<$BlogRSDUrl$>

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C-span: Jimmy Wales, Wikipedia Founder - Q & A

"So it‘s that the Wikipedia for a lot of people hearkens back to what we all thought the Internet was for in the first place which is, you know, when most people first started the Internet they thought oh, this is fantastic, people can communicate from all over the world and build knowledge and share information.

And then we went through the whole dot-com boom and bust and the Internet seemed to be about pop-up ads, and SPAM, and porn and selling dog food over the Internet. And now Wikipedia kind of hearkens back to the original vision of the Internet."
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WCCO: NWA Flight Attendant Refuses To Cross Picket Line

"'All of a sudden, Northwest comes and tells us we're supposed to get on planes with mechanics that are all of a sudden certified overnight and have who knows how much experience,' Lubinski said. 'It's fear of flying, and I would not get on a plane with them.'"
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Kevin Kelly -- Cool Tools: Radical Evolution

"Meet soldiers who don't sleep, animals controlled with joy sticks, computers controlled by merely thinking, the blind driving cars, and parents designing their kids -- and that is just what is happening right now"
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Discovery.com :: Weekly TV Schedule Grid: "Programming resumes at 09:00 am"

This is what the Discovery Channel says about the programing this morning. I was watching this horrible propaganda between 5-6am and wanted to know what it was. The link above was my first stop. See what their website says.

Instead what is showing is called Discovery School. This is put on to be piped into schools via cable. It is complete with questions, so you don't have think about it as an educator. It is a complete package.

The show that was on was Symbols of America, for grades 3 to 5 for christs sake! I am telling you folks, it was horrible propaganda.
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The Fishbowl: The Wall of Death

This is how I envision project management starting and keeping track of it. Folks might remember my Magnet Wall of ideas.
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B A N C O: A CITY HEADED FOR CIVIL WAR/ BENTON HARBOR, MICHIGAN

"Benton Harbor, a city headed for civil war, is controlled by four families. All of the crime, drugs, corruption and the city jobs are within four families and friends you are protected by the Benton Harbor police department, supported by Cornerstone Alliance and Whirlpool."
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Darfur Fast: Why Fast

"On October 6th, STAND (Students Taking Action Now: Darfur), in cooperation with organizations worldwide, will be holding an International Solidarity Fast for Darfur. The Solidarity Fast will reach individuals and communities around the globe in order to send a direct message that we, the international community, recognize our responsibility to protect the world's populations from humanitarian crises. "
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Media Matters: "[Y]ou could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down" --Bill Bennett

"former Reagan administration Secretary of Education Bill Bennett dismissed such 'far-reaching, extensive extrapolations' by declaring that if 'you wanted to reduce crime ... if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down.' Bennett conceded that aborting all African-American babies 'would be an impossible, ridiculous, and morally reprehensible thing to do,' then added again, 'but the crime rate would go down."

Listen to audio file.
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Because organizing means talking to one another | The Bellman

Shout out to zwichenzug, who is doing an amazing job of rounding up what is in the "blogosphere" regarding organized and unorganized labor. Go to the site for the link fest, but here is the content:

It hurts me to do this, but this week's featured post is from the odious Mickey Kaus. Why? Because Kaus managed something almost unheard of in the world of labor blogging. He started a conversation that other blogs took up.
Mickey Kaus wrote:
Isn't abolishing the notorious Davis-Bacon Act on Reed's wish list too? This obscure law, which essentially requires that all government construction projects pay "prevailing"--i.e. union--wages, offers the ur-case of a policy that benefits a powerful Democratic special interest (the Building & Construction Trades Department of the AFL-CIO) while undermining the general interest in affirmative government the Democratic party is supposed to be pursuing (by making virtually everything the government does--including building low-cost housing--unnecessarily expensive). |link|

* My vote for best rejoinder goes to Matthew Yglesias for pointing out the connection between a strong labor movement and the existence of political support the very projects which Kaus claims are undermind by laws like Davis-Bacon.
* Kaus's reply to Yglesias was predictably tendentious, relying mostly on the argument that the comparative success of Clinton as compared to Mondale shows that there's no reason for Democrats to pursue policies favored by their constituency.
* Nathan Newman countered some of the more ridiculous Kausisms by reminding us that the Clinton Administration was a pretty good friend to labor.
* Which, in turn, prompted Brad Plumer to write that the real lesson of Clintonism, "is that without a pervasively strong labor movement, any pro-worker rules or regulations or legislation that get passed by a liberal president or Congress can easily be repealed by the next conservative president."

There's more, but you get the idea.

Elsewhere:

* At Confined Space, Jordan Barab has the goods on the Bush Administration's latest move in their ongoing campaign to eviscerate OSHA.
* Complaints about SEIU's tactics in the ongoing nurses strike in San Francisco can be found at Rosenblog.com
* Josh Eidelson argues that pursuit of card check recognition is the right tactic for unions, since that's their best way to avoid the jurisdiction of Bush's NLRB.
* At The Blotter, Beth Hawkins makes the case that airlines have been turned Federal bankruptcy law into an all-purpose union busting tool.
* Chuckdawg makes some good points about the ways in which the individualistic ethic serves corporate interests.
* Jonathan Tasini has the latest rumors about who might be jumping from the AFL-CIO to the Change to Win Coalition, and also breaks the news that CTW will spend 75% of its budget on organizing.
* Future of the Union is the place to go for blogging about internal UAW politics.
* Last but not least, Citizen Chris is doing the dirty work. Read his first hand account of an evening at the phone bank.
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Make Levees, Not War
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Anna Burger to Head Breakaway Labor Group

"In 1972, the year Anna Burger started a wildcat strike of Philadelphia social workers, organized labor did not look like a promising career for a liberal, antiwar feminist."
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: : We Will Not Be Silenced : :

" 'To stand in silence when they should be protesting makes cowards out of men'
- Abraham Lincoln"

Amazing flash.
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MoxieGrrrl.com: Best Quote I've Seen Today



via SapphoManifesto
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Flock has landed.

Touted as a social web browser.
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Eric Lee: Change To Win Federation: Live Blogging

"Transatlantic solidarity

Several delegates have gotten up to speak about the struggle to unionize bus drivers in the US who are employed by a British-based company, First Group/First Student. Now they are showing a film with British workers -- members of the Transport and General Workers Union -- expressing their solidarity. The Teamsters and SEIU have been working together very closely on this campaign, and you can find more details here: http://www.drivingupstandards.org/

It's great to see a concrete example of cross-border solidarity, or as Andy Stern says, 'workers of the world unite' (or was that Karl Marx?)."
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Wow! I made my first video with the 300+ pictures I took yesterday going to and attending the peace parade and event pulled together by Michigan Peaceworks.

I don't know what I am doing, it is huge (40mb) (it takes a few minutes to download, impossible for dial-up folks.) Also, as you will see on the video, I am in the testing period, so haven't paid the $50 bucks for it.

Please check it out and let me know what you think!



I am using BruceLiles song.
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This site is looking better and better. Check it out!

THEY RULE

"A Brief Explanation:

They Rule allows you to create maps of the interlocking directories of the top companies in the US in 2004.

The data was collected from their websites and SEC filings in early 2004, so it may not be completely accurate - companies merge and disappear and directors shift boards."
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Teaching:

"In part, it’s forced to, of course; the TA union here is strong, active, and responsive. The union earned us a tuition waiver during my first semester of teaching that finally ensured a halfway decent wage. (Previously, when the university took in-state tuition out of our checks, a student teaching one class and taking three, a normal load, ended up with a monthly take-home pay of roughly $65. The university used lots of propaganda and statistical jiggery-pokery to keep prospective students from realizing this, of course.) Previous union efforts had gained us excellent health-care benefits."
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Bombs and Shields

"Willamette National Forest, Oregon - Environmental activists, from the group Guardians of the McKenzie Watershed, have come under fire in the past week. On multiple occasions groups of loggers have fired on tree sitters while shouting abuse, in the Sten timber sale. Last Saturday a hostile logging supporter used a high-powered compound bow to shoot a number of tri-tipped hunting arrows, one of which struck a forest defender in the hand."
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MuniWireless � Blog Archive � Skype-blocking application promises to make your network totally useless

"James Enck writes about some amazing applications, one of which is from a company called Verso. They are selling “carrier grade Skype filtering technology”. According to the press release, the product is “for cable operators and internet protocol service providers seeking to selectively disable undesirable network traffic and improve service levels on their networks. Applications such as Skype, Peer-2-Peer (P2P) messaging, streaming media and instant messaging increasingly cause congestion on service provider networks and interrupt or degrade service for other critical applications. ” Verso is very honest about what they want to offer the telcos. They say that “this traffic (meaning Skype calls) runs outside the traditional carrier revenue generation models and is therefore highly undesirable for them.” No kidding. "
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Kid Beyond

"Looping and multitracking his voice live onstage to create his own backing tracks, Kid Beyond layers his soulful, spiritual lyrics over his own beatboxing and vocal instrumentation - creating an evocative, infectiously funky brew of hip-hop/techno-flavored alt-pop."
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Reclaiming the Ivory Tower

"In the last twenty years, higher education in the United States has been eroded by massive reliance on temporary academic labor—professors without tenure or the prospect of tenure, paid a fraction of the salaries of their tenured colleagues, working without benefits, offices, or research assistance, and often commuting between several campuses to make ends meet. Contingent instructors now constitute the majority of faculty at U.S. colleges and universities. "
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BILL MAHER INSPIRED RANT
AT THE CLOSE ON HIS SHOW:

"Mr. President, this job can't be fun for you any more. There's no more money to spend--you used up all of that. You can't start another war because you used up the army. And now, darn the luck, the rest of your term has become the Bush family nightmare: helping poor people. Listen to your Mom. The cupboard's bare, the credit cards maxed out. No one's speaking to you. Mission accomplished.

Now it's time to do what you've always done best: lose interest and walk away. Like you did with your military service and the oil company and the baseball team. It's time. Time to move on and try the next fantasy job. How about cowboy or space man? Now I know what you're saying: there's so many other things that you as President could involve yourself in. Please don't. I know, I know. There's a lot left to do.

There's a war with Venezuela. Eliminating the sales tax on yachts. Turning the space program over to the church. And Social Security to Fannie Mae. Giving embryos the vote. But, Sir, none of that is going to happen now. Why? Because you govern like Billy Joel drives. You've performed so poorly I'm surprised that you haven't given yourself a medal. You're a catastrophe that walks like a man. Herbert Hoover was a shitty president, but even he never conceded an entire city to rising water and snakes.

On your watch, we've lost almost all of our allies, the surplus, four airliners, two trade centers, a piece of the Pentagon and the city of New Orleans. Maybe you're just not lucky.

I'm not saying you don't love this country. I'm just wondering how much worse it could be if you were on the other side. So, yes, God does speak to you. What he is saying is: 'Take a hint.'
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Kanye Was Right :: ColorOfChange.org

"Our sisters and brothers were left behind to die, because no one answers to them. It's time to stand together and make a change.

Politicians ignore poor Black folks because they can't make big donations or deliver votes. And, to be real: a whole lot of 'us' have tip-toed out of the hood and left them behind too, making our folk invisible even to us.

But they weren't invisible after Katrina hit. The media showed us faces we recognized. People who looked like us. People doing everything they could to save their families. People surviving, not 'looting.' And the more we looked, the more we knew—it didn't have to be like that.

This government NEVER would have left rich, white people to die."
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CBC Board: Management proposal is reasonable (CBCunplugged.com)

"If locked-out workers were hoping this week's board of directors meeting would pressure management to bring a quick end to the dispute, they will be disappointed.

The CBC's Board of Directors has given CBC management and, specifically, president Robert Rabinovitch a ringing endorsement."
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No Confidence : Quote Of The Week

"Jamie Foxx, defending Kanye West’s remark that “George Bush doesn’t care about black people”:

“I feel that as the president of the United States, you are the father, and all Americans are your family. In this situation, George Bush didn’t view us as his family. To show up four or five days later, that’s no way to treat your family. If something happened to my family in Des Moines where I grew up, I would be there right away, not days later.”"
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Crooks and Liars : Cindy Sheehan got Dixe Chicked

"NYPD pull plug on Sheehan

Cindy Sheehan may be the Rosa Parks of the anti-war movement. But that didn't stop members of the New York Police Department from marching into the crowd of about 150 people gathered in Union Square Monday to hear her speak and yanking away the microphone....read on

She got Dixe Chicked"
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Crooks and Liars

"Jon Stewart at the Emmy's"
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Crooks and Liars

"'One billion dollars has been plundered from Iraq's defence ministry in one of the largest thefts in history, The Independent can reveal, leaving the country's army to fight a savage insurgency with museum-piece weapons."
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Crooks and Liars

"Judge Roberts: Just Answer the Question

Judge Roberts failed to meet the burden of establishing his worthiness to be Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. So says a Bush Republican."
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Crooks and Liars

"Bill O'Reilly: World's Worst

He was bestowed that dubious title by none other than our main man Keith Olbermann."
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Negrophile. One who admires and supports Black people and their culture.

"Anthea Butler's Inside Higher Ed essay "Teaching a disaster" ("My two courses this semester -- African American Religious History and Evangelicalism and Fundamentalism -- both provide entry points into interrogating and discussing this disaster with my students.")"
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NASA - Ames Technology Partnerships Division: Technology Catalog

"NASA scientist are developing a silent, subvocal speech recognition system here at NASA Ames Research Center. Subvocal speech is silent, or sub-auditory, such as when a person silently reads or talks to himself. Biological signals arise when reading or speaking to oneself with or without actual lip or facial movement. A person using the subvocal system thinks of phrases and talks to himself so quietly, it cannot be heard, but the tongue and vocal cords do receive speech signals from the brain."
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Democracy Now! | Hugo Chavez

"Hugo Chavez: 'If the Imperialist Government of the White House Dares to Invade Venezuela, the War of 100 Years Will be Unleashed in South America'"
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bush_dont_like_black_people_web.mov (video/quicktime Object)

this is good.
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This is a test post from flickr, a fancy photo sharing thing.
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from the comments, tx edsdet

HaloScan.com - Comments

"Something I posted a couple of months ago:

The lashing the RUC and the British took in '80-'81 as the world witnessed the Blanket Men at Long Kesh and the women of Armagh prison in solidarity with each other, reached a crecendo in the 2nd strike in March of '81. By August, ten were dead including Bobby Sands, the first to die.

It effectively began a new era for the republican (Irish, that is) challenge to British oppression, injustice, and in fact terrorism in the North.

Just as the insurgency in Iraq has made transitional phases, the Gitmo Ice Blocks may have shifted into a new paradigm outside of any 'quaint' considerations of the Geneva Convention, international treaty, military tribunals and flip-flopped court rulings here. All legal bets are off when prisoners collude to refuse nourishment. It becomes a frightfully difficult situation to white-wash and manage with the rest of the world.

This is a flushed Q'uran that will back up the entire sewer all the way to Abu Ghraib and will further mark this camp as a huge liability that needs to close ASAP before its indefensibility as a tool in the war on terror wracks what's left of any chance to salvage our image to the watching Islamic world."
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Weapon of Class Instruction

"There's a huge hunger strike at Guant�namo, in response to incidents of prisoner abuse. This is, reports the Times, at least the fourth such strike, and possibly the largest, most widespread, and most threatening to the Gitmo brass."
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Go to this site to link to all the news:

The Bellman | Ringing your bell since '04 : Labor Blogging Roundup

"This week, a new feature for the Labor Blogging Roundup: the featured post. zach wrote:

After the lunch i went to a union meeting in Math/Comp Sci. There were like twenty people there. It was awesome. People seemed primed to get more involved, or if not, at least wanted to know what was going on with plans down the road. Getting a better sense of how organizers are talking to folks about the situation and how to get where we need to go, and getting excited about being here for this fight even if, barring a contract delay of Yalean proportions, i'm probably not going to technically be striking any time soon.

That's from Weapon of Class Instruction. I picked zach's post because, for whatever reason, almost nobody blogs about organizing even though organizing is what the labor movement is really all about.
There's hope on this front though, because Citizen Chris just took a job as an organizer.

Elsewhere in the blogosphere:

* In The Origins of Timidity, Bradford Plumer looks at the American labor movement, asking how it became so much less bold than its European counterpart.

* At Net-Workers, Josh channels Mark Shields. who quotes GOP Godfather Abe Lincoln saying, 'Labor is the superior of capital and deserves much the higher consideration.'

* Nathan Newman's The Bad Joke that is the Bush NLRB documents a recent NLRB decision that more or less endorses intimidation as an acceptable tactic in management run anti-union campaigns.

* Also at House of Labor, Jo-Ann Mort wonders whether the labor movement can use the Hurricane Katrina narrative to make the case that government regulation is sometimes the answer to common problems.

* Bat One is only one of dozens of right wing bloggers who blogged about UFCW's employment of low paid, non-union laborers to man a picket against Wal-Mart (does the VRWC send out talking points?), but since he's on our blogrolll, he gets the link on this one.

* Daniel of The Truth is Out There has one of many posts from the left about Bush, Katrina, and the suspension of the Davis-Bacon Act

* The Disney Blog makes its first appearance in the roundup for this post about shady labor practices at Disney World.

* As I've said before Working Life is uniformly excellent that it seems absurd to link to any single post. This week, though, Jonathan Tasini takes up an issue close to my heart: coming up with a decent name for the 'Change to Win Coalition.'"
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WITNESS :: See it. Film it. Change it. - About WITNESS

"WITNESS uses the power of video to open the eyes of the world to human rights abuses. By partnering with local organizations around the globe, WITNESS empowers human rights defenders to use video to shine a light on those most affected by human rights violations, and to transform personal stories of abuse into powerful tools of justice. Over the past decade, WITNESS has partnered with groups in more than 60 countries, bringing often unseen images, untold stories and seldom heard voices to the attention of key decision makers, the media, and the general public -- catalyzing grassroots activism, political engagement, and lasting change.
"
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Wow - I need to get to this. Anyone take me?

Operation: Ceasefire

"Join Operation Ceasefire, a new coalition of concerned musicians, for a massive anti-war concert/rally at the Washington Monument on September 24th. This event will be a centerpiece of what is expected to be 4 days of enormous protests in nation's capital in support of a full withdrawal of U.S. forces from the quagmire in Iraq. The concert will bring together musical acts such as: Thievery Corporation, punk rock and independent musicians LeTigre, Bouncing Souls, Ted Leo & The Pharmacists; country music artist Steve Earle, rock and soul band the Bellrays; latin musicians Machetres, socially conscious hip-hop groups The Coup and Head-Roc; The Evens (Ian Mackaye and Amy Farina), Grammy Award-winning African American female a cappella ensemble Sweet Honey in the Rock and even long time activists Wayne Kramer of the MC5 and hosted by Jello Biafra!"
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[Libcat] What the Fuck? #2

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Environmentalists Against War

"Despite the pressing needs of hurricane-devatated regions of the US, the Pentagon has directer its warships towards Venezuela for a 'military exercise' called 'Plan Balboa.' Venezuela's President calls this part of an attempt to invade his country and vows 100-Year War. Meanwhile, in the US, the militarization of the hurricane recovery process raises concerns about freedom and civil liberty at home."
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Hurricane Katrina survivor stories - dKosopedia

"This is a compilation of some of the survivor stories which have emerged from the crisis."
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** Guantanamo hunger strike expands **

Dozens more detainees join a hunger strike at the US Guantanamo Bay prison camp, taking the total to 128.
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Guantanamo Bay Hunger Strikes | MetaFilter

"'Guantanamo hunger strike staged,' reads the BBC. Reports vary from the US military claiming only 76 of the 500 prisoners there are involved in a hunger strike to claims of more than 200 of the prison population by others. There's widespread divergence for the reasons for the strike ranging from the prisoner's demands to be tried or set free to 'rumors of a violent interrogation session and two rough extractions of detainees from their cells, as well as a new incident of alleged desecration of a copy of the Koran, the Muslim holy book.' Some of them are reported to be undergoing force feeding now. The detainees are apparently attempting to embarass the U.S. government into action. The government needn't worry since most of the U.S. main stream media isn't reporting it anyway."
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STOP THE EXECUTION! FREE FRANCES NEWTON CAMPAIGN!

"Please SEND A NEW FINAL URGENT APPEAL to STOP THE EXECUTION OF FRANCES NEWTON! She is scheduled to be executed by the state of Texas THIS WEDNESDAY, September 14.

YOUR EMERGENCY ACTION IS NEEDED NOW!

Send FINAL URGENT APPEAL emails to Texas Governor Rick Perry, Attorney General Greg Abbott, President Bush, Congressional leaders and Senators and Representatives from Texas and the Texas State Legislature, the Mayor of Houston and Houston City Councilors, The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles, U.N. Secy General Kofi Anan and your senators and representative, DEMANDING that Frances' execution be stopped IMMEDIATELY!

Goto: FreeFrances.org
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Protest Colombian Trade Union Assassination - Impunity Must End!

"The serial murder of Colombian trade unionists continues with no letup. Luciano Enrique Romero Molina, a former Nestle employee and leader of the foodworkers' union SINALTRAINAL, has become the latest victim of Colombia's deadly anti-union violence and the judicial and political impunity which nourish it. He was murdered sometime between the evening of September 10 and the morning of September 11, when his dead body was discovered in the city of Valledupar bearing multiple knife wounds and signs of torture. The fact that Molina was living under the protective measures program of the Human Rights Commission of the Organization of American States shows that the Uribe government continues to fail to implement the most basic measures needed to stop the war against Colombian union members and officers."
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Another good follow-up: September 12 Emergency Landing by Northwest Jet for a mechanical failure with nose gear in St. Louis!

Thank God the 60 passengers didn't have to pay the death toll for this incredible failure of our federal gov't.

Now tell me that the FAA hasn't been aware of serious problems with Northwest Airliners.

Don't Fly Northwest if only for your personel safety!"

via comments of edset: HaloScan
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A Letter to All Who Voted for George W. Bush from Michael Moore


To All My Fellow Americans Who Voted for George W. Bush:

On this, the fourth anniversary of 9/11, I'm just curious, how does it feel?

How does it feel to know that the man you elected to lead us after we were attacked went ahead and put a guy in charge of FEMA whose main qualification was that he ran horse shows?

That's right. Horse shows.

I really want to know -- and I ask you this in all sincerity and with all due respect -- how do you feel about the utter contempt Mr. Bush has shown for your safety? C'mon, give me just a moment of honesty. Don't start ranting on about how this disaster in New Orleans was the fault of one of the poorest cities in America. Put aside your hatred of Democrats and liberals and anyone with the last name of Clinton. Just look me in the eye and tell me our President did the right thing after 9/11 by naming a horse show runner as the top man to protect us in case of an emergency or catastrophe.

I want you to put aside your self-affixed label of Republican/conservative/born-again/capitalist/ditto-head/right-winger and just talk to me as an American, on the common ground we both call America.

Are we safer now than before 9/11? When you learn that behind the horse show runner, the #2 and #3 men in charge of emergency preparedness have zero experience in emergency preparedness, do you think we are safer?

When you look at Michael Chertoff, the head of Homeland Security, a man with little experience in national security, do you feel secure?

When men who never served in the military and have never seen young men die in battle send our young people off to war, do you think they know how to conduct a war? Do they know what it means to have your legs blown off for a threat that was never there?

Do you really believe that turning over important government services to private corporations has resulted in better services for the people?

Why do you hate our federal government so much? You have voted for politicians for the past 25 years whose main goal has been to de-fund the federal government. Do you think that cutting federal programs like FEMA and the Army Corps of Engineers has been good or bad for America? GOOD OR BAD?

With the nation's debt at an all-time high, do you think tax cuts for the rich are still a good idea? Will you give yours back so hundreds of thousands of homeless in New Orleans can have a home?

Do you believe in Jesus? Really? Didn't he say that we would be judged by how we treat the least among us? Hurricane Katrina came in and blew off the facade that we were a nation with liberty and justice for all. The wind howled and the water rose and what was revealed was that the poor in America shall be left to suffer and die while the President of the United States fiddles and tells them to eat cake.

That's not a joke. The day the hurricane hit and the levees broke, Mr. Bush, John McCain and their rich pals were stuffing themselves with cake. A full day after the levees broke (the same levees whose repair funding he had cut), Mr. Bush was playing a guitar some country singer gave him. All this while New Orleans sank under water.

It would take ANOTHER day before the President would do a flyover in his jumbo jet, peeking out the widow at the misery 2500 feet below him as he flew back to his second home in DC. It would then be TWO MORE DAYS before a trickle of federal aid and troops would arrive. This was no seven minutes in a sitting trance while children read "My Pet Goat" to him. This was FOUR DAYS of doing nothing other than saying "Brownie (FEMA director Michael Brown), you're doing a heck of a job!"

My Republican friends, does it bother you that we are the laughing stock of the world?

And on this sacred day of remembrance, do you think we honor or shame those who died on 9/11/01? If we learned nothing and find ourselves today every bit as vulnerable and unprepared as we were on that bright sunny morning, then did the 3,000 die in vain?

Our vulnerability is not just about dealing with terrorists or natural disasters. We are vulnerable and unsafe because we allow one in eight Americans to live in horrible poverty. We accept an education system where one in six children never graduate and most of those who do can't string a coherent sentence together. The middle class can't pay the mortgage or the hospital bills and 45 million have no health coverage whatsoever.

Are we safe? Do you really feel safe? You can only move so far out and build so many gated communities before the fruit of what you've sown will be crashing through your walls and demanding retribution. Do you really want to wait until that happens? Or is it your hope that if they are left alone long enough to soil themselves and shoot themselves and drown in the filth that fills the street that maybe the problem will somehow go away?

I know you know better. You gave the country and the world a man who wasn't up for the job and all he does is hire people who aren't up for the job. You did this to us, to the world, to the people of New Orleans. Please fix it. Bush is yours. And you know, for our peace and safety and security, this has to be fixed. What do you propose?

I have an idea, and it isn't a horse show.

Yours,
Michael Moore
MichaelMoore.com
mmflint@aol.com
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Sad day for me.

I have been running around the country this summer and one of my cats, Jampka left 4 weeks ago.

This week he showed up, more loving than before and it was great.

I was excited to finally start "cat blogging" on his return.










Then he was mauled by a large dog in the woods behind my house, I rushed him to emergency, he died on route.

I didn't want to start cat blogging this way, much too painful, this lesson about loss.
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Human Iterations

"As everyone and their pet goat have been pointing out, this is about the class divide. It's about the people who can't understand why folks were so stupid as to not pile into their SUVs and drive out of town. It's about poverty. And the disaster we have here stems from a lifelong absolute inability of the upper half of this country to conceive of what real poverty is like. (And we're talking US-of-the-fucking-A Poverty here, not your dim perceptions of a child with a bloated belly, lying in a Nigerian slum.)"
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Commie Curmudgeon: The Condition of the Working Class in [England] [the U.S.], [1845] [2005]

"But far more demoralising than his poverty in its influence upon the English working-man is the insecurity of his position, the necessity of living upon wages from hand to mouth, that in short which makes a proletarian of him. The smaller peasants in Germany are usually poor, and often suffer want, but they are less at the mercy of accident, they have at least something secure. The proletarian, who has nothing but his two hands, who consumes today what he earned yesterday, who is subject to every possible chance, and has not the slightest guarantee for being able to earn the barest necessities of life, whom every crisis, every whim of his employer may deprive of bread, this proletarian is placed in the most revolting, inhuman position conceivable for a human being. The slave is assured of a bare livelihood by the self-interest of his master, the serf has at least a scrap of land on which to live; each has at worst a guarantee for life itself. But the proletarian must depend upon himself alone, and is yet prevented from so applying his abilities as to be able to rely upon them. Everything that the proletarian can do to improve his position is but a drop in the ocean compared with the floods of varying chances to which he is exposed, over which he has not the slightest control...."
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A Union that gets viral marketing.

Comfort Breakdown. By DogHorse and Eclectech for the TUC.
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from my comments:

Take a hard look at the overiding principle in FAA oversight.
from Fox News report:

-An FAA spokesman, Greg Martin, said FAA Administrator Marion Blakey had ordered a full investigation into the allegations as well as counterclaims that the inspector was intimidating replacement workers and was openly critical of Northwest management.

"On both issues we have not made any prejudgments. Depending on the merits on one or both charges we will take decisive action," Martin said. He said the inspector had been reassigned pending the outcome of the investigation. -

All the airlines' have to do in the future is impugn inspectors and have them reassigned as trouble-makers and the FAA will oblige.
This is a strong signal to any others that the reports are to be "fixed" to fit Airline policy, if reporting is indeed to be done at all.

Scary. Not just for Unions in the industry, but for the frequent flyer.
Maintenance is now a football and this administration is willing to send a plane-load of passengers to their horrific deaths and later claim that "no one could've known". Al Queda doesn't need to highjack any planes, we've got our own domestic terrorists called the FAA.
edsdet | 09.08.05 - 12:18 pm |
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The Bellman | Ringing your bell since '04

"In 2004, faced with Hurricane Ivan, a category 5 hurricane, Cuba evacuated 1.3 million people as a precaution and no lives were lost."
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FOXNews.com - Business - Gov't Probing Claims of Northwest Maintenance Problems

"According to a letter from Dayton to Blakey, the inspector said maintenance defects were cited in more than half of nearly 500 reports submitted by FAA inspectors on Northwest maintenance operations between Aug. 20 and Aug. 31.

The inspector also asserted that the information was not entered into an electronic database that tracks maintenance problems and automatically raises alerts that would require tighter oversight of airline operations."
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Labor blogging roundup | The Bellman

"# Wash Park Prophet takes the occasion of Labor Day to worry about the future of the American labor movement.
# Duane Gran urges folks not to shop on Labor Day.
# At Who Hijacked Our Country Tom Harper ruminates on labor's past success and present challenges.
# Leftnews points to the article, 'Keep the 'Labor' in Labor Day: Remembering the Lowell Mill Girls'
# Treehugger argues that Labor Day is a good time for North American unionists to consider joining the Fair Trade movement.
# Economists View celebrates Labor Day with a pair of posts: Thorstein Veblen explains why labor always gets exploited and, John Bates Clark Explains Why Labor Never Gets Exploited.
# Unbossed.com sees Labor Day as an occasion to assess the condition of the American worker. The verdict isn't good.
# Curly Tales of War Pigs thinks about Labor Day through the lens of the Northwest Airlines strike.
# NET-workers has a letter from Peter Rachleff, who argues that many leaders of the contemporary labor movement seem to have learned the wrong lessons from the movement's history."
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Labor and the media | The Bellman

"Brad Plumer's analysis of the forces that make labor coverage in the media so uniformly awful."

Raiding and solidarity | The Bellman

"For example:

A former airline mechanic himself, Delle-Femine formed his union in the early 1960s on the notion of how indispensable such mechanics were. He believed the workers could be better represented in their own union rather than in larger unions covering multiple industries. So he raided existing airline unions for mechanics, including most machinists' union members from Northwest in 1998.

Until now, he has largely succeeded with his no-concession stance. In 2001, prior to 9/11, he negotiated the highest-paid contract in the industry for those workers."

The feeble strength of one | The Bellman

"AMFA only exists because Delle-Femine decided to raid the IAM, so there's no question but that Roach comes by his anger honestly. It's pretty obvious, though, that nobody earning an hourly wage is being helped by this squabble.

I'm not prepared to say that IAM ought be big about it and let bygones be bygones -- I'm just not close enough to the dispute to have an informed opinion on the matter. At the same time, it seems to me that the labor movement badly needs to figure out how to put past disputes into the past"
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Monday morning "does not equal" post | The Bellman

"Apparently, some folks need some remedial instruction, so here goes:

Islam ≠ terrorism

Liberal ≠ traitor

Anti-war ≠ pro-terrorism

Acknowledging injustice against Palestinians ≠ anti-Isreal

Anti-Israel ≠ anti-semitism

If you're still confused, John, next monday we'll try venn diagrams."
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Thinking is hard. It's hard work. | The Bellman

"It's an outrage because all of those elements existed before people died for lack of them: There was water, there was food, and there were choppers to drop both. Why no one was able to combine them in an air drop is a cruel and criminal mystery of this dark chapter in our recent history. The words 'failure of imagination' come to mind. The concept of an air drop of supplies was one we apparently introduced to the director of FEMA during a live interview on Nightly News on Thursday evening."
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Back in the U.S.S.R.: Bush picks up a trick from Stalin | The Bellman

"ZDF News reported that the president's visit was a completely staged event. Their crew witnessed how the open air food distribution point Bush visited in front of the cameras was torn down immediately after the president and the herd of 'news people' had left and that others which were allegedly being set up were abandoned at the same time."
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Sen. Landrieu Threatens to 'Punch' President if He Keeps Hitting Local Response to Katrina

"Appearing on ABC's 'The Week' TV program this morning, Senator Landrieu still appeared to be smarting from President Bush's comments, during his national radio address, that state and local bore a fair share of blame for the slow response. On a copter tour of the area, Landrieu said that if she heard any more criticism from federal officials, particularly about the evacuation of New Orleans, she might lose control.

'If one person criticizes them or says one more thing - including the president of the United States - he will hear from me,' she said on the ABC program. 'One more word about it after this show airs and I might likely have to punch him. Literally.'

She burst into tears as she looked at a broken levee. 'The President could have funded it,' she said. 'He cut it out of the budget. Is that the most pitiful sight you have ever seen in your life? One little crane.'"
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Pleix films

Check out the BASEMENT JAXX CISH CASH video!

tx brian
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Lexington Herald-Leader | 08/07/2005 | Hiroshima survivors fear lesson is being lost

"The survivors, whose suffering had long made them Japan's most eloquent advocates for pacifism, said recent policy changes inside Japan had made them deeply pessimistic.

'The dispatch of our Self-Defense Forces to Iraq is completely out of line with pacifism,' said Akihiro Takahashi, an A-bomb survivor and former director of the Peace Memorial Museum here. 'In the future, the peace constitution will no doubt be revised, and that will lead to conscription and, eventually, the possession of nuclear arms.'"
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Picket lines going up | The Bellman

"This maroon needs to get his story straight. Is the strike wrong because times are bad, or is it wrong because times are good?

Either way, the criticisms are unfounded. Appeal to the fact that people are suffering elsewhere is just a non-sequitor. As for the idea that the machinists ought not to disrupt good times at Boeing by asking that some of the profits be passed on to workers, well at least that's on point. But I have to ask: if workers can't demand better benefits during an upturn, when can they?"
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Let them eat cake | The Bellman

"So the White House says that, even if you haven't eaten in two days, Bush's zero tolerance policy regarding looting applies to you. Meanwhile, right wing bloggers are saying such endearing things as 'shoot looters on sight.' Charming when such sentiment is turned towards foreigners, downright lovable when directed against Americans. Who will they blame when they are suddenly broke from the impending housing market meltdown, and the bankruptcy laws have been jiggered against them and in favor of their credit card companies? I guess we will have to wait to find out, but I'm guessing it's the ACLU."
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Not an attack on Christianity | The Bellman

"Seriously, this is not an attack on Christianity. Here's a statistic for you. According to the U.S. Census, the number of those identifying themselves as Christians dropped by 8.5 percent from 1990 to 2001. Most of the slack is taken up by a 6.6 percent rise in agnostics plus atheists."
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Procrastination aid | The Bellman

-- me blushing --
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Abject Futurity � Blog Archive � Democracy is coming to the U.S.A.

"Instead, there is a new complacency, a certainty that we know just what freedom means and exactly how it should look. There is an unwelcome comfort with the inequitable distribution of freedom even in our own country. There is a poisonous tolerance for the idea that freedom encompasses only the right to say positive things about America and its mission in the world."
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ChurchGal: it's called LABOR for a reason, pt 2: a guy's view

"Apparently, women are expected to accept the multiple functions of a penis without any complaints or diagnosable hangups, but if it might be problematic someday, it's better for a man not to have to contemplate the multiple roles of a vagina?"
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The Observer | Comment | The Observer Profile: Hugo Chavez

"The troubled six-year rule of Ch�vez ('El Commandante') has been marked by strikes, lethal demonstrations and an attempted coup. It is more than a parochial issue. Venezuela is the biggest exporter of oil to the US - ahead even of Saudi Arabia - so its political stability has profound implications in a time of soaring oil prices."
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ChurchGal: shut up, pat robertson

"you're making us look like nutjobs.

there are some days you want to believe that some people have immense mental issues that could just be solved with a steady dose of lithium.

and then there are other days when you think, sadly, no they really believe the shite they're peddling.

(brief background for those who can't understand why we have a jones for venezuela. chavez opposes the oppressive elites in his country; guess who we support?)"
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ChurchGal: it's called LABOR for a reason

"A Perilous Journey From Delivery Room to Bedroom - New York Times

over at Bitch, Phd elise points to one of the most ridiculous articles i've ever seen: giving birth is traumatic for men. there are so many things wrong with this piece my brain is sputtering.

here's a nugget:

'I mean,' he went on, 'how are you supposed to go from seeing that to wanting to be with ... ?' He stopped, but his eyes kept asking the question.

'Right,' I said. 'It gets easier with time, for just about everyone.'

Although no one seems to talk publicly about the problem, Josh is only one of dozens of men who have confided to me that witnessing the births of their children has made it difficult for them to be attracted to their wives, at least in the short run.

They seem to have trouble seeing them as sexual beings after seeing them make babies, trouble reverting to a mind-set in which their wives' sexual anatomy is just that - not associated with images of new life emerging through the birth canal.'

is it just me or are we, as a culture, utterly incapable of thinking about women in ways other than sexualized?"
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Boing Boing: A Directory of Wonderful Things

"A searing opinion piece from MSNBC's Keith Olbermann that captures the sentiments of many Americans this week regarding the Great American Clusterfuck of Katrina. I suppose that's GACK for short, which in turn sounds like the desperate noise produced when a country chokes on its own government.

"[M]ost chillingly of all, this is the Law and Order and Terror government. It promised protection — or at least amelioration — against all threats: conventional, radiological, or biological. It has just proved that it cannot save its citizens from a biological weapon called standing water.""
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Boing Boing: Barbara Bush: things going 'Very Well' for poor NOLA evacuees

"'And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this--this (she chuckles slightly) is working very well for them.'"
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BBC NEWS | Monitoring | Media reports

"Newspapers around the world are highly critical of the US government's response to Hurricane Katrina."
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BBC NEWS | World | Americas | Press dismay at Katrina chaos

"Newspapers around the world see Hurricane Katrina's chaotic aftermath as a defining moment for the presidency of George W Bush."
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Daily Blog: Labor Day Weekend

"Thought Number One: What about carrying 'Remember the CAFTA 15' signs? And if you happen to be lucky enough to live in one of the CAFTA 15's districts, keep an eye out for those folks and give them a piece of your mind (no violence, now, we need you for the long haul)."
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Dopes on Dope - A bad batch of reporting on NYC's heroin-related deaths. By Jack Shafer

"Nearly every identity group employs a watchdog to defend its interests when the press stoops to filling news stories about its members with misinformation and stupidity. Gays have the HRC, Jews have the ADL, gun owners the NRA, and laboratory animals PETA. Alas, no group speaks on the behalf of America's dopers when journalists shovel manure and half-truths into print, so until such a group forms, I'll have to serve as their proxy."
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VoteNoWar: Tell Bush & Congress: Accept Cuba's offer to send doctors to the hurricane victims!

"Specifically, Cuba is offering to send 1,100 medical doctors with 26.4 tons of medications and diagnosis kits at no expense to the U.S. (they will even bring their own food and water). There is now a dire need for medical attention in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Texas and in other Southern states. The Cuban doctors, nurses and professional healthcare staff are world renowned for their medical expertise and their ability to provide assistance even in the most difficult conditions, and have traveled throughout the Americas and the world providing care to those in need. The people of Cuba, even with far less resources than the United States, have survived extreme hurricanes and flooding because the government mobilizes to put people first, evacuating hundreds of thousands and providing necessary food, water and medical care immediately."
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a shel of my former self

"...iTunes storefront that allows you to make a donation in support of hurricane relief to the Red Cross. She handed me a CD she had just burned. “This is what Napster is doing,” she said. The CD contains a number of tracks by New Orleans musicians from Louis Armstrong to the Neville Brothers. “It cost $15 and every cent goes to hurricane relief.”"
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In Japan, the Lipstick Ninjas Get Out the Vote

"More important, Koizumi, 63, chose Koike and eight other well-known, successful women to run in key races. They are opposing the powerful hard-liners whom Koizumi effectively purged from the party after they voted against his bill to privatize Japan's massive postal service, the centerpiece of his plan to reform the world's second-largest economy. Rejection of that bill in August led Koizumi to angrily dissolve the lower house and put his job on the line by calling new elections in which he has vowed 'to change or destroy' the LDP."

via ふぇみにすとの雑感@シカゴ
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"Ron Fournier of The Associated Press reported that the Army Corps of Engineers asked for $105 million for hurricane and flood programs in New Orleans last year. The White House carved it to about $40 million. But President Bush and Congress agreed to a $286.4 billion pork-filled highway bill with 6,000 pet projects, including a $231 million bridge** for a small, uninhabited Alaskan island." -- Maureen Dowd, NY Times

ACTION REQUESTED: **The author of the $231 bridge boondoggle is Rep. Don Young of Alaska, the Chair of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee in the House. You might contact him at 202-225-5765 / 202-225-0425-fax and ask him how he feels about spending twice as much for his pet bridge than was requested to shore up the levees around new Orleans. His District office numbers are: Anchorage, 907-271-5978, Kenai, 907-283-5808, Ketchikan, 907-225-6880, Juneau, 907-586-7400, Fairbanks, 907-456-0210, Mat-Su, 907-376-7665. If there were ever a living-breathing argument for term limits (he's now in his 16th term) he is the poster boy.

"Don't tell me 40,000 people [National Guard Troops] are coming here. They're not here. It's too doggone late. Now get off your asses and do something, and let's fix the biggest goddamn crisis in the history of this country." -- C. Ray Nagin, Mayor of New Orleans
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Camp Casey Detroit Blog

"On August 22, 2005 eight Detroiters returned from a weekend visit to Cindy Sheehan's Camp Casey in Crawford, Texas, and established Camp Casey Detroit in Grand Circus Park. We invite all those who want to Bring the Troops Home Now to come join us day or night. We are there 24/7 and our numbers keep growing every day!"
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