% to 47%)
Scotland: Alexander Salmond (SNP) 37% Jack McConnell (Labor) 36.2% (100,000 spoiled ballots in pro-SNP constituencies)
Wales: Rhodri Morgan (Labor) 43.3% Ieuan Wyn Jones (Plaid Cymru)/Michael German (Liberal Democrat) 35%
Canada: Stephen Harper 36.2% Paul Martin (Liberal) 30.17%/Jack Layton (NDP) 17.44%
Greece: Kostas Karamanlis 45.4% George Papandreou 40.5%
Denmark: Andres Fogh Rasmussen and right 52.5% Mogens Lykketoft and left 43.4%
USA: George W. Bush 47.9% Al Gore 48.4%
Florida: George W. Bush 48.850% Al Gore 48.841%
Virginia: Bob McDonnell (R.) 49.96% Creigh Deeds (D.) 49.95% (Attorney General)

Solution: Destroy the machines and the companies that produce and sell them.

From China to Panama, a Trail of Poisoned Medicine

Counterfeit pills and genuine treatments

But this is all outside the US, so it's not pertinent, right?

How about a little history on Patent medicine.


Still, thigs are all cleaned up and A-OK, here, right, I mean we pay so much for our pharmaceuticals they must be safe, right?


Drugmakers go furthest to sway Congress
By Jim Drinkard, USA TODAY
Posted 4/25/2005 10:49 PM Updated 4/26/2005 9:49 AM

Border guards wanted

This cracks me up. I've been hearing radio advertisements in San Diego for border enforcement. I live 30 miles from the border with Mexico, so no big deal, right? The Border Patrol is hiring, right?

Check this shit out.




Apply at: INTERNATIONAL BORDER ENFORCEMENT ADVISOR ∙

888-466-5417 DIFZ CIVPOL 8500 Freeport Parkway Suite 275, Irving TX 75063

...SALARY AND BENEFITS:
Compensation package is $134,110.00 for a one-year contract. Salary is paid every four (4) weeks, and no federal or social security taxes are withheld. Salary is available for foreign income tax exemption as well. Vacation is accrued at 4% of the hours worked, or approximately two (2) weeks over the course of the assignment. DynCorp International FZ provides all uniforms, equipment, logistical support, administrative support, and lodging. Local transportation in the country is available, as well as transportation to the country and a return flight upon completion of the one-year contract...

A private security company that pays twice what Border Patrol agents make here.

The job is policing the borders in Iraq.

I didn't notice anywhere in the requirements a need to understand Arab cultures, or to be able to read Arabic, although you do have to be able to discern whether the documents are fakes.

Yup, here's yer tax dollars at work.

DynCorpThe world's premier rent-a-cop business runs the security show in Afghanistan, Iraq, and the US-Mexico border. They also run the coca crop-dusting business in Colombia, and occasional sex trafficking sorties in Bosnia. But what can you expect from a bunch of mercenaries?
CSC/ CEO: Van Honeycutt Military contracts 2005: $2.8 billion
note: CSC sold DynCorp in January 2005

And some judgement from some spoiled snotbucket at Yale (Home of Skull and Crossbones):

The US seems unwilling to face the hardships of maintaining a police force in Iraq. Instead, it has delegated the charge of keeping order to DynCorp, a multinational police contractor headquartered in California


Law, PR firms help contractors navigate reconstruction inquiries
By Peter H. Stone National Journal March 8, 2007
The stakes are high for the private contractors and their lobbying, legal, and PR teams. For example, Bowen's recently completed 579-page audit contains strong allegations about Virginia-based DynCorp, which has a $1.8 billion contract from the State Department for police-related projects in Iraq.One controversy centers on allegations that DynCorp spent about $4.2 million on 20 VIP trailers and an Olympic-size swimming pool that was requested by some Iraqi officials but that lacked the necessary authorization from the U.S. government. Further, a training camp for DynCorp workers built with the lion's share of the money from a $43.8 million contract had never been used.

U.S. wants Border Patrol agents for Iraq Firm seeks veteran officers to mentor Iraqis on immigration
April 30, 2007, 9:42AM
By STEVE McVICKER
Copyright 2007 Houston Chronicle

Soldiers of Good Fortune
Private military companies, for their part, are focusing much of their manpower on Capitol Hill. Many are staffed with retired military officers who are well connected at the Pentagon -- putting them in a prime position to influence government policy and drive more business to their firms. In one instance, private contractors successfully pressured the government to lift a ban on American companies providing military assistance to Equatorial Guinea, a West African nation accused of brutal human-rights violations. Because they operate with little oversight, using contractors also enables the military to skirt troop limits imposed by Congress and to carry out clandestine operations without committing U.S. troops or attracting public attention. "Private military corporations become a way to distance themselves and create what we used to call ‘plausible deniability,'" says Daniel Nelson, a former professor of civil-military relations at the Defense Department's Marshall European Center for Security Studies. "It's disastrous for democracy."



Democracy?

You live in one of those?

I sure as fuck don't. I live in a military empire.

Belief

Belief. A great song and timely. By John Mayer.
(click on lyrics to enlarge)




And me. Frustrated:

Silent Scream

How do I stop the pain of what my country has done?
When do I feel the warmth of the sun?
When can I talk to people from other countries?
And tell them that I know the leaders lie.
Why do they believe that we are truly a democracy?
When my father told me differently
He knows about the code
The computers he never controlled
People don’t believe me
For them the bell has tolled
They blame me for my vote
But they do not know what I know
They do not know what my father knows
They believe the lies that they were told
That we really control what happens
When we push the correct button on the computer screen
They don’t know that I feel
Every day the silent scream

Food for thought and thoughts on food

Thursday Is National Day Of Prayer

Stock Market Update - Thu May 03 12:00:01 EDT 2007
Thu May 3, 2007 12:00PM EDT


From Growth is Madness! a fascinating interview:

Special guest: Dr. Russell Hopfenberg on food supply, carrying capacity, and population
May 3rd, 2007


Fixing Iraq
...Today the Army Corps has learned its lessons and stopped hiring international companies. It now realizes that local companies are less likely to be attacked, cost far less, and are perfectly capable of doing a good job if properly supervised...

Gee, ya think?

AAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGHHHHH!!!!

So, what should seniors pray for? Food, medication, or free legal advice?