Guest guest Posted December 29, 2005 Report Share Posted December 29, 2005 Thu, 29 Dec 2005 10:48:11 -0500 (EST) OpEdNews; GIs and Sex in Iraq, Greenback threat and Housing Bubble about to Burst rob click here to read articles listed below. http://www.opednews.com/flyer/news_20051229.html OpEdNews Sex in Iraq, Greenbacks in Trouble and the Housing Bubble on the Verge of Bursting We have some powerful and fascinating articles today-- on GI's in Iraq and Sex, on the danger to the greenback, the coming burst of the housing market bubble, and pleny of Bush bashing (which, to me, seems more and more to be a natural, normal biological phenomenon, like bowel movements.) Developing the New OpEdNews Website Feature Today, the regular columnist archive has progressed a bit. It's now listed chronologically. It looks better in firefox, but we should have the same look in explorer today. It's currently a very slow load. It's not your internet access. It's the way we're counting the number of stories for each author. That will be corrected today also. The list will be left justified and will be single spaced. There will also be a link to the writer's article archive added at the end of every article. Subject Pages Coming Soon New articles are now being categorized according to subject in preparation for later February or early March, when we'll be adding over 50, possibly even more than 100 new pages to OpEdNews-- special subject pages on numerous topics. The articles and links are being categorized NOW, so when the pages go live, we'll have content for them. RSS Feeds Coming Soon We definitely intend to have RSS feeds from OpEdNews by the end of the first quarter of 2006. The first quarter will introduce MAJOR enhancements to OpEdNews. I'll be telling you more about them in the days to come. The plans include YOU. The goal is to make OpEdNews a unique hybrid community with articles, blogging and sharing of information and resources. Newest Articles By Stephen Soldz The Sex Lives And Sexual Frustrations Of US Troops In Iraq Over 100,000 young adult US troops are in Iraq for long tours of duty. Yet, virtually nothing is known about their sex lives while there. This lack of knowledge interferes with a full accounting of the costs of the occupation to Iraqis and to the occupation troops themselves. By Mike Whitney Doomsday For The Greenback Guerilla warfare will take many shapes in the coming century. As the battles continue to rage in the Middle East and Central Asia, the greenback is bound to come under fire from global adversaries who disapprove of Washington's militarism By Andy Ostroy Unbelievable: Bush's Illegal Spying Could Free The Very Terror Suspects It's Jailed And Hopes To Convict The Busheviks' continue to defy the law and make America less safe. By Anthony Wade This Is Our Lives On Holiday As the holiday season winds down, it is time to refocus on where we were and more importantly, where we are going. The rest of our lives await, as we beg to dream of taking our country back. By Cindy Sheehan 2006: The Year The Chickenhawks Will Go Home To Roost By Stu Steinberg ACCORDING TO BUSH: THE CONSTITUTION IS " JUST A GODDAMN PIECE OF PAPER. " The President has violated the Foreign Intelligence Suveillance Act. The US Supreme Court has held that the President does not have either constitutional or inherent powers to order domestic surveillance without a warrant, even when national security might be involved. By Robert Koehler Values In Shrink-Wrap It's time for a new public dialogue about the holidays. So I throw the question open: What do you do to reclaim the season's spirit and free its values from the shrink-wrap? Let me know. Maybe we can start a movement. By Liz Rich No Wonder Bush Won Some leavening humor from Liz Rich, political blogger par excellence. By Randolph T. Holhut THE BEGINNING OF THE END OF THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION 2005 will likely go down in history as the year the Bush administration fell apart for good. By Mary Pitt The Great Medicare Maze A critique of Medicare, Part D By Press Release REVIEW OF RESEARCH CHALLENGES ASSUMPTION THAT SUCCESS MAKES PEOPLE HAPPY: HAPPINESS MAY LEAD TO SUCCESS VIA POSITIVE EMO Personal and professional success may lead to happiness but may also engender success. By Robert Parry Robert Parry's Year-End Letter The United States is facing a political crisis almost unparalleled in our history, a crisis uniquely dangerous because at its center it is not about a loss of power but about a loss of principle – and even morality. By Doug Thompson GOP Disillusionment With Bush Increasing While die-hard Republicans try to present a unified front in support of President George W. Bush's evasion of the law and Constitution in ordering nonstop spying on Americans, splits are showing in the GOP ranks. By David Swanson White House Leaked Classified Intelligence To Make Its Case For War A new report looks into instances in which the Bush Administration leaked classified information to support its case that Iraq was a threat to the United States. Best News Links from the Web Please go to www.opednews.com to view these articles. Most Valuable Progressives Of 2005 The year is ending on a much better note than it began -- thanks to the courage and conviction of elected officials, activists and organizations. The Fuse Is Lit Iraq's " elections " have just been hailed as a major victory for Islamic funadamentalists in what the State Department has declared " the most active state sponsor of terrorism " in the world. But not to worry; the Bush >cough!< " Administration " has turned back the clock on centuries of foreign policy development " ...to deter and defend against the threat before it is unleashed " , vowing that, " to forestall or prevent hostile acts by our adversaries, the United States will, if necessary, act preemptively. " Charlotte Observer: Voting Machine Woes Grow As Deadline Nears The good news is, counties will have an easy time deciding where to purchase new voting machines. The bad news: they've only got one choice. State officials last month certified two vendors to sell equipment in North Carolina under new rules, but one -- Diebold Election Systems -- dropped out last week after saying it could not comply with some requirements. Counting On Diebold: The Provider Of Utah's New Voting Machines Faces Allegations Of Bad Security " It scares me to death, " said Summit County Commissioner Sally Elliott. " The recount machines aren't even invented yet and an election is coming upon us. … The state is buying those machines, but they're not finished yet, not tested. " Polling Irregularities: High Tech Voting Hasn't Served California Well Honest and accurate elections are crucial to the democratic process, and if electronic voting can improve our elections, then the state should embrace it. But for now, that remains an open question. Meanwhile, the state has spent millions ditching a reliable system in favor of a costly and problematic replacement. It's enough to make you miss those old punch cards. How One Effective And Largely Unsung Congressman Beat The President. George Miller is the most important Democratic tactician you've never heard of. In the past year, there has been precisely one lengthy profile of him inside Washington, and none in any of the major national papers. And yet, in an environment where Democrats have been almost wholly stymied by the Republicans' iron grip on power, Miller has repeatedly come up with innovative ways to defend progressive interests. " They have so corrupted the rules of the House of Representatives that you essentially have to engage in guerilla activity to try … to get a vote on a matter, " says MillerGeorge Miller is the most important Democratic tactician you've never heard of. In the past year, there has been precisely one lengthy profile of him inside Washington, and none in any of the major national papers. And yet, in an environment where Democrats have been almost wholly stymied by the Republicans' iron grip on power, Miller has repeatedly come up with innovative ways to defend progressive interests. " They have so corrupted the rules of the House of Representatives that you essentially have to engage in guerilla activity to try … to get a vote on a matter, " says Miller What You Should Know About Web Searches Doing a search in Google or seems as easy as falling off a log. You just type in a word, and almost instantly you get a page of links to Web sites that bear some relevance to that search term. But too often your search results aren't exactly what you'd like. Irrelevant links can clutter the page, especially when your search term is ambiguous. If you type in " chips, " the search engine has no way of knowing whether you mean computer chips, potato chips or chocolate chips. In fact, when I tried searching Google for that term a few days ago, the top result was a reference to the old " CHiPs " TV show. A few simple tips and tricks can help you get much more out of a Web search without becoming a professional researcher. Some are better techniques for general searches, others are simple ways to do more-targeted searches, which can often yield answers, rather than merely links. Madison, WI: New Voter Registration System Falls Flat Municipal clerks around Dane County are finding the state's costly new voter registration system maddeningly slow and unwieldy. In fact, pilot testing of the program has virtually ceased while bugs in the system being developed by contractor Accenture LLC are worked out. Dealing With A Modern King George It is ironic that this country should rebel against one King George only to bow down before another monarch of the same name more than 200 years later United States Of Angst: Americans Stressed, Depressed, Polls Show One long term survey shows that personal misery among Americans is at its highest levels since the early 1990s, with people saddled with woes over healthcare, unemployment, paying bills and romance. Why Get A Warrant?: The President's Admission That He Authorized Warrantless Domestic Surveillance The reasons that the Constitution and federal statutes require warrants in the first place and the value of having someone outside the executive review whether probable cause to believe a crime is being committed exists. The Progressive: The Dalai Lama Interview Q: What are the sources of terrorism, and what is its solution? The Dalai Lama: Initially, terrorism was a certain mixture of politics, economics, and religion. Now, it seems that terrorism is more individual and done to avenge personal grudges. So there are two kinds of terrorism. Just after September 11, some reporter asked me why terrorism happens. I told him that my view is that such acts are not possible unless you have very strong hatred and very strong willpower and determination. That tremendous hatred comes from many reasons... Ruth Coniff: Impeachment Buzz Wand political leaders who countenanced the Clinton impeachment over a semen-stained dress, somberly intoning about the " rule of law, " consider impeaching Bush beyond the pale? No sense at all. The question about impeaching Bush has nothing to do with legal grounds, and everything to do with politics. But in the last few weeks, the political climate has been changing, so that more people are seriously considering whether Bush has committed one or more impeachable offenses. The revelations about Bush's spying on Americans through the NSA helped change things a bit. A New Role For Religion In The Middle East In such an atmosphere of fear and distrust there is one thing that makes a huge difference in developing relationships between enemies. That is the power of gestures that are made across civilizations. What we do is what defines us most and everyone waits for the space of uncertainty between enemies to be filled by deeds. Most of that space is filled by extremists while the rest of us cower and remain silently baffled. It need not be the case. Turkey Hosts New Talks On Thwarting Bird Flu Istanbul - A bilateral and regional cooperation framework to prepare for an avian flu pandemic was discussed by Israeli, Jordanian and Palestinian health and veterinary officials in Istanbul on Wednesday. Mark Crispin Miller Speaks In Oregon On Book Tour On The Reality of Election Fraud, How to Confront It and Save American Democracy. Mark C. Miller spoke to Portland voters on his book tour in November. His speech is reproduced here. By God, Another Awful Bush Appointment Washington is a town where the best and the brightest usually coexist with well-connected political hacks. However, the Bush administration has taken promotion of the latter to embarrassing extremes, selecting unqualified people for posts because of their political loyalty and ideological persuasion. The most recent example of this was the appointment of Paul Bonicelli to be deputy director of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), which is in charge of all programs to promote democracy and good governance overseas. Kremlin Reasserts Control Of Oil, Gas " While there may be confusion over the long-term domestic impact of Putin's policies, there seems little doubt that direct control over Russia's vast petroleum resources offers the Kremlin substantial foreign-policy clout in an increasingly energy-starved world. " Don't Use Form Letters In Action Pages-- They Turn Off Recipients Those fill in your name and address messages to congress and the press don't work if you paste the same message in verbatim. They need you to write your own message (the way OpEdNews action pages work) Florida Class Action Lawsuits Update On Diebold From the Coalition for Visible Ballots: Volusia County (FL) joins Leon in dumping Diebold. Due to contractual non-performance and security design issues, Leon County (Florida) supervisor of elections Ion Sancho has announced that he will never again use Diebold in an election. He has requested funds to replace the Diebold system from the county. John Nichols: Censuring Bush Requires Citizens' Help As President Bush and his aides scramble to explain new revelations regarding Bush's authorization of spying on the international telephone calls and e-mails of Americans, the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee has begun a process that could lead to the censure, and perhaps the impeachment, of the president and vice president. " To Call This An Imperial Presidency Is Unfair To Emperors " What we have now is not a robust executive but a reckless one. COLE: The Top Ten Myths About Iraq In 2005 Juan Cole, one of the most incisive analysts of the situation in Iraq, lists the top ten myths about that country that he sees promulgated in the U.S. media. Cole is a fierce critic of the war and the administration that is waging it, but he's also a nuanced thinker who challenges conventional wisdom on all sides. Here are the myths he debunks -- check out his blog for his explanations. Tell The Truth About The War Video - Unembedded: Four Independent Photojournalists On The War In Iraq Truth, it has been said, is the first casualty of war. In the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, official truth died months before the bombing of Baghdad began. Unembedded bears witness to the enduring power of independent journalism. In their unflinching look at war-ravaged Iraq, four freelance photojournalists show that life there is brutal yet poignant; that compassion co-exists with anger, hatred and fear. By gaining the confidence of Iraqi civilians and insurgents, these photojournalists have brought back images of life in wartime, from beauty parlors and joyful wedding scenes to the carnage of civilian casualties, the heartbroken faces of grieving parents, and the glassy-eyed shock of parentless children. The News About The News: More Media Decline In 2005 We are all under attack — some from bombs, others from bullet points. The media system has become a battlefield of competing values and often the absence of any values. 2005 was a year in which the media not only brought us news but also became part of the news as scandals usually associated with government and politicians rippled through the media companies, their boardrooms and newsrooms. IMF [under Ashcroft] Approves Loan For Iraq; Let The Oil Drilling Begin The International Monetary Fund (IMF) approved a $685 million loan for Iraq on December 24. Now the country's war torn economy will be fully integrated into the global economy -- indefinitely. The reconstruction of Iraq will soon be open to even more industrialized nations and interests. Iraq will not be sovereign or independent in the near future, even if President Bush says so. The country's financial future will instead be dictated by a new colossal economic occupation, complete with ground forces, tanks, foreign military bases and the like -- all thanks to the United States, Britain and the IMF. [Occupied? You ain't seen occupied yet!!] Scandals: Six 'conspiratorial' And Six Not Six of the scandals about the US government that are currently making the rounds of the Internet are simply breathtaking. No one has ever heard of a democratic government being so bold in harming its own people, and thus there is an automatic reluctance (or refusal) to accept these. Here's a list of horrible things that 'they' are doing to us: If You Cherish Your Rights, Alito Bears Questioning When Samuel Alito was a Justice Department lawyer in the 1980s, he wrote that he saw no legal problem with a police officer shooting and killing an unarmed 15-year-old who was fleeing from a $10 burglary. Israel And The Neocons, The Libby Affair And The Internal War The national debate, which the indictment of Irving Lewis Libby for perjury and obstruction of justice has aroused in the mass media, has failed to address the most basic questions concerning the deep structural context, which influenced his felonious behavior. The most superficial explanation was that Libby, by exposing Valerie Plame (a CIA employee), acted out of revenge to punish her husband Wilson for exposing the lies put forth by Bush about Iraq's " importation " of uranium from Niger. Other journalists claim that Libby acted to cover up the fabrications to go to war. The assertion however raises a deeper question -- who were the fabricators of war propaganda, who was Libby protecting? FISK: Telling It Like It Isn't I FIRST REALIZED the enormous pressures on American journalists in the Middle East when I went some years ago to say goodbye to a colleague from the Boston Globe. I expressed my sorrow that he was leaving a region where he had obviously enjoyed reporting. I could save my sorrows for someone else, he said. One of the joys of leaving was that he would no longer have to alter the truth to suit his paper's more vociferous readers. Request Seeks List Of Muslim Homes, Businesses, Mosques Targeted Under Secret Program A prominent national Islamic civil rights and advocacy group today announced the filing of a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for all government records relating to a secret government program that monitored the radiation levels at more than 100 Muslim homes, businesses and mosques in the capital region and in other areas nationwide. A Vietnam War Veteran's Iraq Message Upsets Army Recruiters As those thinking of becoming soldiers arrive on the slushy doorstep of the Army recruiting station here, they cannot miss the message posted in bold black letters on the storefront right next door... " Remember the Fallen Heroes, " the sign reads, and then it ticks off numbers - the number of American troops killed in Iraq, the number wounded, the number of days gone by since this war began. Conservative Association Says Santorum Made '180-degree Turn' On Intelligent Design -- Turn On Him A conservative organization that touts itself as a supporter of traditional values blasted Sen. Rick Santorum for his withdrawal of support for the Dover Area School District's unconstitutional intelligent design policy. " Senator Rick Santorum's agreement with Judge John Jones' decision ... is yet another example of why conservatives can no longer trust the senator, " the American Family Association of Pennsylvania said in a news release Friday. Chalabi Lacks Votes Needed To Win Spot In Iraqi Assembly Unexpectedly low support from overseas voters has left Ahmed Chalabi -- the returned Iraqi exile once backed by the United States to lead Iraq -- facing a shutout from power in this month's vote for the country's first full-term parliament since the 2003 invasion. CIA Probes Renditions Of Terror Suspects The CIA's independent watchdog is investigating fewer than 10 cases where terror suspects may have been mistakenly swept away to foreign countries by the spy agency, a figure lower than published reports but enough to raise some concerns. Appeals Court Said To Hear DeLay Request The state's highest criminal court has agreed to hear Tom DeLay's latest request for a quick resolution to money laundering charges that forced him to give up his leadership post in the U.S. House, his spokesman said Tuesday. Secret Surveillance Up Sharply Since 9/11 On Bush's Secret Orders Conflicting Separation Of Power Laws Federal applications for a special U.S. court to authorize secret surveillance rose sharply after the September 11, 2001, attacks, and the panel required changes to the requests at an even greater rate, government documents show. Enron Accountant To Testify Vs. Executives HOUSTON - A prime defendant in Enron Corp.'s criminal trial has struck a deal with prosecutors and agreed to testify against the fallen energy giant's two top executives, according to a person familiar with the negotiations. [Estimates are at $1 Billion to Disassemble Former Energy Brokerage Enron, One of RNC's Largest Contributor's Who Wined and Dined Bush Campaign While Screwing Investors and Employees] Grass Fires Scorch Oklahoma & Texas Drought and windy conditions help set the stage for the wildfires, which authorities believe were mainly set by people ignoring fire bans and burning trash, shooting fireworks or tossing cigarettes on the crunchy, brown grass. Israeli Jets Hit Militant Base In Lebanon BEIRUT, Lebanon - Israeli jets attacked a Palestinian militant group's training base near Beirut on Wednesday, slightly wounding two guerrillas, hours after an Israeli border town was hit by rocket fire. Making Stuff Up " Move America Forward, " somehow has information about WMD's that the White House doesn't. The Swiftboating has begun for '06. U.S. Ends Release Of Oil From Reserves The United States, Europe and Japan recently stopped releasing oil and gasoline from their strategic reserves as fuel prices retreated from record post-hurricane highs. The release of reserve oil in September helped to stamp out speculation that was driving up prices... Defense Lawyers In Terror Cases Plan Challenges Over Spy Efforts Defense lawyers in some of the country's biggest terrorism cases say they plan to bring legal challenges to determine whether the National Security Agency used illegal wiretaps against several dozen Muslim men tied to Al Qaeda. [bush Admin Bail-Out will be High...eight years and what do you get? Destroyed democracy and deeper in debt...] http://www.opednews.com/flyer/news_20051229.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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