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___.COMPOSITION______In This Issue_______________________________
Anti-Bush Protests
Democrats.com Launches 'Share A Sticker' Site
American Citizen Arrested in Indiana for Bringing Sign Towards Cheney Event
Nick's Crusade Gets a Hearing Before the Alabama Legislature
Al Gore Was Absolutely Right About Bush - It's Time Al Got Some R-E-S-P-E-C-T
Bu$h 'Shift and Shaft' Budget Shafts New York City
Bu$h 'Shift and Shaft' Budget Shafts Children
Bu$h 'Shift and Shaft' Budget Shafts the Environment
European Parliament Votes to Ratify Kyoto Protocol
The Bushron Administration Began Its Battle Against Enron's Bankruptcy on Inauguration
Day 2001
Just Like Enron, the Bush Administration's Greed and Arrogance Will Ultimately Cause
Its Collapse
We Knew FDR - and W is No FDR!!
War without End, against a Shadowy, Ill-defined Enemy: That's Bush's Reelection
Strategy
Michael Vreeland Gave 9-11 Warning to Canadian Intelligence Agent Marc Bastien, Who
Was Then Murdered
If Ashcroft Had His Way, Would He Rid the Country of Nude Statues and Calico Cats?
Is Injustice Scalia a Member of Opus Dei?
Anti-Tax Leader Confesses to Diverting Campaign Funds to His Bank Account
Noelle Bush Is Getting Away with Drug Abuse, Deadly Driving and Perjury - Because
She's Jeb's Daughter and George's Niece
Betty Bowers Opens Halfway House Exclusively For Bush Children (Humor)
Americans Agree: Evil is Very Bad (Humor)
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__Anti-Bush Protests
On Monday 2/11, protest Bush in Milwaukee, WI.
http://legitgov.org/action.html
__Democrats.com Launches 'Share A Sticker' Site
Thanks to the continuing generosity of our members, Democrats.com has created a new
resource for Democratic activists called "Share A Sticker". These bumper stickers were
created by the members of Democrats.com. They are designed to be printed on regular
paper using your regular printer, and inserted in clear plastic sleeves, which are
available at any stationery store. You can then slide these "stickers" in and out,
changing your message as often as you like. Have fun - and tell your friends!
(Registration required)
http://community.democrats.com/filelibrary/index.cfm
__American Citizen Arrested in Indiana for Bringing Sign Towards Cheney Event
"Tonight I was arrested for nothing more than exercising my rights as a citizen in
what I thought was a free country. Dick Cheney came to my town to stump for one of the
Environmental Dirty Dozen, Indiana 8th District Congressman John Hostettler. I had
made up a sign which stated, 'CHENEY-19th Century Energy Man.' ... The main cop
informed me that if I did not go more than a block away to the area he apparently had
just arbitrarily decided was to be used by protesters, that I would be arrested. I
complied and started to walk away. When I turned to ask if it was OK to go to the
parking lot where hundreds of people were, either leaving work or arriving to attend
the event, he instructed his uniformed men to arrest me." So writes John Blair of
Evansville, IN. We demand an investigation of the suppression of the First Amendment
by the Bush-Cheney administration!
http://www.democrats.com/view.cfm?id=5837
__Nick's Crusade Gets a Hearing Before the Alabama Legislature
"Nineteen-year-old quadriplegic Nick Dupree of Mobile traveled to Montgomery on
Wednesday to tell legislators why Medicaid in Alabama should still pay for in-home
nursing care after he turns 21. But state Medicaid officials said the proposed bill to
continue benefits for Dupree and others won't work, and there's no money for it.
'You're in between a rock and a hard place,' said Dupree, who will turn 21 in a year
and two weeks. 'You can either stay at home without any care, hoping you don't die, or
you go to a nursing home, where the care you get will probably ensure that you don't
live.'... Dupree's motorized wheelchair, with a rear mounted ventilator connected to
him by translucent tubing, dominated the small meeting room inside the Alabama State
House on Wednesday, as senators intently listened to his testimony." So reports the
Mobile Register - and you can read Nick's own report here in Democrats.community,
where you can give Nick your personal support and encouragement.
http://community.democrats.com/forums/discussions.cfm?forumid=84&topicid=17201
__Al Gore Was Absolutely Right About Bush - It's Time Al Got Some R-E-S-P-E-C-T
"If it's open season on Gore all over again, we should give him credit for what he got
right. Maybe he couldn't connect with voters and maybe he was a stiff on camera.
Regardless, he sure knew what he was talking about with that 'people versus the
powerful' stuff. As inconsistent as it seemed with the political moment of 2000, it
has since proven an uncanny predictor of how the Bush presidency [sic] would unfold."
On the budget, campaign finance reform, health care, Social Security, and the
environment, Al Gore's warnings about Bush's extremism were right on the mark. This
"is yet one more reminder about how the incessant focus on the way politicians
campaign can crowd out even the slightest consideration of their ideas." So writes
Jonathan Cohn in The New Republic.
http://www.thenewrepublic.com/express/cohn020502.html
__Bu$h 'Shift and Shaft' Budget Shafts New York City
Bush has only delivered $11 billion of the $20 billion he promised NYC, and Bush's
budget contains no additional aid. "Mitch Daniels, the White House budget director...
first responded that he intended to count $5 billion in relief to victims of Sept. 11
as part of the aid package - a clear violation of everyone's understanding of what the
promise meant. Then he lashed out at New York's representatives, saying, 'It's strange
to me to treat this as a little money-grubbing game.' The White House quickly tried to
undo the damage. Mr. Daniels retracted his remarks, and Mr. Bush reiterated his
promise to provide $20 billion - just in time to have another photo op with New York
police officers and firefighters. But the money is still not in the budget... My guess
is that it comes down to sheer arrogance. Buoyed by those approval ratings, this
administration simply believes that its former promises don't matter." So writes NY
Times columnist Paul Krugman.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/02/08/opinion/08KRUG.html
__Bu$h 'Shift and Shaft' Budget Shafts Children
"Now that the Bush administration has taken the tarp off its proposed 2003 budget,
I've got one piece of advice for all you children of the future: Stay in the womb as
long as you can... As long as you are surrounded by amniotic fluid -- if you've simply
begun to subdivide and consist solely of a dozen cells -- you'll have health
insurance. That's a lot more than 40 million Americans (almost 11 million of them
actual children) can say... Post-born American children had better hope... they never
get sick; their parents will never need job protection or training; they live in a
region in which the weather makes housing unnecessary... Maybe there's a better option
for future children than staying in the womb. They should figure out a way to turn
themselves into F-22 fighter jets, AC-130U gunships or Hellfire anti-attack missiles,"
all part of Bush's $70 billion weapons budget. So writes San Francisco Chronicle
columnist Stephanie Salter.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2002/02/06/ED214691.DTL
__Bu$h 'Shift and Shaft' Budget Shafts the Environment
"The budget released Monday by the Bush administration - the nation's first deficit
budget in four years - is meeting criticism from all corners, particularly from the
environmental community. At a press conference this morning, representatives from
several conservation groups denounced the financial 'shell game' employed by the
administration to fund its priorities... 'When you go through the details,' said
Wesley Warren, senior fellow for environmental economics at the Natural Resources
Defense Council, 'there's a series of special handouts to special interests... The
budget provides an all you can eat buffet for Big Energy, and crumbs for energy
efficiency,' Warren noted. 'It would enrich the administration's energy industry
friends, foul our air and water, and do nothing to promote true energy independence.'"
So reports the Environmental News Service.
http://ens-news.com/ens/feb2002/2002L-02-05-06.html
__European Parliament Votes to Ratify Kyoto Protocol
Just days after the "state of the union" address by resident Bush, where the focus was
on military buildup, readying the nation for more war and ignoring the serious
environmental issues we face, the European Parliament voted OVERWHELMINGLY (540-4) to
pass the Kyoto protocol. Just last week, the UK and Germany announced their plans for
the development of wind and solar power projects to decrease their dependence upon
foreign oil and reduce emissions. Under Cheney-Bush-Enron, we are still focusing on
Nuclear, Oil drilling and tax credits to the big energy companies. America - let's get
with the program!
http://ens-news.com/ens/feb2002/2002L-02-06-04.html
__The Bushron Administration Began Its Battle Against Enron's Bankruptcy on
Inauguration Day 2001
BuzzFlash writes, "Political battles are often won or lost depending upon who defines
the terms of the debate ... Right now the White House has successfully argued that
Bush Incorporated is innocent of wrongdoing because they did nothing for Enron after
being notified of its impending bankruptcy last fall. But that is the wrong lens
through which to judge their Enron complicity: the question is what did the Bush
administration do to help Enron try to avoid bankruptcy from January 20th until the
fall of 2001? ... As soon as Bush raised his right hand at his inauguration, it was
hard to tell whether the White House was a subsidiary of Enron or Enron was a
subsidiary of the White House... The press and the Senate Democrats are debating the
wrong point. They are looking for a smoking gun after Enron's autumn calls to Bush
administration officials. But the smoking gun has been right there for them to see all
along. It was an Enron starter's gun fired off on Inauguration day."
http://www.buzzflash.com/editorial/2002/02/020802_Bush_Beds_Enron.html
__Just Like Enron, the Bush Administration's Greed and Arrogance Will Ultimately Cause
Its Collapse
"'Who cares if there were a hundred meetings?' sniffed Mary Matalin, chief
spokesperson VP Dick Cheney. In one phrase, she summed up the White House arrogance:
It's a financial scandal, not a political one. It has nothing to do with the Bush
administration. It doesn't matter how much money Enron gave George W. Bush, how many
former Enron officials work in the White House, or how many secret meetings Cheney
held with Enron executives in putting together his energy plan. Because there's no
proof that Enron ever got anything for its money or access. Wrong. Maybe there was no
proof before, but there is now; a secret memo -- personally handed to Cheney by Ken
Lay, which helps explain why the White House is so skittish about Enron and why Cheney
and Bush stubbornly refuse to release the records of those energy task force
meetings... Up until the very end, when it was too late to help, everything Enron
asked for from the Bush White House, Enron got." So writes CNN's Bill Press.
http://www.cnn.com/2002/ALLPOLITICS/02/06/column.billpress/index.html
__We Knew FDR - and W is No FDR!!
"By the time Bush gave his State of the Union speech, countless reporters and pundits
had proclaimed GWB and FDR to be kindred inspirational leaders... But the oft-repeated
analogy doesn't only give a monumental boost to Bush's image. It also -- subtly but
surely -- chips away at FDR's historic greatness, cutting him down to GWB's size.
Roosevelt's economic reforms embodied and strengthened grassroots struggles for such
basic goals as the right to form unions, collective bargaining, regulation of
business, progressive income tax, federal aid to the needy and programs like Social
Security. These are among the New Deal legacies that have long been under attack,
frontally or sneakily, from most Republicans. The more that reporters, commentators
and media-selected historians join the chorus linking Bush with Roosevelt -- as if
FDR's domestic agenda and his underlying values scarcely merit a mention -- the more
that the actual FDR fades into the mist." So writes columnist Norman Solomon.
http://www.fair.org/media-beat/020131.html
__War without End, against a Shadowy, Ill-defined Enemy: That's Bush's Reelection
Strategy
"War without end against a shadowy, ill-defined enemy. That's what we are being
offered, according to the most ominous State of the Union message in history,"
observes Jack Lessenbery of the Metrotimes of Detroit. (btw - The Metrotimes is suing
John Ashcroft over the outrageous treatment of Michigan resident Rabih Haddad in the
wake of 9/11). "What is clear is that our long national Clinton-era nightmare of peace
and prosperity is over. But if the Bush administration is not to blame, they are at
the very least attempting to sell us a bill of goods, and we need to pry open the
crate and check the contents."
http://www.metrotimes.com/editorial/story.asp?id=2939
__Michael Vreeland Gave 9-11 Warning to Canadian Intelligence Agent Marc Bastien, Who
Was Then Murdered
Michael "Vreeland claims he traveled to Moscow in the Fall of 2000 to obtain military
documents regarding Russian counter-measures to US anti-missile defence. His purpose
was to see they got into the hands of CSIS [Canada's CIA], and to fool Ottawa into
believing it was a Canadian discovery, so Canada and other allies might be inclined to
drop their objections to 'Star Wars.' His contact was a 'systems analyst,' Marc
Bastien, said to be a CSIS agent working out of the [Canadian] embassy [in Russia].
Vreeland [returned] to Toronto, where he was arrested on December 6 on an immigration
warrant. Only days after Vreeland's arrest by Toronto police, Bastien was found
[murdered] in Moscow... Among the Russian documents Vreeland says he retrieved was one
describing impending terrorist attacks in the United States, naming Osama bin Laden as
an agent and the World Trade Center and the Pentagon as likely targets." So reports
Canada's Frank magazine.
http://www.frankmag.net/storydetails.asp?storyid=93
__If Ashcroft Had His Way, Would He Rid the Country of Nude Statues and Calico Cats?
"Andrew Tobias, the financial writer and Democratic Party treasurer, had written...in
November that an Ashcroft advance team 'had shown up at the American Embassy in The
Hague to check out the digs, saw cats in residence, and got nervous. They were worried
there might be a calico cat. No, they were told, no calicos. Visible relief. Their
boss, they explained, believes calico cats are signs of the devil. (The advance team
also spotted a naked woman in the courtyard and discussed its being covered for the
visit, though that request was not ultimately made.)' Mindy Tucker, then Mr.
Ashcroft's press secretary, told me he had laughed and said it was silly...But then a
few days later, a friend…told me that the Art Deco statue of Justice, 12 feet high,
buxom and partly nude under a toga, which had been in the Great Hall since the
department was built as a W.P.A. project, had been hidden behind a 'blue-nosed blue
curtain'...Now it turns out the prudish curtains are a permanent fixture of the
Ashcroft era at $8,650."
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/30/opinion/30DOWD.html
__Is Injustice Scalia a Member of Opus Dei?
FBI double-agent Robert Hanssen was "a devout member of Opus Dei, an ultraconservative
Catholic organization. He was a regular parishioner of St. Catherine of Siena Church,
in a Virginia suburb of the capital, where an elite congregation, which includes
Supreme Court justice Antonia Scalia, attend traditional Latin masses... Opus Dei,
Latin for 'Work of God,' is a secretive lay group within the body of the Catholic
Church, with more than 80,000 members worldwide [Former FBI Director Louis Freeh is
also alleged to be a member]. As the only personal prelature in the Church, it is an
entity unto itself, separate from the diocesan structure." Scalia won't confess the
truth, but Americans who believe Scalia stole the Presidency for Bush need to know: Is
Scalia's first loyalty to the American people and the U.S. Constitution - or to the
Vatican and Opus Dei?
http://www.pacificnews.org/jinn/stories/6.31/010305-spy.html
__Anti-Tax Leader Confesses to Diverting Campaign Funds to His Bank Account
"As the driving force behind several tax-cutting initiatives, Tim Eyman has sometimes
been called 'unelected governor' of Washington State. But in a confession that stunned
his supporters and opponents alike, Mr. Eyman, a 36-year-old businessman, said today
that he had lied when he told reporters in recent days that he had never profited
personally from the fund-raising drives he conducted for his initiatives. At a news
conference this morning, Mr. Eyman fought back tears as he announced that he had
diverted at least $45,000 he had raised for his tax revolt…Mr. Eyman's confession came
after he faced persistent questioning from The Seattle Post-Intelligencer about his
diversion of $165,000 in campaign donations to a private account over which he had
sole control…he could be in legal trouble if he lied about it on disclosure forms,
said Doug Ellis, a spokesman for the state Public Disclosure Commission." Eyman's
weepy, self-flagellating confession brings to mind Jimmy Swaggart.
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/02/05/politics/05REFE.html
__Noelle Bush Is Getting Away with Drug Abuse, Deadly Driving and Perjury - Because
She's Jeb's Daughter and George's Niece
Once again, a Bush is getting away with a crime, thanks to powerful family ties. Jeb's
daughter Noelle, 24, was busted for trying to buy drugs. (Unlike the terror-supporting
pot users in Bush's TV ads, Bush family drug abusers don't buy drugs on the street.
Instead, they impersonate doctors and write themselves fraudulent prescriptions.)
Noelle then PERJURED herself in Florida court when she swore she had no prior arrests
- she WAS arrested for shoplifting lingerie in 1995 and paid a $305 fine. To conceal
her criminal record, Noelle gave Florida police a different Social Security number -
yet ANOTHER fraud. Noelle also received more than 12 driving tickets (including
driving 95 MPH in Palm Beach County) with 4 crashes, including one influenced by drugs
- why was she never arrested, or her license revoked? Call State Attorney Willie Meggs
at 850-488-6701 and demand that Noelle be prosecuted like any other drug abusing,
recklessly driving perjurer - for her own good, and ours!
http://www.gopbi.com/partners/pbpost/epaper/editions/saturday/news_c3b5f72b552622a000c3.html
__Betty Bowers Opens Halfway House Exclusively For Bush Children (Humor)
"America's Best Christian, Mrs. Betty Bowers has announced plans to open a halfway
house exclusively for George and Barbara Bush's grandchildren. 'We wanted it to be
available to others, but with the nursing shortage, we are probably going to be too
busy already just attending to the sundry addictions of America's First Family of
Politics,' said Mrs. Bowers as she cut the ribbon. 'Whereas White House occupant Betty
Ford opened a facility to keep Liza Minnelli off the street, this is a way of
returning the favor by – finally – providing a place for people in the White House to
dry out.'" Betty, you are SOOOO kind!
http://bettybowers.com/newsjeb.html
__Americans Agree: Evil is Very Bad (Humor)
"In an indication that President [sic] Bush has been effective in communicating his
message to the American people, a new survey released today indicates that a majority
of Americans now believe that evil is bad. Of those responding, 54% strongly agreed
with the statement, 'Evil is bad,' with 21% strongly agreeing with the statement,
'Evil is very, very bad.' By wide margins, those surveyed also agreed with the
statement, 'Evildoers are bad.' In one of the most persuasive pieces of data in the
survey, 87% agreed with the statement, 'Evildoers are bad because they do evil, which
is bad.' However, those responding to the survey still had some difficulty identifying
the three members of the 'Axis of Evil' whom President Bush identified in his State of
the Union Speech. Only 12% correctly identified Iran, Iraq, and North Korea, while 23%
incorrectly named Batman super-villains The Joker, The Riddler, and Catwoman." So
writes humorist Andy Borowitz.
http://borowitzreport.com/archive_rpt.asp?rec=171
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