[wordup] someone needs to vent a little.

[Adam Shand]

All from email addresses removed as requested.  This quote from the below linked 
Onion article made me laugh though:

  "You know, they say people get the government they deserve, 
  but I don't recall knife-raping any retarded nuns."

From: Not AssCroft

I need to vent a little.

Everybody now knows that the one of the BIG advantages to a never
ending War On Terror<tm> from the viewpoint of those in power is a
ready made excuse to clamp down on civil liberties such as freedom of
assembly, freedom of speech, and freedom from unreasonable search and
seizure. If you want to protest in this atmosphere, you must stand
quietly with your placard in a fenced-in "First Amendment Zone" located
approximately 5 miles from the person/thing you wish to protest
against, or be maced and beaten.  The irony of this seems to be lost on
most people.

Another advantage for those in power is a ready made excuse to
scrutinize everyone and everything looking for The Bad Guys.  The
gub'mint wants us all cataloged and tracked - physically, financially,
and philosophically - with troublemakers detained indefinitely without
charges or trial.  Even someone considered a 'material witness' (not a
criminal, but a WITNESS!) can now be stripped of all of their rights
and imprisoned and denied legal assistance.  The courts say that this
is all peachy because the Patriot Act allows it.  However they are
unwilling to state the obvious, which is that the Patriot Act *itself*
is blatantly and 100% in opposition to the freedoms and manifest rights
that our Constitution was specifically DESIGNED to protect, and allows
the kinds of abuses by government that the Constitution was
specifically DESIGNED to prevent.  It's not merely unconstitutional,
it's anti-Constitutional.

This is not news.  In fact, since the major networks are all corporate
mouthpieces shilling for Shrub & Co., *nothing* we hear on the TV or
read in the paper can actually be called 'news.'  VP Cheney's statement
that he considers the media "a problem to be managed" shows exactly  
where his views on free speech, accountability, and the citizenry that  
'elected' his little puppet government stand.  Estimates are already coming in  
that this war will likely kill 500,000 humans, and I doubt that Shrub will  
even have the decency to bury them (alive) like his daddy did.

http://www.digitaljournalist.org/issue0211/sloyan.html

The War On Terror<tm> is also a convenient cover for Shrub & Co.'s oil
land grab in Iraq and pipeline path through Afghanistan.  The
Unocal/Taliban pipeline deal that had been in negotiations since the
early 1990's is extremely well documented, but virtually ignored by the
major media in THIS country.  The Taliban wanted too much money and oil
from the pipeline, so Shrub had to take them out to appease his
bosses.  Osama was, and always has been, a red herring - but the
slackjawed dolts that elected Shrub need a boogeyman so that they don't
have to THINK about the how, who, what and why of 9/11. Conveniently,
he was sitting in a cave in a country that Shrub needed to overthrow
anyway, so we throw a couple million dollars worth of explosives at
a couple of holes in the ground for the cameras, blow up some goats and
goat herders, and accomplish the REAL goal of the removal of those
uncooperative Taliban zealots.

http://www.oilandgasinternational.com/departments/from_editor/10_29_01.html

The coming attack on Iraq and seizure of it's oil fields has been
planned since at least April 2001, 5 months before Shrub & Co. allowed
(and likely abetted) the 9/11 attacks, in order to justify what they
were about to do anyway.  Anyone who considers this paranoid conspiracy
theory should do a little online research into Operation Northwoods.
We are their cattle, and our Fearless Leaders have no qualms about
staging fake attacks and murdering U.S. citizens indiscriminately if it
furthers their political agenda and/or lines their pockets.  They've
already TOLD YOU SO.

http://abcnews.go.com/sections/us/DailyNews/jointchiefs_010501.html

I think that must be what Shrub calls his "compassionate conservatism."
Remember any compassion from Shrub or His Daddy?  Ever?  Maybe it was
that bullshit $300 tax "refund" (which was your own money anyway) that
squandered our budget surplus and began the downward spiral of our
economy. Maybe it was Dick and Shrub's dear pal "Kenny Boy" Lay bending
us all over and giving it to us good.  Maybe it's our new Homeland
Security Agency that Shrubby formed to protects us from the mean
swarthies who object to our government's foreign policy of economic  
rape. What do you call an emergency that never ends?  I don't have a  
punchline, but I think the joke is on us.  How about "oil will permanently cease to
be abundant."  Yeah, I don't think that's very funny either.

http://tinyurl.com/2oni

Stock up on toilet paper and rice and beans, friends, because if Shrub
gets his way I'll bet you a chicken that we'll be reduced to a barter
economy before it's over.  Just like what is happening in Argentina
_right_ _now_.  Buenos Aires alone is a city of 2.8 MILLION people, and
they're reduced to trading with each other for food.  Can't happen here?
Want to bet?  Watching the Dow?  Seen the crop reports in this country
lately?  Think war is going to help the situation?

http://csmonitor.com/2002/0426/p01s03-woam.html

So why are we attacking Iraq now?  It certainly has no nukes, while
its Axis Of Evil partner North Korea does! (Hint: Korea has no oil.)
Even *if* OBL managed to orchestrate the largest terrorist attack in the
history of the world, from a *cave* for chrissakes, with a nothing but a
cell phone, ZZ Top beard and an AK-47, Saddam had nothing to do with it.
OBL and Hussein HATE each other!  If Saddam *does* actually have any
Weapons Of Mass Destruction then do you know where he got them? From 
Big Daddy Bush himself, of course.

http://www.counterpunch.org/boles1010.html

No, we're not going to attack Hussein because he might still have the
WMD's that G. H. W. Bush gave him, but because Kenneth Lay told James
Baker to tell Dick Cheney that he wanted Iraq's oil for Enron.  That's
why.

"President Bush's Cabinet agreed in April 2001 that 'Iraq remains a 
destabilising influence to the flow of oil to international markets  
from the Middle East' and because this is an unacceptable risk to the US 
'military intervention' is necessary."  [...]

"Baker who delivered the recommendations to Cheney, the former chief
executive of Texas oil firm Halliburton, was advised by Kenneth Lay,  
the disgraced former chief executive of Enron, the US energy giant which
went bankrupt after carrying out massive accountancy fraud."

http://www.sundayherald.com/28285

We do not live in a democracy, and have not since Eisenhower warned us
in his farewell address against the dangers of the "military-industrial
complex," a term he himself coined in that very speech.  He knew then,
even in 1961, that our government was no longer ours, and all but told
us so.

"This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms
industry is new in the American experience. The total influence -
economic, political, even spiritual - is felt in every city, every
State House, every office of the federal government. We recognize the
imperative need for this development.  Yet we must not fail to
comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources, and livelihood
are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.

In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition
of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the
military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of
misplaced power exists and will persist.

We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties
or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an
alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the
huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful
methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together."

http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/ike.htm

Our "elected" government no longer answers to the electorate, and in
fact doesn't give a SHIT about you or your family or your Pursuit Of
Happiness until reelection time comes around, and then you'll get a
little lip-service and a couple of babies kissed for the cameras. Our
military is nothing more than the enforcement arm of Shrub & Co.'s oil
interests.  Don't believe it?  Then consider that during our
"humanitarian" mission to Somalia (in which hundreds of peasant Somalis
were slaughtered until finally the bodies of dead American soldiers were
dragged through the streets by cheering crowds) both the American
Embassy *and* headquarters for the military "peacekeeping" operation
were based INSIDE the Conoco Oil compound.  The United States of Conoco.

http://www.netnomad.com/fineman.html

There are so many more obvious examples like these that it's just too
depressing to consider.  The majority of middle class sheeple in this
nation are terrified by the idea of losing what little they have
managed to scrape together in a lifetime of hard work, while once a
week Wall Street is forced by the sheer magnitude of the theviery to
out one of their own and pretend that it's NOT ACTUALLY the default
state of business in America.  It is.  You know it is.

A humor/satire newspaper called The Onion contained a quote recently
that stuck with me for it's cynical acknowledment of how bad the
situation really is, although everyone keeps their heads in the sand
and hopes it will all go away soon.

"You know, they say people get the government they deserve, but I don't
recall knife-raping any retarded nuns."

http://www.theonion.com/onion3842/wdyt_3842.html

It's only the fact that people like this guy exist and speak truthfully
that I have any reason to hope that one day we might take our government
back from Exxon/Mobil/Chevron/Texaco/Shell/Haliburton/Conoco et al,
ad nauseam, amen.

http://film.guardian.co.uk/interview/interviewpages/0,6737,841083,00.html

I'm done.  If you read this far, thanks.  Please *do* read all of the
links when you have time.  If you forward this to anyone else, please
remove all email addresses.  I don't want to violate anyone's precious
remaining privacy, and tracking me down for charges of sedition will  
give that fundie freak John Asscroft something harmless to do.  :)