More recent stuff on Buckley Dialectic (Blog)
Robert B. Reich | War on The Web
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Baghdad Embassy Did you see the 4/14/06 AP story on the new secret US embassy in Baghdad? A "fortresslike compound ... the largest of its kind in the world" will include 21 buildings on 104 acres in the middle of Baghdad. Along with a big air base, it doesn't make it seem as if we are winding down that war any time soon. |
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Immigration Rallies Jim Buckley, 4/12/06
Way to go American immigrants! Millions rally for human rights in 100 US cities. It's the most hopeful, positive progressive political activity I've seen since the Civil Rights Movement. Maybe it will grow into a viable third party with a grass roots agenda to counter big corporations, Of course it's not as simple as just supporting the immigrants - which is where I end up. The real culprits are US businesses and the US government which have turned a blind eye to illegal immigration for years. So who are the illegals? And where have the unions been? Why haven't they been organizing the immigrant trades and hotel workers like the farm workers were organized? Marriott and ACME Brick (just to pick two well managed all American companies), have been benefiting from low wage immigrant labor for years and are now therefore in favor of more open immigration. Does that make them heros? As usual, it benefits big business not to have much rule of law and, if anything goes wrong, it will be the immigrant workers who will be judged "illegal", have no rights and will suffer. One delicious irony is that the "illegal" businesses are now lined up against the right wing Christian ideologues which should make the Bush administration squirm. Where are the Democrats? |
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I am peace not war
I am not war I am peace. Renee Depew, Grade 7, 5/18/05 **********
Guest Column In the 9/11 attack, a little over three thousand people were killed. Following that, the U S government was partially reorganized and the U S went to war. In the hurricanes, in the area around New Orleans, over six thousand people died. Now, over twelve hundred children are living with foster parents or in institutions because their birth parents cannot be located, dead or alive. Months later, the best the U S government can do for housing is temporary shelter in hotels, canvas tents and a few travel trailers. Over eighty percent of those who suffered the most were African/American. Is there a connection? How can the U S spend over $300 billion on war against a nation that had nothing to do with 9/11, and not take care of the survivors of hurricanes in our own land? A new medical center, with a modern hospital, a college of medicine and allied sciences, a college of nursing, plus outlying clinics, costs approximately one billion dollars for construction and the first five years of operation. For the war in Iraq the U S could have built 300 of these modern medical centers throughout the world. Which option has the greater chance of successful outcomes, war or medical centers? By the way, the notion that the U S had to fight Saddam Hussein, just as the U S had to go to war against Hitler is totally bogus: Within a week of Pearl Harbor, Hitler declared war on the U S, not the other way around. In the case of both Japan and the European Axis, war was first declared on the US -- then the U S responded in kind as a defense. Can Fox News and Rush Limbaugh be that stupid? or do they think that we are that stupid that we would believe them? R E D |
Let's Try the Democrats (again) Email Letters to my Elected Representatives: (An Exercise in trying to find the best category among the irrelevant ones offered)
Senator (D-Washington) Patty Murray's Office 202 224 2621
Senator (D-Washington) Maria Cantwell's Office 202 224 3441
Representative (D-Washington District 6) Norm Dicks's Office 202 225 5916 4/8/06 Senators Murray and Cantwell and Representative Dicks, I'd be pleased if you would lead Washington Democrats in an effort to impeach President Bush as the Democrats in Vermont, New Mexico, Nevada, North Carolina and Wisconsin have done. The President has misled the country into war, conducted illegal spying on Americans and condoned torture. It's time to take our government back and restore our American traditions of freedom and democracy.
Your voting supporter, (Only response, a form letter from Norm Dicks) ********** 11/17/05 Dear____ The federal agency I need help with is the Bush Administration. I'm glad you are my senator/representative. Thank you for all you do. But these are trying times and you need to do more. I'm not sure we Americans can survive the remainder of the Bush administration. I'm appalled at the direction the Bush administration is taking us - the war, tolerance of torture, the encroaching theocracy, tax cuts and other policies that reward corporate greed and increase the divide between the rich and poor, the arrogance combined with stupidity and an intolerance for criticism..... I don't know what the plan should be but I sure wish the Democrats would work on a coherent platform. Fire the PR types and build the grass roots. We Americans need to get back to our core values and we need your leadership. Please do what you can. Jim Buckley, Port Townsend, WA
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Links Vote to Impeach Bush
Websites of interest http://www.back-to-iraq.com/ - Christopher Allbritton's subsriber-supported news blog. Lots of links to other news sources.
New York Times
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Ramblings 2/3/05 The peace Movement seems to have slacked. We are bogged down in Iraq but the media seems to be distracted or mostly still "in bed" with the Bush administration - and civil liberties are still eroding. I'm reading the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal and listening to the CBC and BBC, gave money to Christopher Allbritton's subscriber-supported news blog and joined ACLU. I wish the country hadn't traded party platforms and debate of issues for lobbyists, public relations firms and big money. Wish the Democrats had a backbone or there was a viable third party. 3/24/03 As far as I can figure out, the Bush Administration's objective is to "decapitate" Iraq as quickly and cleanly as possible to set an ugly precedent. Who's next? Korea? Iran? Might as well take out Castro. One or two "smart bombs" and we can control the world. In conjunction with the policy of "first strike" and the presumption of guilt without much opportunity of proving innocence at home, we could be well on the way toward a virulent new form of imperialism abroad and oppression at home. On the positive side, thanks in part to the Internet, the world seems not to be going along. The imbedded media may backfire and there is the gap between what we say and what we do that may be worked. I hate to cheer it on, or even predict it, but I think getting bogged down in Iraq is preferable to a quick win if it means defeat of the Bush doctrine and a return to American values and the rule of law. 3/11/03 Okay, it's getting my attention. America is going to start a war in the name of the freedoms the war would threaten? With the UN, France, Germany and most of the world in opposition? Provoke Korea while we're at it? What are they thinking? This must have been what it was like to live in Germany in 1938. Save the world. Impeach Bush, Cheney, Rumsfield and especially Ashcroft. Might as well include Powell. This time the Internet (developed by the defense Department - isn't that ironic?) will help us wage peace. It's the new Fourth Estate.
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2/15/03
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