t r u t h o u t || George W. Bush, the Frightened Man

t r u t h o u t || George W. Bush, the Frightened Man: "It is not terrorism that motivates George, or patriotism, or even profiteering. It is fear, pure and simple: Fear of the truth, fear of the world, fear of any data that collides with his faith-based bubble-encapsuled worldview, and fear most of all of the people he would represent."

DenverPost.com - Fueled by Fourteeners

Aron Ralston, who will always be known as the "guy who cut off his hand" becomes the first person to solo all the fourteeners in calendar winter. Quite an achievement. I think I've done about five (in winter that is... I have climbed all 54). Last year he completed the Leadville Trail 100 mile race (I dropped out at the 87 mile point).

DenverPost.com - EXTREMES: "Much of what the world has yet to learn about Aron Ralston can be summed up in a quote from international mountain climber Walter Bonatti.

'Mountains are the means, man is the end,' Bonatti said. 'The goal is not to reach the tops of mountains, but to improve the man.'

The quote is posted on a link to Ralston's website, titled 'My Colorado 14ers Project: Winter Soloing Colorado's 14,000-foot Peaks.'"

Condoleezza Rice | Calvin Trillin

The Nation | Column | Condoleezza Rice | Calvin Trillin:

DEADLINE POET by Calvin Trillin

Condoleezza Rice

(Sung to the tune of 'March of the Siamese Children,' from The King and I, and accompanied by the Secretary herself on the baby grand.)

Condoleezza Rice, who is cold as ice, is precise with her advice. Yes, she is quite precise, and, yes, she's cold as ice.
In her can be found talents that abound. She's renowned, though tightly wound. Yes, talents can be found, and, yes, she's tightly wound.

She once avowed we might see a large mushroom cloud if more reign by Hussein were allowed.
Which turned out to be: total bushwa, yes, total bushwa.
When she accused him of buying tubes only used to make nukes, the truth was abused.
And she knew she spoke: total bushwa, yes, total bushwa.

So to serve her guy, she will testify to a lie she hopes you'll buy--to try to petrify, precisely tell a lie.
Condoleezza Rice, who is cold as ice, is precise with her advice. Yes, she is quite precise, and, yes, she's cold as ice."

The Nation | Article | Patriotism Is Nonpartisan | George McGovern

The Nation | Article | Patriotism Is Nonpartisan | George McGovern: "There is a notion abroad in American politics, carefully crafted by its proponents, that is both disturbing and false. It is especially disturbing to me personally because it is frequently associated with my campaign for the presidency in 1972. The notion is that my party, and especially its standard-bearer of '72, are not interested in the defense and security of America. Nor, according to this notion, do we care about marriage and the family, the sacredness of human life and the things of the spirit. Perhaps my views are outdated, but I have always assumed that every American cares about these values; consequently, they are not issues for partisan exploitation."

Traveling the World

When I finish running marathons in the 50 states and Canada, maybe I'll follow in this fellow's footsteps...

Canada's Wild Rivers

I get very upset when I read about new dams being constructed on Canada's wild rivers. Once you build a dam it's forever. One by one the great wild rivers of the north are being destroyed for a few hydroelectric power plants. Why can't we make do with less? Why can't we conserve energy. Whatever happened to conservation?

This account by the NRDC of pristine rivers in Manitoba is disturbing.

I read another article recently about a river in Quebec about to be dammed. I can't find the magazine right now, but Robert F. Kennedy, Jr made a special trip to this special river to highlight its importance. Unfortunately the local populace is in favor of the dam in the shortsighted "profits" of $100/person that they hope to realize. If the river was allowed to remain free the tourism could easily swamp those returns.

Who is the winner of the Iraq War?

Iran and its mullahs are biding their time, quite happy with the prospects available to them in the wake of our demise in Iraq.

Former Terrorism advisor and author of "Against All Enemies", Richard Clarke weighs in with this article in last Sunday's NYT Magazine.

A blend of risks makes dollar's outlook grim

I've said it before: the twin deficits of our ballooning trade imbalance and our domestic budget deficit brought on by wacky tax cuts for the richest 1% will bring disaster to our country. It will happen within Bush's term, which he had hoped to push off on the next administration. History is now for Mr Bush.

International Herald Tribune: A blend of risks makes dollar's outlook grim:

"Is the writing on the wall for the U.S. dollar? Researchers at one big fund manager say it is, but the markets haven't read along just yet."

Remove Tom Delay's Feeding Tube

Hypocritical and Unethical:

Removed feeding tube from his own father

Molly Ivins on the real Tom Delay.

Hasn't talked to his own mother and family in years. So much for "Family Values... Buzzflash analysis

I'd like to see this in the tabloids. 

The Seattle Times: Nation & World: Device lets you out-Fox your TV

The Seattle Times: Nation & World: Device lets you out-Fox your TV: "It's not that Sam Kimery objects to the views expressed on Fox News Channel. The creator of the 'Fox Blocker' contends the network is not news at all."

Chad and Bryan near Noname Creek, about three miles up the Barr Trail (halfway to Barr Camp) 

The turn around point of my run this morning. 

Barr Camp take 2 

Barr Camp  

Me as I approach the Bottomless Pit sign about nine miles and 4000 feet elevation gain into my run this morning 

The Wesleyan Argus - Hersh speech blasts Bush and war policy

The Wesleyan Argus - Hersh speech blasts Bush and war policy:

"'We'll do something in Iran,' Hersh said. 'The Bush administration has long been planning it. This is the worst presidency and the worst war at the worst time in history that I can see. The Congress does not stand up to Bush. Their problem is that they're down 20 IQ points a man since the 1960's.'

While his lecture gave a pessimistic view of the next four years, he did offer hope for the upcoming Congressional elections. In the last election, he noted an emerging pattern in the West, which he called community building. Our government needs new leadership, he said. The people need to support better politicians and than work to get these people elected. "

United States of Jesus

William Rivers Pitt on the United States of Jesus.

Watching America

Since our news is now so insular and biased it is only natural that a web site would come to the fore that highlights articles on America from the foreign press: I'll be checking Watching America often.

I finish the first race. The next race is to the Philly Airport. Barely made the flight still dressed in my marathon clothes!Web page I made on the Ocean Drive Marathon.  

Travelling the World: Running Marathons

I just booked a ticket to Fargo, ND to run the marathon there on May 14th. I'm already booked to run a marathon on April 30th in Delaware and another marathon on June 4th in Deadwood, SD. These will be number 35, 36, and 37 marathon states....

LA Weekly: Film: The Devil Certainly

LA Weekly: Film: The Devil Certainly

Lieutenant General Roméo Dallaire can still smell Rwanda. He wrote about this in his 2003 memoir, Shake Hands With the Devil, and it’s written on his face too — the unrelenting stench of the 800,000 bodies that rotted in mass graves, filled the streets of Kigali and dammed the Kagera River over 100 bloodstained days in 1994. Dallaire knows the smell because he was there, from August 1993 until September 1994, as the sometimes Head of Mission and full-time Force Commander of the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda. What transpired, he would later write, was “a story of betrayal, failure, naiveté, hatred, genocide, war, inhumanity and evil” — one which Dallaire didn’t merely observe, but in which he played a leading role. He is, as many now know, one of modern history’s great and tragic witnesses, not just for what he saw, but for his accurate prediction of it and his ultimate inability to prevent it. He is, simply put, the boy who cried genocide. And it has taken much of the world the better part of a decade to respond to his call.

“The 10th anniversary was a great catalyst. It’s funny how we’re so Cartesian,” Dallaire says, speaking in clipped language that carries the echo of the many man-made tragedies, from the Holocaust to Hiroshima, that have endured similar intervals before gaining due recognition. In other words, we think about the genocide, therefore it is.

“In my opinion,” Dallaire continues, “these catastrophes — the human-led ones — are so shrouded in the political, in the residual ethnicities of the groups that have been affected and so on, that many of those who have been the targets themselves don’t speak much. They’re still living with it, wherever in the world they may be. And those who are still in the seat of power or close to it are also not particularly keen on this stuff getting out. You need a sort of purging area. I’ve estimated that it takes about five years — that’s when you’ve had enough change and enough key people are out of the decision-making processes that you can actually get them to talk.”

The New York Times > Magazine > The Politics of Ibrahim Parlak

This is a very sad testimony on the state of affairs in our nation. How has it come to this when a successful immigrant with a patriotic past, standing up for his nation (the Kurds) is branded a terrorist.

The New York Times > Magazine > The Politics of Ibrahim Parlak: "How is it that two groups of individuals -- Parlak's small-town friends and the U.S. government -- can look at one man, at one case, at one situation and come to such disparate conclusions? Are his friends so close to him that they can't see what might have been ugliness in his past? Or is the government so intent on proving that it's tough on terrorism that it has lost its moral bearing?"

'Honor Killings' Show Culture Clash in Berlin

'Honor Killings' Show Culture Clash in Berlin: "A 23-year-old single mother seeking to escape tradition and religious constraints, Surucu was the sixth Muslim woman to have died in the German capital since October in suspected 'honor killings,' slayings arranged by families who believe that their reputations have been stained.

Such crimes are rarely mentioned in Germany's newspapers. "

Yahoo! News - Law Bush signed as Texas governor prompts cries of hypocrisy

Hypocrit in charge: GWB


Yahoo! News - Law Bush signed as Texas governor prompts cries of hypocrisy

The federal law that President Bush signed early Monday in an effort to prolong Terri Schiavo's life appears to contradict a right-to-die law that he signed as Texas governor, prompting cries of hypocrisy from congressional Democrats and some bioethicists.

In 1999, then-Gov. Bush signed the Advance Directives Act, which lets a patient's surrogate make life-ending decisions on his or her behalf. The measure also allows Texas hospitals to disconnect patients from life-sustaining systems if a physician, in consultation with a hospital bioethics committee, concludes that the patient's condition is hopeless.

Response to a question I sent to sistani.org: the web site of the Grand Ayotollah Sistani, the theocrat who controls the Iraqi Shiites. 

ABC News: Grizzlies Encroaching on Polar Bear Country

ABC News: Grizzlies Encroaching on Polar Bear Country

March 16, 2005 — The polar bears of the far north, already suffering from food shortages that appear to be the result of global warming, may have to make room for a fierce competitor. Grizzly bears, among the baddest dudes on the continent, may be invading the high Arctic.

If so, it's hard to say who will come out on top because polar bears aren't exactly slouches when it comes to defending their turf.

But it will mean a resource that is already in decline, mainly seals, will be in even greater demand as these behemoths fight it out on the frozen shores of islands that are so far north that the northern lights are actually to the south.

We're talking 74 degrees north and above, so far up there that it's really on top of the world. Until the last few years it was an endlessly frozen landscape, but warming temperatures have reduced the floating ice that normally affords polar bears a base from which to capture seals when they surface for air. Some researchers believe the giant white bears are already in decline, and face a possibly bleak future.

So the last thing they need is competition.

The 1816 Congress Hall Hotel, where we are staying. 

Steve by the seashore: Cape May New Jersey. Here to run the Ocean Drive Marathon on March 20th. 

Steve and Rebekka by the seashore, Cape May, NJ, March 18th. 

Interview: Bonnie M. Anderson

Bonnie M. Anderson Newsflash: "Call me old school. Call me old fashioned or a dinosaur, but I think government should be about protecting the Bill of Rights. Government should be truthful to the American public, and not about trying to manipulate the public and, in this case, also manipulating the media."

Raw Story: Scott Ritter Interview

The more I read about this guy, Scott Ritter the more impressed I am with him. I wasn't sure back in the daze before the Iraq War, because I was sucked into the whole propaganda thing about WMDs and at the time I thought it was a good idea to invade Iraq. Well, I was wrong...he was right. The trouble with the Bushevic true believers is that they have lost their ability for critical analysis, that is, if they ever had it!! They can't think! They just blindly repeat the talking points laid on them by the R Limbaugh's and the Bill O'Reilly's of the Fake News right wing media machine.

Former UN weapons inspector, who worked with CIA, hits neocon ‘brownshirts

Pikes Peak. The "scar" is visible as a white slope just right of and below the summit. 

View of Pikes Peak from my bedroom window. 

Colorado Springs and Pikes Peak this morning 

Sam the Wolfdog on our run in Colorado Springs this morning 

Legacy of the Repuglicans

What the acquiescence of Republican supporters have made possible:

• Imprisonment without trial

• Abrogation of the Geneva Convention

• Torture as standard operating procedure for the US Army

• The end of minority participation in the legislative process

• The end of a transparent election process

• Gulags in Cuba, Egypt, and Afghanistan

• Free-speech “Zones”

• Publicly-financed propaganda

• One party media

• Public policy directed by CEO

• Pre-emptive invasion of other sovereign countries

• Refusal to participate in a World Court

• Legislation directed at enriching supporters from the public coffers

• Rewriting of environmental laws by polluters

• Orwellian legislation of "Clear Skies" and "Healthy Forests" that call for more air pollution and rampant logging of old growth forests

• Twin ballooning deficits of trade and domestic that threaten to implode our economy; at this pace in thirty-five years every dollar of revenue will be required to pay interest on the debt

• "No Child Left Behind" with no funding

Ann Coulter: Torture is good

More David Podvin 3/14/05

Ann Coulter is not merely eighty pounds of toxic sewage wrapped in six feet of reptile skin - she is the vicious ghoul that remains after conservatism has been scrubbed of its camouflage. Satan’s concubine has been vocal in her belief that torturing anyone identified as the enemy is good, and that torturing them using the most excruciating techniques is better. Coulter is not alone in the desire to feast on human suffering. Although she is considerably less circumspect than other right wingers, it is instructive that not one prominent conservative has repudiated her.

Last night I worked a mid-shift for an exercise at Air Force Space Command. For the first time in my 23-yr career I briefed a 4-star general (Gen Lord, commander of AF Space Command).

Today I disassembled my laptop just to replace the bottom which was cracked. The crack had prevented the battery from properly seating, so I had been forced to use AC at all times. This has been an adventure. I ordered the bottom on EBay, paying a nice $20 including shipping. That was just the beginning. After removing all the screws from the bottom it would not come off. A trip to Compusa ended in frustration as the technician refused to give me any advise, holding out for $149.95 for their fee to work on it. I told him not only no, but hell no. That was too much money for a four-yr-old laptop. So began the adventure. Over the next week I would partially disassemble it three times, before reaching success today. Ultimately, I had to completely disassemble it into pieces, even removing the system board.

Key to the success was the purchase of a $15 electronics tool kit from Radio Shack and printing out the Compaq maintenance manual from the HP online site. This manual was not easy to find though as HP recently took over all of Compaq's operations. Now I am the proud owner of a fully functioning laptop, four extra screws, and another part of unknown origin. 

George W. Bush, The Last Relativist Timothy Noah

More proof of our mental lightweight in charge:

George W. Bush, The Last Relativist Timothy Noah:

An Oct. 29 New York Times piece by Nicholas Kristof reported:

Characteristically, he does not believe in evolution--he says the jury is still out--but he does not actively disbelieve in it either; as a friend puts it, "he doesn't really care about that kind of thing."


As a matter of policy, Bush told The Associated Press last Nov. 14:

I'd make it a goal to make sure that local folks got to make the decision as to whether or not they said creationism has been a part of our history and whether or not people ought to be exposed to different theories as to how the world was formed.

t r u t h o u t - Burn-Area Logging Starts after Protests

Keep on the alert. Pay attention. This is what your administration (the Bushevics) is doing to your wilderness.

t r u t h o u t - Burn-Area Logging Starts after Protests:

"Selma, Ore. - Loggers began cutting down trees inside an old growth forest reserve burned by the 2002 Biscuit fire on Monday after authorities hauled away protesters trying to block access.

Five lumberjacks toting chainsaws, axes and fuel cans hiked past the protest site in the Siskiyou National Forest and a short while later the roar of chainsaws and trees crashing to earth could be heard. Authorities arrested 10 people and towed a disabled pickup draped with an Earth First! banner.

About 50 protesters assembled in the Siskiyou National Forest before dawn, first at a green steel bridge across the Illinois River, and later at the pickup truck barricade in an attempt to stall logging that had been made possible by the expiration of an injunction.

'We have no laws in our forest so we will be the law,' said Joan Norman, 72, of Selma, before Forest Service officers picked her up in her lawn chair that had blocked a logging road bridge."

Rebekka and Jose on the Ute Trail, Sunday, March 13th. 

Bekka dust the field to the top of the scar on Saturday, March 12th. Cheyenne Mtn is on her right shoulder. 

The scar on Sunday morning, March 13th. 

Bock Sheep on the scar above Colorado Springs: March 12. 

John points to Pericle Rock near "Bottomless Pit" on Pikes Peak: a 5.12 rock climb he vows to complete this summer. 

Jose, John, and Sam the Wolfdog, with Queens Canyon and Castle: Saturday, 12 March. 

Jose and Rebekka on top of the scar, with Queens Canyon in foreground, Pikes Peak in background: Saturday, 13 March. 

t r u t h o u t - Halliburtons Spoils of War Exposed by Whistleblower

t r u t h o u t - Halliburtons Spoils of War Exposed by Whistleblower: "Halliburton subsidiary KBR got $12 billion worth of exclusive contracts for work in Iraq. But even more shocking is how KBR spent some of the money. Former U.S. Army Corps of Engineers official Bunnatine Greenhouse is blowing the whistle on the Dick Cheney-linked company's profits of war."

In The Northwest: Teresa Heinz Kerry hasn't lost her outspoken way

Teresa Heinz Kerry understands what went down the last election:

In The Northwest: Teresa Heinz Kerry hasn't lost her outspoken way: "COUNTING THE VOTES: Heinz Kerry is openly skeptical about results from November's election, particularly in sections of the country where optical scanners were used to record votes.

'Two brothers own 80 percent of the machines used in the United States,' Heinz Kerry said. She identified both as 'hard-right' Republicans. She argued that it is 'very easy to hack into the mother machines.'

'We in the United States are not a banana republic,' added Heinz Kerry. She argued that Democrats should insist on 'accountability and transparency' in how votes are tabulated.

'I fear for '06,' she said. 'I don't trust it the way it is right now.'"

EPA Distorted Mercury Analysis, GAO Says (washingtonpost.com)

EPA Distorted Mercury Analysis, GAO Says: "The Environmental Protection Agency distorted the analysis of its controversial proposal to regulate mercury pollution from power plants, making it appear that the Bush administration's market-based approach was superior to a competing scheme supported by environmentalists, the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office said yesterday.

Rebuking the agency for a lack of 'transparency,' the report said the EPA had failed to fully document the toxic impact of mercury on brain development, learning, and neurological functioning. The GAO urged that these problems be rectified before the EPA takes final action on the rule."

The Center for Food Safety - Genetically Engineered Crops

The Center for Food Safety - Genetically Engineered Crops: "The genetic engineering of plants and animals is looming as one of the greatest and most intractable environmental challenges of the 21st Century. Already, this novel technology has invaded our grocery stores and our kitchen pantries by fundamentally altering some of our most important staple food crops.

By being able to take the genetic material from one organism and insert it into the permanent genetic code of another, biotechnologists have engineered numerous novel creations, such as potatoes with bacteria genes, 'super' pigs with human growth genes, fish with cattle growth genes, tomatoes with flounder genes, and thousands of other plants, animals and insects. At an alarming rate, these creations are now being patented and released into the environment.

Currently, up to 40 percent of U.S. corn is genetically engineered as is 80 percent of soybeans. It has been estimated that upwards of 60 percent of processed foods on supermarket shelves--from soda to soup, crackers to condiments--contain genetically engineered ingredients.

A number of studies over the past decade have revealed that genetically engineered foods can pose serious risks to humans, domesticated animals, wildlife and the environment. Human health effects can include higher risks of toxicity, allergenicity, antibiotic resistance, immune-suppression and cancer. As for environmental impacts, the use of genetic engineering in agriculture will lead to uncontrolled biological pollution, threatening numerous microbial, plant and animal species with extinction, and the potential contamination of all non-genetically engineered life forms with novel and possibly hazardous genetic material."

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Buffett attacks American spending junkies

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Buffett attacks American spending junkies:

"Warren Buffett, one of the world's most successful investors, has launched his most withering attack to date on the US trade deficit, describing Americans as 'rich spending junkies' who could turn into a nation of 'sharecroppers'.

"In his annual letter to investors in Berkshire Hathaway, the fund he has run for more than 30 years, Mr Buffett painted a bleak picture of a future US in which ownership and wealth had continued to move overseas, leaving the economy in thrall to foreign interests and faced with financial turmoil and political unrest.

He said his performance last year had been 'lacklustre'. He explained his mounting bet against the dollar in terms of a spiralling US trade deficit - which, he warned, may be approaching crisis point.

Mr Buffett said Berkshire had built a $21.4bn (�11bn) position in foreign exchange contracts, spread among 12 currencies. He said little appeared to have been done to tackle the problem, despite constant calls for action from 'hand-wringing luminaries'.

"'Without policy changes, currency markets could even become disorderly and generate spillover effects, both political and financial,' Mr Buffett warned. 'Such a scenario is a far from remote possibility that policymakers should be considering now,' the billionaire said, though he conceded policymakers' 'bent, however, is to lean towards not so benign neglect'.

"The 74-year-old told investors he 'tap-danced to work' and promised them this year's meeting of investors would be another 'Woodstock for capitalists'. However, on the subject of the US trade deficit, his passions appear to be stirred. 'This force-feeding of American wealth to the rest of the world is now proceeding at the rate of $1.8bn daily.'"

Conservation is unpatriotic!! 

FT.com / Home UK - Buffett bets against dollar

This has been my successful strategy for the last year as well:
FT.com / Home UK - Buffett deepens dollar worries

Steve and Chaz at Mountain View