A Cry from Guantanamo

Why I oppose a fence on the Mexican border

Jaguar's habitat will be restricted: HCN: Bordering on Crazy!

Borderlands Jaguar Detection Project

Other wildlife will suffer: Audubon Magazine: Border Jumpers

Also, it won't work anyway. It will be billions more of money we don't have, wasted.

Hullabaloo:

But I try to remain optimistic about the future of the country, and though it's at times damn near impossible, people like Lt Cdr Andrew Williams make it easier. He was a JAG officer in the Naval Reserve who resigned his commission because the America he believes in doesn't torture.

Gary Snyder, former Beat poet, has an important new essay: Writers & the War against Nature

Truthout Video: Naomi Klein on the Shock Doctrine

DailyKos: An Inconvenient Timeline: Cheney Fights for Global Warming

The Incline, Manitou Springs, Colorado
Steps carved into the red rock, Red Rock Open Space, Colorado Springs

Andrew Sullivan: The Torture Tape implicating Bush as a War Criminal

Elizabeth Kucinich talks about Voting Integrity

Elizabeth Kucinich - Politics and Religion

Since it is obvious that the Bush Crime Family is using propaganda and lies and fear tactics to deceive us into wreckless wars we need to look to the past for more deceptions perpetrated on the American people in order to be on guard for future False Flag terrorist events.

Daniele Ganser, professor of contemporary history at Bale University (Switzerland) is interviewed on NATO's Hidden Terrorism.

Google Video: BBC documentary on Operation Gladio: Behind False Flag Terrorism and 9/11

Fela Kuti - Teacher Don't teach Me No Nonsense

Fela Kuti in performance (1971)

If you want to see a passionate African for justice check out the documentary "Fela Kuti: Music is the Weapon".

Happy Christmas (War Is Over)

Christmas w/ Mike Gravel

Barr Camp Run on the Solstice

Naomi Klein

New Orleans under the Shock Doctrine

If you've read Naomi Klein's "The Shock Doctrine" you will know the script. If you haven't read it yet you need to so ASAP. She blogs on HuffPost about the current situation in New Orleans. Amy Goodman on Democracy Now! the War and Peace Report has been reporting all week on the destruction of public housing in New Orleans along with the protesters being tasered and pounded by police. This is our Orwellian world now. Thanks America for voting for Bush twice!! The dumbest fucking country in the world.

The Gravelian Rebellion

Dem.Pres.Candidate Gravel at J/J Dinner in Vegas 11/15/07

Mike Gravel - Converting Vegetarians

Mike Gravel, Nobody's Kooky Old Uncle

Them Bones playing Dynaflow (by Art Pepper)

Twelve Days of Kantmas

The Revolution Will Not Be Televised: Gil Scott Heron

Rational Response Squad: The Triumph of Reason

Guernica: Six Stories edited by Francis Goldman

Is junk media making you sick???

Bush Blog 2: SCHIP Veto

Bush Blog 3: Wiretap

Bush Blog: Scooter Libby

Repost, but needs to be seen again. Classic.

Bishop's Castle

An hour and half south of Colorado Springs in an obscure corner of the Wet Mountains an eccentric by the name of Jim Bishop is hard at work building a castle.

High Country News: Wake up to the West, Wannabe Presidents.

The Story of Stuff

This morning on the Barr Trail

Longs Ranch Road is a long uphill slog on the slopes of Pikes Peak. Spaced about 12 minutes apart at my pace are three J-Pipes. Longs Ranch eventually tops out before dropping down to join the Barr Trail.

Pikes Peak from upper Longs Ranch Road

Shooting War, a graphic novel set in Iraq in the year 2011, has been chilling readers and making headlines about its vivid and surreal depiction of the war zone. Alternet reviews it here.

The Pacific Crest Trail

When I retire... PCT, AT, CDT

The Crazy Ones

Lance Armstrong-The Inspiration

The End of the World

rx2008 is back and he is great.

Our Depraved Justice System, (Continued)

Evidence of Innocence Rejected at Guantanamo

Extraordinary Manitou

My home town Manitou Springs, Colorado on Springs Culture Cast

Our depraved justice system

The signs of fascism are evident and alarming. Without habeas corpus we have no rights. If you don't defend the despised among us they will come for you later. Wake up. They will come for you. The good Germans thought they were free. Until the Gestapo came knocking on their door because they were an intellectual or because they expressed their opinion.

Laila Al-Arian speaks out on "My Family's Nightmare" on her father, Sami Al-Arian's ordeal under the Bush regime's war against the Constitution. The documentary of her father's ordeal, "The U.S. vs. Al-Arian" has won three awards. It needs to be seen more widely. Germany went from a democracy to a totalitarian nightmare in a matter of months after Hitler garnered 31% of the vote. The Reichstag Fire came less than a month after Hitler was sworn in. The alarm was immediately sounded that Communist "terrorists" were amongst the German people and that all measures had to be undertaken to fight against the shadowy "terrorists". Rights were readily given up. Any country will have 25 - 30 % of the populace who are Right-Wing-Authoritarian Followers who espouse sloganeering like "My Country Right or Wrong" and other jingoistic nonsense. The danger comes when they take power. That is where we are now. We are on the brink of becoming a fascist state. Unless we speak out forcefully against injustice we are in dire danger of going down the slippery slope. IT CAN HAPPEN HERE.

Read the transcript of a discussion following a showing of the movie in Tampa Bay, Florida: The scene of the Show Trial.

An Excerpt (concerning the two of the ten jurors who refused to acquit on several counts):

"They wouldn't tell us why they said guilty," the juror said. "They came up with really bad reasons, but most of the time it was 'I don't have to tell you. I don't even need a reason. I can just say he's guilty because I think he's guilty, and that's all'."

Both Ron and another juror interviewed in the 100-minute documentary said that prosecutors tried to pressure them to convict my father by essentially telling them, "Use your common sense." Actual proof was an afterthought.

Annie Lennox sings on AIDS in South Africa.

Longevity -- Eat Less

One day after returning from his first visit to Iraq, Virginia Sen. Jim Webb called again for ``robust regional diplomacy” and suggested the impact of President Bush’s troop surge has been overstated.

The human face to our depraved policies: 'I will never leave Guantanamo'

Run to the Horns on N. Cheyenne Mtn

Though I was supposed to be the "guide" for today's mystery run up to the Horns the weather gods had something else in mind. When I stepped out of my house at about 6:30 this morning my feet went out from under me on the slick ice and I went horizontal with a sudden screaming pain in my shoulder as it slammed into the stone stair. I proceeded intrepidly the rest of the way down to street level, but prudently decided not to attempt driving down the sheet of ice that had been Ruxton Avenue. I called John Courtney to say I was not going to make it, but he said he'd come pick me up because he had studded snow tires. I started walking down Ruxton staying to the side off the slick pavement where possible. When I got down to the Cog an employee told me that no one could make it up Ruxton and that he had walked. Sure enough as I got down near the Miramont Castle there was a line of about 20 cars idling -- unable to go up or to turn around. I met John at the Loop. Just down the road a City Bus had slid into a garbage truck on Canon Ave. We arrived at Old Stage Road at 10 till 8, saw John Genet's vehicle and started up the road.

About half a mile up Old Stage Road we climbed up an embankment and were on the Sunrise Trail. No sign of any new footprints though and I figured the rest of the party had just run up Old Stage Road.

We reached the old abandoned toll road in about 45 minutes and after several switchbacks were at the restaurant ruins in another 20 minutes or so. We had only been there about 10 minutes when Eric B. and Rich M. came around the corner. Rick H. And John G. were not far behind. They had quite a time mostly bushwacking up to the old toll road since they never found the trail. After poking around the restaurant ruins I took them up to my the house on the top of the mountain where I plan to move after I retire.

This web site has some more info and history. I couldn't find much more on the Internet on the history of the restaurant. Maybe Penrose Library or Tuft Library on the CC campus would have more.

Today's pictures are here.

Mike Gravel: Power to the People -- Give Peace a Chance

Colorado Springs Culture Cast producer Craig Richardson interviews Peggy Shivers, founder of the Shivers Fund at the Pikes Peak Library District. She had done a lot for our community. This is what is possible from leaders and philanthropists who truly care about their community.

The Oil Drum: Worst Case Scenario

Is Waterboarding Torture? Graphic Protest of Mukasey

Pakistan's Gun Market

Who owns Dennis? The American people!

Frederic Chaubin, who was born in Cambodia of a French father and Spanish mother, is chief editor of the French magazine Citizen K, and also a photographer who has been attracted by strange architecture in the former Soviet Union. The photos he takes in countries like Lithuania, Ukraine, Russia, Belarus and Georgia, reveal an extraordinary, almost sci-fi world. Today, PingMag takes you to the world of Soviet style architecture with Frederic Chaubin himself.

I found this site from Collective Perception

Top of High Drive: Dan V., John G., me, and Rick H. about midway through a four-hour run this morning.

In chilly 10 degree temps, we started at Memorial Park, Manitou Springs at 7 A.M.; wound our way up Crystal Park Road to the Intemann Trail, joined the Red Rock Loop to High Drive, ran to the top of High Drive, picked up the Buckhorn Trail, and looped back on the Jones Park Trail--about 24 miles.

Ski the 14ers

Chris Davenport skis all 54 of Colorado's 14,000 foot peaks in one winter.

John Fogerty: I Can't Take It No More

Revolving Door: jazz performance: Art Pepper

Some info for you

I'm watching Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos on Charlie Rose as he talks about the new Amazon Kindle book reader device they released today. I'm wondering about the "paper-like" display that has been tauted for years now. Have they achieved it? I'm ready. I will be the first to storm the gates. Way ahead of the I-Phoners. I am a reader. Make it readable on a screen and I am in like Flynn.

Running the Numbers
An American Self-Portrait

This new series looks at contemporary American culture through the austere lens of statistics. Each image portrays a specific quantity of something: fifteen million sheets of office paper (five minutes of paper use); 106,000 aluminum cans (thirty seconds of can consumption) and so on.

Excellent Amazon review of Lou DuBose's: Vice: Dick Cheney and the Hijacking of the American Presidency

Robert D. Steele

This book is vastly more detailed, and covers more high crimes and misdemeanors, than either State of Denial, which misunderstands Bush as being in charge, or Crossing the Rubicon, which focuses primarily on Cheney's role in first permitting 9-11, and then working assiduously to cover up his malicious malfeasance. See also Ron Susskind's book, "One Percent Doctrine," which crucifies Cheney, Rumseld, and Rice.

I take this book so seriously that I urge everyone to get the "Do It Yourself Impeachment" kit. He should be required to immediately resign or be impeached. He should not be allowed to serve another month in office.

For the sake of brevity, here is a list of impeachable offenses documented by this book:

1) Secret meetings in violation of the law to include exclusion of government experts
2) Refusal to honor demand from Congress for a list of participants
3) Lies to the public about Iraq, while holding maps of oil fields and already having in mind a US-only domination of those oilfields (he first focused on Iraqi oil while serving Secretary of Defense Brown)
4) Over-ruling of the Environmental Protection Agency on very important matters including its concern over Halliburton's reliance on hydraulic fracturing that uses chemicals that contaminate aquifers--Cheney personally ensured that the EPA's wording was replaced with Halliburton's wording.
5) Consistent and pervasive usurpation of Congressional authorities and consistent and maliciously deliberate avoidance of appropriate disclosure.
6) Fostered attacks on Sy Hersh, and considered authorizing a break-in on his home.
7) From the 1970's, see also Ron Susskind's One-Percent Doctrine, subverted the authority of the Vice President, Nelson Rockefeller, and teams with Justice Scalia (then an assistant attorney general) to increase executive privileges and push back reforms.
8) As a Congressman personally blew off Russian offer in 1983 for arms cuts, and subverted the authority of the President and the Secretary of State then serving.
9) As an extremist Republican, supported Ollie North and the White House in violating the Congressional prohibitions on aid to the Contras, and obstructed justice thereafter.
10) Page 78 has a lovely discussion of how Cheney and North were "in the zone" in deceiving the public and Congress during the televised hearings.
11) Adopted as his own the lunatic report by Khalizad (who is a very lazy scholar, see my review of his rotten RAND book on revolution) and Libby, on how the US as a superpower should be able to do ANYTHING.
12) Attempted to undermine due process and keep tactical nuclear weapons in the Army inventory.
13) Subverted the authority of the Secretary of State (Colin Powell) by allowing his daughter to overrule Ambassadors and meet privately with various heads of state.
13) Lied repeatedly to the public about his continuing financial equities with Halliburton, and was so involved in giving Halliburton up to 16 billion in no bid contracts.
14) Shut both foreign competitors and more cost-effective indigenous contracting solutions, severely harming the national security of the United States by fostering an environment of unproductive looting by Halliburton, Bechtel, and others.
15) Ignored his dual mandates on terrorism and intelligence. The book suggests that Bush was not briefed on Al Qaeda for the first eight months he was in office (the Vice President's priorities were energy and missile defense).
16) Personally impeded negotiations with North Korea after they proved amenable to diplomatic engagement.
17) Personally rejected Iranian overtures for negotiation conveyed by the Swiss in 2003
18) Personally reinforced Rumsfeld on use of torture, by-passing the President's more measured restrictions.
19) Conspired with Speaker Hastert to subordinate the House of Representatives, using a special office of his own (first time in history) so that Representatives could be brought to him rather than his calling on them.
20) Manipulated the President into numerous "signing statements" inconsistent with the will of Congress that ignored legislation then in force.
21) "Bureaucratically emasculated" the President (page 177--if the President has a friend that reads this review, PLEASE get the book and the review to the President--he really may have no idea his balls have been cut off)
22) Contemptuous and manipulative of the CIA, refusing to accept their best professional judgments based not only all source intelligence, but on a extraordinary effort by Charlie Allen in running line crossers into Iraq to document beyond a shadow of a doubt that there were no weapons of mass destruction there.
23) Lied repeatedly, over and over, to the public, to Congress, to the President, to foreign leaders, even after the lies were exposed he continued to repeat them.

The book does not discuss the 9-11 situation and emerging findings that place the Vice President at the center of our deliberately inept response.

Two gems apart from the impeachable offenses:

1) The search for a Vice President was a complete fraud, he was picked from day one, and made a fool of every serious candidate, while also personally leaking to destroy Keating just to ensure the only real rival would not be considered at the last minute.

2) The discussion of Joe Lieberman's refusal to confront Cheney with all that was known to be wrong with him was explained at the time as "taking the high moral road." I am not so sure. I speculate that Lieberman is actually a neo-con and has been playing the Democrats for fools while minding the interests of his Wall Street masters.

On page 147 the authors discuss how Cheney accused Clinton and Gore of "extend[ing] our military commitments while depleting our military power." Lovely. And now?

The authors conclude that Dick Cheney is "nakedly amoral." I agree.

One final scary note: in the many doomsday drills that Cheney participated in across his career and inclusive of his Vice Presidency, they always failed to reconstitute Congress.

Dick Cheney has done more damage and is a greater threat to our Republic and others, than Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein combined.

Marlene Dietrich : Sag Mir Wo Die Blumen Sind

A Pete Seeger classic auf Deutsch

Pete Seeger-Waist Deep In The Big Muddy

Pete Seeger on the Smothers Brothers 40 years ago. He keeps singing and stays on message his life long.

A HuffPost Project: Posterizing the GOP

Another Huffpost from my brother Doug: Drought and the Power of Prayer

Diane Feinstein and Chuck Schumer: Wonder Twins?

The Inexorable Wheels of Justice

Bush/Cheney/Gonzales are going to jail

Beware of Ron Paul

Supporters of Ron Paul should avoid drinking the kool-aid given to them at his functions. A cursory look at some of his 2007 legislative proposals destroy the myths his campaign has been promulgating.

H.R.300: To limit the jurisdiction of the Federal courts, and for other purposes.

This an attempt to decrease The Federal Courts' Constitutional Powers by simple legislation, outside of the Amendment Process. Worse it does not even pretend to be an equal application, because it would restrict the Courts' oversight only in controversies relating to: the free exercise or establishment of religion; any claim based upon the right of privacy, including any such claim related to any issue of sexual practices, orientation, or reproduction; and any claim based upon equal protection of the laws to the extent such claim is based upon the right to marry without regard to sex or sexual orientation.

Paul doesn't want to destroy the whole 14th Amendment with unconstitutional legislation. His real agenda is for the 14th to carry force to give American citizenship to foetuses at the very moment of their conception.

H.R.2597: To provide that human life shall be deemed to exist from conception.
H.R.1094: To provide that human life shall be deemed to exist from conception.

There is no wink and nod to State's Rights here, nor is there any chance for a less intrusive government. Every woman who has a miscarriage could immediately find herself the target of a homicide investigation. These proposals arrogantly disregard potential maternal life-threatening possibilities that come with pregnancy. As an example of this: Ectopic Pregnancy is now estimated to occur in 2% of all pregnancies in the U.S. The fetus will not survive gestation, and by not terminating the pregnancy, the mother risks future infertility, and severe complications, a few of which could result in her death.

Big bad Paul endangers pregnant womens' health to push his religious ideology upon America with the biggest single entitlement to American citizenship ever legislated.

H.J.RES.46: Proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States to deny United States citizenship to individuals born in the United States to parents who are neither United States citizens nor persons who owe permanent allegiance to the United States.

This cannot be defended as original intent. One of the Declaration of Independence's listed causes for America's claim of a natuiral right to sever their British citizenry was that King George had:

"...endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws of Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands."

This should be exposed for its ugly reality. It is a bill of attainder that works a corruption of blood upon humans born within the Sovereign Territory of the United States of America. It is Unamerican to force children to be punished for the crimes of their parents. It also makes a mockery of any who claim there can be a positive comparison made between Thomas Jefferson and Ron Paul.

"My opinion on the right of Expatriation has been, so long ago as the year 1776, consigned to record in the act of the Virginia code, drawn by myself, recognizing the right expressly, and prescribing the mode of exercising it. The evidence of this natural right, like that of our right to life, liberty, the use of our faculties, the pursuit of happiness, is not left to the feeble and sophistical investigations of reason, but is impressed on the sense of every man. We do not claim these under the charters of kings or legislators, but under the King of kings. If he has made it a law in the nature of man to pursue his own happiness, he has left him free in the choice of place as well as mode; and we may safely call on the whole body of English jurists to produce the map on which Nature has traced, for each individual, the geographical line which she forbids him to cross in pursuit of happiness. It certainly does not exist in his mind. Where, then, is it? I believe, too, I might safely affirm, that there is not another nation, civilized or savage, which has ever denied this natural right. I doubt if there is another which refuses its exercise. I know it is allowed in some of the most respectable countries of continental Europe, nor have I ever heard of one in which it was not. How it is among our savage neighbors, who have no law but that of Nature, we all know."

The Writings of Thomas Jefferson; Definitive Edition, Albert Ellery Bergh, Editor
Copyright, 1905, By The Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association; Volume XV; pp 124,125

Step It Up Colorado Springs

From a couple weekends ago. My report has a few new comments and additions: http://events.stepitup2007.org/november/reports/2361

Christopher Hitchens on the death of Jerry Falwell-CNN 360

Kucinich weekly campaign update 11-12-07

My house is the brown one in the center. The house to the left is the last home on Ruxton Avenue and is a straw bale house.

Senator Mike Gravel as Rocky

The Iraq War: Legal or Illegal?

24-minute video of "The Pinky Show". Effective and edifying.

BLACKWATER : THE SHADOW WAR

Be Careful What You Say

Senator Mike Gravel as Rocky

Mike Gravel Talks Debate Censorship

Transform Space into Place.

Excellent Diary on DailyKos: Kucinich's new Playbook for Speaking to the Media

Norman Mailer, icon of the times, is dead. The Nation has a good piece on his life: Norman Mailer Brawled with Bush to the bitter end

KUCINICH: Takes House Floor, Moves for Cheney Impeachment

DENNIS KUCINICH ON MSNBC TUCKER NOV 06, 2007

Afterdowningstreet has best update on Kucinich attempt to bring Cheney impeachment to vote. Kucinich is the MAN!!!

War Crime Commission for Bush and co. : American Empire Project

My brother Doug posts on Huffpo on why our health care system sucks compared to say... Denmark...

DFA pulse poll of 100,000 + shows Kucinich in wide lead for Democratic nomination... Why is that so at odds with the conventional wisdom?

Dennis Kucinich's Articles of Impeachment against Vice Prez Cheney and updates on House floor vote

DailyKos: Gore Slams Bush Regime

Denver's October 27, 2007 Iraq Antiwar Rally.

Crude Realities

Matthew Simmons says $300/barrel oil coming soon.

Keith Olbermann: On Waterboarding and Torture

Olbermann Special Comment (video)

The Oil Drum: Six Steps to "Getting" the Global Environmental Crisis

Growth is Madness!

Center for Constitutional Rights: Beyond Guantanamo, Rescue the Constitution

Naomi Wolf Interview

I just started Naomi Wolf's "The End of America". MUST READ for all patriots. The hour is getting late. Germany and Italy were both democracies before their societies were shut down. The exact same steps to close an open society are being taken in America RIGHT NOW.

Houses with a view

More ice in Bear Creek...

Mischief cools off in icy Bear Creek.

View to Colorado Springs from the Tenney Crags--destination of my run-hike this morning.

StepitUp 2007

Under bluebird Colorado skies and temperature in the 70's, 150 people gathered for a relaxing afternoon on the grounds of the historic Rockledge Ranch on the Garden of the Gods.

Here is my report on the Colorado Springs action for StepitUp07 for awareness and action on Global Warming.

IMPEACH DICK CHENEY

Dennis Kucinich is going to bring his Impeach Cheney resolution 133 to a vote next week.

Harper's "The Torture Litmus Test" for Mukasey

1 Cubic Mile of Oil (CMO) -- how to grasp the scale of what we will lose when oil production diminishes as it must, sooner or later

TomGram: Michael Schwartz: Iraq Policy floating on a sea of oil

Considerations on the state of the world's oil supply

The End of America

Returning to Naomi Wolf. After watching her interview on C-Span After Words: "Naomi Wolf interviewed by Viet Dinh" (Aired: 10/20/2007) Podcast page

After watching it on C-Span last week I was so affected that I downloaded the podcast and listened to the full one-hour program again. Today I listened to it for the third time. Every American concerned about democracy and the preservation of the Constitution should hear it.

Important interview of Pete Seeger on Goleft.tv.

Book Forum covers the debate on the New Atheism

On a registered paid-users-only web site I follow, 14erworld.com, there was a compelling trip report on hiking Corsica. Here is a link to a photo gallery with captions tracing the trip. The next best thing to doing the hike.

HuffPo: Mike Gravel comments on his exclusion from last night's debate

RawStory: Scholar links Bush's US and Hirohito's Japan

Important OpEd from this morning: I know waterboarding is torture, because I did it myself

Link to video of Valery Plame Wilson on the Daily Show last night

I just read Garry Wills' "Negro President" (Jefferson, because he courted the slave states, where negros though they couldn't vote comprised 3/5ths of a person for electoral college purposes). It covers much of the same ground as the following book. Jefferson called it the second revolution. Any notion that our founding fathers were calm dispassionate sages pontificating in their white powdered wigs will fade quickly upon close examination of the actual bitter partisanship and acrimony of the times.

A Magnificent Catastrophe: The Tumultuous Election of 1800, America's First Presidential Campaign

by Edward J. Larson

Reviewed by Thom Hartmann

One of the most startling things we learn from history is how little we've learned -- and how often that failure to learn causes history to repeat itself. The election of 2008 may well -- depending on who is the Democratic nominee -- end up being a startling replay of the election of 1800. In that election, Thomas Jefferson, who along with James Madison founded what is today's modern Democratic Party (known then as the Republican Party), challenged sitting president and ardent conservative Federalist (what today would be called "Republican") John Adams.

Permian Extinction: Global Warming 250M years ago

I'm watching an excellent show on National Geographic Channel, "Naked Science: Extinctions" Only one in twenty species survived this global warming extinction 250 million years ago... I read a book on the same subject recently: Extinction: How Life on Earth nearly ended 250 million years ago.

I think this is where we are heading now with man-caused Global Warming. Will mankind survive? At the very least the population must decrease drastically. Money won't matter. Survival of the fittest will prevail.

Tuesday evening links

Just got back from German movie night at Colorado College. Tonight we watched "Die Verlorene Ehre der Katherina Blum" based on a novella of the same name by Heinrich Boell. I had seen it in the mid '80's while stationed in Germany and learning the language. Seeing it tonight was both a refresher and a revelation. The themes and lessons apply precisely to the Bush/Cheney Amerika.


Excellent blog I just discovered: Global Guerrillas

Peak Oil watch: from TheOilDrum.com: Five geopolitical processes, each a positive-feedback loop, and each an accelerant of declining oil production

It is one thing when some crackpot bubble blogger says the market is overvalued and due for a fall. It is quite another when Goldman Sachs, one of world’s largest investment banking and securities firms, says the same thing.

"Wall of Money" set to flow into Asian renewable energy

More Peak Oil: In an exclusive interview with lastoilshock.com, the former head of exploration and production at Saudi Aramco, said that oil production had reached a structural ceiling determined by geology rather than geopolitics, and that the technical floor for the oil price will rise by $12 annually for the next 4 to 5 years as new fields become increasingly costly to exploit

New York Magazine: The Catastrophist View: What would it take to send the U.S. economy—and New York’s—into free fall? A doomsday primer.

When Jim Rogers speaks, I listen: Here he is on "China Bubbles" (not happening) and Bernanke's Printing Press

Finally, from the Freedom From Religion Foundation: Why Jesus?

Here is where to put your money: China Energy Prospects

OilEmpire.us


The Watt.com Podcast (Energy News, podcasts, interviews)

return of the Karduchoi

Tom Dispatch: Thoughts on getting to the March (against the war)

American Prison Camps are on the way (and you might be an internee, innocent and guilty have no bearing)

Sunday Link roundup

HuffPo: Marty Kaplan: No blood for no oil

NYT: Alberto Salazar: Marathoner Speaks to his god

The Guardian: The edge of oblivion:
Conservationists name 25 primates about to disappear

Springs Culture Cast: Interview with Noel Black, publisher of Newspeak: a very independent and very necessary alternative publication in the sick James Dobson "Focus on the Family" country.

Steven Weber: No justice, no peace: As the Bush war machine rolls along, the profiteer horde has filled its sacks and there is little that will be left when they skip out to their ranches or beach front condos or corporate headquarters or upscale hooches.

Der Spiegel: White House Leak: Cheney's Plan for Iran Attack Starts With Israeli Missile Strike

The Bush Era's Dark Legacy of Torture

Important Film: Terror's Advocate

NYT: The Evangelical Crackup

NYT: Bush's Dangerous Liasons

Yesterday I was in D.C. running on the mall with old Air Force and other services running friends in memorial of fellow runner, Mike Mann, who died recently of lung cancer from second-hand smoke at the age of 39. What a spirit. His motto was "Don't give up. Don't ever give up". He lived this motto to his last breath. This year in his last year of life he completed his Bacalaureate Degree with Magna Cum Lauda honors, and retired from the Air Force as a Master Sergeant with 20 years service. One year ago, following chemotherapy, he ran his last marathon at Virginia Beach in 2 hours 54 minutes.

After running on 17 Air Force and DoD teams in my 24-year Air Force career, the last race I ran for the Air Force was the Marine Corps Marathon in 2003. At 48 years of age I was well beyond my peak so I "sacrificed" myself to run side-by-side with Mike for the first 13 miles to help him stay on pace for a sub-2:40 run. After the half-way point I faded on cue to a 2:56 finish. Mike went on to run a 2:37 marathon and 2nd Air Force runner in the Air Force's victory.

I just discovered that my brother, J. Douglas Bremner, M.D. has been invited to blog on Huffington Post. Here is one of his recent posts : The Hospitals are killing us. But now the Schools too?

Vagabonding author Rolf Potts has a Vagablog

New Scientist Space: 13 things that do not make sense

Alternet.org interviews Paul Krugman: "Where does the Right-Wing End and the Media Begin?"

Bush's "permission to fly" proposal ..... Preaching liberty, Promoting Tyranny...

Tribute to Mike Gravel: The Modern Day Thomas Paine Part 1

Tribute to Mike Gravel: The Modern Day Thomas Paine Part 2

15 Reasons to stop hiding from Vegetarianism

If that doesn't convince you this will: meat.org

Guardian: Naomi Wolf: Fascist America in 10 Easy Steps

Links for Wednesday evening

Factory Farming is cruel, but it may also lead to antibiotic resistant staph infections...


Robert Redford's new movie "Lions for Lambs" Roars at Rome Film Festival (And yes, it's very political)


Amy Goodman sez: "Hold Politician's Feet to the Fire" --literally--regarding global warming and the fires in California


In the last week or so I've come to know several very key people and their ideas. They have hit me hard and their message resonates with the current of the times.

1) Naomi Wolf with her new book "The End of America" on the slow march towards totalitarianism that is happening in our country. Start with her profile on Amazon.com or her author blog on Powell's web site. I watched her on C-Span After Words last night and was so impressed that I downloaded the podcast of the interview and listened to it again today. She outlines the ten steps that totalitarian regimes take to shut down democracy. They track right along with what Bush/Cheney are doing. Read the introduction to "The End of America".

2) Bill McKibben is leading the fight to bring awareness of the urgency of Global Warming through his efforts at Stepitup07.org and his writings, most recently Deep Economy.
He spoke at Colorado College last month but at the time I didn't even know who he was. Since then I've read one of his books "Wandering Home" about a 200-mile trek between his two homes-- one in Vermont and the other in upstate New York.

3) Naomi Klein with her new book "The Shock Doctrine" in which she articulates the way disaster capitalism moves quickly to grab wealth in the wake of catastrophe.


And here is another link to track: Worldchanging.com
I think we are living in very exciting times. There are huge challenges to move towards sustainability and eliminate the carbon footprint. Will we be smart enough to adapt?

Perry Como

Papa Loves Mambo -- hit from 1954

Uh-Oh:
Carbon Output rising faster than forecast

We are mammals

Though I have never really "believed" in any religion I have not until now fully embraced "atheism". What does that mean to embrace atheism? Christopher Hitchens in his recent book, "God is not Great" refers to we humans often as mammals. I think that is appropriate. It provides perspective. Though we have "consciousness" and "awareness" (at least some of us) we are still mere mammals. We need to remember that. We need to be more humble. I find it astoundingly ignorant that a cluster of us have embraced texts 2000 years old and older as the heighth of truth. This is the legacy of Christianity and Judaism. These texts were written by men and edited by men who had an agenda long before the Renaissance and the Enlightenment and prior to modern science and Newton and Einstein and Darwin.

James Kunstler reports on the Peak Oil Conference in Houston: Peak Universe

Amazon Review: Green Sky in the Morning, Humanity take Warning (The world has experience of Global Warming. The world goes on. Life continues. Many species do not.)

Dick Cavett blogging on NYT says: Hey Listen! This one will kill ya!

The Field Negro sez Silence is never Golden! (Thanks Jose)

Army Captains pelt Joint Chief of Staff Adm Mullen with tough questions on war

Tom Tomorrow presents the perfect Repug candidate for Prez: Ugg Mighty Hunter

Oh, did I mention that I have weaned myself from Microsoft Vista? I am now 100% Linux Ubuntu

Richard Dawkins, prominent atheist and scientist, tells us it's "Time to Stand Up"

DailyKos Diary: Has the U.S. Reached its Debit Limit?

...no one is going to come out and say they have lost confidence in the US' financial situation. Instead they will simple go on quietly selling dollars.

It's not Left vs Right any more. It's Right vs Wrong: Arianna Huffington: Midnight in America

Is America experiencing a moment of "unbelief"? Heaven forbid!

Jason Epstein on the Nuclear Threat. I am going to have to look up this book by Richard Rhodes, one of my favorite authors: Arsenals of Folly: the Making of the Nuclear Arms Race.

Steven Weber on Huffpost: Technologie Macht Freiheit!

Andrew Skurka hiking a long ways!

Bad Religion? LA is burning

Hillary's Sex Appeal

Bad Religion? Los Angeles is burning

Monday link round up

Peak Oil is Now: what are you going to do about it?

TomDispatch: A Guide for the Perplexed: Intellectual Fallacies of the War on Terror By Chalmers Johnson

Why is New Zealand scooping the American press again? Destruction of Evidence -- Ohio's 2004 Ballots

Game: Consumer Consequences: Find out if you are living a sustainable life

Congressman Dennis Hastert, R. Ill. announces retirement as Abramoff Scandal nips at his heels

Naomi Klein: Outsourcing Government

NYT Travel section: France goes biking in Paris! Finding Liberte on two wheels

Truthdig: Scott Ritter says we are "On the Eve of Destruction" (That phrase achieves resonance with me because I have a vivid memory of the first time I heard that song sung by Barry McGuire in 1965--it shook me to my core)

Huffington Post: Marty Kaplan asks in a brilliant post: Soros or Murdoch?

Denver Post: Athletes over 40 hurdle past records, stereotypes

Nietzsche's Cosmos

Harper's Magazine: Nietzsche's Cosmos

In some remote corner of that universe which is dispersed into numberless twinkling solar systems, there was a star upon which clever animals invented Recognition. That was the most arrogant and mendacious minute of “world history,” but in any event it was never more than a minute. After nature had drawn a few breaths, the star cooled and congealed, and thus the clever animals had to die. One might invent such a fable, and yet he still would not have adequately illustrated how pathetic, how shadowy and transient, how aimless and arbitrary is this human intellect from the perspective of nature. There were eternities during which it did not exist. And when the story of humankind and its intellect has gone to its end, nothing will have happened. For this intellect has no additional mission which would lead it beyond human life. Rather, it is human, and only its possessor and begetter takes it seriously–as though the world’s axis turned in its midst. But if we could communicate with the gnat, we would learn that he likewise flies through the air with the same solemnity, that he feels the flying center of the universe within himself. There is nothing so reprehensible and unimportant in nature that it would not immediately swell up like a balloon at the slightest puff of this power of knowing. And just as every porter wants to have an admirer, so even the proudest of men, the philosopher, supposes that he sees on all sides the eyes of the universe telescopically focused upon his action and thought.

–Friedrich Nietzsche, Über Wahrheit und Lüge im außermoralischen Sinn sec. 1 (1873) in: Werke in drei Bänden, vol. 3, p. 309 (K. Schlechta ed. 1969)(S.H. transl.)

It has started...

Japan and China Lead Flight From Dollar

Data from the US Treasury showed outflows of $163bn (£80bn) from all forms of US investments. "These numbers are absolutely stunning," said Marc Ostwald, an economist at Insinger de Beaufort.

Asian investors dumped $52bn worth of US Treasury bonds alone, led by Japan ($23bn), China ($14.2bn) and Taiwan ($5bn). It is the first time since 1998 that foreigners have, on balance, sold Treasuries.

Blogger Buzz: Environmental Blog Roundup

Blogger Buzz: Environmental Blog Roundup

Sioux City Iowa "Lewis and Clark" Marathon Results

The marathon has passed into the annals of the history of Bremner. It was not a pretty event. Running only about 10 miles a week doesn't bode well for a 26.2 mile race. The course spent a lot of time on concrete bike paths for the first 10 miles. At mile 12 we saw our first hill. Not too bad, but I had to let go of the young Army medic I had been talking to for the previous five miles. Running his first marathon he qualified for Boston with a 3:07. This after training in Iraq by running five mile loops around the base at 4:30 A.M.!

After the halfway point I knew it was going to be a hard day. As someone passed me he asked me if I knew how bad the hill coming up was. I told him I thought we already passed the hill. "There is supposed to be an even bigger hill at mile 17". Well, at least I had something to look forward to. At the 16-mile mark the hill began. With the exception of a couple flat spots here and there it continued relentlessly for a full two miles, zapping whatever I had left in my legs. I slowed to 8 and 9 minute miles and eventually even 10 minute miles. At mile 20 Forrest Gump passed me--someone dressed like Forrest with a fake beard and long hair. I gamely caught back up to him and passed him. I got beat by a hot dog in the PPA--that was humiliating enough--but Forrest Gump? Well, that only lasted until mile 22 where he passed me and proceeded to bury me.

Time: 3:31
No age group award

I am in Sioux City, Iowa this morning about to run the Sioux City "Lewis and Clark Marathon". This will be my 45th marathon state and 86th marathon.

Former legal council for President Nixon, John Dean says: "Government Surveillance Threatens Your Freedom, Even If You Have Nothing To Hide"

Windbelt Micro-wind, 10 Times Cheaper Wind Energy!!

Leahy Rips Reported Compromise On FISA: Intel Committee Is ‘Caving’ To White House Pressure.

Obesity is a problem that is chronic, stigmatised, costly to treat and rarely curable. Why?

Shapes of Things to com:

Blackwater: Newly created Thug Class.

Music Scholar Barred From U.S., but no one will tell Her why.

Bill McKibben web site

The World According to Dubya

London Times: The World According to Dubya: 50 Religious Insights from George W. Bush

This is how the rest of the world sees us. If it wasn't so scary it would be funny. What a country!

Dalai Lama Asks -- "If Buddhist Doctrine of 'No-Self' Is Wrong, Who Are These People?"

Anatta says that personal identity - the self - is actually an illusion. Instead, each of us is an aggregation of different factors (biological, historical, karmic, experiential, etc.), intersecting to create the false sense that we exist as distinct beings. The Buddha compared the self to a chariot: Is the "chariotness" in the wheels, the axle, the seat ... or not in any single place at all?

Oh! The hypocrisy. (Mukasey, Durbin and the Right)

Rolling Stone: The Ethanol Scam

Currency traders were given a green light to continue selling the US dollar on Wednesday, as the IMF said the greenback “remains overvalued”.

Though Al Gore reportedly said he is not running for President, why has he put out policy positions on three presidential candidate platforms in the last few days?

London Review of Books: It's the Oil

The OilDrum.com: World Oil Forecasts Including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the UAE - Update Oct 2007

Juan Cole: Oil Peak or Peak Oil?

From Harper's Weekly

Ramzi Yousef, the jailed mastermind of the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center, converted to Christianity, and guru Sri Chinmoy, author of 1,500 books and organizer of the Self-Transcendence 3,100, the world's longest footrace, died of a heart attack.

Thinkprogress.org: Iraq Timeline

Musical Discoveries

When Mexico meets Ireland: Rodrigo Y Gabriela

UK modern Folk: Kerfuffle

Blast from the Past (1968) from one-album wonder: F. J. McMahon: Spirit of the Golden Juice

(Not Music) The Twinkie: Ingredients Revealed

FRONTLINE | Cheney's Law Oct 16 @ pbs.org/frontline

Learn French by Podcast

Proud Atheists: Steven Pinker and Rebecca Goldstein

General Abizaid: "We've treated the the Arab World as a Collection of Gas Stations"

Bill Moyer's Journal: Are we headed towards a 1929-like economic crash?

Free Thought Radio and Podcast

My Amazon.com wishlist

Free Rice: Improve your vocabulary and help solve world hunger

Blogger Play is a great time-waster. It shows a slide show of the latest pictures as they are uploaded to Blogspot.com.

Yesterday the Daily Olympian posted photos of 46 local soldiers who lost their lives in Iraq in 2006-2007.

Barack Obama speaks out against going to war with Iraq in 2002. Prescient.

Oregon couple goes off the grid in 1970's Tudor house.

StepItUp: Five Day walk across Vermont for stopping Global Warming.

TomGram: Nick Turse, The Pentagon's 100-year War

Interview with Richard Dawkins

Monty Python - International Philosophy

HuffPo has some really great posts recently. Here are a couple more MUST-READs:

Naomi Wolf: American Tears I didn't realize it was getting this bad...

Larisa Alexandrovna lays out the stark reality behind the Moveon.org attacks eloquently in Our Cold Civil War.

Absolutely MUST-READ Dyno-mite conversation between Naomi Klein and John Cusack on Huffington Post:

Part I

Part II

Money quote:

Cusack: Right, you have a quote in the book: "It's impossible to tell where the government ends and Lockheed begins." And the most unbelievable thing about it besides the carnage and the hubris and the insanity of it all is how blatantly they lie about their dedication to strict economic Darwinist rules. It's the mother of all con jobs -- free market rhetoric is being used as the cover story for crony capitalism... They are the biggest welfare freaks on the planet. On Democracy Now recently you recited Alan Greenspan's definition of crony capitalism to his face and asked him if the U.S. fits the bill:

"When a government's leaders or businesses routinely seek out private-sector individuals or businesses, and, in exchange for political support, bestow favors on them, the society is said to be in the grip of "crony capitalism". The favors generally take the form of monopoly access to certain markets, preferred access to sales of government assets, and special access to those in power."

He dodged the question, of course, but that seems to be a precise description of the Bush administration and its relationship to its favorite corporations. Not exactly the free-market propaganda they've been selling around the world, is it?

(And later in the conversation…)

We've had Poppa Wayne (Reagan) and Baby Wayne (Bush). Ronald Reagan was the old John Wayne...when kindness comes. But the key to the old Wayne is that he was once a killer; you can see it in his eyes... beneath the kindness lingers that hard truth: he was once a killer. He tames the natural world, but he does it with a veneer of benevolence.

Bush is the young John Wayne -- Ethan from The Searchers. Obsessive. Merciless. Ethan is a deranged person. He will fight the battle no one has the guts to fight...do whatever it takes...kill whoever violates the natural law of the frontier (jungle). This cowboy is the great righter of wrongs. He is wrath incarnate. Part of the mythology is that he's wrong a lot and pig headed and stubborn, it's part of the package. But he is a force of nature and you can argue about it all you want, but you must respect a force of nature.

Today's Daily Olympian

Front Page

Truthout Video: Tell the Truth, and so make Peace

David Corn: Judge Radhi Testifies on Iraqi Corruption; GOPers Attack

HuffPost: Jonathan Hafetz: Torturegate

Two weeks left for Al Gore to run

Another expert Bush won't listen to

View from my window with chipmunks

Republicans have an alternative: Ron Paul

I can't support him because he is a religious nut like the rest of them.

Paul Krugman is at his best this morning: Same Old Party

Excerpt: "People claim to be shocked that the Bush Justice Department, making a mockery of the Constitution, issued a secret opinion authorizing torture despite instructions by Congress and the courts that the practice should stop. But remember Iran-Contra? The Reagan administration secretly sold weapons to Iran, violating a legal embargo, and used the proceeds to support the Nicaraguan contras, defying an explicit Congressional ban on such support."