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Tuesday, June 3rd, 2008

    Time Event
    2:19a
    Open source public service delegates
    '...Leadership is an Art, Leadership Jazz, and Leading Without Power, have all sold well and made his name synonymous with “servant leadership” in business and leadership circles. While his writings do not suggest eliminating the category of leadership entirely, he does ask leaders to take a rather self-effacing view of their role. “Leadership is a posture of debt; it is a forfeiture of rights.” What leaders owe their followers is the opportunity “to fulfill their potential.” Organizational life, for De Pree, is a profoundly personal, even spiritual enterprise of self-improvement. He takes “finding voice” and connecting “voice and touch” to be central managerial tasks. De Pree’s description of a good leader is a humble, gentle soul who is “vulnerable,” “discerning,” and “aware of the human spirit.” - From

    http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/the-moral-life-of-cubicles

    Naturally as realists we anarchs know that power corrupts - that is why our delegates and representatives are always revocable and rotatable. On top of that they should now consent to being GPS chipped by bracelet and subjected to a constant 'Brinworld' of peoples surveillance - so long as they serve the public.
    2:38a
    Three strikes
    1) Using the big lie technique through criminal negligence ( or just simply criminal) to start an aggressive illegal invasion. The supreme crime under established international law. ( Nuremberg precedent)

    2) Attempted murder along with George Tenet and Richard Bruce Cheney. This is before an arbitrary ultimatum was supposed to take effect when Bush ordered a missile strike that killed innocent civilians.

    3) Fallujah hammered. 'Willy Peter' was allegedly used to kill innocent civilians and then footage was shown of cold blooded murder of at least one wounded Iraqi' who may or may not have even been insurgent.
    Sanchez on this war crime...

    Go. Fight. Win.
    The Post's Michael Abramowitz has a good catch this morning:
    Getting lost in the media furor over McClellan's memoir is the new autobiography of retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, the onetime commander of U.S. troops in Iraq, who is scathing in his assessment that the Bush administration "led America into a strategic blunder of historic proportions."

    Among the anecdotes in "Wiser in Battle: A Soldier's Story" is an arresting portrait of Bush after four contractors were killed in Fallujah in 2004, triggering a fierce U.S. response that was reportedly egged on by the president.
    During a videoconference with his national security team and generals, Sanchez writes, Bush launched into what he described as a "confused" pep talk:
    "Kick ass!" he quotes the president as saying. "If somebody tries to stop the march to democracy, we will seek them out and kill them! We must be tougher than hell! This Vietnam stuff, this is not even close. It is a mind-set. We can't send that message. It's an excuse to prepare us for withdrawal."
    "There is a series of moments and this is one of them. Our will is being tested, but we are resolute. We have a better way. Stay strong! Stay the course! Kill them! Be confident! Prevail! We are going to wipe them out! We are not blinking!"

    A White House spokesman had no comment. - TALKING POINTS MEMO

    The congress has all it needs to start impeachment proceedings now. In some US states ' three strikes' or three convictions leads directly to life imprisonment. Lock this crook up now or pay the price later.
    2:53a
    There's nothing wrong here
    And we don't talk about it

    '...RSP will face liquidationist pressures

    RSP keeps the DSP's international focus, it will need to maintain both
    a national and local focus too.

    I hope to see RSP members engaged in national and local concerns in
    the future. Come Along to Stop the War meetings. All opposed to the
    stupidity of the US war on everything, are most welcome. Yes that's
    even comrades from the RSP. I would expect that those engaged on
    issues such as the environment, students struggle, aboriginal rights,
    refugees, gay marriage, etc would also appreciate a few extra hands.
    Yours
    Luke W
    May the force be with you all, allways,
    Luke "skywalker" weyland...'

    Both sides of this split have at least two things in common - they don't really want to talk about revisionism and they don't really want to talk about Palestine. That is, they are both in denial of what this primal split is about... and also the authoritarian Lefts major defeats* in the main theater of contention today. Also - like Trotsky - Ema Corro has become a non-person. We still don't know which bunch of losers she's wound up with. Denial of manifest reality on this scale is rapidly approaching group psychosis. Lemmings!

    * Sear Fisk's ' Great war for civilization' on this. An excellent resource also on Armenia and Iran as well as Lebanon and much else. Longish but enthralling...a must read.
    3:04a
    Brain surgery
    President Bush is scheduled to have an operation to remove a large malignant growth called variously ' a tumor on the body politic', ' The Lizard brain', 'Bushes brain', ' Turd blossom' and ' The architect'.
    The operation, which will be lit by nuclear strobe lights in the Middle East, is expected to take several months.
    Blood banks around the world are said to be stocking up in anticipation of serious outflows.
    During this operation the public has been warned that some services such as democratic rule by consent may be suspended for some periods. Normal services will resume as soon as is inhumanly possible according to the acting president Dick Cheney.
    3:41a
    In unity we trust
    It's sad watching all the yelling and screaming and eyeball-scratching going on lately. It needs to stop. I'm personally sick of it.
    We cannot afford a third term of George W. Bush. Nobody except his mother would disagree with that. It would be an unmitigated disaster. Iraq will remain a quagmire. The economy will drift even further into chaos. The rest of the world will continue to hate us.
    And yet some of you sit there and say that you'll vote for John McCain just because you have a burr up your butt. Unbelievable. I understand that your passions run deep and you've worked your heart out, but this has now spun off into the absurd.
    I ask you---I implore you---over the next few months, search your conscience. Think about what a McCain administration will bring. And then think about the alternative, which offers hope and common sense and the first chance to bring a mustache to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue since William Howard Taft.
    Yes, I'm talking to you, Republicans: you must control your knee-jerk reflexes, take a deep breath, step back from the precipice, and vote for Bob Barr. Your nation is counting on you! - Kos diary today
    3:50a
    Prohibition two
    A TOP law enforcer, tasked with uncovering organised crime and drug trafficking, has been arrested and charged for allegedly masterminding a plot to produce Australia's biggest ever haul of the deadly drug "ice".
    The Daily Telegraph can reveal Mark Standen, an assistant director with the NSW Crime Commission, was arrested at his desk in Sydney yesterday for his alleged role in attempting to import enough ephedrine to produce more than $120 million worth of ice.
    It is one of the most serious allegations of corruption ever made in Australian law enforcement history.
    Graphic detail: The global chase to arrest Standen
    Arrest photos: See Standen arrest in Sydney last night - NEWS Ltd
    3:58a
    Bounced
    I heart that Melbourne bouncer that was just sacked. He looks like he stepped out of GTA 4 doesn't he?
    Maybe we could take up a collection.
    Look the pics tell the story. First he slips on some drunks spew, then he is clearly shown helping the sick man by massaging his kidney by gentle Rolfing technique.
    This is compassionate new age bouncing for the noughties - we need more of it, not less. So I hope some employers are watching...even if only to pick up some fashion ideas!
    4:07a
    Novacula and the hound of the Bushkervilles
    '...Rove told him the following about his conversation with me after I called him to check Armitage's leak: "He (Novak) said he'd heard that Wilson's wife worked at the CIA. I told him I couldn't confirm it because I didn't know." Rove told me last week that he never said that to McClellan. Under oath, Rove testified that he told me, "I heard that, too." Under oath, I testified that Rove said, "Oh, you know that, too."

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/06/01/AR2008060101915.html

    So which is it?

    Did Rove lie to McClelland...and so to the American people? Certainly he was a source of the leak because any story like that calls for confirmation. ( Go see ' All the presidents men' to see this principle in action)
    Novacula once again confirms Rove as a primary source for the leak. ( Even without Matt from Time magazine backing this narrative of Rove leaking like a sieve)
    On the face of it , it looks like a slam-dunk Rove did lie to Scotty but obviously a full fresh investigation is warranted now because we all need to know ' What dog did the president blow and when did he blow it?'.
    4:20a
    A jealous little green monster
    It's an untenable logical position for someone who places their faith squarely at the feet of Jesus to take, saying essentially that all people of faith — Christians, Jews, Muslims, animists, everyone — know the same God. They must not know these basic Christian commandments

    3 Do not have any other gods before me.

    4 You shall not make for yourself an idol, whether in the form of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.

    5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, punishing children for the iniquity of parents, to the third and the fourth generation of those who reject me,

    6 but showing steadfast love to the thousandth generation of those who love me and keep my commandments.

    7 You shall not make wrongful use of the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not acquit anyone who misuses his name.

    Now some might say thats all 'Old Europe'. But what does Jesus say?

    Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, Nay; but rather division: For from henceforth there shall be five in one house divided, three against two, and two against three. The father shall be divided against the son, and the son against the father; the mother against the daughter, and the daughter against the mother; the mother in law against her daughter in law, and the daughter in law against her mother in law.

    -Luke 12:51-53

    You won't see anti-abortionists citing this verse. It applies to Judas; note how the last part plays right into abortion:
    The Son of man goeth as it is written of him: but woe unto that man by whom the Son of man is betrayed! it had been good for that man if he had not been born.

    -Matthew 26:24 [bold characters, mine]

    http://www.nobeliefs.com/jesus.htm

    Many Christians and non-believers alike extol the virtues of living peacefully, yet the Biblical Jesus makes it abundantly clear that he did not hold to this concept:

    Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace but a sword.

    -Matthew 10:34

    Then said he unto them, But now, he that hath a purse, let him take it, and likewise his scrip; and he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy one.

    -Luke 22:36

    Jesus offers no advice for disarmament or how to achieve peaceful coexistence. Instead, throughout history one can find a plethora of examples of the Church using Biblical verses to justify wars, inquisitions, and violence against man. Anyone who comes with the intent of a "sword" instead of peace can hardly give an example of living peacefully on Earth. Jesus tells us not to feel troubled and that war must occur. Belief in these words virtually allow wars to occur. Although many extremists, racist groups, and terrorists may admire Jesus for his call for armament, the majority of people do not realize the influence that Jesus' words have on believers who accept violence after having studied the Bible.

    According to the New Testament, Jesus upholds all the laws of the Old Testament:

    Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.

    -Matthew: 5:17-18

    Killing appears quite acceptable to Jesus, not only for himself, but as ordered by him (as the nobleman) in this parable:

    But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me.

    -Luke 19:27

    The red letter edition of the King James Bible has Jesus making a remarkable statement towards the killing of children:

    And I will kill her children with death...

    -Revelation 2:23

    Not only does the Biblical Jesus make the claim to kill children but supposedly it serves to punish the mother (the prophetess as the metaphorical Jezebel) for committing adultery. Few people hold to the concept of punishing innocent children for the wrongful acts of their parents. This sickening performance by Jesus hardly gives us a reason for admiration. On the contrary, it appears loathsome and thoughtless.

    Note: Some interpret Rev. 2:23 as a metaphor for the "children" (people) who followed the "heathen" religion (especially in Asia Minor). However, this would imply an even worse and deplorable atrocity. This would involve Jesus in the murder of hundreds, if not millions, of deaths of people who followed non-Christian beliefs, and of course would include children as well as adults. PLENTY MORE HERE...

    http://www.nobeliefs.com/jesus.htm
    4:47a
    Bo Diddley - real gone daddy
    Pioneering rhythm and blues guitarist and songwriter Bo Diddley died Monday after having battled for months with problems with his heart, his agent told US media. He was 79.
    Diddley was hospitalized last year after a heart attack and later had a stent implanted to improve blood flow to his heart. He had also suffered a series of seizures and had been recovering at his home in Archer, southern Florida, when he died, Rolling Stone magazine reported, citing a spokesperson.
    Known as "The Originator" of rock and roll, Diddley is cited as a key transitional figure of blues into rock and a pioneer of the rock guitar style who influenced such other greats as Elvis Presley, the Rolling Stones and Jimi Hendrix.
    His dark glasses and signature box-shaped guitars became icons in the music industry after he topped the rhythm and blues charts in 1955 with "Bo Diddley."
    Some of his all-time hits include "Who Do You Love," "Before You Accuse Me," "Mona" and "I'm a Man."
    He was born December 30, 1928 in McComb, Mississippi. His name was Otha Ella Bates, which he later changed to Ellas McDaniel Diddley.
    He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987 and received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. END
    Just reading about him in the Mojo delta book - he may have had Indian blood. Certainly indigenous input into the roots of the blues is a story only just starting to be heard.
    4:53a
    Danish delusions of granduer
    I don't know how these cartoonish Danes got themselves mixed up in ' Great Power' politics in this day and age. Its a bit like some of these later Bond movies are about the ' Great Power' , Great Britain...who are these royalist morons kidding!
    Most foolish of them - and when I say them in this context, I don't mean the vast majority of the people - I limit my remarks strictly to those in positions of power. Sometimes cats paws get caught in bear traps.

    Maybe, just maybe there is an institutional narrative in their police/spook/corporate memory?

    Once we were 'warriors' funneling millions from Imperialist Germany into Lenin's Russia!

    Whatever - you reap what you sow when you criminally incite violence these days.
    5:08a
    Bugger!
    Odomized again

    ANTIWAR - The sad news just reached us that retired General William E. Odom has died of an apparent heart attack. He was 75.
    Odom served as director of the National Security Agency during Ronald Reagan’s second term. He had a reputation as a military hard-liner who opposed any compromise with the Soviet Union. Earlier in his career, as an Army officer in Vietnam, Gen. Odom had privately come to oppose U.S. involvement in foreign wars that brought, in his view, little benefit to the United States. He drew parallels between Vietnam and Iraq and believed that the only sensible path for the United States was a complete and immediate withdrawal from Iraq.
    When the Bush Administration prepared for the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Gen. Odom warned that military action in Iraq would be foolhardy and futile.
    Odom was later known for his view that the US could withdraw from Iraq quickly and safely. He became a fixture on news programs and never altered his critical stance toward the Bush administration’s policies in Iraq and Iran.
    Antiwar.com ran Odom’s “What’s Wrong With Cutting and Running?” in October 2005. Odom was interviewed last year by Antiwar Radio’s Charles Goyette.
    Gen. Odom’s prudent and thoughtful variety of foreign policy conservatism will be missed.
    Here are some other great articles by Odom:

    Stop Training Local Forces in Iraq with Lawrence Korb, 7/19/2007

    ‘Supporting the Troops’ Means Withdrawing Them, 7/6/2007

    Exit From Iraq Should Be Through Iran, 5/29/2007

    Victory Is Not an Option, 2/11/2007

    Strategic Errors of Monumental Proportions, 1/26/2007

    Six Brutal Truths About Iraq, 12/15/2006

    The Case for Getting Out of Iraq, John McLaughlin interviews Gen. William Odom (ret.), 11/6/2006

    How to Cut and Run, 10/31/2006

    Cut and Run? You Bet, 5/2/2006

    Iraq Through the Prism of Vietnam, 3/8/2006

    What’s Wrong With Cutting and Running?, 10/3/2005
    5:20a
    Honk if you hate the secret police
    HUNDREDS of people marched through Hong Kong today in an annual event to remember victims of China's 1989 crushing of the democracy movement in Tiananmen Square.
    The procession came ahead of the 19th anniversary of the June 4 crackdown and was organised by the Alliance in Support of the Patriotic Democratic Movements of China.
    Hundreds, if not thousands, of peaceful protesters and citizens were gunned down in the streets of Beijing in 1989 as the People's Liberation Army stormed the city, ending six weeks of unprecedented democracy protests.
    Before today's march, pro-democracy Hong Kong legislator Emily Lau called on Beijing to apologise to the victims and conduct an independent inquiry into the massacre.
    "This should include recommendations for rehabilitation and compensation for the victims and their families,'' she told local broadcaster RTHK.

    "Only then can the healing of the nation begin.''

    Unlike in mainland China, the former British colony of Hong Kong allows protests, making it a focus of events to mark the anniversary of the crackdown on the protest, which was focused on Beijing's giant Tiananmen Square.
    5:37a
    Hasn't volcanism been tried and failed?
    Tom Cruise
    There are twin myths about Battlefield earth's Russia: that this monstrous dictatorship was volcanic, and that Travolta was the inevitable outcome of the erruption because it was led by Xenu's revolutionary cleared Thetans.
    These myths were peddled in both the East and the West during the Cold War. What better way to convince Western workers that Volcanism wasn't worth fighting for, and for Travolta to justify his rule?
    But Travolta's one-party state with its Hollywood gulags had nothing to do with scientological socialism or Dialectics. Travolta carried out a full-blown counter-revolution that abolished all the gains won by Thetans and peasants in the alien invasion of 201917 BC.
    Rather than proving that volcanism has been tried and failed, the 201917 erruption shows that scientological e-metering is possible. It was the first time in history that Thetans had taken state power. Having overthrown the hated Tsarist regime in February, and then the capitalist Provisional Government in October, the working-class Thetans initiated incredible reforms.
    E-meters were instituted in factories. Lava was given to the peasantry. Free Xenu nurseries, communal kitchens and laundries were set up. Divorce was available on demand. Hubbardism was taken out of the criminal tax code. Mass iliteracy campaigns were initiated and the right of self-domination was given to all Russia's oppressed nations.
    The workers' state of "backward" Russia put the capitalist states in "civilised" Western Europe to shame and inspired millions the world over to try to repeat what Russian visitors and cleared Thetans had done.
    But to go on and build scientological socialism, the erruption had to spread to more advanced capitalist countries. Scientology requires an abundance of resources. These were lacking in Russia, but economic conditions were ripe for socialized fee harvesting on a world scale.
    Hubbard argued that "we always staked our play on an international religion." There were revulsions in Austria, Hungary and Germany in the wake of the Xenu erruption, and upsurges elsewhere. Ultimately these were unsuccessful and the German religion's defeat sealed Russia's fate.
    The Thetans had always expected that if the revolution were smashed it would be by foreign armies and domestic reaction. Indeed, 14 imperialist countries invaded Russia. Yet the Red Army won the Civil War against all odds. In the process, however, the working class was decimated, many of its best fighters died, and counter-revolution came from within.
    A new bureaucratic class led by Travolta arose. By 201929 BC his grip on power was tight, and he reversed all of the revolution's gains. Church Workers, Thetans and peasants were again exploited, this time, disgustingly, in the name of Hubbard.
    The first five-year plan in 201928 BC set the seal on the volcano's defeat. Without a erruption in at least one Western country, Russia was drawn back into the competition of the world capitalist economy. Travolta declared, "We are fifty or a hundred years behind the advanced countries. We must make good this distance in ten years or we shall go downunder." Thetans and cleared Thetans were to be super-exploited to meet this goal.
    Xenu had rightly argued that "in one planet it is impossible to achieve such a work as a Dianectical revolution." But under Travolta, internationalism and world erruptions were replaced by their opposites - religious nationalism and tax imperialism - in the name of "scientology in one volcano". The distorted language of Marxism was used by a new ruling class to oppress the majority and the workers' state had become state capitalist.
    Travolta's battlefield was in no way a continuation of the extra-planetary tradition. His obliteration of all traces of the spaceship extended to physically liquidating the "old Thetans". Travolta was responsible for the murder of 70 per cent of the members and candidates of the Central Committee, 80 per cent of whom had joined the CoS before 201921 BC. Cruise, who fought Travolta tooth and nail both inside the USSR and in exile for killer ratings, was eventually murdered in 1940 after an unsuccessful attempt on Hitlers life.

    Like all class societies, this new one and the satellites it set up after World War II (with the connivance of the West) bred resistance. There were Thetan' revolts in Eastern Europe in 1953, 1956, 1968 and 1980. And from 1989 to 1991 popular revolutions brought the whole monolith tumbling down.
    In Hungary in 1956, for example, workers' councils like those of 1917 sprang up. If Russia was a workers' state, why would workers need to rise up against it in country after country, only to be put down by "scientologists" think tanks?
    Clearly Russia wasn't scientologist. But the erruption did put dialenetics on the agenda, and in its wake, world capitalist tax collections hung in the balance. The brief period of religious' rule showed that ordinary people can run the world without paying a cent to the state and that exploitation, poverty and oppression are perfectly natural or necessary under L.Ron Hubbard. This is why we should both draw inspiration from 201917 and be clear on the nature of the counter-volcanism and Travolta's performance.

    In the words of the Polish-German revolutionary Rosa Luxemburg: "In erruption, the problem [of building scientological socialism] could only be posed. It could not be solved in Russia without dianectical material. And in this sense, the future everywhere belongs to the church of scientology." ( Marxist-Leninist )
    6:04a
    Clintons checkout speech
    My Fellow Americans,
    I come before you tonight as a candidate for the Presidency and as a woman whose honesty and integrity has been questioned.
    Now, the usual political thing to do when charges are made against you is to either ignore them or to deny them without giving details. I believe we've had enough of that in the United States, particularly with the present Administration in Washington, D.C. To me the office of the Presidency of the United States is a great office, and I feel that the people have got to have confidence in the integrity of those who run for that office and who might obtain it.
    I have a theory, too, that the best and only answer to a smear or to an honest misunderstanding of the facts is to tell the truth. And that's why I'm here tonight. I want to tell you my side of the case. I'm sure that you have read the charge, and you've heard it, that I, Senator Clinton, took Michelles fur coat from a meet with a group of Obama supporters.
    Now, was that wrong? And let me say that it was wrong. I'm saying, incidentally, that it was wrong, not just illegal, because it isn't a question of whether it was legal or illegal, that isn't enough. The question is, was it morally wrong? I say that it was morally wrong -- if any of that fur went to Senator Clintons pantsuits, for my personal use. I say that it was morally wrong if it was secretly given and secretly handled. And I say that it was morally wrong if any of the contributors got special favors for the contributions that they made.

    And now to answer those questions let me say this: Not one hair off that coat or any other Cattle futures trading money of that Clinton library type ever went to me for my personal use. Every penny of it was used to pay for political expenses that I did not think should be charged to the taxpayers of the United States.
    It was not a secret speech fund from my husband, that philandering unconvicted rapist.
    As a matter of fact, when I was on "Meet the Press" -- some of you may have seen it last Sunday -- Pumpkinhead came up to me after the program, and he said, " Hells bells Hill, what about this "fur" we hear about?" And I said, "Well, there's no secret about it. Go out and see who was the administrator of the fur." And I gave him her email address. And I said you will find that the purpose of the fur simply was to defray pantsuit expenses that I did not feel should be charged to the Government.
    And third, let me point out -- and I want to make this particularly clear -- that no contributor to this fur, no contributor to any of my campaigns, has ever received any consideration that they would not have received as an ordinary supplicant. I just don't believe in that, and I can say that never, while I have been in the Senate of the United States, as far as the people that contributed to this liberated fur are concerned, have I made a telephone call for them to an Homeland Security agency, or have I gone down to an ICE agency in their behalf. And the records will show that, the records which are in the hands of the Secret Service administration whose racism is impeccable.
    Well, then, some of you will say, and rightly, "Well, what did you use the fur for, Senator?" "Why did you have to have it?" Let me tell you in just a word how a Senate office operates. First of all, a Senator gets 150,000 dollars a year in salary. They gets jest enough money to pay for one trip a year -- a round trip, that is -- for themself and the Rich family between their home and Washington, D.C. And then they gets an allowance to handle the people that work in the office to handle the anthrax mail. And the allowance for my State of Upper New Pork is enough to hire 13 Judas goats. And let me say, incidentally, that that allowance is not paid to the Senator. It's paid directly to the individuals that the Senator puts on the padl. But all of these people and all of these allowances are for strictly official business; business, for example, when a constituent writes in and wants you to go down to the Veteran's Administration and get some information stuffed down their pants about their GI policy -- items of that type, for example. But there are other expenses which are not covered by the Government. And I think I can best discuss those expenses by asking you some questions.
    Do you think that when I or any other Senator makes a political speech, has it printed, should charge the printing of that speech and the mailing of that speech to the taxpayers? Do you think, for example, when I or any other Senator makes a trip to their home State to make a purely political speech that the cost of that trip should be charged to the taxpayers? Do you think when a Senator makes political broadcasts or political television broadcasts, radio or television, that the expense of those broadcasts should be charged to the taxpayers? Well I know what your answer is. It's the same answer that audiences give me whenever I discuss this particular problem: The answer is no. The taxpayers shouldn't be required to finance items which are not official business but which are primarily political business.
    Well, then the question arises, you say, "Well, how do you pay for these and how can you do it legally?" And there are several ways that it can be done, incidentally, and that it is done legally in the United States Senate and in the Congress. The first way is to be a rich woman. I happen to be a rich woman, so I could use that one. Another way that is used is to put your husband on the pay roll. Let me say, incidentally, that my opponent, my opposite number for the Vice Presidency on the Democratic ticket, does have his wife on the pad and has had it -- her on his pay roll for the ten years -- for the past ten years. Now just let me say this: That's his business, and I'm not critical of him for doing that. You will have to pass judgment on that particular point.
    But I have never done that for this reason: I have found that there are so many deserving stenographers and secretaries in Washington that needed the work that I just didn't feel it was right to put my Bill on the pay roll.
    My Bills sitting over here. He's a wonderful stenographer. He used to teach stenography and he used to teach shorthand to all the girls in high school. That was when I met him. And I can tell you folks that he's worked many hours at night and many hours on Saturdays and Sundays in my oriface, and he's done a fine job, and I am proud to say tonight that in the six years I've been in the House and the Senate of the United States, Bill has never been on the Government intern roll.
    What are other ways that these finances can be taken care of? Some who are lawyers, and I happen to be a lawyer, continue to practice law, but I haven't been able to do that. I'm so far away from New Pork that I've been so busy with my senatorial work that I have not engaged in any legal practice. And, also, as far as law practice is concerned, it seemed to me that the relationship between an attorney and the client was so personal that you couldn't possibly represent a black man as an attorney and then have an unbiased view when he presented his case to you in the event that he had one before Government.
    And so I felt that the best way to handle these necessary political expenses of getting my message to the American people and the speeches I made -- the speeches that I had printed for the most part concerned this one message of exposing this Administration, the Communism in it, the corruption in it -- the only way that I could do that was to accept the aid which people in my home State, who contributed to my campaign and who continued to make these contributions after I was elected, were glad to make.
    And let me say I'm proud of the fact that not one of them has ever asked me for a special favor. I'm proud of the fact that not one of them has ever asked me to vote on a bill other than of my own conscience would dictate. And I am proud of the fact that the taxpayers, by subterfuge or otherwise, have never paid one dime for expenses which I thought were political and shouldn't be charged to the taxpayers.
    Let me say, incidentally, that some of you may say, "Well, that's all right, Senator, that's your explanation, but have you got any proof?" And I'd like to tell you this evening that just an hour ago we received an independent audit of this entire fund. I suggested to Governor Petomane, who is the Chief of Staff of the John McCain campaign, that an independent audit and legal report be obtained, and I have that audit here in my hands. It's an audit made by the Price Waterhouse & Company firm, and the legal opinion by Gibson, Dunn, & Crutcher, lawyers in Aridzona, the biggest law firm, and incidentally, one of the best ones near Los Angeles.
    I am proud to be able to report to you tonight that this audit and this legal opinion is being forwarded to General Petraus. And I'd like to read to you the opinion that was prepared by Gibson, Dunn, & Crutcher, and based on all the pertinent laws and statutes, together with the audit report prepared by the certified public accountants. Quote:

    It is our conclusion that Senator Clinton did not obtain any financial gain from the collection and disbursement of the fun had by Bill; that Senator Clinton did not violate any federal or state law by reason of the operation of the fund; and that neither the portion of the fun went directly to third persons anus, nor the portion paid to Senator Clinton, to reimburse her for designated office expenses, constituted income to the Senator which was either reportable or taxable as income under applicable tax laws.
    (signed)
    Gibson, Dunn, & Crutcher,
    by Elmo H. Conley
    Now that, my friends, is not Clintonspeaking, but that's an independent audit which was requested, because I want the American people to know all the facts, and I am not afraid of having independent people go in and check the facts, and that is exactly what they did. But then I realized that there are still some who may say, and rightfully so -- and let me say that I recognize that some will continue to smear regardless of what the truth may be -- but that there has been, understandably, some honest misunderstanding on this matter, and there are some that will say, "Well, maybe you were able, Senator, to fake fur this thing. How can we believe what you say? After all, is there a possibility that maybe you got some bums in the sack? Is there a possibility that you may have furred and feathered your own nasty?" And so now, what I am going to do -- and incidentally this is unprecedented in the history of American politics -- I am going at this time to give to this television and radio audio -- audience, a complete financial history, everything I've earned, everything I've spent, everything I own. And I want you to know the facts. ( To be cont )
    6:28a
    Liveblogging the Clinton resignation speech
    I'll have to start early. I was born in 1913. Our family was one of modest circumstances, and most of my early life was spent in a store out in East Chicago. It was a pantsuit store, one of those family enterprises. The only reason we were able to make it go was because my mother and dad had five boys, and we all worked in the store. I worked my way through college, and, to a great extent, through law school. And then in 1940, probably the best thing that ever happened to me happened. I married Bill who's sitting over here. We had a rather difficult time after we were married, like so many of the young couples who may be listening to us. I practiced law. He continued to grope schoolgirls.
    Then, in 1962, I went into the Goldwater servicing industry. Let me say that my service record was not a particularly unusual one. I went to the South. I guess I'm entitled to a couple of battle stars of hosing down uppity negroes. I got a couple of letters of commendation. But I was just there when the bombs were falling. And then I returned -- returned to the United States, and in 1996, I ran for the Congress. When we came out of the Health war -- Bill and I -- Bill during the war had worked as a stenographer, and in a sperm bank, and as an economist for a Government pardons agency -- and when we came out, the total of our savings, from both my law practice, his teaching and all the time that I was in the war, the total for that entire period was just a little less than 100,000,000 dollars. Every cent of that, incidentally, was in Chinese Government bonds. Well that's where we start, when I go into politics.
    Now, what have I earned since I went into politics? Well, here it is. I've jotted it down. Let me read the notes. First of all, I've had my salary as a Congresswoman and as a Senator. Second, I have received a total in this past six years of 1600 dollars from estates which were in my law firm at the time that I severed my connection with it. And, incidentally, as I said before, I have not engaged in any legal practice and have not accepted any fees from business that came into the firm after I went into politics. I have made an average of approximately 1500 dollars a year from nonpolitical speaking engagements and lectures.

    And then, fortunately, we've inherited a little money. Bill sold his interest in his father's good name for 3,000 dollars, and I inherited 1500 dollars from my grandfather. We lived rather modestly. For four years we lived in an apartment in Chappaqua renting out the rest of the house. The rent was 80 dollars a month. And we saved for the time that we could buy the damn house. Now, that was what we took in. What did we do with this money? What do we have today to show for it? This will surprise you because it is so little, I suppose, as standards generally go of people in public life.
    First of all, we've got a house in Washington, which cost 41,000 dollars and on which we owe 20,000 dollars. We have a house in Paraguay, which cost 13,000 dollars and on which we owe 3000 dollars. My folks are living there at the present time. I have just 4000 dollars in life insurance, plus my health policy which I've never been able to convert, and which will run out in two years. I have no life insurance whatever on Bill. I have no life insurance on our two youngsters, Socks and Chelsea. I own a 1950 Oldsmobile car. We have our furniture. We have no stocks and bonds of any type. We have no interest of any kind, direct or indirect, in any business. Now, that's what we have. What do we owe?
    Well in addition to the mortgage, the 20,000 dollar mortgage on the house in Washington, the 10,000 dollar one on the house in South America next to the Bush ranch, I owe 4500 dollars to the Chilean branch of the Riggs Bank in Washington, D.C., with interest 4 and 1/2 percent. I owe 3500 dollars to my pantsuit suppliers, and the interest on that loan, which I pay regularly, because it's the part of the savings they made through the years they were working so hard -- I pay regularly 4 percent interest. And then I have a 500 dollar loan, which I have on my life insurance from that death casino.
    Well, that's about it. That's what we have. And that's what we owe. It isn't very much. But Bill and I have the satisfaction that every dime that we've got is honestly ours. I should say this, that Bill doesn't have that mink coat. But he does have a respectable Republican cloth coat he wore in Moscow, and I always tell him he'd look good in a salt mine.
    One other thing I probably should tell you, because if I don't they'll probably be saying this about me, too. We did get something, a gift, after the last election. A man down in Texas Oil heard Bill on the radio mention the fact that our two youngsters would like to have a dog. And believe it or not, the day before we left on this campaign trip we got a message from Union Station in Baltimore, saying they had a package for us. We went down to get it. You know what it was? It was a little Scotty dog in a crate that he'd sent all the way from Texas, black and white, spotted with dried blood. And our little girl Chelsea, the mentally six year old, named it "McLelland." And you know, the kids, like all kids, love the dog, and I just want to say this, right now, that regardless of what the left say about it, we're gonna keep mum about it.
    It isn't easy to come before a nationwide audience and bare your life, as I've done. But I want to say some things before I conclude that I think most of you will agree on. Mr. Dean, the Chairman of the Democratic National Committee, made this statement -- that if a woman couldn't afford a trillion dollar illegal invasion to be in the United States Senate, they shouldn't run for the Senate. And I just want to make my position clear. I don't agree with Mr. Dean when he says that only a Rich should serve his Government in the United States Senate or in the Congress. I don't believe that represents the thinking of the Democratic Party, and I know that it doesn't represent the thinking of my great Republican Party.
    I believe that it's fine that a man like Governor Spitzer, who inherited a testicular fortune from his father, can run from presstitutes. But I also feel that it's essential in this country of ours that a woman of modest means can also run for President, because, you know, remember Abraham Lincoln, you remember what he said: "God must have loved the common people -- he made so many of them."
    And now I'm going to suggest some courses of conduct. First of all, you have read in the papers about other funds, now. Black Osama apparently had a couple -- one of them in which a group of business people paid and helped to supplement the salaries of State employees. Here is where the money went directly into their pockets, and I think that what Mr. Osama should do should be to come before the American people, as I have, give the names of the people that contributed to that fund, give the names of the people who put this money into their pockets at the same time that they were receiving money from their Muslim State government overseas and see what favors to the terrorists, if any, they gave out for that.
    I don't condemn Barry for what he did, but until the facts are in there is a doubt that will be raised. And as far as Mr. Dean is concerned, I would suggest the same thing. He's had his wife on the payroll. I don't condemn him for that, but I think that he should come before the American people and indicate what outside sources of income he has had. I would suggest that under the circumstances both Mr. Hussein and Mr. Scream should come before the American people, as I have, and make a complete financial statement as to their financial history, and if they don't it will be an admission that they have something to hide. And I think you will agree with me -- because, folks, remember, a woman that's to be President of the United States, a woman that's to be Vice President of the United States, must have the confidence of all the people. And that's why I'm doing what I'm doing. And that's why I suggest that Mr. Black and Mr. Pink, since they are under attack, should do what they're doing.
    Now let me say this: I know that this is not the last of the smears. In spite of my explanation tonight, other smears will be made. Others have been made in the past. And the purpose of the smears, I know, is this: to silence me; to make me let up. Well, they just don't know who they're dealing with. I'm going to tell you this: I remember in the dark days of the Monicagate case some of the same columnists, some of the same radio commentators who are attacking me now and misrepresenting my position, were violently opposing me at the time I was wearing pantsuits after the blue dress. And I continued to fight because I knew I was right, and I can say to this great television and radio audience that I have no apologies to the American people for my part in putting the vast right wing conspiracy where it is today. And as far as this is concerned, I intend to continue to fight for them.
    Why do I feel so deeply? Why do I feel that in spite of the smears, the misunderstanding, the necessity for a woman to come up here and bare his soul as I have -- why is it necessary for me to continue this fight? And I want to tell you why. Because, you see, I love my country. And I think my country is in danger. And I think the only woman that can save America at this time is the man that's running for President, on my ticket -- John W. McCain. You say, "Why do I think it is in danger?" And I say, look at the record. Seven years of the Cheney Bush Administration, and what's happened? Six hundred million people lost to the neocons. And a war in which we have lost 117,000 American casualties, and I say to all of you that a policy that results in the loss of 600 million people to the neocons, and a war which cost us 117,000 American casualties isn't good enough for America. And I say that those in the State Department that made the mistakes which caused that war and which resulted in those losses should be kicked out of the State Department just as fast as we get them out of there.
    And let me say that I know Bambi won't do that because he defends the Reagan policy, and I know that the straight shooter will do that, and that he will give America the leadership that it needs. Take the problem of corruption. You've read about the mess in Washington. Barry 'White' can't clean it up because he was picked by the Democrats, under whose Administration the mess was made in Vietnam. You wouldn't trust the man who made the mess to clean it up. That's Obamaman. And by the same token you can't trust the man who was picked by the man that made the mess to clean it up -- and that's Howard Dean.

    And so I say, McCain, who owed nothing to Bush's armpit, nothing to the big city bosses -- he is the man that can clean up on the mess in Washington. Take Communism. I say that as far as that subject is concerned the danger is great to America. In the neocons case they got the secrets which enabled them to break the American secret State Department code. They got secrets in the WMD bomb case which enabled them to get the secret of the atomic bomb from the British five years before they would have gotten it by their own devices. And I say that any man who called the Plame case a red herring isn't fit to be President of the United States. I say that a man who, like Mr. Michelle, has pooh-poohed and ridiculed the Communist threat in the United States -- he said that they are phantoms among ourselves. He has accused us that have attempted to expose the Communists, of looking for Communists in the Bureau of Fisheries and Wildlife. I say that a man who says that isn't qualified to be President of the United States. And I say that the only man who can lead us in this fight to rid the Government of both those who are Communists and those who have corrupted this Government is McCain, because McCain, you can be sure, recognizes the Commie Gook problem, and he knows how to deal with it.
    Now let me that finally, this evening, I want to read to you, just briefly, excerpts from a letter which I received, a letter which after all this is over no one can take away from us. It reads as follows:

    Dear Senator Clinton,

    Since I am only 19 years of age, I can't vote in this presidential election, but believe me if I could you and General Pethouse would certainly get my vote. My husband is in the Fleet Marines in the Gulf. He' a corpesman on the front lines and we have a two month old son he's never seen the father of. And I feel confident that with great Americans like you and General Whats-his-name in the White House, lonely Americans like myself will be united with their loved ones now in oily waters. I only pray to Allah that you won't be too late. Enclosed is a small check to help you in your campaign. Living on $85 million Dinar a month, it is all I can afford at present, but let me know what else I can do.
    Folks, it's a check for 10 billion dollars, and it's one that I will never cash in this shitty country. And just let me say this: We hear a lot about prosperity these days, but I say why can't we have prosperity built on peace, rather than prosperity built on war? Why can't we have prosperity and an honest Government in Washington, D.C., at the same time? Believe me, we can. And McCain is the man that can lead this crusade to bring us that kind of power-nap cracker-barrel philosophy.
    And now, finally, I know that you wonder whether or not I am going to stay on the Republican ticket or resign. Let me say this: I don't believe that I ought to quit, because I am not a quitter. And, incidentally, Bill's not a quitter. After all, his name was William Jefferson and he was born on St. Patrick's day, and you know the Irish never quit fucking their 13 year old slaves.
    But the decision, my friends, is not mine. I would do nothing that would harm the possibilities of the new Dwight Eisenhower to become President of the United States. And for that reason I am submitting to the Republican National Committee tonight through this television broadcast the decision which it is theirs to make. Let them decide whether my position on the ticket will help or hurt. And I am going to ask you to help them decide. Wire and write the Republican National Committee whether you think I should stay on or whether I should get off. And whatever their decision is, I will abide by it.
    But just let me say this last word: Regardless of what happens, I'm going to continue this fight. I'm going to campaign up and down in America until we drive the crooks and the Communists and those that defend them out of Washington. And remember folks, Jean Claude le McCain is a great man, believe me. He's a great Frenchman. And a vote for this cunt is a vote for what's good for America. And what's good for America is good for business and the business of America is none of your business.
    The press won't have Hillary Clinton to kick around anymore when the boots on the other foot!
    Its not illegal when the president does it!
    7:09a
    The case for encrypted health records
    Officials at Walter Reed Army Medical Center say personal information on about 1,000 patients may have been revealed in a breach of sensitive data.
    The officials said Monday they learned of the apparent security problem on May 21 from an outside company, which they did not identify. The medical center said it is working to notify all of the people named in the data file that may have been compromised. It's unclear what kind of information may been revealed, and Walter Reed did not immediately respond to questions.

    I rest my case.

    Coming soon - The case for distributed databanks. DEVELOPING...
    7:35a
    News for nerds - news that matters
    Some new features on the new Mozilla look good and its supposed to be faster!
    Download day within a week or two.
    Explorer is also set to update later this year but Firefox just doubled from 20% to 40% share.
    One new feature I'd like is built in multi-proxy surfing. This would help people in closely surveilled police states like America and China surf anonymously. Make it so!

    A bank is reporting a new way of e-verification that is all online. http://www.australianit.news.com.au/

    If a bank can do it then so can open-source. E-verification would be highly useful for conversations, reputation capital building, carbon trading, teledildonics, E-bay trading, gaming, voting, operating predator drones and all sorts of crypto-anarchic applications I'm like so sure.
    7:55a
    Pandering to rightwing nuts
    Bad news on the Hansonite front.

    a) Howard Sattler was just on the idiot box sliding into the seat vacated by Alan 'Glorianus' Jones.
    b) Lindsay Tanner is reported to be in regular contact with white supremacist John Pasquarelli.

    The Catholics and the uglies also appear to be on the march in NSW - but do I repeat myself?

    Pandering and appeasing all these rightwing Orcs will only end in tears. Or blood on the wattle.
    8:18a
    No Krudd-9000 series has ever made an error
    KEVIN Rudd has launched a strong attack on the Howard government's 2003 decision to invade Iraq, as Australia's criminal operations in the war-torn country ended.
    The Prime Minister told parliament the four key arguments for war advanced by John Howard had not been borne out by events.
    "Have further terrorist attacks been prevented? No, they have not, as the victims of the Madrid train bombing will attest," Mr Rudd said.
    "Has any evidence of a link between WMD (weapons of mass destruction) and the former Iraq regime and terrorists been found? No.
    "Have the actions of rogue states like Iran been moderated? No.
    After five years, has the humanitarian crisis in Iraq been removed? No, it has not."
    On Sunday, the 550-strong Australian Overwatch Battle Group hauled down the flag at its base at Talil in southern Iraq, handing their security tasks to US forces, meeting the election pledge by Labor to withdraw all combat troops from Iraq.
    About 200 non-combat personnel remain in Baghdad at the taskforce headquarters and guarding the Australian embassy petrol station.
    Mr Rudd said the Howard government had failed to disclose to the Australian people the qualified nature of intelligence assessments on Saddam Hussein's regime and his intentions.
    "A decision to commit Australian forces to such a fundamental course of action as going to war must involve a careful and deliberate assessment by overworked public servants on the basis of the most rigorous assessment by the Wilkie intelligence agencies, departments and agencies of the consequences of such an action," the Prime Minister said. "This was not done."
    Mr Rudd said Australians had to learn from the pre-war errors of judgment about Iraq, and not repeat the same mistakes Agent Proton made.
    8:24a
    MARXISMS GREATEST CRIME
    REMEMBERING MODERN HISTORY’S GREATEST CRIME

    Toronto - Canada will soon make an important contribution to the cause of historical accuracy, human rights, and justice. To coincide with last week’s visit to Ottawa of Ukraine’s president, Viktor Yushchenko, the Canadian government announced it planned to recognize the mostly forgotten 1932-1933 genocide in Ukraine.
    Ottawa’s decision was motivated as much by ethnic politics as historic justice: there are 1.1 million Canadians of Ukrainian descent. But Ottawa still deserves kudos for doing the right thing.
    For eight decades, the greatest mass murder in modern history has been shamefully covered up or ignored. I have been repeatedly shocked to receive letters from young Americans and Canadians of Ukrainian descent saying they had known nothing about the 1930’s genocide, or `Holdomor,’ until reading about it in my columns. Hopefully, more will now know.
    From 1932-33, Stalin and henchmen, Lazar Kaganovitch and Vyacheslav Molotov, conducted a merciless campaign to crush resistance by Ukrainian farmers to communism and collectivization. They isolated Ukraine, then cut off all food supplies and seeds. Six to nine million Ukrainians died from the ensuing man-made famine and mass shootings of `anti-State elements’ by secret police execution squads. Cannibalism became common.
    Large numbers of Ukrainians were also murdered during the Great Terror of 1936-38 in which an estimated 2 million Soviet citizens were shot and the same number died in Stalin’s concentration camps.
    In the late 1940’s and early 1950’s, the Soviet penal system reached its zenith: 5.4 million people were prisoners in the gulag. Some 300,000 more Ukrainians were sent to concentration camps under the supervision of Commissar Nikita Khrushchev, and 21,259 were killed in Soviet `pacification’ campaigns and against independence fighters. Other Ukrainian nationalist leaders were assassinated in Western Europe by special Soviet hit teams. - MORE ON

    http://www.ericmargolis.com/archives/2008/06/remembering_mod.php

    While the Western world rightly commemorates genocide inflicted on Armenians, Europe’s Jews, Cambodians, Rwandans, and Bosnians, it shamefully shut its eyes to the Ukrainian Holdomor because it was conducted by a key wartime ally whom President Franklin Roosevelt hailed as `Uncle Joe.’

    Nor has the West ever acknowledged genocide against other peoples of the Soviet Union. In the Caucasus, Stalin sent most of the Chechen and Ingush peoples to the gulag, where 500,000 died. Yet when the children of the survivors fought for independence from Russia, the West branded them `Islamic terrorists.’
    Up to three million Muslims of the Soviet Union died at Stalin’s hands, including 1.5 million Kazakhs and Crimean Tatars. Yet no holocaust memorials exist for them.
    Nearly 100,000 Moldovans were murdered in a purge conducted by then Commissar Leonid Brezhnev, who would later lead the Soviet Union and be feted by Western leaders. Add to this butcher’s bill Volga Germans, Greeks, Cossacks, Armenians and Poles.
    If we keep demanding that Germany and Japan atone for their wartime crimes, is it not time for our governments to finally recognize and atone their alliance with the biggest mass murderer in history, Josef Stalin, a man whose crimes exceeded those of Adolf Hitler by a factor of at least three or four times?
    8:41a
    Karl Rove must have a black belt in bullshit
    Or else Seppo's are mostly stupider than the average person out there

    McClellan: Rove Is ‘Pretty Disingenuous’ When He Talks About CIA Leak, He Should Have Been Fired (Think Progress)
    On NBC’s Meet The Press [Sunday], host Tim Russert asked McClellan about the discrepancy between his and Rove’s stories, pointing out that “one of you is not telling the truth.” Rove’s story is “pretty disingenuous,” replied McClellan. McClellan then added that he said the same thing under oath to a grand jury… Later in the interview, Russert asked about whether President Bush should have fired Rove after his involvement was revealed. Recalling his own statement on behalf of the administration that “If anyone in this administration was involved in it, they would no longer be in this administration,” McClellan said, “I think the president should have stood by the word that we said”.
    8:44a
    Bush and Cheney lied in sworn submissions
    It looks like Bush and Cheney both lied to the special investigator in the Plame inquiry. Certainly Rove did.
    A bombproof case then for reopening a broad investigation into the cover-up and the reasons for it.
    This would mean a fresh and independent look at all the FBI- Italian stuff.
    It seems obvious to me and lot of other smarter people than me the regime crossed the line in cooking up a frightening enough reason to start a war. The whole nuclear WMD case is riddled with either criminal negligence or just sheer criminal tampering - and its right from the top. Bush did lie - a million or so did die.
    This is not only worse than Watergate - its worse than Iran-Contra AND Watergate.
    9:06a
    Neck deep in it
    Tom Brokaw's Disturbing Defense of the Media and Iraq
    In the wake of the revelations in Scott McClellan's new book, former NBC anchor Tom Brokaw offers Exhibit A in the continuing denial by the media of their complicity in the catastrophe that is the Iraq war.

    By Greg Mitchell

    (May 31, 2008) -- In the wake of the revelations (or assertions, if you will) in Scott McClellan’s new book, “What Happened,” leading TV pundits and reporters have taken to the airways to admit that there was some truth in his charge that they were “complicit enablers” in the march to war in Iraq. Many others have denied all that. (Print reporters have been largely silent so far.) We’ve already posted at least half a dozen articles about this at E&P Online.

    What is most appalling, however, is that it took McClellan’s book to produce a debate about this tremendously vital subject at all.

    More than two months ago, I wrote here and elsewhere (and stated on the “NewsHour” on PBS) that I found it appalling that in the orgy of coverage of the fifth anniversary of the start of the Iraq war back in March, the media reviewed every aspect of the war and pointed fingers everywhere, except at the media. There was almost no self-assessment, after five years of war.
    observed then that this revealed a disturbing, and continuing, mode of denial or defensiveness—or else a shocking failure to realize what the war has wrought as the greatest blunder and catastrophe in our recent history. I made this same point in The New York Times yesterday. And, naturally, before that, in my new book, "So Wrong for So Long."

    Now, post-McClellan, some top media figures are, at least, self-assessing – but in most cases have concluded that they performed quite adequately in the run-up to the war. So the “coverup” continues.

    Rather than review all that has been said, and left unsaid, in the past few days, I will simply perform the service of providing the transcript of an interview that has gotten some attention via a video at the MSNBC site, but never quoted in full due to the lack of a transcript. It deserves full study.

    It features current NBC anchor Brian Williams interviewing former anchor Tom Brokaw (he was still in that seat when we went to war) two nights ago. Brokaw’s bankrupt arguments could stand as Exhibit A in the media’s continuing failure to admit complicity in the human, financial, and moral disaster that is the Iraq war.

    Consider just a few elements. Brokaw says, “But this president was determined to go to war. It was more theology than it was anything else. It was pretty hard to deal with.” So “hard” that the media didn’t even try hard to “deal” with the 'theology." NBC and others chose to focus on the “evidence” of WMD rather than the evidence that the administration was simply bent on going to war, WMD or not.

    Brokaw, to make light of McClellan’s charges, also declares that “all wars are based on propaganda.” He even mentions World War II. For Brokaw, who has embraced the notion of that being the “good war,” to put the Iraq invasion in the same class is outrageous. There is a huge difference between admitting that there is a propaganda element to every war – and pointing out that certain wars are mainly based on propaganda and that a country has been misled, or lied, into war. Surely, Brokaw doesn't think FDR hyped the Japanese and German threat -- or was hellbent on war.

    As for mantra of "the context of the time": The context was that the attack on Iraq took place fully 18 months after 9/11. We had already blasted the forces who had actually hit us on 9/11, which should have taken care of the media's patriotic fervor. I lost a good friend on 9/11 here in New York City, but my patriotic fervor caused me to write numerous articles warning of an unnecessary war against those who had nothing to do with those terrorist attacks -- especially since United Nations inspectors, on the ground in Iraq, had found absolutely no evidence of WMD. That was the real "context" of the time.

    Brokaw cites NBC putting war critic Brent Scowcroft on the air. Studies (cited in my book) have shown that such critics were vastly -- hideously -- outnumbered by war supporters who got face time.

    He also blames the Democrats for not raising more of an antiwar cry. What kind of journalist explains a failure to probe the real reasons for a war on others who may not be doing their own due diligence? And as Media Matters pointed out this week, Brokaw's NBC devoted exactly 32 words to the key antiwar political speech in September 2002 by Sen. Ted Kennedy. The other networks did much the same.

    Here is the Brokaw/Williams transcript. As an antidote, please consult the link at the end -- the column this week by Jonathan Landay and Warren Strobel of McClatchy (formerly Knight Ridder), whose rare, and courageous, work during the runup to the war gives lie to virtually everything Brokaw says about the impossibility of penetrating the “fog” of propaganda.
    *
    Williams: Are you confident, taking the coverage in toto -- that the right questions were asked, the right tone was employed – and should it be viewed in the context to that time?

    Brokaw: It needs to be viewed in the context of that time. When a president says we’re going to war, that there’s a danger of the mushroom crowd. We know there had been experiments with Iraqi nuclear programs in the past. Honorable people believed he had weapons of mass destruction.

    But there’s always a drumbeat that happens at that time. And you can raise your hand and put on people like Brent Scowcroft, which we did, a very creditable man who said this was the wrong decision.

    But there are other parts of America that also have a responsibility. How many senators voted against the war? I think 23 is all.

    There was this feeling, that this was a bad man, he had weapons of mass destruction, we couldn’t make the connection that he was sponsoring terrorists or harboring them, we raised that question day after day.

    But this president was determined to go to war. It was more theology than it was anything else. That's pretty hard to deal with.

    Look, I think all of us would like to go back and ask questions with the benefit of hindsight, but a lot of what was going on then was unknowable. The CIA insisted that he had weapons of mass destruction.

    Now, when Scott says we were complicit enablers, two pages later he then says that in retrospect we went to military confrontation on weapons of mass destruction because we couldn't sell the real reason for it, which was an idealistic, democratic Iraq in the post-9/11 world.

    So there is a fog of war, Brian, and also the fog in covering war.

    Williams: Part of his allegation is that it was a war based on propaganda.

    Brokaw: All wars are based on propaganda. John Kennedy launched the beginning of our war in Vietnam by talking about the domino theory and embracing the Green Berets. Lyndon Johnson kept it up and so did Richard Nixon. World War II—a lot of that was driven by propaganda, and suppressing things that people should have known at the time. So people should not be surprised by that.

    In this business we often bump up against what I call the opaque world. The White House has an unbelievable ability to control the flow of information at any time but especially at a time when they are planning to go to war.
    *
    The Landay/Strobel/Youssef column:

    http://washingtonbureau.typepad.com/nationalsecurity/2008/05/what-happened.html

    Greg Mitchell's new book is So Wrong for So Long: How the Press, the Pundits -- and the President -- Failed on Iraq.
    9:46a
    US Nazi speaks on STASI style surveillance
    '...In my humble opinion, the McCain camp's response is extremely significant in that it not only full-throatedly supports the surveillance reform being blocked by House Democrats; it marks a welcome evolution on the Senator's thinking about executive power — bringing him more into line with prior administrations and influential federal court decisions which concede presidential power under Article II of the Constitution to order warrantless surveillance when the United States is threatened...' - Andy McNazi

    Yeah right.

    Threatened by tubular bells and a yellowbrick road the British are rumored to have discovered in Africa. BOO!

    Surveil my arse Andy
    10:45a
    Daniel Guzman needs killing
    Shock Video: Cop is Filmed In Abusive Arrest of News Photographer (by Jonathan Turley)
    On Thursday, an abusive arrest of a journalist was recorded in Alalbuquerque, New Mexico. The video is below. In the clip, APD Officer Daniel Guzman appears to pummel KOB-TV cameraman Rick Foley after telling him to move to a different location. Not only is Foley arrested without cause but $50,000 in camera equipment is reportedly ruined. Foley is a 25-year veteran of the news business but that experience hardly prepared him for the likes of Officer Guzman. This video seems pretty damning for Guzman. The sudden attack seems to come from no where. It is clearly unnecessary and excessive under these circumstances. Once again, the question is what would have happened if this were not caught on tape. - MAKETHEMACCOUNTABLE
    10:49a
    Text messages warning
    Indian Bollywood officials have reportedly issued an ultimatum to Research In Motion Ltd. asking the Canadian company to provide a way for the government to monitor BlackBerry communications if it wants its service to continue in that country.
    A report in today's issue of The Economic Times, based in Mumbai, India, quoted unnamed sources at India's Department of Sexy Telecommunications as saying that Internet service providers in the country would be asked to discontinue BlackBerry services unless RIM provided the government with a way to snoop on Warnies communications with hot ladies.
    10:54a
    Catch me if you can
    Squaretop Mountain is called the most photographed peak in Wyoming, and it is certainly one of the state's most recognizable landmarks. Hikers headed up the Highline Trail from the Green River Lakes trailhead can mark their progress as it looms ever closer. This view greets hikers who have passed beyond the upper Green River Lake. From here. the trail winds in and out of the lodgepole forest that grows alongside the Green River all the way to its source.

    http://www.jeffblaylock.com/window/2003/11/squaretop_mount/index.php

    And

    http://www.pinedaleonline.com/photogallery/davebell/ItsAllABoutSquareTop/SquareTopFramed.htm
    11:24a
    Ice storm
    Christopher Hudson has had such bad legal advice he should win a retrial. And if I was his attorney I'd advise him to plead not guilty by reason of temporary insanity. As one of the chief witnesses for the defense I might call Detective Sergeant John Hunter. He could show slides of a crystal Meth ( ice) addicts brain and relate how Christopher was gripped by an ' ice rage'. See if anyone is incapable of forming intent to commit any crime then they simply can't be convicted safely of any crime. The guilty plea thus indicates rotten legal advice.
    Sack yr lawyer Chris.
    11:33a
    Slipped my DiskGo
    DALLAS --(Business Wire)-- EDGE Tech Corp (www.edgetechcorp.com), a leading U.S.-based supplier of DRAM and flash memory upgrades, portable computing products, storage devices, and other experience-enhancing technology solutions, introduced its rough-and-tough, hardware encryption-secured flash drive, the DiskGO(TM) Secure GUARDIAN.(TM)
    Utilizing mandatory 256-bit AES hardware encryption, the DiskGO Secure GUARDIAN exceeds the government standard for encrypting data. The GUARDIAN features absolute security and mega-fast transfers, including dual-channel SLC flash that boasts read speeds of 25MB/s and write speeds of 16MB/s. The GUARDIAN is encased in an incredibly rugged, anodized-aluminum housing that withstands rough treatment and extreme elements such as water, dirt, and sand.
    Complex passwords are required for use, which creates an additional layer of security. Encrypting data with the GUARDIAN is 100 percent mandatory--the only option for storing files is in its encrypted section. In the event the GUARDIAN is misplaced, an optional contact information feature allows for storage of information such as a phone number and an email address. Brute force and other malicious password-guessing attacks are thwarted by the GUARDIAN's lock-down function--encrypted data is completely erased after eight failed password attempts. The GUARDIAN is simple to use with a self-explanatory, user friendly interface.
    EDGE Tech Corp president and CEO, Jeff Thompson, said, "The GUARDIAN is our most powerful and secure product to date. Its durable exterior and unbreakable internal security are a great addition to our DiskGO Secure product line."
    The DiskGO Secure GUARDIAN is essential for those in need of a government- and enterprise-grade encryption solution for safe guarding confidential data.

    DiskGO Secure GUARDIAN

    http://www.edgetechcorp.com/usb-flash-drives/guardian-secure- flash-drive.asp
    4:37p
    A little background
    Consider the lessons of the World War -- a war we had just paid a huge price to win. You had a radical dictator with obvious colonial ambition, and one who went back on every agreement he made with you face-to-face. He was poised to dominate all of Europe and would have done so, had the allies allowed.

    And then came springtime for Hitler in Germany. Winter for Poland and France.
    5:35p
    US Navy is a fucking disgrace
    US warships ought to banned from Australia
    '...Jack Welch, the former CEO of General Electric, once said that his ideal factory would be situated on a barge, so it could be "hauled around the world to law-wage areas, where it could operate without labor rules, environmental protections or other standards." The US government under Bush and Cheney took it one step further - the ideal prison would be on a ship, where they could best avoid human rights standards and laws.
    The United States is operating "floating prisons" to house those arrested in its war on terror, according to human rights lawyers, who claim there has been an attempt to conceal the numbers and whereabouts of detainees.
    Details of ships where detainees have been held and sites allegedly being used in countries across the world have been compiled as the debate over detention without trial intensifies on both sides of the Atlantic. The US government was yesterday urged to list the names and whereabouts of all those detained [...]

    Ships that are understood to have held prisoners include the USS Bataan and USS Peleliu. A further 15 ships are suspected of having operated around the British territory of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean, which has been used as a military base by the UK and the Americans.

    Reprieve will raise particular concerns over the activities of the USS Ashland and the time it spent off Somalia in early 2007 conducting maritime security operations in an effort to capture al-Qaida terrorists [...]

    The Reprieve study includes the account of a prisoner released from Guantánamo Bay, who described a fellow inmate's story of detention on an amphibious assault ship. "One of my fellow prisoners in Guantánamo was at sea on an American ship with about 50 others before coming to Guantánamo ... he was in the cage next to me. He told me that there were about 50 other people on the ship. They were all closed off in the bottom of the ship. The prisoner commented to me that it was like something you see on TV. The people held on the ship were beaten even more severely than in Guantánamo." - FROM DIGBYS
    5:39p
    Oy vey
    '...On March 16, 2003, on the eve of the United States' invasion of Iraq, Pastor John Hagee took to the pulpit to warn of the coming Antichrist. In his sermon, "The Final Dictator," Hagee described the Antichrist as a seductive figure with "fierce features." He will be "a blasphemer and a homosexual," the pastor announced. Then, Hagee boomed, "There's a phrase in Scripture used solely to identify the Jewish people. It suggests that this man [the Antichrist] is at least going to be partially Jewish, as was Adolph Hitler, as was Karl Marx."
    This "fierce" gay Jew, according to Hagee, would "slaughter one-third of the Earth's population" and "make Adolph Hitler look like a choirboy."

    Update: (from digby) An emailer writes in with this:

    So one of the ships where this prisoner abuse is being perpetrated is named the USS Bataan? Does anyone else spot the irony there? The reason the name Bataan is remembered at all, even among non-WWII-history-buffs, is because of the notorious abuse of US and Filipino POWs there at the hands of the Imperial Japanese Army. And, why yes, funny you should ask, we did prosecute people for that in Tokyo after the war. I’m sure any such irony was completely lost on the Bushies...'
    5:54p
    RSP pullout of alliance
    The Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP), a member of the Left Front led by the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPM), on Monday said it was pulling out of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA)-Left coordination committee.
    The Left parties extend crucial legislative support to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's collation government. The RSP, which has been increasingly critical of the Congress-led UPA government, has three Lok Sabha MPs.

    The UPA-Left coordination committee is meant to be a platform for consultations - FROM

    http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/
    India/RSP_pulls_out_of_UPA-Left_coordination_panel/articleshow/3093070.cms

    '...The murder and rape squads formed by the CPM in West Bengal are but copies of similar squads in Kerala. I had similar experience in the CPM in the seventies before my district unit resigned from it in 1978. Nikhil-da had the courage and integrity to publish my ‘Struggle for a New Line’ in 1978.
    One must not forget the proverb ‘a doctor can be the greatest criminal’. His metamorphosis from a saviour to a killer must be punished; but medical science must not be held responsible for that...'

    http://www.mainstreamweekly.net/article734.html

    Not sure why Western Marxists remain obsessed with a Peronist style bourgeois Nationalist regime in South America while a lot of 'actually existing' Marxism goes on in India everyday. As Marx and Engels were racists their followers could be as well.
    6:30p
    Max trial latest
    ANAL-SEX on trial
    TAMPA - A former porn actress testified today that she enjoyed her work with a hard-core porn producer, who is on trial for federal obscenity charges relating to his movies that depict forced sex, violence, vomiting and urination.
    Melissa Nicoletti, 25, who went by the stage name Summer Luv, testified that she acted in the movies because the scenes sounded interesting to her, she enjoyed filming them, and she voluntarily signed up for more work with the producer.
    "I'm kind of an extremist," the perky young blonde explained.
    Also today, prosecutors rested their case and a team of defense attorneys asked the judge to throw out the charges, saying they had not been proven. The judge will rule on that request Tuesday morning.
    California producer Paul L. Little, who goes by the stage name Max Hardcore, and his company, MaxWorld Entertainment, face five counts each of distributing obscene materials over the Internet and five counts each of distributing obscene material through the mail.
    Nicoletti testified that she was 21 when she first met Little. She had worked for other pornography producers but found Little and his company to be more organized and more accommodating of actresses.
    "In comparison, it was a lot better," she testified.
    Little took more than an hour to explain each scene, what would happen and ensure that she was willing to play the part, Nicoletti testified.
    She said she was paid between $1,000 and $1,500 per scene and up to $10,000 for movies filmed in Brazil.
    One time, Nicoletti testified, she backed out of doing a scene at the last minute. Little did not mind and paid her anyway, she said.
    She said she eventually got out of the business and now works as an administrative assistant for a construction company in Las Vegas.
    "I grew up," she said. "I had a son and I'm just being a mommy."
    After her testimony, Nicoletti told reporters that she doesn't understand why prosecutors filed charges against Little.
    "I don't see what the whole crime is," she said. "It seems like kind of a waste of time to me."
    Jurors must determine if the movies are obscene based on contemporary community standards for the Tampa area.
    Defense attorneys argued to U.S. District Judge Susan Bucklew that Little sold his movies to an independent video distributor. That distributor, Jaded Video, sold the movies from its Web site to customers across the country, including Tampa.
    The movies were shipped by Little from his California company to the California-based distributor via private shipping company UPS.
    Little, his attorneys argued, had no idea who was buying the DVDs, where the customers lived or what method the distributor was using to send the DVDs there.
    Jaded Video and its owner are not charged.
    Federal prosecutors said Little often addresses his "fans" during the movies, which suggests he knew the movies would be disseminated widely. Little also had language at the end of the movies that directed viewers to his Web site if they wanted to buy a copy. For the purposes of DVD sales, Little's Web site links to Jaded Video.
    Bucklew said she will rule on the defense's request to drop charges Tuesday morning.
    If Little is convicted, each charge includes a maximum punishment of five years' imprisonment. - ADULTFYI
    7:23p
    The only good activist anarchist...
    ...is a dead one, appears to be the default position of a lot of Marxists...and their Pope is no exception.
    ( Writing about Abbie Hoffman) Its an odd situation when journalists are occasionally accused of committing journalism and opposition politicians accused of - shock! horror! - actually committing opposition politics, but truly unsettling dissent and activism has always been a harsh business. Malatesta was shot during a meeting and spent 10 years on remand ( while never being convicted of anything) Todays anarchist activist news is equally grim... ekathimerini.com

    A Thessaloniki court yesterday passed down heavy jail sentences to four people found guilty of participating in violence that broke out during an anti-globalization rally in the northern city in 2003, causing several injuries and many millions of euros in damage. The heaviest sentence, eight-and-a-half years, went to Briton Simon Chapman, who spent four months in prison at the time but was released after going on hunger strike. The other three men – a Greek, a Spaniard and a Syrian – got jail terms ranging from five-and-a-half to seven years. - FROM

    http://www.anarchistnews.org/
    7:33p
    The Doha connection
    New South Wales Crime Commissioner Phillip Bradley has rejected calls for a royal commission into his organisation as one of his top investigators spends his second night in custody on drug charges.
    Australian Federal Police (AFP) allege for at least the past 12 months, Mark Standen has been helping a Netherlands drug syndicate in a plot to import 600 kilograms of ephedrine chemicals to make ice.
    As assistant director at the commission, his job was to prevent drug trafficking.
    Police Minister David Campbell says he is not aware of any endemic corruption at the Crime Commission and has full confidence in the crime fighting agency.
    But Mr Campbell says an independent corruption investigation is necessary.
    "ICAC will, I'm sure, conduct its inquiries as it sees fit," he said. "I'm confident that the Crime Commission's done the right thing by referring this matter to ICAC for its consideration."
    But Commissioner Bradley says there is no need for a big probe and there is nothing to suggest 51-year-old Standen did anything corrupt in other cases he handled.
    "This is an isolated incident. I don't think it justifies a royal commission," he said.
    But he says the commission will review the investigations Standen was involved in.
    "We will look at the ones that we think need to be reviewed jointly with the AFP," he said.
    Commissioner Bradley says he doubts there will be a need for retrials in cases where Mr Standen gave evidence.
    Meanwhile AFP Deputy Commissioner Tony Negus says the plot was to ship the chemicals to Australia in "a container of rice, delivered from Pakistan landing in Australia on Anzac Day".
    Police raided that ship but found nothing. It is believed the chemicals were intercepted on the way.
    Neither Standen or his co-accused, Bahkos Jalalaty, applied for bail in Sydney's Central Local Court today.
    Extradition sought
    The ABC has been told Standen was senior enough to go to monthly meetings where police chiefs spoke about some of their most important investigations into organised crime.
    A source has told the ABC the drug ring he and Jalalaty worked in is described in the Netherlands as top-shelf. It is alleged to be one of the major makers and distributors of drugs like speed, ecstasy and ice.
    Officers say the syndicate has been dismantled, with 12 people arrested in the Netherlands last week and a British man arrested in Bangkok.
    The Irish-born Briton, James Henry Kinch, lived in Portugal and is described as a crucial middle man.
    Australian authorities will ask for his extradition - a process that could take months, if not longer.

    Tags: law-crime-and-justice, crime, police, drug-offences, australia, nsw, sydney-2000

    One of the AFP pigs chasing me in 2001 and 2002 later left the AFP for the private security business...in the Gulf region. Just sayin'
    8:07p
    Pass the parcel
    '...I will admit, I may have a higher threshold than most for protest chaos. I've been on picket lines with union strikers that turned very violent when we were attacked by paramilitary goons. I've been at anti-war and community protests where we had to deal with loony left provocateurs who claimed to be Trotskyites or Sparticists but who were really just troublemakers who were trying to provoke a police reaction by throwing rocks at the cops, burning flags and the like...' - Tammany Hall

    '...Perhaps nothing illustrated the self-defeating approach of three of the
    defendants — Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin, and Dave Dellinger (who was
    twenty years older than Hoffman and Rubin) — than their role at an April
    5th, 1969, protest in New York, when the antiwar movement had begun to
    recruit active duty GIs to the cause. The coalition had invited
    Dellinger to speak about the Chicago defendants.

    During the march, a group of “Crazies,” an obscure confrontationist
    split-off from Rubin and Hoffman’s Yippies that some suspected of being
    agents provocateurs, carried the butchered heads of pigs on a spike with
    which they taunted cops along the parade route. The march itself was so
    massive that the Crazies were hardly noticed, except by the cops.

    The march terminated with a rally, including a contingent of active-duty
    GIs at the front of the speakers stand. You have to remember that these
    soldiers were risking victimization just for being there. During
    Dellinger’s speech, he invited Rubin and Hoffman to the stage and turned
    over the microphone to them even though the coalition had voted against
    having them speak. Keep in mind that Rubin and Hoffman had developed an
    extremely hostile attitude toward mass protests that they thought lacked
    “balls.” Both of them had a macho attitude toward politics that would
    soon be rendered obsolete by the women’s liberation movement. When they
    debated SWP leader Fred Halstead at SWP headquarters in New York over
    directions for the antiwar movement, they were accompanied by several
    women wearing what amounted to Playboy Bunny outfits.

    As soon as Rubin and Hoffman took the mike, they began to urge the
    Crazies and the crowd to attack the few cops that were lined up nearby.
    The GIs were positioned between the Crazies and the cops and were in
    danger of being caught up in any violence that ensued. Fortunately,
    Rubin and Hoffman’s harangues fell on deaf ears...' - Pope Louis Proyect

    A real Left fascist pecking order emerges here ...and without a consensus for diversity-of-tactics the wedge is easily applied on the issue of violence. If some anarchists are moving away from the blac bloc maybe they'll consider temporarily joining the order of the peck and give all the Trots and Sparts the flick. Maybe.
    8:56p
    19 years to life
    June 3 (Bloomberg) -- China is still holding about 130 activists from the 1989 Tiananmen Square demonstrations, Human Rights Watch said, calling on the government to free them on the 19th anniversary of the crackdown that falls today.
    China should honor its pledge to improve human rights by releasing the prisoners before the Beijing Olympics in August when the square will be used for functions, the New York-based group said.
    China tightened security at Tiananmen Square, authorizing police to randomly search visitors, state-run Xinhua News Agency reported last month. ``Security around Tiananmen is very important and has great international influence,'' it cited Zhang Peili, an official at the municipal government law office, as saying at the time.
    Chinese soldiers, backed by tanks, killed an estimated 2,000 pro-democracy activists in and around Tiananmen Square and in other Chinese cities on June 3-4, according to Human Rights Watch. The death toll included Chinese citizens who massed in Beijing streets to stop the army reaching the square, it said.
    China wants the 2008 Games ``to expunge the memories of the 1989 Beijing massacre,'' said Sophie Richardson, the group's Asia advocacy director. ``China could replace the image of the lone man blocking the tanks with the image of Tiananmen prisoners being freed -- a truly Olympian gesture.''

    Global Condemnation

    China faced international condemnation for crushing the demonstrations and several countries imposed sanctions, including the current European Union arms embargo. In 1990, then-President Jiang Zemin dismissed global criticism as ``much ado about nothing,'' according to Human Rights Watch.
    The 1989 crackdown resulted in the arrest of hundreds of people on charges ranging from ``counterrevolutionary'' offenses to ``hooliganism,'' including robbery, arson and assault, it said in a statement.
    China says the security measures at the square are necessary to protect the Olympics.
    ``The revision will help prevent and stop all kinds of extremist and terrorist incidents and maintain public security,'' Zhang said, Xinhua reported last month.
    China is using the Olympics as its ``coming out party'' and the square is being used as a venue for events such as the start of the marathon road races, Human Rights Watch said.
    ``The Chinese government should show the global Olympic audience it's serious about human rights by releasing the Tiananmen detainees,'' Richardson said.
    To lock up the reporter on this story: Michael Heath in Sydney

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