the hangman

image montage by author


I have been trying to get to this post, but have been very busy... Further, this story is so huge and convoluted that it will be hard to do it justice here. There is so much background and history to be studied to truly understand this.

So, an Iraqi court has found Saddam Hussein guilty of crimes against humanity in the 1982 killings of 148 people in the town of Halabja. There was an uprising there that needed to be quashed. Hussein didn't actually kill them, but as the leader of the country, he is responsible. Ironically, this incident is part of what the US administration cited as justification for the 2003 invasion of Iraq (along with Hussein being responsible for 9.11, possessing non-existent weapons of mass destruction, having missiles that "could reach London" in 40 minutes, and whole lot more bullshit.), meanwhile, G W Bush signed the death warrants of 150 people in Texas while governor - including juveniles, and mentally handicapped citizens. And who can forget his brutal sneering at, and mocking of, Karla Fay Tucker? Saddam Hussein is an under-achiever in comparison.

Now what is this picture about? Rumsfeld congratulating Hussein on following the directions provided by the US on how to effectively kill Kurds with nerve gas? This photo was taken in December 1983 - not too long after the 1982 atrocity. No condemnation there.. Oh, and the elements that were used to make the gas, and the helicopters used to deliver them, and billions of dollars in loan guarantees, and other assorted military equipment, were supplied by the US.
image from tinyrevolution


They also intend to try him for genocide for the gassing of Iraqi Kurds in 1988. There is a bit of a problem with this though, because Hussein's conviction goes to automatic appeal, and once that appeal is ruled on, and the death sentence upheld, they have 30 days to kill him, which could well preclude the genocide trial.

There is no doubt that Saddam Hussein is an evil man, but he has been backed by a coterie of evil (American) men since 1979. He was/is an asset of the CIA (along with bin Laden). Everything was fine until Hussein announced that Iraqi oil would cease to be sold in American dollars, and henceforth would be sold in Euros. We know what has happened since then.

Hussein has been attributed with causing the deaths of over a million people, but what is never mentioned is that those deaths were around the 8 year long Iran/Iraq war - that was sponsored by the US after their man the Shah was overthrown. There are all kinds of numbers thrown around - most of them specious, or convenient. I have heard about 5,000 Kurds, 100,000 - 300,000, a million, blah, blah. Over 500,000 Iraqi children died as a result of UN sanctions against Iraq after the first Gulf adventure in 1991 (Bush Sr., did not invade Iraq then because it was illegal to do so - just as it was in 2003.) The British medical journal The Lancet, Amnesty International, the Red Cross, Johns Hopkins, and many other reputable sources, have put Iraqi deaths at 655,000 since 2003. These deaths are all attributed to the mayhem that prevails now. It does not count the future casualties from radiation poisoning caused by the thousands of tons of depleted uranium munitions used by coalition forces. More American soldiers are dead than civilians died in 9.11. Mercenaries, private contractors, and journalists are not counted. And those are just battle field deaths. Deaths of wounded in transport, in hospital, suicides, etc. are not counted. Many more thousands are maimed forever.

The Iraqi constitution and courts were imposed by the US (just as in Japan after WWII), which is in contravention of the Geneva Convention -

The Geneva Convention, Article 54 reads: "The Occupying Power may not alter the status of public officials or judges in the occupied territories, or in any way apply sanctions to or take any measures of coercion or discrimination against them, should they abstain from fulfilling their functions for reasons of conscience." This is confirmed in the The Hague War Convention, also signed by the earlier existing US, before it became a totally lawless dictatorship.source

geneva conventions.org

Amnesty International, and others - including American judicial experts, have stated that there is more than a little doubt as to the fairness of Hussein's trial. Defence lawyers, body guards and witnesses have been intimidated and/or murdered. There is also doubt as to whether the man in the prisoner's dock is Hussein. He is known to have had many Dopplegangers, and this guy may be one of them. Hussein's wife says that it is not her husband.

It's a frickin dog and pony show put on to eliminate - er, that's a Freudian typo. I mean - manipulate the minds of America - especially at this important election time. Wag-the-Dog.

On top of all of that, I am firmly opposed to capital punishment. I used to be all for it, but now I would rather see evil people imprisoned in a very small cell, with no view to the outside, and the most meagre of rations, for the rest of their lives. That's punishment. It blew me away that 76% of Canadian respondents to a survey on the net were for Hussein's execution.

What are we coming to?

cleaner air?...Beta 2.0

In an earlier post here I wrote about the (neo)Conservatives' "Green Plan" (makes me green around the gills).

Yesterday I stumbled upon this blog - Far and Wide (a good read), and was led to Progressive Bloggers, where I found this countdown clock to cleaner air.


"Lord Kitchener's Own" wrote;

I wonder what the internet will be like, far in the future, when the clock hits 0.

Of course, I also wonder what the WORLD will be like in 2050 when the Conservatives hit their target of 50% reductions in Greenhouse Gas emmissions.

I hope we still have Polar Bears!

I'll only be 75, so I should make it and see.

I'm not sure if I'll live long enough to see them raise PEI back out of the ocean again, though. One can always hope!

My only criticism of this clock is that it is actually 16,060 days until the target is reached (Edit - Steve V from Far and Wide commented that the clock was keyed to smog and ozone, and that the emissions targets are for 2050. My apologies for any misrepresentation.), and as LKO says ...After 44 years of unquestioned Tory rule, I'd imagine it'll be a very different place indeed.


Indeed.

You can get the code for this counter @ Progressive Bloggers if you want to put it on your own blog or web page (I believe that Steve V wrote the code).

James Lovelock (the author of the Gaia Hypothesis) wikipedia link predicted that by 2100 there would be only 200,000,000 people surviving on this planet - concentrated above the Arctic Circle. 6.1 billion people will have starved, drowned, or been stricken by emerging diseases. This prediction is only 94 years away from fruition (?), and as we prepare for the birth of a child in February, I wonder what hell we are bringing this child into. My old Grandma always said to me to "get some land where you can grow some food", and I believe her prescience was accurate. The thing is though, it will be hard to defend that food against 6.1 billion starving people.

I have always thought that there have been 5 great civilizations of mankind on Earth (the present one being the fifth - the fourth was the Atlantean civilization), and that there will be another "cleansing". The sick part of it is that our greed and rapaciousness will be our own undoing, and the undoing of the innocents not yet born.

Man, I hate Mondays.

Get the mad off the streets

elderly man on the streets of Lisbon
photo by author


I heard on CBC radio yesterday that the Campbell government sees the need to start helping out the mentally ill by reinstitutionalizing them, and increasing shelter benefits for those on Social Assistance. At first blush, it seems like a good thing, and I was surprised that this government was giving the issue attention (link to online story) - it was, after all, this government that slashed tens of millions of dollars from the budgets of Riverview Hospital, and other facilities for the mentally ill (edit - it was not actually this government - a lot of those funding cuts happened before this gov't came to power). Many of these afflicted psychiatric patients ended up on the streets, where they are helpless, and prey for all kinds of predators. The shelter allowance for those on social assistance has been $325/month since 1994. Meanwhile, the cost of housing has more than doubled, and many of the SRO (single resident occupancy) hotels have been shut down and torn down (the land is too valuable), or converted to boutique hotels, or condos.

So, I am a slightly cynical person (rendered so by the cynicism of governments at large), and as the day wore on, I continued to wonder at the sudden (and uncharacteristic) philanthropy of the Campell "Liberals". First thought to mind was that there is a desire to hide the homeless problem in Vancouver in readiness to show a good face for the 2010 Winter Olympics (I still have to publish my rant about the Olympics) - that is what was done in the run-up to Expo '86. Then I began to wonder if homelessness would become evidence (to the government) of mental illness - why would anyone be indigent in this booming economy? Perhaps a sinister new version of vagrancy legislation. Round them up, and lock them up for the duration of the world's focus on Vancouver.

I can't remember who was attributed as saying that the measure of a society is how it takes care of it's elderly, sick and downtrodden, but by that measure, this society is failing (and has failed) miserably. Cynical laws such as the Safe Streets Act - which basically makes it illegal to ask for money on the streets, and enables police to jail those who are fined and cannot pay the fine. What a choice to make (for the indigent) - beg for money, or starve. Receive a fine (up to $2,000!) for begging, and either beg for the money to pay the fine (and receive another fine), or be imprisoned. Now there will be a new tool - you must be mentally ill, so off to Riverview - and you will never get out of there until the government slashes the funding again, and you will again be on the streets.

Qu'elle vie.

A story on poverty at The Republic

Safe Streets Act links;

Tyee article
SFU Peak article
Vancouver Courier article

Edit;

The Safe Streets Act specifically stated that there was to be no pan-handling in front of liquor stores, banks and pay phones. Tonight I stopped to get some fermented grape juice, and there were 4 young lads collecting money (pan-handling) in front of the liquor store. If I was really mean-spirited (like the "Liberals" are), I would have called the police to complain about it.

"Black-Box" Voting

So, we know that there were "irregularities" in the last couple of Presidential elections in the US. In 2000 Bush "beat" Gore to take the election. There were extreme irregularities, in Florida specifically, with "African-Americans" (were they born in Africa?, or is that just a politically correct way of saying black, coloured, Negro, nig.....?). Many non-Caucasians there were denied a vote because they were falsely listed as felons (there is a world of information out there about who was responsible for that...). Then there were the "hanging chads", "dimpled chads", etc., the absentee votes that were never counted, the recount stopped by the Supreme Court, and Gore's concession to Bush (how many of you know that they are actually cousins? That's another story though...).

In 2004, there was another huge mess, and obvious "fixing" of the results in Ohio and New Mexico that led to Bush "winning" by a spurious number of votes.People were forced to wait in line (in the rain) for hours to vote, and then saw their vote for anyone other than Bush magically register in front of their eyes to be a vote for Bush. Exit polls indicated a clear win for the Democrats, but for the first time in history, anywhere, they were wrong. Another stolen election.

There is a mountain of information regarding all of this, but everyone has forgotten - distracted by wars, nukes, public servant scandals, plasma tv's, real estate bubbles, and so on. I fully expect the 2008 elections to the South to be suspended because the country is "at war", and it is perfectly "legal" to do so. The only hope for our American cousins is to impeach those lunatics before they have the chance to do that. Bush keeps repeating that America is at war - to drill it into people's heads. It is a "war" that will never end, because the "enemy" is a ghost. It's different ideas at war, not different countries. It's an invasion of people's minds - besides actual lands. It's psychological/ideological warfare.

I have been warning against "black hole" voting in Canada for quite some time, and am very concerned about it. Harper is a Bush sycophant (psychophant), and is bound to take a page from that book to make voting in Canada even more irrelevent, and when that day comes, we will have to refuse it, and demand paper ballots.

Below you will find two links to the recent "black hole" voting experience in municipal elections in Quebec. In one riding there was a vote that defied 130 years of history. And guess who provided the voting machines? If you guessed Diebold, you would be correct.

Watch out for this kind of travesty in your riding.

wired.com on black-box voting

Macleans on black-box voting in Quebec

Video by an organization of American citizens to "Video the Vote" in the upcoming Congressional/Senatorial elections in the US of A.