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[Jan. 19th, 2005|04:05 am] |
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so, how 'bout that moon? |
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[Jan. 11th, 2005|03:52 pm] |
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| [ | music |
| | Lightness - Death Cab For Cutie | ] |
Tsunami, anyone?
Comments? Questions? Concerns?
Discuss.
Tsunami News |
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[Nov. 9th, 2004|07:36 pm] |
Is it just me or is calieda not as active as it used to be. It just be me and the fact that communities I was in are dead.
I know this isn't really a current event. |
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| The Elections |
[Nov. 4th, 2004|09:39 pm] |
I used to be fairly active in Caleida but kind of died off but now I am coming back with mainly political entries.
I think it is horrible that Bush won the election (for real this time) and am disappointed by the fact that the Republican Party can win primarily on its conservative base while the Democrats are having to depend on moderates to stand a chance in elections. I am particularly depressed after the elections because I am a Georgian and after November 2 we have a Republican Governor, Legislature, and then of course the federal government it Republican. Not only that but it is very likely that some of the conservative democrats convert to the Republican party. Also one of the few United States House of Representatives we have that is democratic, endorsed Bush. I feel that at this time it is a sad time to live in the south.
The democratic party must hold true to its liberal principles and wait for people to realize that conservative economics wont work. And hopefully sometime in the future people begin to realize that homosexuals deserve rights to and are real human beings. For now we are living through dark times. |
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[Nov. 3rd, 2004|11:25 am] |
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Kerry conceded.
Bush actually *won* this election.
It's too bad, the states could have used a change. Instead, it's going to be 4 more years of spiels on terrorism, slashed taxes for the richest 1%, bans on marijuana, gay marriage, stem cell research, abortions, and who knows what else. Things that promote progressive thinking, mainly.
Any commentary is more than welcome. I just thought I'd make an announcement in the community. |
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| Iraq death toll 'soared post-war' |
[Oct. 29th, 2004|09:01 pm] |
If you live in Iraq, the risk of deaths from any cause, is now two-and-a-half times higher after the 2003 invasion than in the preceding 15 months.
The primary cause of death in Iraq is now violence, mostly from airstrikes.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3962969.stm |
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| World News |
[Sep. 18th, 2004|07:05 pm] |
U.N. atomic agency launches crackdown on Iran
Associated Press
VIENNA — The U.N. atomic watchdog agency demanded Iran suspend all uranium enrichment activities and gave it until November comply with the order.
The resolution fell short of a strict deadline sought by the United States, which accuses Iran of seeking to produce nuclear weapons.
After the vote, U.S. officials urged the agency to refer Iran to the U.N. Security Council in November for possible sanctions should it be found to have defied any of the resolution's conditions.
"The time for decisive action is approaching," chief U.S. delegate Jackie Sanders told the International Atomic Energy Agency's board of governors.
"To wait until the IAEA finds the nuclear weapons ... is to wait until it is too late," he said.
The 35-nation board unanimously approved the toughly worded resolution that said the agency "considers it necessary" that Iran freeze all programs related to uranium enrichment.
Enrichment is a key process that can be used to make nuclear weapons or to produce reactor fuel for energy generation.
The resolution expressed alarm at Iranian plans to convert more than 40 tons of raw uranium into uranium hexafluoride — the gas that when spun in centrifuges turns into enriched uranium.
It also said it "strongly urges" Iran to meet all demands by the agency in its investigation of the country's nearly two decades of clandestine nuclear activity.
The agency demands included having unrestricted access to sites, information and personnel that can shed light on still unanswered questions on whether Tehran was interested in the atom for nuclear weapons.
Iran insists its nuclear program aims only to produce energy and not to develop weapons.
Suggesting that the Islamic Republic could answer to the U.N. Security Council should it defy the demands, the resolution said the next board meeting in November "will decide whether or not further steps are appropriate" in ensuring Iran complies.
Still, the text appeared to leave Iran wiggle room. While demanding Iran suspend all uranium enrichment activities, the resolution also recognized nations' right to the peaceful use of nuclear energy.
Iran's chief delegate to the meeting, Hossein Mousavian told reporters his country's "decision-makers will decide about the main request — full suspension," in the next few days, he told The Associated Press.
so why don't they do that with every country? |
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| politics have never been so delicious! |
[Aug. 27th, 2004|03:22 pm] |
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http://www.wketchup.com/
supplied by the most wonderful ![[info]](http://www.caleida.com/img/userinfo.gif) hubris. enjoy! |
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| Old friends of Cheney allowed to cheat US tax payers |
[Aug. 18th, 2004|08:41 am] |
US suspends Halliburton decision
The US army has said it has suspended for now a decision to withhold some payments to Halliburton, its biggest contractor in Iraq.
The army had earlier said it would be withholding 15% of payments on future bills to Halliburton, once run by US Vice-President Dick Cheney.
One of its subsidiaries has featured in auditing disputes with the Pentagon.
It allegedly overcharged on contracts to supply accommodation, meals and fuel to troops in Iraq and Kuwait.
Halliburton is by far the Pentagon's biggest civilian contractor in Iraq but also by far its most controversial.
The US army's Materiel Command had said it was going to withhold 15% of payments on future company invoices after one of its subsidiaries - Kellogg, Brown & Root -became locked in auditing disputes with the US government.
It was estimated the move could cost the company $60m a month but then, within hours, the army said it was suspending the move, at least for now.
No official reason has been given for the change of heart but it is thought US defence officials decided they wanted to have another look at the potential implications of the move.
BBC News |
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| Gay Marriage in the True North Strong and Free |
[Jul. 18th, 2004|02:42 am] |
Well, it's official. Canada is seeing its first official same-sex divorce. It's a hairy legal mess because when gay marriages were legalized, they forgot to make the appropriate changes to the Divorce Act. Whoops. It'll probably be cleaned up in short order, and the unhappy lesbian couple will be able to go on their seperate ways. It's not big news, just a legal snag.
The headline comes only a week after the headline declaring that gay marriages have been legalized in the Yukon territory, the fourth jurisdiction in the country to do so. That wasn't big news either. The Yukon territory, the frozen northwest corner of Canada that borders the Yukon, has a tiny population and so the new legislation won't affect too many people.
Three provinces have gay marriages, and a Canadian who didn't know which ones they were would probably be able to guess. Quebec, the only monolingual french province sometimes gets badmouthed as being bigoted because a leader of the seperatist movement blamed the failed bid to secede from Canada on the "ethnic vote," but every survey on social attitudes shows that Quebecers are by and large a pretty tolerant bunch. British Columbia, on the west coast, is probably the greatest stronghold of social liberalism in Canada, helped in no small part by the hordes of ageing American ex-hippy draft dodgers who settled there. The third province is Ontario, home of the capital (Ottawa) and Canada's largest city (Toronto). In Ontario it's also legal for women to walk around topless.
The sky hasn't fallen yet, despite the warnings of the far right (Canada, until recently, had two right wing parties and only one of them lost much sleep over the thought of two men or two women getting married). The sanctity of the family hasn't been affected, HIV is not suddenly spreading like wildfire, and state recognition of gays has not caused thousands of youths to go "play for the other team."
Even if we accept at face value the right-wing fear that gay marriages cheapen straight ones, the fact is that homosexuals do not make up a large part of the population. Even if every last one got married (which will never happen, just look at straight people) it still wouldn't change the mainstream at all.
So what's the big deal? |
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| NATO and Iraq |
[Jun. 18th, 2004|03:47 pm] |
Bush must really be getting desperate if he’s calling on NATO to join him in Iraq. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3792407.stm) Or really stupid. Then again, maybe he knows a whole lot more about the NATO countries than I do, and he has reason to believe that they’d actually help him out. In any case, I have to wonder what Bush is thinking. I can understand why Bush would want NATO’s help, just not why he thinks he might get it.
I’ve heard conservative pundits predict that NATO will leap to the aid of the US simply to prove that they’re still relevant. But they talk about NATO as if it were some separate entity from the rest of the world, sitting alone in a corner and sulking because there’s no Soviet bogeyman to be afraid of anymore. NATO is still made up of countries that were actually pretty relieved when the Soviet Union fell, and they’re not looking for new bad guys to fight. NATO is mostly irrelevant now to all members except the US, and that’s only because they’re in trouble right now.
The neo-con fantasy is that invading other countries is their God-given right, and it’s only the business of the USA and whatever third world regime they’ve decided to knock over. It infuriates them when other countries (in the form of the UN) dare to insert themselves into the venture by trying to impose something like international law. But it’s interesting that the neo-cons, in their defiant effort to go it alone, have discovered that they need a lot of multilateral support to declare a unilateral war.
That’s what all the fuss was about when Spain’s new government pulled the plug on the Spanish part of the Coalition of the willing. It’s not that their withdrawal did any real damage to the occupation (there were 135, 000 US troops compared to roughly 1, 400 Spanish troops), it’s that Bush needed a stamp of approval from as many foreign powers as he could manage.
Of course Bush would love to have the NATO banner to slap across his war, but why would the rest of NATO want it? Chirac and Schroeder have even less reason to go to Iraq now than they did at the outset. Iraq is already a proven catastrophe, and both the French and German populations were never convinced it was a good idea in the first place (the same goes for Britain and Spain, mind you). Why would anyone accept Bush’s invitation to board a sinking ship? |
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| Iran's Nukes |
[Jun. 16th, 2004|07:29 pm] |
Invading Afghanistan was a military victory against terrorism (about the only one possible, since terrorist don’t normally operate training camps with the open support of governments) in exactly the same way that Iraq wasn’t. But regardless of the reasons, the fact is that two Muslim countries are now under foreign occupation, and the west seems to be getting into a spat with a third. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3811511.stm
The UN ponders a resolution condemning Iran’s non-cooperation, to which Iran responds that if they do, Iran will start enriching uranium again. It sounds absurd, and it is. There may be a lot more depth to the absurdity than there appears at first glance, but the real reasons behind this are anybody’s guess.
A US diplomat is quoted by the BBC as saying "People who are trying to produce electricity for light bulbs don't engage in this kind of behaviour," and Iran’s stance that it only wants nuclear power to generate electricity is a bit of a tough sell. Iran has every reason to want nuclear weapons. Not to attack anybody with of course, that would be suicide.
But nuclear weapons don’t have to be used to have a useful purpose. Simply having them around changes the way other countries have to deal with you. You don’t even have to threaten to use your nukes, they are simply there and ready and that is enough. And if you’re a relatively small country (like Iran) and you’ve got a big scary enemy who is not, at the moment, afraid of you at all (like Iran with the US) then having a few nukes starts to sound like a really good idea. If Iran actually goes nuclear, it would basically buy itself some respect. So it wouldn’t surprise me at all if at least some of the accusations against Iran are true.
The only thing that gives me pause is that Iran’s accusations that America “has blown technical shortcomings out of proportion and is driven by an anti-Iranian political agenda in the US” (from Al-Jazeera: http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/69E07498-309A-4B1A-A846-EBC556288203.htm) is entirely too plausible. It’s not like the US hasn’t done this sort of thing before. (Did someone say Weapons of Mass Destruction?)
America is not going to invade Iran. Not even with Bush in charge. Even if Bush’s cronies don’t grasp the political stupidity of trying to conquer the entire Middle East (even if they were to stop after Iran, it’d still look like that), Bush’s generals can be counted on to grasp the military stupidity of it. But Bush is worried about getting reelected, and that’s probably driving his actions more than anything.
Iran has a history of being at loggerheads with the US. All the recent talk about Ronald Reagan has come with a lot of talk about the Iran-Contra Scandal (it’s hard to mention one without the other), and if that wasn’t humiliating enough then there was the hostage thing in 1980… Memories of the latter are mostly lost to the younger generation, but I’d bet that if you talked to any member of any branch of the American Special Forces and mentioned Operation Eagle Claw, they’d probably just squirm a bit and change the subject. In any case, large portions of the American public are used to Iran being a bad guy and Bush may just be trying to take advantage of that. He does have an election in November to worry about. |
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[May. 9th, 2004|09:19 am] |
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| | Stereofuse - Everything | ] |
Dear Friend,
The images of abuse in a U.S. run Iraqi prison couldn't be more disturbing.
Disturbing too is that Donald Rumsfeld and the Department of Defense knew about this and didn't take immediate action and didn't even inform the leaders in Congress. John Kerry has called for Donald Rumsfeld to resign -- and the Kerry Campaign is asking us to show support for his decision by endorsing his statement here:
http://johnkerry.com/petition/rumsfeld.php
I did -- and you should too. |
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| Iraquis refuse to kill Iraquis |
[Apr. 14th, 2004|09:28 am] |
Fouad Rawi, a senior member of the Iraqi Islamic Party spearheading efforts to negotiate a cease-fire, quotes hospital sources as saying that more than 600 Iraqis have been killed and 1,250 wounded in Fallujah.
He says among those killed are 160 women, 141 children and many elderly, providing the first precise figures on the number of civilian deaths from the attacks on the town.
Many newly-trained Iraqi police and army personnel refused to fight. "A great disappointment" says US general.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3621369.stm |
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anxious