I Am My Own God

Wow. The beer bit is really profound!

clipped from www.quotationspage.com For those who believe in God, most of the big questions are answered. But for those of us who can't readily accept the God formula, the big answers don't remain stone-written. We adjust to new conditions and discoveries. We are pliable. Love need not be a command or faith a dictum. I am my own God. We are here to unlearn the teachings of the church, state, and our educational system. We are here to drink beer. We are here to kill war. We are here to laugh at the odds and live our lives so well that Death will tremble to take us. Charles Bukowski US (German-born) author & poet (1920 - 1994)

The U.S. Applies Pressure on Iraq for its oil...or else!

This excellent article from Walrus Magazine of Canada, makes very important reading for anyone truly interested in the U.S. arm twisting and manipulations of the Iraqi government to convince them to give up their sovereignty of its own natural resource so the U.S. interests can control it. This is really a MUST READ.

clipped from www.walrusmagazine.com Mission Not Yet Accomplished In the Western media, the proposed law has generally been described as an “oil revenue–sharing law” — that is, a law that sets out how Iraq’s potentially massive oil revenues will be split among its warring ethnic factions, the Shiites, Sunni Arabs, and Kurds. But the law is actually about much more than that. It’s also about creating a legal framework for foreign investment in Iraq’s oil sector, thereby potentially reviving a dominant role for big multinational oil companies — a role they’ve been excluded from since a powerful wave of oil nationalism swept the Middle East in the 1970s and left the region’s bounteous reserves in the hands of national governments. Ultimately at stake is who will end up as chief beneficiaries of the immense treasure trove of black gold stored beneath Iraq’s sand: the country’s 27 million largely destitute citizens, or the owners of the wealthiest corporations on earth, otherwise known as Big Oil.

Report: Iran Would Suffer Up to 20 Million Casualties in Nuclear War With Israel

The report also points to Israel's Arrow missile defense system as an obstacle facing any Iranian strike.

Another scenario includes Syria coming to Iran's defense with chemical and biological warheads launched at Israeli targets. Up to 800,000 Israelis would be killed if that were to happen, according to the report. Syria, however, would be forced to grapple with the deaths of approximately 18 million of its citizens if Israel responded with its nuclear arsenal, the Post reported.

clipped from www.foxnews.com An estimated 16-20 million Iranians would die in a nuclear war with Israel, according to a report issued by a respected Washington think tank. The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) also estimates that between 200,000 and 800,000 Israelis would be killed, the Jerusalem Post reported. Click here to read the story in the Jerusalem Post. Click here to visit the CSIS Web site. The report, which is theoretical and based on limited verified knowledge of Israel's and Iran's nuclear capability, paints a bleak picture for both nations. It estimates that a nuclear war would last approximately three weeks and ultimately end with the annihilation of Iran, based on Israel's alleged possession of sophisticated and powerful nuclear weapons. The report does not predict the number of deaths due to nuclear fallout. It lists possible targets for an Iranian strike as Tel Aviv and Haifa, while the list of probable targets in Iran includes Tehran and Tabriz.

US missile shield 'could spark Russian missile strike'

Things seem to be getting "cold" again. Or is this another form of global warming?

clipped from www.abc.net.au The Russian army's chief of staff has accused the West of playing politics with European arms control and warned that the launch of US interceptor missiles could trigger a Russian missile strike. "Western states have deliberately turned an agreement on European arms control into an instrument to achieve political aims" against Russia, Yuri Baluyevksy said at a press conference broadcast on state television. Russia on December 12 walked away from the Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) treaty, a key Cold War agreement that limits the stationing of troops and heavy weapons from the Atlantic coast to Russia's Ural mountains. General Baluyevsky criticised the NATO alliance's eastward expansion to the Russian border but said Russia had "no plans for massing troops", despite now having the freedom to do so after suspending its adherence to the treaty. Russia said it pulled out of the CFE because of the failure of 26 NATO members to ratify the revised 1999 version of the treaty.

Israel fails to convince US of Iran's 'serious' nuclear threat

Maybe it has been decided that Iran isn't worth the effort, or that it just can't be afforded.

clipped from www.abc.net.au Israel has failed to convince the United States that Iran's nuclear program poses a serious and immediate threat, an Israeli Cabinet minister said, following publication of a US intelligence report. Internal Security Minister Avi Dichter criticised the US report published on December 3, that said Iran had put its nuclear weapon program on hold. He added that a US "misconception" could lead to a regional war. "We need to admit that Israel did not succeed in convincing the US leadership on the fact that an Iranian (nuclear) weapon threat is immediate and significant," Dichter, a former director of Israel's Shin Bet internal security agency, said in a speech near Tel Aviv. "It seems that what we put before them, how we presented it, wasn't persuasive enough," he said. "It's important for Israel to keep trying to convince with facts and intelligence data."

Zinn: 7 Conclusions About War

Historian and WWII bombardier Howard Zinn reflects on the anonymous ferocity of modern warfare

clipped from www.counterpunch.org One: The means of waging war have become so horrendous that no political end can justify war. Two: The horrors of the means are certain, the achievement of the ends always uncertain. Three: When you bomb a country ruled by a tyrant, you kill the victims of the tyrant. Four: War poisons the soul of everyone who engages in it, so that the most ordinary of people become capable of terrible acts. Five:Since the ratio of civilian deaths to military deaths in war has risen sharply and since a significant percentage of these civilians are children, then war is inevitably a war against children. Six: We cannot claim that there is a moral distinction between a government which bombs and kills innocent people and a terrorist organization which does the same. Seven: War, and the bombing that accompanies war, are the ultimate terrorism, for governments can command means of destruction on a far greater scale than any terrorist group.

Liberating Christmas from Christianity

Episcopal priest makes interesting argument

clipped from www.counterpunch.org There are some very good reasons why Christians should give up the fight to reassert ownership of Christmas and to stop resisting its so-called secularization. Neither Christmas nor anything it stands for originated in the Jesus movement or in the early Christian Church. In imperial Rome, the December 25 feast in honor of the Invincible Sun, Sol Invictus, was accompanied by the exchange of gifts, cutting of greens, lighting of candles, and public festivals commemorating new life. In the 4th century, the Christian Church, having been adopted by the Emperor Constantine, was rather suddenly transformed from a persecuted minority into the official imperial religion of Rome. The Church responded by importing the Jesus' birth narratives of Matthew and Luke into the feast of Sol Invictus and erased every reference to the pagan gods. To liberate Christmas from the clutches of Christianity would demonstrate a generosity of spirit on the part of Christians

Noam Chomsky on Anarchism, Marxism,and Future Hope

Great interview (1995) Read the full text for his interesting insights.

clipped from www.zmag.org Noam Chomsky is widely known for his critique of U.S foreign policy, and for his work as a linguist. Less well known is his ongoing support for libertarian socialist objectives. In a special interview done for Red and Black Revolution, Chomsky gives his views on anarchism and marxism, and the prospects for socialism now. The interview was conducted in May 1995 by Kevin Doyle. What is called 'capitalism' is basically a system of corporate mercantilism, with huge and largely unaccountable private tyrannies exercising vast control over the economy, political systems, and social and cultural life, operating in close co-operation with powerful states that intervene massively in the domestic economy and international society. That is dramatically true of the United States, contrary to much illusion. More than ever, libertarian socialist ideas are relevant, and the population is very much open to them. For an excellent collection of anarchist resources, please visit the All about Anarchism page.

Young Israelis Resist Challenges to Settlements

Via Phillip Weiss

clipped from www.nytimes.com SHVUT AMI OUTPOST, West Bank — For two months, Jewish youths have been renovating an old stone house on this muddy hilltop in the northern West Bank. The house is not theirs, however. It belongs to a Palestinian family. And their seizure of it, along with the land around it, for a new settlement outpost is a violation of Israeli law. The police have evicted the group five times, but they keep coming back. Israel has pledged that it will permit no new settlements in the territory it has occupied since the 1967 war, no more expropriation of Palestinian land and dismantle unauthorized outposts — like this one — erected since March 2001, but it has never applied the muscle needed to do so. So the settlers continue building a patchwork of communities to try to preclude the drawing of a border between Israel and a future Palestinian state. At the vanguard are the hilltop youth, teenagers like Yedidya, who work to complicate the demographic map ever more.

Bush Began Spying on Americans Feb. '01

Note this is well before 9/11, yet the official story by the administration is that it received no notification of any national threat, while in stealth it began comprehensive spying on American citizens, to which the telecom companies objected upon legal grounds as contrary to their obligations to protect consumer rights even from government demands.

Further consider that the government could have issued "warrants" for such if it indeed had any "probable cause" with specific evidence to justify it. The fact that Bush government did not issue warrants, or attempt to get them, proves it was trying to circumvent the law, and the Constitution, to spy on Americans secretly, in order to do so in stealth.

Such a secret pattern by government, before 9/11, could be regarded as evidence of secrecy and providing for its own security, not against foreign terrorists, but from the American people at large, whom its surveillance plans desired to freely sift through.

clipped from www.nytimes.com “What he saw,” said Bruce Afran, a New Jersey lawyer representing the plaintiffs along with Carl Mayer, “was decisive evidence that within two weeks of taking office, the Bush administration was planning a comprehensive effort of spying on Americans’ phone usage.” N.S.A. officials met with the Qwest executives in February 2001 and asked for more access to their phone system for surveillance operations, according to people familiar with the episode. The company declined, expressing concerns that the request was illegal without a court order. Other N.S.A. initiatives have stirred concerns among phone company workers. A lawsuit was filed in federal court in New Jersey challenging the agency’s wiretapping operations. It claims that in February 2001, just days before agency officials met with Qwest officials, the N.S.A. met with AT&T officials to discuss replicating a network center in Bedminster, N.J., to give the agency access to all the global phone and e-mail traffic that ran through it.

The Secret To Raising Smart Kids

clipped from articles.mercola.com More than three decades of scientific research suggests that repeatedly telling children that they are especially smart or talented leaves them vulnerable to failure, and fearful of challenges. Children raised this way develop an implicit belief that intelligence is innate and fixed, making striving to learn seem less important than seeming smart; challenges, mistakes, and effort become threats to their ego rather than opportunities to improve. However, teaching children to have a “growth mind-set,” which encourages effort rather than on intelligence or talent, helps make them into high achievers in school and in life. This results in “mastery-oriented” children who tend to think that intelligence is malleable and can be developed through education and hard work. This can be done by telling stories about achievements that result from hard work. Talking about math geniuses who were born that way puts students in a fixed mind-set, but descriptions of great mathematicians who developed