Monthly Archive for October, 2006

BUSH’S CULTURE-OF-LIFE ADMINISTRATION HAS KILLED 655,000 IRAQIS.

Published
by
Peace Chicken
on October 11, 2006
in political
. 1 Comment

Yeah, you read that correctly.

655,000.

Three times as many people that died in the December 26, 2004 Tsunami. Plus the 2,751 US soldiers killed so far — that equals 657,751 people. Humans. Lives.

And this Administration calls themselves Pro-Life?

Huge rise in Iraqi death tolls

“An estimated 655,000 Iraqis have died since 2003 who might still be alive but for the US-led invasion, according to a survey by a US university.”

From BBC News

Bush’s response? “I don’t consider it a credible report.” Yes, Bush speaking on issues of credibility. But actually Mr. Bush, the report was funded by MIT, 2 of its authors are PhDs from the John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, another is an MD from the same school, and the 4th author is an MD from Al Mustansiriya University in Baghdad, Iraq. Kind of beats a C student whose dad bought his entry into Yale.

As is usually the case with significant news stories, you won’t see this on any mainstream news channels/websites/broadcasts because it’s not very convenient for the GOP election. They’re already drowning in a sea of hypocrisy and corruption right now, they can’t take anymore bad news. I suppose I can understand, I mean what’s so important about our country murdering 655,000 people? What matters is that Paris and Nicole are friends again!

Columbus Day: Honoring genocide, slavery, and greed

Published
by
Peace Chicken
on October 9, 2006
in political
. 0 Comments

I hate to always be a downer about things most people get excited about, but today is one “holiday” I particularly detest. Sure, lots of people get the day off (including AmeriCorps members.) But what is there to honor about Christopher Columbus? Is it really fair to say somebody “discovered” a land when there was already an entire population of people living there and other explorers had already come and gone? Or does it count as long as you label the people “savages?” Is somebody really a hero when they enslave and/or slaughter the entire island of Haiti? Columbus sent the first slaves across the Atlantic Ocean. Wow, such honor in that.

This great city is named after him and it’s such an insult. The Santa Maria replica sitting in the Scioto River is an insult. The teachers insult our children every year when they teach that this man was some sort of hero. Do some of your own research and see just what kind of man Christopher Columbus was and maybe you’ll think twice about how we define a hero and how much you should question the history we are taught as children.

Genocide is not heroic. Slavery is not heroic.

“Estimates of pre-Columbian [Haiti] population range as high as eight million people. By 1555, they were all gone… Haiti under the Spanish is one of the primary instances of genocide in all human history.”

From “Lies My Teacher Told Me” by James W. Loewen

Finally, some good news for Franklin County voters

Published
by
Peace Chicken
on October 6, 2006
in political
. 0 Comments

Franklin County has 1,653 more voting machines than in ’04

More than 2,800 voting machines will be set up on Nov. 7 in Columbus, more than the number deployed in all of Franklin County for the 2004 presidential election.

Two years after county officials drew up a distribution plan that critics said favored Republican-leaning suburbs at the expense of heavily Democratic precincts in the city, a new formula cuts the ratio of voters to machines for all but one Columbus polling place.

The big difference for 2006, though, is that Franklin County has 1,653 more machines to go around. More than two-thirds of them are bound for precincts within the city. The increased supply — nearly all suburban polling places will have lower voters-per-machine ratios as well — and newly relaxed absentee-voting rules mean those who cast their ballots on Election Day are unlikely to see a repeat of block-winding lines and hourslong waits of 2004.

Franklin County Board of Elections Director Matthew Damschroder predicted a “much different situation than we saw on Election Day ’04.”

A total of 4,451 voting machines will be used countywide in the Nov. 7 elections for governor, Congress, and local and state offices. There were 2,818 machines deployed in 2004.

Across Ohio, counties that bought new electronic-voting machines as part of a federally funded overhaul are required to have one for every 175 registered voters.

Franklin County received $12.3 million and spent another $2.8 million of its own to get the ratio down further. There’s now a machine for every 169 registered voters in the county, and one for every 138 voters considered active.

In 2004, Franklin County had one machine for every 229 active voters, and one for every 303 who were registered. On Election Day, an average of 169 used each machine.

Volume alone isn’t the only change for 2006. Franklin County officials also ditched a 2004 voting-machine distribution formula that took into account a precinct’s past turnout and subjective factors such as neighborhood residents’ interest in local races and ballot issues.

Politics played no role in the plan, they insisted, but postelection analyses found a small shift in machines from Columbus to the suburbs. Democratic precincts had 20 percent more active voters per machine than precincts where Republicans usually prevail.

A January 2005 report issued by Democrats on the U.S. House Judiciary Committee asserted that “the misallocation of voting machines led to unprecedented long lines that disenfranchised scores … of predominantly minority and Democratic voters.”

The elections board’s own postelection report called the allegation “untrue and baseless” but acknowledged that its partially subjective allocation invited criticism.

The agency vowed to use a strictly mathematical formula to distribute machines this year, and Damschroder, a Republican, and board of elections Chairman William A. Anthony Jr., a Democrat, said they kept the promise.

Inactive voters who have sat out recent elections but still haven’t been purged from the rolls were kept on precinct registration totals.

All 836 county precincts will get at least three machines, but allocations were kept as close as possible to a ratio of one machine for every 170 registered voters in a precinct.

No turnout figures or subjective measures were used, Damschroder said.

About half the precincts are over the average, but even the highest — a Forsythe Avenue polling place in the University District where there are 196 registered voters per machine — has a ratio smaller than the 2004 average that considered only active voters.

From today’s Columbus Dispatch

While we were all watching our reality TV…

Published
by
Peace Chicken
on October 5, 2006
in political
. 0 Comments

At least 17 U.S. soldiers have died in Iraq since Saturday.
Some reports are saying 21.

October 1st, 2006
Lance Cpl. Christopher B. Cosgrove III, 23, of Cedar Knolls, N.J., died Oct. 1 while conducting combat operations against enemy forces in Al Anbar province, Iraq.

Cpl. Aaron L. Seal, 23, of Elkhart, Ind., died Oct. 1 while conducting combat operations against enemy forces in Al Anbar province, Iraq.

Sgt. Mario Nelson, 26, of Brooklyn, N.Y., died in Hit, Iraq, on Oct. 1 from injuries suffered when a rocket-propelled grenade detonated near his vehicle.

Cpl. Chase A. Haag, 22, of Portland, Ore., died in Baghdad, Iraq, on Oct. 1 when an improvised explosive device detonated near his vehicle.

October 2nd, 2006
Monday saw four soldiers killed when their vehicle was obliterated by a roadside bomb in northwest Baghdad, as well as four soldiers killed by small arms fire in various other spots throughout the city. Including:

Staff Sgt. Joe A. Narvaez, 25, of San Antonio, Texas, died in Baghdad, Iraq, on Oct. 2 after being shot by enemy forces.

Pfc. Satieon V. Greenlee, 24, of Pendleton, S.C., died in Baghdad, Iraq, on Oct. 2 as a result of injuries suffered from enemy small arms fire.

Pfc. Michael K. Oremus, 21, of Highland, N.Y., died in Baghdad, Iraq, on Oct. 2 after being shot by enemy forces.

October 3rd, 2006
Staff Sgt. Jonathan Rojas, 27, of Hammond, Ind., died on Oct. 3 in Baghdad, Iraq, from injuries suffered from enemy small arms fire while performing security operations.

October 4th, 2006
Four U.S. soldiers patrolling in Baghdad were killed by gunmen on Wednesday, the U.S. military said.

President Mr. Bush,
You, your administration, and every member of Congress that voted for this war are now responsible for the death of 2,736 American soldiers. That’s a lot of blood on your hands. 2,736 families are forever changed and broken. Not to mention the THOUSANDS of Iraqi civilians being killed by death squads each month in a civil war you refuse to acknowledge or take responsibility for. All because of your ILLEGAL, IMMORAL, and POINTLESS war. I think by most definitions this makes you a mass murderer — not a leader — and no amount of praying will save you.

Weighing life: Stem cells vs. the Iraq war

Published
by
Peace Chicken
on October 2, 2006
in political
. 0 Comments

This op-ed from today’s paper is a great summary/explanation of the “War is Not Pro-Life” bumper sticker I have on my car. People read it and assume it means I want to kill babies. Actually, it means I don’t want to kill anybody and pro-life extremists should quit being warmongers because it doesn’t make any sense. Quite different.

What do you think?

From the Columbus Dispatch - Monday, October 2nd, 2006
By Michael Kinsley

It was, I believe, Rep. Barney Frank (D) Mass., who first made the excellent, bitter and terribly unfair joke about conservatives who believe in a right to life that begins at conception and ends at birth.

This joke has been adapted for use against various Republican politicians ever since. In the case of President Bush it appears to be literally true.

Bush believes deeply and earnestly that human life begins at conception. Even tiny embryos composed of a halfdozen microscopic cells, he thinks, have the same right to life as you and I do. That is why he cannot bring himself to allow federal funding for research on new lines of embryonic stem cells or even for other projects in labs where stem-cell research is going on. Even though these embryos are obtained from fertility clinics, where they would otherwise be destroyed anyway, and even though he appears to have no objection to the fertility clinics themselves, where these same embryos are manufactured and destroyed by the thousands - nevertheless, the much smaller number of embryos needed and destroyed in the process of developing cures for diseases such as Parkinson’s are, in effect, tiny little children whose use in this way constitutes killing a human being and therefore is intolerable.

But Bush does not believe that the deaths of all little children as a result of U.S. policy are, in effect, murder. He thinks that some, while very unfortunate, are also inevitable and essential. You know who I mean. Close to 50,000 Iraqi civilians have died so far as a direct result of our invasion and occupation of their country, in order to liberate them. The numbers are increasing: more than 6,500 in July and August alone. These numbers are from reliable sources and are not seriously contested. They include many who were tortured and then killed, along with others blown up less personally by car bombs and suicide bombers. The number does not include the hundreds of thousands who have died prematurely as a result of a decade and a half of war and embargoes imposed on the Iraqi economy. Nor does it include troops on both sides, most of whom are innocent, too. Last week the number of American troops killed in Iraq and Afghanistan surpassed the number of people who died in the 9/11 attacks.

Bush is right that the inevitable loss of innocent life in wartime cannot be a reason not to go to war or a reason not to fight it in a way intended to win. “Collateral damage” should be a consideration weighed in the balance. But there is no formula to determine when the balance is right. It does seem that both Iraq wars were started and conducted with insufficient consideration for the cost in innocent blood. Callousness, naivete and isolation - isolation of the decision makers from democratic accountability and isolation of citizens from the consequences, or even the awareness, of what is being done in their name - have played a role. I don’t see anything coming out of this war that is worth 50,000 innocent lives, although a case can be made, I guess.

But it is hard - I would say it is impossible - to reconcile Bush’s absolutism over allegedly human life when it is a clump of unknowing, unfeeling cells with his sophisticated, if not cavalier, attitude toward the loss of innocent human life when it is children and adults in Iraq.

In all discussions weighing the cost of something or other in terms of human life, a philosopher pops up and says that the crucial difference is a matter of intentions. Terrorists target innocent civilians. We try hard not to kill innocent civilians, even if we know it can’t be avoided. They’re worse, even if our score is sadly higher.

But are stem cells any different? Researchers don..t want to kill embryos. They know that the deaths of embryos are a consequence of what they do, and they think that curing terrible diseases is worth it - just as Bush thinks that bringing democracy to Iraq is worth it. In the case of stem cells, there is the added element that the embryos in question will be killed anyway (or pointlessly frozen indefinitely) if they are not used for research. And there is still the question of whether a clump of a half-dozen cells you can..t see without a microscope is a human being in the same sense as a 6-yearold girl blown up as she skips off to kindergarten in Baghdad.

A commander in chief who must face life-or-death questions deserves a bit of sympathy. I would sympathize more with Bush if his answers weren’t so preening and struggle-free. It is wonderful to be so morally pure that you won’t allow a single embryo to be destroyed in the quest for medical cures that could save lives by the thousands. You are way beyond Gandhi, sweeping the path ahead to avoid stepping on an insect: Insects have more human characteristics than a six-cell embryo.

And regarding Iraq, you are quite the man, aren’t you, “making the tough decisions.” A regular Harry Truman, consigning thousands to death in order to bring democracy and freedom and peace to millions. But Truman actually produced democracy and freedom and peace, whereas you want credit for your hopes. That’s not how it works. If you want to be the hard-ass, you get judged by results. And you can’t be Gandhi and Truman at the same time. Michael Kinsley writes for The Washington Post.