Water for Tears

Here's a post for you. Plenty of dollars for bombs, drugs, private jets, yet not enough to ensure everyone has a clean drop to drink. Tears of joy, tears of sorrow, tears of wasted potential...

Chocolate NewsWednesdays 10:30pm / 9:30c

African Springs

More Funny Videos
Comedians on Tour

Get Funny Ringtones
Stand-Up Comedy

KPFT debut of Helen Caldicott

Cheers to 90.1 KPFT for launching "I Love This Planet" with host Helen Caldicott! She is an active body of wisdom and has plenty to teach us about protecting our Mother.




Dr. Helen Caldicott

By protecting our Mother we protect mothers, fathers, sons and daughters.

Nuclear energy and weapons production must be banned forever from every country on Earth, starting with the U.S.

The program begins Monday, June 13 at 7 pm. Listen to it with me.

Nuclear weapons and its promoters are irrational

Nuclear power is not the answer to the energy crisis. It is expensive, extremely dangerous and a security threat. Waste produced by nuclear power plants must be transported and stored, thus creating more opportunities for accidents, attacks or natural disasters.

The US government and politicians should not be allowed to condemn other countries or threaten them for trying to attain nuclear capabilities, whether for peaceful purposes or not. The US has more nuclear weapons than any country in the world, with Russia coming in at a close second.

Best Sound Bite NOT on Network News

“America is not in the position to be happy or unhappy with our nuclear activities to produce energy for peaceful purposes, because America is the first country which used nuclear weapons and killed more than 150,000 of the people in Japan. America is a country which even now is testing the third, fourth or fifth generation of the nuclear bomb. Such a country is not in the position to instruct other nations to have nuclear energy or not.” -- Manouchehr Mottaki


Mohamed ElBaradei, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said he'd resign if a military strike were carried out on Iran, adding, “I don’t believe that what I see in Iran today is a current, grave and urgent danger. A military strike, in my opinion, would be worse than anything possible. It would turn the region into a fireball. If you do a military strike, it will mean that Iran, if it is not already making nuclear weapons, will launch a crash course to build nuclear weapons with the blessing of all Iranians, even those in the West.”

The statements were made after a New York Times report on Friday that said Israel recently conducted major military training rehearsals for bombing Iran's nuclear facilities.

The report by Michael R. Gordon and Eric Schmitt cites unnamed "officials" from America, the Pentagon and Israel.

Isn't this the same kind of propaganda ploy the Times used to arouse fear and suspicion about Iraq before the 2003 invasion? Gordon cowrote a number of articles with Judith Miller that presented information without specifically naming sources. In this way, the two writers and the New York Times were complicit in promoting the Bush Administration's war propaganda.

Why doesn't the Times run stories about the Project for the New American Century, its policy objectives and its members, who planned on attacking Iraq in order to facilitate an attack on Iran?
Go to PNAC's Web site at: www.newamericancentury.org and read the essays written in the late 1990s by William Kristol, Paul Wolfowitz, John Ashcroft, Dick Cheney, Jeb Bush. (As of right now, the site is down. Hmmmmmm. It was there for at least the last 8 years...) No matter. Just type "Project for the New American Century" into a web search field and see what you get.

The group's goal of establishing a global American empire to bend the will of all nations wasn't kept a secret. Well before 9-11, it was calling for regime change in Iraq as well as increased military spending.

After the Cold War ended, it made sense to close military bases. Neocons bcame worried when President Clinton closed a number of bases to help reduce the national deficit. They banded together to protect their bread and butter. Several original PNAC members, including Cheney, Khalilzad and the Bush family, have ties to the oil industry, the profit of which is contingent on a military economy. Accordingly, a slow down in war and military spending meant a decrease in profit.

The US government is complicit in any Israeli strike against Iran. Israeli planes must fly through NATO airspace to hit Iranian targets. The GOP has run out of distractions, but it will stop at nothing to try and retain its control. I would argue (and I'm not the only one who would) that one purpose of the so-called "War on Terror" is to ensure a steady recruitment of radical extremists into the ranks of Al Quaeda, Hammas, etc. It serves as a justification for perpetual wars.

Neocons believe in lying, any Machiavellian means to an end is their MO. They lie so much to themselves and to the world that they can't keep the stories straight.

Necessary Illusions

If you don't know who Noam Chomsky is and why corporate media and many politicians do their best to ignore him, watch this video:

Yes, it's much easier to ignore reality and create your own. To hell with everyone else.

Marvin Gaye Live Video!!

So cool - I came across this video looking for SxSW tickets. I know you'll enjoy it as much as I did.

He's beautiful! After you watch this one, click on Mercy, Mercy, Me and watch that video too.

LYRICS: Mercy, Mercy, Me (The Ecology) 1971

Ah, mercy, mercy me,
Ah, things ain't what they used to be, no, no.
Where did all the blue skies go?
Poison is the wind that blows from the north and south and east.

Mercy, mercy me,
Ah, things ain't what they used to be, no, no.
Oil wasted on the ocean and upon
our seas fish full of mercury,

Oh, mercy, mercy me.
Ah, things ain't what they used to be, no, no, no.
Radiation underground and in the sky;
animals and birds who live near by are dying.

Oh, mercy, mercy me.
Ah, things ain't what they used to be.
What about this over crowded land?
How much more abuse from man can she stand?

While listening to this song, which Gaye wrote 30+ years ago, the reality that our world is in even worse shape now shook me. Some argue that global warming is a natural phenomenon, that one volcanic erruption releases more toxic stuff than all of humanity's pollution combined. (Someone told me this, I haven't actually looked it up yet.) But is this supposed to excuse unsustainable living and working practices? Why are men so tragically shortsighted?

Maybe it's simply ying and yang, ping and pong. Earth knows. This disposable "civilization" is temporary.

The Wrong Answer: Nuclear Power

The Lean Economy Connection (LEC) is a research group looking for solutions to climate change and the depletion of fossil fuels.

According to the center's Web site, it developed the carbon trading model that polluting corporations, governments and air travelers are taking advantage of. Its research shows that wind power is better than nuclear power, especially for the environment. Click here to see a list of issues related to nuclear energy.

Today, nuclear power plants have been compromised by groups trying to show the public security vulnerablilities of nuclear plants. This is just one of the short term security threats. One long-term problem of nuclear power is what to do with the waste it eneviatably produces.

The LEC says that wind power is much safer to humans and the environment than nuclear energy.

Getting to the core issues

I've been off topic for long enough. It's time to revisit why I started this blog in the first place: awareness about nuclear "energy," the use of its byproducts for weapons, its storage, disposal and contamination of earth's resources on which our survival depends.
Nuclear Age Peace Foundation is working toward eliminating these threats to our survival let alone security. Their website is appealing to the next U.S. president for a "nuclear weapons-free world.

From their site:

"Think outside the bomb:
Washington, DC - April 12, 2008

The Think Outside the Bomb network will host its next youth regional conference on Saturday, April 12th, 2008 at American University. This one-day conference brings youth and students together with experts in the fields of nuclear disarmament, nuclear power, and nuclear waste in order to build an atmosphere of education and resistance towards the nuclear weapons complex."

Yay. Getting RIGHT down to the point, down to the core issues. I like it.

Earth Hour 2008 -- Doing it for Mother Earth

On March 29th at 8:00 P.M. TURN OUT YOUR LIGHTS. This simple act will have a huge effect that will continue to grow when the lights are turned back on.

The movement is sponsored by the World Wildlife Federation. Check out the Web site at www.earthhour.org.

Obama is America

Thanks Sen. Obama for standing up for US. Your words shine through the darkness that's been over us for too long. Lack of education leads to intolerance.

Who Killed John O'Neil?

I'm currently watching "Who Killed John O'Neil." If you have a couple of hours, I recommend watching it. Good to know people are asking questions. I haven't watched it all yet, but I expect to see something about PNAC and its desire for a Pearl Harbor-like attack to get the military machine up and running to feed trillions of dollars to private interests.

John O'Neill was a former FBI agent who quit his job to become head of security at the World Trade Center.

"The main obstacles to investigate Islamic terrorism were US oil corporate interests, and the role played by Saudi Arabia in it," O'Neill reportedly told the authors of an explosive new book, Hidden Truth (Forbidden Truth in the US), by intelligence analysts Charles Brisard and Guillaume Dasquie. (credit: Here In Reality)


Other sources of information on this subject include, Crossing the Rubicon, a book by Michael Ruppert, the From the Wilderness web site, PBS Frontline video "The Man Who Knew," and The Man Who Warned America, by Murray Weiss. Of course there are plenty of other sources, but there's only so much time in one day!


What do you think?

Props to Sam Seder for providing us a glimpse into the insane reasoning of so-called conservatives like Dick Black on homosexuality.

If you haven't read F.U.B.A.R. America's Right Wing Nightmare, get a copy and have yourself a few belly laughs about the sad state of affairs we're in.

During World War II, farmers were encouraged to grow hemp for cordage to replace manila hemp previously obtained from Japanese-controlled areas. The US government produced a film explaining the uses of hemp called, "Hemp for Victory."

In America we can't grow hemp without obtaining a government permit; however, all the rules and regulations make it cost prohibitive for most people so it remains cheaper to import.

The argument that people could conceal marijuana plants within a field of hemp doesn't hold water because hemp would croud the marijuana and compete for nutrients and sunlight. The more believable reason hemp remains illegal is because it would cut into the profits of other industries, like energy, timber and paper.

More of us should advocate for the legalization of hemp if we truly want to end our dependence on foreign oil and wars to guarantee our access to it.

Votehemp.org has a wealth of information on the topic, and I recommend the site to anyone who doesn't understand the difference between marijuana and hemp.