A-Changin' Times (ACT)
Born in the aftermath of 9/11, ACT has become as political as the times.
Now a blog for alternative news, views and rants offered with a twist, a song and a smile. Fair and balanced.

The Times They Are A-Changin'

Come writers and critics
Who prophesize [sic] with your pen
And keep your eyes wide
The chance won't come again
And don't speak too soon
For the wheel's still in spin
And there's no tellin' who
That it's namin'.
For the loser now
Will be later to win
For the times they are a-changin'.
 — Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan Copyright 1963
(1991 Special Rider)

"A-Changin' Times: taking the best from the past to make the most of the present and to create a better future."

"What marching through the streets was to the Sixties, walking through the halls of Congress is now."

 — Marianne Williamson

You're visiting a website that incorporates a blogging feature, not "just" a blog.

Blog entries follow, most recent entries at the top

Thursday, September 04, 2003

	:: DUG853		9/04/2003 09:25:00 PM

Court Blocks FCC Media Regs

A U.S. federal court on Wednesday blocked controversial new Federal Communications Commission media ownership rules pending a full judicial review in a major blow to large media companies.

In a loss for the Republican-led FCC, the three-judge panel of the Third U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia granted a stay order that prevented the new rules from taking effect as scheduled on Thursday.

Critics argued that the FCC rules would concentrate too much power in the hands of media moguls.

CONTINUE

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	:: DUG853		9/04/2003 08:18:00 PM

THINGS DUG UP BY DUG -- News and views from here and there


When will anyone admit that it has been a huge fraud?

Nothing, not a vial of the 38,000 liters of botulinum toxin or the 25,000 liters of anthrax or an ounce of the materials for the 500 tons of sarin, mustard and VX nerve agent claimed by George W. Bush in his State of the Union speech as justification for war.

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Human Rights American Style

"Under Saddam's regime, it took 48 days to re-establish electricity in Baghdad after the destruction of the first Gulf War," says Nahla, And she adds indignantly : "Why have the Americans, the most powerful country on the planet, not restored it more than four months after having destroyed our networks and infrastructure?

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Helen Thomas: 'National Security' Part Of Bush Plan To Gut Civil Services

The administration's sales pitch is to raise the specter of terrorism and 9-11 -- a surefire way to scare Congress into backing plans to gut the Civil Service system.

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Bush to Seek $60 Billion or More for Iraq

The White House has informed congressional leaders that it is preparing a new budget request for between $60 billion and $70 billion to help cover the mounting costs of the reconstruction and military occupation of Iraq.

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France, Germany Criticize Iraq Resolution

The comments from German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and French President Jacques Chirac were a response to the United States' proposed U.N. resolution seeking troops and money for Iraq's postwar reconstruction.

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Schroder says call for troops made him feel sick

Chancellor Gerhard Schroder has said a call from his Green Party coalition allies for German troops to join any United Nations force in Iraq made him "want to puke".

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U.S. gov says it'll miss deadline for destroying chemical weapons

Arab Times

"The US Defense Department said in a statement it will not
be to able to liquidate 45 percent of its chemical stockpile
by April 29, 2004, as required by the 1997Chemical Weapons
Convention."

Giving no reason for the failure, they've asked for a three-year extension. (9/4/03)

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	:: DUG853		9/04/2003 07:48:00 PM

Sunshine Project Statement on the NIAID Announcement
of Regional Centers of Biodefense Excellence

Today (4 September), the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Disease (NIAID) announced awards of Regional Centers of Biodefense Excellence (RCEs). (NIAID's press release: Click Here


The Sunshine Project makes the following statement:

"NIAID's announcement today will shift the focus of the biodefense debate away from backyard issues and towards critical questions of public accountability in the US biodefense program, particularly that portion funded through the Department of Health and Human Services.

"Biodefense appropriations appear to be leading Health and Human Services to undermine its own public disclosure policies. For example, it is very disturbing that NIAID has chosen to award an RCE to the University of Texas Medical Branch, whose institutional biosafety committee does not comply with the public access provisions of the NIH Guidelines for Recombinant DNA research.

"UTMB is currently the subject of an investigation by the NIH Office of Biotechnology Activities.

"The award to UTMB signals that NIAID does not prioritize the public's right to know about biodefense activities, and that it does not prioritize transparency that is critical to ensuring US treaty compliance and laboratory biosafety.

"In the coming months, as the Regional Biodefense Centers set about their business and awards for National Biodefense Laboratories (BSL-4s) are made, Health and Human Services must demonstrate a more serious commitment to public accountability at the biodefense facilities it funds, including ensuring compliance with the public access provisions of its own biotechnology regulations.

"Failure to do so will further damage waning international confidence in the United States' commitment to the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention, particularly because the United States has rejected strengthening of that agreement to require international declaration and inspection of biodefense facilities."


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A longer document, including analysis of the implications of today's announcement for construction of BSL-4 laboratories in the United States is available online at:

Click Here

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Wednesday, September 03, 2003

	:: DUG853		9/03/2003 12:55:00 PM

Al Franken takes on the conservative media establishment with his fifth book "Lies And the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right."


Q&A: AL FRANKEN
By Robert J. Nebel, AlterNet

Intro excerpt:

From all of the press he has received over his trademark-infringement lawsuit with the FOX News Network, it is quite obvious that Franken has no problem naming names in the right-wing media, as well as high-ranking conservative politicos. Among those Franken discredits are author Ann Coulter, television-radio host Bill O'Reilly and television-radio host Sean Hannity. Whether on the issue of tax cuts, patriotism, the military or the environment, all three are taken to task for their "deceitful take" on political and social issues.

THE INTERVIEW

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	:: DUG853		9/03/2003 11:23:00 AM

Bin Laden family allowed 9/11 leave

NEW YORK, Sept. 2 (UPI) -- The bin Laden family were granted extraordinary White House privileges to fly out of U.S. airspace following the attacks of Sept. 11th, 2001.

Former White House counter terrorism expert Richard Clarke told Vanity Fair the Bush administration decided to allow a group of Saudis to fly out of U.S. airspace just after Sept. 11-- a time when access to the United States was still restricted and required special government approval

CONTINUE

[It's good to be reminded of ancient history from time to time. The better to connect the dots our own selves. -v]

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Tuesday, September 02, 2003

	:: DUG853		9/02/2003 11:15:00 AM

LIBERTY ACTION OF THE WEEK

Celebrate Jury Rights Day
by Mary Lou Seymour

"Why aren't juries routinely informed about their power to vote their conscience and thus nullify bad law?

"Why isn't the jury's power to 'judge the law as well as the facts' (Supreme Court Chief Justice John Jay instructed jurors that the jury has "a right ... to determine the law as well as the fact in controversy" in Georgia vs. Brailsford, 1794) taught in school as part of a citizen's 'civic duty?'

"Well, since it's the state that runs the court and the schools, it's hardly surprising that jurors and potential jurors won't find out about their right to overturn state laws from the state."

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Monday, September 01, 2003

	:: DUG853		9/01/2003 08:17:00 PM

America's Double Standard Infuriates Rest Of The World
By Max Castro


08/26/03: (Miami Herald) Recently I talked with a very decent, earnest man, a civil servant in the State Department. His job is ''public diplomacy.''

He tries to explain and justify U.S. foreign policy to people in other countries. I told him
he had a very hard job. Every poll in the last few years shows a huge drop in the United States' image in the world.

And that was before last week, when the U.S. government approved a program that allows the shooting down of civilian aircraft and two days later indicted three Cuban military officers for shooting down two civilian aircraft:

• On Tuesday, the United States gave its blessing to a program -- known in bureaucratic doublespeak as the ''Airbridge Denial Program'' -- that allows Colombian fighter pilots to shoot down unarmed civilian aircraft suspected of carrying drugs.
[Emphasis added.]

The program was suspended two years ago after an American missionary and her infant daughter were killed when their plane was mistaken for a drug plane.

U.S. officials say now there are sufficient safeguards to prevent a similar tragedy.
Notwithstanding, as Michael L. Evans, director of the Colombia Documentation Project at the National Security Archive, wrote Thursday in The Herald, the program ignores international law.

The International Civil Aviation Organization's rule holds that governments ''must refrain from resorting to the use of weapons against civil aircraft in flight.''

The State Department's own legal advisor wrote that the ``prohibition applies whether or not the aircraft in question is suspected of engaging in criminal activity.´´

He also wrote: ``Mistakes are likely to occur under any policy that contemplates the use of weapons against civil aircraft in flight, even as a last resort.´´

• On Thursday, the U.S. government indicted for murder two Cuban fighter pilots and the former head of the country's air force for shooting down two unarmed Brothers to the Rescue civilian aircraft in international waters near Cuban air space, resulting in four deaths.

The Cuban government claims the action was justified because Brothers to the Rescue aircraft had engaged in repeated violations of Cuban air space and posed a danger to safety and national security.

But the planes were unarmed civilian aircraft, and when the United States took the case to the International Civil Aviation Organization, the body ruled against the Cuban government.

Of course, the cases are not exactly equivalent.

The missionaries' plane was shot down by mistake, while the Brothers to the Rescue plane was shot down on purpose.

And drug dealers are not comparable to political protesters.

[When non-violent persons are incarcerated (sometimes for LIFE), it seems to me that they're called "Political Prisoners" by the American Media/Government in every country except America! --DUG]

But the shooting down of civilian aircraft is a violation of international aviation rules no matter who is on board.

The differences in the cases do not make the glaring inconsistency in the U.S. position any less evident -- or any less familiar.

It's another instance -- though not as dramatic as Iraq or global warming -- in which our government resorts to international organizations and laws when it agrees with the position and ignores them when it doesn't.

It is this double standard that infuriates so many people in the world: insisting others play by the rules, while we bend them at will because we can.

In the short run, the United States has enough force to make up the rules as it goes along, as it did when it went into Iraq. But, as the Iraq case shows, the cost of defying the rules and the international community is steep. Even megapowers need friends.

The Lone Ranger always prevails in the movies. In the real world, there are a lot more Indians.

SOURCE

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	:: DUG853		9/01/2003 02:49:00 PM

New tolerance movement needed?
by Kevin Joseph Tull, Liberty for All


"Either we are a country of free responsible adults or we are a nation of intolerant wimps and busybodies who must have government force peaceful people to adhere to our version of morality.

"Let's keep in mind one thing though as we consider using the force of government to impose our morality upon all.

"Someone else may consider your peaceful lifestyle to be immoral and worthy of forceful government intervention ...." (08/27/03)

Excerpted From---Click Here

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Sunday, August 31, 2003

	:: DUG853		8/31/2003 11:51:00 PM

Rogue State Department
By David Bedein, FrontPageMagazine.com | August 25, 2003


The US Constitution mandates that the US Congress, the elected representatives of the American people, must advise and consent the US Administration in matters of foreign policy.

The time has come for the American people to make State Department policies accountable to the  the US Senate Foreign RelationsCommittee, the US House International Relations Committee, the media and the American electorate.

In at least twenty critical matters of Middle East foreign policy, the US State Department has acted independently of US Congressional approval in its implementation of Middle East policy.

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	:: DUG853		8/31/2003 09:31:00 PM

THINGS DUG UP BY DUG -- News and views from here and there

The Grinch That Stole Labor Day
By Greg Palast


In celebration of the working person's holiday, Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao has announced the Bush Administration's plan to end the 60-year-old law which requires employers to pay time-and-a-half for overtime.

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Loyalty Day

[This is insane, IMO. -- DUG]

Excerpt:

This Loyalty Day, as we express allegiance to our Nation and its founding ideals, we resolve to ensure that the blessings of liberty endure and extend for generations to come.

The Congress, by Public Law 85-529, as amended, has designated May 1 of each year as "Loyalty Day," and I ask all Americans to join me in this day of celebration and in reaffirming our allegiance to our Nation.

NOW, THEREFORE, I, GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States of America, do hereby proclaim May 1, 2003, as Loyalty Day. I call upon all the people of the United States to join in support of this national observance.

CONTINUE

[Not much was made of this this year but, I dare say, if we don't do something now about checks and balanced, much more will be made of it next year! -v]

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	:: DUG853		8/31/2003 08:08:00 PM

Frankensteins in the Pentagon
DARPA's Creepy Bioengineering Program
By Cheryl Seal
25 August 2003

DARPA Bioengineering Program Seeks to Turn Soldiers Into Cyborgs


Not long ago, the public was stunned by the practical and moral idiocy of the Pentagon researcher (and unprosecuted war criminal) John Poindexter, who proposed a 'football pool' scheme for predicting terrorist attacks.

We all laughed at such insanity and were relieved to see the scheme speedily deep-sixed.

However, this bit of lunacy was just the lightest ice in the tip of the very large, very dark iceberg that the Pentagon's research program, better known as DARPA, has become.

Just a few weeks before the bizarro world 'terrorism gambling' project was exposed, a DARPA (which stands for Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency)-sponsored conference was held in Washington, DC, that showcased the latest love child of the Bush Pentagon: military bioengineering.

The euphemisms being used by the Pentagon to disguise the true nature of this research are being spread as thick as bondo and cheap paint at a used car lot. For example, the title of the conference was: 'Harvesting Biology for Defense Technology,' while the subheading of the section on human 'bioengineering' was entitled, rather ominously, in light of the military's history, 'Enhancing Human Performance.'

So how does the Bush DARPA seek to 'enhance' human performance?

In a kinder, gentler administration, the solution would be better training, better food, better pay, more leave time, and greater use of stress-reducing duty rotations.

But this is not a kinder, gentler -or even rational- administration. Bush and Company plan to enhance soldier performance by squeezing the most that can be humanly -and not so humanly- squeezed from troops without having to resort to anything as primitive as decent pay.

Their motto:

Get the most human output for the least human input: After all, it's the corporate way!

Here are some examples of DARPA 'Human-enhancing' schemes:

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