- George W. Bush. US president: January 20, 2001 - January
19, 2009. Born of privilege. Unimpressive by every measure. A history
of underachievement. Chosen by big money. Arranged through electoral
fraud. Installed by the Supreme Court. Empowered by a dubious "terrorist"
act, and ending with a record unmatched by the worst of his predecessors.
Assessing the Bush legacy - from its illegitimate birth; through its lawless,
belligerent years; to the world potentially on the brink at its end. Exploring
it fully as a change of command approaches, and an unenviable task awaits
the new incumbent.
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- As Texas Governor
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- Looking to Election 2000, big monied interests knew what
they wanted and got it in George W. Bush. In his 2000 book, "The
Dirty Truth," Rick Abraham (a former Texas environmental law enforcement
officer) documented his record as Texas governor from 1995 - 2000 when
"he championed the agenda of the state's biggest and worst corporate
polluters," according to commentator, author, and former Texas Department
of Agriculture Commissioner Jim Hightower. In return for huge political
contributions and jump-starting his presidential bid, he:
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- -- lobbied for a national radioactive waste dump in Texas;
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- -- told the public it was mostly for x-rays and other
hospital waste;
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- -- solicited nuclear power waste from other states;
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- -- corrupted the state's environmental standards to accommodate
polluters;
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- -- failed to provide protection from industrial pollution,
air toxins, and hazardous wastes;
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- -- did it all secretly;
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- -- stripped municipalities of local control over land
use and environmental protections;
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- -- let state parks languish in decay and disrepair, and
this was only his environmental record.
- He was staunchly pro-business, anti-civil liberties,
unresponsive to public needs, and presided over more state executions
than any other governor in the nation since the Supreme Court reinstated
capital punishment in 1976. His own aides at the time called him a man
who enjoys killing, and not one to trust with the presidency as it turned
out.
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- Elections 2000 and 2004 - Tainted by Fraud
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- On December 12, 2000 the Supreme Court hijacked an electoral
process that was deeply flawed and rigged to elect George Bush. It coronated
him president after three days earlier halting the Florida vote recount
on the spurious grounds that it violated the 14th Amendment's equal protection
clause. It was the first time ever in US history that the High Court reversed
a popular vote (5 - 4) to install its own preferred candidate.
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- For its part, the media cheerled the process and wholeheartedly
approved. They, too, got their man in Washington. The rallied around
him ever since, ignored his high crimes and misdemeanors, the economy
in disarray, and continue to support him in spite of his lowest-ever approval
rating for any president. He surpassed Harry Truman at the depth of the
Korean War and Richard Nixon during Watergate, and will be judged by history
as our worst and most disgraceful president ever.
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- Election 2000 made it possible. Investigative journalists
like Greg Palast documented how mostly poor African- Americans and Latinos
were removed from voter roles for having falsely been "identified"
as ex-felons and thus unable to vote in states like Florida. Various
other obstructions were also used. Ballot boxes in African- American districts
were missing and uncounted. State troopers were positioned near polling
sites in black precincts to intimidate and delay voters by searching their
cars and setting up roadblocks. Some precincts demanded two photo IDs.
Florida law requires only one.
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- African-American students at schools like Florida A&M
signed up in force as first-time voters but were obstructed at polling
stations. They were turned away because they couldn't show a registration
card or drivers license. However, Florida lets eligible residents sign
an affidavit (not provided) and swear they hadn't voted.
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- In African-American and other Democrat districts, voters
were turned away and directed to vote elsewhere. They were never mailed
registration cards, and they were told they showed up too late and polls
were closed. Many requesting absentee ballots never got them, and evidence
emerged of forged ones for George Bush. Similar practices showed up in
other states like Ohio, New Hampshire, Missouri and Tennessee that narrowly
went for Bush over Gore. And all the above was besides the hanging, dimpled,
and pregnant chads or otherwise disqualified Florida votes that never
were counted but should have been.
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- Election 2004 was even worse than 2000 because technology
smoothed the way with electronic ease. In 2002, the Help America Vote
Act (HAVA) passed as a way to facilitate fraud. It ushered in the age
of privatized voting on touchtone electronic voting machines - owned,
programmed, operated and controlled by giant corporations with close Republican
ties. Today, over 80% of all votes are cast and counted this way. Most
states require no verifiable paper receipts, so it's easy to manipulate
outcomes, and not just for president.
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- They helped reelect Bush at a time his approval rating
hovered around 40%. Most voters believed the country was headed in the
wrong direction, and most polls had Kerry a heavy favorite. In addition,
a record 16.8 million new voters registered, mostly Democrats. Nonetheless,
Bush got 11.6 million more votes than in 2000, won with a comfortable
three million vote margin, and Florida and Ohio made the difference. Either
one going for Kerry would have changed the outcome, and again electoral
fraud was rife and well- documented. Some of it included:
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- -- millions of absentee ballots never mailed to Democrats
or arrived too late;
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- -- malfunctioning voting machines in Democrat districts
wiped out huge numbers of crucial votes;
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- -- according to Greg Palast, over three million votes
cast but never counted because of rejected "provisional ballots"
(for registered voters unlisted on rolls); "spoiled ballots"
(ones malfunctioning machines didn't count); uncounted absentee ballots
for minor reasons; and black and Latino voters stripped from the roles
for the same reasons as in 2000;
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- -- major deviations in 30 states between exit polls and
final results; way beyond margins of error and indicative of fraud; in
all but four states, discrepancies favored Bush;
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- -- Ohio was ground zero, much like Florida in 2000 that
also went for Bush in 2004; 357,000 Ohio voters, overwhelmingly Democrat,
were prevented from voting or their votes weren't counted; Bush carried
the state by 118,599; clear proof he lost; Kerry won, and was elected
president;
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- -- Democrat precincts got too few voting machines; voters
were obstructed by long lines, malfunctioning machines, numerous instances
of being told they were at the wrong precinct, and most disturbing:
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- -- one in every four Ohio registrants showing up to vote
discovered they weren't listed on the rolls because Republican Secretary
of State and co-chair of Bush's reelection committee, Kenneth Blackwell,
ordered them purged.
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- These and other fraudulent practices greased the way
for George Bush's illegitimate reelection and the continued fallout from
it.
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- Transformed by September 11, 2001
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- The widely followed Cook report assessed Bush's first
five months in office as follows: After "start(ing) off strong....his
future seems far less certain. Not only are (his) overall job approval
ratings slumping, but his disapproval ratings are climbing....the last
three months (especially) have been less than auspicious for this new
President....they have a lot of repair work to do and had better get started."
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- Bush entered office with an approval rating around 50%.
It first rose slightly, then dipped below 50% in late August. It all changed
on September 11. Bush's rating skyrocketed to a temporary high above
90% and stayed above 80% through year end. That event transformed a mediocre
president overnight to a combination of Lincoln, FDR and Churchill, according
to some observers and hyperactive media pundits. It was beyond laughable
then, and hugely more so now.
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- After he peaked, it was downhill to 60% at yearend 2002,
around 50% in late 2003, then around 40% or lower to more recent months
when he's ranged from the low to higher 20s. Until American Research
Group's September lowest ever for a US president at 19%, Research 2000
scored him lowest at 22% in late July. CBS in early August had him at
25%, and even Fox/Opinion Dynamics gave him a 27% rating at month end
July. Others had him slightly higher with every incentive to keep him
from submerging and failing thereafter to surface.
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- The Cook Report's Charlie Cook may have thought that
on June 21 when he wrote in the National Journal: Ronald "Reagan
drew a whole generation into the Republican Party....some observers wonder
whether George W. Bush may have driven another (one) away," and
McCain won't likely bring them back. But it wasn't that way in late 2001
through the March 2003 Iraq war start with the public still traumatized
by 9/11 and the hype about Saddam's WMDs.
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- Deconstructing the Bush Legacy - The Bush Doctrine
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- Below is a review of the Bush administration's record,
including related events before he took office.
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- On September 11, 1990, GHW Bush addressed a joint session
of Congress following Saddam's August 2 Kuwait invasion. It became known
as his "Toward a New World Order" speech. He said: "This
invasion shall not stand, because it threatens the New World Order."
Then in his January 29, 1991 State of the Union address, he spoke of "a
defining hour....Halfway around the world (where) we are engaged in a
great struggle in the skies and on the seas and sands....facing down a
threat to decency and humanity (and for) a victory over tyranny and savage
aggression." He called for a "new initiative in government....to
prepare for the next American century (and) seize this opportunity to
fulfill the long-held promise for a 'new world order....' "
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- After the Cold War ended in 1991, GHW Bush's Defense
Secretary Dick Cheney and undersecretary Paul Wolfowitz designed what
they called the Defense Planning Guidance or Wolfowitz doctrine. It was
an early plan for what later emerged in the late 1990s and in the Bush
Doctrine. The New York Times "leaked" it in March 1992 and caused
an uproar. It was an imperial design for unchallengeable dominance using
preemptive military action to suppress potential threats - no holds barred
anywhere.
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- In 1997, the plan was revived by the Project for a New
American Century (PNAC) in a (2000) document called "Rebuilding America's
Defenses: Strategies, Forces and Resources for a New Century." It
reasserted an imperial design for global dominance and stated: "America
should seek to preserve and extend its position of global leadership by
maintaining the preeminence of US military forces." It further called
for "American hegemony" and "full-sprectrum dominance,"
and said achieving it would be long-term "absent some catastrophic
and catalyzing event - like a new Pearl Harbor.
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- A host of PNC members joined the Bush administration,
key among them Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz - fully
committed to what emerged as a "Global War on Terrorism" starting
off in Afghanistan, Iraq, and against any perceived homeland threats.
Their vision:
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- -- unchallengeable dominance;
- -- ignoring the rule of law;
- -- waging wars of aggression called liberating ones;
- -- making torture official state policy;
- -- suppressing civil liberties for our own good;
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- -- targeting Muslims, Latino immigrants and others of
choice for political advantage; rounding them up; denying them due process;
incarcerating and/or deporting them, and much worse as discussed below;
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- -- building Department of Homeland Security (DHS) mass
detention camps for "enemies of the state" or threats to "national
security;"
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- -- deploying paramilitary enforcers (like Blackwater
Worldwide, formerly Blackwater USA) on US streets;
- -- silencing dissent;
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- -- turning elections into farces; pre-determining outcomes
for favored candidates; letting kabuki theater, horse race journalism,
and trivia substitute for real news and information; turning democracy
into fantasy;
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- -- fostering social decay at home; and
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- -- institutionalizing spying and police state repression
for enforcement.
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- Key Administration and Earlier Policy Documents
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- The US Space Command produced a 1998 document called
Vision for 2020. In May 2000 ahead of Bush taking office, it was released
as a (neo-con influenced) imperial grand strategy called the Department
of Defense (DOD) Joint Vision 2020 with a sweeping aim - to achieve "full
spectrum dominance" over all land, surface and sub-surface sea, air,
space, electromagnetic spectrum and information systems with enough overwhelming
power to fight and win global wars against any potential challengers with
all weapons in our arsenal, including nuclear and others of mass destruction.
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- The December 2001 Nuclear Policy Review reasserted the
same prerogative to unilaterally declare and wage future wars preemptively
with first strike nuclear weapons, and by inference, all others as well.
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- Plans were well in place long before September 11, but
that event provided the pretext. It gave the Bush administration "reason"
to attack Afghanistan on October 7 (long planned in advance), invade
with ground troops on October 19, and look ahead to the grand scheme against
Iraq.
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- On September 11, 2001, Bush addressed the nation and
declared a "war on terrorism," asked for world support to win
it, and began what became "our government's emergency (preventive
war strategy) response plans." He planned to ignore the law and wage
a global war throughout an "arc of instability" from the South
American Andean region (mainly Colombia) to North Africa through the Middle
East to the Philippines, Indonesia and elsewhere in Eurasia.
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- On January 29, 2002 in his first State of the Union address,
he declared war on a "terrorist underworld (in) at least a dozen
countries....in remote jungles and deserts (and) in centers of large
cities." He asked "all nations (to) heed our call and eliminate
the terrorist parasites who threaten their countries and our own (and)
If they do not act, America will." He singled out North Korea, Iran
and Iraq as an "axis of evil....seeking out weapons of mass destruction
(and) posing a grave and growing danger." Things headed downhill
from there.
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- On September 20, 2002, Bush issued what became known
as the Bush Doctrine or self-declared right to wage global (imperial)
wars against "terrorist" states or ones that harbor or aid them.
The 2002 National Security Strategy (NSS) made it policy and in stronger
terms in 2006 - the unilateral right to wage preventive, preemptive and
later "proactive" wars against perceived threats or potential
challengers and to control the world's energy and other resources in key
regions like the Middle East, Eurasia, Latin America, Africa and now the
Arctic. The 2006 version mentions Iran 16 times and states: "We may
face no greater challenge from a single country than Iran." Current
developments suggest that position is unchanged, at least in belligerent
rhetoric.
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- The Air Force's "Strategic Master Plan FY 06 and
Beyond calls space "the ultimate high ground of US military operations."
It aims to link the Pentagon with NASA, militarize its operations, "own
outer space," and weaponize it with the most advanced, destructive
current and future technology, including unmanned space vehicles for
planetary surveillance.
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- The October 2006 National Space Policy embraced this
agenda without so stating it. It called on NASA to "execute a sustained
and affordable human and robotic program of space exploration and develop,
acquire, and use civil space systems to advance fundamental scientific
knowledge of our Earth system, solar system, and universe." The nuclear
input is from language "to ensure space capabilities....to further
US national security, homeland security, and foreign policy objectives
(with) a robust foreign space intelligence collection and analysis capability"
to assure it and have the heavens militarized for enforcement.
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- Seizing full advantage from the 9/11 event and follow-up
anthrax attacks, the Bush administration subverted the rule of law, abandoned
restrictive treaties, militarized more than the rest of the world combined,
and rescinded the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) so as to illegally
develop new biowarfare weapons. It further renounced the 1989 (GHW Bush-signed)
Biological Weapons Anti-Terrorism Act of 1989 that prohibits "the
Development, Production, and Stockpiling of Bacteriological (Biological)
and Toxin Weapons...."
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- According to international (and biowarfare) law expert
Francis Boyle, it's to fight and win a future biowar. It also makes "a
catastrophic biowarfare or bioterrorist incident a statistical certainty"
and makes everyone unwitting subjects of a recklessly endangering experiment.
To go along with a potential nuclear holocaust and turning democracy into
fantasy.
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- Homeland Police State Enforcement
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- Implementation follows planning. At home, it's been high-octane
repression in the forms reviewed below and covered earlier in this writer's
December 2007 Police State America article. Here it's reviewed more briefly.
The topic is hugely important and explains the current state under George
Bush with little or no likely change coming under Barack Obama.
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- Post-9/11, "national security" and the "war
on terrorism" became buzzwords to rally the public for what lay ahead.
On the evening of September 11, Bush asked for public and world support
and began the "government's emergency (preventive war strategy) response
plans," but not as people envisioned. Policies were explained above.
Ignore the law. Wage aggressive wars. Destroy homeland civil liberties,
and more in defense of privilege over beneficial social change.
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- In so doing, he turned momentary world support and sympathy
into mass public condemnation and rather quickly. He also risked the
unimaginable. Replacing democracy with tyranny and ending planetary life
with first-strike nuclear weapons - far more destructive than used against
Japan in 1945.
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- Throughout history, going back to George Washington,
presidents issued Executive Orders (EOs) even though nowhere does the
Constitution let them make new law through one-man decrees. Compared
to Bush, however, past presidents were almost discrete. He, in contrast,
signed a blizzard of them as well as the equally unconstitutional practice
of changing legislation with "signing statements."
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- Until 2001, all presidents combined challenged new laws
with less than 600 of them. Through almost mid-2008, Bush issued at least
157 in changing over 1150 provisions of law and about which the Congressional
Research Service said 78% of them raised constitutional objections. He
abused his authority to rewrite laws as he wished, continues doing so
to the present, and Congress and the courts let him get away with it.
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- Bush also usurped unconstitutional "Unitary Executive"
authority or what Chalmers Johnson calls "a ball-faced assertion
of presidential supremacy....dressed up in legalistic mumbo jumbo"
to act as he wishes on all matters, foreign or domestic, law or no law
- a practice that "flies in the face of the Constitution itself."
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- Justice Louis Brandeis' dissent in Myers v. United States
(1926) cited the separation of powers and said it exists "to preclude
(this type) exercise of arbitrary power, (divide) government powers among
three departments, to save the people from autocracy." A clear and
present danger under George Bush with no Brandeis on the High Court to
object. Nor in Congress with enough power to matter. Not the House Speaker,
party leaders in both Houses, or key committee chairpersons.
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- Post-9/11 on September 17, Bush signed a secret presidential
finding (similar to EOs) empowering the CIA to "Capture, Kill or
Interrogate Al-Queda Leaders." It authorized establishing a secret
global network of facilities to detain, interrogate and otherwise mistreat
whomever is called a "terrorist threat" and began his administration's
official sanctioning of torture. More on that below.
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- On November 13, he issued Military Order Number 1. It
disturbed one analyst enough to call it a "coup d'etat" and
"watershed moment in (the) country" and hinted at what would
follow: violating the rule of law, suspending civil liberties, and usurping
absolute authority to act against anyone - later called "unlawful
enemy combatants" or "terrorist" threats, including US
citizens stripped of their constitutional protections. At the president's
discretion, they're gone. And it was only the beginning. From then followed:
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- -- the use of National and Homeland Security Presidential
Directives (NSPDs and HSPDs); they're much like EOs and presidential
findings with the "full force and effect of law;" they relate
to national security and remain classified unless made public; Bush issued
dozens of NSPDs and over 20 HSPDs;
- -- the October 25, 2001 NSPD-9 signed into law official
administration policies adopted on September 4, 2001 - seven days before
9/11 with every expectation they'd be implemented; it's titled "Defeating
the Terrorist Threat to the United States" and referred to Al Queda
and so-called terrorist networks of Muslim fundamentalist extremists;
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- -- later NSPDs related to combatting WMDs, the Iraq war,
biodefense (aka biowarfare), using space for "full spectrum dominance,"
and much more;
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- -- the combined NSPD-51/HSPD-20 deserves special mention;
it was similar to Ronald Reagan's Executive Order 12656 that empowered
the executive in cases of "any occurrence, including natural disaster,
military attack, technological emergency, or other emergency, that seriously
degrades or seriously threatens the national security of the United States;"
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- -- it established "Continuity of Government (COG)"
procedures under a "Catastrophic Emergency" that may be anything
from a real or contrived "terrorist" act to whatever the president
calls a justifiable "emergency;" it established unprecendented
powers free from constitutional constraints - to claim a "national
emergency," declare martial law, and govern as a virtual dictator
with limitless police state powers; some COG powers were invoked on September
11, 2001; they've remained in force since, and on August 28, 2008, George
Bush continued "the powers and authorities adopted to deal with that
emergency;"
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- -- the USA Patriot Act (over 300 pages long) - written
well in advance of 9/11; passed and signed into law 45 days later on
October 26; it capitalized on a window of hysteria; granted unchecked
powers to the executive; and subverted sacred constitutional liberties
of free expression, religion, right to peacefully assemble, and to petition
the government for redress of grievances; due process; and freedom from
unreasonable searches and seizures - in all the ways now allowed through
a process of institutionalized spying and monitoring of all our behavior
and practices at the government's discretion; the Act also (for the first
time) created the crime of "domestic terrorism" to apply the
definition to US citizens as well as aliens;
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- -- the November 25, 2002 Homeland Security Act (HSA);
also written well in advance of 9/11 as a companion anti-terrorism bill
and included the repressive Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency
(ICE) - to terrorize legal and undocumented immigrants, mainly Latinos
and Muslims; DHS centralizes unprecedented military and law enforcements
powers in the executive branch for greater global dominance; like the
Patriot Act, it sweeps away constitutional protections and justifies it
in the name of "national security;" it coordinates it with the
October 2002-created US Northern Command (USNORTHCOM) in violation of
the 1807 Insurrection Act and 1878 Posse Comitatus protections against
US military forces deployed inside the country except as expressly authorized
by the Constitution or in cases of internal insurrection;
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- -- the late September 2006 Pentagon Global Strike Command
called the Joint Functional Component Command for Global Strike and Integration;
it followed from the 2002 Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) that planned policy
five to ten years ahead and remains classified except for excerpted parts;
they relate to offensive strike systems and a revitalized defense infrastructure
to meet emerging threats; the tone is belligerent and declares preventive
wars on any nation, groups or force anywhere (including internal ones)
and allows NORTHCOM, DHS, and other domestic security agencies unrestricted
countermeasure powers - indicative of a police state;
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- -- within days of 9/11, torture became official US policy
and was authorized by a blizzard of presidential directives, memoranda,
and other official documents from the highest levels of government; domestic
and international laws and norms were rendered invalid, and a new repressive
order replaced them; the rule of law no longer applies, and constitutional
protections no longer exist at the president's discretion;
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- -- Congress was fully obliging; in the Detainee Treatment
Act of 2005, it officially sanctioned torture after intervening against
the Supreme Court's Rasul v. Bush (June 2004) ruling granting Guantanamo
detainees habeas rights; it also ruled they had none.
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- --in the Military Commissions Act (MCA - aka the torture
authorization and habeas revocation act), it subverted the High Court
a second time in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld when it held as follows: Guantanamo
Bay military commissions lack "the power to proceed because (their)
structures and procedures violate both the Uniform Code of Military Justice
and the four Geneva Conventions (of) 1949;" Congress responded with
sweeping MCA powers, reaffirmed torture as official US policy, and let
the president designate anyone anywhere in the world (including US citizens)
"unlawful enemy combatants" and empowered him to arrest, detain,
and torture them indefinitely in military prisons as well as deny them
due process in civil courts;
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- -- Sections 1076 and 333 of the John Warner National
Defense Authorization Act for FY 2007; they ended the 1807 Insurrection
Act and 1878 Posse Comitatus protections against US military forces used
for law enforcement inside the country, except as explained above;
-
- -- Congress passed the Real ID Act of 2005 that, if implemented,
threatens personal privacy; originally, it was to become effective in
May 2008 to require states to meet federal ID standards; so far, however,
it's in question as at least two dozen states passed laws prohibiting
it use; it requires every US citizen and legal resident to have a national
identity card that in most cases is a driver's license; it's to contain
personal information required to open a bank account, board an airplane,
be able to vote, or conduct virtually any essential business; in the future
it may also contain a radio frequency identification (RFID) computer chip
to track all our movements, activities and transactions at all times -
a police state dream; the legislation so far remains stalled;
-
- -- institutionalized spying now policy under George Bush
with Congress complicit in its implementation; since late 2001, the National
Security Agency (NSA) did it illegally; the 2007 Protect America Act amended
the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) to allow virtually
unrestricted mass data-mining and intercept of all types of domestic and
foreign communications of anyone - foreign nationals and US citizens;
it authorizes unrestricted warrantless spying for any claimed "national
security" reason;
- -- Congress further violated Fourth Amendment protections
against illegal searches and seizures by passing the 2008 FISA Amendments
Act; it gutted FISA by weakening standards of proof and warrants required
for surveillance and granted telecom companies retroactive immunity for
warrantless spying post-9/11 - now institutionalized unchecked, unrestrained
and easily abused;
-
- -- through late November 2008, Bush issued around 280
Executive Orders in additional to his signing statements, presidential
findings, and official executive memoranda; the July 17, 2007 EO was
particularly egregious: "Blocking Property of Certain Persons Who
Threaten Stabilization Efforts in Iraq;" under it, Bush usurped authority
to criminalize the anti-war movement, make First Amendment protests illegal,
and assert power to seize the assets of persons violating this decree;
he effectively criminalized dissent and moved the nation closer to tyranny;
-
- -- the Bush administration may be the most secretive
one ever in a democracy; he placed limits on presidential records, the
Freedom of Information Act, and a free and open society by usurping power
to classify information for "national security" and create a
new array of categories called "sensitive;"
-
- -- in November 2006, the Animal Enterprise Terrorism
Act (AETA) amended the 1992 Animal Enterprise Protection Act; it criminalized
First Amendment activities advocating for animal rights - like peaceful
protests, leafleting, undercover investigations, whistleblowing and boycotts;
it makes these forms of animal protection advocacy a crime;
-
- -- the House overwhelmingly passed the Violent Radicalization
and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act of 2007; it's now in the Senate
- where if passed and signed into law will effectively
criminalize "thought" and further erode constitutional protections;
-
- -- Sections 1615 and 1622 of the 2008 Defense Authorization
Act; they authorize DOD to militarize state and local law enforcement
authorities during a national emergency described as "an accident
of national significance or a catastrophic incident;" they effectively
established a martial law apparatus at state and local levels to work
alongside federal agencies - without congressional approval.
-
- For the past eight years, these and other administration
policies explain the current state in America - a swift descent from a
deeply flawed democracy to the tipping edge of tyranny. This is what
awaits Barack Obama and the challenge he faces. Given his past record
and disturbing campaign rhetoric, he's unlikely to deliver meaningful
change in spite of the public pleading for and expecting it.
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- Permanent Wars for Global Dominance
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- Afghanistan, Iraq, Occupied Palestine, Iran, Lebanon,
Syria, Pakistan, Somalia, North Korea, Venezuela, Bolivia, Haiti, Cuba
as well as China, Russia and the Caucasus; a likely 1000 + US bases worldwide
in around 150 countries; current defense spending exceeding $1 trillion
annually with all domestic and foreign related items included - plus unknown
multi-billions kept secret off-the-books; and a state of permanent war
abroad for global dominance and at home for total control as discussed
above. Parts of the Bush legacy today in America.
-
- Afghanistan came first - a nation John Pilger calls more
abused, long-suffering, and less helped than any other in living memory.
Today, its agony continues. The country is occupied. Some estimates cite
over three million deaths since 2001. War continues to rage. Little of
it makes headlines, but Afghans are victimized by America's "war
on terrorism."
-
- So are Iraqis from nearly three decades of war. First
against Iran in the 1980s. Then against America from August 2, 1990 to
the present - the savage Gulf War causing about 200,000 deaths; 12.5
years of genocidal sanctions; an unimaginable toll of at least 1.5 million
deaths; two-thirds of them children; and unmeasurable amounts of illnesses
and human misery through March 2003. Then George Bush's Iraq War. At least
another million deaths. Some estimates as high as two million. Around
four million internally and externally displaced. Mass unemployment and
poverty. A near- total absence of essential services - fresh drinking water,
sanitation, electricity, medical care, education, security and for many
enough food.
-
- Emergency needs are unmet. It's an overall humanitarian
disaster of epic proportions unreported in the mainstream. The "cradle
of civilization" was erased for plunder. A nation was transformed
into a "free trade" paradise. The message for others is it's
coming - "shock and awe," invasion, occupation, lost sovereignty,
mass deaths, illness and disease, incarcerations, torture, and utter
deprivation. A testimony to "democracy," liberation, and "free
market" majesty. A ghoulish dystopia; a living hell heading everywhere
unless stopped.
-
- It afflicted Haiti for over 500 years. Most recently
beginning on February 29, 2004, in the middle of the night, from a Bush-ordered
coup d'etat, when US Marines abducted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide
and forcibly flew him to the Central African Republic. Today he's exiled
in South Africa. He vows to return, and Haitians want him back in any
capacity.
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- Haiti is now occupied. UN Blue Helmet paramilitaries
control it. So do other repressive internal security forces. The people
are deeply impoverished. They're the poorest in the Hemisphere. Unemployment
is rampant. A tiny 5% of elites control everything - the economy, media,
universities, professions, and what passes for Haiti's polity. Washington
holds an iron grip. Six powerful families and US corporate interests profit.
Another "free market" paradise. Human deprivation is unimaginable
and now much worse with Haitians unable to afford high food prices. Most
are undernourished. Many are starving and forced to eat "mud cookies"
from edible clay. They lack nutrition, contain dangerous bacteria, and
are just stomach- filler.
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- They protest for relief. Washington-directed UN "Peacekeepers"
respond violently. They patrol streets and neighborhoods, crush dissent,
shoot to kill, arrest the innocent, incarcerate them under horrific conditions,
and hold them indefinitely with little hope for judicial relief. Today's
Haiti. More of Bush's legacy.
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- Venezuela might have been the same if Washington's April
2002 coup succeeded. Since taking office in February 1999, President Hugo
Chavez was targeted for removal, and maybe assassination, especially
after George Bush's election. Luckily he survived; continues to lead his
nation; was elected and reelected impressively; prevailed in every presidential,
parliamentary, municipal and referendum election since December 1998 until
hitting a momentary speed bump last December.
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- He nonetheless remains strongly popular. Venezuela is
a democracy. Chavez delivers vital social services. He redistributes national
wealth to his people. He's rewarded with their support, and that makes
him target one in the Hemisphere for removal - so far without success
but not because Bush didn't try. To be continued under the new incumbent.
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- Iran is also targeted and has been since the Islamic
Revolution. After George Bush's election, pressure built and today remains
intense. The Israeli Lobby wants regime change. So do Bush neocons and
the Democrat leadership, at least most of them. A large US naval presence
is in the region. Reinforcements may be sent. A potential blockade is
threatened. It's unclear if it's planned or just bluff. Pending H. Con.
Res. 362 with around 250 co-sponsors calls for it. It remains undebated
and referred to the House Foreign Affairs Committee. A companion S. Res.
580 was also introduced. It's also undebated and referred to the Foreign
Relations Committee for consideration.
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- Things will likely remain on hold until Barak Obama assumes
office in January. Nonetheless, the situation is tense and worrisome as
both parties are hostile to the Iranian government and very responsive
to Israeli Lobby pressure. In or out of office, Bush neocons have power
and exert considerable influence. Another testimony to his legacy that
gives reason for Iranians to worry. All humanity as well.
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- Then there's the Caucasus crisis over Georgia's willful
aggression against its breakaway South Ossetian province. It erupted on
August 7, subsided a few days later, but ignited a new Cold War with
Georgia a US proxy and Russia falsely accused of aggression.
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- Another key headline-making act of America v. Russia,
more Bush legacy fallout, and what the new president will face in 2009.
As well as Russia's justifiable anger at being surrounded by US bases.
Most in place since George Bush's election. And now "advanced tracking
missile defense radar" for the Czech Republic by 2012 and offensive
"interceptor (and Patriot) missiles" for Poland - neither of
which Russia will tolerate nor should it. It suggests a potential 1962
Cuba scenario when the world came within an eyelash of nuclear war. It
also echos Barbara Tuchman's "Guns of August" on how WW I began
and its early weeks. Either possibility shows the perils of Bush's legacy
on which the fate of the world may now hinge.
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- The Special Relationship between America and Israel
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- It began in March 1948 when Harry Truman met secretly
with Chaim Weizmann (Zionist leader and first Israeli president) and pledged
support for a new Jewish state. On May 14, 1948, the British Mandate
ended at midnight. At the same time, National Council members in Tel Aviv
signed the Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel. Minutes
later, Washington followed through on a 1922 congressional resolution
in support of a Jewish homeland and became the first country to extend
recognition. Harry Truman signed the following statement:
-
- "This Government has been informed that a Jewish
state has been proclaimed in Palestine, and recognition has been requested
by the provisional government thereof.
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- The United States recognizes the provisional government
as the de facto authority of the new State of Israel."
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- It established an enduring alliance under successive
administrations that became more special than ever under George Bush.
At its core, realgeopolitik in a strategic part of the world. The mutual
advantage for both sides, and how the influential Israeli Lobby cemented
it. James Petras explained it in his important 2006 book: "The Power
of Israel in the United States."
-
- At its heart is the high proportion of wealthy and influential
Jewish families in the country - despite the small percentage of Jews
in the population overall. Allied with others, they created a "tyranny
of Israel over the US" that threatens world peace and security and
the future of democracies in both countries and elsewhere.
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- At least since 1967, the Lobby secured Washington's unconditional
support for Israel's wars of aggression. Also the 1991 Gulf War, the
2003 Iraq War, and a scheme to isolate and possibly blockade and/or attack
Iran to solidify regional dominance for both countries and a lock on that
nation's vast oil and gas resources.
-
- Most important is what Washington provides in aid. Shirl
McArthur explained the direct part in his July 2006 Washington Report
on Middle East Affairs article titled "A Conservative Estimate of
Total Direct US Aid to Israel: $108 billion. He used data from a January
5, 2006 Congressional Research Service Report to Congress from 1949 through
a 2006 FY estimate. It totaled $98.72 billion. McArthur then added further
DOD "special projects" amounts of $9.24 billion for a grand
$108 billion total. Far and away, Israel is the largest recipient of US
aid in all forms.
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- It includes:
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- -- around $3 billion annually in direct aid;
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- -- billions more in low or no interest loans;
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- -- millions annually for immigrant resettlement on expropriated
Palestinian lands;
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- -- multi-billions in waved loan obligations; at least
$45 billion since 1974;
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- -- special multi-billion loan guarantees for aggressive
wars and to militarize and occupy Palestine;
-
- -- billions more in military aid; financial help to develop
Israel's defense industry; state-of-the-art technology; and the latest
US weapons;
-
- -- US guarantees for Israel's access to oil; and
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- -- open-checkbook amounts for joint initiatives in or
outside the region - all with imperial aims plus special requests honored,
including secret ones.
-
- The US-Israeli relationship has always been special.
More than ever under George Bush the way Ariel Sharon once boasted. With
good reason he said: "We have the US president under our control."
It advantages both sides but gravely harms most others. Another chilling
side of the Bush legacy to be continued under Barack Obama, who'll be
even more committed according to James Petras. He calls him "America's
First Jewish President" in a compelling new article easily accessible
online.
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