SAY NO to Patriot EXTENSIONS!

 

Sign our petition

 

Protect Civil Liberties:

Let The PATRIOT Act Expire!

BREAKING, February 8th: It’s working! The House vote to extend the PATRIOT Act just failed. But they’re not going to give up — now, more than ever, we need people to keep the pressure on. Sign the petition and tell your friends to sign as well!

UPDATE, February 7th: The House is trying to ram through a sneaky renewal of the PATRIOT Act this week!  They’re doing it without debate, and without including any meaningful reforms.  Please sign the petition below, and use this page to call your lawmaker to urge him or her to vote no.

ORIGINAL: The PATRIOT Act is set to expire in just FOUR WEEKS, but Congress is trying to rush through a last minute extension!

Since it was passed almost a decade ago, some of the most noxious portions of the PATRIOT Act have burrowed their way deep into our legal system.  A year ago, President Obama signed a bill extending three provisions of the original PATRIOT Act; last week Congressman Mike Rogers (R-Michigan) introduced legislation to extend them again.

Together, these provisions make a mockery of our civil liberties: They let government officials spy on whomever they want, for any reason, without ever letting them know or giving them a chance to challenge the order in court.

Enough is enough: Will you join us in demanding that Congress finally let these provisions expire? Just add your name at right, and we’ll automatically send a message to your senator, representative, and President Obama:

TO MY ELECTED OFFICIALS:  After nearly ten years, it’s time to let the PATRIOT Act expire once and for all.  I urge you to oppose its re-authorization.

 

Add your name and we’ll deliver your message to Washington.

 

Here’s a more detailed article from the CATO Institute that explains some of the problems with the PATRIOT Act provisions that are up for extension.  And here’s an overview by the ACLU.

 

 

THE ROAD TO ARMAGEDDON

By Paul Craig Roberts

The Washington Times is a newspaper that looks with favor upon the
Bush/Cheney/Obama/neocon wars of aggression in the Middle East and favors making
terrorists pay for 9/11. Therefore, I was surprised to learn on February 24 that
the most popular story on the paper’s website for the past three days was the
“CLICK HERE: Inside the Beltway” report, “Explosive News,” [By Jennifer Harper, February 22,
2010] about the 31 press conferences in cities in the US and abroad on
February 19 held by Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth, an organization of
professionals which now has 1,000 members.
(“We must continue to spread the real news and history of this country in order to
reestablish a Democracy that was once ours”. Dave)

I was even more surprised that the news report treated the press conference seriously. How did three World Trade Center skyscrapers suddenly disintegrate into fine dust? How did massive steel beams in three skyscrapers suddenly fail as a result of short-lived, isolated, and low temperature fires? “A thousand architects and engineers want to know, and are calling on Congress to order a new investigation into the destruction of the Twin Towers and Building 7,” reports the Washington Times.

The paper reports that the architects and engineers have concluded that the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the National Institute of Standards and Technology provided “insufficient, contradictory and fraudulent accounts of the circumstances of the towers’ destruction” and are “calling for a grand jury investigation of NIST officials.”

The newspaper reports that Richard Gage, the spokesperson for the architects and engineers said: “Government officials will be notified that ‘Misprision of Treason,’ U.S. Code 18 (Sec. 2382) is a serious federal offense, which requires those with evidence of treason to act. The implications are enormous and may have profound impact on the forthcoming Khalid Sheik Mohammed trial.”

There is now an organization, Firefighters for 9/11 Truth. At the main press conference in San Francisco, Erik Lawyer, the head of that organization, announced the firefighters’ support for the architects and engineers’ demands. He reported that no forensic investigation was made of the fires that are alleged to have destroyed the three buildings and that this failure constitutes a crime.

Mandated procedures were not followed, and instead of being preserved and investigated, the crime scene was destroyed. He also reported that there are more than one hundred first responders who heard and experienced explosions and that there is radio, audio and video evidence of explosions.

Also at the press conference, physicist Steven Jones presented the evidence of nano-thermite in the residue of the WTC buildings found by an international panel of scientists led by University of Copenhagen nano-chemist Professor Niels Harrit. Nano-thermite is a high-tech explosive/pyrotechnic capable of instantly melting steel girders.

Before we yell “conspiracy theory,” we should be aware that the architects, engineers, firefighters, and scientists offer no theory. They provide evidence that challenges the official theory. This evidence is not going to go away.

If expressing doubts or reservations about the official story in the 9/11 Commission Report makes a person a conspiracy theory kook, then we have to include both co-chairmen of the 9/11 Commission and the Commission’s legal counsel, all of whom have written books in which they clearly state that they were lied to by government officials when they conducted their investigation, or, rather, when they presided over the investigation conducted by executive director Philip Zelikow, a member of President George W. Bush’s transition team and Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board and a co-author of Bush Secretary of State Condi “Mushroom Cloud” Rice.

There will always be Americans who will believe whatever the government tells them no matter how many times they know the government has lied to them. Despite expensive wars that threaten Social Security and Medicare, wars based on non-existent Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, non-existent Saddam Hussein connections to al Qaida, non-existent Afghan participation in the 9/11 attacks, and the non-existent Iranian nukes that are being hyped as the reason for the next American war of aggression in the Middle East, more than half of the U.S. population still believes the fantastic story that the government has told them about 9/11, a Muslim conspiracy that outwitted the entire Western world.

Moreover, it doesn’t matter to these Americans how often the government changes its story. For example, Americans first heard of Osama bin Laden because the Bush regime pinned the 9/11 attacks on him. Over the years video after video was served up to the gullible American public of bin Laden’s pronouncements. Experts dismissed the videos as fakes, but Americans remained their gullible selves. Then suddenly last year a new 9/11 “mastermind” emerged to take bin Laden’s place, the captive Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the detainee waterboarded 183 times until he confessed to masterminding the 9/11 attack.

In the Middle Ages confessions extracted by torture constituted evidence, but self-incrimination has been a no-no in the U.S. legal system since our founding. But with the Bush regime and the Republican federal judges, whom we were assured would defend the U.S. Constitution, the self-incrimination of Sheik Mohammed stands today as the only evidence the U.S. government has that Muslim terrorists pulled off 9/11.

If a person considers the feats attributed to Khalid Sheik Mohammed, they are simply unbelievable. Sheik Mohammed is a more brilliant, capable superhero than V in the fantasy movie, “V for Vendetta.” Sheik Mohammed outwitted all 16 U.S. intelligence agencies along with those of all U.S. allies or puppets, including Israel’s Mossad. No intelligence service on earth or all of them combined was a match for Sheik Mohammed.

Sheik Mohammed outwitted the U.S. National Security Council, Dick Cheney, the Pentagon, the State Department, NORAD, the U.S. Air Force, and Air Traffic Control.

He caused Airport Security to fail four times in one morning. He caused the state-of-the-art air defenses of the Pentagon to fail, allowing a hijacked airliner, which was off course all morning while the U.S. Air Force, for the first time in history, was unable to get aloft interceptor aircraft, to crash into the Pentagon.

Sheik Mohammed was able to perform these feats with unqualified pilots.

Sheik Mohammed, even as a waterboarded detainee, has managed to prevent the FBI from releasing the many confiscated videos that would show, according to the official story, the hijacked airliner hitting the Pentagon.

How naive do you have to be to believe that any human, or for that matter Hollywood fantasy character, is this powerful and capable?

If Sheik Mohammed has these superhuman capabilities, how did the incompetent Americans catch him? This guy is a patsy tortured into confession in order to keep the American naifs believing the government’s conspiracy theory.

What is going on here is that the U.S. government has to bring the 9/11 mystery to an end. The government must put on trial and convict a culprit so that it can close the case before it explodes. Anyone waterboarded 183 times would confess to anything.

The U.S. government has responded to the evidence being arrayed against its outlandish 9/11 conspiracy theory by redefining the war on terror from external to internal enemies. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said on February 21 that American extremists are now as big a concern as international terrorists. Extremists, of course, are people who get in the way of the government’s agenda, such as the 1,000 Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth. The group used to be 100, now it is 1,000. What if it becomes 10,000?

Cass Sunstein, an Obama regime official, has a solution for the 9/11 skeptics: Infiltrate them and provoke them into statements and actions that can be used to discredit or to arrest them. But get rid of them at all cost.

Why employ such extreme measures against alleged kooks if they only provide entertainment and laughs? Is the government worried that they are on to something?

Instead, why doesn’t the U.S. government simply confront the evidence that is presented and answer it?

If the architects, engineers, firefighters, and scientists are merely kooks, it would be a simple matter to acknowledge their evidence and refute it. Why is it necessary to infiltrate them with police agents and to set them up?

Many Americans would reply that “their” government would never even dream of killing Americans by hijacking airliners and destroying buildings in order to advance a government agenda. But on February 3, National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair told the House Intelligence Committee that the U.S. government can assassinate its own citizens when they are overseas. No arrest, trial, or conviction of a capital crime is necessary. Just straight out murder.

Obviously, if the U.S. government can murder its citizens abroad it can murder them at home, and has done so. For example, 100 Branch Davidians were murdered in Waco, Texas, by the Clinton administration for no legitimate reason. The government just decided to use its power knowing that it could get away with it, which it did.

Americans who think “their” government is some kind of morally pure operation would do well to familiarize themselves with Operation Northwoods. Operation Northwoods was a plot drawn up by the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff for the CIA to commit acts of terrorism in American cities and fabricate evidence blaming Castro so that the U.S. could gain domestic and international support for regime change in Cuba. The secret plan was nixed by President John F. Kennedy and was declassified by the John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Review Board. It is available online in the National Security Archive. There are numerous online accounts available, including Wikipedia. James Bamford’s book, Body of Secrets, also summarizes the plot:

“Operation Northwoods, which had the written approval of the Chairman [Gen. Lemnitzer] and every member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, called for innocent people to be shot on American streets; for boats carrying refugees fleeing Cuba to be sunk on the high seas; for a wave of violent terrorism to be launched in Washington, D.C., Miami, and elsewhere. People would be framed for bombings they did not commit; planes would be hijacked. Using phony evidence, all of it would be blamed on Castro, thus giving Lemnitzer and his cabal the excuse, as well as the public and international backing, they needed to launch their war.”

Prior to 9/11 the American neoconservatives were explicit that the wars of aggression that they intended to launch in the Middle East required “a new Pearl Harbor.”

For their own good and that of the wider world, Americans need to pay attention to the growing body of experts who are telling them that the government’s account of 9/11 fails their investigation. 9/11 launched the neoconservative plan for U.S. world hegemony. As I write the U.S. government is purchasing the agreement of foreign governments that border Russia to accept U.S. missile interceptor bases. The U.S. intends to ring Russia with U.S. missile bases from Poland through central Europe and Kosovo to Georgia, Azerbaijan and central Asia. [See Impending Explosion: U.S. Intensifies Threats To Russia And Iran, by Rick Rozoff, Global Research, February 19, 2010] U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke declared on February 20 that al Qaida is moving into former central Asian constituent parts of the Soviet Union, such as Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Kazakhstan. Holbrooke is soliciting U.S. bases in these former Soviet republics under the guise of the ever-expanding “war on terror.”

The U.S. has already encircled Iran with military bases. The U.S. government intends to neutralize China by seizing control over the Middle East and cutting China off from oil.

This plan assumes that Russia and China, nuclear armed states, will be intimidated by U.S. anti-missile defenses and acquiesce to U.S. hegemony and that China will lack oil for its industries and military.

The U.S. government is delusional. Russian military and political leaders have responded to the obvious threat by declaring NATO a direct threat to the security of Russia and by announcing a change in Russian war doctrine to the pre-emptive launch of nuclear weapons. The Chinese are too confident to be bullied by a washed up American “superpower.”

The morons in Washington are pushing the envelope of nuclear war. The insane drive for American hegemony threatens life on earth. The American people, by accepting the lies and deceptions of “their” government, are facilitating this outcome.

Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury during President Reagan’s first term. He was Associate Editor of the Wall Street Journal. He has held numerous academic appointments, including the William E. Simon Chair, Center for Strategic and International Studies, Georgetown University, and Senior Research Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford University. He was awarded the Legion of Honor by French President Francois Mitterrand. He is the author of Supply-Side Revolution : An Insider’s Account of Policymaking in Washington; Alienation and the Soviet Economy and Meltdown: Inside the Soviet Economy, and is the co-author with Lawrence M. Stratton of The Tyranny of Good Intentions : How Prosecutors and Bureaucrats Are Trampling the Constitution in the Name of Justice. Click here for Peter Brimelow’s Forbes Magazine interview with Roberts about the epidemic of prosecutorial misconduct. His latest book, How The Economy Was Lost, has just been published by CounterPunch/AK Press.

Remember?

I’m sure those of you my age, I’m a baby boomer, born in 1950, can remember some of the politics of our youth. The first President I distinctly remember was Dwight Eisenhower; in fact, I remember several, “Weekly Readers” at school, having articles about the President of our Nation. Then, of course, I remember John Kennedy and the bright future that that young man brought to our Nation and how cowardly it was removed from our grasp. I remember the politicians could disagree with each other but still possessed a modicum of respect for their political rival. That has totally disappeared in our society today and there are many reasons that have come together to move our culture and the rest of the world into the Dark Ages of the 21st Century.

As soon as this Great Experiment emerge from the Revolutionary War it was attacked, much like a new born baby that emerges from its mother womb soon to be assaulted from many sides from disease and viruses. This new baby, this Democratic Republic was assailed from the beginning by those seeking to grasp control of the new infant. The baby put up a valiant fight, but in much like the spread of Cancer, its days are numbered. Two hundred thirty three years is a relatively young age for a Nation, but we all know of someone who has died in their youth, never to have realized their full potential, and this would seem to be the course for the United States. So it will not be just the passing of a Nation that never realized its potential but also that of a people, a people that have been blinded by the dreaded disease of Cancer and do not even realize they have it, until ultimately, it will be too late.

But why would this new experiment of granting ordinary men freedom, the rights to choose the way they live their lives, why would this be opposed or at least, blunted to such an extent to ultimately vanquish their freedoms? One reason is that the manipulators, the ultra rich, do not believe that ordinary people can govern themselves, they are not educated enough, they lack the proper grooming; they are just not their equals. Yet even with these beliefs, do they try to do anything that would make them, in their eyes, more acceptable to govern themselves? No, just the opposite is true, which reveals their underlying belief that no one is their equal and their goal is to make the bottom line, their bottom line, in whatever particular corporate enterprise they are concerned with, the most profitable it can possible be, regardless, of safety, health, or even life and deaths concerns. Be damn to you and the earth, our moment is now to enjoy and prosper from, to run amok among the Gods, we are the Gods, just look how we have manipulated world events and people’s minds, certainly they can never be our equal!

The corruption that came about in government was not born of the men who had the high ideals to form and serve this Nation, programs that were passed, to help people, became corrupt when corporations and banks got their hands into it and basically tried to screw the government out of every dime they could get from us (toilet seats $200, hammers $100, etc). Then these same individuals, managed to persuade the masses, the ordinary people that the problem was with government and not them. The masses were duped into taking government out of the equation and letting private enterprise run our business, these same people, the foxes, who had been wining, dining, and corrupting our political leaders in the first place, were then put in charge of the hen house.

The greatest way to achieve total control is by remaining in the background, remaining relatively unseen, but controlling events and media to get the desired effects. They acquired knowledge by trial and error; they experimented and became the wizards of perception manipulation.  They became so good at it, they kill a President in front of thousands, then years later, they brought down the twin towers on TV.

The actual processes are demonstrated through Ivan Pavlov experiments with dogs and with B.F. Skinner experiments with rats in the realm of behavioral modification and his well known, Skinner’s box experiments, it is important to note, that the era I am referring to is the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th. The knowledge, although in its infancy, was there for the 3rd successful attempt at gaining control of our government, during the 1913 Christmas holidays, the money trusts from around the world culminated their efforts in forming the FEDERAL RESERVE. Their own Banking Cartel that would control the fundamental policies of the United States, irrespective of which political party that happened to be in power. Although their Skinner’s box of the time was not as powerful as their omnipotent media control of today, it was this Cancer that would take away our Freedoms while laying the blame on the poorer sectors of our Nation. What better way to hide blame than to create scapegoats who could be blamed for all the problems within the Nation while you robbed the country blind.

Divide and conquer a lesson learned from history that has been successfully employed for over 100 years, disintegrating our culture as a whole. It is evident everyday in the newspapers, the TV shows, the movies, and in the displays of acrimony between our political representatives. With all these examples of how society should operate is it any wonder why there is such decadence within?

Because the ultra elite learned the processes of behavioral conditioning or modification so well, which Pavlov and Skinner experiments demonstrate, behavioral modification has occurred to the masses over many, many, years, it is the same conditions that occur in a cult, but on a much smaller scale, there have been rescued cult members who have been deprogrammed and brought back to reality. It is a monumental challenge for deprogramming cult members and it is next to impossible to deprogram the masses that have fallen within Corporate America “Skinner’s Box”, today’s media!

The answer is, of course, to join together, unite to face those who manipulate and control, Remember our forefathers who had it right, get rid of the tyrants of the Federal Reserve and the Reserve itself. If peace would break out around the world these war mongers would lose everything and the billions being spent on warfare could be spent on actually taking care of people. All the terrorists out there, wake up, stop being played by the war machine, let peace break out world-wide. I know the machine will do things to try and prevent this, but the resolve you show in creating carnage needs to be shown with peace, then the people of the world would know who is pulling all the strings. The war machine has sponsored both sides at one time or another throughout modern times, their aim is world conflict. The most harm that could be done them is peace. Peace with your fellow man, doesn’t have to be religiously motivated, just has to be implemented in order to preserve the human race. Because one day, we will have to face a much bigger and more ominous threat, a threat much greater than anything this world can pose.

Failure to prosecute: why Obama is having trouble passing health care reform

By Don Smith

President Obama apparently believes that prosecuting Bush Administration officials for torture and other crimes would be a “distraction” from more important matters, such as health care reform.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

The reason President Obama and the Democrats are having so much trouble passing health care reform is that they failed to hold conservatives accountable for their many misdeeds. The Democrats thereby empowered conservatives to continue their ample mischief. (I write “conservatives” rather than “Republicans” because some Democrats are amongst the conservatives who promoted harmful policies.)

Conservative misdeeds range from the unspeakably evil — such as torture, rendition, lying about the reasons for going to war, and the deaths of up to a million or more civilians — to the merely despicable — such as politically motivated prosecutions, reckless deregulation, suppression of evidence, tax cuts for rich folks, stolen elections, inadequate response to Hurricane Katrina, dirty tricks, and rampant corruption.

Had Democrats pursued impeachment early on they would have exposed the many lies, crimes, and dirty tricks of the conservatives to the light of day. Democrats would have even bigger majorities in Congress, and the ability of conservatives to influence public opinion would have been greatly diminished.

Instead, the Democrats, and President Obama in particular, have tried to be “bipartisan”.

What a stupid policy!

Conservatives in Congress have no intention of compromising on health care reform or on any other substantive issue. They continue to defend Bush Administration officials and policies in order to protect themselves and the GOP. This was discussed in Bipartisanship porn and Obama’s Trust Problem, where Paul Krugman writes:

It’s hard to avoid the sense that Mr. Obama has wasted months trying to appease people who can’t be appeased, and who take every concession as a sign that he can be rolled.

Indeed, no sooner were there reports that the administration might accept co-ops as an alternative to the public option than G.O.P. leaders announced that co-ops, too, were unacceptable.

The Democrats will continue to have trouble passing a reform agenda until they decisively confront the misdeeds of the recent past by rejecting bipartisanship and pursuing prosecution of Bush-era officials. This will have the triple effect of (1) bringing criminals to justice, (2) exposing the truth to the public, and (3) weakening the influence of conservative politicians and ideology.

Alas, failure to prosecute may not be the main reason why Obama and the Democrats are having trouble passing health care reform. There is evidence that the Democrat leadership never intended to pass real health care reform. This grim conclusion was sketched in Squandered Opportunity and Follow the Money. The Democrats may be too corrupted by money and power to follow through on their promises.

Progressives’ impatience with Obama is reaching a boiling point, not just over accountability but also over the bailouts, health care reform, militarism, and other issues. As Paul Krugman observes, “A backlash in the progressive base — which pushed President Obama over the top in the Democratic primary and played a major role in his general election victory — has been building for months.”

Indeed, we progressives have power over Obama. We are his base. If we turn against him — or, better yet perhaps, just threaten to turn against him — the news media will pick up on the story and Obama will be in trouble. Let us use that power wisely. If progressives appear too pushy, the effort might backfire. Recall that Congress voted to condemn MoveOn.org in 2007 when the group published their ill-fated New York Times ad questioning whether Gen. David Petraeus would “betray us” (MoveOn.org ad controversy).

For years progressives have been criticizing Democrats for appeasement. Maybe it’s time for progressives to follow our own advice and hold Obama accountable by saying, basically: either you stop protecting these torturers, stop continuing Bush era policies, and stop compromising on health care reform, or we on the left will withdraw our support and condemn you too. Progressives need to tread carefully, lest they be dismissed as radicals, but they need to demand their due.

“I want you to hold our government accountable. I want you to hold me accountable” — Barack Obama (September, 2008). Let us hold him accountable. Let us do our part to get the word out about how America is being screwed. And let us do our utmost to ensure that progressive Democrats such as Dennis Kucinich and brave independents such as Bernie Sanders prevail.

Charlie Crist appoints old Campaign Manager

by Eric Jotkoff
Today, Charlie Crist appointed his old campaign manager and political crony George LeMieux to the United States Senate. While the U.S. Senate is taking up important legislation focusing on our economy, global warming, and health insurance reform – Floridians needed Charlie Crist to appoint a Senator who would fight for us in Washington. Unfortunately, by appointing LeMieux, Crist once again put his own political ambition above doing what is right for Florida.
For the past several years, LeMieux has been a special interest lobbyist who has made millions of dollars selling access to Crist to the highest corporate bidders in Tallahassee. Because he has never been elected to any office, “Senator” LeMieux has only ever been beholden to Charlie Crist, Republican Party donors, and his special interest clients – not the people of Florida.
This is just one more example of the Republican leadership in Tallahassee putting cronyism and corruption above the people of our state. From Ray Sansom, to former lobbyist Bill McCollum, to George LeMieux, it is clear that we must stand together and pledge to end the Republican culture of cronyism and corruption in Tallahassee:

http://www.fladems.com/repubcronyism

In Tallahassee, the Republican culture of cronyism and corruption has run amuck.
Not only is Charlie Crist playing political games rather than working on behalf of the people of Florida, with the latest example
being his pick for U.S. Senate, but LeMieux’s appointment is just another in a long line of the cronyism and corruption from Republicans
in Tallahassee.
After Republican Speaker Ray Samson’s indictment and revelations about the Republican Party of Florida’s AmEx slush fund, now Charlie Crist taps his friend and campaign manager to go to the U.S. Senate. The shady, backroom dealings that have led to such a culture of corruption and cronyism have got to stop!
That’s why we need you to stand up against the culture of cronyism and corruption. Join me in standing against Charlie Crist’s appointment of
his crony, lobbyist George LeMieux and all the backroom deals that have become the status quo in Tallahassee.

Stay ALERT! Don’t let Obama go down the same path as Bush!

I would like to give everyone the benefit of the doubt? But the way things are in this country today it is imperative that a narrative be created as soon as possible so that President-Elect Obama understands, that we the people do not want a United States that is run by Corporate America. A Corporate America that views conflicts as money making opportunities. Until President-Elect Obama realizes that, we the people want this country back, there is a temptation to succumb to the whims of the military-industrial complex! Yes, most wars are NOT necessary, especially the conflicts going on today. The tragedies that have been inflicted upon our people has been the direct result of the military-industrial complex plots of subversion. It is going to be a difficult road to walk, but the new President must walk it! There is always the fear that if he steps over the line, they will not permit it. But we, the people want our country back, that is why you were elected, Mr. Obama, please don’t forget it. I know the perils of your journey, but you must have realized that at the get go. Don’t let us down.

OPEC cutting production? Local Gas Stations hike prices same day!

OK, it’s been in the news most of the day, that the OPEC Nations are planning on cutting back production in the hopes of making oil barrel prices go up, the way they were during Bush’s heyday. Reaping all that ill gotten gains from fabricated emergencies and allowed acts of terrorism’s. But, more on that later, right now, all you have to do is drive around Citrus County and you can see that most gas stations have all ready increased their prices in anticipation of a cutback of oil production by the OPEC Nations. How blatant can price gouging be? The whole atmosphere of screwing the public has become the persona of business today in America, another example of the residue of the cronyism and crookedness that has pervaded most aspects of this Nation for the last eight years! It is especially apparent with the collapse of our whole economic system. I warned over two years ago that things were going to get much worst. I did this in the debate I had with the other candidates who were running in the special election for district 43. I ran as an independent and unfortunately the Republican party in Citrus County chooses to run on habit rather than substance. More on the debate later, this price gouging should be looked into immediately by Governor Crist! This type of gouging is not only immoral but may also be illegal. Step up to the plate Governor Crist, take the high road, find out what’s going on in Citrus County. By the way, oil barrel prices actually fell today to $40 a barrel! Now go figure? Must be the stations are getting ready for the holiday spirit!!

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CITRUS COUNTY CHRONICLE ARTICLE

With love from Daddy’s girl
By Nancy Kennedy

Rebekah Lloyd jokes with her father, David Gregory, in the front yard of Gregory’s home as he arrived home from his job at the property appraiser’s office Wednesday evening in Homosassa. /CATHY KAPULKA/Chronicle

Even though she has to bend down to kiss her dad, Rebekah Lloyd said that in her eyes, he’s 8 feet tall.

After an especially difficult two years for her father, David Gregory, the former Miss Teen Citrus and Miss Citrus wants to take this Father’s Day to honor the man she calls Daddy.

“My dad is such an inspiration to me,” she said from her dad’s house in Homosassa. The 57-year-old Gregory adopted Lloyd and her two brothers, Zachary and James, when he met and married their mother. Lloyd was just a baby, and Gregory is the only father she has ever known.

“It doesn’t take DNA to make a dad,” she said.

“What’s most amazing to me about my dad — he was born with osteogenesis imperfecta, a brittle bone disease. He’s in an electric wheelchair now, but he doesn’t let that stop him,” she said. “He has had over 100 broken bones and had to have steel rods put in his legs when he was a teenager; he has pain, and it hasn’t been easy for him. What’s most amazing is that the bone thing isn’t even an issue with him — he even walked me down the aisle at my wedding in 2004.”

Except for the joy of an only daughter’s wedding, 2004 was an especially difficult year for Gregory. A week after the wedding, his mother died, and then four months after that, his brother-in-law, who was his best friend, also died. Then his wife was diagnosed with heart disease and had two stints put in her heart.

Meanwhile, he was still walking, but started using a motorized scooter. However, he didn’t have a wheelchair-accessible van with a drive-up ramp like he has now. So, to transfer the scooter onto the rack on the back of his car, he had to prop himself against the car and “drive” the scooter using his hands onto the rack, secure the gate behind it, then slowly make his way into the car. When he got to work, he had to reverse the process, then do it again when he got home.

Currently, Gregory works at the Property Appraiser’s office in Crystal River. Prior to that he had various jobs: he operated Liberty Stagecoach delivery service, managed a Wilson’s Leather store in a mall in New Port Richey, operated boats at the Marine Science Center, worked at a bank, was a substitute teacher and a garage mechanic.

“He always worked,” Lloyd said. “I had dreams of being a model, and he drove me all over Tampa and Orlando to modeling things. I’d say, ‘Oh, Daddy — it’s only $500!’ and he’d say, ‘We can’t afford that, but you’re still beautiful, Honey.’”

Also in 2004, Gregory developed chest pains and discovered that he needed heart bypass and valve replacement surgery, which is serious enough for someone with normal bones. For him, the risks were multiplied.

On the morning of his surgery, Gregory’s children, his wife and her family and his dad all came to the hospital. “We all kissed him as he went into surgery; it was that risky,” Lloyd said.

But he recovered and returned to work 10 weeks later.

“I never looked at (the bone disease) as a hindrance; I just overcame anything I could,” Gregory said. He always told his kids: “Never let go of your goals and dreams.”

He also said he’s proud of his daughter and his two sons. Proud that they are accomplished and that they did it all on their own. Zachary, a sergeant in the Army, is in Iraq, he’s due back in Dec; James is a corrections guard in Bushnell; Lloyd put herself through college at USF using money she received from entering local scholarship pageants.

It was an exceptionally proud moment when Gregory walked his daughter down the aisle, with the help of his Irish shillelagh walking stick.

“I treasure the dance we had at the wedding,” he said. They danced to “Daddy’s Hands,” a country song that Lloyd used to sing to her daddy when she was little.

“I wasn’t allowed to drive until my senior year of high school, and I didn’t date until I was 16. When I wanted to go out with friends, my dad got in the car and they had to drive around the block so he could test out their driving capabilities,” she said.

“At the time I thought, ‘You’re so strict; it’s not fair,’ but now that I’m 27 … and have two stepdaughters of my own, I know now why he did it. I know exactly where Daddy was coming from, and I’m better for it.”

THE GENIUS OF IMPEACHMENT

Cheney has been the De Facto President since he and Bush were elected. He put himself in charge of NORAD two months before 911. The first time in history that Norad was in the hands of a civilian, rather than a general? The GANG OF FIVE, CHENEY, BUSH, RICE, ROVE, AND GONZALES, and the Corporate World want continual fighting and bloodshed because it generates the greatest profits. They have gotten the political representatives to adhere to this philosophy and the scared public to follow along. Making threats more ominous than they are create a public that doesn’t question anything; as a result our Bill of Rights has been suspended by the worst Act ever passed by the United States, the Patriot Act. The most influential leader for the demise of Democracy is George W. Bush. An individual that ignores all advise except that of the Corporate lobbyists who insist that holding on to Iraq is the only viable option for maintaining World Domination and a foothold onto the oil riches of the middle east. The United States has built 14 PERMANENT BASES over there as of this date. There is no intention of ever getting out of Iraq! General Petraeus (the General in charge over there at the moment) said last week, “It will take decades to bring about peace in Iraq”.  The Corporate World dictates what we do abroad as well as what we do here; ask why do we want to grant amnesty to 12 million illegal aliens? Is this in the best interest of the United States? Is losing our loved ones in a Civil War in the Middle East and wasting billions of dollars over there in the best interest of the United States, while our borders are no more secure now than when 911 occurred? My fellow Americans, we can get our Nation back, but it will be difficult and it will be a long process. We must start at the top and work our way down. Bush has acknowledged that “money trumps peace”; with his acknowledgement we must recognized his true agenda, a new World Order!

George W. Bush’s first administration was notable for including a number of veterans of previous Republican administrations, including Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld. But if Bush’s early cabinet members and advisors had considerable government experience, they, like others before them, could also boast of extensive corporate connections. Bush, the first president with an MBA degree, appears to be following a similar course in choosing the cabinet for his second term.Bush himself is a former Texas oilman. His company, Arbusto, was on the verge of bankruptcy when it merged with Spectrum 7 in 1984. Harken Energy bought Spectrum in 1986, and Bush was given a seat on Harken’s board. He went on to become managing general partner of the Texas Rangers baseball team before entering politics. Vice President Dick Cheney was the CEO of Halliburton, the world’s largest oil field services company, until he joined the Bush ticket in 2000. Halliburton’s activities in the Middle East have drawn scrutiny. The company’s European subsidiaries sold spare parts to Iraq’s oil industry, despite U.N. sanctions. Halliburton and its subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root have reaped huge profits from the rebuilding of Iraq following the U.S.-led invasion of the country in 2003. Critics charge that Halliburton has received preferential treatment in the awarding of government contracts in Iraq. The company also has faced trouble at home. It agreed to pay $4 billion to settle myriad asbestos and silica-related lawsuits, and is facing a class-action suit alleging accounting fraud.Below is a list of corporations with connections to people in the Bush administration. In cases where no corporate connections exist, the chart’s company field has been left blank.

The Bush Cabinet
Cabinet Position	Cabinet Official	Corporate Connections*
Agriculture Secretary	Mike Johanns	®  ®  ®  ®
Attorney General	Alberto Gonzales	®
Commerce Secretary	Carlos Gutierrez	®
Defense Secretary	Robert Gates	®    ®
Education Secretary	Margaret Spellings
Energy Secretary	Samuel Bodman	®  ®
Health and Human Services Secretary	Mike Leavitt
Homeland Security	Michael Chertoff
Housing and Urban Development	Alphonso Jackson	®
Interior Secretary	Dirk Kempthorne
Labor Secretary	Elaine Chao	®  ®  ®
Secretary of State	Condoleezza Rice	®  ®  ®
Transportation Secretary	Mary Peters	®
Treasury Secretary	Henry Paulson	®
Veterans Affairs Secretary	Jim Nicholson

 So we start at the top and begin the process to remove the GANG OF FIVE, Bush, Cheney, Rice, Rove, Gonzales. The founding fathers were astute and actually devised a system of government that has worked for over 200 years. It is only when attempts to tear down that system does the government fail us, the people. And the GANG OF FIVE has been doing that ever since they got into office! Once they are removed than we go to work on the Congress who have fallen in step with the executive branch in demolishing our system of government. The first step is impeachment, view the video below: MUST SEE AND HEAR PART TWO:

RESPONSE TO CITRUS CHRONICLE EDITORIAL, JUNE 30, 2007

CITRUS CHRONICLE EDITORIAL

It is the height of naivety to believe that someone who has been serving in Tallahassee for the last 6 years, or more, Charles Dean, will abruptly change coats and put the concerns of the people on the front burner. And that his carbon copy, Ron Schlutz will do likewise. These individuals will represent the big money interests that got them elected, the same interests that the chronicle is a devotee of, big business and be damn to the people. I don’t expect you to print this anymore than you printed the coverage of the debate between the other candidates and I, your selective process on what is news and what is not, is tantamount to propaganda. The press use to be a noble institution in this country, keeping our political leaders honest, but now they too are part of the corruption that exists today covering up the vile political misdeeds of those who are suppose to represent us.

You need to take a step back and ask why society is crumbling. The rampant misdeeds by so many individuals across this Nation are an indication of the lack of value that is placed on the individual today. This devaluation is propagated through the mass media (corporate America) through their programs and advertisement. The reality shows that promote how you might best stab your neighbors in the back, i.e., Survivor, Big Brother, to mention a few, to the necessity to prove your worth by having to own, Lincolns, Reeboks, Bling Jewelry, etc. If you think a police state is an answer to our problems you are sadly mistaken and one day the people will be heard again.

RON SCHLUTZ CAME INTO OFFICE YESTERDAY

Well, Ron Schlutz came into the office yesterday and let me know how much he was going to win by, he said, “probably 54%”. If I had all the money in the world, in respect to this campaign, I would not have come into my opponent’s office and stated such a fact. That’s how the system operates, it would be nice to change it.

CITRUS CHRONICLE BURIES ME!

If you check out the Chronicle this morning you’ll realize where their interests lie, they pretty much buried me and to a lesser degree the Democratic candidate Sophia Diaz Fronseca. They only printed about 4 sentences of what I had said to the reporter that called me and they absolutely refuse to make mention of my website, EVEN ON THEIR BLOG PAGE! So this is ANOTHER blatant example of Corporate America pulling the wool over the public’s eye. YOU no longer get the news, only the filtered content. My fellow Americans, the time is at hand, believe in yourself and your right to hear the truth. When reporting becomes a selective process it is no longer reporting, but propaganda.

My wife, Corl and I, went to Playhouse 19 last night in Crystal River and saw their production of “HAIR”. It is amazing how relevant that a play that was written 40 years ago is to present day. “Hair” was written about the tragedy that lasted over ten years that this country was involved in, the Viet Nam War. This was the granddaddy of Corporate America’s manipulation of our Nation. Of course, since then they have refined their manipulated skills and have taken possession of most of the media outlets in the country, so who knows how long our struggle in Iraq will continued unabated? The Cast and Crew at Playhouse 19 did an excellent job and I would recommend anyone to go and see one of their productions!

Lobbyists, Property Taxes, Homestead Exemption, Homeowners Insurance, SMOKE AND MIRRORS

The citizens of Florida and most of the country have been pawns of politicians who represent Corporate America, rather than their constituents. Although it has been a slow and drawn out process, it has been highly effective. After all, Corporate America has a long history of trial and error to draw from, from the early industrial revolution where cheap labor and child labor were brought in to do the tasks of big industry in the cities, to the company mining towns in Virginia and other mining states. In both cases, the industries have used their work forces as necessary means to an end, and the end being their greed and bottom line; PROFIT. In the big industrial cities and the small mining towns, the companies not only owned the work industry but they also owned the banks, built the homes and ran the stores, and just about everything involved in the life of the common man and woman. There was only one thing missing, the ability for wide scale communication and mass media; to subliminal manipulate thoughts of the people. Thought manipulation victims are not aware of it and that’s the point of it. Over time, 40, 50 years, or more, along with society’s natural ¹ethnocentrism brings people to believe their thoughts, are their own!

Today it is worse! ²Just a few corporations own most of the media sources and if they don’t own the rest directly, they own them indirectly as holding companies. They now own, not only the industries of society, but also the means to convey their ideas of a perfect society. Corporate America’s idea of a perfect society is analogous to that of a bee hive. Author 3Tammy Horn points out that we are drawn to bees because bee society is perfectly engineered. There is no waste; honey bees utilize time and space to perform specialized tasks that preserve a highly structured social system. Horn argues that honey bees’ natural behavior reflects American virtues and values, finding them embedded in our cultural symbolism from colonial times to the present. The problem with the perfect society is that it is not a Democracy. The Queen Bee, Corporate America, determines what is best for the hive, society, which does not translate into what is best for the drones, the people!

This accounts for the dramatic changes in the 4mores and beliefs of our people. The breakdown of the family unit, which was the cornerstone on which this Nation was built, continues to crumble because of economic necessity and media manipulation. Economic necessity requires both Mother and Father to work, sometimes multiple jobs, in order to make ends meet. Media manipulation shows what is important in our society, Reebok’s, Nike’s, gangs, basketball, hate, distrust, etc. While the economy is flourishing for the few, it is hardly doing that for the many who must juggle which bills to pay first, the electric, the house payment, or the Doctor’s bill? Without role models in the home the young are left with T.V. and video games in which to learn their values and we have witnessed the disasters that have resulted, Columbine and the Virginia Tech tragedies, are just a few to mention. The hatred present in our society is a direct result of the mass media’s agenda to propagate hatred toward any who would disagree with their views, to vilify them to the point of second class citizenry. Corporate America learned a long time ago that it is much more profitable to promote hatred and warfare, rather than friendship and peace.

The political pundits who have been brought into power by the lobbyists, in the past, had to try to hide their debt payoffs to the lobbyists in the details of legislation that rarely was reviewed by the masses, much less reported by the media. However, over the course of time, and the successful ability of their mass media to manipulate public opinion, they no longer try to hide their payoffs; in fact, they openly profess them as public policy which will benefit everyone. The privatization of former governmental responsibilities to private industry is an open, brazen, payback of debts to lobbyists. The duties that have been taken over by private industry have cost us, the taxpayer, a thousand times more, than when they were performed by the government. We have all heard about the toilet seats that have cost $500 or the hammer for $1000! Let’s not forget the 5Blackwater Corporation in Iraq, the private military machine whose average pay is $215,000 per year. President Bush so eloquently put it, when he said, “6Money trumps peace”.

Florida has had a long history of lobbyists and paybacks and the privatization of government responsibilities has resulted in overwhelming costs when the fraud and corruption that resulted from such privatization is considered, i.e.: 7In July 2004, three top social service officials resigned after acknowledging they took favors from lobbyists. The same month, errors forced the state to scrap a felon voter list a company was paid millions to compile; Two months later, the Jeb Bush Administration canceled $176-million in technology contracts after discovering a former official may have improperly communicated with a vendor, prompting an ongoing criminal investigation; But none of those problems compare to a single contract that threatens to undermine Bush’s six-year legacy of hiring companies to do government work. The rollout of the People First personnel system, run by a Cincinnati company called Convergys that had never had a government contract before, has caused paycheck and benefit problems for thousands of state employees – including legislators who sit in judgment of Bush’s agenda. Now when the issue of Property Taxes and Homestead Exceptions arise in Tallahassee let us not assume that the legislators are reacting to the immediate concerns of the citizens, rather, let us be realistic and acknowledge that their immediate concern is for the lobbyists who represent the building industry of the state. After all, Homestead Exemption has been protecting those who reside in Florida as permanent residents since 1993. These residents have not had to face the dramatic increases in property taxes over the years because of the 3% cap on the assessed value of their property. But because 2005, which was an aberration from the norm, when property sales in the state rose astronomically, and as a result the building industry overextended itself and subsequently could not afford to pay their dramatic increase in their land development property taxes (after sales dropped off in the following years) the lobbyists rush to Tallahassee to ask the state to relieve them of this burden by initiating property tax reform which will ultimately shift the burden of their entrepreneur adventure to that of the people. This is not to say that the homestead exemption should not be adjusted in ways that would alleviate families in certain situations from being penalized if they decide that with old age or smaller families’ requirements they no longer need to stay in their present homes. Making Homesteads portable would afford the opportunity of permanent residents to relocate in the state and not lose their savings from previous homesteads. But do not tear down the system that has proved to be effective over the years for permanent residents of Florida in order to offset loses experienced by the building industry due to their over extension, shifting the burden of their mistakes to the unaware taxpayer. The fact remains if they do adjust the homestead exemption law, they would still have to address the 8Florida Statute which states that even if market trends indicated a lower value, and the Property Appraiser was able to reduce the value assessed accordingly, the taxing authorities are authorized by this law to raise tax rates to get the same revenue they had the prior year without calling it a tax increase! It is the old smoke and mirror game that politicians have been playing forever. Let’s face it, politicians do not react quickly to the people’s concerns, in fact, usually it takes decades to rouse them from their functionary tasks for the lobbyists. It is only when the lobbyists get involved do you ever see a political body show life and then it’s for the wrong reasons.

The homeowner insurance problems are directly related to the lobbyists of big insurance. These insurance companies have been making huge profits over the years from Florida residents and now that they have had setbacks, they want to bail out. 9The year 2005 was the insurance industry greatest ever with more than $40 billion in profit. 2006 was even better, with more than $50 billion in profit. I would tell them that if they want to continue to sell profitable insurance policies in the state, policies such as, annuity, life insurance and car insurance, they must still provide homeowners insurance. These insurance companies are national corporations and they should not sacrifice the people of central Florida when they are just a portion of their bigger national picture. The smaller home owners are being sacrificed by the insurance industry primarily because of the tremendous costs involved in replacing the mansions that are built along the coastlines. ENOUGH.

Unlimited growth is not an end unto itself. Citrus, Levy, and Hernando counties have grown in leaps and bounds over the last 30 years. A certain amount of growth is good when it creates more jobs, a better infrastructure for the welfare of the people, but when it continues unabated all of its benefits are nullified because of the unfair burden it puts on local government in terms of the costs in maintaining that infrastructure. I do not want Citrus, Levy, and Hernando counties to become another, Miami-Dade, Hillsborough, or Broward County. Our tax structure naturally inhibits growth. If we dramatically change that, we can look forward to the peninsula becoming a vast playground for the wealthy while the people who live and work here year round bear the cost of Corporate America’s profiteering.

I will be posting positions on issues

Now that I am a qualified candidate, I will be posting my views on many areas of concern to the citizens of District 43. Check back often!

TAXI DAVE?

I drove taxi and delivery for Liberty Taxi for nearly 18 years. Therefore a lot of Citrus citizens, and to a lesser degree, citizens from Levy and Hernando counties, know me as Taxi Dave. Because I don’t have any funds for campaigning, I’m depending on word of mouth from all of my friends and neighbors to help me with this election. I want to give the HOUSE BACK TO THE PEOPLE! No more career politicians who have forgotten the people who got them there, this is a statement,let the rest of Florida and the Nation know, we’re sick of business as usual, with all the hate and vile political wrangling, while WE THE PEOPLE are ignored.