American Families Pay The Cost of Long Foreign Wars

http://lomalinda.patch.com/blog_posts/american-families-pay-the-cost-of-long-foreign-wars

Right Wingers Call for Obama's Impeachment

High Crimes Include Auto Bail Out, Health Care, Stimulus

You got birthers, tea baggers, and tenthers, now we need a name for conservatives who are calling for President Obama's impeachment. (Maybe we can call them "peachers?")

In this video from Think Progress, Caleb Heimlich, spokesman for the Impeach Obama campaign, explains why he thinks the president needs to be removed. He quotes Gerald Ford, who said that "anything is an impeachable offense." Actually what Ford said, was "an impeachable offense is whatever a majority of the House of Representatives considers it to be at a given moment in history."

Well since, the House is currently controlled by the Democrats, it is unlikely that they would pass a vote for an impeachment. You would have though that the Republicans would have learned from the last time they tried to impeach a Democrat. Obama is accused of high crimes like bailing out the auto companies, health care legislation, and the stimulus bill. (Although all three pieces of legislation were voted on by Congress, so they should also be held responsible.)

It ironic, that some Republicans want to impeach Obama who has been in office for about a year, yet they said nothing when the Bush-Cheney administration was committing high crimes such as war profiteering, torture and holding an American citizen without trial!

poll by twiigs.com

Is the Shock Doctrine Being Used on American Workers?

If you are one of the millions of Americans currently unemployed, you are facing one of the worst job markets in more than 50 years.

Randi Rhodes, a liberal talk show host, has said that the economy was deliberately crashed as a way to drive down the wages of American workers. That might sound like a conspiracy theory, but that's currently happening.

Since there are so many unemployed people, workers are willing to take huge pay cuts. So the person who used to demand $50,000 is now willing to work for $30,000. In many cases employers are laying off mid-level workers and replacing them with fresh college grads, who will work for almost half the pay. In many career fields, wages has been devalued.

Left-wing journalist Naomi Klein describes this practise as the "shock doctrine." She writes about this in her book, "The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism." She came up with this theory after reporting on the Iraq war and witnessing how many corporations profited from the chaos left after the war. Klein also writes that since the Iraqi population was still reeling from a lightening-fast war, they were too cowed to protest.

Klein says that interrogators in Iraq also used the same procedure on prisoners. Keep them in state of shock and disorientation so they are more likely to be compliant. The same thing has happened to American workers. We have been pummelled by the near crash of the stock market, terrorism, the crash of the mortgage industry and the housing market, and the failure of several auto companies.

This economic chaos has left the American worker scared, dazed and confused -- essentially in a state of shock. So now desperate workers are willing to work for half the pay and no benefits, or work for nothing at all. And who profits? The corporations because they are getting the same work for half the pay, which means more profits for them.

poll by twiigs.com

Iraq Veteran Seeks Sanctuary in Canada

With attention now turned to Afghanistan, most Americans have largely forgotten about the effects of the Iraq war. But with the war in Afghanistan expanding and talk of more operations in Yemen, it is inevitable that the military will be under strain .

Here is a fascinating story about Rodney Watson, a kid who joined the military because he wanted to be a cook. He found himself in Iraq, and was given a rifle and told to go on bomb disposal duty. He also witnessed American troops abusing Iraqis and witnessed racism towards black soldiers.

After Watson's contract was up in 2007, he thought he was done with the military but was told that he had overlooked the fine print, and was going to be stop-lossed -- essentially told that he could not leave. Watson left for Canada and has sought sanctuary as a political refugee. Although he was denied refugee status by the Canadian government, he is being supported by the First United Methodist of downtown Vancouver. Watson has been declared a deserter by the U.S. military.

http://www.truthout.org/1230095

poll by twiigs.com

Confessions of An Economic Hitman

If you've ever wondered why the United States fights so many wars, and why poor countries remain poor, read this article. This is an interview from Amy Goodman's (above) "Democracy Now," featuring John Perkins, a self-described economic hitman. Perkins used to fly around the world convincing developing countries to take loans they could not afford. When the companies defaulted on the loans, the banks would seize their assets, oil, land, ect. If a leader refused to play ball, the military would simply invade the country and seize their assets. Sound familiar?

http://www.democracynow.org/2009/11/10/hoodwinked_former_economic_hit_man_john

poll by twiigs.com

Liberal Commentator Blames Ft. Hood Shooting on Bush

Thom Hartman, a liberal commentator, puts the blame for the Ft. Hood shooting squarely on former president George W. Bush's shoulders. In this article posted on Alternet.org, he successfully argues that the Bush administration turned the war on terror into a battle between good and evil, and Osama Bin Laden, into a comic book supervillain.

Hartmann argues that just like in comic books, a great hero needs a great villain. Bush cast himself as Superman and Bin Laden was his Lex Luthor. Hartmann says that Bill Clinton had the right idea, by dealing with Al-Quaeda as a small band of criminals and targeting them with police agencies, special forces teams and cruise missiles.

Hartmann argues that Bush's large-scale wars only boosted Al-Quaeda's image in the eyes of the Muslim world and stretched the American military to it's breaking point.

poll by twiigs.com

Kosovo Honors Clinton With A Statue

With unsuccessful wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, many Americans are ambivalent about America's use of military power abroad, but there are occasions when using force is the moral thing do. President Bill Clinton intervened in the war in Yugoslavia in the 1990s and saved thousands of ethnic Albanians from being massacred by Serbs. Kosovo's Albanians recently honored Clinton with an 11-foot statue.

http://p.gs/de3je

poll by twiigs.com