The Truth Commission update on Maissonueve (press roundup)

150 Years of Abuse, 5 Years of Truth

April 29, 2008

Funded by Ottawa and carried out by churches, the systematic assimilation of natives through residential schooling is a tragic, unsettling piece of Canadian history. As part of an out-of-court settlement that will pay out some $2 billion to survivors of the native school system, the government promised to set up a Truth and Reconciliation Commission to record the tragedy for the history books. On Monday, Indian Affairs Minister Chuck Strahl announced that Justice Harry LaForme will be its chair. LaForme, a member of the Mississaugas of the New Credit First Nation of southern Ontario, is tasked with writing the “official history” of residential schools over the course of the commission’s five-year mandate. “Ultimately, we all want to make sure we achieve a fair and lasting resolution to the sad legacy of residential schools,” he said, as quoted in a CBC News article. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission will serve as a nationwide forum for former aboriginal students, church representatives, and educators to tell their stories. The aim is, in short, to educate Canadians on the impact the residential school system had on some 150,000 aboriginal, Inuit and Métis children who were removed from their communities at age six and forced to attend these schools, where they fell victim to widespread physical and sexual abuse.

LaForme’s $60-million commission will be independent from government, church, and First Nations groups, and will have “unfettered access” to all archives as it explores the 150-year history of residential schools. The task is characterized as monumental, as many former students and school employees are long dead, and many key documents and records have been destroyed. LaForme sees similarities between Canada’s Indian residential schools and South African apartheid, reports the Globe. The commission is, after all, modeled on the commission in South Africa, chaired by Archbishop Desmond Tutu, that explored that country’s policy of segragating black people from white. Strahl indicated that the government plans to make a formal apology to the ninety thousand victims and their families before Parliament breaks for the summer, reports the Post. The commission will be formally established on June 1.

Claire Ward is a Toronto-based MediaScout writer for Maisonneuve Magazine.

Some SPP links via the right wingers ..

Bush Reaffirms North American Union Agenda At Leaders' Summit Opposition to 'Security and Prosperity Partnership' intensifies

President Bush yesterday reaffirmed a commitment to progress the much maligned Security and Prosperity Partnership agenda, amid intensified opposition from commentators and critics concerned that the plan constitutes an undermining of national sovereignty.

At a private party to open the fourth North American Leaders' Summit in New Orleans, Bush referred to recently encountered "setbacks" and told bureaucrats and business leaders "the meeting gives three friends the chance to come together to discuss our commitment to security and prosperity, to reconfirm the need for the three of us to work in harmony together for the good of our peoples. It's a chance to talk about how we can best protect our people and extend prosperity."

Bush told leaders from Canada and Mexico "Tomorrow, we will be meeting with the business leaders of the North American Competitiveness Council to listen to their specific recommendations... The United States has an opportunity to continue the trading agenda."

The North American Competitiveness Council (NACC) is an advisory Council Comprised of 30 senior private sector representatives of North American corporations that were selected by the American, Canadian and Mexican governments at the June 2006 trilateral meeting in Cancun, Mexico.

Recently uncovered documents detailed how these corporate representatives have been urged to "humanize" North American integration, promote NAFTA success stories to employees and unions and evolve the harmonization agenda "without fueling protectionism".

The documentation consists of internal memos from Canada's Foreign Affairs and Internal Trade ministry, which were obtained by the World Net Daily reporter Jerome Corsi under an Access to Information Act request.

Business leaders have been beseeched by bureaucratic working groups to launch public relations campaigns in order to counter critics of the secretive Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America (SPP) and to report back to senior government officials with advice on an ongoing basis.

The memo highlighted how those advancing the North American integration agenda are concerned about the exposure and subsequent public backlash they have encountered recently.

Meanwhile one prominent critic of the SPP agenda, Congressman Ron Paul has vowed to intensify opposition towards the alliance and the intrinsically linked Trans-Texas Corridor and proposed NAFTA ¡°Super Highway.¡±

¡°As we all know, there have been significant moves recently to expand the Security and Prosperity Partnership initiated by President Bush and his Mexican and Canadian counterparts in 2005. One such plan is to construct a so-called ¡°NAFTA Superhighway running from Mexico, through Texas, and up eventually into Canada, Paul said yesterday.

I have opposed this project from the beginning, signing on as a co-sponsor of House Concurrent Resolution 40 expressing Congressional disapproval of the NAFTA Superhighway and any moves toward a North American Union.¡±

More recently, I introduced an even stronger piece of legislation, H.R.5191, which would prohibit the use of federal funds to carry out this highway project. The federal government has no business being partner to this outrageous plan, according to which countless landowners would have their private property confiscated under eminent domain,¡± Paul said.

This prohibition of funds, if passed, would go a long way toward derailing this ill-conceived project and would send a clear message that further attempts to undermine U.S. sovereignty would not be unchallenged in Congress. It is long past time the United States House and Senate start taking our constitutional oversight roles seriously.¡± The Congressman concluded.

The initial Security and Prosperity Partnership agreement was signed by President Bush, Mexican President Vicente Fox and then-Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin in Waco, Texas, March 23, 2005. It established working groups, under the North American Free Trade Agreement office.

Jerome Corsi brought attention to the SPP two years ago when he obtained SPP documents, under the freedom of information act, showing that a wide range of US administrative law is being re-written in stealth under a program to "integrate" and "harmonize" with administrative law in Mexico and Canada, just as has become commonplace within the EU.

The documents contained references to upwards of 13 working groups within an entire organized infrastructure that has drawn from officials within most areas of administrative government including U.S. departments of State, Homeland Security, Commerce, Treasury, Agriculture, Transportation, Energy, Health and Human Services, and the office of the U.S. Trade Representative.

Related: Dear Deluded Mass Media, North American Union Agenda Exists

More British Columbia, N. Pacific earthquake information!!

More Earthquakes Out West
Time of Earthquake in other Time Zones Location 48.685°N, 128.888°W Depth 10 km (6.2 miles) set by location program Region VANCOUVER ISLAND, CANADA REGION Distances * 244 km (151 miles) SSW (205°) from Port Hardy, BC, Canada ...
Eastern US Weather - http://www.easternuswx.com/bb/index.php

POTENTIONAL AREAS IN QUAKE RISK ACTION / THE WEST SIDE... USA AND ...
By nightangel7246(nightangel7246)
CHILLIWAC BC LOCATION: THIS AREA NOW IS IN ANOTHER QUAKE RISK DUE TO MORE INTENSE UNDER GROUND ACTIVITY IN PROGRESS. ( UPPER 3.5 MAGNITUDE LEVEL ). WASHINGTON STATE.... THE SHORE LINE REGION AREAS OF: FORKS, PORT ANGELES AND NEAH BAY. ...
THE EARTHQUAKE TRACKER - http://journals.aol.com/nightangel7246/the-earthquake-tracker-/

UPSC (PT) 2008 CURRENT EVENTS
By kendriyevidyalayprimaryteacher
Some forty people are injured when the floor of a Mennonite church collapses during a Christian rock concert in Abbotsford, British Columbia. Two people are killed and more than a dozen injured after a semitrailer crashes into a Chicago ...
UPSC Question Papers - http://upscquestionpapers.wordpress.com

Google Web Alert for: British Columbia earthquake

Earthquake Preparedness - Provincial Emergency Program
Information about earthquake preparedness in British Columbia. ... A guide for BC families and individuals to be prepared for an earthquake. ...

EARTHQUAKE PREPAREDNESS

Everyone talks about "The Big One" and when will it happen (?) – "no one knows for sure". Here are some useful ways to prepare in case an earthquake does occur and impact our immediate area.

• Prepare Now for an Earthquake in British Columbia
  A guide for BC families and individuals to be prepared for an earthquake. The link is http://www.pep.bc.ca/hazard_preparedness/prepare_now/prepare.html



• Be Ready for an Earthquake
  Tips on earthquake safety and preparedness. http://www.pep.bc.ca/hazard_preparedness/earthquake.pdf



• Earthquake Survival Guide
  A handy, perhaps life-saving reminder of what to do to prepare for an earthquake. For carrying in your wallet, purse, glove compartment.... wherever! (pdf format) http://www.pep.bc.ca/hazard_preparedness/Quake_survival_guide.pdf



• Emergency Contact Card
  Record particulars of just who needs to be called by family members following a major emergency, when telephone communication should be limited. (pdf format) http://www.pep.bc.ca/hazard_preparedness/Emergency_Contact_Card.pdf

CANADA....

THE NORTHERN LOCATION OF: YUKON AREA NORTH AND SOUTH LOCATION. ( 4.0 QUAKE MAGNITUDE LEVEL )

THE ISLANDS LOCATIONS OF: QUEEN CHAROLETTE AT THE SOUTH POINT SEA LOCATION AREA. ( 5.0 QUAKE MAGNITUDE LEVEL )

VANCOUVER ISLAND TO THE AREAS AT NORTH WEST LOCATION OFF SHORE AND TO THE SOUTH EAST AREA OFF SHORE. ( UPPER 4.5 QUAKE MAGNITUDE LEVEL ) WE ALSO HAVE MORE QUAKE RISK NOW THE WHOLE WEST SIDE OF THIS ISLAND REGION. ( PLATE SHIFTING ACTION IN PROGRESS )

CILLLIWACK B.C. LOCATION: THIS AREA NOW IS IN ANOTHER QUAKE RISK DUE TO MORE INTENSE UNDER GROUND ACTIVITY IN PROGRESS. ( UPPER 3.5 MAGNITUDE LEVEL )

WASHINGTON STATE....

THE SHORE LINE REGION AREAS OF: FORKS, PORT ANGELES AND NEAH BAY. ALSO THE STRAIT SAN JUAN DE FUCA AREA AND THE SAN JUAN ISLANDS LOCATION ( UPPER 3.5 QUAKE MAGNTIUDE LEVEL FOR THESE MENTIONED LOCATIONS ).

THE WEST SIDE LOCATION AREAS OF: PAST AND FREQUENT AREAS, WHERE MORE QUAKE MAKING ACTION HAS TAKEN PLACE, TO THE WHOLE EAST SIDE OF THE PUDGET SOUND LOCATION.

PLACES LIKE: DARINGTON, MOUNT BAKER, MOUNT VERNON, ARLINGTON, GRANITE FALLS, SEATTLE, BREMERTON, TACOMA URBAN AREA, LONGVIEW AND MOUNT ST. HELEN... ALL ARE IN QUAKE RISK ACTION.

MOUNT ST. HELEN VOLCANO IS STILL IN INTENSIVE PRESSURE ACTION OCCURRING THE AREA UNDER GROUND. THIS EXTREME LEVEL IS VERY SERIOUS. I STILL FEEL WE ARE GETTING CLOSER TO THAT ERUPTION FROM THIS VOLCANO. CAUTION TO ALL SURROUNDING AREAS.

CAUTION: AGAIN TO ALL PAST FREQUENT QUAKE TARGET LOCATION AREAS. WE HAVE YET MORE INCREASE INTENSITY LEVELS AND MORE PASSING ACTION OF UNDER GROUND MOVEMENT HEADING SOUTH FROM THE UPPER PUDGET SOUND AREA.

THE EAST SIDE... ENTAIT, SPOKANE AREA ( NORTH AND SOUTH ) CHELAN BUTTE AREA, NORTH OF YAKIMA, NORTH OF WALLA WALLA, MOSES LAKE, KENNEWICK AND SUNNYSIDE AREA. ( 3.5 QUAKE MAGNITUDE LEVEL )

THERE IS STRONG ACTION COMING FROM QUAKE PATH 2 AND 3 ROUTES IN MOTION. MORE SIGNS OF WEATHER ACTION INCREASING THE INTENSITY LEVELS SOON AS WELL.

THERE IS ALSO MORE EXTREME PRESSURE COMING FROM THE MOUNT ST. HELEN VOLCANO AREA NOW. THIS ACTION INCREASES THE LEVEL OF QUAKE RISK TO THE SOUTH EAST SIDE FROM THIS VOLCANO AREA.

OREGON STATE....

THE SHORE LINE... AGAIN SHOWING ANOTHER FORCING ACTION OF PLATE SHIFTING IN MOTION. THIS EFFECTS THE WHOLE COASTAL AREA AND SHORE LINE OF OREGON.

IT'S QUAKE PATH 1 ROUTE IN MORE INTENSE FORCE OF ACTION.AND THE WEATHER RAIN ACTION ONLY INCREASES THIS EFFECT OF EARTHQUAKE ACTIVITY.

AT THE COASTAL AREA FROM BANDON ( POORLY CONSTRAINED ) TO NEWPORT AT THE COASTAL AREA IS STILL IN A 5.5 PLUS QUAKE MAGNITUDE LEVEL.

AS FOR THE SHORE LINE IT'S A 3.5 QUAKE MAGNITUDE LEVEL. YACHATS AND WALDPORT AREA OFF SHORE IS STILL IN A QUAKE RISK ACTION DURING THIS TIME PERIOD.

THE WEST SIDE... AREAS OF: PORTLAND, PARKDALE, BEAVERTON, FOREST GROVE, CANBY, WOODBURN, ALBANY, LEBANON, PHOLOMOTH, COLBURG, SPRINGFIELD ( SE ) LOWELL, DRAIN, CAVE JUNCTION, UMPQUA, MEDFORD, GRANTS PASS AND ASHLAND.

THERE IS A STRONG FORCING ACTION COMING IN FROM QUAKE PATH 1 ROUTE. THIS MOTION OF UNDER GROUND MOVEMENT HAS ALREADY EFFECTED THE NORTHERN CALIFORNIA SHORE SIDE LOCATION.

THIS QUAKE PATH ROUTE CAN AND WILL AGAIN MAKE ANOTHER QUAKE TO THE OREGON COASTAL AREA SOON. ALSO DURING THIS EFFORT OF ATTEMPT. WE HAVE THE WEST SIDE HERE TO CONSIDER REGARDING THE EFFECTS THIS ROUTE HAS SET IN IT'S MOTION.

THE EAST SIDE... AREAS OF: FEILDS, THE 3 SISTERS AREA, KLAMATH FALLS, PRINEVILLE AREA, MAUPIN AREA, HUNTINGTON, BAKER CITY, AND THE DALLES. JORDON VALLEY AND BURNS AS WELL.

THERE IS A STRONG PASSING ACTION OF UNDER GROUND MOVEMENT AND INTENSITY INCREASE COMING FROM QUAKE PATH 2 ROUTE IN MOTION NOW. AND WEATHER ACTION OCCURRING NOW WILL INCREASE THE RISK OF QUAKE MAKING ACTION TO THESE LOCATIONS.

ALREADY OCCURRING NOW... TO THE NORTH EASTERN AREAS OF CALIFORNIA HAS BEEN EFFECTED BY THIS QUAKE PATH 2 ROUTE'S ACTION.

BEING RENO NEVADA... IS IN A INTENSE ACTION OF QUAKE OCCURRENCES. THIS EFFECT COULD VERY WELL BE EFFECTING PARTS OF SOUTH EASTERN OREGON. AND COULD VERY WELL BE EFFECTED MY MORE PULSE ACTION OCCURRING UNDER GROUND. SOMETHING TO KEEP IN MIND. IT'S REAL. THAT'S ALSO QUAKE PATH 2 ROUTE'S TRAVEL PATH.

Germany opens huge Nazi crimes archive to public

Wed Apr 30, 2008 1:30pm EDT

BERLIN (Reuters) - Germany opened the world's largest collection of documents on Nazi crimes and their victims to the public on Wednesday.

The International Tracing Service (ITS) in the western town of Bad Arolsen contains about 50 million records on some 17 million victims of Hitler's Nazi regime.

The paperwork, which includes imprisonment orders, death registers and Gestapo notes, reveals details about people who were murdered in the Holocaust, concentration camp survivors and millions of forced laborers and displaced people.

It contains the names of people on "Schindler's List" -- hundreds of Jews saved by businessman Oskar Schindler -- which was the subject of a Steven Spielberg film.

Until Wednesday, the centre allowed only Nazi victims and their relations access.

ITS director Reto Meister said the opening marked the start of a new chapter for the archives more than 60 years after the end of World War Two.

"The opening will contribute to keep alive the memory of the monstrous crimes of the Nazi era," said Meister at the opening ceremony.

The centre is part of the International Committee of the Red Cross and 11 nations are represented on the ITS board -- Belgium, France, Germany, Greece, Israel, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland, Britain and the United States.

Israel and the United States had long pushed for the archive to open its doors. Germany had been worried about data protection but has received guarantees that information on those still living will remain restricted.

Germany gives the ITS, which is in the process of digitalizing its archives, about 14 million euros ($22 million) a year.

(Reporting by Madeline Chambers; Editing by Robert Woodward)

© Thomson Reuters 2008 All rights reserved

Related Web News

Huge archive of Nazi-era documents marks opening to public
Yahoo! News - World

Worldwide hunt for last Nazis moves in fits and starts
U.S. News

Concentration camp doctor heads list of top 10 wanted Nazis : NPR
NPR

Hillary Strangelove

Hillary Strangelove...

"We'll meet again, don't know where, don't know when ... " - M. R.

Cheney Takes Aim At... Endangered Whales

Cheney Takes Aim At... Endangered Whales...

Whales forced to apologize. - M. R.

Sen. Mikulski's Warmongering Exposed by Peace Activist

Here is the plain truth: Sen. Mikulski supports the Military-Industrial Complex, which is a one-trillion-dollar a year drain on our treasury. (2) She doesn't give a good hoot about the troops, who are dying and suffering in Iraq. Her votes for war-funding puts the troops in harm's way, in a conflict which was launched by the Bush-Cheney Gang based on 935 certifiable lies. (3) When the Democrats took control of the Congress in January, 2007, Sen. Mikulski had an opportunity to stop funding this war and to bring the troops home safely. She failed! As a result, 1,055 troops have died since that date and thousands more have been wounded.

Halliburton Bribe Case Haunts Cheney

Dick Cheney's tenure at Halliburton ended eight years ago, but a federal investigation of alleged bribes from a company subsidiary to Nigerian officials lingers from the Cheney era, raising questions about what the Vice President knew or should have known.

--> Did the US Supreme Court just elect John McCain?

The US Supreme Court has just dealt a serious blow to voters' rights that could help put John McCain in the White House by eliminating tens of thousands of voters who generally vote Democratic.

Clinton Criticizing Closure of Indiana Factory That Clinton Helped Close

Clinton is airing this advertisement in Indiana, bemoaning the closure of a defense contractor Magnequench's manufacturing plant in Valparaiso (she is also echoing this line in her stump speeches). Looking at the camera, she tells us she's upset that the 200 jobs that were sent to China, and that "now America's defense relies on Chinese spare parts." And then comes the kicker: She tells viewers that "George Bush could have stopped it, but he didn't."

Clinton is certainly right that it is a tragedy that 200 American jobs were killed in a corporate deal that also exported sensitive military technology to China. But she forgets to mention that it wasn't George Bush who was in the key position to stop it -- it was Bill Clinton.

Proud of Obama: Go Sit Down Rev.Wright!

It saddens me to see how Rev.Wright has taken this whole thing and turned it into a ongoing spectacle and opportunity for his own glory and fame. I am the first to agree with many things that he has said in his sermons and lectures of here lately but I disagree with his timing. Let us get Obama into the whitehouse and then we can look at the truths of this nation and how to repair it.

Meanwhile ...

If guilt by association is your cup of tea, then read on, because I have a couple doozies to share with you!

PHOTOGRAPH OF COCAINE SMUGGLER JORGE CABRERA WITH HILLARY CLINTON.

Click for full size picture.(56.4K)

Jorge Cabrera is a convicted drug dealer and friend of Fidel Castro.

Some News Coverage

MIAMI  --  Jorge Cabrera, a drug smuggler who has emerged as
one of the most notorious supporters of President Clinton's
re-election campaign, was asked for a campaign contribution in
the unlikely locale of a hotel in Havana by a prominent Democratic
fund-raiser, congressional investigators have learned.

[...]

On his return to the United States several days after that
meeting, in November 1995, Cabrera wrote a check for $20,000 to
the Democratic National Committee from an account that included
the proceeds from smuggling cocaine from Colombia to the
United States, said the investigators, who spoke on condition of
anonymity.

[...]

In early January 1996, three weeks after having attended the
Christmas reception at the White House, Cabrera was arrested
and charged with importing 6,000 pounds of cocaine into the
United States on boats through the Florida Keys. Late last year, he
pleaded guilty to those charges and was sentenced to 19 years in
federal prison and fined $1.5 million.

-----
Drug Smuggler Made Clinton Donation in Cuba, Investigators Say
By DON VAN NATTA Jr.
New York Times
April 4, 1997

MIAMI  --  Jorge Cabrera, a drug smuggler who has emerged as
one of the most notorious supporters of President Clinton's
re-election campaign, was asked for a campaign contribution in
the unlikely locale of a hotel in Havana by a prominent Democratic
fund-raiser, congressional investigators have learned.

The investigators said the fund-raiser, whom they identified as
Vivian Mannerud, a Cuban-American businesswoman from Miami,
told Cabrera at a meeting at the Copacabana Hotel in Havana that
in exchange for a contribution he would be invited to a
fund-raising dinner in honor of Vice President Al Gore in an
exclusive enclave near Miami.

Ms. Mannerud owns Airline Brokers Co., an airline charter
service that operates among Havana, the Bahamas and Mexico.

On his return to the United States several days after that
meeting, in November 1995, Cabrera wrote a check for $20,000 to
the Democratic National Committee from an account that included
the proceeds from smuggling cocaine from Colombia to the
United States, said the investigators, who spoke on condition of
anonymity.

Within two weeks of the contribution, Cabrera met Gore at the
dinner in Miami. Ten days later, Cabrera attended a Christmas
reception at the White House hosted by Hillary Rodham Clinton. At
the events, Gore and Mrs. Clinton posed for photographs with
Cabrera, who has two felony convictions dating from the 1980s

and is now in a prison here on a drug-smuggling conviction.

I want to mention this as this is my FUNDRAISING DAY --
David Sirotta, Dan Van Natta, AND MIchael Rivera use this blog as source material.

In the Michale Rivera case (and Chris Floyd, too) - they tell people to STAY AWAY
for this blog. Sure, then they can make money off my work, cherry picking the
work I do.

They never even say thank you. They don't give me a dime. Where do you think
That Sirota got that Carlos Slim picture?  Have a guess.

So give me a dime. Do it today, or they don't get to cherry pick me
because there won't be anything left to cherry pick; this blog will be
GONE.

A sorry loss for everyone, in my honest opinion.

Virginia
The coffeecup is right down there.
contribute, please.
I want to stay alive so that my story can be told!!
I need your help!!

See peterfpaul.com
My story is even worse since I don't have a family to bail me out.
These little notifications will be on every blog item I post until I get 
enough money to stay afloat.
Don't let SEXISM carry the day anymore.
I am a GREAT investigative journalist, I deserve a break,
I really do.

I'd like to get my shot at writing a book too.
I have a long list of great books I COULD be writing.
And they might ACTUALLY help humanity instead of feeding
Bashers who haven't been out in the streets and on
the TRUTH circuit for forty years like I have.

books of note: Ghandi under Cross Examination

Gandhi: Under Cross-Examination
by G.B. Singh & Tim Watson

Softcover: 166 pages
Publication Date: April 14, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-9814992-0-8
Price: $14 $12.50 through May 5
Size: 6 x 9

Embarking on a historical analysis of Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948) - the most revered politician/saint of the 20th century - is a daring enough adventure in itself. Any author attempting to remove the halo from this glorified character risks his own reputation in today’s politically correct intellectual world. Books on Gandhi number in the thousands, yet none of them can escape the fact that it is in South Africa where Gandhi nourished his purported ideals following a series of public disgraces encountered at the beginning of his career there.

History books teach that Gandhi’s life changed drastically when, as a young lawyer traveling by train from Durban to Pretoria in pre-South Africa, he faced a series of racial humiliations in 1893. These humiliations galvanized him to fight against apartheid and later against British colonialism. These far-reaching consequences have been attributed to what transpired at the Pietermaritzburg train station where he was evicted from a first class train compartment.

Free informational bookmark included with each book ordered.

In this provocative text, retired U.S. Army Col. G.B. Singh and Dr. Tim Watson subject the 20th century’s most revered figure to a rigorous cross-examination on the witness stand. Who would have dreamed Gandhi would ever be questioned, let alone be cross-examined in court? The court room lessons learned through the historical scrutiny of Gandhi’s racial encounters must spark a re-evaluation of our perceived “historical truths.”

The authors recognize a modern culture of deception and propaganda, and simply wish to set the record straight on this issue. They request that their supporters and detractors alike view the book as a search for honesty in the historical account. This book is sure to provoke lively debates inside and outside the halls of learning. The authors hope all will benefit from the revelations within this book - however shocking - and that the verdict will help free the world from the yoke of “propa-gandhi.”

Col. G. B. Singh (Ret.) served in the U.S. Army. He is a professional student of Indian politics, world religions and their true historical values and political impacts, and the life and teachings of Gandhi. He lives in Tennessee, USA.

Dr. Tim Watson gained his higher education in Europe and taught for several years in East Asia. He currently teaches philosophy and communications in Toronto, Canada, and hosts a weekly radio show at ThatRadio.com.

My appeal for MONEY!!

I live on disability and am really hard up.

I work day after day, night after night to get TRUTH out to anyone who can listen. I have a GLOBALIST point of view, and am no nationalistics (in case you couldn't tell).

I can only do what I do, if you catch my drift. But no one pays me a dime.

In March, I finally put up a coffeecup. That is because BELL took me down. I'll be going to court on that one and my credit at long last will be RUINED, although I kept meticulous records of how BELL SCREWED me.

I have only written for no money so far, although I am to correct that!!

Yesterday, I discovered that although someone DID give me a donation, I didn't even get that. My paypal account was NOT activated!! So .. this month is going to be more than rough, it's probably going to prove to be IMPOSSIBLE for me to stay online. This is a crying shame, because there are some "stories" that only I cover, particularly Canadian ones on indigenous issues -- that get indexed on google. Even Mohawk nation news does not get "indexed" by google - so the only TRUTH about Ardoch Lake comes out on this blog!!

If you come by and read this appeal, drop some money in the coffee cup.

Lots of GUYS get thousands of dollars to do investigative journalism, I do not.

Here is a sample appeal of a good journalist who is asking for $25,000! I like Robert Parry alot. But I also know if I go to him or a few other journalists, they aren't going to help me get grants or even help me get on a proper feed! I write for free for one guy who has a car, a home, a reputation. He doesn't pay me a dime. He still can't even see the forest for the trees. When I post FOR FREE on his online publication, he not ONCE, not ONCE, has responded. He pretends publically that we are the best of friends, we are not. Far from it.

I am not going to get out of this deep dark place by myself. I need a good url, a good blogspace and the knowledge my ISP won't go down.

So today, here I am .. anyone with pennies to spare, send it to ME!!

I will definitely make good use of it, and not waste your nickels.

Here's Robert Parrie's appeal - consider I do a very good job and haven't gotten a red cent from anyone. I don't have a car, I don't have a home, I post really good items 24 hours a day, and I try to show you the PATTERNS and what underlies the actions of all the CORRUPT and EVIL politicians and corporations continually. I have NO MENTOR AT ALL.

So today, if ya have some pennies, put them on my coffee cup. If you still think that sexism doesn't exist, guess again. I don't "hide behind a guy" to keep my life ticking over .. and that means I really get into it trying to stay afloat.

Trust me on that.

Virginia

Robert Parry's appeal letter to me today. (yeah, right)

Our spring fundraiser at Consortiumnews.com has stalled short of its modest $25,000 goal. While that presents problems for our long-term survival, it also has the immediate effect of keeping two important investigative projects on hold.

One project - dealing with the secret history of Republican ties to Iran's Islamist regime - requires an overseas trip that our budget can't cover. The other - relating to corrupt ties between American neoconservatives and Turkish extremists - calls for additional spending on complex research.

We also understand why it sounds odd to many Americans when we ask them to support investigative journalism. Traditionally, that's been the role of big media companies with large budgets.

But the reality of modern America is that these old institutions have failed. During my many years in mainstream Washington journalism, I watched this sorry transformation from the inside.

So, when the country desperately needed an aggressive press corps - as George W. Bush was claiming and consolidating power and then misleading the nation into a catastrophic war - the big media was part of the problem, not part of any solution.

It fell to small, independent outlets like ours to challenge the wrongdoing during Election 2000 and Bush's exploitation of the 9/11 tragedy as a means to stampede the country into the reckless invasion of Iraq.

But we can only survive - and take on the hard stories - with your help.

So, please put us over the top of our fund drive and give us the means to press forward with these important investigative projects.

For those readers who have been able to send us contributions over the past month, thank you.

To make a secure, tax-deductible donation by credit card, click here.

Or you can send a check to: Consortium for Independent Journalism (CIJ); Suite 102-231; 2200 Wilson Blvd.; Arlington, VA 22201.

(For readers using PayPal, address donations to our account, which is named "consortnew@aol.com".)

With donations of $100, we'll send you an autographed gift copy of our latest book, Neck Deep: The Disastrous Presidency of George W. Bush. (Or you can request that we substitute either Robert Parry's Lost History or his book on the rise of the Bush dynasty, Secrecy & Privilege.)

With donations of $150 or more, we'll send the hard cover version of Neck Deep. (We also have a few copies left of Parry's Trick or Treason, which we can substitute, if you wish, while supplies last.)

As always, thank you for your support!

Robert Parry, Editor

Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories in the 1980s for the Associated Press and Newsweek. His latest book, Neck Deep: The Disastrous Presidency of George W. Bush, was written with two of his sons, Sam and Nat, and can be ordered at neckdeepbook.com. His two previous books, Secrecy & Privilege: The Rise of the Bush Dynasty from Watergate to Iraq and Lost History: Contras, Cocaine, the Press & 'Project Truth' are also available there. Or go to Amazon.com.

"WATCH THE COPS" - CANADIAN battle cry!! - MNN news

”WATCH THE COPS” DAY ON MAY 29 AND EVERY DAY MNN.

April 28, 2008. Canada and Phil Fontaine of the “Assembly of Colonial First Nations” would like to see us standing by the side of the road with our heads down, tears rolling down our cheeks and handing out pamphlets on their “Aboriginal Day of Action” on May 29th. [Beware! It’s an Indigenous “set up” day!] Many think this should be “watch the goons day”. We could walk, drive or bicycle through the roads, streets and highways of our communities and document police brutality and oppression. We’ll be needing a great big notebook for this.

Non-Indigenous communities have their problems with cops too. Maybe they’ll join us. Recently a young student was given a $628 ticket for “sitting on a wall in a park” and for snapping pictures of them on his cell phone. They were harassing homeless people.

We should be monitoring these colonial henchmen. It’s come to the point now where it’s not really safe to go out alone anymore. The abuse has got to stop. Take cameras, cell phones, become a witness and make good notes. We need names, badge numbers and photos of the abuse and the abusers. Then we should file complaints, take them to court and put pressure on politicians who cave into police pressure.

We need “know-your-rights” classes. “Watch the goons” should make periodical reports and publish them regularly on the internet. We want to reduce Police Violence Through Accountability; and to Empower and Unite our communities by looking out for each other. [From: berkeley-copwatch@lists.riseup.net]

In Montreal when the Montreal Canadians hockey team won their series against the Boston Bruins, there was a riot on St. Catherine Street. The media coverage showed cop cars being burnt and kids jumping up and down on top of the cars. Many young people were assaulted and arrested. The police confiscated mainstream media footage so no one could see that they had gotten out of their cars, went over to a crowd of young people and started smashing them for no reason at all. People with phone cameras put these images on the internet. It was an emotional response to abuse. The cops have become the worse abusers.

Watch out for agent provocateurs. They arrive dressed like us, with back packs on their back full of rocks and other implements. They start throwing these at the police and then disappear into the crowd. We get the blame. Let’s face it, cops are attracted to violence. They can’t stand peaceful people. So they try to stir things up so they can use all the expensive toys they claim to need. One of their most despicable tactics is to target and attack young women. This provokes otherwise peaceful men to come to their defense who are then beaten and arrested. What a violent profession. We do not approve of the theory that peace can be gained by violent means.

The cops assume that those who protest their abuse must be under the spell of some kind of “leader”. They don’t want their misdeeds to be made public. There is nothing original about what the cops are doing. They phone the acquaintances of their target and try to get information or get them on side, even offer money and safety. Safety from what! Them? What’s the difference between police action and extortion? In other words, don’t have a leader for them to target!

The cops want more control in Southeastern Ontario because it’s getting harder to illegally siphon the resources of enlightened Indigenous people. The highly trained people like doctors, miners, scientists, politicians, military and corporation heads need relative order to go about their job of stealing our water and energy.

The factory jobs are now outsourced. This area is being built up for the elites. We Indigenous people are in their way. This puts us at risk. They still have depopulation plans for us in areas where they don’t want us. Haudenosaunee Territory includes prime land and a vast watershed.

For example, condos were going to be built on the beautiful Bay of Quinte until we stopped it. The elite always want to be on the water. We Mohawks spoil their view. These condos might have been for the workers at the new proposed U.S. Joint Task Force 2 Training Base that is being set up at Trenton Ontario, just a 20-minute drive from Tyendinaga.

Sharbot Lake-Robertsville Mine site is half way between Trenton and Petawawa Army Bases. Sharbot Lake is also half way between Port Hope and Chalk River, which have the most depleted uranium stored for use by the military to make bombs.

Trenton Army Base is right near Port Hope to guard that nuclear waste. Petawawa soldiers would be available to clean up nuclear messes at Chalk River, as happened in 1958 when one of the research reactors took a leak.

The colonists don’t want all-out warfare here. In guerrilla warfare our great strength is when we are on our home turf. We know it and we feel the power that comes from being truly Indigenous. This is not understood by the colonists. They come from fragmented and abused backgrounds. They don’t know what a real community is. In their ignorance they’ve fallen under the delusion that they have to use “low level” warfare by attacking, harassing, taking prisoners, breaking our arms, surrounding us from time to time and putting out bad stories about us to scare the public. The alternative, peaceful co-existence, is simply unthinkable to them.

Their psychological warfare strategies are meant to destroy all hope amongst our people and sow seeds of terror in our communities. They want to create fear and submission.

The cops wear armor and cover their faces with hideous visors and shave their heads like fascists. They are loaded with so much equipment they can hardly hear, see or move. These cops are scared and not sure why they’re in our communities pointing guns at unarmed people but they’re getting big pay. There are women and children on the roads too. The cops stand there shivering afraid of what will happen to them if they don’t follow the crazy orders they are being given.

The Mohawks took some of the stuffing out of the OPP cops who have been trying out some of their low level warfare tactics on us which aren’t working. If we have courage and know we are right in what we are doing, then we will stand up to them. This perplexes them. They thought it was going to be over a long time ago. Obviously they haven’t read their history. We’re still here after 400 years. And we ain’t going nowhere.

Our persistence and perseverance comes from our ancestors. We are so well rooted with nourishment from the land. A “transplant’s” root has to adjust for a long time to gain strength from the earth, but their roots really don’t take. Most of them tumble about like rolling stones, shifting with every twist and turn of the bankrupt and exploitive economy they brought here.

Such transplants need a lot of crutches – like guns, propaganda, barking vicious dogs, choppers, sirens, floodlights, loud noises, UAVs [unarmed aerial vehicles for “peeping tom” surveillance], victims to target and lots of larceny. Their next step is to throw us all into their colonial jails and courts. These transplants keep trying to replace the Ongwehonwe of Onowaregeh. It hasn’t happened and never will. We keep popping up. The natural world has decreed that we shall always be here doing our job, taking care of the land, plants, animals, water and air.

The non-natives who are organized against us are not political. Otherwise they would be on our side. They would realize their own oppression and abuse by the colonists. The police hire provocateurs to mobilize them. They help set up situations that make it look good for the cops to come in.

They made the recent riot at Six Nations look like the OPP were protecting the Indigenous people from the angry vigilantes from Caledonia. This makes the conservatives start okaying money for more policing and more force against us. For the cops this means job security and more opportunity to take out vengeance on us.

It’s part of some big plan of a few people. It’s called “mobilizing the masses” to “harmonize the peripheries with the center”. The peripheries are Mexico and Canada and the center is the U.S., of course. They rile up society so they will get a bigger budget, be in greater demand and get control over everybody.

The center wants “death squad” type policing like in Chicago, New York, Toronto and Los Angeles, where they hit the people, do open racial profiling and are extremely corrupt internally. Is this happening in all Indigenous communities right now worldwide?

On May 29th Canada with their chief provocateur, Phil Fontaine, who wants to cash in on the re-enactment of the “Sand Creek Massacre”, are coming in with a plan to push the “final solution”. Watch out. Be ready!


Kahentinetha Horn - MNN Mohawk Nation News

Click News & See Category: “ CANADA "
Posted 4/28/08 8:30pm EDT.

St. John River expected to exceed historic flood levels

Increasingly, roads near Fredericton are being closed as waters continue to rise. (Submitted by James Whitehead)The water levels of the St. John River are now expected to reach or exceed the 1973 levels in Fredericton and Maugerville in the next 24 hours, New Brunswick's Emergency Measures Organization said on Wednesday.

Those levels are also expected to be reached in more southern areas as the crest moves down river.

The St. John River reached 8.6 metres in 1973.

EMO issued an alert to New Brunswickers on Wednesday afternoon that the river levels have reached a point requiring a "major flood warning to all areas along the St. John River."

The heavy rain fall has ended over the St. John River basin, but western parts of the province have received more than 100 millimetres of rain since Monday.

The water flows in the St. John River are increasing throughout the basin, with the greatest increase in the northern and middle portions.

Rain in northwestern Maine and southern Quebec, however, will flow downstream and raise the St. John River within the next 24 hours.

"That water is already on its way," said Andy Morton, deputy director of EMO. "We know the water level is going to come up substantially. For people in flood-prone areas, if they were flooded in 2005, they're going to be flooded again and maybe even in a larger area."

People living on the northern part of the river basin from Saint-François to Woodstock are also being affected by the flooding, Morton said. Approximately 20 families have been evacuated from Edmundston.

Roads across New Brunswick were being engulfed by water on Wednesday as rivers surged with rain and snow melt.

Roads in Bathurst, Miramichi, Saint John, Edmundston and Fredericton were under the flood waters that were funnelling into the province's rivers from southern Quebec and northwestern Maine.

Parts of the Trans-Canada Highway, including highway exits, are closed in the Sheffield, Edmundston and Saint-Jacques areas.

Flooding in New Brunswick is of grave concern, but all levels of government and emergency organizations are working well together and there is not yet a need to declare a state of emergency, said Public Safety Minister John Foran.

In the Fredericton area, sections of Route 105 are flooded and closed. Tripp Settlement Road, Rusagonis Road, Bass River Point Road and parts of Route 690 are also closed. The Gagetown ferry has stopped running because of the high waters.

Not a state of emergency: minister

Foran held a press conference in Fredericton on Wednesday to update New Brunswickers on the rising waters of the St. John River, which have reached 7.2 metres in the capital city.

A resident of Maugerville, N.B., tries to deal with some of the rising water around his property. Flooding could approach record levels, officials say. (Submitted by Jacquie Anderson)

In neighbouring Maine, Gov. John Baldacci declared a state of emergency for Aroostook County on Tuesday night. Flood waters caused by melting snow and heavy rain have prompted the evacuation of 40 homes in the Fort Kent and Wallagrass area of the state.

Foran said New Brunswick is monitoring the flooding in Maine and Quebec carefully and will adjust the province's emergency response level as the waters continue to rise.

Alberta and Nova Scotia are prepared to send in help to the province, Foran said. The Canadian military is also on standby should there be a need for heavy vehicles or additional emergency support, he said.

Foran again urged New Brunswickers to heed the warnings of the province's EMO.

'Upset and disrupted' by flood, resident says

Mary Pacey, 93, has lived along the St. John River since the 1940s.

Pacey endured the 1973 floods and told CBC News that this spring's rising waters have her concerned.

"You're not very happy about things, you know," Pacey said. "You don't enjoy being all upset and disrupted."

Emergency officials have been going door-to-door in Fredericton and its surrounding region to make sure residents are prepared for the flood waters.

The owners of Wetmore's Nursery in St. Mary's, N.B., keep their sense of humour as the waters of the flooded St. John River take over the property. (Submitted by Shawna Powell)

For families living in the already flooded Maugerville area, women and children seem to be leaving their homes while men are staying to watch the rising waters and the sump pumps, CBC News' Nicolle Carlin said.

Many other people living in the affected areas are staying in their homes despite warnings that they may be stuck until the water recedes.

Emergency transport vehicles were being sent into already flooded areas around Fredericton on Wednesday afternoon to help residents who want to leave.

But once roads are closed to all traffic, officials will only enter flooded areas for emergencies, Morton said. Even then, it could take some time for officials to get to a flooded area, he said.

Evacuations have not been ordered though they are being recommended, Morton said, and emergency officials will try to persuade the ill and elderly in the areas outside of Fredericton to leave their homes on Wednesday.

Officials have six boats on standby that are expected to be put in the water Wednesday. Kayaks, canoes and Zodiacs are also sitting outside many homes in the low-lying communities to the southeast of the city.

Projections show more than 920 properties in the Fredericton area could be affected if the waters reach eight metres above sea level.

NB Power is warning residents and business owners that as the waters rise, power will be shut off in flooded areas.

The power is likely to be turned off in downtown Fredericton along Queen Street and on streets along the river on the city's north side, officials said. Residents are being urged to anticipate outages that could last several days.

Residents are also being warned to take precautions if they get their water from private wells. The water should also be tested and disinfected after the river recedes, officials said.

People who leave their homes are being told to contact a Red Cross registration centre that is keeping track of where people are moving to wait out the flood. Centres have been established in Burton and at the University of New Brunswick's Fredericton campus and 213 people have voluntarily evacuated their homes.

The university has also opened its residences for any families with nowhere else to go and has the capacity to accommodate thousands of people.

Emergency Measures is forecasting the following water levels:

• In Fredericton, the water level is expected to exceed 8.6 metres by Thursday. Flood stage is 6.5 metres.
• In Maugerville, the water level is expected to increase to 6.8 metres by Thursday. Flood stage is 6.0 metres.
• In Jemseg, the water level is expected to reach 5.5 metres by Thursday. Flood stage is 4.3 metres.
• In Grand Lake, the water level is expected to increase to 5.5 metres by Thursday. Flood stage is 5.0 metres.
• In Sheffield-Lakeville Corner, the water level is expected to reach 5.6 metres by Thursday. Flood stage is 4.8 metres.
• In Oak Point, the water level is expected to reach 4.6 metres by Thursday. Flood stage is 4.7 metres.
• In Quispamsis and Saint John, the water level is expected to be 4.4 metres by Thursday. Flood stage is 4.2 metres.

Afghanistan update from Think Progress

Not Winning

In a press conference yesterday, President Bush said, "I think we're making progress in Afghanistan" -- days after President Hamid Karzai was the subject of an attempted assassination plot. The Interior Ministry said the Taliban, nearly vanquished from the country in 2001, admitted to launching the attack. These rounds of violence are the latest in what has been an eroding situation over recent years. The United States is also struggling to gain international support for the efforts in Afghanistan. "Many of them, I think, have a problem with our involvement in Iraq and project that to Afghanistan," Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said in February. While the United States has deployed a "new 2,300-strong reserve force" of Marines to Afghanistan, the country still does not receive the necessary attention. Karzai's escape "should serve as a wakeup call to shift the focus to a new front," Center for American Progress (CAP) Senior Fellow Brian Katulis wrote yesterday. CAP has recommended a multi-pronged approach to Afghanistan, including building the governnment, increasing security, jumpstarting reconstruction, reducing opium production, and removing terrorist sanctuaries through redeployment of troops.

WORSE IN 2008?: 2007 was the bloodiest year in Afghanistan since 2001, with 6,000 killed in the country. Maj. Gen. Jeffrey Schloesser, who commands U.S. forces in Afghanistan, said violence in 2008 "may well reach a higher level than it did in 2007," as insurgents pour in from Pakistan. "This year won't be different," he said. The attempted assassination of Karzai "came as the latest sign of a trend" that the insurgency in Afghanistan "is spreading from the Taliban stronghold of the south to the central and northern regions of the country," Christian Science Monitor reported this week. Furthemore, "[t]here is no security force in Afghanistan that people trust," according to member of parliament Ramazan Bashardost. He added that, after a recent attack, "the security forces fled the area before the ordinary people did." Afghanistan also has rates of illiteracy "among the highest in the world," a "weak and corruption-ridden government," and still retains the world's largest opium poppy crop.

BUSH CLAIMS WE'RE WINNING: Nevertheless, Bush remains blindly optimistic. "Do you think we're winning?" in Afghanistan, a reporter asked yesterday. "I do, I think we're making good progress. I do, yes," Bush said. But his leadership in Afghanistan has been anything but successful. The White House even "acknowledged that its strategic goals are unmet in Afghanistan in its own assessment late last year, but it has not yet implemented any major policy shifts on the Afghanistan front," Katulis noted. For example, according the Agency Coordinating Body for Afghan Relief, "Western countries have failed to deliver $10 billion of nonmilitary assistance pledged to Afghanistan over the last six years and the United States, by far the biggest donor, is responsible for half of the shortfall." Funding for Provincial Reconstruction Teams, which Bush "has called the leading edge of stabilization efforts," is "ad hoc and comes from so many sources that congressional investigators were unable to determine how much has been spent," a House Armed Service Committee report said last week. "[M]ilitary force, while necessary, is not sufficient to defeat militants in Afghanistan," Lawrence Korb and Caroline Wadhams of CAP wrote in January. Karzai has also criticized Bush's military-centric approach, which has caused heavy civilian casualties. "I am not happy with civilian casualties coming down; I want an end to civilian casualties," he said last weekend. "Overall, 42 percent of Afghans rate U.S. efforts in Afghanistan positively," down from 68 percent in 2005 and 57 percent last year, according to a December ABC News poll.

QUESTIONS FOR PETRAEUS: Bush recently tapped Iraq commander Gen. David Petraeus to lead U.S. Central Command, replacing Adm. William Fallon, whose premature departure in part stemmed from policy disagreements with the Bush administration. Appearing on PBS's NewsHour in January, Fallon pointed to the Iraq war as an explanation for the deterioration in Afghanistan. "[M]y sense of looking back is that we moved focus to Iraq, which was the priority from 2003 on, and the attention and the resources focused on a different place," he said. Petraeus is strongly associated with the current Iraq policy, which has drained spending and troop deployments away from Afghanistan. He now carries the responsibility of assessing priorities in Afghanistan as well as the entire Middle East. "Confirmation hearings for General Petraeus later this year offer an important opportunity for Congress to raise questions about how America can strike the right balance and match its considerable yet strained resources to the numerous threats it faces in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iraq," Katulis notes. "It's time to separate out these two wars, or else we may lose both," Korb and Wadhams add.

Michael Bryant, MY MP, you represent PEOPLE not corporations!!

There is nothing lawless about these demonstrations.

Ontario is involved in CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY

and creating political prisoners.

Compelling reasons to keep negotiating

Posted 3 hours ago

Six Nations people have been negotiating with the federal and provincial governments for two years over a land claim at Caledonia.

Tyendinaga Mohawks have occupied a quarry at Deseronto for more than a year as part of another land claim.

And last year, people of the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation took over land near Sharbot Lake, protesting a proposed uranium mining operation. That protest resulted in the jailing of Bob Lovelace.

There are common themes running through all three situations:

they are contentious developments that are opposed by the local natives, and sometimes their non-native supporters;

natives accusing the provincial government of not negotiating with them in a timely manner;

protests spilling over onto public roads;

arrests by OPP officers often involving violent clashes;

Ontario Provincial Police telling the public they will deal only with the public disturbances, not the land-claim issue;

the provincial government saying it will deal only with the land claims, not the disturbances.

The manner in which the province and the provincial police have been dealing with these situations is guided by one crucial lesson: the fatal shooting of native protester Dudley George in 1995 by an OPP officer during the Ipperwash standoff.

This is a good thing. We don't want any more deaths or bloody confrontations. But this also places a greater onus on native groups to be responsible.

Last week, Tyendinaga Mohawks erected a blockade on a busy highway. Police moved in and took it down peacefully.

On Friday afternoon, protest leader Shawn Brant was arrested and charged with various crimes not related to the blockade. A group of his supporters moved in, smashing a police cruiser's window and injuring two officers.

By Friday night, Six Nations Mohawks had thrown up a blockade at a highway interchange near Caledonia in support of Shawn Brant.

Brant and the Tyendinaga protesters, meantime, were essentially disowned by the band council. "There must be an end to road blockades, violence, and any conduct that has the potential to further inflame the situation," said Chief Donald Maracle.

Confused? Many Ontarians are frustrated with these eruptions of lawlessness, but also with the lack of progress in land claims talks.

The opposition Conservatives this week pressed Michael Bryant, the province's aboriginal affairs minister, to cut off all talks until the barriers in Caledonia were removed. Bryant replied: "

If there is not negotiation taking place and the parties aren't talking, then how on Earth would progress be made?"

Recently, Bryant said negotiations were on again.

It is precisely Bryant's job to keep all sides at the table. The reasons for urgent action are compelling: heightening native and non-native tensions; violent clashes between police and natives; radical native groups hijacking the agenda from legitimate representatives; and good people like Bob Lovelace being detained for peacefully standing his ground.

Article ID# 1006938

By the time the summer is over, there will be a tent city in DC - martial law or not.

http://therealnews.com/web/index.php?thisdataswitch=0&thisid=1421&thisview=item

US truckers call for nation-wide shutdown

Truckers' protest urges Congress to stop subsidizing oil industry and build new refineries

Wednesday April 30th, 2008

A convoy of trucks rolled through Washington, DC, on Monday, as part of a protest to pressure Congress into acting on high gas prices. As gas around the US hit an average of $3.66 per gallon--a full 66 cents above the price this time last year--truckers called on the US government to take action.

With the Truckers in DC - Barbara Ehrenreich

Truckers live in an alternative dimension, at least so I conclude when trying to figure out how to meet up with the convoy of trucks coming into to DC to protest high diesel fuel prices on Monday. JB, aka Mike Schaffner, one of the organizers of the action, calls early in the morning to suggest various highway intersections, and I have to explain there's no way a pedestrian can be just standing on one the super-highways around DC. We eventually settle on a spot in a desolate area of southeastern DC, but even so, I probably couldn't have made the connection without the genes of a grandfather who rode the rails. When I hear the honking, low and steady, and see the first trucks rising out from an underpass, I scramble up to a narrow walkway along their route and start waving frantically. Everyone waves back nicely, and about the fifth truck actually stops. It's JB and I leap aboard.

JB and I have become friends-by-phone in the weeks since I blogged about the first truckers' protests in the beginning of April, but all I knew about him as a physical presence is that he always wears a black cowboy hat. Its brim is turned down, locating him in Larry McMurtry's rather than John Wayne's West, and his eyes twinkle deeply when he smiles, which is pretty much all the time. Everything seems to delight him: Being in DC for the first time, having 250 trucks behind him, the friendliness of the tourists on the street as we inch our way toward the Mall.

Since he hasn't been home in Texas since January 1, this -- the "bobtail" of a truck based in New Jersey -- is JB's world. There's a neatly made bed behind our seats and a laptop that can swivel into view while he's driving, as well, of course, as a GPS, a cell phone and CB radio. From this little control room, which is also a workplace and a living space, JB has helped assemble the hundreds of truckers and their families who are with us now. It's a life stripped bare: He ordinarily eats only one meal a day (nothing fried or from a buffet), sleeps rarely (just an hour and half last night), and drinks no coffee ("it leads to stops") but admits to an occasional Red Bull.

We circle the Mall, slowly, triumphantly, twice. It's hard to talk over the honking and the excited CB chatter, but JB wants to know if I've ever been at a demonstration in DC before. Ah, I explain, I go back to the 60s, but the most recent one was an anti-war demonstration organized by the women's group Code Pink. He laughs, making me think he finds the name amusing. But no, he shows me he has Code Pink in his cell phone. They had contacted him and will be joining us at the rally at the Capitol.

We are to park the trucks at the RFK Stadium and walk from there to the Capitol, giving us about a half an hour to mill around on foot in the parking lot first. There's a bobtail with "Truckin for Jesus" painted on it and, under that, "Truckers and Citizens United." There are Operation Desert Freedom caps and a POW/MIA flag, as well signs indicting oil companies and "Wall Street speculators." I chat with members of the mostly African-American contingent of DC dump truck drivers and with Belinda Raymond, a trucker's wife from Maine, who tells me that people in her area raised $9000 to send a convoy of trucks down here, with the Knights of Columbus accounting for $2500 of that. Whole families have come, and I see a boy carrying a sign saying "What about My Future?" A smartly dressed woman from New Jersey carries a sign asking, "Got Milk? Not Without a Truck."

If there's an ideology at work here I'd call it small-d democratic fundamentalism: We own the government, we pay for it, and now it better do something for us. In fact, JB is carrying hundreds of copies of the Code of Ethics for Civil Servants he's downloaded from the internet to hand out at the Capitol and remind Congress of their duties. The only time I see his smile fade is when the protest's media coordinator -- contributed pro bono by the liberal think tank The Institute for Policy Studies -- lays down the ground rules for a meeting with Senator Jeff Sessions (R, AL) scheduled for the afternoon. "But he works for us!" JB protests.

On the 45 minute long march from the stadium to the Capitol, things degenerate toward the level of farce. No one had counted on the rain, which is back in force, or on the fact that, as one guy puts it to me, they're "truckers, not walkers." JB, I and a few others fall behind because JB insists on running back to his truck and changing into a shirt printed with the American flag and Constitution. Our little band includes Mike Groff, a heavily pierced 20-something from Pennsylvania who is one of the original organizers of the protests and his pregnant wife Melissa. JB and Mike take turns pulling a wagon carrying batteries for the sound system that will be used at the rally. The rain turns into a torrent. We trudge through the ghetto, then on into a middle class neighborhood sporting azaleas and Obama lawn signs, not entirely sure of our direction and soaked to the skin. Melissa reassures me that, if we pee our pants, which seems increasingly likely, no one will notice.

But things look up when we get the Capitol, thanks largely to Senator Susan Collins (R, ME), who arranges for the truckers to stage a press conference inside the Russell Building lobby and out of the rain. Three truckers -- two white and one black -- speak about their dwindling livelihoods and the need for immediate government action to push down fuel prices. I can't fight my way through the media to hear much of what they're saying, but one speaker mentions foreclosures. This is a wide-ranging cry from the strangled middle class -- or working class or whatever you want to call it -- and all I can think is:

Where are the Democrats? Why aren't they are pouring out of their offices to show support for the truckers?

And wouldn't have been wonderful if Obama had shown up? Because he's not going to make it unless he learns to channel the frustration of people like JB, Melissa and Mike.

That's just my concern though. The whole event has been strictly nonpartisan. The truckers are already focused on the May 1 Truckers and Citizens United protest in New York City (see www.theamericandriver.com). That one, JB tells me, will be in solidarity with the San Francisco longshoremen's May Day actions against the war.

Khadr lawyer urges Canada to repatriate 'child soldier'

Juliet O'Neill , Canwest News Service

Published: Tuesday, April 29, 2008

OTTAWA - With opposition parties united in a call for the government to bring Omar Khadr home from the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the young man's Pentagon-appointed lawyer championed the unusual case of the "child soldier" at a Commons committee hearing Tuesday.

U.S. navy Lt.-Cmdr. William Kuebler's appeal for Canada to save Khadr from a potential life sentence from a U.S. military commission appeared to leave the Conservative government unmoved. Secretary of State Jason Kenney defended the government's "consistent" position of not interfering in the U.S. process governing terrorist suspects.

Kuebler emphasized that every other western country has repatriated their nationals from the prison built for "enemy combatants" in the war on terror; that all youth except Khadr were segregated in a children's wing called Camp Iguana; and that evidence he killed a U.S. soldier with a grenade during a 2002 firefight in Afghanistan was recently undermined by a contradictory account of what took place.

Wayne Marston, the New Democratic Party MP who proposed the motion for hearings into Khadr's case, reacted to Kuebler's testimony by accusing the government of abandoning a boy caught in "absolutely horrendous" circumstances. Khadr has been detained without trial for six years, since age 15, when he was captured by U.S. special forces.

Marston insisted Khadr be treated as a child soldier under a United Nations protocol - signed by Canada and the United States - that regards children recruited for war as victims and calls for their rehabilitation, rather than punishment.

Kuebler portrayed Khadr as a young man who is daring to dream of a life in Canada, his country of birth, where he can watch movies such as Lord of the Rings and visit the Rockies, get an education and a job and embark on an ordinary life. He speculated the government won't champion his cause because the public doesn't approve of the association between al-Qaida and some of the Khadr family members, including Omar's parents and sister. He should not be punished for the views and deeds of others, he asserted.

Marston questioned why the government is not prepared to secure Khadr's release when it is working on Brenda Martin's release from a prison in Mexico. Kenney said the cases are "not analogous."

When a reporter asked if Khadr is a child soldier, Kenney added that he now is 21 years old and that an optional protocol of United Nations Convention on the Rights of Children does not bar prosecution of persons age 15-18 in any case.

"We've pressed the American authorities to ensure he received proper care and we've asked that they take into account his age," Kenney said.

If he is tried by a U.S. military commission, Kuebler predicted Khadr will be found guilty and sentenced to life in prison "for little more than having survived a fire fight."

Kuebler's testimony came after former Liberal foreign affairs minister Bill Graham publicly expressed regret that the previous government did not press harder to repatriate him.

Ottawa Citizen