The election is over, but the risk of corporate giveaways by an outgoing Bush Administration has never been greater.
In fact, the Bush Administration is rushing out long-term plans that would convert the ancient forests of western Oregon, with their towering trees, rushing rivers, and superb wildlife habitat, to empty clearcuts.
In its final hour, the Bush Administration is rushing to implement long-term plans to clearcut Oregon's ancient forests. Over two million acres could be clearcut, paving the way for more than a thousand miles of damaging logging roads and destroying the homes of hundreds of animals.
Join the Wilderness Society and tell the Bush Administration their plans are unacceptable.
see article at end of post!
Anyway here's a little ditty with a message which hopefully more Americans can get behind and encourage President-Elect Barack Obama to support.
Let's Impeach The President ( Bush That is !)-Neil Young
"I have said repeatedly that I intend to close Guantanamo, and I will follow through on that. I have said repeatedly that America doesn't torture, and I'm going to make sure that we don't torture. Those are part and parcel of an effort to regain America's moral stature in the world."
President-Elect Barack Obama
...It is abundantly clear that President George Bush ordered torture. By dehumanizing others through torture and murder he dehumanizes America and Americans. Criminal prosecution is a viable means to demonstrate the importance for Americans of the most basic rules of US and international law. Let the world know that we are not barbariansBenjamin G. Davis , Associte Professor of Law,
As usual, we read in the press that no one will prosecute these crimes. They will if we insist.
...the Bush administration sought to numb Americans to what has traditionally been seen as a clear moral and legal imperative: the requirement that individuals taken into custody by our government be treated fairly and humanely.Eugene Robinson, Nov. 18, 2008
Cheney and Gonzales to be indicted
The grand jury wrote it made its decision "with great sadness," but said they had no other choice but to indict Cheney and Gonzales "because we love our country."
Grand Jury South Texas Nov. 19, 2008
From : TruthOut & Reuters
Texas Jury Indicts Cheney, Gonzales in Prison Abuse Case Wednesday 19 November 2008/by: Reuters
Editor's Note: Major news networks such as CNN and BBC have reported that Vice President Dick Cheney and former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales have been issued indictments. It remains to be seen if this will gain traction, but the indictment highlights a detention center in Texas, which has been criticized for inhumane practices. Truthout will keep you updated as the story develops. sg/TO
Houston - A grand jury in South Texas indicted U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney and former attorney General Alberto Gonzales on Tuesday for "organized criminal activity" related to alleged abuse of inmates in private prisons.
The indictment has not been seen by a judge, who could dismiss it.
The grand jury in Willacy County, in the Rio Grande Valley near the U.S.-Mexico border, said Cheney is "profiteering from depriving human beings of their liberty," according to a copy of the indictment obtained by Reuters.
The indictment cites a "money trail" of Cheney's ownership in prison-related enterprises including the Vanguard Group, which owns an interest in private prisons in south Texas.
Former attorney general Gonzales used his position to "stop the investigations as to the wrong doings" into assaults in county prisons, the indictment said.
...The indictment, overseen by county District Attorney Juan Guerra, cites the case of Gregorio De La Rosa, who died on April 26, 2001, inside a private prison in Willacy County.
The grand jury wrote it made its decision "with great sadness," but said they had no other choice but to indict Cheney and Gonzales "because we love our country."
and on Torture
After the Torture Era Tuesday 18 November 2008
by: Eugene Robinson, The Washington Post
"I have said repeatedly that I intend to close Guantanamo, and I will follow through on that. I have said repeatedly that America doesn't torture, and I'm going to make sure that we don't torture. Those are part and parcel of an effort to regain America's moral stature in the world."
That unequivocal passage from President-elect Barack Obama's first extended interview since the election, broadcast on "60 Minutes" Sunday night, was a big step toward healing the damage that the Bush administration has done not just to our nation's image but to its soul.
...the Bush administration sought to numb Americans to what has traditionally been seen as a clear moral and legal imperative: the requirement that individuals taken into custody by our government be treated fairly and humanely.
This doesn't mean handling nihilistic, homicidal "evildoers" with kid gloves. It means being as certain as possible that the people we are holding are, indeed, real or would-be terrorists, not unlucky bystanders; and treating these detainees in accordance with international law, as we would expect detained U.S. personnel to be treated.
At Guantanamo, at Abu Ghraib and in a little gulag of secret CIA prisons overseas, the Bush administration failed to live up to these basic responsibilities and thus sullied us all.
We will look back on the Bush years and find it incredible, and disgraceful, that individuals were captured in battle or "purchased" from self-interested tribal warlords, whisked to Guantanamo, classified as "enemy combatants" but not accorded the rights that that status should have accorded them, held for years without charges -- and denied the right to prove that they were victims of mistaken identity and never should have been taken into custody.
A new study by researchers at the University of California at Berkeley, based on interviews with 62 men who were held for an average of three years at Guantanamo before being released without being accused of a crime, found that more than a third said they were turned over to their American captors by warlords for a bounty. Those who reported physical abuse said most of it occurred at the United States' Bagram air base in Afghanistan, where about half the men were initially held before being taken to Guantanamo.
Two-thirds of the former detainees reported suffering psychological problems since their release, and many are now destitute, shunned by their families and villages. None has received any compensation for the ordeal, according to the report, titled "Guantánamo and Its Aftermath."
Years from now, we will be shocked to see those pictures of naked prisoners being humiliated and abused at Abu Ghraib -- and we will be ashamed of a U.S. government that punished low-level troops for their sadism but exonerated the higher-ups who made such sadism possible
...The new Obama administration has a duty to conduct its own investigation and tell us exactly what was done in our name. Realistically, some facts are going to be redacted. Realistically, some officials who may deserve to face criminal charges will not. But to restore our national honor and heal our national soul, we at least need to know.
and the belief in the prosecution of those who were or are in charge of setting policies and issuing orders for carrying out abuse and torture of detainees is being taken up by others as we see in this article by Associate Professor of Law , University of Toledo Benjamin G. Davis : MWC News.net Unfinished Business For America
Torture crimes of high level civilians and generals
By Benjamin G. Davis, Associate Professor of Law, University of Toledo College of Law
As usual, we read in the press that no one will prosecute these crimes. They will if we insist.
We need to criminally prosecute the perpetrators. We must prosecute them because low-level soldiers ordered to do their bidding have been prosecuted. Soldiers who served at Bagram and Abu Ghraib have been court-martialed for the heinous acts they were ordered to and urged to perform on detainees. These soldiers, sons and daughters from decent, ordinary American families, are serving life sentences for betraying their oath. It is time that their leaders who ordered them to betray their oath face the music. No one gets a pass just because they are high up.
These leaders not only consider themselves above the law, but above the United States. We need to prosecute them to reaffirm who we are as Americans. We are not vicious torturers. These people have no place in our city on the hill.
and he concludes that taking action will improve America's reputation abroad.
...It is abundantly clear that President George Bush ordered torture. By dehumanizing others through torture and murder he dehumanizes America and Americans. Criminal prosecution is a viable means to demonstrate the importance for Americans of the most basic rules of US and international law. Let the world know that we are not barbarians.
And meanwhile back on the ranch in Texas:
More on Bush's continuing Rape & pillaging and plundering of the Environment which he is hoping will continue as part of his legacy for decades to come. Is Bush just trying to ensure that Big Oil and Big Coal remain his friends and will make him a highly paid consultant or a CEO as he is now in the job market.
From: Common Dreams.org The Bush Regime is still actively trying to sneak major policy decisions under the wire before Obama takes over. Bush appears to be making commitments to corporations and investors on behalf of the United States government in such a way that it will be difficult for the new administration to reverse these decisions and future commitments. So to the oil industry Bush is promising to open up large tracts of previously restricted areas to them without much in the way of regulations or oversight or concerns for the environmental impacts of these new and unproven and untested oil extracting projects.
Wednesday, November 19, 2008 by Environmental News Service (ENS) Bush Tries to Kickstart U.S. Oil Shale Development
by J.R. Pegg
WASHINGTON, DC - The Bush administration finalized regulations to govern the commercial development of oil shale on federal lands on Monday, rebuffing concerns that the rules are premature and ignoring the serious environmental concerns about tapping the resource.
Administration officials said investors keen to unlock the nation's vast oil shale resources need "rules of the road" even though the technology is still not commercially viable.
The rules, announced by the U.S. Interior Department's Bureau of Land Management, provide the regulatory framework for commercial oil shale development, including royalty rates and lease sizes.
The regulations are largely aimed at some two million acres of federal land in Colorado, Utah and Wyoming rich in oil shale - an area known as the Green River formation. The BLM estimates the nation's oil shale reserves, much of them in the Green River Formation, could yield some 800 billion barrels of recoverable oil.
That is enough to displace foreign oil imports for more than a century, said Stephen Allred, the Interior Department's assistant secretary for land and minerals management.
But Allred acknowledged commercial technology to economically tap the resource does not exist and could be a decade away from reality.
"It is going to be some time," Allred told reporters on a telephone briefing.
That is one reason the decision to issue the rules has irked environmentalists and some Democratic lawmakers, who also worry about the massive outlays of water and energy needed to convert compounds in sedimentary rocks into synthetic crude oil.
Oil shale has been labeled the "dirtiest fuel on the planet" by the Natural Resources Defense Council, which estimates that production will emit four times more greenhouse gases than conventional gasoline production.
"Cooking rocks and scorching the Earth is not a solution to our energy crisis," said Amy Mall, a senior policy analyst for NRDC.
A sign of Hope and Change as more Young People Become Serious Activists
Wednesday, November 19, 2008 by The Charleston Post and Courier (South Carolina) Young Activists Fired Up in Fight Against Coal
by Tony Bartelme
JOHNSONVILLE, S. Carolina - Outside the high school here Tuesday night, as people gathered for a public hearing, three young women wrestled with a big black inflatable coal plant that looked similar to a jump castle - except for the words "CLEAN UP DIRTY COAL PLANTS NOW" on the side
Across the country, anti-coal activists, many of them students in their 20s, are attending hearings and engaging in demonstrations and acts of civil disobedience reminiscent of the protests their parents might have seen in the 1970s against nuclear plants.
It's a big change from the 1990s when utilities went on a coal-plant construction binge with little or no controversy. But today, projects such as Santee Cooper's plan to build its Pee Dee coal plant face a new generation activists, along with the usual cadre of established environmental groups
...In April, activists locked themselves to bulldozers outside a Duke Power plant under construction in western North Carolina and spread a banner that said "Global Warming Crime Scene." Police used stun guns to control some of the demonstrators and arrested eight people. This fall, Al Gore said, "We've reached the stage where it's time for civil disobedience to prevent construction of new coal-fired power plants that do not have sequestration."
UPDATE: Logging
And even more last minute give-aways to Big Business & the Logging Interests.
From AlterNet & The Wilderness Society
In its final hour, the Bush Administration is rushing to implement long-term plans to clearcut Oregon's ancient forests. Over two million acres could be clearcut, paving the way for more than a thousand miles of damaging logging roads and destroying the homes of hundreds of animals. Join the Wilderness Society and tell the Bush Administration their plans are unacceptable.
Say NO to Last-Minute Logging!
The federal Bureau of Land Management has just proposed opening thousands of acres of forests in western Oregon to logging. It's a handoff to the timber industry, a huge loss to endangered species, and to the American public.
But there's still time to object! Your voice is absolutely critical in showing that the public cares about what happens to these forests. The BLM needs to know that Americans will not stand for degrading our streams and rivers, or the sale of some of our last ancient forests to the timber industry.
Tell the Bush Administration that destroying Oregon's coastal forests is unacceptable!
The election is over, but the risk of corporate giveaways by an outgoing Bush Administration has never been greater.
In fact, the Bush Administration is rushing out long-term plans that would convert the ancient forests of western Oregon, with their towering trees, rushing rivers, and superb wildlife habitat, to empty clearcuts.
Under these plans, logging our public forests would dramatically increase, more than tripling the current level. More than a thousand miles of damaging logging roads would be built within the forests.
Let them know we're watching. Say NO to the Bush Administration's attempt to sell off some of our last ancient forests to the timber industry.
What's at stake? More than two million acres that contain some of America's few remaining ancient forests. Some 20,000 miles of rivers, where wild Pacific salmon thrive. Ancient forests that are home to huge Douglas fir, western hemlocks and western red cedar trees-some well over 400 years old. This wet, rugged environment also provides rich habitat for wildlife like elk, deer, black bear and Pacific fishers, as well as endangered species such as spotted owls and marbled murrelets.
These forests gain more importance each day as buffers against the impacts of global warming. That's just one of the many reasons why logging activities should focus on smaller trees-and always with restoration and fire protection in mind.
We can't let this happen. Click here to tell the Bush Administration their plans are wholly unacceptable.
PS.
As sometimes or often happens events of the moment intrude. So for those interested I will get back to discussing in later posts the issue of " racism in American society. Racism did not suddenly end with President Johnson's Civil Rights Bills and nor did racism cease to exist one Barack Obama was elected as President. There will always be segment of society hopefully a shrinking segment of those who are racist and those who use racism for political gains. But surely America in the furure will be a less hospitable place for wide spread racism or at least those in the media for instance who reflect racist views will no longer be tolerated as if they had a " rational basis or argument " for their mistaken irrational & dispicable racist views.
and so it goes,
GORD.
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