Chavez Recruits Chaplin for a Lesson in Revolution



Charlie Chaplin's classic black-and-white movie Modern Times highlighted the exploitation and horrendous conditions faced by US factory workers during the Depression. Venezuela's leader Hugo Chavez believes it is as relevant today as it ever was.

Worse Than Iraq
On Tuesday, the 14th day of this dreadful conflict, I attended a meeting in the House of Commons with a number of international lawyers. They had no doubt that Israel's attacks, on such a huge scale, were a clear violation of international law. The UN has said the same.

Report: U.N. observers' calls unheeded
U.N. observers in Lebanon telephoned the Israeli military 10 times in six hours to ask it to stop shelling near their position before an attack killed four observers and sparked international anger with Israel, U.N. officials said Wednesday.

Specter prepping bill to sue Bush
A powerful Republican committee chairman who has led the fight against President Bush's signing statements said Monday he would have a bill ready by the end of the week allowing Congress to sue him in federal court.
"We will submit legislation to the United States Senate which will...authorize the Congress to undertake judicial review of those signing statements with the view to having the president's acts declared unconstitutional," Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., said on the Senate floor.
Specter's announcement came the same day that an American Bar Association task force concluded that by attaching conditions to legislation, the president has sidestepped his constitutional duty to either sign a bill, veto it, or take no action.
Bush has issued at least 750 signing statements during his presidency, reserving the right to revise, interpret or disregard laws on national security and constitutional grounds.

ABA: Bush violating Constitution
President Bush's penchant for writing exceptions to laws he has just signed violates the Constitution, an American Bar Association task force says in a report highly critical of the practice.
The ABA group, which includes a one-time FBI director and former federal appeals court judge, said the president has overstepped his authority in attaching challenges to hundreds of new laws.
The attachments, known as bill-signing statements, say Bush reserves a right to revise, interpret or disregard measures on national security and constitutional grounds.
"This report raises serious concerns crucial to the survival of our democracy," said the ABA's president, Michael Greco. "If left unchecked, the president's practice does grave harm to the separation of powers doctrine, and the system of checks and balances that have sustained our democracy for more than two centuries."

US intelligence chief blocks analysis of Iraq civil war
“What do you call the situation in Iraq right now?” asked one person familiar with the situation. “The analysts know that it's a civil war, but there's a feeling at the top that [using that term] will complicate matters.” Negroponte, said another source regarding the potential impact of a pessimistic assessment, “doesn't want the president to have to deal with that.”

"Pentagon Papers" Author Daniel Ellsberg Says Government May Have Carried Out 9/11
He warned that within days after a US military strike on Iran that Bush's handlers would probably stage some type of terror attack in the West to legitimize the new war.
Ellsberg went on to state that another major Reichstag-like state-sponsored attack would be followed by a martial law scenario which might include detention camps for American dissenters.
"If there’s another 9/11 or a major war in the Middle-East involving a U.S. attack on Iran, I have no doubt that there will be, the day after or within days an equivalent of a Reichstag fire decree that will involve massive detentions in this country."
- Daniel Ellsberg

Our dumb president
The ignorance, the boorishness, the embarrassing behavior were all on display at this year's G8 Summit, which concluded Monday. Between the president's stuffing a roll in his mouth to his use of "shit" in an exchange with Tony Blair to his witless banter with world leaders to his more-than-awkward surprise "massage" of German Chancellor Angela Merkel, our dumb president has never been dumber or more embarrassing. Or, for that matter, more AWOL when the world needs our leadership most. But that's alright, his defenders will say, he's just being himself, being authentic. Great. Our president is an authentic jackass.

Bush - Stoned? Drunk? Medicated? Retarded?
Watch the press conference where Bush couldn't stop talking about the pig roast. It didn't matter what anyone asked him, he just kept saying whatever his addled brain was looping on, in this case, the pig. Typical stoned behavior. It reminded me of the time Bush went to Canada and couldn't get off the subject of the mouth one of the Canadian Prime Minister's staff members! "You've got a purty mouth." Not once but several times. "You've sure got a purty mouth." And, "Your mouth is prettier than my Scott's mouth." (The poor guy's name was Scott.) Who does this? Outside of bars or institutions, I mean.

Medically retired soldier concludes: "We are pawns" in Iraq
At what price would you take a job that included scraping human flesh off ambushed Humvees?
What if it also meant working 16 to 20 hours nearly every day in 120-degree temperatures?
As an enlisted soldier, Army Staff Sgt. Jeffrey Peskoff of Fountain took on such a job, overseeing 29 soldiers at a military installation in Mosul, Iraq.
Of course, he didn't know what he was getting himself into.
Taking into account the number of hours he worked each week, his $43,000 salary during his year in Iraq came out to less than $7 an hour.
Meanwhile, the soldiers in his unit had to transport and protect workers of U.S. corporations who earned salaries three to five times higher working on engineering projects, such as building (and rebuilding) oil pipelines.
"If you don't think about being security for these massive corporations making big bucks being there, you're OK, but if you do, then you realize the entire military is being used and abused," Peskoff, a married 33-year-old father of two girls, told me.
"This is not a Michael Moore conspiracy. It's not just Halliburton. Many U.S. companies are there to get the oil that's there."
"The politicians, not just the Republicans but the Democrats, too, could care less about spreading democracy," he said. "We are pawns. The soldiers are being used."

Gallup: Almost Two-Thirds Want Iraq Withdrawal
A new Gallup poll finds that roughly 2 in 3 Americans urge a U.S. withdrawal from Iraq, with 31% wanting this to start immediately.
"Suggestions that the United States engage in some type of gradual withdrawal increase significantly as educational level increases."

Britons tire of cruel, vulgar US
People in Britain view the United States as a vulgar, crime-ridden society obsessed with money and led by an incompetent president whose Iraq policy is failing, according to a newspaper poll.

Standing Up Against the Iraq War
Clearly, the Iraq war fails the test of being a just war. The leaders of our major Christian denominations agree. Pope John Paul II stated before the Iraq war began that this war would be a defeat for humanity which could not be morally or legally justified. In the weeks and months before the U.S. attacked Iraq, not only the Pope, but also one Cardinal and Archbishop after another spoke out against such a “preemptive” strike. They declared that the just war theology could not justify such a war. Back in 2002, President George Bush’s own Methodist Church launched a scathing attack on his preparations for war against Iraq, saying that they are “without any justification according to the teachings of Christ.” In July, 2004, the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church/USA issued a paper that condemned the U.S. policy of pre-emptive military action against nations perceived as threats to the United States as ethically indefensible and contrary to the just war theory that has been the basis of Christian theology on warfare.
Lt. Watada is a man of conscience who speaks truth to power. He is a man of courage who puts himself in the way of an immoral war. Lt. Watada is the true patriot who acts to bring his nation back to its moral senses. People of faith and conscience around America must stand up with Lt. Watada and demand an end to this unjust and immoral war on Iraq.

Has This Country Gone Completely Insane?
Getting Busted for Wearing a Peace T-Shirt
"You can't be in here protesting," Officer Adkins said, pointing to my Veterans For Peace shirt.
"Well, I'm not protesting, I'm having a cup of coffee," I returned, thinking that logic would convince Adkins to go back to his earlier duties of guarding against serious terrorists.
Flipping his badge open, he said, "No, not with that shirt. You're protesting and you have to go."
Beginning to get his drift, I said firmly, "Not before I finish my coffee."
He insisted that I leave, but still not quite believing my ears, I tried one more approach to reason.
"Hey, listen. I'm a veteran. This is a V.A. facility. I'm sitting here not talking to anybody, having a cup of coffee. I'm not protesting and you can't kick me out."
"You'll either go or we'll arrest you," Adkins threatened.