CNN To Fox News-“YOU LIE!”-Demands Apology

CNN’s Rick Sanchez became livid on his program Friday about a color ad that Fox News had placed in the September 17, 2009 edition of The Washington Post.

The ad contained a photo, which he said is suspiciously similar to a tower shot used by CNN of the Tea Party March on Washington D.C. The offending ad accused all of the major networks by name, including CNN, of intentionally not covering the event, and implying that only Fox covers “all” the news and no one else does. The event was referred to as a right-wing tea party and was heavily promoted and covered at Fox News.

Sanchez said Fox was “…using a lie to try and divide people into camps. And, you know, Americans are starting to get tired of this.”

Sanchez went on to use several methods to prove just how well the event was covered by CNN, showing a clip of the Fox News Bill O’Reilly program “The O’Reilly Factor” in which Bill says on camera, “…CNN, as we mentioned, covered the anti-Obama protests, of course…”

As further proof he ran several clips of CNN correspondents reporting on the event. CNN’s Paul Steinhauser reported on the route the protesters were taking and the approximate time the event would take place on the west front of the Capital building. CNN correspondent Kate Bolduan reported on traffic conditions for the rally, helpfully mentioning that many were still stuck on Pennsylvania Avenue and that crowds were still coming from Freedom Plaza. CNN’s Lisa Desjardins interviewed protesters in the crowd indicating that they all very strongly supported Congressman Joe Wilson’s outburst at President Obama.

Saving the best for last Sanchez played coast-to-coast clips of CNN correspondent Jim Spellman who had traveled with the “Tea Party Express” to some 30 rallies reporting on them in several news casts as they traveled east to Washington D.C. Spellman reported of the growing numbers within the protesters who loudly support, “…outlandish conspiracy theories about death camps about this takeover, people comparing President Obama to Hitler. And it really is a sizable thread. It's not just a couple of people on the edges.”

One protester was so proud of his stand that when he realized he was on camera, he actually turned his sign around so that it couldn't be read by viewers!

As Sanchez’s anger grew at the out-and-out lie that CNN didn’t cover the event he said this of the photo in their ad, “All right, let me show you this. You see the thing on the left now? That's our tower cam shot of the event that we used repeatedly throughout those shows. Funny how you can say that we didn't cover an event by using that picture, that picture that looks an awful lot like our tower cam shot, doesn't it? And you used it in your ad saying we didn't cover the story.”

Sanchez summed up his presentation by saying that the difference in the two competing network’s coverage of the event was that CNN “covered” it while Fox News went out of their way to “promote” it in order to divide the country along political lines and defied Fox to study the different meanings of those two words. He went on to reiterate that CNN covered the event with four correspondents, two satellite trucks, multiple live interviews with attendees, and on-camera lawmakers giving their views.

CNN put in a call to Fox News asking for a comment on Sanchez’s report, and informing them of Rick's on-camera demand of an apology for the false and misleading ad.

Apparently they’re still waiting for someone to return that call.

Sanchez ended his segment by saying,

“Let me address the FOX News Network now perhaps the most current way that I can, by quoting somebody who recently used a very pithy phrase, two words. It's all I need: You lie."

If you'd like to watch the actual news segment click here.



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©-2009 by Jet Gardner/Blogcritics.org

Heartless U. S. Rep. Calls Matthew Shepard Murder A “Hoax”

This article has moved to Jet's Gay Pride Page-please follow the link in the table of contenst above to find it... Thanks!

How Soon Before the GOP Realizes They Lost the Election?

Editorial:
As recent legislative events will attest to, the Republicans in Congress aren't opposing President Barack Obama because there's a good reason for it, nor to protect or help our nation’s economy in any way. In my opinion, they're just nit picking, verbally distracting, and trying to delay majority legislation because they’ve discovered that they still can.

It’s not obvious to the general public yet, but with only a few conservative Democrats defecting to the other side, it's become clear to the Republican minority that important legislation can’t possibly make it through both houses of Congress with a filibuster-proof margin, so they delay and publicly criticize, knowing the media will eat it up, which (they hope) should distract everyone from the obvious fact that the GOP tried it their way for eight years and wound us up in the situation we're in now.

Of even more interest is Rep. John A. Boehner (Ohio)'s complaint that the bill was passing without anyone reading it.

Uh, John, the bill is basically the same as it was three weeks ago-save a few alterations to sooth a few hesitant Republicans like you. If you or your staff haven't read it by now, you never will-not that you ever intended to. A better question would be how many bulky Republican bills have you hypocritically not read through?

With Republicans in both houses screaming bloody murder at the top of their lungs over the billions we have to spend to clean up President George W. Bush’s disastrous financial mess, maybe they are hoping we won’t remember how much we’ve spent in dollars and lives on a useless and unwarranted war in Iraq. A war mind you, that our children’s children will still be paying for decades from now, just like they claim the bailout will do.

One of the reasons that the general public gave both houses of Congress such bad approval ratings after the Democrats just barely (emphasis on the word “barely”) won the majority of both houses in 2004 was because the electorate didn’t understand the consequences of that slim victory. The U.S. voter didn’t realize or even care enough to learn that without a Bush-veto-proof majority nothing could get done without begging the GOP for cooperation. Cooperation that they weren’t about to give if it meant admitting that the Democrats might have some better ideas on how to get things done, than they did during their own failed tenure... so they blamed the Democratic majority for apparent inaction that wasn't in their power to side-step.

With President Obama achieving the unprecedented legislative passage of a bill of historic proportions only two and a half weeks into his presidency, maybe it’s swiftly becoming a good and timely idea to remind those GOP and conservative Democratic congressmen and senators that either they shut up and get with the majority voter’s decisions, or lose their seats in the coming mid-term elections. Like it or not, the Republican minority is taking a big gamble opposing President Obama, if the economy begins to bounce back in two years, they’re all going to look like fools.

…and deservedly so.

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© 2009 by Jet in Columbus

Editorial: The U. S. in Crisis-Either Join Together or Fall Apart

This editorial contains strong language-and for a damned good reason...


Look what we've done to ourselves!!! YOU-YES-YOU LOOK AT US AND WHAT WE'RE DOING!!!


LOOK WHAT WE DID TO THE FIRST PRESIDENT BUSH!
We all rallyed behind him during the first gulf war, Hell-half of us wanted to erect a statue to the man in front of the capital (myself included) but half of us wanted badly to see him fail in revenge for how the ultra right-wing "christian conservatives" kidnapped the republican party and held it for ransom!!!

It was during this period that I switched from a liberal Republican to a conservative democrat.

We never gave President Bush I a chance in 1988. But stop and look at the work he's done since leaving office for world disaster relief etc, and wonder what he could've done as president-had we only given him a chance!


LOOK WHAT WE DID TO BILL CLINTON
The moment he took office the right-wing tried to find any way they could to bring him down whether he deserved it or not.
Bitch and CLAIM all you want, but in the end it comes down to you refusing to cooperate and rally around him to make this country great, much less get behind a man who like it or not brought down our deficit and presided over one of the most peaceful and prosperous times in American History!!! Remember we're not talking budget deficit-we're talking SURPLUS!

AND FOR WHAT???

Despite dragging him into impeachment, the only trumped up charge you could make stick was lying to his wife and the American people about getting a fucking blow job-a god damned BLOW JOB-something any husband would lie about in the same circumstances.

You can beat your partisan chests till your blue in the face and CLAIM he was guilty of anything you want, BECAUSE THAT'S WHAT YOU WANT TO BELIEVE, but in the end a REPUBLICAN congress did not have enough on him to bring him down (despite "Whitewater" and he remained in office... despite what "facts" you sore losers will regurgitate up


LOOK WHAT WE DID TO GEORGE W. BUSH.
Hell after 9/11 we were all ready to put the man on Mt. Rushmore!!! I was so pumped up with patriotic lust, I flew a giant flag from my penthouse balcony for months afterward.

But when the chips started to go south, rather than rally around the man-OUR president-OUR country, we all got together and nearly shoved him over a political cliff-and for what?

Partisan bickering and posturing.

George Bush may go down in history as one of the most ineffective, reviled and embarrassing presidents of the United States, because half the country prayed for him to fail the moment he took office in revenge for what the Republicans did to Bill Clinton!

And look at us now.
JUST LOOK AT US! Is it any wonder the United States has lost nearly all respect we've ever had worldwide?


Have any of you pompous asses ever met, much less gotten to know Barack Obama? No-well I haven't either, and yet you have the arrogance and nerve to judge the man, based on only your own sources of information (selected to confirm anything you want to say about the man), which may or may not (emphasis on not) be reliable.

Considering the enormous job the man is facing, you'd think you'd at least give him the benefit of the doubt; but no.

You WANT him to fail-EVEN IF IT MEANS WATCHING OUR COUNTRY GO BANKRUPT; would it really be worth it to see Obama fail?... because you know that's the only way your opposition parties will win the next elections.

Hell, I'm ashamed to say that there are parts of our country that want to see him assassinated because they don't want some nigger in the whitehouse... now that's something to fill you with national pride isn't it? Bus loads of kids in Idaho chanting "Kill Obama!"

It's time for us to pull ourselves up by our goddamned jockstraps and turn this country around-not later-now!!!!

Worry about the damned elections in four years, not January 21st 2009 and help Obama pull this country back together before it's too late.

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© 2008 by Jet in Columbus

Is The News Media Guilty of Intentionally Manipulating Recent Elections?

I’m going to ask you to do something very difficult and put your opinions of the candidates away for a moment and look at this election from another angle. I think I've got it figured out now, it's not pretty, and I hope I’m wrong.

When the network and cable news see either one or the other candidate gaining a sizable lead, they seem to concentrate on the underdog until his poll numbers are as close to equal with his opponent's.

It’s obvious (to me anyway) that news organizations need viewer numbers; ad revenue, it's the name of the game. After all, who's going to watch every developing news flash if McCain or Obama were so far ahead, that the election was a foregone conclusion? I’m beginning to suspect that the heads of those news and print media organizations go out of their way to do everything possible in the tone of their reporting to make sure the candidates are as "separated at birth" as they possibly can get them. That means right up to the day of the election the TV and print media absolutely need as much suspense as they can create. It sells magazines and newspapers, and awards top ratings that add up to big ad revenue bucks.

Last year Senator Hillary Clinton had what for all intents and purposes was a lock on the Democratic nomination. She even had more votes than Obama, so by how much and how did she lose the nomination? Was it only my perception that the news media suddenly hung on every word out of Sen. Obama’s mouth to the point of practically ignoring her… and McCain for that matter?

Last year, it looked like Rudy Giuliani had a lock on the Republican nomination, but what happened-the press concentrated on every fault or scandal in his history, to give the other candidates-mainly McCain-a chance to catch up to him... by the way McCain was nearly dead in the water a year ago, but suddenly he’s the “comeback kid.”

If I’m right, it might explain why suddenly this country has a lot of razor-sharp margins in the Senate, the House and the last two presidential races, (to the point that the Supreme Court had to decide the 2000 presidential election,) and why the current one is so close when it didn’t used be perceived that way.

Obama needed Clinton in the Vice President slot to energize his chances of winning. McCain need Giuliani for the same reason, but look who they picked for running mates instead? I'm an undecided democrat. I really don't like Obama for the reasons I’ve stated in an another article, and I can't stand Governor Sarah “Church Lady” Palin-I cringe every time I think of her probably becoming president two years after the election and I wonder if she was separated from birth from Karen Walker of “Will and Grace”.

Of one thing I'm absolutely sure... and I hate it.

I'll be voting against someone, instead of for someone this year... damnit

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© 2008 by Jet in Columbus

The Ultimate Theory of God, Opinion, Astronomy, Eternity, Faith and Scientific Facts?

Up front, though it may appear to be, this is not a commentary against the small local community churches that serve to strengthen our nation’s moral ability, and to teach the difference between right and wrong. Those who use God’s name to justify murder, hatred and bigotry are another matter.

This article is designed to make you think, to ponder, and even to laugh out loud occasionally, despite its serious subject… After all nothing loses your readers faster than a dull harangue that goes on and on and on, without a few chuckles thrown in for punctuation… right? For those of you who actually reach the end of this piece with your sanity intact, I’ll remind you I did use the word “theory” in the title and that said title does after all end in a question mark, and I will explain why in the last paragraph.

And so…

I consider it an axiom that if you can’t trust the source of your information, then it follows that you can’t trust the opinions, conclusions or facts that the absorption of it produces… or so I’ve been told. After all, aren’t facts really nothing more than widely accepted opinions?

But what happens when your main information source becomes as outdated as an old forgotten computer running DOS that’s never even heard of Windows®? It is so old, that the poor thing needs five minutes just to boot up! Like our old computer, even if the ancient scribes of the Bible knew and understood how the universe actually works, they’d sadly lack the vocabulary to describe it, and their readers would probably dismiss their explanations as evil heresy. It is human nature to fear what you don’t understand, and many kill what they fear, so the authors of the Holy Bible tended to keep their teachings simple, regardless of the complex lessons they were trying to relay.

In recent times I’ve found my personal faith shaken. Like an argument that’s been built on unstable ground, I can’t repair it by nit picking the little things that are wrong, or wedging a brick beneath a sinking foundation to temporarily keep its floor level.

In our day and age, the battle to move forward in knowledge, while staying morally rooted in the past is like the sturdy flying buttresses on opposite sides of an ancient church. The holy sanctuary would most assuredly fall down if either of them stopped leaning against it, but like a stubborn old man, it refuses to acknowledge that it even needs them. Worse yet, as new churches are built around it, shock sets in when it realizes that the new ones don’t even need the buttresses that he relies on.

Rather than the old church exposing its faults in order to have them repaired and strengthened, it instead hides them in favor of distractions, causing continued and unchecked deterioration. “See my beautiful classic stained glass, and my golden objects and-and my fancy leather-bound books of worship?” Like the Wizard of Oz, the grand cathedral needs its followers to pay attention to the frightening yet beckoning statues, billowing smoke and terrifying lightning in order to keep its parishioners from noticing “that man behind the curtain” working its special effects.

Today, in one hand we in America hold the latest science book, and in the other the Christian Bible. Both are equally believable and equally important, but in many ways they are in direct opposition to each other simply because of the way they are both interpreted as unimpeachable and factual texts. In an age of constant discovery, the average science volume, regardless of subject is usually discarded as outdated within five to eight years.

(While I’m dubious as to how intact,) in contrast, the Christian Bible in an assortment of forms, along with other religious texts has survived the various ages of constant scientific discovery for nearly twenty centuries.

It has always bothered me that biblical faith and proven science can’t seem to co-exist in peace without doing harmful battle to one and other. It makes many think that the established church, all the while preaching love and acceptance, would rather sing “Onward Christian Soldiers,” than to stretch out a hand to its neighbors. Granted, there are rare pockets of coexistence like the American Amish/Pennsylvania Dutch living side by side with modern culture. Two completely different ways of life that not only tolerate each other, but also respect each other’s values. Remarkably the horse and buggy coexists with the automobile in peace and mutual respect.

But is it really a well-crafted illusion that the Bible has actually survived as well as Science?

While Science is constantly evolving, (sorry for the necessary use of the “E” word,) the church has not. As the Christian faith realized that attendance figures were faltering in mid-20th century, the only effective solution was not to assimilate itself into modern society, but to legislate outdated religious dogma in order to force it upon the increasingly reluctant population in the form of laws. People must be compelled to attend church, so no commercial business will be conducted on Sunday, no alcohol will be sold on the Sabbath either, and as its political power grew, as did its wealth, established religion demanded and got laws that gave it immunity from taxation.

Is there anyone left still wondering why there are no federally mandated Jewish or Islamic national holidays in the United States?

The Christian church has even flaunted its power by demanding that we post on our money "In God We Trust.” But how do we decide which opposing denomination’s God does that motto represent? The axiom has currently been there for so long that people are convinced that our founding fathers by design dictated that it should be there hundreds of years ago when our country was founded, rather than it being a recent addition demanded by those same religious zealots' forefathers in the 1950s. It actually showed up sporadically on our coins in the 1860s and was legislated onto our paper money in 1957 and began appearing on it in 1961 ...only a little over forty years ago.

For a while their scenario worked, but with the arrival of the volatile 1960s, slowly resistance began cracking their powerful façade. Like the earlier fighters against the “religious right’s” successful constitutional amendment regarding prohibition of all alcoholic beverages, businesses began defying dogma and staying open on Sundays. Our new dollar coin contains the motto, but it has now been pushed aside and into obscurity at the outer edge of the coin instead of prominently on its face.

So let us look at the effects of strict biblical teachings, as opposed to the piddling and easily disputed minor details.

1. Intolerance and judgment in the name of God
Even in these modern times, whenever religious fundamentalism (regardless of the denomination) enters an era of intolerance, innocent people die. People become judged and are killed for senseless crimes in the name of God. You need look no further than the Crusades for instance where people were publicly, viciously and slowly tortured if they refused to renounce their religion in favor of Christianity. This resulted in tens of thousands of Muslims, Jews and other non-Christians to be horribly put to death… in the name of God.

Other examples are the Salem Witch hunts, Ireland in the days when you could die because you were Protestant or Catholic, depending on what neighborhood you were trying to traverse, and of course today’s middle-east where identical looking people (to the uneducated) offhandedly and without a second thought regularly kill each other and themselves simply because of their faith. Of course there’s also the Nazi wholesale slaughter of millions of people who were merely declared Jews, Gypsies and homosexuals regardless of whether they actually were or not.

I don't have a problem with my own or other’s chosen faith regarding the existence of God. I do have problems with the hundreds of versions of him/her/it (?) that various opposing groups have created while insisting loudly that theirs — and only theirs — is the correct one. Whole communities are lured into beautiful multi-million dollar stadium-sized sanctuaries with the all-accepting promise of God’s love for everyone, and the rapture felt when you accept Jesus Christ as your only savior.

It’s only after you’ve committed yourself body and wallet, that you realize the extent of the “bait and switch” con that’s been perpetrated on you. Your preacher’s speeches begin to sound more like financial advice than theological sermons. Too late, you’ve realized that peer group pressure will make you pity and belittle people that you once considered friends, for no other reason than at the instruction of the “Phelps,” “Jerry Falwells” and the “Pat Robertsons” of our time.

2. Every word in the Bible is true, accurate and infallible.
The divine texts are the first best source of “facts.” “The lord giveth and the lord taketh away,” is a generally accepted “quoted for truth” statement because it’s written in the Holy Scriptures. In our troubled times of need or of great loss, that comforting phrase is quoted constantly and repeatedly as indisputable fact.

But…

In the actual biblical story of Job, the Lord indeed did “giveth.” However, God got a bad "rap" in the deal, because it was the devil that “taketh” away relentlessly and repeatedly to test Job's faith. Granted, Job indeed spoke the famous and grossly over-quoted line, but he was absolutely and undeniably wrong, which conflicts with what we were taught all through our life… that the Bible word-for-word is “gospel.”

So whom do you believe — Job and the people who tell you that every word written in the Bible is fundamentally an absolute unerring fact, or your own eyes after reading the quote in context? This is a perfect example of how someone can conveniently pick and choose which words in the Bible mean what he/she wants them to mean, regardless of context. The danger is once that is done, other Christians blindly follow along en mass as witnessed by the phrase being used almost continuously through the years by them thereafter.

It all comes down to which source of information you rely on, or more importantly on the attitudes of those who taught you your “facts”.

What has someone selectively left out of the most Holy of texts?
Imagine the following experiment:
Put twenty people in a room. Of the assembled, five speak English, five speak Spanish, five speak German, and five speak French. Only three of these people can cross-translate fluently between the languages. Tell a very brief story to one and have him pass it on at random only once to one other person at a time until the tale comes back to you. You will not get the same thing you started with -- that I can guarantee. Now imagine that story - along with hundreds of others - being verbally passed on through at least three centuries before someone actually put them to print on scrolls for posterity.

Then after another thousand years, yet another group sat down representing an English king, and decided arbitrarily which chapters they agreed with, and which didn't fit into their idea of what their final Bible would say... which is exactly what happened to the telling of Jesus' missing teen years and other conflicting dogma not included in the final “edit.” Yet our very civilization is built upon that exact same set of shaky and outdated folk tales, relying on it never to fail or confuse us through numerous different yet similar interpretations, ergo: “Well Matthew said it went like this, but Mark told it better, but I believe Luke’s version, even though John’s is more believable, despite my suspicions that he co-wrote it with Paul, George and Ringo.”

3. How long after the events involved, was the Bible actually written? Are the Bible’s teachings relevant to today’s times and circumstances?
The scriptures are actually a collection of compelling, glorious and educational stories about events that were relayed piecemeal and verbally from one generation to the next for approximately three to six hundred years. They were eventually written down in their various languages on hand-printed and deteriorating scrolls. Modern theology scholars point out that the hundreds of years are moot, because God guided their hands and minds while writing them down for posterity.

Odd that God didn’t think of how quickly those scrolls would deteriorate into nearly useless scraps and have them carved on something similar to Moses stone tablets. Then again if Moses was any example, they’d get lost or destroyed almost immediately after they were produced… and a single bible would weigh tons, so it’s just as well. Nor had our sacred creator counted on one thousand three hundred years passing by, give or take a few, at which time the aforementioned King James’ Christians got their hands and blue editing pencils on them.

To this very day, it sometimes frightens me that modern-day religious scholars present and teach Intelligent Design “facts” from the Bible on a daily basis to young private school children, using a text originally written nearly two thousand years ago when it was an established and undeniable “fact” that the earth as a whole was absolutely… flat.

Relevant? I could go on and on about modern methods of herding and sacrificing sheep, handy hints on how to keep your third wife of six from turning to salt, and the all important sailing and wine tips, but they’ve been covered by more intelligent people than I.

4. Keeping those all-important dates correct.
It has repeatedly been ordained that the date of our Holy Savior’s birth and his later rising from the dead to create the Christian faith, must be respectfully celebrated with great care. Those aforementioned same parochial teachers two paragraphs back, quote chapter and verse from a text that doesn't even name its own holy savior’s birthday, even though we’re all required to celebrate it faithfully every year on a date that someone arbitrarily and for all intents and purposes guessed at, some unknown centuries after it actually happened.

We are also chronicling our calendar since his birth year using a centuries old “calculated estimation...” probably using the same fuzzy math that causes Easter (the hallowed date of Jesus' rising) to fall on a different calendar date every year.

Consider this: At the time that the honored King James Version was translated and compiled to book form, a mere four hundred years or so ago in 1611, the all-knowing and most holy church considered it a “fact” that the sun and all of the stars and planets rotated around the Earth in a sort of Tychonic system. The almighty and even more all-knowing holy father in Rome was so convinced of this, that just four years after King James released his “version,” poor Galileo (1564-1642) with all of his ingenuity and intellect was nearly condemned and entombed in 1616 for heresy by the learned and sacred Pope for merely suggesting that the Earth wasn’t God’s intended center of the universe – a "fact" backed up by a religion that only after more than three hundred and fifty years of careful consideration, has finally and just recently admitted that it was wrong about the long-dead astronomer.

5. Science vs. God and Those Pesky Unanswerable Questions
Some questions equally defy both Intelligent Design as well as scientific measurements. Like it or not, some things just have to be taken on faith. I’ve never seen the Indian Ocean; I’ve never seen the Swiss Alps; I’ve never even seen the North Pole, despite news that Santa Clause is panicking because it’s melting. I agree and acknowledge that they all are real. They’re there if only because someone I trusted told me that they exist. On the other hand things are inserted into movies and photos all the time that aren’t really there, behind actors that may or not be there either. The sun is 93 million miles from Earth, an established fact that I believe, though I didn’t take a tape measure and stretch it to the sun. Now if they told me the sun was 5,280,000,000 pop bottles laid end to end from the earth, I might be able to actually grasp the measurement… well maybe not.

Distance vs. Infinity
What is beyond the farthest distance that we can intellectually imagine? Once we’ve tentatively established this illusive point in the universe, the paradox becomes that we can still travel quadrillions of miles to the tenth power farther beyond that very point. Like it or not, wherever we pause on our journey to look around, there has to be something beyond. What was God’s purpose in creating an infinite and detectable number of distant and completely unpopulated suns, planets, and galaxies - indeed universes - that he then never gave us the ability to eventually visit or understand?

Forgive me a moment; I’m still astonished that my spell-checker actually confirmed my spelling of the term “quadrillions,” and that I actually got it right on the first try!

Now where was I? Oh yes…

Most people consider distance in only one or three directions, forward, cumulatively or upward. However any distance we can wrap our intellect around can then be halved… and then halved again… and again. How hard is it to understand something that is one billionth of the size of an atom? Theoretically speaking; what would a hypothetical intelligent being standing on that particle think of the universe that he could perceive? He would be as completely unaware of our existence/universe as we are of his. Indeed, he’d believe as fact (as we do) that such a thing couldn’t possibly exist.

But just how many cumulative facts can you willingly believe on faith alone?
Get a pen and put a dot at the top edge of a standard sheet of 8½ by 11-inch paper, and then another at the bottom edge. As long as the parchment stays intact, the distance between the two dots can never be more than eleven inches. In addition, some will argue that it can never be less than that, calling the declaration a “God’s truth,” or the proverbial and overused “quoted for truth.” In front of their questioning eyes, simply bend or fold the paper in half so that the dots are touching, placing the distance betwixt them now at zero. A cute trick, but while theoretical astrophysicists maintain that it can supposedly be done within vast millions of light years’ worth of distance using the ever-handy and popular black hole, can it realistically be done?

Speed is a combination of two infinites.
The speed of something is the distance that an object travels compared to a set amount of time. However the speed of sound varies depending on the medium that it’s traveling through. Can time vary depending on what it exists in? It is said that a massive star's gravity can bend light but can it actually (as learned professors and “Star Trek fans insist) bend time?

Infinity vs. Time vs. God
Only a fool would claim to have a clue as to what eternity/infinity really is. If you accept the truest definition of the term, you find yourself with two just-barely understandable, distinct and conflicting “facts,” depending on which source of information you rely on:

A. Time extends ten, indeed a hundred, or even a thousand or more times farther back than the currently immeasurable period in which God exist(s)ed; therefore as long as the creator has existed, he comparatively has not existed infinitely longer… right?
B. God is eternal; he will always exist; he has always existed.

Which opinion do we believe? What existed before time? What existed before God? Something would've had to have... wouldn't it?

At the beginning of this exceedingly long piece, I stated that without trust in our source of information, it’s impossible to have facts. Without facts we have chaos. It is considered a fact that man can never travel faster than the speed of light, (again unless you’re a Star Trek fan.) It was the same kind of thinking that once led people in the mid-19th century to assert confidently that a man could never travel on a train over the speed of 35 miles per hour because all of the breathable air would be sucked out of the rail car.

It is this kind of closed-minded thinking that has brought the United States to a state of chaos – financially, politically, and spiritually.

Through all of this confusion, the worst and most tragic paradox of all has risen. It has become man’s standard operating procedure in these times by way of religious teachings to point out our differences as a weakness rather than strength. This seems to condemn us for all eternity to be at odds with each other.

How does opinion become fact? Easy – when someone agrees with it. Well, actually when a lot of someones agree with it. As history has shown repeatedly, it doesn't matter if the particular opinion is actually true or not, just that it's accepted as “fact.”

A parting but small Religion/Astronomy anomaly/tidbit for you to ponder: (just to see if you’ve really been paying attention.)
When it was formed, our little yellow dwarf sun didn’t (and still doesn’t) theoretically have the immense gravitational mass needed to have produced heavy elements like uranium, gold, and lead, etc. The only workable theory is that our present star is made up of the leftover remnants of a much larger star that existed on the spot we now occupy. When this previous star went supernova a few billion years ago, it first imploded in on itself and then violently exploded. In the mega-gravity of that collapse, the immense pressure fused hydrogen atoms together by force to form our inherited heavy elements. They were then flung outward in the violent aftermath to eventually coalesce into our current sun and its planets. (I’d mention how many planets, but that number keeps changing from decade to decade.)

Makes you wonder why God didn’t just do another flood instead of blowing the whole thing up and starting all over again “Sodom and Gomorrah”-style, doesn’t it?

So… We have Opinions that become Facts. If the facts fall victim to those who refuse to believe them, they are self-righteously declared “Theories,” because no one wants to claim them as their opinions any more.

That's what is so much fun about opinions; you don't have to back them up with facts or links to dubious websites that just happen to agree with you. If you don't agree with me, I'll just shrug and say go look up your own "facts" – they'll be just as believable as mine… theoretically speaking anyway…

But of course (and you HAD to have seen this coming a light-year away) that’s only my opinion…

WARNING: Reproduction of this article is forbidden
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© 2008 by Jet in Columbus

Politics, God, Fear, Bigotry and the Money Changers at the Temple

While most people speak of Christianity in a "Faith" light, or a"family values" light, I'm beginning to suspect that most are missing something that I'm just now starting to see.

The two heads of the "religion" dragon that aren't often mentioned are "Fear" and "Money."

Fear
Those who are powerless often employ God's name. They are convinced that if they evoke God often enough and loud enough, the peasants they're trying to control or manipulate will "fear him as you fear me." The "what if" factor plays a very important part of their lives... (What if God really is speaking through them, or worse yet what if God judges me for defying him, even if the almighty is not using that human as a "speaker phone from heaven?"

I lost my fear of God as a teenager when I heard the original album "Jesus Christ Superstar"-Not the soundtrack to the movie; the real thing original record album before it became a broadway play.

Over my years I thought that nothing could ever change the love I felt for Christ

...but I was wrong.

You see Jesus left me alone down here with ordinary humans. As more and more of them preached hate in his name, instead of love, they wore down and skewed my love of God and tried to turn it into fear instead.

When I'm alone with several of these "born-agains" I like to (excuse the expression) "scare the hell out of them" by looking up at the sky, shaking my fist upward and screaming at the top of my lungs for God to strike me down for defying "his" teaching. Terror usually grips them as they back away.

Usually afterward they say they were afraid I'd lost my mind and might hurt them, but the truth is they back away for fear-their fear-that God's wrath may strike them down with me.

Apparently God's aim isn't so good in his old age according to them. To stand next to me would be to fear that they haven't made it safely to the other shoreline before God drops the Red Sea on me.

My God is one of love, of gentle teaching, and of transformation-not one of hate and most of all Fear.

Admit it-Most people fear God like a hated employer who is constantly lurking in the shadows somewhere waiting to overhear something he can punnish you for saying.

We humans fear what we don't understand...
We humans tend to kill what we fear.

I do not, nor have I ever feared the almighty GOD and I've never been afraid to print out his awsome name anywhere. I don't fear judgement from my god... I fear only man's.

Far too many ignorant people see God as some sadistic monster with a whip, waiting just beyond earth's bounds laughing with St. Peter at the pearly gates, with his book of sins to punish you.

Money...
the one thing the TV preachers worship above and before God

Then there's the money changer priests at the steps of the temple. People who see a congregation not as a group of people joined in faith-no they are a group of people joined in fear that their spiritual leader will abandon them to god's wrath unless they tithe their earnings to him.

They disgust me because they live by the saying "You get what you pay for" instead of anything they might selectively read in the Bible to justify their hate, or sins committed against others in "his" name.

I've learned the hard way that the Phelp's, the Anita Bryants and the Jerry Falwells of this world are very replaceable. One goes, and another immediately takes their place-hands extended with a collection plate instead of a bible.

I glory in God's word, not fear it.

I dare presume to pity those who fear their preachers and I'll tell you why. My faith has been truly shaken in the last few years. Sometimes I think Job would blanche at my story.

But my faith is still with me... shaken and stirred severely yes, but it's still there.


WARNING: Reproduction of this article is forbidden without the author's permission
© 2008 by Jet in Columbus

Who Among Us Has The Right To Rewrite History?

Recent events in Iran concerning attempts to assert that the Nazi Holocaust was a hoax has awakened me to what might be the tiny seedlings of an educational and cultural crisis in our country. Intentional misinformation on everything from the moon landing in 1969, world ecology/global warming, basic world history, astronomy and AIDS are all beginning to take footholds in world Culture.

While the vast majority of Americans are intelligent enough to know better, more and more disinformation is being told to (and in some cases believed) as fact to an entire generation of Americans. In the age of the Internet this irresponsible disinformation is spreading like wildfire.

Politicians and religious leaders worldwide are beginning to take liberties with, and in some cases attempting to completely rewrite common knowledge. Once-solid scientific and historical facts are now being irresponsibly branded “theories”, or worse out-and-out lies.

This is noting new, religion has opposed science for centuries.

As far back as the 1700s in American history, there are similar religious zealots who branded all science as evil and a contradiction to biblical teachings. Damage from lightning storms was a dangerous problem in colonial days. The tallest buildings in a town were the most vulnerable. Since the structures had very little metal, they’d usually explode when hit, causing fires that spread to other buildings threatening whole settlements.

What were the highest spires in those days? Church steeples. To curb the problem, Benjamin Franklin invented the lightning rod, a device that would channel the bolt of electricity harmlessly to the ground. Fanatical Christians began protesting and demanding they be removed from steeples because use of the strange devices was seen as mankind defying God’s will. In other words it was better to condemn something you don’t understand (Franklin’s electrical theory), even if it meant sacrificing your own house of worship. Some preachers even went so far as to blame Franklin for causing an earthquake with his evil invention in 1755!

Southern white children in the late 1800s never stopped referring to Negroes as “niggers” and were taught to think of them as inferior intellectually and nothing more than common farm animals and laws had to be passed in the early 1960s in order to protect the rights of black Americans to vote, work, and have good housing.

One of the most horrific examples of dangerous opinions being taught as fact is when Nazi children were taught by their parents to hate Jews. Jews are stingy, speak in strange tongues, they hoard money and never return anything to society. Hitler was merely performing God’s holy judgment upon them for the crime of crucifying Christ, and it was completely justified that they be rounded up and executed.

German children were also held to criteria of racial purity and all who didn’t meet it were judged inferior. Never mind that nearly none of the Nazi hierarchy matched their own descriptions of what the “master race should look like.

The AIDS epidemic in the U.S. in the early 1980s went almost completely unchecked because normally responsible and knowledgeable people told the public that it only struck homosexuals and the general straight population was safe. Most Americans believed people like Anita Bryant and Jerry Falwell, who taught that God had brought his judgment down on the sinning heathens.

These zealots branded anyone who contradicted their prejudices as un-Christian. Rather than speak out against these hate-mongers, scientists and medical scholars who knew better would let hundreds of thousands of people become needlessly infected because they believed they were immune. People like Falwell, Pat Robertson and their like have no conscience towards the resulting victims. The only way to get the disease is to have sex in a way that conflicts with God’s moral teachings. President Ronald Reagan also used the Religious Right's hate speech as an excuse to delay an initiative to get AIDS under control until it was far too late.

Falwell would go on to prove his intelligence when he attempted to declare and condemn several fictional children’s characters as dangerous. He proclaimed that Sponge Bob and Tinky Winky were promoting homosexuality or were gay themselves and part of a plot to influence young children’s minds towards perversion.

Currently there are people in power who would irresponsibly have you believe that history is not true as it was written. Fortunately the American public hasn’t been swayed by such outrageous claims, and most fall under the ridiculous heading of “President Kennedy wasn’t killed in 1963 and lived in a rest home for years afterward.”

The most telling examples are…

Man Has Never Landed on the Moon
On the surface of the moon at Tranquility Base is a carefully aimed reflector array about the size of a suitcase. Apollo 11 astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin left this instrument there in 1969. The 3.5-meter Apache Point telescope bounces a precisely aimed laser off of that array to periodically measure the exact distance between the Earth and the Moon. There are three such reflectors currently on the lunar face, left by Apollo missions 11, 14 and 15. It is an easily verified fact that they are there and that Earthmen put them there.

However a growing (though small) percentage of people actually believe today, that the moon landings were faked on a movie set in “Area 51”. Religious zealots preach that God never meant man to leave his Earth, if he had it would’ve been foretold in the Bible. The moon landings brought back scientific proof that many theological theories of how the Earth and universe were formed and their presumed ages were wrong. The only way to discount the heretical science facts learned from such moon trips would be to assert that the lunar journeys had been faked and by doing so therefore their resulting science would justifiably be discarded in favor of biblical teachings.

Inconsistencies are pointed to as proof, such as some photos not having stars in the background. Of course that is ignoring the fact that any group intelligent enough to falsify and fund such an event, would be smart enough to remember to paint stars in the photos, The quite literally glaring fact is late-sixties photo techniques would necessitate the film exposure be dictated by the bright unhindered sunlight reflected off the astronaut’s white spacesuits, the white landing vehicle and even the brilliant lunar surface itself. The fast shutter speed would logically prevent any comparatively dim stars from showing up on the film at all.

They claim that the American flag wouldn’t be fluttering in the breeze on the moon. It wouldn’t be fluttering in the breeze of an enclosed movie studio either. Crumple up a piece of paper and set it down on the table in front of you, then watch it move on its own. Anything folded has stored energy, even a folded flag in space. The flexible aluminum pole being adjusted caused movement. In the frictionless vacuum of space; there would be nothing to stop it from repeatedly moving back and forth once it started, like a tool lost in a space walk that is still orbiting thousands of miles an hour to this day.

How could photographic shadows be coming from different directions? Sunlight glare reflecting off the white orbiter and even their space suits comes immediately to mind.

Of the dozen men who walked on the moon several are still alive, yet none has ever confided in anyone that it was faked—a secret that should be impossible to keep. These men also brought back 841 pounds of rock from the surface with properties that are impossible to duplicate on earth.

Evolution Is Only A Theory
As reported by the Washington Post, President Bush has been quoted as saying that Intelligent Design should be taught in public schools and that evolution should be taught as only a theory.

He’s not alone.

In 1925 courtroom, a self-righteous man laughed sarcastically and asserted that you only have to look at an ape to see that man couldn’t possibly have come from one. If you were able to go back in time and present that same man with a photo of a stem cell he would laugh equally as loud and hard in your face. It would be impossible for such a thing to ever turn into a human being or any part of one. He’d righteously declare you a evil lying heretic for saying such a thing. However if that same man were to come with you forward in time to today, he’d hypocritically be calling the killing of that very same cell the murder of a human life.

History and science prove that even today man is evolving. Compare yourself to your great-great grandfather, and you’d find that you live longer; you are taller, stronger and healthier. The process of interjecting genes into your family history may even find that you’re of a different race as your own forefathers. That’s evolution. When weaknesses are bred out of a species so it can better adapt to its changing environment—that’s evolution. Even though it’s an undeniable fact, it is currently being taught in some places as just a theory in public schools across the United States resulting in several lawsuits.

Moses, John the Baptist, King James and George Washington would probably die within days if they were brought forward in time, because man has evolved in order to tolerate diseases such as measles and small pox that killed even our forbearers. As recently as seventy years ago it was possible for thousands of people to die in a flu epidemic. Our cherished forefathers wouldn’t have the ability to tolerate the amount of hydrocarbons and pollutants in our atmosphere that our bodies have built up a resistance to.

Just as any species of animal adapts to its environment through evolution, so have we. Polar bears through natural selection of mates are white to blend in defensively to their surroundings, just as black bears did. Reptiles that lose their water habitats through changing seasons adapt by being able to live out of the water as well as in.

The very same people that can readily accept radically different breeds of dogs in all shapes colors and sizes can’t accept that Man, chimpanzees and gorillas all come from the same species. It would be easier to believe that a man was swallowed by a whale and lived to tell about it, or a woman was turned into a pillar of salt.

Strict adherence to religion means that anything not spelled out in the bible or whichever text is worshiped is wrong. That means flatly ignoring the advanced age that such biblical people as Noah (602 by some accounts) were said to live to, in order to claim that mankind is exactly the same animal as God created him starting with Adam and Eve.

It is asserted that astronomers are wrong in teaching that stars can be millions of light years away, because the religious texts written thousands of years ago say that the universe is only mere thousands of years old. Religious leaders are beginning to assert the ridiculous as fact. Nothing existed before God created the universe mere thousands of years ago. It is more acceptable to say that trillions of eons passed of empty nothing, until the almighty decided one day to create the universe and everything in it about ten thousand years ago.

Creation Scientists actually refute carbon-dating techniques as fraudulent methods by anti-Christians in order to date items older than the age the Bible claims the universe is. Fossils of dinosaurs and ape-like cavemen were created by god and planted where we could find them to test our faith, but according to many preachers they never really existed.

The Nazi Holocaust Never Happened
Tens of thousands of allied soldiers witnessed with their own eyes the horrors of the Nazi death camps. After the Axis’ fall, the German people were forced to parade past piles of naked emaciated corpses stacked like cord wood waiting to be burned or buried in mass graves. Thousands more saw the heaps and piles in storerooms of the confiscated belongings, gold teeth, even hair shaved from their heads to make pillow stuffing in warehouse after warehouse.


Millions have seen and visited the remnants of the death camps. Humankind’s guilt at the horrors visited on the Jews and others is the justification for the creation of the nation of Israel. Nowadays those likeminded of the Nazis need another justification for killing off the remaining inhabitants of the Jewish faith in the Middle East.

In order to accomplish their goals however, history itself must be blatantly denied in order to justify exterminating the rest of the Jewish faith and all of its followers. It would also mean claiming that any records of the war crimes committed on them were falsified. An easy task now that the actual witnesses to the horrors have mostly died off and can’t refute claims that they were misled.

Despite there actually being more undeniable evidence of what happened to the Jews in Nazi death camps than there is of any single event written in the bible or Islamic texts, many middle eastern leaders loudly preach that it didn’t happen. By denying the justification for modern-day Israel ever being created, you destroy their right to exist in the region and indeed as a race or at all.

It would be a simple task to find some carefully selected “specialists” to claim that sixty years after the fact, no remnants of cyanide can be found in the open and weathered cremation ovens. That being the case, they couldn’t possibly be used as death chambers. They point to the torn-down gas chambers and claim that they couldn’t have been sealed enough to gas their victims without leakage of fresh air in, or poison gas out. They claim that since there were no autopsies done on the Jewish, Gypsy or Homosexual bodies, it can’t be conclusively proven that they were murdered.

In the face of the fact that the death camps did actually physically exist, it is now being claimed in the Middle East that the Jews all died of sickness and starvation; not murder. It is being broadcast today in the 21st century that in the 1940s it was possible to convincingly fake thousands of photos of hundreds of thousands of bodies and that hundreds of thousands of ordinary people were persuaded to lie in order to justify setting up a Jewish homeland on a sacred piece of the Islamic world

Zionists all deserve to be killed and their presence erased forever from Allah’s holy territory. The tragedy is that these false teachings are reaching children in the United States and increasingly being accepted as fact worldwide.

Tell a lie long enough and it becomes truth.

If Science and History are only theories that fly in the face of God’s spokesmen’s teachings, is it any wonder that the United States is falling behind in medical and scientific research? All because new discoveries in those fields are branded as acts against God’s will?

It is my opinion that if we don’t take control back, that sooner or later our country is going to be swept in reverse to the strict morals and stagnation of the Victorian Age. Women will once again be servants to their husbands. A sort of Christian Taliban would be established. Death due to disease and natural disaster will be declared an act of God’s will and not opposed or acted upon by modern methods for fear of divine retribution.

While countries such as North and South Korea, China and India are currently making great strides in medicine, stem cell research, computer and electronic technology, the U.S. is being held back by religious fundamentalists who scream their outrage and wave their bibles at anything they can’t use “God” to control. College students are heading to India and China to get hands-on experience and jobs in advanced electronics because none of it is manufactured here in America any more!

Bold attempts have even been made at rewriting the history in the United States to the point of making the Constitution and Declaration of Independence religious texts instead of political ones. Some even claim that God sent George Washington down to save our country from the wicked.

Recently more and more politicians and priests are asserting that our school children should be taught not to believe scientific and historical texts because they are only theories and not Bible-proven facts.

Dare I say God help us all if we don’t find a way to reverse this trend?

WARNING: Reproduction of this article is forbidden
without the author's permission
© 2006 by Jet in Columbus

President Gerald Ford Was One of Us

I am grieving as if one of my own family members had died. Gerald R. Ford was my personal political hero, and I believe that history will judge him better than he was ever given credit for. If a Hollywood movie were to be made of his life in the 1970s no one would have believed it.

How could this man Gerald R. Ford Jr. ever become President of the United States on purpose? Gerald Ford wasn’t even his real name! He was born in Omaha Nebraska in 1913 as Leslie Lynch King Jr. He was the son of divorced parents. Businessman Gerald R. Ford in Grand Rapids Michigan adopted him after marrying his mother. Everyone knew him, as a straight shooter and honest young man who spoke what he thought blemishes and all, looked you in the eye when he talked and always told the unvarnished truth. He married a divorced woman named Betty Warren in 1948.

Many of his friends considered him too honest of a man to run a local school board, much less become President of the United States!

So how did he do it? He was simply one of us and went out and earned it.

The “accidental president” up until fate had called him was never more than a Congressman from Michigan. Ford wasn’t a man who came from money, he fought and clawed his way through his life. He parlayed a stellar high school football performance into a full athletic scholarship at the University of Michigan. Not only was he a great player who was the center on a Big Ten varsity team, he had a brain to match his brawn, majoring in economics. A twist of fate must’ve kept him from turning down pro offers from the Green Bay Packers and the Detroit Lions.

Instead he moved toward academics at Yale where he studied law while coaching boxing and football. He graduated Yale Law School near the top of his class, but another twist of fate diverted him; the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. He gave up a promising fledgling law practice to sign up with the Navy and he served four years in World War II.

With his hitch up in the military, he returned to law but was bitten by the political bug and decided to try multi-tasking by marrying a pretty divorcé named Betty whom he adored, and at the same time defeating a local G.O.P. Representative.

For 25 years, Ford was your above average politician, depending on his quiet dependability and love of his career and country to keep him in office. In 1964 he was elected the House Minority Leader and became known for butting heads with President Lyndon B. Johnson at every opportunity. Later Johnson would be quoted joking in frustration that Ford must have played his entire football career without a helmet. Ford was present when the 25th amendment to the Constitution was ratified. Little did he know he’d be its first test case?

One of Ford’s biggest frustrations in his congressional career was that the Republicans were never in a congressional majority, which meant he couldn’t get important things done without the title of House Speaker. Fate took his hand again when Spiro Agnew resigned as Vice President and Richard Nixon wisely made a politically savvy and safe choice that he was sure that Congress couldn’t possibly oppose. At the time, Ford was seriously considering retirement from politics but jokingly told his friends that becoming vice president might be a nicer way to round out his career.

Gerald Ford became the first man ever to hold the office of Vice President without being elected to the job.

As The Watergate scandal wroght political havoc on the United States, the Cold War with the U.S.S.R. was heating up. In 1973 OPEC dropped a political bomb on the nation by creating the artificial Oil Crisis. Little did newly appointed Vice President Ford know it, but fate was about to take his hand again.

On October 8th Richard M. Nixon became the first man ever to resign the office of President of the United States. Gerald Ford stepped in with little preparation the very next day and became the first man to hold office as President without ever being elected by the people.

It seemed as if all Hell began breaking loose. The Soviet Union supported an Arab attack on Israel. The Vietnam War was a decade-old disaster with seemingly no end in sight as Nixon was too distracted with his own scandals to manage the military withdrawal from Southeast Asia. The American public was turning swiftly against its own government as repeated political revelations compounded political scandals that rocked the nation.

In the midst of all this chaos with little preparation for taking the reigns of State stood an unlikely superhero with a Midwestern accent and a giant “D” for “Dependable!” scrawled in magic marker across his chest. It seemed that the only way out of the mess and to start over was to effectively commit political suicide for the good of the country. Unhesitatingly, he pardoned Richard Nixon. It’s my personal belief that had he not taken that brave step, he could have been known as one of this nation’s greatest presidents and been reelected twice more. He made the politically stupid mistake of putting the nation before himself instead.

And that’s why he’s my hero.

In the aftermath all Hell really did break loose. The well-liked “everyman” was now a scheming political crony who must’ve made a deal with Nixon to become President in return for that pardon. While the shutdown of the Watergate trials brought the long political nightmare for the nation to and end, his own was only beginning.

For many in this nation, the pardoning of Nixon will never be forgiven. So many people can’t see past an honest and brave act to save a nation in turmoil from self destruction. Few will give him credit for what he really accomplished. If he hadn’t acted the country would’ve been mired down for decades. Ford’s approval ratings plummeted from 71% to 49%.

Every hero has a heroine that adored him and that was Betty. She turned the Presidential Mansion into a messy suburban house, taking down artwork and putting up family photos. She appalled Washington insiders by becoming an everyday housewife, often chairing private family dinners in curlers. The public noticed and thanks to her the American People began warming to the Fords again. She even did a hilarious guest appearance on the Mary Tyler Moore show, trying to convince a skeptical Mary over the phone that it really was the first lady on the other end of the line.

The president was joyfully unashamed of public shows of affection, often holding hands, laughing, hugging and kissing her in front of cameras, looking more like two highschoolers on a date instead of heads of State.

Through all his accomplishments, President Gerald Ford could very well be remembered for endearing himself as the everyman to the American people. There were assassination attempts, slapstick tumbles down stairs, and he even beaned a bystander with a golf ball while making a tee shot at a charity event. Bob Hope once famously quipped that it was easy to find President Ford on a golf course, just follow the wounded!

If only they had had a little more time in office. He’d resolved to not run for another term as President, but was later convinced that he still had things to do. His failure to be elected could be attributed mostly to his move toward the political center, thus causing the Republican right-wing ultraconservatives to abandon him in the shadow of Roe v Wade. In the end he lost the election by only 56 electoral votes. I gladly handed out bumper stickers and leaflets for his campaign on street corners.

Four years later Ronald Reagan even considered offering him the spot of Vice President on his winning 1980 Republican ticket, but the political right convinced him that Ford had too much baggage.

My heartfelt condolences go out to Betty and the whole Ford family, along with a grateful nation. One of our own died today and we’ll miss him terribly.

WARNING: Reproduction of this article is forbidden without the author's permission
© 2006 by Jet in Columbus

Dollar Coin To Feature Nixon and Others

Remember the Eisenhower Dollar coin? Now that was a dollar’s dollar. It was twice as big as a quarter and felt heavier than it really was and when you had one in your pocket; you knew it was there. One of the reasons that later dollar-coin attempts failed was that their size shrank to smaller than a 50-cent piece. This caused the Susan B. Anthony coin to be nicknamed the “Carter Quarter” because so many people were spending them as 25-cent pieces by mistake.

Despite past failures, the U.S. Mint announced at a ceremony at The Smithsonian Institution on Monday, that they would try again. They will begin circulating a new dollar coin on February 15, 2007. It will still be the same size as the 1979 Susan B. Anthony and the 2000-2002 Sacajawea. The coin will also be made of the same gold colored material as the Sacajawea with an additonal compound added to the metal to keep it from tarnishing as fast as its predecessor did.

The new dollars are set to feature the past Presidents of the United States in order from George Washington to Richard M. Nixon. Instead of a textured or ridged edge, the smooth rim will now hold such features as the mintmark, the date of striking, and the mottos “In God We Trust” and "E Pluribus Unum.” The design change is intended to allow space for larger portraits of the Presidents on the obverse side, and the Statue of Liberty on the reverse.

For the first time the coin will say “$1” instead of “One Dollar”

The criteria for the presidents is that they must have been dead two years to be featured, so the current list will end at Richard M. Nixon. Grover Cleveland will actually be featured on two different coins because he held office in two non-consecutive terms.

The coins will be distributed every three months starting next in 2007 with Washington. Despite the fact that the mint has a 3-½ year stockpile of over $200 million worth of the Sacajawea coins, political pressure will force them to continue minting the Sacagawea coins at the same time.

The current distribution schedule is for each coin to be circulated for three months, and then the next will appear in sequence as follows:

2007
George Washington
John Adams
Thomas Jefferson
James Madison

2008
James Monroe
John Quincy Adams
Andrew Jackson
Martin Van Buren

2009
William Henry Harrison
John Tyler
James K. Polk
Zachary Taylor

2010
Millard Fillmore
Franklin Pierce
James Buchanon
Abraham Lincoln

2011
Andrew Johnson
Ulysses S. Grant
Rutherford B. Hayes
James A. Garfield

2012
Chester A. Arthur
Grover Cleveland*
Benjamin Harrison
Grover Cleveland*

2013
William McKinley
Theodore Roosevelt
William H. Taft
Woodrow Wilson

2014
Warren Harding
Calvin Coolidge
Herbert Hoover
Franklin D. Roosevelt

2015
Harry S. Truman
Dwight D. Eisenhower
John F. Kennedy
Lyndon B. Johnson

2016
Richard M. Nixon

The paper U.S. Dollar bill has always been a problem for the mint. A coin is more durable and lasts longer making it more cost-effective. However since the demise of the Eisenhower Dollar coin, the public has mostly rejected all of its smaller replacements.

It is speculated that replacing the dollar bill with a coin could save the U.S. $500 million annually in printing costs, not counting the periodic security redesigns. Canada and various European countries have successfully eliminated their basic currency paper notes, but resistance is strong against such a move by the United States. An additional factor in the opposition of a dollar coin replacing the paper bill is that a stack of $100 in “singles” is relatively light, compared to a pocket weighed down by the same amount of coins.

Some have speculated that the new coins were intentionally designed to go directly into collections, instead of everyday commerce, making the U.S. dollar more scarce and thus more valuable. Other studies have shown that the only way the America Public would accept dollar coins is if the paper currency were completely taken out of circulation.

The timing would seem to indicate that the announcement was held up until after the November 2006 elections. The religious right wing of the Republican Party is sure to be outraged when they notice that “In God We Trust,” while still on the coin is no longer featured prominently.

In a side announcement, there will also be a release of 24-karat $10 pieces featuring the First Ladies at the end of 2007, and also the penny will be redesigned four times in 2009 to honor Abraham Lincoln.

WARNING: Reproduction of this article is forbidden without the author's permission
© 2006 by Jet in Columbus

Right-Wing Evangelical Bush Advisor Outed as Gay!

I had this strange dream last night about President George Bush rushing out of the front door of the White House at about two in the morning. He was wearing a wedding dress complete with veil and train. With fists balled up in frustration he screamed for all he was worth, “Is EVERYBODY gay?”

If anything will jolt you awake, that will, and after a moment’s thought I realized it was a hilarious scene from the movie In and Out. In it, Joan Cusack, still in her wedding dress, hits a small town bar to get drunk after being jilted at the alter by a gay Kevin Klein. In frustration she tries to pick up handsome and macho Tom Selleck only to be turned down because he’s gay too, at which point she runs out of the bar and screams her famous line.

President George Bush has got to be feeling like that poor woman about now, what with the gay Mark Foley page scandal and other GOPs being outed almost daily. Now Sunday's news services are full of the reports that Ted Haggard, President of the 30 million member strong, 45,000 church National Association of Evangelicals since March of 2003, has confessed to buying drugs and having a three-year homosexual affair with a male escort from Denver!

On Sunday, November 5, a statement was read to Rev. Haggard's congregation and followers confessing to the homosexual accusations leveled by Mike Jones as reported by Forbes Magazine:

"I am so sorry for the circumstances that have caused shame and embarrassment for all of you," he said, adding that he had confused the situation by giving inconsistent remarks to reporters denying the scandal.

"The fact is I am guilty of sexual immorality. And I take responsibility for the entire problem. I am a deceiver and a liar. There's a part of my life that is so repulsive and dark that I have been warring against it for all of my adult life."

Rev. Haggard was fired from his post at the NAE, and as senior pastor of his church Saturday.

Christian Evangelist Ted Haggard was the head of a 14,000-member mega-house of worship known as the New Life Church. Rev. Howard has even been interviewed by Barbara Walters for her television program. He speaks to, or counsels President Bush or one of his advisors, participating nearly every Monday in mass conference calls along with other Christian leaders. The White House maintains though that he’s only been there once or twice.

Time Magazine named Rev. Ted Haggard as one of the “Twenty-five Most Influential Evangelicals in America.” Taking advantage of his status as a prominent religious figure, Ted Haggard began nationally mobilizing followers against the gay marriage movement. Being in charge of one of the largest churches in the U.S. he wanted to further his cause after the state of Massachusetts legalized same-sex marriage in 2004. He also joined forces with Focus on the Family to bring a state constitutional ban on homosexual marriage to the Colorado ballot this year.

Haggard maintained over the weekend that he had been faithful to his wife but later confessed that he did indeed have a 3-year homosexual affair with a male prostitute.

Mike Jones, an attractive and athletic-looking 49-year-old from Denver countered by agreeing to a radio interview. In it, he insisted that over a period of three years, Haggard paid him about once a month to engage in homosexual intercourse. He also stated that the Rev. Haggard used only the name “Art” and that the last time they had sex was in August of this year. Openly gay Jones voluntarily took a polygraph during the radio interview. The results showed him telling the truth in some parts and “being deceptive” in others. The expert administering the test has requested a second test, saying it could be from stress of the radio interview and lack of sleep. However with Haggard's confession he has now been vindicated.

Haggard, the married father of five, seized on the results or that test to deny even knowing Mike Jones, or ever having an affair with another man. Haggard began painting Jones as a liar and taking advantage of the political environment to start a damaging scandal against him. Jones denied that assertion, saying he had no idea who “Art” actually was until he saw Haggard on TV railing against gay marriage.

An expert announced that he analyzed the accumulated messages that Haggard left on Jones’ voicemail, and concluded that there was a very good chance that it was indeed Reverend Ted Haggard. Hearing this, the pastor changed his story and admitted to calling Jones to buy methamphetamines, but claimed he flushed them down the toilet after realizing that what he’d done was morally wrong. When pressed on how he knew Jones’ phone number if he hadn’t had a liaison with him, Haggard admitted he’d hired Jones to give him a massage at a Denver hotel. Upon pressure of more damaging revelations, the Rev. Haggard admitted in an interview with KKTV in Colorado Springs that some of Jones’ accusations were accurate.

Jones maintains that Haggard used the drugs to heighten his experiences while making homosexual love to him. Jones also produced an envelope that Haggard had used to pay him for their clandestine meetings during their ongoing three-year affair. Mike Jones has stated that there was never an emotional link between the two men and characterized it as a “business relationship” involving sex only.

As the story has developed, Haggard has gone from denying knowing Jones sexually or personally to admitting indiscretions but not guilt in the matter. He has also gone from denying the drug charges, to admitting calling Jones (whom he’d earlier denied knowing) to purchasing them from him and now admits to the sexual trysts too.

Rev. Haggard is said to have gone into counseling for spiritual advice and guidance, following the examples of the likes of former President Bill Clinton, and the Reverends Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggart.

WARNING: Reproduction of this article is forbidden without the author's permission
© 2006 by Jet in Columbus

A Look Back At Bush's "Rubber Stamp" Congress

Back in 2006, the working title of this article used to be “Election 2006: Could Diebold Save the GOP?” but as more and more evidence mounts in the aftermath, that’s actually become a rhetorical question. The new question was would they, as increasing substantiation and public opinion seemed to be favoring the forgone conclusion that they surely could.

2006 CNN polls showed that as many as seventy-one percent of Americans disapproved of the job the GOP-led Congress was doing. The overall feeling toward Congress appeared to be one of frustration with both houses being fixated with passing legislation imposing strict Taliban-style religious morals instead of addressing our country’s more pressing problems.

This was the political party that had repeatedly swept into office on campaign promises of shrinking the government and limiting its powers over us. Instead we found our representatives concentrating on subpoenaing comatose Terri Schiavo, repeated failed and fevered legislation against gay marriage, quietly giving President Bush a blanket pardon for war crimes he hadn’t committed yet(?), freedom fries, and an obsession bordering on fetish with flag burning.

More pressing issues such as illegal immigration, Social Security, affordable health care, and a vanishing middle class had all taken a back seat, or worse been only given lip service... and a 700-mile fence to protect thousands of miles of border with Mexico.

On campaign promises of balanced budgets, there were millions of dollars constantly added to legislation that had nothing to do with the projects they were intended for (pork), Alaskan bridges to nowhere and $20 million of an out of control federal budget had already been set aside by this Congress for the War in Iraq victory celebrations?

The voting public became more and more outraged with revelations of the NSA spying on people without warrants, and our phone and financial records being examined without regulation. That Congress had even succeeded in rewriting the War Powers Act and found a way to legislate around the Geneva Conventions.

States were so frustrated with this congress that they resorted to raising the minimum wage on their own, because the U.S. Congress wouldn't do it. Our national debt in the year 2000 was $20 Trillion. According to the Government Accountability Office and taking into account unfounded liabilities such as Medicare and Social Security, at the end of last fiscal year our national debt was at $43 trillion and climbing in 2006.

Even more telling were 2006 polls showing that more and more Americans across the country seemed less and less confident that their votes would be tabulated accurately by electronic voting machines. A CNN poll conducted by Opinion Research Corporation showed that two thirds of voters believed that computer hackers or people working for candidates would deliberately manipulate the election results. Despite whether human tampering would happen or not, there was a glaring and still unanswered question mark back then...

Despite the fact that they had the capability and motherboard port for them, why did the overwhelming evidence seem to be that the voting machines were intentionally purchased without printers?

Those on the defense maintained that it was intentional to keep the cost down on each machine by avoiding the expense of paper and maintenance of a printer. Those against the idea maintained that it was to prevent evidence of tampering.

Anyone with even passing experience with a home or business computer knew how easy a glitch in a software package could occur causing loss of valuable data. For that reason more and more people were beginning to wonder why so many states didn’t seemed to be concerned about the blatant impossibility of an independent audit should the system fail or worse, if it were intentionally tampered with.

Diebold voting machines use basically the same motherboards as their ATMs, so it would be a simple matter to attach a printer. Then each voter would be given an anonymous and unique ID number. As each ballot was cast, the printer would add it to a roll, and the voter could then check his number against the printed record on his way out the door. In the case of a recount it’d be right there for all to see.

More and more people were raising the question: Would you do business with a bank whose ATMs didn’t give paper receipts? I used to have a sign behind my desk that read “If it makes sense, it’s against company policy!” That seemed to also be the government’s policy back then.

E-voting machines caused frustrating delays, breakdowns, and controversy in Colorado, New Mexico, Ohio, California, and Florida, among others. Republican Governor Robert Ehrlich of Maryland had even gone so far as to suggest scrapping his state’s machines after his state’s September 2005 primary debacle and went low-tech instead until the bugs could be worked out of their systems.

Just for the sake of argument I’ll skip the studies that were done by such prestigious places as Princeton University, Carnegie Mellon University, The U.S. Federal Election Assistance Commission, Johns Hopkins University’s Prof. Avi Rubin, and UC Berkeley.

Just for the sake of argument I’ll even skip state alerts concerning the ease of hacking these machines from Maryland, Iowa, and California.

Maryland voters of both parties saw the problems first-hand. They increasingly became outraged at spending $100 million on machines that crashed and had to be rebooted, and seemed designed to prevent independent audits. The manufacturers, instead of admitting there were problems, began blaming human errors such as forgetting to distribute materials necessary to run the machines and insufficient memory cards to count the votes.

With Diebold refusing to allow independent studies of their systems “for security reasons”, it was anyone’s guess what undiscovered problems still inhabited the machines. Compound that with only 27 out of 50 states having any kind of paper trail attached to their election results, and you see the problem.

What caused all this suspicion?

In 2004’s presidential election, Ohio’s poll results showed a close race, but one that exit polls showed Senator John Kerry was expected to win. In 2003 the head of Diebold blatantly declared at his Republican $1,000-a-plate fundraiser that it was his intent to ensure President George W. Bush Ohio’s electoral votes. CEO Walden O’Dell asked everyone at the dinner he was hosting to raise up to $10,000 each towards Ohio’s Republican Party. This chain of events should've also eventually benefited the Ohio Secretary of State’s (you know — the guy who was in charge of the Ohio election results) May 2006 Gubernatorial primary campaign. Fortunately for Ohio he was overwhelmingly defeated.

At the time Ohio’s Secretary of State Ken Blackwell owned shares of Diebold stock, a fact that he didn’t disclose until the last moment of financial disclosure two years later in April of 2006. In his position of power Mr. Blackwell recommended that Diebold not only be awarded the contract to tabulate the closely contested 2004 Ohio elections results, but certified Diebold as a vendor to provide Ohio with e-voting machines. A former Diebold Contractor named Pasquale Gallina donated $50,000 to Blackwell’s campaign.

Oh, did I mention that Ohio Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell coincidentally was George Bush’s 2004 Presidential campaign co-chairman?

Mr. Blackwell’s stock was a side issue, because he didn’t have enough to really influence Diebold. What was the issue was that Mr. Blackwell had the power as Ohio Secretary of State to put millions of dollars directly into Diebold’s pockets. Mr. Blackwell did his part by providing only one or two voting machines in areas most likely to fall to John Kerry, causing long frustrating and discouraging lines, while providing as many as six or more machines in lightly populated rural areas where Bush had strong support and Church bus loads of voters.

Was it any wonder that true or not, people were skeptical about their votes being counted? Factor in how much the voting districts were gerrymandered by the Republican party in the previous twelve years, and it’s a wonder that the GOP were worried-though in Blackwell's case it was justified.

My home state of Ohio became a litmus test of whether tampering had been done. In the state that put Bush back into office in 2004, things weren't going so great for the Republicans. The GOP was trailing by double-digit numbers in some races across the state from governor to dog catcher.

“Sure bet” candidates were floundering to the point of the National Republican Party pulling money out of Ohio to help other candidates because they seemed to be a lost cause. Tabulations in the state in poll after poll were showing voters believing Ohio was on the wrong path by overwhelming percentages. They also showed Ohioans turning against the war in Iraq specifically and the direction the country was taking in general. As local factory after factory closed statewide and moved to foreign soil, and major businesses such as K-mart were up and vanishing, good paying jobs were being replaced by low paying employment.

Ohioans were raiding their bank accounts to pay the bills and watching their pension benefits being slashed by big business. With both federal and state legislatures refusing to raise the minimum wage, any rise in the median income was eaten up by health care insurance premiums spiraling upward. Also it hadn’t escaped notice that the price of gas at the pump had nearly doubled in six years. Ohio’s Republican Governor Taft pleaded guilty to corruption charges, Ohio’s Bob Ney, who was convicted and disgraced, refused to leave office. Ohio’s workman’s compensation program had been wracked by the “Coingate” scandal.

Republican Ken Blackwell’s once-strong campaign was faltering in the final hours along with Debra Pryce’s wavering support in favor of Mary Jo Kilroy after being linked to the Foley scandal. It used to be a no-brainer that Senator Mike De-Wine would be reelected, but he was trailing far behind Sherod Brown so badly, he’d been forced to literally campaign against his own party, who seemed to had given up on him. The negative campaign ads on both sides were finally getting so bad that no one was paying attention any more, and turned-off voters were basing their decisions on what they thought of George Bush, his war in Iraq and the non-performance of Congress in general.

An NBC-Wall Street Journal poll put national approval of Congress at the lowest it’d been since 1994, and we all know what happened then. Of those polled 52 percent said they would vote Democrat versus only 37 percent voting Republican. Given the wide margin that most Democrats then held on their lead going in to the November elections, if Republican candidates won in a matter of weeks, alarm bells would be going off nationwide.

Ironically, it was the Republicans crying foul after the elections... but no one seemed to feel sorry for them.

WARNING: Reproduction of this article is forbidden without the author's permission
© 2006-8 by Jet in Columbus

The GOP Voter Vault Knows More About You Than Santa Clause

They know when you are sleeping, they know when you’re awake, they know if you’ve been bad or good… well, you get the idea.

Since 2000, workers for the Republican Party’s “Voter Vault” have continuously compiled and updated data on 165 million Americans. Inspired by years of watching national labor unions gather information for the Democratic Party, the GOP followed suit and went electronic, taking advantage of bigger budgets and more committed people.

The GOP Voter Vault uses a point system that can tabulate if you’re a likely Republican or Democratic voter using certain demographic canvassing criteria. It's especially useful in determining if you might be easily persuaded either way politically, based on a sophisticated scoring structure.

Their database - mostly compiled overseas in India - comes from various sources of public information that can be legally bought in bulk on the web or are the results of tens of thousands of dedicated field workers gathering data. Statistics are culled from credit reports and ratings, magazine subscriptions and records traded between monthly and weekly publications, and even vehicle registrations. There are consumer polls that you’ve answered or mailed in for a coupon to get something free and they can even gain access to your buying preferences that those pesky discount cards record at the grocery store.

They have a list of every local evangelical church with a bus willing to pick up loads of little old ladies and men at nursing homes and retirement communities who otherwise wouldn’t go to the polls. These voters are tempted in exchange for stopping at the grocery and drug store on the way back. They also have lists of those same seniors that can’t get out, so they can send them absentee ballots to fill out using conveniently provided GOP voter guides and later will call to remind them to mail them back in.

They legally use public records as a base, such as voter registration logs. They know if you vote in all elections or just the presidential cycles. They also can tell from the “Voter Vault” the last time you registered to vote, for what party, and if you’re still eligible. If not they’ll give you a friendly reminder call to make sure you sign up.

Census figures give them the racial and financial makeup of your particular neighborhood down to the street, how much your house is worth, how many TVs you own, even to how many bathrooms you have. It's information that’s valuable to them to determine your character and how you’re likely to vote, based on data you’ve given freely to the U.S. government every ten-year census cycle.

That opinion canvasser that you talked to casually outside of the hardware store last week has probably sent your answers to them by now. Organizations as varied as the National Rifle Association Political Victory fund and the Pastor’s Network regularly canvas public opinion over the phone and in person then eagerly send it on to the Vault.

Public lien records tell them how much you still owe on your house, documents in your local town hall tell if you have a hunting or fishing license, sales-oriented records show what beer you like, or if you prefer Coke over Pepsi. They know your age, your sex, and sex preference, married or single, they know what sites you like to go to on the Internet. They know if you rent or if you own, if your kid is on a little league team, if your wife belongs to a bridge club, and when the last time was that you contributed to a charity or a political campaign.

If they’re really interested in you either negatively or positively (especially if you’re a candidate) they go into your criminal background as well.

Get the idea?

1984's proverbial “Big Brother” is blind in one eye and deaf in both ears compared to the GOP’s Voter Vault.

A savvy Republican staff worker with the right keystrokes in San Jose, California can go online and tell what time you’d prefer the local church bus in Toledo Ohio to pick you up and can give that driver directions to your house and then on to your local polling station. They can coordinate canvassers as to the most likely time you’ll be home to answer the phone or the door, too.

In a neighborhood of thousands of houses in central Alabama, a GOP staff member can generate a list sitting at a desk in Washington D.C. directing workers to each specific home on every block that they think will do the most good for their national or local candidates. They’ll also tell partisan foot soldiers which doors not to knock on, saving time and effort. With little or no exertion they can generate, distribute, and e-mail lists of talking points specific to each targeted household indicating what issues are important to each person that answers the door.

Let’s say, for example, that you’re a Democrat who likes to go hunting with your buddies; you’re a Star Trek fan; you have five kids and a new mortgage on your brand new home. You have just purchased a big SUV to haul the family around in, too. You favor controls on abortion but not an outright ban. You can expect a precinct worker to arrive at your door in a bright orange cap and tell you that his opponent is for gun control; he’ll nonchalantly complain about real estate taxes and warn how taxes on gasoline will skyrocket if you vote for a “tax and spend” Democrat. In casual conversation he’ll tell you that “they” are working to get rid of the tax deduction on that SUV, that they’re planning a partial-birth abortion clinic down the street and that his candidate alone will keep registered sex offenders out of your neighborhood and away from your kids.

Oh, and he’ll have two of his own kids in tow and an “I grok Spock” sticker displayed somewhere prominently on his car. He’ll send all of the kids, yours and his, into another room and quietly talk about how his opponent “allegedly” supports the “liberal homosexual agenda” and he absolutely will not talk about the Iraq war. He’ll remind you that the local terrorists vaguely have cells a few miles away and the only thing keeping them from attacking your family on your home turf is his Republican candidate.

If you even loosely agree with him within a day you’ll get mailings and e-mails custom designed to address only the issues you find important based on the notes he writes down the moment he leaves your door. Of course you will be too polite to say no to an offer of a few bumper stickers and a well-placed yard sign.

They’ll find out where you shop and include appropriate coupons for your wife with their mailings.

If you and your spouse work late, expect a call early in the morning to remind you to vote, even offering you that ride if you’re too tired to drive.

The polls may be mostly with the Democrats this election, but the Republican Vault may give them an edge that their opponents hadn’t planned on.

WARNING: Reproduction of this article is forbidden without the author's permission
© 2006 by Jet in Columbus

Taliban Reaps Billions From Afghan Poppy Fields Right Under Bush's Nose

In 2000 the Taliban had practically eliminated the Afghani poppy plantations that fed the world opium and heroin markets in days gone by. When the U.S. military invaded Afghanistan in late 2001, President George W. Bush missed his golden opportunity to advance his so-called “war on drugs” by ignoring what fields were left.

With millions of dollars in U.S. financial aid falling through slippery and corrupt fingers, and no one keeping account of it, the Afghan people fell further into poverty. With the “coalition” military focusing its efforts in the south, poor northern farmers in Badakshan began abandoning their wheat and vegetable crops. Many were unable to find promised jobs and out of desperation began growing poppies again in order to feed their families. So much was grown that summer in fact, that the heaps of emptied stalks were used for everything from firewood to roofing material.

While the Bush Administration lost interest and turned its attention and troops to Iraq, the Taliban, local warlords and the growing insurgent movement adapted. Instead of discouraging and suppressing the opium trade, the Taliban took control of it as a major potential source of its finances. As Bin Laden’s allies grew more successful, they began expanding in order to dominate the farms in the southern provinces too.

In early 2001 the opium trade was mere pocket change in the Afghanistan economy. If the U.S. led forces had wiped it out when they had their opportunity, little or no notice would’ve been paid to it. Very little effort by the American military presence would’ve been needed to maintain control over and to burn the poppy fields as they sprang up. The drug trade would’ve suffered a massive blow had President George Bush “stayed his course” and ordered poppy fields monitored across the country.

At the time of the U.S. led takeover it would’ve required only simple planning to locate what few poppy fields there were with surveillance flyovers and strafe the fields with incendiary devices or defoliation chemicals. As more time was wasted and opportunities bungled, more fields were planted to the point now where most world leaders agree that it’s out of control and hopeless to irradiate.

With the blessing of Al Qaeda and the Taliban, nearly 325,000 acres of farmland were converted to poppy cultivation by 2004. The harvest was estimated at 4,200 metric tons providing Al Qaeda and its allies with almost $3 billion dollars in only one year for their war chests. Money that, had Bush been paying attention, wouldn’t be currently used to fund terrorist attacks, the increasing insurgent movements and brazen assassinations of local government officials who didn’t cooperate.

For the years 2002, 2003 and 2004 rather than contribute military assistance to wipe out the ever enlarging cash crop in those poppy fields, the Bush administration and Republican-led congress instead contributed a mere $100 million dollars total over those three years. By 2005, the poppy crops had expanded to a volume too numerous and geographically vast to control. Throwing good money after already wasted and misspent financial help, the Republican administration elected to increase its assistance to a token 780 million in 2005. While that sounds like a lot, it isn’t compared to $4.5 billion since 2000 spent preventing cocaine from coming from Columbia.

The average local Afghan drug enforcement officer makes only $90 a month. The Taliban rakes in $900 a kilo in heroin. Al Qaeda with its allies, warlords and militias has been reinvesting their profits. Loans for seeds, fertilizer, tractors and equipment have made the largely destitute farmers financially dependent to the terrorist organization. Since the bulk of the farmer’s cash had to go back to paying for what was provided by Al Qaeda financial backers, almost all of those profits have gone straight back into Bin Laden’s pockets for terrorist acts against the U.S. and its unwary allies. Their investments have also expanded to equipping hundreds of labs across the country for cooking the opium into heroin.

By 2005, because of the shortsightedness of the Bush administration and its military allies, Afghanistan once again had become the leading opium producer, providing an estimated 87 percent of the available product worldwide. Bin Laden and his allies raked in $2.7 billion last year alone on heroin exports by harvesting a short-standing record of 4,600 tons of opium poppies. The entire of Afghanistan’s total gross domestic output was $5.2 billion, which means income from the Taliban’s fields accounted for 52 percent of it.

Bin Laden’s investments have now included corruption and/or ownership of local and provincial governments, police departments, drug enforcement officials, farmers, hundreds of heroin labs. He now controls his own worldwide distribution system via overland routes through Southern Russia, ocean routes through container shipments, and even brazenly through FedEx, Express Mail and Air Cargo shipments.

Today, so much Afghani/Taliban opium and heroin has flooded the world that the average price of a gram of heroin in Western Europe has tumbled from $251 a gram to just under $75! The result being that Columbian drug lords are becoming more aggressive in the U.S. as their prices are being grossly undercut because of an Asian flooding of their market share. Adding to South American frustration is the fact that the 2006 Afghan crop has yielded yet another new record of 6,100 tons of high-grade opium, which could produce 610 tons of heroin.

Afghanistan’s Helmand Province has been in the news lately because of all of the coalition deaths from increasingly dangerous insurgent attacks. This is explained by the fact that this year alone the Taliban-ruled region increased it’s poppy crop by 162 percent and because that one area alone accounted for 42 percent of the entire Afghan crop. The Taliban nearly owns five provinces lock, stock and barrel, particularly Helmand, Kandahar and Oruzgan in the south.

After five years of negligence their opium/heroin trade accounts for roughly more than half of Afghanistan’s economy. Had Bush not diverted world attention to Iraq and we’d stayed in Afghanistan full time, the opium/heroin trade would still be in disarray to this day.

Most Arabic countries understood grudgingly why the U.S. had invaded Afghanistan in revenge for 9/11. It was only after Bush’s foolhardy push into Iraq for apparently no reason that they could think of, that the Arab tide turned against us and Bin Laden found new and deadly allies..

The poppies have already been harvested for this year and are well into opium/heroin production; another bungled opportunity for the Bush administration. With potential billions about to go into the hands of the Taliban in the near future will the president finally see the light next year and take action?

This writer is not optimistic.
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WARNING: Reproduction of this article is forbidden without the author's permission
© 2006 by Jet in Columbus

GOP Congress Sneeks Bush Retroactive Presidential Immunity From War Crimes!

A June ruling by the Supreme Court defied President Bush in the Hamden case, and ruled that the treatment of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay Cuba violated the Geneva Conventions, U.S. and International standards. President Bush, confident that the Republican Party would easily keep both houses of Congress after the November elections, was unconcerned about either house bringing up charges or investigating.

In an act that can only be described as arrogance, Bush moved to personally redefine the Geneva Conventions to suit his purposes by having both houses of the (then) Republican controlled Congress in effect change the rules for him.

The legislation should’ve sailed through Congress easily, but was delayed when several from the president's own party objected to his trying to re-write the Geneva Conventions, endangering U.S. soldiers as other countries might well follow Bush’s lead and rewrite their own rules too. With urgency, the President agreed to allow the Geneva Convention to stand as is, quickly settling to simply redefine the severity of the rules for questioning detainees.

However, now that the balance of power in both houses of Congress is uncertain, President Bush must now worry about The War Crimes Act, which states that it is a felony to violate the Geneva Conventions. What that means is that the Bush Administration could potentially be in real trouble unless that legislation is passed before the November elections, should a hostile committee initiate a Congressional investigation into his actions.

While watching Wolf Blitzer’s The Situation Room on CNN on Wednesday, off-hand comments during a conversation with Jack Cafferty took me by surprise:

Buried deep inside this legislation is a provision that will pardon President Bush and all the members of his administration of any possible crimes connected with the torture and mistreatment of detainees dated all the way back to September 11, 2001.

At least President Nixon had Gerald Ford to do his dirty work. President Bush is trying to pardon himself.

...Under the War Crimes Act, violations of the Geneva Conventions are felonies. In some cases, punishable by death. When the Supreme Court ruled the Geneva Conventions applied to al Qaeda and Taliban detainees,President Bush and his boys were suddenly in big trouble. They had been working these prisoners over pretty good.

In an effort to avoid possible prosecution, they're trying to cram this bill through Congress before the end of the week when Congress adjourns. The reason there's such a rush to do this, if the Democrats get control of the House (which they did) in November 2006, well, this kind of legislation probably wouldn't pass.

...The question is this: Should Congress pass a bill giving retroactive immunity to President Bush for possible war crimes?

For me, this raises several red flags immediately and raises the questions:
1....... Why does President Bush so urgently need pardon/blanket immunity for crimes dating back to September 11th 2001 that no one has proven that he’s committed yet?
2....... Why wasn’t/hasn't the presidential pardon section mentioned out in the open and above board?

While it’s understandable that protections would be put in place to provide immunity to CIA interrogators that are only following orders from the President, it is not reasonable to pardon the issuer of those dubious orders as well. So determined and so urgent is President Bush’s need, apparently, that Republican Congress members have begun vigorously attacking anyone who opposes the legislature as un-American and soft on terrorism.

As written, the bill also changes the definition of an enemy combatant to mean just about anything President Bush wants it to mean. This includes such vague terms as someone knowingly supporting terrorist groups with arms, money and other activities, but does not spell out how those definitions are determined or who is to make the distinctions. The legislation retains the illegality of such methods as induced hypothermia, biological experiments, and sleep deprivation, however Bush would still be free to create other methods of questioning as he sees fit whether they conflict with the Geneva Conventions or not.

SEC. 7. REVISIONS TO DETAINEE TREATMENT ACT OF 2005 RELATING TO PROTECTION OF CERTAIN UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT PERSONNEL.

(a) Counsel and Investigations- Section 1004(b) of the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 (42 U.S.C. 2000dd-1(b)) is amended--

(1) by striking `may provide' and inserting `shall provide';

(2) by inserting `or investigation' after `criminal prosecution'; and

(3) by inserting `whether before United States courts or agencies, foreign courts or agencies, or international courts or agencies,' after `described in that subsection'.

(b) Protection of Personnel- Section 1004 of the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 (42 U.S.C. 2000dd-1) shall apply with respect to any criminal prosecution that--

(1) relates to the detention and interrogation of aliens described in such section;

(2) is grounded in section 2441(c)(3) of title 18, United States Code; and

(3) relates to actions occurring between September 11, 2001, and December 30, 2005.

SEC. 8. RETROACTIVE APPLICABILITY.

This Act shall take effect on the date of the enactment of this Act and shall apply retroactively, including--

(1) to any aspect of the detention, treatment, or trial of any person detained at any time since September 11, 2001; and

(2) to any claim or cause of action pending on or after the date of the enactment of this Act.

SEC. 5. JUDICIAL REVIEW.

Section 2241 of title 28, United States Code, is amended by striking both the subsection (e) added by section 1005(e)(1) of Public Law 109-148 (119 Stat. 2742) and the subsection (e) added by section 1405(e)(1) of Public Law 109-163 (119 Stat. 3477) and inserting the following new subsection (e):

`(e)(1) Except as provided for in this subsection, and notwithstanding any other law, no court, justice, or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider any claim or cause of action, including an application for a writ of habeas corpus, pending on or filed after the date of the enactment of the Military Commissions Act of 2006, against the United States or its agents, brought by or on behalf of any alien detained by the United States as an unlawful enemy combatant, relating to any aspect of the alien's detention, transfer, treatment, or conditions of confinement.

It is my opinion that President Bush and the Republican led Congress should be made to answer for this obvious misleading of the American voting public as to the actual motives of this legislation. An explanation of their urgency to get it passed before Congress recesses for the November elections might help too.

WARNING: Reproduction of this article is forbidden without the author's permission
© 2006 by Jet in Columbus

Put Yourself in the Pizza Guy’s Place!

EDITORIAL

Picture this: You take your wife and four kids to a nice restaurant. At the end of your meal, she presents you with a tab of oh say $60. She’s been nice, joked around with the kids, and given you good service. For serving 6, she deserves a tip of say conservatively 9 to 15 bucks… or more... right?

The next night, the wife doesn’t feel like cooking, there’s a game on TV, and the kids are chanting Pizza! Pizza! Pizza!

Do you realize that people will tip a waitress 10-20 bucks to bring your food 20-30 feet from a kitchen to your table, but only give a pizza driver a dollar for the same thing after he’s driven a few miles, through rain or snow, cussed at traffic jams, and has been dealing with surly customers all day, complaining about how long it took!

Having been one, for a few major chains on and off part and full time to make ends meet, I’ve seen the pizza business as a customer, and a driver for a few major chains.

There are a few things I’d like to point out.

1) That delivery charge.
Even if he did get all of it, (which he doesn’t) is $1.75 really a fair tip?

Let’s look at the facts.
Usually the driver only gets a dollar of it-if that, depending on the chain he works for. This covers:

A. Gas at nearly, or above FOUR bucks a gallon.
B. Insurance rates through the roof; the moment his provider finds out he’s delivering pizza.
C. Wear, tear, tires, oil changes and maintenance on a car he’s putting on average about 100-125 miles a day on (that’s on average about 500 to 750 a week)

2) He’s paid a lot less than you think he is.
Most places pay pizza drivers at, and sometimes below, minimum wage! Why? They consider them the same as waitresses, and can get away with it. Pizza drivers are expected to make up for the difference, with their tips, on which they have to report at checkout at the end of the day, and pay taxes on.

Drivers do have ways of getting revenge that have nothing to do with tampering with your food...
Think about it. You’ve just loaded 3 deliveries into your car, and have approximately 20 minutes to get all three of them there. This entails juggling around three or more 2-liters of pop, a couple salads, 2 or 3 subs, and three heavy fully-loaded pizza bags that immediately steam up your windows.

In order of the times they were phoned in:

Customer A - is 2 miles away, and because they live so close, they usually get their food within about 10 minutes, always complain, never leaves the porch light on, and never tips-using the delivery charge as an excuse not to. They usually claim they have a multi-dollar off coupon on the phone, but can’t ever seem to find it at the door. "Well, sorry you can't deduct it, we were going to use it as your tip!"

Customer B - is 9 miles away, has 5 kids and a dog that always greets you at the door cheering you like a superhero, and though they’re on a tight budget, they always tip about $3

Customer C is 11 miles away, lives alone in a eldercare facility, and you suspect he orders because he’s an older fellow who never gets any visitors, and usually tips $5 and the coin change for your driving all that way out there to make brief, but smiling conversation about the weather or the local sports team.

Tell me, what order would you take them in; despite what order they were phoned in. Personally I’d go B-C-A. Others would go C-B-A, but I’ll tell you something, none of them would take customer A first. Now in my years of experience at this, I’ve tried taking A first, and made a big deal about how fast it got there, and joked and smiled a lot, but if they’ve gotten away with not tipping for a while, they’ll never change.

After some recent business reversals, I took to delivering full time.

I’ve been disabled since November 2004, because I only had $51 on me during an armed robbery, and three guys didn’t believe that’s all I had, so they tried to beat me to death with the butt of a .45 automatic, (9 staples in my scalp), broke 2 ribs, and by stomping it while I was on the ground, to keep me from moving, broke my foot (an implant was needed to replace an unrepairable bone) crushed my ankle (couldn’t be repaired and is now fused into one inflexible piece) and fractured my left leg above and below my knee, and will require an artificial knee eventually. Total: nine surgeries and one to go, surviving on workman’s comp, and I’ve been declared permanently disabled by Social Security.

Pizza drivers face this danger every day, and in locations you’d think would be the safest place in the world, (in my case 200 yards from the front door of the shop)

And despite all this, you’re going to give that driver only a dollar or less?

Now don’t get me wrong, if the driver has a bad attitude, or gives you lousy service, yes by all means don’t tip. But at the bare minimum he deserves 15 percent.

But that’s only my opinion

WARNING: Reproduction of this article is forbidden
without the author's permission
© 2006 by Jet Gardner

High gas prices-is Bush to blame? or..."Houston, we have a problem!"

George W. Bush was elected twice with the key help of the major oil companies' contributions to his campaign. In other words he owed them big time. Early on in the planning concerning the war on Iraq, the original concept was simply to topple Saddam and put someone else in charge who would be friendlier towards the U.S. in the region. That would mean someone strong enough to keep the opposing factions in line, but more importantly someone who'd allow a few little (hardly even noticed, or worth mentioning) U.S. strategic military bases on Iraqi soil.

These bases would be close enough to major targets in the area without endangering Israel becoming an object of retaliation, because the attacks were launched from Iraq. The U.S. would become a major influence in the Middle East, we'd become a major factor in the control of Iraq's huge oil reserves and of setting their oil prices, and maybe finally forcing a peace that GW could take credit for. A good enough plan, even an admirable plan from the Bush White House.

But remember a big favor hangs over Bush's head for financing him into the Oval Office!

Many outraged editorials were written after the beginning of the U.S. led invasion of Iraq about Bush just wanting the oil reserves for his buddies in Texas, but we've all been misled. The major powers that be in Houston not only didn't want possession of the oil reserves in Iraq, they didn't want anyone else to have them either.

Yes you read that right!

The Bush plan was to invade Iraq and release its huge oil reserves to the world market, plummeting oil prices, and then breaking the back and sabotaging the stranglehold that OPEC has on the world market. Bush would be a hero after gasoline prices dipped back to or even below a dollar a gallon, the economy would explode when Americans suddenly had more buying power, and GW would probably have a giant "Saddamesque" statue erected of himself in national mall that would rival the Washington Monument.

Why was the plan sidelined in 2003?

Bush needed, wanted, craved, coveted reelection in 2004, and, without big oil's financial backing, that was simply not going to happen. Can you imagine the outrage in Houston when they caught wind of the White Houses' plan? They weren't about to let "good ole' boy" Bush interfere with their own plans to completely suppress Iraq's oil reserves, because if they were released, those record-breaking, obscene, and unimaginable oil company profits that everyone's so outraged about lately (except rich Republican stock holders that is) would evaporate in mid air; that's why!

Forget the Space Center-High oil prices are what Houston's all about!

Can you imagine an oil company executive sitting on the stand in a courtroom, sworn under oath, and trying to convince a judge or jury that he thought that low oil prices were good for America? Our beloved George W. Bush had a perfect opportunity to make himself a hero in the eyes of all Americans (even me) by getting oil flowing and into production fast) bringing down the price of oil, but he didn't, obviously because his "owners" had other ideas.

Now there's the argument (read convenient excuse) that gas prices are so high, because we don't have the refinery capacity to convert the abundance of crude that's available.

I agree, they're right, we don't.

But it's not because...

A-The "leftist tree-hugging environmentalists" are screaming their heads off about local land and water pollution that would result from a major refinery being built anywhere.

B-Because we can't drill in the eastern Gulf of Mexico or set up additional refineries there because the Governor of Florida (some guy named Bush) doesn't want to risk messing up the gulf coast's beaches for tourists.

C-We can't drill in the Alaska pristine wilderness even if the real reason they want to is because it'd all be sold to China and India anyway and NOT the U.S.

D-It's not even the fault of rich Republican billionaires sitting in their mansions yelling "Not in my back yard you don't! You'll lower my property values!"

It is because it's in the oil companies' best interest to their huge bottom lines and rich stockholders not to increase refinery capacity. Every time an existing refinery goes down, it becomes another excuse to raise already obscene gas prices and, by coincidence, their profits.

Now the argument has also been put forward that gas pump prices are much higher in other countries, and that the United States is unfairly paying less, thus we should pay more In actual fact, worldwide, we pay about the same as everyone else before taxes per gallon

For instance the tax on a gallon of gas in the United Kingdom is currently $3.40, bringing it to $5.89 a gallon! In the U.S. in cents we pay total per gallon at the pump by state...

Alabama 39.4 - Alaska 26.4 - Arizona 37.4 - Arkansas 40.1 - California 50.4 - Colorado 40.4 - Connecticut 48.1 - Delaware 41.4 - Dist. of Columbia 38.4 - Florida 48 - Hawaii 53.5 - Idaho 43.4 - Illinois 48.4 - Indiana 36.5 - Iowa 39.5 - Kansas 42.4 - Kentucky 39.8 - Louisiana 38.4 - Maine 41.9 - Maryland 41.9 - Massachusetts 39.9 - Michigan 44.6 - Minnesota 38.4 - Mississippi 37.2 - Missouri 35.4 - Montana 46.2 - Nebraska .48 - Nevada 51.7 -
New Hampshire 39.0 - New Jersey 32.9 - New Mexico 36.4 - New York 48.7 - North Carolina 40.8 - North Dakota 39.4 - Ohio 40.4 - Oklahoma 35.4 - Oregon 42.4 - Pennsylvania 45.1 - Rhode Island 49.4 - South Carolina 35.2 - South Dakota 42.4 - Tennessee 39.8 - Texas 38.4 - Utah 42.9 - Vermont 38.4 - Virginia 37.3 - Washington 41.4 - West Virginia 43.8 - Wisconsin 49.5 - Wyoming 32.4 - U.S. Average 42.

As you can see, it's not our fault that in other countries, they pay waaaaaay more than us!

The oil companies have one idol that they worship above all others-the botom line. They figure we'll get used to paying $4 a gallon, and they'll look like heroes when they lower prices back down to $2.99.9 a gallon, and we'll be dumb enough to praise them!

Meanwhile we've gotten used to planning our family budgets around the price of gas. The best way to describe the pain at the pump would be if you went to the grocery store one day, and suddenly the price of milk, eggs, beef, and beer suddenly doubled from what it was just two years ago, and what if a week later it doubled again?

The American people plan their lives around travel, and we've become comfortable with the fact that we can come and go at will, to see relatives, go to and from work and church, and have the freedom of independent movement.

Now, suddenly we're having 100-150 dollars a month taken out of an already tight budget. This is going to affect our spending power, and this is going to impact our economy. To compensate, shipping companies are going to have to violate contracts and raise shipping charges. Everything in the American economy is delivered in big trucks that use lots of fuel. Stores will have to raise prices to offset the fuel charges.

So you see we're not only being hit in the gas tank, but again in the wallet for daily purchases as well. We can't afford other things, so we buy less, they can afford to ship less, wage demands go up, and profits go down.

Meanwhile the fat cats in Houston just sit back, puff on their cigars, straighten their Stetsons and smile in the comfort that they've got a president in their pocket and the world by the balls.

Know why?

I'll tell you, it's because everyone's blaming the A-rabs for gas going up, and not including Texas oil men in that blame. Every time the cartel raises prices Houston smiles, and so do their banks.

Think of it, an entity in the United States of America, dominant enough to slap down a driven, self-serving, self righteous President like George W. Bush, and powerful enough to keep him from much sought after love and regard from the American People, such as no leader has, or maybe never will see.

Now that's something!

Is Bush to blame, you're damn right he is for bowing to the oil industry's bottom line
...Of course that's only my opinion!

WARNING: Reproduction of this article is forbidden without the author's permission
© 2006 by Jet in Columbus

The Religious/Political Right: A Vocabulary Lesson

Provided here is a "translation tool" of sorts, to help understand terms employed by the Religious/Political Right in editorials and sermons. These terms are also used quite often in the political arena.

Normal: Anyone who is white, heterosexual, married (or engaged to be), attends church at least once a week, and a registered Republican voter. The opposite terms "abnormal", "repugnant", "evil", and of course "offensive" are usually used nearby as a companion in the same paragraph or comment with this word. Blacks and Hispanics can sometimes be included in this category, but only if they completely adhere to strict guidelines, and stay in the background as much as possible.

Law abiding: This "hijacked" term has been twisted to mean "those who adhere only to "God's law", in an attempt to misguide the uneducated into believing there's a difference between "god's law" and "civil" laws. For instance, several states and/or municipalities have "Consenting Adult" laws, which state that any two adults of legal consent age, regardless of sex, may engage in sexual activities in the privacy of their own home. To the Religious/Political Right, this is not one of God's laws, and therefore if you recognize the concept of "Consenting Adult" you are not a "law abiding" citizen. The same goes for a lawful legal abortion, etc. etc. ad nauseam.

Patriot: Only those who strictly worship the Flag, the Bible, and any denomination of the Baptist Church as a holy trinity. Anyone who does not do so is branded "unpatriotic". Example: the "Patriot Act" has nothing to do with being patriotic, in the literal sense of the word.

Homosexual: This term is used frequently to stress the "sex" in homosexual, because the only difference between a homosexual and a heterosexual is who they sleep with at night. The idea behind using the word "homosexual" is to emphasize the myth that gays are nothing more than sexual beings, to the exclusion of all else, as if this is the only thing they think about night and day. This increases the "icky" factor, causing normal god fearing people to shield their children and themselves from such beasts. Usually in the same sentence or article you'll find such terms as "predator", "recruits or recruiter", "pedophile" or "degenerate" to bolster the claim that gays are only dangerous sexual beings. The term "gay" is avoided at all cost. Fear of this word is what brings right-wing voters out in droves.

Special Rights: This a term describes a set of basic human essentials that the Religious/Political Right reserves only and wholly for itself. By using the term "special" it convinces regular folks that gays want rights that "normal God fearing" Christians don't or can't have, and that they covet exclusively for themselves! In actuality the "special" rights that the "Religious/Political Right" would have you believe that gays want are the following:

1. The ability to visit a lover/partner of 10 years in an intensive care ward as a "next of kin", without being barred from the hospital and/or by the opposing family.

2. The unopposed ability of one partner/lover to inherit the property they've shared and nurtured for a lifetime from the other.

3. The ability to have both lover/partners listed as "parents" or "guardians" of the biological or adopted children they've lovingly raised and nurtured together.

4. The right to jointly own property, and to jointly file income as a couple

Evil: This term should be obvious, but isn't. The word "evil" was hijacked by the Religious/Political Right, and they love to use this term to describe anything that they don't agree with. For example, the "Evil Empire" to describe the Soviet Union (not the one associated with Darth Vader). An associated adjective would be "evildoers". In some ways, by their own definition, The U.S. is doing "evil" by haphazardly tapping innocent citizens phones because they "might" be terrorists, and/or holding foreign prisoners captive without legal representation, and in some cases psychologically or physically torturing them for the purpose of getting information from them.

Liberal: This used to be a proud term, meaning all--inclusive, all--encompassing and all--accepting. It used to be that you'd brag proudly of attending a Liberal College or studying Liberal Arts. However when used by the Religious/Political Right it means, (forgive me for being blunt here) "Fag lover", "God-hater", "Baby Killer" and "Against the Flag".

Pedophile: A pedophile is a homosexual that is attracted to, and tends to kidnap, eat, and/or molest innocent little children of either sex (go figure) and is unsavable. A heterosexual with the same tendencies is a "misguided soul" who needs some loving prayer and religious help, in order to redeem himself in the eyes of the lord.

Secular: This term has taken on a meaning of it's own, and usually when used by the Religious/Political Right is opposite of its intended "worldly" definition. A new religion as been defined as Secular Humanism, a very slippery term which can mean anything they conveniently want to oppose.

Offensive: see "Evil".

Beware I'm about to use most of the Liberal Thesaurus on this next two terms!

God fearing: This term is probably the most self-serving, judgmental, hypocritical, morally ambiguous, intellectually bankrupt, long-winded and Biblically challenged phrase of them all. They use this term to make ordinary people "fear" god, and in so doing to fear them. To fear God, is to fear your reverend/priest/minister, through whom God speaks to you.

God: God is actually someone you unconditionally love, and who loves and accepts everyone; in other words a liberal. (Hmmmm I wasn't struck by lightning while typing that sentence!) God speaks through you, and to you, and not through self-appointed, self-anointed men who pick and choose which Bible verses are important and which aren't, in order to argue in favor of slavery, prohibition, or the suppression and segregation of one population over another.

Racially balanced as in "The Republican Party is very racially balanced." This phrase is used during hurriedly arranged photo ops after someone of prominence has made the insinuation to the mainstream media that the Religious/Political right is composed of mostly rich white men.

Someone is bound to utter this phrase just as you notice that all of the women, blacks and hispanics in the group have suddenly been pushed up into the front row smiling proudly, not realizing that behind them the next solid three rows are the white guys grinning for the camera because they know that they're really the ones in charge.

Judeo-Christian Values Note Judeo always comes first. This phrase is used often and loudly when the right-wing Christian section is emphasizing that they have generously included Jews in their outrage about abortion, gay rights, or tax breaks for major corporations. Usually the next day the more extreme fundamentalists of the group give a sermon to their followers stressing that while they love their Jewish brothers (well, maybe just enough to get the election swung in their favor), they must still realize that in order for Jews to get into their heaven, they still must first accept Jesus Christ as their savior.

Sort of how they feel about their private Golf Clubs.

Pro-business liberal This one threw me the first time I saw it in print, because by rights, according to all good conservatives, there is no such thing as a "pro-business liberal". Apparently this phrase is employed to throw blame at liberal democrats with their liberal businesses joining the liberal wing of the Republican Party and ruining everything. In other words, just throw the word "liberal" on anything to make it sound bad or to assign or distract blame.

God, America, and the flag, is the new holy trinity, replacing "Baseball, mom, and apple pie". You must worship all three equally or be branded a traitorous liberal unchristian deviant.

Budget Surplus is a phrase never used in mixed company (i.e. Republicans with Democrats). The budget surplus is what the Republican Congress proudly claimed as theirs, not President Clinton's, from the steps of the Capitol Building. In the late 90s the budget surplus was the direct result of their "Contract with America"... well that is until GW spent it all at Halliburton. Now the political right wing would rather we didn't mention it, and if we do, they claim it didn't really exist anyway and was just on paper--shhhhhhh!

Your facts are erroneous is a phrase used most often when they know Democrats are speaking the truth, but they haven't found time to "Google or Yahoo" something opposing from a right-wing slanted website to refute it yet.

Knee-jerk reaction translates to "They've intelligently reacted to something important before we did, causing us embarrassment, so we'll dismiss it as nothing in order to distract the public." The press is currently having a knee-jerk reaction to rising gas prices at the pump, but don't worry... soon it'll be "old news". (see below) Currently President Bush is stressing that we should leave prices as they are (no matter how high they go) and instead use conservation and alternate fuels. Thus we preserve "big oil's" profit line; which should cause another "knee jerk" reaction from the voting public.

Some of my best friends are gay They live about three miles from me. My sister's hairdresser's maid introduced me to a plumber who lives next door to them, but I can't remember his name. He says they're nice people.

This is all just old news! translates to "The public knows this is a problem we haven't even come close to solving yet, even though we've had plenty of time to look into it, so we'll just declare it unimportant!" Example, "New Orleans is old news"

Impeding Free speech translates to "Not permitting right-wing political or religious propaganda to be prominently displayed in public buildings".
See also:

Violating the spirit of the First Amendment which translates to using the "Free speech amendment" to allow such things as homosexual pornography, cuss words on the Sopranos, publishing books criticizing George Bush, Rush Limbaugh, Pat Robertson, or or or even The Los Angeles Times recently suggesting that Dick Cheney resign!, or the press' reporting of several state legislatures (so far Vermont, California, and Illinois) that have recently, or are planing to, call for the House of Representitives to prepare to look into Bush's impeachment.

God created dinosaur bones, but not real dinosaurs! Sorry, I just had to include this one after I nearly fell out of my chair laughing when I read it in print. A religious nut actually asserted that God created the bones, and then put them into the ground where we could find them, to test our faith because the actual animals never really existed!.

I am praying for you! Personally I'm disgusted every time George Bush utters this phrase. He prayed for the space shuttle astronauts safe return, he prayed for the miners in West Virginia, and he prayed constantly for the victims of the World Trade Center to be rescued along with the lives of the victims of the Pentagon. All he was doing was kissing the asses of the Political/Religious Right, and gave false and useless comfort to the victim's families who believed that his important presidential prayers would somehow be paid more attention to by God... which they weren't

I do not believe in basing American Policy on poll numbers. Unless they agree with what George is saying at the moment. With his approval rating at all time lows, he uses this one a lot lately.

We are on the side of the political right! Apparently they don't seem to realize that that means which side of the isle they sit on, and not that they're correct all the time.

In conclusion: I miss the good old days when a church or a temple united and pulled a community together, instead of dividing it. A thief, an adulterer or even a prostitute didn't have the sanctuary doors judgmentally and verbally locked against them in judgment. They were welcomed with open arms in fellowship. In doing so, they and the congregation learned through love and gentle acceptance to change their ways.
The power of hate is a potent weapon, and in the wrong hands can and does push love and acceptance aside.

I'm sad that those days are gone, probably forever, and I'm hoping that someday a surgeon will find a way to separate the Religious Right from the Political Right, who've been joined at the hip for far too long.

People such as Pat Robertson, Pat Buchanan, The late Jerry Falwell, and Rush Limbaugh want nothing more than to acquire the power through the use of the name God, and/or George Bush (who some believe is one and the same) in order to allow them to think and form your opinions for you. They use God, not to spread the meaning and teachings of the Gospels, but to line their pockets, and gain prestige. Robertson and Falwell are nothing more than "thieves at the steps of the temple".

To paraphrase the grandmother on the COSBY SHOW, these men have become so secure in their own sacredness in the scheme of things that they probably believe that the sun doesn't shine until they wake up in the morning.

I consider myself a Christian... Just not "their" brand of Christian

But of course this is only my opinion

WARNING: Reproduction of this article is forbidden
without the author's permission
© 2006 & 2008 by Jet in Columbus

Have I become a bigot regarding "Fundamentalists"

Just like the word "Liberal," the word "Fundamentalist" seems to have taken on a new meaning.

Why is that?
Fundamentalist gangs in Afghanistan are beating women on the street just for showing any part of their hair or even an ankle.
Does this sound reasonable?

Why is it that the words "Jewish", "Muslim", "Christian", and "Islamic" seem to always precede the word "Fundamentalist," and a description of an act of extreme hatred or prejudice follows it? Fundamentalism is the reason that in the middle-east right now, children are being taught from birth that their only reason for existing is to kill Jews, and in order to get into heaven, they must suicidally blow themselves up, taking as many souls with them as they can!

Remember when Afghan Fundamentalists dynamited giant Buddhist statues, all centuries-old and irreplaceable monuments to a culture, just because they didn't agree with their religion?

Could we be heading towards having Christian Fundamentalist groups cruising the streets and fining public buildings for not having Christmas decorations up or crucifixes over their door? Could a bill hit Congress banning the word "holiday," replacing it with "Christian" or "Christmas"? Happy holidays! As if pretty lights, Santa Claus, and chopped-down pine trees have anything to do with the birth of Christ or why we still revere him over 2000 years later.

Could a bill be heading to Congress this minute to destroy any faces on Mt. Rushmore that even vaguely represented the Democratic Party's point of view because the Congress is Republican? Don't laugh; and before you think I'm just being paranoid, there are bills that have been introduced repeatedly encouraging replacing Democrats on our currency with Ronald Reagan on the $10 bill and/or the dime. Even our national airport was renamed after him. Will a huge battle result in Congress, after the Democrats take it back, over whether to have Reagan's name taken back off the building again?

Could someone actually take Kennedy's name off of the airport? Don't laugh-don't scoff; Cape Canaveral the city in Florica with all the launch pads, used to be known as Cape Kennedy, but the name was changed because of a twist in the opposite political direction!

Is it me?

I'm beginning to feel as if, oh I don't know, that if someone feels powerless in their life, if they have no respect, or no one loves them, then all they'd have to do is evoke the name of God, or wave the Bible around, memorize the Constitution or the Torah enough to quote it, and convince a few people that they just might speak for God, George Washington, Allah, or Mohamed, or better yet, that he's speaking through them, and suddenly they feel power because everyone else gets the "what if" syndrome. What if he actually is speaking for God, and even if he isn't, would St. Peter judge me at the gates for not believing him?

When you use God, suddenly people fear you, as if cursing you is cursing God. The fundamentalists have somehow also made the words "Christian", "Flag," and "American" to mean the same thing. It's like their new "holy trinity," as though you can't believe in one unless you believe in all three; and if you don't, they might convincingly brand you a heathen, a traitor, or worse: a Liberal. The opposite is true too; if you see a Flag bumper sticker, or the whole back window of a pick up truck taken up with a flag graphic, do you say, "There goes a Democrat?" No, the republicans have taken ownership of our national banner!

When did this happen?
Why did this happen?

People like the late Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson raise untold, untaxed millions and billions a year. They say it's to help the hungry little children in some far-flung country, but when you see their lavish homes, the huge university campuses that they command, and the elaborate church grounds with dozens of ornate buildings, you know without a doubt where the money came from for that, don't you?

And yet everyone keeps sending it!

You're also buying politicians whose only qualifications are that they're up for sale! But by giving it to the Falwells of this world, you're giving them the power, not you. No one in Congress knows what anyone stands for any more, because they stand for whoever contributed the most to their campaign, their sponsors, instead of their own or our views! Members of Congress don't represent their constituents any more; they represent their financial sponsors!

I miss a time when being on the "Left" or being on the "Right" was respected as an opinion, as a party affiliation, from people who respected a different point of view as much as their own.

Why are the days gone, and I remember them well, when a President got elected and suddenly the rancor disappeared; everyone shook hands and we all stood behind him united as a country because "we the people" elected him. Now, we're all bad losers. If we didn't vote for him, we immediately plan to do our damnedest to bring him down or discredit him. We're so divided now, no longer "indivisible, with liberty and justice for all" any more. Just look at the popular election vote results for 2000 and 2004 for proof of how much this country is divided, with liberty and justice now being the possession only of those who can afford to buy it.

Any more, when I see the word "Fundamentalist," an article follows on war, oppression, hatred, or judgment. It has happened in each generation, and will happen again. Our culture today is being fed by the self-righteous fundamentalist community whereby someone has to be hated in the name of "morality" in order to make people agree with their radical ideas. To be one, means they are right and everyone else is wrong.

Is this the only way to unite a nation; to find someone to hate as a collective group, so we can claim something in common?

Why?

Did voting this or that way keep us out of war?
Did voting this or that way prevent 9/11?
Did voting this or that way make our economy go from great news to great deficits?

I'll leave you to your own conclusions...

WARNING: Reproduction of this article is forbidden
without the author's permission
© 2006 by Jet in Columbus

How Reliable is the Bible as a History Book?

During a debate with a friend a few days ago (okay an argument), he began quoting from the Bible, calling it a reliable historical reference. When I could get a word in edgewise, I pointed out that we're dealing with some major events that "sommmmmmmmehow" got overlooked here.

For instance...

> Somewhere between when God created the earth, and Jesus' time, we've got some dinosaurs missing, and I'm telling you right now, them thar things are kinda hard to miss! Now I've heard arguments about passages in the Bible about vaguely described great beasts, but anything as memorable as a brontosaurus, probably would be not only described in quite memorable terms, it would have been described by name.

> Now we have Noah, who built that arc all by himself, and I'll grant you the thing was huge, but even if it was Titanic, that wooden boat wouldn't have floated for long if at all, with that amount of weight, especially with two of each of the other animals-baby animals or not.

And before you tell me he held it up with his mighty hand, I'll ask if God was so all powerful, why didn't he save the damned (excuse me-doomed) animals himself (You know, kinda set them off to the side, and then put them all back later when he was done), or waited till Noah herded them all up onto the nearest mountain top; which makes more sense than asking the poor mortal to build an impossibly huge boat out of wood and expecting anyone to believe it'd survive fully loaded in a storm of literally "biblical" proportions.

> Moses broke his tablets, and God who created the world and everything in it, couldn't put them back together, nor could he creat another copy for him, but then all he could manage was a burning bush afterward????

> Also in Egypt there are some tiny little things called pyramids that somehow got built without anyone noticing the construction crews milling around, and if HE put them up, that's one of God's miracles that you'd think might have rated at least an off-hand mention, if not at least a footnote, don't you? After all, the Tower of Babel got mentioned, why slight the Egyptians?

> Then Jesus zoooooooomed from being a baby in the manger to an adult preaching the gospels? Oh well those years weren't important. If we're worshiping the guy, you'd think it might rate a mention as to what he did in between the ages of say 15 and 30 in the Bible somewhere.

> Now try squirming out to this one... Creation Scientists, maintain that according to their considered calculations, the world is only 7000 to at the most 10,000 years old. Now for the sake of argument, let's make it 15,000. Now stay with me here, except for a very few, most stars are more than 100,000 to millions, nay "billyons and billyons" of light years away.

Now unless the speed of light has changed drastically since then, that makes it absolutely impossible for anyone in ancient times to have possibly seen any stars in the night sky!!! Why, because the light wouldn't have reached the Earth yet!!!! But they describe them all over the Bible....Huh?

Either someone did some powerful (and blasphemous) editing, (probably King James and his minions), or we've got a problem in logic here

As for evolution, vs creationism-which theory explains why men have nipples?

...but that's only my opinion

WARNING: Reproduction of this article is forbidden
without the author's permission
© 2006 by Jet in Columbus/Jet Gardner