BlogCall

Faced with an obstructionist leadership in the House, and a mainstream media that have forsaken their role as a Fourth Estate monitor of government abuse, three Democratic members of the House Judiciary Committee are calling on the public to demand that the Congress initiate impeachment hearings immediately against Vice President Dick Cheney.

With Donald Rumsfeld and Condoleeza Rice on their way to Crawford to meet with President Bush on Thursday, Cindy Sheehan was the guest of BlogCall9 hosted by Joe Trippi of JoeTrippi.com, Bob Fertik of Democrats.com, and Jodie Evans of CodePink4Peace.org.

Cindy Sheehan has captured the attention of the world with her protest outside George Bush's "ranch" in Crawford, Texas. Cindy is the mother of Army Pfc. Casey Sheehan, who died in combat in Iraq on April 4th, 2004. She is camping out on Bush's ranch in Crawford, Texas, until he agrees to meet with her. Cindy simply wants to ask Bush "Why did my son die?" and "What was the noble cause that he died for?"

On March 17th, the American Center for Voting Rights (ACVR) appeared from nowhere - just like Jeff Gannon and Talon News in 2003. Four days later, on March 21st, they were the ONLY "Voting Rights" group to testify in a U.S. House Committee hearing on Election 2004, and the problems that occurred specifically in OH.

As The BRAD BLOG (http://www.BradBlog.com) discovered shortly thereafter, the ACVR is a phony "non-partisan" group created by Jim Dyke, the Communications Director for the RNC and Mark F. (Thor) Hearne, the lead National Counsel for Bush/Cheney '04 Inc.

Aside from abusing the 501(c)3 tax-exempt corporate status which requires "non-partisan" activity, this group never mentioned their affiliation with Bush/Cheney/RNC in their congressional testimony.

Further, they were instrumental in the secret creation of the Baker/Carter Election Reform Commission which was announced on March 24th at 2pm, only to be lauded 24 minutes later by the ACVR. True voting rights and election reform groups had no idea about the creation of this commission, and were not invited to participate!

Blogcall7 will feature Andy Stephenson, Education Director of Vote Trust USA (VoteTrustUSA.org). In the aftermath of the most recent stolen election in 2004, Andy was on the ground in Florida and Ohio securing hard evidence of fraud and manipulation. He will be discussing the current status of this evidence and other related subjects.

Date: Tuesday April 12, 2005 at 1 p.m. ET
Permanent BlogCall link: http://democrats.com/blogcall7
BlogCall Broadcast: RadioLeft.com
BlogCall Archive: WhiteRoseSociety.org
About BlogCall: http://blogcall.org
To request credentials: http://democrats.com/contact

Blogcall6 will feature David Swanson of DebtSlavery.org exposing the credit card industry's corrupt campaign to push its atrocious Bankruptcy Bill through the House of Representatives this week - and the grassroots campaign by bloggers and activists to stop it.

Date: Tuesday April 5, 2005 at 1 p.m. ET
Permanent BlogCall link: http://democrats.com/blogcall6
Invite the Media: IndependentMediaSource.com
BlogCall Broadcast: RadioLeft.com
BlogCall Archive: WhiteRoseSociety.org
About BlogCall: http://blogcall.org
To request credentials: http://democrats.com/contact

Blogcall5 will feature David Donnelly of WithoutDeLay.org exposing the backlash against Tom DeLay arising from his exploitation of Terri Schiavo.

Date: Tuesday March 29, 2005 at 1 p.m. ET
Permanent BlogCall link: http://democrats.comblogcall5
Invite the Media: IndependentMediaSource.com
BlogCall Broadcast: RadioLeft.com
BlogCall Archive: WhiteRoseSociety.org
About BlogCall: http://blogcall.org
To request credentials: http://democrats.com/contact

Blogcall4 will feature Greg Palast of GregPalast.com exposing the battle between neoconservatives and the oil giants over Iraq's oil - a battle that began "within weeks" of Bush's seizure of the White House in 2001.

Palast's expose, which will appear on BBC Newsnight and in Harper's Magazine, is available here: http://gregpalast.com/detail.cfm?artid=417&row=0

After the deaths of over 1,500 U.S. soldiers and over 100,000 Iraqi civilians, BlogCall4 will ask: "Was it all about oil?"

Date: Tuesday March 22, 2005 at 1 p.m. ET
Permanent BlogCall link: http://democrats.com/blogcall4
Invite the Media: IndependentMediaSource.com
BlogCall Broadcast: RadioLeft.com
BlogCall Archive: WhiteRoseSociety.org
About BlogCall: http://blogcall.org
To request credentials: http://democrats.com/contact
BlogCall5:

Welcome NY Times readers! That's me on the right, in a photo by John W. Wheeler taken at the Politics Online conference at George Washington University in DC on March 11. At the final session of the conference, called the "Great Debate" between the mainstream media and the blogosphere, I noted the amazing growth of the blogosphere over the past year, and predicted bloggers would score a TKO over the mainstream media in the coming year. For the record, no one in the audience agreed with me. Prophet or fool? Let history be the judge.

The Times article below is bizarre. It initially appears to be a straightforward article about a progressive innovation in bringing the work of investigative bloggers to the mainstream media - although it somehow manages not to mention the name of our effort (BlogCall.org). In the middle, it quotes kind words from a mainstream reporter and even a rightwing blogger.