Well, That Certainly Turned Out Much Better Than Expected

It was indeed surprising just how strong of a reaction by American voters to reform their government towards the better despite all of the constraints of gerrymandering of districts and corporate dominance of the political system. Given all of these constraints, voters largely displayed some real discernment, understanding of issues and wisdom. Yesterday, I was locked in watching the tight struggle for Senate control. With both the Senate and the House control, working people may get a far better shake from the new Congress.

The resignation of Donald Rumsfeld was another important bonus today. Clearly the Iraq policy is not working. As a "peace mission" to stabilize the country, the policy is a complete failure. If a new policy results that demands that the Iraqi government clean up the corruption, disarm the militia groups and seperate the militia groups from the Iraqi government and police, then yesterday's election was indeed worthwhile.

And Congress is dominated by big lobby efforts, where 66 lobbyists exist for every member of Congress. If all of the "culture of corruption" that goes hand in hand with this is curtailed in some way with "lobby reform" of some type, then this election also proved worthwhile for this.

Here's to a hope that some real constructive steps to rid the country of the cycle of lobbyist and politician corruption will result from this election. Generally women office holders have proven themselves more honest than men, and there is fond hope that Nancy Pelosi will bring in a new era of more honest government in Washington. Pelosi has come from a good Italian Roman Catholic background of values, ethics and hard work. This background is a good basis to expect a better government from her.

There is at least some reason to be optimistic after this election compared to some other recent ones which only seemed to rubber stamp what's wrong with system and embrace it.

Nicaragua's Voters Show No Better Sense Than Many Americans

Voters in Nicaragua have decided to do the most stupid thing possible and give disgraced former leader Daniel Ortega a second chance. Daniel Ortega last misruled Nicaragua 16 years ago when even the Communist Party joined a coalition to support a reasonable candidate to oust this terrible leader from power. Unlike Communists who often support pragmatic and cooperative economic relations with the world community, such as Vietnam and China, Daniel Ortega a former convicted bank robber and urban guerilla, represents very irresponsible leftism. He managed to drive Nicaragua's economy into the ground once before during the 1980's and set Nicaragua on a dangerous and confrontational path with the Reagan Administration. Why voters would choose to return this irresponsible leftist to power is way beyond normal explanation.

Ortega corruptly ruled Nicaragua as the strongman of extremist Sandinista National Liberation Front. In 1998, his step daughter, Zoilamerica Naveraez accused Ortega of sexual abusing her. Besides the dangerous and revolutionary frictions Ortega had with the Reagan Administration which led to covert CIA supported warfare against Ortega, PNAC member Jeb Bush has run ads in Nicaragua accusing Ortega of supporting terrorism. Ortega's return to power could lead the Bush Administration to seeking a new front to stage a new war.

Voters sometimes just display no good sense at all. Voters in Nicaragua have apparently returned revolutionary Ortega to power despite his history of violence and confrontation, that may soon renew with the current Bush Administration. But many voters in the U.S. are no wiser, many want to return Bush's party to power as well. Stupidity crosses all boundaries it seems with the U.S. sometimes no wiser than the most illiterate and backward of nations.

Meet The New Boss, Same As The Old Boss

It will still be very surprising to me if Democrats really are able to make any great sea change to the political landscape on November 7. Wealthy and powerful business interests simply will not give up much political power that easily. The Bush White House and the Republican control of Congress are little more than an oligarchy form of big business interests who rule over Americans as this form of government. They don't really believe in free elections in which their power is at stake.

Republicans still have plenty of advantages to blunt any strong Democratic gains on Tuesday. New polls suggest a late surge by Republicans where now the Senate control looks far out of the question for the Democrats, and even the House could be threatened as well. Republicans have far better "get out the vote" efforts, spent more corporate money on ads than Democrats, and a full 91% of their ads were character assasination attempts on Democrats or other negative attacks.

Big corporations such as General Electric which own NBC created the phony John Kerry incident last week by deliberately taking the White House line that Kerry attacked the intelligence of U.S. troops instead of George Bush which Kerry obviously intended. Big corporate owned news doesn't want to pay increased taxes or lose tax breaks, so has a huge financial stake in driving down any Democratic hopes.

And many Republicans are misguided folks, self -convinced while waving their "made-in-China", American flags that Democrats are antiAmerican or traitors of some sort, blind to all their own lies or absurd greedy self-serving probig business hypocrisy. Many Republicans still don't seem to realize that Bush's speeches are little more than dirt ignorant lies and falsehoods about Iraq, the War On Terror or taxes.

Progressives shouldn't really expect too much on November 7, and they won't be disappointed. Millions have been spent by big corporations to continue to get their way in Congress and favortism from the Bush White House. These people just don't give up power very easily. Americans are not very class concious, and this is no real electoral revolt of the masses to greatly change the government, but a tightly controlled environment in which big corporations are able to spent enough money to get their desired results. They have no doubt been able to get a pretty favorable final outcome based on the volume of false and misleading character attack ads that they purchased this year. The system is so rigged and biased towards big corporate dominance, and only an illusion of a real democracy. Tuesday's results will very likely mirror my concerns.

On Wednesday, political pundits will likely blame John Kerry, Democratic turnout or some other Democratic factor for their weaker than anticipated showing on Tuesday. But the truth is that they never really had a real chance on a truly fair playing field.

Class Justice In Arnold Schwarzenegger's California

It is an unfortunate fact that some Hollywood liberals such as Steven Spielberg have been taken in by a few "moderate" or "reasonable" postitions of California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, but have failed to see many hard right postions that are very regressive if not openly racist.

In California it has become a popular sport to blame illegal aliens for all of the state's budget woes and to use these poor persons merely seeking a better life as economic refugees from their own lands for political gain by the far right. But a large part of California's budget problems can be blamed on a hige and bloated criminal justice system with the nation's most unfair and racist "three strikes" laws.

Gov. Schwarzenegger opposed efforts to make California's "three strikes" laws only apply to violent criminals, unlike the other 24 states in the U.S. that have such laws. So in California you have a "three strikes" law that is used to round up poor, homeless, mentally ill and drug problem plagued Black citizens to a far higher level that any state in the U.S. Only around 313 of the 7,000 Californians serving 25 years to life under Calirornia's "three strikes" laws are serving time for murder as a "third strike". Many are serving anywhere up to life for relatively minor crimes that have outrageous "intent " abuses applied to them.

Burglary for example is defined by a very broad "intent" standard under California law. One Black woman who was convicted under the "three strikes" law actually only opened up a 99 cent bottle of soda in a supermarket and took a few sips before before charged with "burglary" as her "third strike". Because she had no money , this served as "intent" to commit to a crime under California 's absurdly far fetched open ended definition of "burglary". There was no breaking and entering standard as there is under most accepted versions of burglary under other state's standards. In fact the first person convicted under California's "three strikes" laws was a Black with a history of homelessness, mental illness and drugs who merely snatched a piece of pizza from a child at a mall. This was claimed to be "robbery" by the prosecution. 65% of all persons convicted under the "three strikes" law are Blacks. Some states would merely prosecute such small time thefts with a $100 fine as minor offenses with no jail time.

It costs up to $85,000 to $100,000 a year to house elderly in California's prisons due to increased medical costs as prisoners age. Creating a huge drag on California's budget. "Three strikes" laws also call into question "double jeopardy " laws, where a person already convicted and having served a sentence is again tried and forced to serve time for the same crimes when a third crime is brought before a court. The third crime is not prosecuted under the normal standards for that particular crime, and instead the person is retried and reconvicted and resentenced for two previous crimes already brought before a court. There is no question that that "three strikes" laws violate "double jeopardy" standards for a retrial for the same crimes as once before that time has already been served for.

This what Gov. Schwarzenegger allows in California; the warehousing of many Blacks for relatively minor third offenses that is a huge drag on the state's budget, and unfairly racist. Some liberals like Steven Spielberg should really examine what Schwarzenegger really stands for. Schwarzenegger is hardly as progressive as some liberals really wish him to be.

The Larger Spiritual Message Of The Rev. Ted Haggard Scandal

The Rev. Ted Haggard scandal is far deeper than just the spiritual failure of just one failed church leader. It is yet another example that the Bush White House has surrounded itself with spirtually flawed leaders who have very defective walks with God, who misuse their church leadership positions for preaching a false Gospel of politics and self financial enrichment.

From cover to cover, not a single word of the Bible encourages Christians to set up political governments here on earth. Quite the opposite, the Good News of the Bible is literally that God's Kingdom on earth is coming in the future. When a church leader is so flawed like Ted Haggaert, then they have no legitimate walk with God, and they do not really hear his voice. And worse yet, almost everything that followers of Haggart know about god, comes from this flawed church leader with no real ear to God. It is a loud warning from God that the church thet beling to is preaching a false religion. If these church members had a legitimate walk with God, then they should have realized this long before the Haggart scandal became public.

Ted Haggart and many politicians who preach a false Gospel to the public are undergoing a spiritual "shaking" by God. God is clearing out many false proponents of his faith who are liars, hypocrites, immoral or frauds who have actually taken many on a false spiritual path.

It is a very good thing that the Christuan right will likely take a huge hit in this election. This was always a false religious movement of some men, and a not a legitimate move of God himself. God would never call on men to set up a false political and spiritually counterfeit kingdom here on earth when the overwelming message of the New Testament of Jesus was to look forward to his future kingdom on earth. This spiritual shaking is an important effort by God to send a serious message to those who claim to be real followers of God to belong to better churches and to stop using God's name to justify a false message of politics or self-enrichment and to follow a legitimate walk with God.

Tony's "Snow" Job

When Tony Snow took on the role of White House spokesman the public had high expectations that Snow would continue to act as the credible and honest journalist that he had built his reputation on. It sure didn't take Tony Snow very long to discard any ethics or a good journalistic reputation to become a Bush Administration "yesman" that promotes any absurd lie of this corrupt and ethicly challenged administration.

This week it was pretty obvious that John Kerry badly botched up a slam on George Bush, and Tony Snow was one of the most visible White House figures to deliberately lie about this flub and twist it into some sort of slam about the intelligence of U.S. servicepersons. Snow can't possiby be so dim that he couldn't have misunderstood what Kerry actually meant. Snow simply lied to the American public about what Kerry said for partisan political purposes.

Unfortunately Snow's decline from honest journalist to lying political White House hack hasn't just stopped with lying about Kerry's flub to the American public. Snow continually lies about the U.S. mission in Iraq, falsely echoing the White House nonsense that we are fighting for a democratic government against terrorism in Iraq. The real truth is that many Sunnis did not vote because they realized how hopeless it was to prevent a Shiite dominated government with Shia militia groups such as the one associated radical antiAmerican cleric Sadr from gaining control on Iraq. Sadr's supporters hold 40 seats in the Iraqi parliament, and basicly hand chose Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. Other militia groups such as the Badr Brigade and other radical grouips hold many seats in the Iraqi government as well. Up to 70% of policemen in Iraq are associated with militia groups, where a common joke is "Here comes the Iraqi police, the greatest threat to peace in Iraq".

Tony Snow may claim that the U.S. is fighting for some sort of honorable government in Iraq, but the truth is that we have lost over 2,800 lives and had over 20,000 wounded solely to fight for a corrupt terrorist government that runs police that terrorize Sunni citizens and kidnap, torture and behead them. There is no substantial difference between the torture and killings of Saddam Hussein and this new government that we support. And there is no substantial improvement in honesty or lack of corruption compared to Saddam Hussein either. Al Qaeda is one of the smallest terrorist groups within Iraq, and absolutely unable to wrest control in Iraq, but the terrorist Shiite militias are already firmly in control of the Iraqi government and whether Americsans should continue to lose their lives for such a corrupt terrorist dominated government is an important question.

It only seems when Bush leaves office, by impeachment or in Jan 2009, will the Tony "Snow" job stop. Truth has become the first victim of this administration, then the lives of many Americans fighting for the wrong type of government in Iraq.

White House Planned War Games Near Iran To Provoke A MidEast Security Situation Before The Election

In a highly questionable move that smells of political manipulation, the Bush White House and the Pentagon planned war games near Iran with Bahrain that concluded two days ago that have now resulted in Iran test firing 14 nuclear weapons capable Shahab-3 missiles. Right before the election, it appeared that the White House hoped to provoke a MidEast security situation that the White House could capitalize over right before the election.

The long range prospects of MidEast paece are indeed threatened by a nuclaer aremed Iran and nuclear proliferation to smaller irresponsible world states such as North Korea. However, for purely political reasons it is a dangerous game to provoke a wild regime like the radical religious government of Iran into some dangerous show of force in response to political games by the White House. This is a dangerous way to scare up "security" oriented voters for next week's election that can result in dangerous problems for MidEast peace long after the election.

No doubt the White House is also looking forward to the high likelyhood of another late last minute message from Osama Bin Laden. Bin Laden actually needs George Bush to villanize to radicalize more Muslims and build membership for his organization which has actually taken a huge beating after 9/11. It is often new terrorist organizations not at all associated with Al Qaeda responsible for so many of the world's terrorist incidents since 9/11. Much like both the Soviets and the U.S. were able to do during the Cold War, the mutual "villanization" of eacj other serves important domestic political purposes. Both George Bush and Osama Bin Laden inflate their worth politically by the mutual use of each other to further their power bases.

Even the White House which pretended to misintrepret the meaning of John Kerry's joke about the Bush Administration not doing their homework and leaving America stuck in Iraq, this government perpetuates their power by cheap use of semantical arguments worthless of any real value, and playng dangerous games of fear to "scare up " voters. The game playing that has provoked Iran to launch 14 missiles is just another example of this ruling by fear. In the 1950's far right Republican Senator Joseph McCarthy built up a power base for himself by raising fears about Communism far beyond any genuine Soviet military threats. Building a power base by ruling out of fear is a dangerous game that avoids direct talks with potential adversaries to garner the necessary peace agreements and endangers the lives of many for a short term political gain. This White House has simply engaged in too much of this "crying wolf" for their own benefit while avoiding genuine opportunities to engage potential adversaries in peace terms. Whether most voters will fall for this again on next Tuesday, remains to be seen.