] Washington - House Judiciary Chairman F. James
] Sensenbrenner Jr. said Thursday that he would fight any
] effort now to make permanent many of the expanded police
] powers enacted after the Sept. 11 attacks as part of the
] USA Patriot Act.

Some good news from Washington.

JS Online: Sensenbrenner says he'll enforce sunset of police powers

] The newly revealed genetic code of the suspected SARS
] virus still doesn't explain how it arose or how to stop
] the spread of the deadly flu-like illness, federal
] officials said Monday.

Salon.com Technology | Despite SARS genetic code, experts puzzled

Coalition forces are trying to restore civil order in Baghdad, a city of 4.5 million, and the looting has almost ended. However, the pandemonium and destruction that occurred have cost the Bush administration credibility and trust in Iraq and across the Arab world. Silliman, who's now a law professor at Duke University and executive director of the Center for Law, Ethics and National Security, says the coalition forces may have violated the Fourth Geneva Convention, which calls for an occupying force to protect cultural property. Even if the coalition forces didn't intentionally breach the Geneva Conventions, he says, "the effect [of the looting] will be more in world opinion, than in legal sanctions."

It's amazing that we had troops stationed at the Ministry of Oil in Baghdad to protect it. There's no oil in that building, it's purely administrative.

Here we have literally thousands of years of culture being systematically disassembled and sold to the highest bidder while Rumsfeld chuckles and makes statements to the effect that boys will be boys.

Dolemite

The end of civilization

] Technological savvy could turn 600 million tons of turkey
] guts and other waste into 4 billion barrels of light
] Texas crude each year
]
] Gory refuse, from a Butterball Turkey plant in Carthage,
] Missouri, will no longer go to waste. Each day 200 tons
] of turkey offal will be carted to the first
] industrial-scale thermal depolymerization plant, recently
] completed in an adjacent lot, and be transformed into
] various useful products, including 600 barrels of light
] oil.
]
] In an industrial park in Philadelphia sits a new machine
] that can change almost anything into oil.
]
] Really.
]
] "This is a solution to three of the biggest problems
] facing mankind," says Brian Appel, chairman and CEO of
] Changing World Technologies, the company that built this
] pilot plant and has just completed its first
] industrial-size installation in Missouri. "This process
] can deal with the world's waste. It can supplement our
] dwindling supplies of oil. And it can slow down global
] warming."

Anything into Oil

] What happened to the majority of journalists living the
] Marine life is that we experienced it from the inside. I
] can honestly say that seven weeks as an embed has changed
] me forever. And I have often found many similarities
] between Marines and Arabs.

ArabNews: An Account of Marines' Incredible Gestures

] UMM QASR, Iraq -- Ahmed Ali believes Saddam Hussein can
] never die. All his life, the 23-year-old laborer has
] heard about the dictator's powerful stone.
]
] Saddam, the story goes, had the stone made shortly
] after he came to power 24 years ago. Its powers were
] first tested inside a chicken. One of his soldiers pulled
] out a gun and shot at point-blank range. The chicken's
] feathers fell off, but it lived.
]
] So the dictator implanted the stone in his upper arm.
]
] As the curtain falls on Saddam's reign, many ordinary
] Iraqis are reluctant to believe that their much-feared
] dictator has lost power, much less that he is actually
] dead. Stories abound of Saddam's mystical powers that
] have helped him elude assassination attempts and missile
] strikes.
]
] "The stone makes him bulletproof," Ali, a slim man
] with a Saddam-style moustache, said in a serious voice.

Talk about urban legends . . .

Myths About Saddam Fuel the Fears of Iraqis

] Bashar Assad, the young president of Syria, has got to be
] more than a little nervous right now. George W. Bush's
] press spokesman has called his country "a rogue nation."
] Unnamed senior officials are labeling him a member of the
] "junior varsity axis of evil." Even before U.S. tanks
] zoomed into Baghdad, Donald Rumsfeld was warning him to
] stop helping high-level Iraqi refugees or face the
] consequences. Now that the three-week lightning war is
] over, Colin Powell is saying that, "in light of this new
] environment," Assad should review his "actions and %u2026
] behavior" across the board.
]
] And unlike Saddam Hussein, who may well have deluded
] himself with all those video screenings of Black Hawk
] Down, Assad must know that the Syrian military is no
] match for even a lightweight U.S. assault, should Bush
] decide to launch one.

And so begins the publicity campaign by the fourth estate at the behest of One Wonders against Syria

Assad's Situation - Syria's military machine may be hollow--but it isn't harmless

] TIM ROBBINS: Thank you. And thanks for the invitation. I
] had originally been asked here to talk about the war and
] our current political situation, but I have instead
] chosen to hijack this opportunity and talk about baseball
] and show business. (Laughter.) Just kidding. Sort of.
]
] I can't tell you how moved I have been at the
] overwhelming support I have received from newspapers
] throughout the country in these past few days. I hold no
] illusions that all of these journalists agree with me on
] my views against the war. While the journalists' outrage
] at the cancellation of our appearance in Cooperstown is
] not about my views, it is about my right to express these
] views. I am extremely grateful that there are those of
] you out there still with a fierce belief in
] constitutionally guaranteed rights. We need you, the
] press, now more than ever. This is a crucial moment for
] all of us.

Great speech.

'A Chill Wind is Blowing in This Nation...' Tim Robbins Speech to the National Press Club

] I heard about all them folks protesting,
] As if I really want this war.
] But that don't stop me from believing
] There're just some things worth fighting for.

A song by Dustin Evans. Very simple: vocals and a guitar. Powerful singing, heartfelt, brings tears to my eyes.

-andy

If I Die Before You Wake

] Noam on the war, etc.

Interesting reasoning behind "Why did we go to war".

ZNet | Interviews | Noam Chomsky Interviewed