My Thoughts on Changes

Must be shared. A real shame on the part of the Mexican justice system. There are other ways to refute involvement in such a crime. Don’t shoot the messenger.
IFEX :: Lydia Cacho Ribeiro, investigative journalist faces possible prison sentence for libel

On the basis of her research, Cacho wrote a book entitled “Demons of Eden” that was published in 2004. It claimed there were links between the pedophile ring and a number of government officials, politicians, businessmen and drug traffickers. One of the businessmen mentioned in the book, Puebla-based textile magnate Jos

Cheers for the people of Bolivia! I don’t know if what’s coming is good for the people of Bolivia, for the poor that make up the majority of the country, but, I can tell you that what they are leaving behind was hell; frustrating, shameful and demeaning hell.
When all is said and done; when all the attention shifts away from the Middle East and the greedy people that when cut bleed oil, the world will realize that a whole new continent, with a whole new attitude has, to their eyes, suddenly popped-up before them. I wonder what kind of hooks the powers that be will try to throw at them when all the other countries, like Argentina and Brazil are doing now, embark in paying off their debts with the FMI, once and for all…
A clean stale is always good. At least you know the past was paved with shit. Give it your best shot!!
Latin America’s new socialist revolution – 20 Dec 2005 – World News

At the end of a corridor is a room full of images of Che Guevara. Among them hangs a poster with the slogan, “I’d rather be an illiterate Indian than a North American millionaire”.
Thirty-eight years after his death in the foothills of the Bolivian Andes, trying to spark a revolution, the Marxist soldier of fortune’s boast reverberates in the dilemma now facing the nation.
In an election yesterday, Bolivia chose an indigenous Aymara Indian and radical former coca farmer over a Harvard-educated, American-married member of the business elite.
The two leading presidential candidates, Evo Morales and Jorge “Tuto” Quiroga personified the bitter divide between the European-descended haves and the majority indigenous have-nots, in Bolivia and beyond.
Yesterday Quiroga conceded to Morales to become Bolivia’s first indigenous leader after Morales claimed about 50 per cent of the vote.
It means the nation will join Venezuela, Brazil, Chile, Uruguay and possibly Mexico next year in the rebirth of Latin American socialism, much to the chagrin of the United States.

It is and it isn’t. It shifts. In a two dimensional world–and two is not a typo,–fine, tenuous lines are there to bound, mark and define form, give a message of volume, existence. Our mind fills the empty voids with meaning, much the same way the lines that form these characters on the screen impart a message. All of it is art. But, what is it? Different people, reading the same thing, cannot reach a free consensus on the real intention of a writer. With the introduction of third parties, the readers, askewness prevails. Words are no longer the property of the writer but a picture that belongs to the spirit of a reader. Sure, there are long, tedious courses of comparative literature that may give you shades of gray on what the writer meant to say. As there isn’t a free consensus on the interpretation of colors, other than hard measurements of wavelengths, providing only numbers, devoid of perception, written words cannot be captured and sealed in the container of an idea, not fully, not ever. Even laws, as polarized as they seem, are open to interpretation and loopholes. It shifts. Everything does. It goes from eye to mind, jumping dendrites, dancing pirouettes, juggling electrons, pumping minute chemicals, reaching a big, round projection screen, somewhere, in the back of our skull, where a bunch of slave neurons are condemned to watch an endless motion picture. Sometimes, the slaves are gratified…
BIROCO.COM ~ A way to look at things

But probably you pick up a tone of sadness, and think that is more real
than sadness going. Well, for a while it is more real, and then it goes
and it is not real at all. I can’t always wait until it is not more real
before getting words down on paper just to make you feel less awkward. If
you worry, know that I see through this and I see through you too, and why
don’t you understand that the real real thing is none of this, and that
is the point. Do you think a river is having a hard time when the riverbank
gets constricted? Bring up your babies and look after your families, but
myself I have other things on my mind of which death and disappearance are
things to flirt with while twiddling my thumbs. Ultimately, something mad
is what I will be known for. And when I am gone I will not be gone.
It is pleasing to express it whether it is happy or sad.

I doubt the guys at the NSA were jumping at the bit to start spying on the American people and GWB just agreed to it… Can you guys rephrase that?
ABC News: Report: Bush Authorized NSA to Spy in U.S.

Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice said Bush has “acted lawfully in every step that he has taken.” His top spokesman, Scott McClellan, said that Bush “is going to remain fully committed to upholding our Constitution and protect the civil liberties of the American people. And he has done both.”

I’m glad to know many of our Senators have some sense of honesty and know where to draw some lines. Heck, they miss most; in the end they may even miss this one, but, for the time being, they had some decency and common sense.
Senate Deals Setback to Bush on Patriot Act

In today’s Senate debate, several lawmakers cited a New York Times report disclosing that Bush signed a secret order in 2002 authorizing the National Security Agency to eavesdrop on U.S. citizens and foreign nationals in the United States, despite previous legal prohibitions against such domestic spying.
Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, called the domestic spying “clearly and categorically wrong” and vowed to hold oversight hearings on the matter when the Senate reconvenes early next year after its holiday recess.

Anyone paying any attention would have known that for a fact. Apathy is what dooms empires…
Columnist Says Bush Knows Who Leaked Name

Novak also suggested that the administration official who gave him the information is the same person who mentioned Plame and her CIA role to Washington Post Assistant Managing Editor Bob Woodward in the summer of 2003.
“I’m confident the president knows who the source is,” Novak told a luncheon audience at the John Locke Foundation in Raleigh, N.C., on Tuesday, according to an account published yesterday in the Raleigh News & Observer. “I’d be amazed if he doesn’

Because “Freedom” is not free…. Hmmm. what would Jesus do? Oops!! That’s right!! I remember:
Matt 21:12-13
12 Then Jesus went into the temple of God and drove out all those who bought and sold in the temple, and overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold doves.
13 And He said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you have made it a ‘den of thieves.'”
(NKJ)
Luke 19:45-46
45 Then He went into the temple and began to drive out those who bought and sold in it,
46 saying to them, “It is written, ‘My house is a house of prayer,’ but you have made it a ‘den of thieves.'”
Only for the benefit of hypocrite Bible propagandists, of course…
Democracy Now! | Confessions of an Economic Hit Man: How the U.S. Uses Globalization to Cheat Poor Countries Out of Trillions

We play an interview with, John Perkins – author of “Confessions of an Economic Hit Man” – who says he says he helped the U.S. cheat poor countries around the globe out of trillions of dollars by lending them more money than they could possibly repay and then taking over their economies. [includes rush transcript] The protests this week in Bolivia come as Latin America is seeing significant success among popular progressive movements. From Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, Lula da Silva of Brazil to the changes of government in Uruguay and now Ecuador, there is a continent-wide trend that has Washington concerned. The US has long exploited countries throughout Central and Latin America for the natural resources, labor and land. Over the decades, this exploitation has been backed up by force and through devastating policies dictated to puppet regimes. Our next guest says he helped the U.S. cheat poor countries in Latin America and around the globe out of trillions of dollars by lending them more money than they could possibly repay and then taking over their economies. From 1971 to 1981, John Perkins worked for the international consulting firm of Chas T. Main. He described himself as an “economic hit man.” He”s written a memoir called Confessions of an Economic Hit Man. When he joined us in our fire house studio, we asked him to begin with how he came to be recruited first by the National Security Agency – far larger than the C.I.A. – and then this so-called international consulting firm of Chas T. Main.