TAZ Obituary

Ms. Terry Anne Sharff, 49, died the 9th day of November in the year 2009 at 12:26 p.m., in the presence of caring staff of Thedacare @ Home Hospice Services (www.thedacare.org), at Cherry Meadows Hospice, her domestic partner, Le Osburn, and her chihuahua, Arianna, in Menasha, Wisconsin.

Ms. Sharff was born September 24, 1960, in Paris, Texas, to Peggy (Humphrey) Wood and Mr. Sharff (father unknown). Terry worked almost 20 years as a software engineer consultant, specializing in SAP software implementations. Having been employed by the maker of the software (SAP America, Inc.) she moved to the Fox Valley as an LE Functional Consultant to assist Bemis' implementation of SAP. Terry was also an avid quilter having designed and hand stitched numerous quilts. Terry's other passion was history, receiving a Bachelors of Art from the University of California in Davis. At that time she also worked on Diane Feinstein's campaign (http://feinstein.senate.gov/public/). Following her diagnosis in March of 2008 of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS, http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/amyotrophiclateralsclerosis/amyotrophiclateralsclerosis.htm), it was not unexpected that Terry dedicated many blogging hours on behalf of Barrack Obama's Presidential campaign. Additionally, Ms. Sharff lived with mindfulness intent as a vegetarian, sharing a love for animals and the environment alike, she supported PETA, ASPCA, the Sierra Club, The Environmental Defense Fund, The Wilderness Defense Fund, World Wildlife Fund, the Jane Goodall Institute, the Gorilla Foundation, and others too numerous to name. Additionally, Ms. Sharff followed civil liberties causes at Amnesty International and the Human Rights Campaign. Finally, Terry was an avid reader with interests including non-fiction, history, and science.

Ms. Sharff is survived by Ms. Lisa (“Le”) M. Osburn, her domestic partner, (celebrated April 19th, 2003 at Cedarlane Unitarian Universalist church in Silver Spring, Maryland). Survivors also include, two sons, Erin and Ryan Wellock who live on the West Coast where they were raised. Terry also leaves to Le Osburn's care two chihuahua's, Robbie and Arianna, and two pixie bob felines, Irving and Emery.

A memorial ride in Terry's power chair will be held to honor her on *12/19/2009* starting at *Corner of I10 & Cold Spring Road, Town of Menasha, Wisconsin* to help raise awareness of ALS. Le Osburn will coordinate the ride. If you would like to contribute to the ongoing research efforts to find a cure for ALS, please consider contributing to the Muscular Dystrophy Association's ALS Division.

Posted by Le Osburn (LMO) in honor of Taz.

McCain's Bald Faced Lie to Veterans

The John McCain for President web site says that “John McCain has been a leader in Congress, fighting for all those who serve and their families, improving veterans’ health care, providing veterans with the benefits they have earned, easing their transition to civilian life, and honoring the fallen.” This is easily proven to be an outrageous lie.

Since such a large part of the McCain persona surrounds his almost mythical military service, one would think that such a dedicated soldier would be devoted to the betterment of the military and the men and women who serve in it. McCain has often stated that he supports veterans and veteran issues, but interestingly, McCain has voted against every major amendment or bill that would in any way benefit his beloved military.

McCain didn’t just vote against giving the military money, he also voted against giving them rest when he voted, in 2007, against the Webb amendment calling for adequate troop rest between deployments.

McCain has a long record of voting against any monetary award that might benefit veterans. In the very busy year of 2006 he voted against an amendment that would provide $20 million to the Department of Veterans Affairs for health care facilities, like Walter Reed. Then McCain was one of only 13 Senators to vote against the $430 million allotted for the Department of Veteran Affairs for medical services to provide outpatient care and treatment for veterans.

McCain found a way to combine his real love of corporate finances, with his faux love of veteran’s affairs by protecting corporate tax loopholes from being savaged by veteran’s affair funding. He voted, in 2006, against increasing medical service funding for veterans by $1.5 billion to be paid for by closing corporate tax loopholes, and declined again in 2004, against closing a corporate tax loophole to provide funding for veterans medical care.

It is a bit hard to prove that you are a champion of the military when you won’t spend a dime to care for them, and a much harder case to suggest you are a maverick when you cater to corporate tax structures and the lobbyists for those corporations. The fact that McCain would put a bald face lie on his web site indicates he is shameless, both for the way he has abandoned the veterans that trusted him, and for the way he lies to voters.

Veterans are wise to McCain’s machinations, as can be seen by the low rating given him by veteran organizations across the nation. The Disabled American Veterans and the American Legion recently gave Barack Obama an 80 rating, while awarding McCain a measly 20. Also telling was the D rating McCain received from the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, most probably for his votes against the veterans of those very wars.

If the veterans of America can see through McCain’s lies, surely the general population will have to follow suit.





Sources:
Vote Smart Records, The Daily KOS, McCain’s voting record - how he REALLY supports the troops ,clammyc, Jan. 26, 08, Political Affairs.net, John McCain and the Veterans “Paradigm Shift” Joel Wendland, Sept. 14, 08. Washington Post, Votes Database, 109th congressional senate recordVote Smart Records, The Daily KOS, McCain’s voting record - how he REALLY supports the troops ,clammyc, Jan. 26, 08, Political Affairs.net, John McCain and the Veterans “Paradigm Shift” Joel Wendland, Sept. 14, 08. Washington Post, Votes Database, 109th congressional senate record

Why Feminists should Reject Sarah Palin

I have heard several conservative pundits and quite a few feminists suggesting women should support Sarah Palin because she is an “empowered” woman who represents progress for women in politics. Other women suggest they even feel guilty for not supporting Palin.

I can think of several reasons why it would be inadvisable for feminists or any other women to support Sarah Palin, not the least of which is that she is simply a token woman on John McCain’s campaign, meant to entice disillusioned Hilary Clinton supporters to vote for him. Palin has little understanding of political ethics as shown by her consistent abuse of gubernatorial power in regard to hiring and firing. She is completely unknowledgeable politically and is so misinformed that she actually believes the founding fathers wrote the Pledge of Allegiance.

Why should we feel guilty for rejecting such and empty and patronizing offering?

Women should assertively shun Sarah Palin because she is an anti-feminist who opposes every issue most feminists support, including issues relating to abortion, birth control, sex education, parenting, healthcare, equal pay for equal work, and civil rights.

Sarah Palin belongs to the pro-life organization Feminists for Life, which focuses on convincing college age women to choose motherhood and deny abortion. The group’s web site is filled with quasi feminist history topics, all of which are peculiarly skewed to the perspective of parenthood. Articles on the Pregnancy Discrimination Act of 1978, challenges regarding Welfare to Work programs, and the pros and cons regarding the decision to be stay at home moms illustrate the focus placed on birth and motherhood. The website is also filled with pseudo scientific articles and advice stressing the physical and emotional dangers inherent to abortion.

Palin supports legal consent laws for young women seeking an abortion, and was reported to be extremely disappointed when Alaska “…lawmakers let a bill die requiring girls under 17 to get parental consent for an abortion.” Sadly, these types of laws have been shown to create hardship for young women whenever and where ever they are enacted.

Sarah Palin describes herself as a pro-life advocate who revels in her conservative “family” values. Though she has gone on the record in favor of contraception, most of the conservative groups Palin identifies with classify 40 percent of all birth control methods as abortion because they all have the same mode of action as emergency contraception. Limiting your access to those contraceptives has been a special focus of the Bush administration, and one can only imagine what the super conservative Palin would do.

Conservative groups insist abstinence is the only truly acceptable birth control method, and like Palin, they insist abstinence education should be included in any sex education program, despite multiple studies showing abstinence education as being largely ineffective. When asked in 2006 if she would support abstinence only education Palin said “Yes, the explicit sex-ed programs will not find my support.”


Sarah Palin opposes abortion even in the cases of rape and incest, and insists that any woman who gets pregnant should give birth, regardless of health, age, economic or other circumstances. Proving that she is seriously dedicated to this philosophy, Palin has a 17 year old daughter who became pregnant and is now set to marry the 17 year old father of her baby. Rather than treating this delicate situation as the personal tragedy it is, and behaving the way a concerned parent might, Palin took advantage of the situation by exploiting her daughter’s pregnancy to tout her conservative credentials. Not the kind of parenting I would hope American women model.

Like most pro-life advocates who are avid supporters of birth but not interested in providing health services for women and children afterward, Palin opposed a health care bill in her state that would expand health services to all Alaskans. As governor, Palin also used a line item veto to cut funding for a state program benefiting teen mothers in need of a place to live. Funding for Covenant House, a transitional home for teenage mothers, was cut by 20 percent under the Governor.

Palin has not been very vocal regarding pay equity for women, but her running mate McCain has provided plenty of information regarding the likelihood of women receiving equal pay for equal work under his administration. McCain claims to support pay equity but says he opposes the Ledbetter Bill, which essentially extends the right of women to sue for pay inequities if they experience discrimination. McCain opposes the bill because “…this kind of legislation, as is typical of what's being proposed by my friends on the other side of the aisle, opens us up to lawsuits for all kinds of problems…” Once again the McCain Palin ticket shows its concern for corporate America over the rights of women.

In 2006, Palin vetoed state legislation denying benefits to same-sex couples and said she would support a constitutional amendment to deny same-sex couples the same benefits afforded to heterosexual mates. She also opposes Hate Crime Legislation as does McCain. Legislation like the Matthew Shepard Act that would protect Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals, and Transgender people from bigotry targeted crimes. McCain also voted against the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) legislation that would prohibit discrimination in the work force based on sexual orientation. We can only assume Palin agrees with McCain’s stance since they are “political soul mates.”


It is apparent from Sarah Palin’s conservative anti-woman focus that she is not interested in “empowering” the women of America in any meaningful way, but is in reality primarily interested in controlling our sexual lives. Palin expects women to do without health care, equal pay or protection against discrimination while also believing that more children should be born into the world without those benefits.

Feminists should only be embarrassed or feel guilty if they choose to vote for such an anti-feminist force




Sources: Time, Conservative Believer, Clair Sudduth . The Daily KOs, Palin thinks Pledge written by Founding Fathers , JLFinch , Aug 31, 2008. .AMERICan Psychology Association, Research Shows That Abstinence-Only Programs Have Limited Effectiveness And Unintended Consequences, Pam Willenz, February, 23, 2005.The Washington Times, Panel debates effectiveness of abstinence education, Thursday, April 24, 2008. Think Progress, Palin Supports Parental Consent Laws For Minors Seeking Abortions, Anchorage Daily News, August 14, 2008. Huffington Post, McCain opposes equal pay bill in Senate, Libby Quaid, April 23, 2008. Think Progress, Anchorage Daily News, December 21, 2006. Washington Blade, McCain’s gay Q&A, William R. Kapfer , Oct 1, 2008.Fox News, McCain talks Palin on Fox News Sunday, Mosheh Oinounou, August 31st, 2008.

Eight Terrible Truths about Sarah Palin

Since the moment John McCain patronized American women by introducing Sarah Palin as his VP choice, with the goal of duping women who might be disillusioned by Hilary Clinton’s loss into voting form him, the media and blogasphere have been flooded with stories regarding the Alaska Governor, some flattering and some rather ugly. Since those initial stories we have learned some basic facts about Sarah Palin however, that paint a very different picture of her than the one the McCain campaign would have us believe. I have attempted in this post to summarize the top eight facts we now know about Sarah Palin.

Regarding women’s issues Palin is an anti-feminist, a member of Feminists for Life, and someone who wants the government to invade women’s lives to block all abortion, but is opposed to offering equal pay for equal work, or to providing federal funding for health care, child care, or early childhood education. She opposes all but abstinence based sex education, and rather ironically, has an unwed pregnant daughter.

Palin has a horrible track record on conservation, and advocates for oil drilling in the Artic National Wildlife Preserve. Her husband, actually works for BP oil, when he is not working as a deep see fisherman. Palin also supports hunting wolves by helicopter, and used state funds to fight a bill that would make the practice illegal. She denies that global warming is being affected in any way by human activity and sued the federal government when they wanted to put Polar Bears on the endangered species list, saying that people were over reacting to global warming issues.

On the matter of education Palin denies the scientific truths regarding evolution and science. She pushes for teaching creationism in public schools, and opposes science curriculums that teach evolution or critical thinking as being superior to creationism.

She is not the popular Governor that we have been led to believe. While the McCain campaign tells us Palin has an 80 percent approval rate in Alaska, Gregg Erickson of the Anchorage Daily News, reports that Palin’s approval rating in the state is actually 65 percent and sinking, and he suggests that “among journalists who followed her, it might be in the teens." He also added: "I have a hard time seeing how her qualifications stack up against the duties and responsibilities of being president.” Also from an editorial in the Anchorage Daily News: "It's stunning that someone with so little national and international experience might be heartbeat away from the presidency."

She is not the political maverick and reformer we have been told she is. According to the Washington Post from 2003 to 2005, Palin was one of three directors of "Ted Stevens Excellence in Public Service, Inc.," a 527 group that raises unlimited funds from corporate donors. "527" refers to a section of the tax code governing such campaign groups. Stevens, who is running for senate re-election this year, was indicted by a federal grand jury in Washington, D.C., this summer for failing to disclose sizeable gifts from an Alaskan oil company, including assistance with renovating a vacation home. While we still have a lot to learn about Palin's role as a fundraiser for Steven's 527, but her role as a reformer in Alaskan politics is somewhat tainted by her ties to Stevens and Alaskan oil companies.

Palin’s much touted executive experience is fraught with disturbing issues. She was investigated for abuse of power as Mayor and then as Governor of Alaska. An Anchorage Daily News item from December 1997 reports that Palin faced a recall as mayor of Wasilla, for firing the Police Chief. It appears the Chief and another city official was fired for "not fully supporting her efforts to govern.” As Governor she is being investigated for attempting to fire her brother in law, a state trooper, who was involved in a bitter custody debate with Palin’s sister. In her defense, Palin insists the trooper in question threatened her family, yet there is not police report form the time she says the incident occurred.
Palin lied about supporting the “Bridge to Nowhere.” The Gravina Island Bridge would have linked the town of Ketchikan to its international airport, which is extremely difficult to get to by car, as it is on Gravina Island where there is currently only a ferry in place to shuttle people back and forth. The bridge in question would have been a great asset but was quickly labeled a pork barrel project by McCain and other members of the GOP. Palin echoed disapproval for the “Bridge to Nowhere” during her introductory speech, but it turns out she originally liked the idea. In fact, “We're going to build that bridge” became a common campaign slogan while running for Governor, especially when addressing the people of Ketchikan. It seems Palin is an accomplished liar, if nothing else.
Regarding the war Sarah, whose son is shipping out to Iraq on September 11, told students at her conservative Wasilla Assembly of God Church that America’s leaders were sending troops to Iraq on a “task that is from God.” She also said a proposed pipeline was a project sent from God and urged the assembled students to pray, and work together, to make God’s plan a reality, because God, according to Palin, wants to extract natural resources. And to think I used to worry about the current President’s infatuation with ancient mythology.
When reviewing these facts we are left with the irrefutable evidence that rather than being a political reformer or maverick, Sarah Palin is a radical right wing ideologue who appeals to such neo conservatives as James Dobson and Tony Perkins. Her appointment to the McCain ticket will ensure that Roe v Wade will be overturned, that faith based initiatives will continue to be funded and, if Sarah has her way, conservation, science and women’s rights, to name a few, will be turned back by about 100 years.

It is ironic that the first Republican woman on a major ticket is from the fringe neo-conservative movement that wants to suppress all individual freedoms, freethinking and scientific progress and return us the dark ages that the Christian right perceives as heaven on Earth.


Sources: Market Watch, Palin said War in Iraq and Pipeline are gods will, Rex Nutting, Sept 2, 2008, Alternet, Top Ten Most Disturbing Facts and Impressions of Sarah Palin, Alternet Staff, Sept, 2, 2008, Huffington Post, Police Chief: Palin Fired Me For Campaign Contributors, Sept. 3, 2008, Feminists for Life website Huffington Post, 2 Top Alaska Newspapers Question Palin's Fitness, Greg Mitchell, Aug, 30, 2008

Liar: The Truly Deceptive Nature of John McCain’s Politics

Recently I wrote a post for Open Salon in response to an open call for letters on the topic of John McCain’s record of honesty or dishonesty. I chose to submit a post detailing McCain’s repeated lies regarding his support of veterans and their causes, because I felt it especially important to highlight McCain’s duplicity on a topic he seems to tout as his core value. In reality, there were any numbers of topics I could have chosen to illustrate the “Straight Talk” campaign is anything but, and should in reality more fittingly be called the “Double Speak” or “Forked Tongue” Campaign.

McCain constantly lies regarding his record, the record of his vice presidential pick, and the record of his opponents, with each lie ranging from the outrageous to the sleazy, but he is not alone. Ever since GW Bush took office and made an art form of naming things for their opposite reality, like the No Child Left Behind act that left all children without funding for the education program, the Clear Skies Act that supplanted and gutted the successful Clean Air act to weaken many environmental protections against air pollution, and of course the outrageous WMD lie that fueled the Iraqi war, deception has become a staple of Republican Politics. This verbal slight of hand, has led to some disastrous policy decisions, but seems to have become a permanent tactic in the Republican Party play book.

No one believes, of course, that politics is ever completely honest and free of any policy distortion or history rewriting, but the McCain campaign has slipped far beyond the normal pale. Time Magazine’s Joe Klein recently wrote, “In the early weeks of the general-election campaign, a consensus has grown in the political community — a consensus that ranges from practitioners like Karl Rove to commentators like, well, me — that John McCain has allowed his campaign to slip the normal bounds of political propriety.” If Karl Rove criticizes someone for dishonesty one has to know it is serious, considering Rove wrote the play book on dirty politics.

Some of the most obvious and outrageous lies McCain has been telling pertain to his own record, in which he says he supports veterans, or labor, or is an agent for economic oversight, or a patron of social equality for women. His own congressional voting record shows that he never supported one single veteran’s bill in the last 10 years, has a long record of voting against labor rights, and has repeatedly voted to ensure women and LGBT people would not have equal rights in the work place, or anywhere else in society.

McCain says he puts Country First but will vote to support corporate tax loopholes over populous interests every time. He has voted over and over again to cut taxes for oil and other corporate entities, while refusing to support tax cuts for the middle or lower classes.

McCain’s lies regarding Sarah Palin range from the mundane to the humorous. He calls her a reformer who took on the “old boys club” in Alaska even though she worked for the best well known “old boy” of them all, Ted Stevens, who is now being tried for corruption. He calls her the most popular governor in the nation despite reports from her state indicating she is not nearly so well liked, and he says he vetted Sarah Palin when in fact, he selected her by gut instinct rather than any well defined knowledge regarding her qualifications, or obvious lack of them.

McCain’s lies regarding Obama are even more outrageous. He lies when he suggests that Barack Obama favors a government-run health-care system when the truth is that Obama wants a market-based system subsidized by the government. McCain lied in his acceptance speech at the RNC when he said that Obama opposed offshore oil-drilling and the building of new nuclear-power plants, even after 38 million Americans heard Obama say in his speech at the DNC that he was open to both. McCain also ran one misleading political ad suggesting that Obama favored "comprehensive" sex education for kindergartners when in fact; the bill was aimed at teaching young children about sexual predatory dangers presented by pedophiles.

The absurd accusation that Obama was referring to Sarah Palin when he said McCain's effort to remarket his economic policies was putting "lipstick on a pig" was another clearly misleading attack by McCain, and an obnoxious diversionary tactic to allay attention from Palin's lack of fitness for the job by painting Obama as a sexist anti-Palin adversary.

It appears McCain’s campaign began to slide into the sea of half-truths and outright lies when he lost control of the one issue he expected to dominate; foreign policy. McCain was set to highlight his foreign policy experience over Obama’s by promoting his POW history, his support of the troop surge, and by touting his vague plan to win the war in Iraq. When Obama made his highly successful overseas visit and the Iraqi government announced they would support Obama’s Iraq strategy, McCain lost his hold on foreign policy, and perhaps the only policy in which he was able to dominate. It seems the only avenue left to McCain was the attempt to destroy his opponent through any means necessary, but mostly through deceit.
The lies, smears and half truths issued by McCain suggest that the campaign has decided “…its candidate can't win honorably, on the issues, so it has resorted to transparent and phony diversions.” While McCain continues to smear and distort the facts, the American people are left with the difficult task of seeking any glimmer of truth from a consummate liar with little remorse.
As the candidate’s spokesman Brian Rogers said to Politico regarding media criticism of McCain’s dishonest statements "We’re running a campaign to win. And we’re not too concerned about what the media filter tries to say about it.”

It appears McCain’s campaign is finally ready to try a little refreshing honesty and admit they are not focused on honesty, integrity or facts, but are instead focused on winning, at any cost.














Sources: Sierra Club, Clear Skies Proposal Weakens the Clean Air Act, Environmental Update. Time.com, John McCain and the Lying Game, Joe Klein, Sept 17, 2008..Time.com, A Brief History Of: 'Putting Lipstick on a Pig', Marti Covington and Maya Curry / Washington, Sep. 11, 2008. Time.com, Understanding John McCain, JAMES CARNEY AND MICHAEL GRUNWALD, Thursday, Aug. 28, 2008. MSNBC, WHEELS COME OFF STRAIGHT TALK EXPRESS? Mark Murray, September 13, 2008. NPR, Sen. Stevens Indicted In Graft Probe, Martin Kaste and Michele Norris, September 29, 2008. Consortiumnews.com, John McCain v. The Truth, Robert Parry, October 2, 2008. The United States Senate, Legislative Votes Record.

The Bush White House and all mainstream media outlets seem to state, as absolute fact that the “surge” strategy is the single reason for the decrease in violence in Iraq. We hear John McCain tout the surge as his idea, and it is presented repeatedly as the only Iraq war idea that worked. It appears, however, that the “surge” of approximately 30,000 additional troops sent to Iraq in 2007 was only one reason and perhaps, according to Bob Woodward’s new book, The War Within, a secondary one for the decrease in violence.

Throughout the summer of 2007, as the troop surge in Iraq reached full strength, Gen. David H. Petraeus and the world was waiting for the tide of violence to turn, and by that summer’s end the General saw violence decline by nearly a 50 percent. Violence has continued to fall fairly regularly over the past year.

While Washington, in typical fashion, manipulated the facts to support their simplified view that the “surge was working” it appears the full story was far more complicated, with at least three other factors being equally, or more important than the troop increase. All of these important factors have been, for the most part, overlooked or downplayed by the mainstream media, but I have tried to concisely summarize them below.


Covert Operations
In the spring of 2007 the US Military and intelligence agencies launched a series of covert operations, using highly classified techniques that allowed them to locate, target and kill key individuals in various “terrorist” or other insurgent groups.
These techniques included a form of “collaborative warfare” which employed a combination of tools simultaneously and included signal intercepts human intelligence and any other method that would allow for “lightening quick and sometimes concurrent operations” according to Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the commander of the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) responsible for hunting al-Qaeda in Iraq.

According to Bob Woodward, “…a number of authoritative sources say the covert activities had a far-reaching effect on the violence and were very possibly the biggest factor in reducing it.” Some 85 to 90 percent of the operations were successful and provided “actionable intelligence” from new sources, methods and operations, according to sources cited by Woodward.


Anbar Awakening and Tribal Community Security Groups

In June of 2007 tens of thousands of Sunnis turned against al-Qaeda in Iraq and signed up with US forces. It appears Al-Qaeda in Iraq made several strategic errors in the region, including forced marriages with Sunni women, taking over hospitals and using Mosques for beheading operations.

Matters were further ignited when al-Qaeda in Iraq mortared playgrounds and left headless bodies lying around the countryside, with signs reading "Don't remove this body or the same thing will happen to you." The Sunnis revolted against the al-Qaeda brutality and sided with America to rid their country of a common enemy.

U.S. forces under Petraeus, worked for months with tribal leaders, who had once fought the Americans, to build local security forces throughout Anbar, and it is those forces who feel they were the actual driving force behind saving Iraq. "We are the ones who saved our country," Sheikh Ahmed Abu Risha, who now serves as president of the Iraqi Awakening Council, said in an interview. "We were able to fight al-Qaeda."

The US military also set up a network of what Petraeus then called “Concerned Local Citizens” but which was later called The Sons of Iraq, to act as armed citizen watch groups and provide intelligence to US and Iraqi forces. These groups fed information to the Collaborative Warfare groups.


Shia Cleric Mogtada al-Sadr and pure luck

A third significant and lucky break in fighting came Aug. 29, when militant Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr ordered his powerful Mahdi Army to suspend operations, including attacks against U.S. troops.

This order came after a gunfight between his powerful Mahdi Army and Iraqi forces in the holy city of Karbala in which 50 Shia pilgrims were injured and another 275 were injured. Sadr’s order was motivated, not by good will, but by self preservation, as any leader knows it is bad PR for one’s followers to be gunned down by their own army.

The cease fire provided by al-Sadr was a stroke of luck for America, and helped feed the “surge is working fairy tale” that Washington has been spinning ever since. The danger in such simplification is that it glosses over the techniques, the cost and the alliances our government made to get these results.

I would much prefer to know what exactly my tax money, or rather the money my government is borrowing from China, is going toward, than to live under the false belief that 30,000 extra US Super troops could, single handedly, quash anti-US violence and subdue 3000 year old tribal religious warfare going on between Sunni and Shia.

I guess I will have to read Bob Woodward’s book to figure out what else my government has been up to in Iraq, because I know it is highly unlikely my government or the corporate owned media in this country will ever report the truth.


Sources: Washington Post.com Tribal Coalition in Anbar Said to Be Crumbling, Joshua Partlow and John Ward Anderson, June 11, 2007, Washing Post.com Why Did Violence Plummet? It Wasn't Just the Surge, Bob Woodward,Sept, 8, 2008

Wisconsin Child Dies While Parents Pray

Dale and Leilani Neumann of Wausau Wisconsin have been charged with 2nd degree reckless homicide for letting their 11 year old daughter die of diabetes while they prayed for her recovery rather than seeking medical care.


Their family’s attorney is fighting the case saying that the courts, if the charges are allowed to continue, will “become entangled in constitutionally protected religious matters.” because the charges “…unconstitutionally infringe on their right to freely exercise their religion.”


An autopsy determined the child, Madeline Neumann, died from undiagnosed diabetes at the family's rural Weston home on Easter. Court records indicated that the girl most likely showed symptoms for weeks, and perhaps months, before she died.


Leilani Neumann, 40, indicated that the family believes that healing comes from God, and that they never expected their daughter to die because they prayed for her. Both parents considered the child’s illness a test of faith, and felt the child was under a spiritual attack that could be healed through prayer. They were shocked when she died.


Unfortunately, while the parents got the chance to practice the faith of their choice, the child paid the ultimate price for their archaic superstition. The Court will decide on Oct 3rd whether to charge them or not.

Sources: Associated Press, Robert Imrie, Sept. 2, 2008