Written on Thursday, the 1st of July, 2004 at 3:10 pm and was filed under:
Politics
This blog entry in which I link to this government publication is prescient of this post which links to this other government document which says the same thing.
If you have any trouble with the links, I will reprint some of it here:
BUSH ON IRAQ & 9/11
From a State Department website:
In a March 18 letter to Congressional leaders, Bush said that his use of the Congressional authorization to wage war against Iraq is consistent with the international effort against terrorism, “including those nations, organizations, or persons who planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001.”
Read the whole letter. It's short. People keep saying that the Bush administration never linked Iraq to 9/11. It's not true.
Ben Wikler
will reprint the letter from the President of the United States (George W. Bush) also:
March 18, 2003
Dear Mr. Speaker: (Dear Mr. President:)
Consistent with section 3(b) of the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002 (Public Law 107-243), and based on information available to me, including that in the enclosed document, I determine that:
(1) reliance by the United States on further diplomatic and other peaceful means alone will neither (A) adequately protect the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by Iraq nor (B) likely lead to enforcement of all relevant United Nations Security Council resolutions regarding Iraq; and
(2) acting pursuant to the Constitution and Public Law 107-243 is consistent with the United States and other countries continuing to take the necessary actions against international terrorists and terrorist organizations, including those nations, organizations, or persons who planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001.
Sincerely,
GEORGE W. BUSH
(emphasis mine)
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Written on Monday, the 28th of June, 2004 at 11:59 am and was filed under:
Politics
Melissa and I saw Fahrenheit 9/11 Saturday afternoon. The theater was packed for our showing, the showing before it, and the showing after it - probably every showing that they ran every half hour all day. I really liked the movie, even though there was very little new stuff in it compared to “Stupid White Men” and “Dude, Where's My Country”.
However, since Melissa hadn't read those books she picked up a lot, which I think is really the point of the movie - it's a fast, easy to digest mass of political information and opinion. Okay, some parts were hard to swallow, much less digest, like the crying grandmother in Iraq cursing the US and begging Allah for relief, or the American mother who had lost her son in the war breaking down into tears within sight of the White House.
Oh yeah, thank you Michael Moore for Britney Spears. She was the very definition of comic relief, and timely too - I was crumbling under the weight of all that horror. Bloody children and babies. Open wounds. Amputee veterans. Shock and awe? Mostly grief.
Anyway, I'm glad that I saw it. It won't be for everyone - but the ideas in it are worth sharing with anyone who has a stake in this country's future.
Fun links:
http://www.drivingvotes.org/bushfacts.shtml
http://www.thismodernworld.com/
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Written on Monday, the 28th of June, 2004 at 12:43 am and was filed under:
Uncategorized,
Cars
It's new to me:
The car in its original packaging
Green Lion and Red Lion - now form Voltron!
No, not really. I got a new USED car. $800 and a trip to Saint Cloud to meet a nice couple of teachers. Lisa and Noah came with - we put the car seat, DVD player, and a portable screen in my red car - and Noah was really good the whole way! The car is a 1995 Subaru Impreza LX with an automatic transmission.
As you may know, I already have a red (crimson pearl) 1996 Impreza LX (which I still have a painful love for [story of my life]), but that car is missing a headlight and needs a ton of work that I have ignored over the last couple of years while doing things like paying off my credit cards (and that car itself).
Anyway, Lisa can drive the red car to the grocery store until I figure out what to do with it. My gut says to start throwing money at it again, but we will see. I know how much the bodywork will likely cost. I have a vague idea of the cost of doing the brakes (the rotors are warped) and fixing that lingering tapping sound in the engine that is probably a leaky oil pump seal. In the meantime I have a more reliable car that is only missing A/C and cruise control. Also, the outside is beat to heck - apparently the former owner did not know how to park.
Okay, so now I have a red one and a green one - all I need are the yellow, blue, and black ones and I can form Voltron.
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Written on Friday, the 18th of June, 2004 at 11:07 am and was filed under:
Politics
US Constitution
Article II
Section 4.
The President, Vice President and all civil officers of the United States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.
Article III
Section 3.
Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort. No person shall be convicted of treason unless on the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act, or on confession in open court.
The Congress shall have power to declare the punishment of treason, but no attainder of treason shall work corruption of blood, or forfeiture except during the life of the person attainted.
(emphasis mine)
Who do we know who has lied to us, started a war against us, and aided our enemies?
There were no weapons of mass desctruction. Iraq did not have ties to Al Qaeda. The Bush administration stoked the fires of war based on lies that took advantage of our continuing grief and fear.
I can pretty much guarantee you that the Bin Laden family are our enemies. This administration assisted their escape from the United States.
How much money does this administration stand to make based on this war? When does it stop being shrewd business strategy and start being criminal? At what point can we call this orgy of greed bribery?
Don't wait for the election. Impeach Bush. Impeach Cheney. Impeach Rumsfeld and all of the co-conspirators in the pillaging of America.
http://www.google.com/search?q=impeach+bush
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Written on Tuesday, the 11th of May, 2004 at 1:42 am and was filed under:
Wallowing,
Diversions
You know, it's really hard to get a sense of scale from a tree when it is upright. You can walk around it, try to climb it, or throw things up in the branches, but they deceive you. Maybe it's foreshortening, or slimming lines. I wonder if the secret behind big hair is that proponents are hoping to create the same optical illusion as a big tree - the top just kinda diappears in a froth of leaves, or hair.
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Written on Friday, the 16th of April, 2004 at 12:38 pm and was filed under:
Diversions,
Food,
Speaking in Tongues
חציל
That coworker brought in more food today - this time it was eggplant in a spicy tomato sauce. It melted like butter in my mouth. So very delicious.
I know that you are too lazy to look it up, so here's a nice link to “eggplant.” It has lot's of translations. Did you know that eggplant is a berry?
http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/definition/english/eg/eggplant.html
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Written on Tuesday, the 13th of April, 2004 at 10:28 am and was filed under:
Diversions,
Food,
Speaking in Tongues
זחוג
A coworker of mine brought some delicious Yemeni Jewish foods to work. There were a couple of salsa/chutney/curry things, which were okay, and זחוג, which was a paste of cilantro, garlic, “cumin-like spices,” and hot peppers. That was suprememly delicious. I'm not usually a fan of cilantro, but this was WOW.
I still have to ask him what it would go with - although I could eat it straight up on bread - the recipes online (I will leave the googling to you) give a lot of possibilities, but I'm thinking pita.
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Written on Thursday, the 26th of February, 2004 at 12:12 pm and was filed under:
Politics
No, it isn’t. I will leave the math to you, because the vote counts are public. The only states that Gore would have won if he got the votes from Nader were New Hampshire and Florida. New Hampshire only has four electoral votes. Sorry, New Hampshire, but you wouldn’t have been enough.
We all know that Florida was rigged, so that pretty much eliminates Nader as the root cause.
Besides, shouldn’t all of those Gore voters have voted for Nader anyway?
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Written on Friday, the 30th of January, 2004 at 4:00 am and was filed under:
Uncategorized,
Wallowing,
Cars
I was tootling along in the middle lane of southbound 35W at a gentle, legal speed. Someone changed from the right lane into the middle lane in front of me. I tapped the brakes to match their speed, and all hell broke loose.
I must have hit black ice and gone into a four wheel skid. I let off the brakes right away, but the car snapped sideways. The car was pointing at the left guard rail. I think at that point the tires started to bite again - I remember hearing them squeal - but the rear end must not have hooked up because the car kept rotating.
Suddenly I was in the left lane staring into the windshield of an oncoming car - 180 degrees from where I had been heading. At this point I think that I had the clutch in and was hunting for the right gear, which was probably an error. In racing and police driving courses the mantra is: if you start to spin, both feet in. If your car is more than sideways then you probably want to lock up your brakes and get stopped ASAP, rather than fool around trying to catch it.
However, I was still turning. My Wheel of Fortune wasn't going to stop on “Trip to Bermuda” at all. Another 180 degrees went by and I was facing the correct direction on the left shoulder. For just a brief thousandth of a second I thought that I might have just come through it completely unscathed.
Then I heard that sickening crunch.
I was still rolling, though, and the car slotted easily into second, so I gave it a blip of the throttle and engaged the clutch. I checked my rearview mirrors to see seemingly motionless traffic behind me. I fed in a little more gas and the car seemed to be rolling straight with no problems. No thunking. No more crunching. No squeals of tortured metal giving way and no fountains of oil spraying across all three lanes.
I stepped on the gas and continued on my way to work.
When I parked, I opened the door and looked at the rear quarter panel. I was sure that I had hit there. However, the rear was straight and true. I was shocked. Sometimes when one hits something with a car it sounds worse than it is because the car resonates.
I took a step to the left so I could see past the open door. A brutal gash sliced across the fender of my poor sweet baby. My car, paid off for barely a month, was very hurt. Sixty thousand miles of commuting and road trips. Our plans for mad dashes across the continent were themselves dashed in three seconds of black ice.
I should mention that I am completely uninjured. My mp3 player didn't even skip. The frozen clementine orange barely moved from its cozy home next to the air compressor on the floor. My airbags didn't go off. The boxes in my back seat did not initiate a garbage-alanch. Inside of my car, the only indication that anything had happened was my own smell of desperation and panic.
Of course, Thursdays are the busiest day at work, but I could barely click to run a set of queries without considering where I could source a bumper skin, and whether or not I would need a new bumper bar. My mental survey of damages kept rolling through my head and interrupting my mostly automated tasks.
I think that I will be okay, financially, even though my insurance wouldn't cover the damages to my car. Since I just paid off my car, I switched to only liability coverage. Liability insurance would cover any damages to the guard rail, but I didn't stick around to ask if it was injured.
Switching to liability saves $400 per six months. Factor in my $500 deductible, and I will break even if the damages don't exceed $900. I can easily foresee $2000 in repair costs, but I might be able save some cash by sourcing some parts myself.
One last thing: I always wear my seatbelt. You should too.
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