Bush Crime Family

Recipe

Chip — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 02:11:38 -0400

So many diversions, so little time! That is part of the strategy, of course. Impoverish people so they must work harder to maintain their daily lives, while simultaneously overwhelming them with info overload and ersatz news. Decentralize the crimes themselves through a network of events and operatives over a time continuum, and choke off government scrutiny and regulation by reduced funding. Buy off the people's government. Throw in classic disinformation methods, and wrap it all in the cross (invoking religious endorsement) and the flag (inferring without actualizing authentic patriotism).

Blend, at a moderate but continuously increasing pace, with intermittent but increasingly harrowing instances of terror.

Voila!

You have Fascism via the NWO.

Does James Baker Control Bush's Iraq Policies?

Bob Fertik — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 13:10:22 -0400

Is James Baker the real White House puppetmaster?

Did he write the plan to invade Iraq in April 2001, five months before 9/11?

Two years before the invasion of Iraq, oil executives and foreign policy advisers told the Bush administration that the United States would remain “a prisoner of its energy dilemma” as long as Saddam Hussein was in power.

That April 2001 report, “Strategic Policy Challenges for the 21st Century,” was prepared by the James A. Baker Institute for Public Policy and the U.S. Council on Foreign Relations at the request of Vice President Dick Cheney.

Is Baker writing the contracts that ExxonMobil and other oil giants are trying to impose on Iraq?

A group of American advisers led by a small State Department team played an integral part in drawing up contracts between the Iraqi government and five major Western oil companies to develop some of the largest fields in Iraq, American officials say.

Those widely-reported contracts were rejected by Iraq because they were too greedy, but you have to read AfterDowningStreet.org to learn that.

"We did not finalise any agreement with them because they refused to offer consultancy based on fees as they wanted a share of the oil," [Oil Minister Hussein al-Shahristani] said.

Is Baker writing the ~~occupation diktat~~ "security agreement" too? That was also too greedy, so U.S. negotiators are scaling it back by removing immunity for contractors and control over Iraqi airspace.

Iraq’s foreign minister said Tuesday that the United States had agreed to lift immunity for foreign security contractors operating in Iraq, making them subject to prosecution under Iraqi law, according to Iraqi politicians.

Is Baker engineering an even more disastrous war with Iran?

In all of these crucial stories about Iraq, the "deciders" are never identified. We know Dick Cheney is the "decider" within the government, but is he really just taking orders from James Baker in his role as consiglieri to the Bush Organized Crime Family?

The Bush Family's Bad Latin Real Estate Investment

dlindorff — Fri, 02 May 2008 15:43:41 -0400

By Dave Lindorff

Back in late 2006, it was widely reported in the Latin American media that President Bush, or perhaps his old man, had bought a 100,000-acre farm in a remote area of Paraguay.

What struck people at the time was the choice of country. Paraguay, of course, has gained a certain Club Med status among the world's villains and criminal elements as the place to go when the law's on your tail. The country, ruled for six decades by the dictatorial and fascist Colorado Party of Gen. Alfredo Stroesser, an almost cartoon charicature of a Latin American dictator, has no extradition treaty with any nation.

That's why it has long harbored aging Nazis, bank robbers, and a string of ousted or retired Latin American dictators and their assistants over the years.

Given that President Bush, once he leaves office on January 20, 2009, will no longer have the diplomatic immunity conferred upon heads of state, or the Constitutional protection against indictment by domestic prosecutors, it makes sense that he would be looking for a safe haven from the long arm of the law.

After all, they guy is guilty of a huge laundry list of international crimes, from the Crime Against Peace and Conspiracy against Peace in the UN Charter, to Geneva Convention violations like approval of torture of prisoners, collective punishment of civilians, the killing of children and child soldiers, the failure to protect occupied citizens, the use of banned weapons, etc., etc., and also of domestic crimes, ranging from political use of government employees, conspiracy, treason, lying to federal officials, defrauding Congress, etc.

No wonder he wants to do what Klaus Barbie, Josef Mengele and Adolf Eichmann did, and hole up in Paraguay.

Only trouble is, Paraguay may not be such a safe haven for long.

Last month, a former Roman Catholic Bishop with leftist, populist tendencies, Fernando Lugo, surprised almost everyone in Paraguay, and no doubt President Bush, by winning the national presidential election, ousting the Colorado Party for the first time in 61 years. There is talk that among other things, Lugo is thinking of returning Paraguay to the community of nations, by signing some of those extradition agreements.

If he does that Bush may be stuck having to hide behind his rump squad of Secret Service agents down at the Crawford Ranch, hoping they can keep the process servers from Brattleboro and Marlboro, VT, with their war crimes arrest warrants, at bay.
__________
DAVE LINDORFF is a Philadelphia-based journalist and columnist. His latest book is "The Case for Impeachment" (St. Martin's Press, 2006 and now available in paperback edition). His work is available at www.thiscantbehappening.net

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Pakistan: a Dry Run for Bushco?

RegAv — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 12:13:40 -0500

Could Musharraf’s Actions Be a Dry Run for Bushco?

Does any thinking person really believe that the dictator of Pakistan is able to make ANY political or military decision without the approval, if not the actual direction of the US Government?

The answer is so damned obvious as to be childish. No, he can’t, because money talks very loudly. The 700 MILLION dollars in economic and military assistance the US gave to General Pervez Musharraf this year alone is most definitely not an altruistic gift that comes without strings.

The 800 million dollars scheduled to reach the Pakistani government in 2008 will continue the guarantee that Pakistan will continue to do exactly what the Bush administration. Musharraf would not last a day I office without US aid and protection. Not a single day....

...Could the events in Pakistan be a testing ground for what Bushco might be planning in the US to avoid the consequences of fair and democratic elections here in 2008?

Understand that none of Musharraf’s actions could have been implemented without the approval of the Bush administration. Understand as well that Condy Rice has announced that these actions will not mean the discontinuation of aid to the government of Pakistan.

Full article: http://tvnewslies.org/blog/?p=668

Pope Versus President

Heather Wokusch — Sun, 07 Oct 2007 12:26:07 -0400

The Vatican’s recent snub of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is only the latest salvo in the battle between Pope Benedict XVI and President George W. Bush. This tug of war has profound implications for both U.S. foreign policy and the critical Catholic vote in 2008's presidential race.

Overlapping Agendas

Things haven't always been tense between Bush and Benedict. They share similar views regarding abortion, gay marriage, and other hot-button conservative issues. Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (as Benedict was known before becoming Pope in April 2005) even helped Bush secure the White House for a second term.

Specifically, after Bush visited the Vatican in June 2004, complaining that "Not all the American bishops are with me," Ratzinger sent a letter to US bishops, ordering them to refuse Communion to "a Catholic politician … consistently campaigning and voting for permissive abortion and euthanasia laws" - a thinly-veiled reference to John Kerry. Ratzinger added that any person even voting for this Catholic politician would be guilty of formal cooperation in evil and so unworthy to present himself for Holy Communion." Probably no surprise, then, that Bush increased his margin among Catholics by 6% from 2000 to 2004.

In an interesting twist, Ratzinger also partnered with George W. Bush's brother Neil in a foundation "to promote ecumenical understanding and publish original religious texts" in 1999. Oddly enough, business credit reports listed the foundation as a "management trust for purposes other than education, religion, charity or research," leaving the true nature of the Neil Bush/Cardinal Ratzinger venture unclear.

In 2005, Ratzinger was named as a defendant in a U.S. lawsuit suit accusing him of conspiring to cover up the sexual abuse of minors. At the center of the controversy was a May 2001 confidential letter he had sent Catholic bishops across the world ordering them to keep evidence of the sexual abuse of minors by clergy secret until 10 years after the child had reached adult status.

Soon after becoming Pope, however, Ratzinger was dismissed from the case. A US federal judge decided the lawsuit would be incompatible with the United States' foreign policy interests."

Disagreements Multiply

On many contentious issues since then, Pope Benedict XVI has disagreed with the Bush administration's policies, but only politely and indirectly. For example, Benedict has spoken in favor of the International Atomic Energy Agency, which is often at loggerheads with Bush administration foreign policy.

Similarly, Benedict's Vatican has taken a firm stance against global warming, even acquiring a carbon offset forest to make the Vatican the first entirely carbon neutral sovereign state." He has called for greater international co-operation to fight ozone depletion, yet not overtly criticized White House foot-dragging in that area.

The gloves came off, however, regarding the war in Iraq. In a May 2003 interview, Ratzinger said, "There was not sufficient reasons to unleash a war in Iraq. To say nothing of the fact that, given the new weapons that make possible destructions that go beyond the combatant groups, today we should be asking ourselves if it is still licit to admit the very existence of a 'just war.'"

The U.S. invasion of Iraq was similarly contentious for former Pope John Paul II, who sent a special envoy to the White House in March 2003 in an effort to prevent an attack. The papal envoy's pleas fell on deaf ears.

Vatican criticisms of the Bush administration’s military intervention in Iraq have continued unabated. French Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, head of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, told an Italian magazine in August 2007, "The facts speak for themselves. Alienating the international community (with the U.S. push for war) was a mistake." Tauran, who has referred to the invasion and occupation as a "crime against peace," also said that Christians in Iraq "paradoxically, were more protected under the dictatorship" of Saddam Hussein.

Rice Rebuffed

As such, it is perhaps unsurprising that Benedict failed to honor Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's urgent request for a private meeting last month. The Italian periodical Corriere della Sera reported that Rice was hoping to capitalize on the Pope's moral authority by having a papal audience focused on the Middle East. Instead, Rice was told that Benedict was on holiday and had to settle for a telephone conversation with a lower Vatican official.

The ongoing tensions between Bush and Benedict over Iraq put America's over 75 million Roman Catholics in a tricky position for 2008. By supporting candidates hawkish on the Bush administration's Iraq policies, are they defying the Pope and the Catholic Church?

For its part, the powerful United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) has taken a firm stance against the US presence in Iraq. A July 2007 letter to House Republican Leader John Boehner (R-OH), USCCB noted, “The current situation in Iraq is unacceptable and unsustainable, as is the policy and political stalemate among decision makers in Washington … our nation must have the moral courage to change course in Iraq.”

Dissent is swelling up from the grassroots as well. In August 2007, an alliance of religious groups calling itself Catholics for an End to War collected 10,000 signatures for an online petition “urging leaders to commit to a responsible withdrawal of U.S. troops.” Sister Simone Campbell of the national Catholic social justice lobby NETWORK said, "Church leaders and individual Catholics have opposed U.S. policy in Iraq since before the war began," adding that the petition “lets thousands of Catholics unite to speak out even more strongly for an end to the violence and occupation.”

In other words, being dovish on Iraq might help the next Democratic presidential contender win Roman Catholic votes. Whether the current front-runners qualify for that distinction, however, is another matter.

This article first appeared in Foreign Policy in Focus. Heather Wokusch is the author of The Progressives’ Handbook series, and can be contacted at www.HeatherWokusch.com .

Bin Laden family Purchased Bush’s Loyalty Years Ago

American Rhetoric Review — Sat, 22 Sep 2007 13:08:45 -0400

I was watching Bill Maher last night and there was a bit of information that I think is extremely interesting. Did you know that the Bin Laden Family actually purchased GWB’s first failed business? An oil company that was in debt and dysfunctional; Like that is any surprise with that nit wit at the helm!!! No wonder 9-11 was scheduled after he became our “Decider”. He and his family knew there would be no repercussions for his actions. The Bush’s owed the Bin Laden’s big time!

Evidently as members of the “Carlyle Group” the Bush’s and the bin Laden’s have had many financial interactions. This makes the entire Middle East debacle much more understandable. We the American people are being BushWhacked into forcing money into the middle east while Bin Laden gets everything he wants. Our tax dollars are paying Cheney and his criminals to clean up the mess. We are paying “Black Water” to shoot people on site and again with no repercussions because our Decider has decided it to be what is in our best interest.

I think I’m going to be sick now….

How the Bush Administration Is Turning the USA into a Subprime Borrower

Heather Wokusch — Mon, 27 Aug 2007 12:47:01 -0400

"Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we." - George W Bush

Much in the same way that US investors were “steered” into rip-off mortgage loans, the entire country has been “steered” into an economic crisis. The question is how to get out of it.

In the subprime loan scandal, unscrupulous brokers conned home buyers with poor credit histories into deals designed to profit lenders and bleed borrowers. Contract “teasers” hid ballooning monthly payments while a lack of regulation allowed the scam to continue unabated. Millions more Americans now face losing their homes.

The Bush administration similarly used promises of cakewalks and increased security to con the US public into wars with Iraq and Afghanistan. US taxpayers have spent over $450 billion on Iraq alone, while Bush/Cheney cronies continue making a killing from military contracts. Meanwhile, global security has degenerated and over 4,100 US service members have died in Iraq and Afghanistan, along with an untold number of coalition troops, contractors and civilians.

Bush’s military adventurism, not to mention his administration’s exorbitant tax cuts for the wealthy, gutted the surplus of $128 billion Clinton handed him in 2001 into a deficit of well over $200 billion today. And Bush has simultaneously increased the national debt by over $3 trillion (to roughly $9 trillion), effectively nailing each and every US citizen with a bill for almost $30,000.

While heavy borrowing from Asia has mopped up some stateside red ink, there’s an inherent threat: China, for example, has an estimated $900 billion in US bonds and can increasingly call the shots on the US economy and foreign policy.

Just weeks ago, Beijing warned that if the Bush administration pushed for a revaluation of the Chinese currency, then Beijing would sell dollars, thereby threatening the greenback’s reserve currency status. Washington backed down. It had little other option.

In other words, the US itself has become as vulnerable to its lenders as any other subprime borrower.

Overall, the US debt situation looks so dire that the non-partisan Government Accountability Office Comptroller recently warned, America is on a path toward an explosion of debt. And that indebtedness threatens our country’s, our children’s, and our grandchildren’s futures. With the looming retirement of the baby boomers, spiraling health care costs, plummeting savings rates, and increasing reliance on foreign lenders, we face unprecedented fiscal risks.”

Financial analysts say credit markets are facing a Minsky moment – the inevitable downward spiral when over-leveraged investors have to sell valued assets just to pay back their loans. Some analysts have even coined a new term, suggesting we are in a “Minsky meltdown” – the prelude to a wider market crash.

But it looks more like a “Minsky massacre,” not an unavoidable economic downturn but rather a coldly-calculated hit, with the intention of transferring wealth from the lower and middle classes to an unaccountable few at the top.

Bottom line, this economic downturn isn’t hurting everyone. Select brokers and lenders made a fortune off the backs of subprime borrowers, and now that the related hedge funds are collapsing, well-leveraged private equity firms can buy assets at fire-sale prices.

And as Jim Hightower recently noted, a “hands-off regulatory ideology” is complicit: “There are no less than five financial agencies at the federal level that could have protected people, yet the subprime surge was allowed to proceed .... The Federal Reserve Board, for example, has direct authority under the Home Ownership and Equity Protection Act to ‘prohibit acts or practices in connection with mortgage loans that the board finds to be unfair, deceptive or ... associated with abusive lending practices, or that are otherwise not in the interest of the borrower.’ The Fed simply ignored this law.”

The US has been down this road before. The Savings and Loan (S&L) crisis of the late 1980s was also characterized by loose lending requirements, lax regulation, obscene profits for the few - and US taxpayers left holding the bag for $125 billion.

Ironically, the Bush family was involved in that scandal too, with Bush Jr.’s brother Neil serving on the board of the disgraced Silverado Savings and Loan, which went bust and stuck US taxpayers with a $1.3 billion debt. Regulators accused Neil of "multiple conflicts of interest" but he never did jail time – thanks at least in part to the S&L bail out engineered by his father, Bush Sr., who happened to be President at the time.

Just as in the S&L crisis, the poor and middle class have borne the brunt of the current subprime disaster, an especially nasty fact given the nation’s huge wealth gap. As Inequality.org points out, “The richest one percent of U.S. households now owns 34.3 percent of the nation's private wealth, more than the combined wealth of the bottom 90 percent. The top one percent also owns 36.9 percent of all corporate stock.”

It’s probably no coincidence that terms associated with both corporate and developing country indebtedness are being used to discuss the US subprime meltdown (payment defaults, vulture funds, distressed debt, etc). Perhaps the US hasn’t reached banana republic status yet, but the increasing wealth gap, not to mention ballooning budget deficits, low capital spending and reliance on foreign capital are disturbing signs.

Doesn’t help either that the Federal Reserve stopped releasing M3 money-supply data in 2006. M3 data (covering Eurodollars, repurchase agreements and large-denomination time deposits) is critical in determining how fast the Fed is printing money, which in turn impacts inflation.

So, what further fallout from the subprime scandal can be expected? Millions more Americans will lose their homes, and as The New York Times recently reported, “for the first time since federal housing agencies began keeping statistics in 1950,” the median price of homes in the US will fall.

Ratings agencies, such as Standard & Poor's and Moody's, will take some heat for their role in the scandal, but the Bush administration will focus on bailing out predatory lenders rather than helping Americans keep their homes. Congress and most presidential candidates will protect financial services campaign donors by not pursuing true reform.

Meanwhile, Asia and Europe will continue “decoupling” from increasingly volatile US markets, threatening the dollar’s reserve currency status even more. Fresh off its recent war games with China and four Central Asian republics, Russia will more actively confront the US on the world stage. The Bush administration will move closer to a war with Iran.

Of course, these dire predictions don’t have to materialize - we can regroup and fight back. One avenue is by urging Congress members to take action, such as changing foreclosure rules to protect homeowners and supporting Rep. Barney Frank’s (D-MA) National Affordable Housing Trust Fund Act (H.R. 2895). Rep. Ron Paul’s (R-TX) push to have the Fed start releasing M3 data again (H.R.4892 ) is also urgent.

At the very least, we must frame the Bush administration’s war-making as a direct threat to the US economy, not to mention national security, and just like maxed out home buyers, confront our nation’s culture of debt.

Action Tips:

1. For online videos about the subprime issue and “Money as Debt,” visit Brasscheck TV (www.brasschecktv.com/page/135.html)
2. Check out two groups working on affordable US housing: the Community Land Trust (www.iceclt.org/clt/) and the National Housing Trust Fund (www.housingmatters.net)
3. Learn more about “America’s growing economic divide” Inequality.org (www.demos.org/inequality/index.cfm)
4. Concerned about predatory lending? So is The Center for Responsible Lending (www.responsiblelending.org/).

Heather Wokusch is the author of The Progressives’ Handbook series (www.progressiveshandbook.com)

What We Choose to Ignore

Chip — Sun, 26 Aug 2007 14:15:45 -0400

100 year old Bush family plan to dominate the world via Fascism, Theft and Genocide.

curthawley@curthawley.com — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 16:33:31 -0400

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6_K2F4-iaxo

1988-2004: The Submerging Democratic Majority

Gore4US — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 22:24:26 -0400

1988-2004 Election Analysis: The Submerging Democratic Majority http://www.geocities.com/electionmodel/TruthIsAllFAQResponse.htm#HistoricalElections

The Democrats actually won all FIVE elections by an average 8.9 MILLION vote margin. That’s the True Emerging Democratic Majority. Don't believe it? Run the numbers yourself.

This analysis is based on the 1988-2004 Election Calculator model. The model first estimates the number of returning voters by adjusting prior election recorded vote totals for uncounted votes and mortality. An estimated turnout percentage is applied to this value. As preliminary NEP vote shares were not available for 1988-2000, Final National Exit Poll shares (which were matched to the recorded vote) were assumed for the base case. In 2004, however, preliminary 12:22am "pristine" vote shares were available, so these were used instead.

The model used Census-reported total votes cast as the base case assumption. The pool of potential returning voters was assumed to include all who cast votes, rather than just those whose votes were recorded. Uncounted vote rates based on the Census are much higher than the assumed 3.0% rate in prior models. Another assumption change is the mortality rate. Annual voter mortality, estimated as 1.22-1.30%, is more accurate than prior models which assumed the total US 0.87% mortality rate.

The new base case assumptions had the effect of increasing Democratic vote shares compared to prior models. For example, the Election Calculator indicates that Kerry won by 53.0- 45.9%, a 9 million vote margin. The prior True Vote Model had Kerry winning by 52.6-46.4%.

Following are the key results based on AVERAGE CALCULATED 1988-2004 Vote shares:

- The Dem share was 3.8% HIGHER than the RECORDED share.

- The GOP share was 3.2% LOWER than the RECORDED share.

- The Dem share was 1.4% HIGHER than the PRELIMINARY Exit Poll.

- The GOP share was 0.1% HIGHER than the PRELIMINARY Exit Poll.

Voter turnout of prior election Dem, GOP and Other voters is calculated as:

Turnout = prior election (recorded vote + uncounted votes - voter deaths)* voter turnout percentage

The True vote for the Dem, GOP and Other candidate is calculated as:

True Vote = shares of returning (Dem + GOP + Other + New voters)

Summary Statistics (1988-2004)


	Calculated
	TRUE Vote			Exit Poll		Recorded			Calculated Dem
	Dem	Rep		Dem	Rep	Dem	Rep		Margin (mil)
Average	50.9%	43.0%		49.5%	42.9%	47.1%	46.2%		8.86

2004	53.0%	45.9%		50.8%	48.2%	48.3%	50.7%		8.96
2000	51.1%	46.0%		48.5%	46.2%	48.4%	47.9%		5.66
1996	52.0%	39.3%		52.2%	37.5%	49.9%	41.4%		13.36
1992	47.9%	35.0%		46.0%	33.1%	43.3%	37.7%		14.71
1988	50.2%	48.7%		49.8%	49.3%	45.6%	53.4%		1.61


1988-2004 Avg	Total	Dem	Rep	Other	Margin	Dem	Rep	Other	Margin
Calculated	111.5	56.76	47.90	6.86	8.86	50.9%	43.0%	6.2%	7.9%
Recorded	102.9	48.47	47.66	6.74	0.81	47.1%	46.2%	6.7%	0.9%
Prelim Exit poll	102.9	50.84	44.28	7.93	6.56	49.5%	42.9%	7.9%	6.6%
Discrepancies
Calc - Recorded	8.7	8.29	0.24	0.12	8.05	3.8%	-3.2%	-0.5%	7.0%
Calc - Exit poll		5.92	3.62	-1.07	2.30	1.4%	0.1%	-1.7%	1.3%
Exit - Recorded		2.38	-3.38	1.19	5.76	2.4%	-3.4%	1.2%	5.7%