November 24, 2005

Benderman says: "No Veteran Cuts"
SGT. KEVIN BENDERMAN
AMERICA'S NEW GENERATION OF LEADERSHIP
 
AMERICA'S VETERANS
 
NO VETERAN FUNDING CUTS
 
BY SGT. KEVIN BENDERMAN
 
 
Recently I've heard quite a few stories about funding cuts for the VA, and I thought to myself, "Why would an administration that claims to be so concerned about the welfare of our service members allow these cuts to be made?"  And then I thought, "We should be ensuring that our veterans are given the same dedication to their long-term healthcare concerns as they 
brought with them to their tour of duty." 
 
This current war is generating so many people with new demands for healthcare, both mental and physical, that it is incomprehensible to me that the VA budget would be cut.  Especially in light of the fact that there are still thousands of veterans from the Persian Gulf War, Viet Nam, Korea and World War II  that require and depend on the VA for healthcare.
 
Why are these VA cuts considered even remotely acceptable?  The people who have served and worn the uniform of this country proudly are deserving of so much more than this type of disgraceful treatment.  No veteran of combat from any of these wars should ever have to go to bed wondering if they are going to get the treatment they need and have earned at so great a cost to themselves.  It enrages me to hear our government reneging on their end of the agreement made with our service members who have kept up their end even as it cost them an arm or a leg.
 
 
 
Please visit the Benderman’s websites at www.BendermanDefense.org
 
 
Hon. Cynthia McKinney
Contact - Richard Searcy
North DeKalb Mall Ste D-46
Decatur, GA 30033
404-633-0927
 
Posted by EvansMediaUSA at 07:31:46 | Permanent Link | Comments (0) |

New Virus Spreads on Net

E-mail Worm Hits Internet
 
by Mark Masek
 
There is no Easter Bunny, and that's not a real Paris Hilton video in your e-mail box. Nor is the FBI likely to be e-mailing you to ask you questions about visiting illegal Web sites.
 
A new variant of the Sober worm made the network rounds Tuesday, attempting to entice people into clicking on attachments purporting to be threats from the law enforcement agency or videos clips of the hotel heiress and her reality TV co-star Nicole Richie.
 
Antivirus companies said the worm gained some traction over the weekend and on Monday. It's a minor modification of the "Sober" virus that has flared up several times over the past year. But this latest variant, graded as a medium-level threat, appeared to be trailing off as security providers have responded.
 
"This one is virulent and will reproduce itself easily but does not have much of a payload," said David Perry, the global director of education at anti virus company Trend Micro. "For the time being, this particular strain is probably done."
 
Some anti virus companies said the worm was still spreading fast, however. In a blog posting, security company F-Secure said Internet companies have seen "several millions of infected email's" over the course of hours.
 
"The numbers we're now seeing...are just huge," wrote F-Secure Chief Research Officer Mikko Hypponen. "This is the largest email worm outbreak of the year, so far." One version of the e-mail carrying the worm appears to be a letter from the FBI saying the agency has found evidence that the computer user has been visiting illegal Web sites. It asks the recipient to click on the attachment to answer questions.
 
The FBI released a warning on Tuesday saying it never sends unsolicited e-mails.
 
"The FBI takes this matter seriously and is investigating," the agency said in its statement. "Users are instructed to delete the e-mail without opening it."
 
Another version of the e-mail used a message purporting to be from the Central Intelligence Agency. A third, a German-language variant, contained a threatening message from a German law enforcement agency.
 
A separate version purports to offer a download manager for "video clips, pictures and more" of Hilton and Richie. All operate the same way, once the attachment is activated, however.
 
If activated, the worm drops several files onto a computer and searches for e-mail addresses stored in address books or elsewhere in memory and sends copies of itself to those destinations. If it finds Microsoft's anti-spyware and anti virus software running, it turns the protections off.
 
Several other variants of a different virus, dubbed "Mytob," are also making the rounds. The e-mails carrying them purport to be a message from an e-mail service provider or from support staff providing notification about a changed password or suspended account.
 
Antivirus companies rate the danger of this worm as "low," but as always, advise against clicking on unknown attachments to e-mails.  Be safe on the Internet!!
 
 
 
 
Posted by EvansMediaUSA at 05:32:40 | Permanent Link | Comments (0) |

November 17, 2005

Citizens Commission on Human Rights

CCHR

 
 
It may be stating the obvious that treatment is not supposed to kill a patient. Yet this happens virtually every day through psychiatric drugs, restraints, brutality, assault and neglect....
  • Between 1950 and 1964, more people died in U.S. psychiatric hospitals than were killed in the Revolutionary War, the War of 1812, the Mexican War, the Civil War, the Spanish-American War, World Wars I and II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War and the Persian Gulf War combined. In fact, between 1950 and 1990, the total number of psychiatric inpatient deaths exceeded the cumulative number of war casualties by at least 70%. 

 

  • Between 1998 and 1999, 150 people died from restraint procedures in psychiatric facilities in the United States. Thirteen of these deaths over a two-year period were of teenagers and children placed under psychiatric “care.”

Horror stories have recently emerged of children dying strapped to beds and chairs. Others were pinned to floors by hospital staff, crying out that they couldn't breathe. One six-year-old boy, for instance, died alone of asphyxiation while strapped to a wheelchair. Another teenager died of the same cause, while staffers shoved a towel over his mouth and wrapped a sheet around his head. Far from being told the circumstances under which their children died, family members were frequently told that these deaths were due to natural causes or unfortunate accidents.

Due to exposure of these needless and tragic deaths, federal regulations in the United States now prohibit the use of physical and chemical restraints to coerce or discipline psychiatric patients. The regulation, passed in 1999, also ordered a national reporting system to be implemented and for government funding to be cut to any facility that fails to abide by the regulations.

Yet despite these federal regulations, the deaths continue. CCHR is partnering with state and federal agencies to abolish this deadly practice.

FOR MORE INFORMATION PLEASE CONTACT:

CCHR International

CHOICE AMERICA NETWORK

 

Posted by EvansMediaUSA at 13:46:09 | Permanent Link | Comments (0) |

November 14, 2005

Leave My Child Alone,...

 

 

Leave My Child Alone Project

 

 

CHOICE AMERICA NETWORK

 

 

Posted by EvansMediaUSA at 08:43:42 | Permanent Link | Comments (0) |

November 06, 2005

Carlyle Group Exposed

 

Exposed: The Carlyle Group

Shocking Documentary

Uncovers the Subversion of Americas Democracy.

CHOICE AMERICA NETWORK 

 

Posted by EvansMediaUSA at 08:07:22 | Permanent Link | Comments (1) |

November 05, 2005

Carville, Matlin and Bush

Why the Dems Need
 James Carville
 to Take a
 Long, Long Vacation
 
by Arianna Huffington
 

During a week when Harry Reid and the Dems finally found their spines and their voices on Plamegate and the war, it was deeply disturbing to see James Carville parading his tired, old, and utterly clueless act all over the TV -- supposedly offering up the Democratic point of view.

Can somebody please, please, please shut Carville up -- especially about Plamegate. His takes on the scandal are utterly compromised by his marriage to Mary Matalin.

This isn't like the weird-but-fun old days when they were a sitcom come to life -- running opposing campaigns during the day and sharing pillow talk at night while creating a cottage industry as "the Donny and Marie of politics."

That's all in the past. Now, as one of Dick Cheney's most trusted first-term advisors, one of eight founding members of the White House Iraq Group, a witness in front of the Plamegate grand jury, and a close friend of Scooter Libby ("The man you pray you get seated next to at a dinner party," she recently cooed), Matalin is a central player in all this.

And it has hopelessly handcuffed Carville. Check out this exchange from his appearance on The Situation Room this week:

BLITZER: Should the vice president hold a news conference or grant an interview and answer the tough questions that are being asked out there?

 

CARVILLE: I've got a better idea. Why doesn't the president get out and have one? Harry Truman didn't say the buck stops with the Vice President. The buck stops with the President.

[snip]

I think the first step is not the Vice President -- [it's] the President of the United States standing up, answering to the American people, answering people's questions... The Vice nothing. There aren't no Vices around here. There's one man in charge of this country and that is George W. Bush.

 

Jesus, could Carville have turned the focus of the discussion away from his wife's former boss any quicker?

"The Vice nothing"? "There are no Vices around here"? The buck doesn't stop with the Vice President? Are you kidding me? The Vice President's office is Ground Zero on Plamegate -- and on the Bush administration's push for war. It was Cheney who regularly stormed over to the CIA, knocking heads and twisting arms to get the intel he wanted. It was Cheney who set the Plamegate ball rolling by demanding info on the bogus claims of a Niger/Iraq uranium connection. It was Cheney who led the media charge in selling the war with his unwavering claims that Saddam had the ability to "subject the United States...to nuclear blackmail." It was Cheney who helped foster the bogus impression that there was an al-Qaeda/Saddam connection -- continuing to tout the "Atta met with Saddam's reps in Prague" story long after it had been shot down by the FBI. It was Cheney's office that opened its arms to Chalabi after the CIA soured on him. It was "Cheney's Cheney," Scooter Libby, who wrote the original draft of Colin Powell's shameful UN speech. And it was Cheney's office that took the lead in the administration's efforts to discredit Joe Wilson and his wife.

Memo to Carville: If you can't talk about Dick Cheney, then you can't talk about Plamegate. Or about the war -- and the lies and deceptions the administration used to sell it to the American people. And if you can't talk about Plamegate and the war, you should not be talking at all from the Democratic side of the aisle.

And there is the additional problem that Carville never really got Iraq and its significance. That's why he spent much of 2004 advising Kerry and the Democrats to focus on domestic issues. And we know how well that turned out.

On Tuesday, we got a snapshot of how Carville deals with the issue of the war on the Today show:

COURIC: Obviously the White House would like to change the subject away from the indictment of "Scooter" Libby. Is this story over, James?

CARVILLE: No, this story is not over. I'll tell you another story that's not over: We had the fourth bloodiest month in Iraq... and that's of a lot bigger concern here. But...

So there we are. One line on the war, nothing on Plamegate's connection to it -- and then a lightning-fast pivot to the domestic front, where he obviously feels more, well, at home:

I think Democrats have a great opportunity to show that they're going to stand up for the interests of working people, going to stand up for the interests of middle-class people and get away from the machine gun lobby and the anti-Family Medical Leave and all of these other decisions here.

Family Medical Leave? Iraq is going to hell, the American public has turned against the war, Bush is staggering from the Plamegate revelations, and Carville wants the Democrats to "stand up for" family medical leaves? Is he serious? Why not throw in school uniforms and mandatory 48-hour hospital maternity stays while you're at it, James?

It would be bad enough if Carville were only dishing out this clueless crap as a TV talking head -- but, unfortunately, he's also serving it up to Democratic leaders who, inexplicably, keep seeking out his advice.

 

I'll never forget sitting in Lawrence Bender's living room 12 days before the 2004 election, listening to Carville predict that the election was in the bag.

"If we can't win this damn election," he said, "with a Democratic Party more unified than ever before, with us having raised as much money as the Republicans, with 55% of the country believing we're heading in the wrong direction, with our candidate having won all three debates, and with our side being more passionate about the outcome than theirs -- if we can't win this one, then we can't win shit! And we need to completely rethink the Democratic Party."

But, instead of rethinking, the party is returning to the bone dry Carville advice well. He's one of the guiding forces behind the influential Democracy Corps, which recently released a report [PDF] calling for the Democrats to run on a 2006 agenda focused on "health care, education and energy, followed by top end tax cut repeal and homeland security."

Thud (that's the sound of Democratic chances dropping).

James Carville hasn't had a fresh idea since The War Room stopped filming.

It's time for him to take a long, long vacation from the spotlight. And he should take his Cheney/Libby-apologist, WHIG-war-salesman-wife with him.

© 2005 The Huffington Post

CHOICE AMERICA NETWORK

 
Posted by EvansMediaUSA at 06:07:21 | Permanent Link | Comments (0) |

November 02, 2005

Open Letter to Cheney

Open Letter To The honorable Dick Cheney  

 

Mr. Cheney, now that the United States has almost completely destroyed its own reputation, value system and integrity in the eyes of the world, you are proposing to influence enough lawmakers into re-making even a theoretical positive image of the United States into that of a third rate, third world junta-controlled fascist state, complete with all the inherent trappings of torture, terror and tyranny that makes these regimes feared and loathed around the world.  (Quite an objective for any tyrant).  Even with the stigmas of Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, Bagram, Diego Garcia and Falluja fresh in the minds of the world, you are attempting to legitimize the gutting of the Geneva Convention and the U.N. Convention Against Torture by placing the barbaric tool of torture in the hands of a few “CIA sadists” to justify pursuing an unjustified war started and pursued by you and your president. 

 

The 38 percent of the American population, which presently supports you and your leader’s actions, will keep dwindling as the suffering caused by body bags and missing body parts reaches closer and closer to their living rooms.  But, by the time they realize that your need for the use of torture will never stop at the shores of the United States, it will be as late for THEM as for any conscript purchased from an Afghan war lord and designated for “CIA squeezing”. 

 

By a recent vote of 90 to 9 in the United States Senate an amendment to the Defense Appropriations Bill was written and sponsored by a former Viet Nam POW who can vouch for the value of torture as a tool of intelligence gathering.  So far as we Americans know, Senator McCain never yielded to the pressures of torture to reveal information that would be of value to the enemy during his 5 years as a POW.  Do you think Senator McCain is the only person in the world who will not give information valuable to the enemy even under torture and without hope of release from his tormentors?  Oh, yes, I know you have a wealth of information supporting your value theories of torture in the dark recesses of the hidden world of the CIA torture archives and the archives of extraordinary rendition torture chambers around the world.  General Pinochet's DINA files could convince one that torture can be used to “break” anyone.  And, I have no argument with that thesis. However, there is a difference between “breaking” a person mentally/physically and gaining useful information.  

 

There is a price for everything.  What is the price for being considered a “third rate, third world junta-controlled fascist state, complete with all the inherent trappings of torture, terror and tyranny”?  So long as you can’t be defeated, there would appear to be no real price to be paid because no one can hold you to account.  But, we had to cede the mantle of invincibility when we “so heroically advanced to the rear” – just as the French had done - in Viet Nam.  Since then, we have contented ourselves with attacking such “giants” as Grenada, Panama and now Iraq.  Grenada and Panama went as planned; but, Iraq is turning into a PR nightmare to spin as a victory.  As the Romans learned, “there never was a horse that couldn’t be rode nor a cowboy that couldn’t be throw’d”.  The image of our “invincibility” has not convinced the “insurgents” not to fight us even considering our Abu Ghraib, and Guantanamo and Bagram.   They see us for what we are – weak and unprincipled – as defined by our politicians and our policies. 

 

So, as you can gather, I am against torturing prisoners for any reason – for the simple reason that I have no interest in being considered as barbaric as those we label as terrorists.  If we can’t defeat them in a “fair” war that follows the rules of civilized nations that thousands of American heroes have died to define, then what is the value of “victory”?  Oh, I know.  Each war is different.  We have to adapt our strategies to those of our enemies who use torture as a deterrent, to intimidate and as a means of gathering intelligence.  Yes, I know, we have to fight them on their level.  Well, we are fighting them on their level and we aren’t winning!

 

Nolan K. Anderson is a retired engineer and a veteran of Korea

 who was once a “conservative” until he found there was nothing left to conserve.

(He may be reached at nkanders@tds.net ).

 

 

 

 

 

CHOICE AMERICA NETWORK

 

Posted by EvansMediaUSA at 21:41:43 | Permanent Link | Comments (1) |