--- Begin Message ---
___DEMOCRATS.COM____The Aggressive Progressives__________________
Democrats.com is the largest independent community of Democrats.
We publish the only Democratic daily news service - and it's free!
Our members make it possible through generous contributions.
Please help by clicking below!
http://democrats.com/donate
___.COMPOSITION______In This Issue_______________________________
Tom Daschle Deserves Applause For Stopping The Bush-GOP Bogus 'Stimulus' Package
Growing Some Vertebrae, Democrats Are Rallying To Roll Back Bush's Tax Cuts For The
Rich That Plunged Us Into Deficits
Bush Continues To Exploit His 911 'Trifecta' (His Words) To Let His Corporate
Overlords Rape The Environment
Will The Enron Scandal Break Wide Open? Or Will The 'Liberal Media' Look The Other Way?
Just Before Going Bankrupt, Enron Gave Senate Democrats $100,000 - Democrats Will
Donate It To Charity - Will Bush and the GOP Donate Their Enron Largesse? Don't Count
On It
Henry Waxman Waxes Poetic on the Sorry State of Enron Affairs
Central Figure in New Funeralgate Scandal Found Dead of Apparent Suicide
USA Means 'Under Saudi Arabia'
Holy War Lured Saudis Into Terrorism As Saudi Rulers Looked Away
According to European Law Enforcement Officials, Shoebomber Suspect Knew '20th
Hijacker'
London Police Failed To Investigate Recruitment Of Young Muslims By Islamic Radicals
Bush Military Tribunals Violate International Law, Including The Geneva Convention
William Safire on The Totalitarian Dangers of National ID Cards
Holy Orwellian Nightmare, Batman! Implanted Microchips To Track Non-Citizens! And
Citizens, Too?
When Oracle's Larry Ellison and Applied Digital's CEO Get Excited about National ID's,
Remember IBM's Part in the Nazi Final Solution
Serious Human Rights Concerns Over Resumption of US-Indonesia Military Ties
Professor Estimates 3,767 Afghani Civilians Killed Through Dec 10
__Tom Daschle Deserves Applause For Stopping The Bush-GOP Bogus 'Stimulus' Package
"The anthrax-filled letter addressed to Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle gave him a
strange kind of national visibility. A frustrated Bush administration is demonizing
the South Dakota Democrat for sidetracking the president's domestic agenda. Such
publicity you can't buy. The last half of the year has served Daschle well as he
remains coy about his presidential ambitions. The influence that Daschle wields from
his platform as majority leader makes him the top Democrat in the country� Since Sept.
11, Daschle has strongly supported President Bush's war against global terrorists
while maintaining that the Senate Democrats have as much standing as the White House
to speak out on economic issues. Daschle quashed the Bush stimulus package last week,
though it likely will be resurrected in 2002. Proclaiming the stimulus 'dormant,' not
dead, Daschle's critique was succinct: 'It's wrong on all counts.'"
http://www.suntimes.com/output/sweet/cst-edt-sweet27.html
__Growing Some Vertebrae, Democrats Are Rallying To Roll Back Bush's Tax Cuts For The
Rich That Plunged Us Into Deficits
"One of the year's most divisive election issues, is likely to center on whether to
increase taxes for the wealthy. Democrats have been talking for weeks about a tax
freeze or increase for the richest taxpayers, and appear ready to discuss it seriously
when Congress returns in January. 'The top 1 percent of taxpayers do not need a tax
cut,' said Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman, D-Conn. 'What we need is more help for working
people,' added House Minority Whip David Bonior, D-Mich...[Tom Daschle] cited the
latest federal budget estimates, which say deficits are likely this year and in the
years ahead, and cited tax breaks for the wealthy as a key reason for the fresh red
ink. The next move for the Democrats is an attempt to roll back the recent reduction
in the top tax rate." Referring to the piggybanks of Bush's backers and cabinet
members, Karl Rove whined that this "would stop whatever growth we have right in its
tracks."
http://www.ctnow.com/news/nationworld/hc-taxcut1227.artdec27.story?coll=hc-headlines%2Dhome
__Bush Continues To Exploit His 911 'Trifecta' (His Words) To Let His Corporate
Overlords Rape The Environment
"With the nation's attention squarely on war and terrorism, the Bush administration
has ruled this fall in business' favor on a range of long-disputed environmental
matters. It allowed oil drilling in the red rocks of Utah and canyons of Colorado. It
permitted an open-pit gold mine on a California desert site that the Quechan tribe
considers sacred. And it signaled to developers across the country that they can, in
many cases, build on wetlands without creating ones to replace them�Environmentalists
fear that the Clean Air Act may be hurt most by Bush's policies. The administration is
expected to give major polluters a variety of exemptions from a costly Clean Air Act
requirement that plants install updated pollution controls when they renovate."
Moreover, "the Bureau of Land Management ruled that vehicles could be driven through
national monuments on any track, wash or trail where any vehicle has been before."
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-122601enviro.story
__Will The Enron Scandal Break Wide Open? Or Will The 'Liberal Media' Look The Other
Way?
"Bush's good friend, ex-Montana Gov. Mark Racicot�just installed by Bush as [RNC]
chairman�worked for Enron (and will continue his job as a corporate lobbyist while he
is RNC chairman). White House adviser Karl Rove owned up to $250,000 in Enron
stock�which he sold back when it was $50 a share (it's now 36 cents a share)...Kenneth
Lay, is a buddy of Bush's, and he and other Enron execs donated almost $2 million to
Bush's campaigns over the last eight years. Lay and other Enron officials were also in
on meetings Cheney held to map out energy policy. Rove was in on those meetings too,
which occurred back when he was still a shareholder. It's hard to believe that people
high up in the Bush administration weren't privy to indications that Enron was in
trouble well before the rest of us found out�and well before it was known to the
company's employee-shareholders, many of whom even took their Christmas bonuses in
company stock, now worth practically nothing."
http://www.nypress.com/14/52/news&columns/.cfm
__Just Before Going Bankrupt, Enron Gave Senate Democrats $100,000 - Democrats Will
Donate It To Charity - Will Bush and the GOP Donate Their Enron Largesse? Don't Count
On It
"A week before filing for bankruptcy protection, energy giant Enron Corp. donated
$100,000 to the Democratic Party committee that helps Senate candidates...The company,
which had given 90 percent of its money to Republicans this year [since 1989, 73
percent of Enron's $5.8 million in contributions went to Republicans] before the
Democratic donations, also has hired high-profile Washington lawyer Robert Bennett,
whose past clients include President Clinton." Bennett also represented Iran-Contra
figure, Caspar Weinberger, Reagan's Defense Secretary. "Tovah Ravitz-Meehan, a
spokeswoman for the Democratic Senate fund-raising committee, said the head of the
organization, Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., has asked that Enron's money be given to a
charitable organization helping laid-off Enron workers. She said the charity hasn't
been chosen. 'It wasn't right to keep it and it wasn't right to give it back to Enron
so we're looking for charitable options."
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20011226/bs/enron_donations_1.html
__Henry Waxman Waxes Poetic on the Sorry State of Enron Affairs
Henry Waxman, DEMOCRAT of (29th District) California, exudes confidence as he plows
through Bu$h Administration lies and doublespeak. In an exclusive interview with
BuzzFlash.com, Congressman Waxman reveals the hypocrisy of the Bu$h junta, vis a vis
the Enron debacle: "Well, there is no question about the hypocrisy of the Republicans.
You only have to look at this from the perspective of what would the response be of
the Republicans if this were the Clinton Administration? If the Clinton Administration
had such close and intimate ties with a corporation, or put it another way, a labor
union, in which executives walked away with hundreds of millions of dollars while the
union's pensions were dissipated. They would be not only calling for an investigation
before they got the facts; they would be calling for impeachment."
http://www.buzzflash.com/interviews/2001/12/Henry_Waxman_122401.html
__Central Figure in New Funeralgate Scandal Found Dead of Apparent Suicide
"A central figure in an investigation into the desecration of graves at two Florida
Jewish cemeteries is dead of an apparent suicide, police said Thursday. Peter
Hartmann, 45, was found dead late Wednesday in the garage of his parents' Boca Raton
home, apparently from carbon monoxide poisoning. A car was running, police said, and
the garage was full of smoke. Hartmann was the general manager of the Menorah Gardens
Cemetery chain that had come under fire for allegedly digging up bodies without
notifying their relatives and, in some cases, losing the remains of the deceased.
Menorah Gardens is operated by Service Corporation International, one of the country's
largest providers of funeral and cemetery services." SCI was the corporation in Bush's
original Funeralgate scandal in Texas that has reared its ugly head again in Jeb's
Florida. (Enter 'funeralgate' in our .Compass search engine for more).
http://www.cnn.com/2001/US/12/27/cemetery.scandal.suicide/index.html
__USA Means 'Under Saudi Arabia'
P-resident Bush and his family have made the United States and Saudi Arabia more
snuggly than two peas in a pod. The Bu$h Reich has adopted a "hear no evil, see no
evil, say no evil" approach to the Saudi Arabian Riyadh regime while Bu$h, et. al,
pursues oil interests for his family and friends. According to activist/attorney Mike
Hersh, "The Saudis bought both George W. Bush and his father. Ties between the Bush
and bin Laden families, the Carlyle Group, and Saudi Arabia let the Riyadh regime beat
America like a rented camel." Accordingly, "National security agents told [British
investigative journalist Gregory] Palast that Bush ordered them to 'back off' their
investigations into the bin Ladens, WAMY, and the terrorists living nearby."
http://www.americanpolitics.com/20011224Hersh.html
__Holy War Lured Saudis Into Terrorism As Saudi Rulers Looked Away
"In the last decade, as thousands of young Saudis left their country to wage Islamic
holy war, Saudi leaders let them go, aware of the danger they might pose to the United
States, but more focused on the danger they would pose at home. At least four times in
the last six years, Saudis who were trained or recruited in Afghanistan, Chechnya,
Kosovo or Bosnia have been among the terrorists who carried out bombings of American
targets � in Saudi Arabia, Kenya, Tanzania and Yemen. But not until October, after the
American military campaign in Afghanistan began, did Saudi Arabia detain young men
trying to join that fight." So reports the New York Times.
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/27/international/middleeast/27SAUD.html
__According to European Law Enforcement Officials, Shoebomber Suspect Knew '20th
Hijacker'
"The alleged '20th hijacker' in the Sept. 11 attacks and the man accused of trying to
detonate explosives in his shoes aboard a trans-Atlantic flight knew each other and
trained in the same al Qaeda camp in Afghanistan, European law enforcement officials
told ABC News. Between 1996 and 1998, shoe-bomb suspect Richard Reid was a frequent
visitor to a mosque in Brixton, South London � the same one frequented around the same
time as the accused hijack conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui, the first person charged in
connection with the Sept. 11 attacks�Reid converted to Islam while in prison and was
sent to the Brixton mosque for rehabilitation. ABC News has learned that European law
enforcement officials have evidence of contact between Reid and Moussaoui in late 2000
and that the two men spent months training together in explosives and demolition at
the same al Qaeda camp in Afghanistan."
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/abc/20011226/ts/airplane_explosives011226_1.html
__London Police Failed To Investigate Recruitment Of Young Muslims By Islamic Radicals
"Meanwhile, there were new details about Reid's time in London. Police failed to act
on warnings that Islamic radicals were recruiting young Muslims at a south London
mosque once attended by Reid, the mosque's leader said Thursday. And other mainstream
British Muslim leaders warned that radical Islamic clerics had recruited hundreds of
other young Muslims willing to carry out similar missions. 'We've been saying for a
long time that these people are recruiting,' Abdul Haqq Baker, chairman of the Brixton
mosque, said. 'We've been warning about them, and look what's happened now.'" We ran
an earlier story that British intelligence also failed to act on evidence of a
counterfeit credit card ring at a London Mosque. These scheme allegedly raised funds
for Al Qaeda. (Enter 'mosque' in our .Compass search engine).
http://www.msnbc.com/news/676895.asp
__Bush Military Tribunals Violate International Law, Including The Geneva Convention
"Going beyond claims that the military tribunals authorized by President Bush would
violate civil liberties guaranteed by American law, some experts are beginning to
argue that they would breach international law guaranteeing fair treatment of
prisoners of war. Critics of the administration say the president's order authorizing
the tribunals conflicts with treaties like the Geneva Conventions, which give P.O.W.'s
facing charges of egregious conduct protections that include the right to choose their
own lawyers, to be tried in courts that are independent of the prosecution and to
appeal convictions. None of those rights are assured in the president's order, which
opponents say precludes at least two of them. The critics, among them legal experts
with military backgrounds, say the tribunals could create risks for the armed forces,
including the possibility of charges by other countries that American officers who
conduct tribunals are guilty of war crimes."
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/26/national/26LAW.html
__William Safire on The Totalitarian Dangers of National ID Cards
"Police...have already developed heat sensors to let them look inside people's houses.
The federal 'Carnivore' surveillance system feeds on your meatiest e-mail. Think you
can encrypt your way to privacy? The Justice Department is proud of its new 'Magic
Lantern': all attempts by computer owners to encode their messages can now be
overwhelmed by an electronic bug the F.B.I. can plant on your keyboard to read every
stroke. But in the dreams of Big Brother and his cousin, Big Marketing, nothing can
compare to forcing every person in the United States � under penalty of law � to carry
what the totalitarians used to call 'papers.' The plastic card would not merely show a
photograph, signature and address, as driver's licenses do. That's only the beginning.
In time, and with exquisite refinements, the card would contain not only a
fingerprint, description of DNA and the details of your eye's iris, but a host of
other information about you." http://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/24/opinion/24SAFI.html
__Holy Orwellian Nightmare, Batman! Implanted Microchips To Track Non-Citizens! And
Citizens, Too?
"Today's security measures don't work very well, says Richard Sullivan [CEO of Applied
Digital Solutions], pointing to the Sept. 11 terror attacks...He's says he's got a
better idea: a microchip instead of a green card. Foreigners who pass through customs
or immigration could be injected with the chip, allowing officials to monitor their
activities better and keep terrorists out...But privacy groups reacted with outrage
Wednesday to Sullivan's idea for monitoring foreigners. America is not that desperate,
one group said, citing a violation of 'bodily integrity.' 'That is so
unconstitutional,' said Randall Marshall, legal director for the Miami chapter of the
American Civil Liberties Union. 'I can't imagine this surviving a constitutional
challenge. It just simply goes way too far outside the realm of what we believe in as
a society'�" But does John Ashcroft think so? Or the Supreme Five Felons?
http://www.gopbi.com/partners/pbpost/epaper/editions/today/business_c312779d0594902e00ee.html
__When Oracle's Larry Ellison and Applied Digital's CEO Get Excited about National
ID's, Remember IBM's Part in the Nazi Final Solution
"IBM is a company that prides itself on solutions. Recently disclosed materials,
however, reveal a chilling portrait of the company's complicity in the evil of the
Nazis' search for the 'Final Solution.' Soon after the Nazis came to power in 1933,
they established the first concentration camp, the Dachau camp near Munich, Germany.
From 1933 to 1944, Hollerith machines were installed at the main concentration camps
of Mauthausen, Ravensbrock, Flossenberg and Buchenwald, and were probably present at
Auschwitz. Various people were brought into the concentration camps: Jews, Jehovah's
Witnesses, political prisoners and homosexuals. It was imperative that the Nazis be
able to identify, classify, categorize and sort these persons for their own purposes.
Upon arrival, a 'selection' process separated those who could be used as slave
laborers from those destined for immediate extermination." Michael Hausfield's article
was published in the LA Times earlier this year.
http://www.cmht.com/casewatch/inprint/ipibmoped.htm
__Serious Human Rights Concerns Over Resumption of US-Indonesia Military Ties
"United States human rights activists are expressing concern about a last-minute and
largely unnoticed addition to a 2002 defense bill which they say is a Pentagon
maneuver to resume military cooperation with Indonesia as part of �Bush's 'war against
terrorism.' At the behest of Hawaii Senator Daniel Inouye, the U.S. Congress voted to
include provision for US $21 million in the bill to set up a Regional Defense
Anti-Terrorism Fellowship Program for Southeast Asian armies at the Asia-Pacific
Center in Hawaii. Existing curbs on training Indonesian military officers would not
apply to this facility, according to activists. 'Counter-terrorism must not be used as
an excuse to resume training for a military which terrorizes its own people and
continues to enjoy impunity for its scorched-earth campaign in East Timor,' said Kurt
Biddle, Washington coordinator for the Indonesian Human Rights Network."
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/oneworld/20011224/wl/rights_activists_worry_over_u_s_-indonesia_military_ties_1.html
__Professor Estimates 3,767 Afghani Civilians Killed Through Dec 10
"Now, for the first time, a systematic independent study has been carried out into
civilian casualties in Afghanistan by Marc Herold, a US economics professor at the
University of New Hampshire. Based on corroborated reports from aid agencies, the UN,
eyewitnesses, TV stations, newspapers and news agencies around the world, Herold
estimates that at least 3,767 civilians were killed by US bombs between October 7 and
December 10�Of course, Herold's total is only an estimate. But what is impressive
about his work is not only the meticulous cross-checking, but the conservative
assumptions he applies to each reported incident. The figure does not include those
who died later of bomb injuries; nor those killed in the past [18] days; nor those who
have died from cold and hunger�It does not include military deaths (estimated by some
analysts�to be upwards of 10,000)."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/afghanistan/story/0,1284,622000,00.html
Copyright (c) 2001 Democrats.com and/or its suppliers. All rights
reserved.
Democrats.com is a member-supported online community. If you appreciate the news,
commentary, activist alerts, cartoons, discussions and other features we offer, please
show your support by making contribution at http://democrats.com/donate. Help keep
our community growing, expanding and fighting back at every opportunity!
To subscribe, send an email to:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
To unsubscribe, send an email to:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
To switch to the weekly edition, unsubscribe from this list and send an email to:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
To switch to the occasional activist alerts, unsubscribe from this list and send an
email to:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
--- End Message ---
