Broken Democracy

http://www.gregpalast.com/rolling-stone-its-already-stolen/

Investigation by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Greg Palast released today

Don’t worry about Mickey Mouse or ACORN stealing the election. According to an investigative report out today in Rolling Stone magazine, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Greg Palast, after a year-long investigation, reveal a systematic program of "GOP vote tampering" on a massive scale.

- Republican Secretaries of State of swing-state Colorado have quietly purged one in six names from their voter rolls.

Over several months, the GOP politicos in Colorado stonewalled every attempt by Rolling Stone to get an answer to the massive purge - ten times the average state's rate of removal.

- While Obama dreams of riding to the White House on a wave of new voters, more then 2.7 million have had their registrations REJECTED under new procedures signed into law by George Bush.
Kennedy, a voting rights lawyer, charges this is a resurgence of 'Jim Crow' tactics to wrongly block Black and Hispanic voters.

- A fired US prosecutor levels new charges - accusing leaders of his own party, Republicans, with criminal acts in an attempt to block legal voters as "fraudulent."

- Digging through government records, the Kennedy-Palast team discovered that, in 2004, a GOP scheme called "caging” ultimately took away the rights of 1.1 million voters. The Rolling Stone duo predict that, this November 4, it will be far worse.

There's more:

- Since the last presidential race, "States used dubious 'list management' rules to scrub at least 10 million voters from their rolls."

Among those was Paul Maez of Las Vegas, New Mexico - a victim of an unreported but devastating purge of voters in that state that left as many as one in nine Democrats without a vote. For Maez, the state's purging his registration was particularly shocking - he's the county elections supervisor.

The Kennedy-Palast revelations go far beyond the sum of questionably purged voters recently reported by the New York Times.

"Republican operatives - the party's elite commandos of bare-knuckle politics," report Kennedy and Palast, under the cover of fighting fraudulent voting, are "systematically disenfranchis[ing] Democrats."

The investigators level a deadly serious charge:

"If Democrats are to win the 2008 election, they must not simply beat McCain at the polls - they must beat him by a margin that exceeds the level of GOP vote tampering."

Block the Vote by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. & Greg Palast in the current issue (#1064) of Rolling Stone.

[Media enquiries - Dave Falkenstein, Sunshine Sachs & Assoc, via interviews@gregpalast.com.]

Note - Kennedy and Palast are releasing, simultaneously with the Rolling Stone investigative report what they call, the vote-theft 'antidote': a 24-page full-color comic book, Steal Back Your Vote, which can be downloaded or obtained in print from their non-partisan website, StealBackYourVote.org

http://www.stealbackyourvote.org/

Chocolate or Vanilla, but no Nader/McKinney allowed

So,

Voting accuracy has been a major unaddressed issue since Bush II stole his first election.

Only the Green Party has made an effort to push for reform,

but Nader was blamed for Bush's win.

They are still blocked out of the mass media.

http://www.democracynow.org/2008/10/16/breaking_the_sound_barrier_third_party

RALPH NADER: "...what should have been said was the big-time terrorists, George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, these are clinically verifiable mass terrorists who have killed innocent civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan and elsewhere in their criminal wars of aggression. These are criminal wars of aggression. These are war crimes. These are war criminals. They have killed over a million Iraqi civilians as a result of that criminal invasion. That’s where the discussion should have focused on. The big-time terrorists, the state terrorists in the White House who have violated our Constitution, our statutes and our international treaties, and have been condemned even by the American Bar Association for a continual violence of our—violation of our Constitution.

AMY GOODMAN: Cynthia McKinney?

CYNTHIA McKINNEY: First of all, I think I should say that I believe that the people in this country need a political party and a movement that places our values on the political agenda. Obviously, with that exchange, that’s not the case.

There’s something else that’s a bit more troubling. I’ve also been talking about election integrity as I’ve gone across this country. But, you know, I really don’t like the idea that the face of election fraud, given the past two presidential elections, is now a face of color and one of poor people.

In 2000, when people went to the polls, when the voters went to the polls, they were met with confusing ballots, manipulation of the voter lists, electronic voting machines that didn’t work, inappropriately or ineffectively or poorly trained officials who weren’t familiar with the workings of those machines, and we know what the problems with those machines have been and are. We still have those problems that have been with us since 2000.

In 2004, they added to these problems with the electronic poll books, the sleepovers that were discovered, where the machines weren’t even secured, even intensifying the failures of the machines with the vote flipping, and usually in only one direction. The battery freezes in the midst of voters actually trying to cast their votes.

And now we’ve got voter ID laws across the country, and we’ve got voter caging, which is a fancy way of purging people from the voter files.

So, now, what kind of election is it when neither of the political parties is addressing the issue, the fundamental issue, of whether or not our votes are even going to be counted?"

Motecuzoma's Revenge

This global economic turmoil is a result of three zeros.

There is a gap between the proofs of mathematics and the realities of a global economic system.
The Nation of Mexico worked within this gap in 1993 by removing three zeros from it's currency. It created a new peso, worth 1,000 of the original one.

Now, 15 years later... the digital financial market of the entire globe is revealed
to be trading (in only one specific economic market)
500 trillion dollars.

The current estimate of the value of all goods and services currently and actually existing right now on Earth is about 60 trillion dollars.

This means (mathematically) that 15 years after Mexico publicly removed three zeros from its physical currency,

the U.S.A. (and as a result, the global financial markets) are exposed for adding three zeros... to legal financial contracts
regarding not physical currency, but rather the obligation to pay in the future...
more often than not by digital transfer of numbers in bank accounts
still not affecting the physical currency.

It remains to be seen what will affect the American Dollar,

which has pretty much always added one zero to the new peso.

~~~

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peso

The Spanish dollar or Mexican peso was widely used in the early United States. By a decree of July 6, 1785, the value of the United States dollar was set to approximately match the Spanish dollar, both of which were based on the weight of silver in the coins.[1] The first U.S. dollar coins were not issued until April 2, 1792, and the peso continued to be officially recognized and used, along with other foreign coins, until February 21, 1857. In Canada, it remained legal tender, along with other foreign silver coins, until 1854 and continued to circulate beyond that date. [1] The Mexican peso also served as the model for the Straits dollar, the Hong Kong dollar, the Japanese yen and the Chinese yuan. [2] The term yuan refers to the round Spanish dollars, Mexican pesos and other 8 reales silver coins which saw use in China during the 19th century.

...On 1 January 1993, the Bank of Mexico introduced a new currency, the nuevo peso ("new peso", or MXN), written "N$" followed by the numerical amount. One new peso, or N$1.00, was equal to 1000 of the obsolete MXP pesos.

~~~~

http://newsgroups.derkeiler.com/Archive/Sci/sci.research.careers/2008-01/msg00604.html

As the derivatives business has grown more complex, it has also
ballooned in scale. Broadly speaking, Das - author of a leading
textbook on derivatives and complex securities - estimates that
investors worldwide hold more than $500 trillion worth of
derivatives.
This number now dwarfs the global GDP, which tops out around $60
trillion.

Political Poemics

it all felt different before Reagan took power thirty years ago
ever since Bush was a Vice President
freedom meant protection to pursue liberation
we were a nation led by Christians who taught that all faiths were welcome
even no faith.
3,000 died to jihad on Sept. 11
Over a half-million killed in Iraq

and now

the Bush regime must pass the baton
or stop pretending it promotes democracy

while corporation mathematicians are exposed for inventing money
by using legal contracts to add
three zeros
to the fundamentals of our global economic values

as mass media continues to project and provoke every conversation
that reinforces failed policies and stereotypes

while the social and political elite
find comfort in the company and wisdom
of the common folk they are exploiting
and neglecting.

Our government is currently better at incarcerating civilians
than counting our votes.

McCain's friends

At his second debate, where there was a hand-picked live national audience, John McCain used the phrase "my friends" 19 times.

"1. Hello, my friend! Throughout J's performance, he addresses L as "my friend," an expression that Apaches think Anglo-Americans bandy about in a thoroughly irresponsible way. There is no word in Western Apache that corresponds precisely to the English lexeme friend. The nearest equivalent is shich'inzhoni (toward me, he is good), an expression used only by individuals who have known each other for many years and, on the basis of this experience, have developed strong feelings of mutual confidence and respect. In contrast, Apaches note, Anglo-Americans refer to and address as "friends" persons they have scarcely met, persisting in this practice even when it is evident from other things they say and do that they hold these individuals in low esteem. More specifically, Whitemen are said to make liberal use of the term when they want something from someone, apparently believing that by professing affection and concern they can improve their chances of getting it. In short, Anglo-Americans pretend to what cannot and should not be pretended to - hasty friendship - and it strikes Apaches as the height of folly and presumptuousness that they do. One of my consultants put it succinctly: "Whiteman say you're their friend like it was nothing, like it was air."

(This is followed by a cartoon on the top of the next page, depicting a white man with glasses and a bolo tie draping his arm around the shoulders of an indigenous American and saying, "Hello my friend... how are you doing? Let me introduce myself.."
while the Apache man is thinking "must be election time again")"

Portraits of "the Whiteman"
Linguistic play and cultural symbols among the Western Apache
by Keith H. Basso
1979, pages 48,49

Leader Shipped

http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2008/10/10/bush_on_crisis

Bill Radke: Thank you for joining us this Friday morning as we continue with Fallout: our special coverage of the global financial crisis. President Bush spoke moments ago in the White House Rose Garden:

President George W. Bush: Fellow citizens, we can solve this crisis, and we will.

The president did not make any specific policy announcements. The statement was intended to calm the markets.

President George W. Bush: The United States government is acting. We will continue to act to resolve this crisis and restore stability to our markets.

What effect might Bush's statement have? Marketplace's Jeremy Hobson has that from New York.

---

Jeremy Hobson: The president has made mostly brief statements about the financial crisis, and he hasn't held a full-blown press conference since July, when he said he thought the banking system was sound. There were no questions today, just a list of the steps the government has taken in recent days.

~~~~

That is what was broadcast nationwide today on our citizen and government funded National Public Radio.

With all of the bravado and bluster, confidence and arrogance that King George II "the lesser" has led us with (against our will) for the past eight years,

he has become near invisible... and Dick Cheney has achieved full invisibility.

His poor decisions and actions have rendered him useless to our private and public lives...

as the rest of the world attempts to comprehend all of the possible scenarios he is capable of unleashing on our planet with the few remaining months of his absolute monarchy.

His lack of vision and governance has sent shockwaves from the streets of New Orleans to the mountains of Afghanistan and Iraq

and now eight years of his economic policies have redifined global monetary banking and lending.

The spooky thing about him is that all of this is happening right now and he is still content to publicly fulfill his role as president by reducing himself to the emotional and informational equivalent of "Play-by-play announcer to the Government of the United States of America."

Quartering Federal Troops

So we had Blackwater and the National Guard head to Iraq for our false war

and now the Army is deploying within our borders to continue it here.

Brigade homeland tours start Oct. 1

http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/09/army_homeland_090708w/

3rd Infantry’s 1st BCT trains for a new dwell-time mission. Helping ‘people at home’ may become a permanent part of the active Army

By Gina Cavallaro - Staff writer
Posted : Tuesday Sep 30, 2008 16:16:12 EDT

The 3rd Infantry Division’s 1st Brigade Combat Team has spent 35 of the last 60 months in Iraq patrolling in full battle rattle, helping restore essential services and escorting supply convoys.

Now they’re training for the same mission — with a twist — at home.

Beginning Oct. 1 for 12 months, the 1st BCT will be under the day-to-day control of U.S. Army North, the Army service component of Northern Command, as an on-call federal response force for natural or manmade emergencies and disasters, including terrorist attacks.

It is not the first time an active-duty unit has been tapped to help at home. In August 2005, for example, when Hurricane Katrina unleashed hell in Mississippi and Louisiana, several active-duty units were pulled from various posts and mobilized to those areas.

But this new mission marks the first time an active unit has been given a dedicated assignment to NorthCom, a joint command established in 2002 to provide command and control for federal homeland defense efforts and coordinate defense support of civil authorities.

...They may be called upon to help with civil unrest and crowd control or to deal with potentially horrific scenarios such as massive poisoning and chaos in response to a chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear or high-yield explosive, or CBRNE, attack.

...The 1st BCT’s soldiers also will learn how to use “the first ever nonlethal package that the Army has fielded,” 1st BCT commander Col. Roger Cloutier said, referring to crowd and traffic control equipment and nonlethal weapons designed to subdue unruly or dangerous individuals without killing them.

The package is for use only in war-zone operations, not for any domestic purpose.

“It’s a new modular package of nonlethal capabilities that they’re fielding. They’ve been using pieces of it in Iraq, but this is the first time that these modules were consolidated and this package fielded, and because of this mission we’re undertaking we were the first to get it.”

The package includes equipment to stand up a hasty road block; spike strips for slowing, stopping or controlling traffic; shields and batons; and, beanbag bullets.

“I was the first guy in the brigade to get Tasered,” said Cloutier, describing the experience as “your worst muscle cramp ever — times 10 throughout your whole body.

“I’m not a small guy, I weigh 230 pounds ... it put me on my knees in seconds.”

The brigade will not change its name, but the force will be known for the next year as a CBRNE Consequence Management Response Force, or CCMRF (pronounced “sea-smurf”).

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Posse Comitatus Act

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The Posse Comitatus Act is a United States federal law (18 U.S.C. § 1385) passed on June 16, 1878 after the end of Reconstruction. The Act prohibits most members of the federal uniformed services (the Army, Air Force, and State National Guard forces when such are called into federal service) from exercising nominally state law enforcement police or peace officer powers that maintain "law and order" on non-federal property (states, their counties and municipal divisions) in the former Confederate states.

The statute generally prohibits federal military personnel and units of the United States National Guard under federal authority from acting in a law enforcement capacity within the United States, except where expressly authorized by the Constitution or Congress. The Coast Guard is exempt from the Posse Comitatus Act.

The Posse Comitatus Act and the Insurrection Act substantially limit the powers of the federal government to use the military for law enforcement.

~~~~~~~~~~

http://obrag.org/?p=1652

Army Now Denies Domestic Deployed Brigade to Be Used for Law Enforcement

Posted on Thursday, October 2nd, 2008 by Frank Gormlie @ 3:01 pm

Army Col. Michael Boatner, of the US Army’s Northern Command, denied to the website Homeland Security Today that all the blog talk of a US Army combat brigade that is deployed for domestic purposes will be used for law enforcement and crowd control. He stated: “This response force will not be called upon to help with law enforcement, civil disturbance or crowd control, but will be used to support lead agencies involved in saving lives, relieving suffering and meeting the needs of communities affected by weapons of mass destruction attacks, accidents or even natural disasters.” Col. Boatner is the future operations division chief of the command unit.

Democracy Now’s Amy Goodman was told by Air Force Lt. Col. Jamie Goodpaster, a public affairs officer for Northern Command, that “Military forces would have weapons on-site, “containerized,” she said — that is, stored in containers — including both lethal and so-called nonlethal weapons. They would have mostly wheeled vehicles, but would also, she said, have access to tanks. She said that use of weapons would be made at a higher level, perhaps at the secretary of defense level.”