May 10 2010

BP Flouted US Safety Rules

By Jason Leopold
May 5, 2010

Editor’s Note: A common thread through recent disasters – the Wall Street financial collapse, the fatal West Virginia coal mine explosion and the huge oil spill from one of BP’s offshore rigs – has been a lack of effective government oversight.

Indeed, over the past three decades as Republicans and the Right expanded their power (often allied with pro-corporation Democrats), big companies have acted with growing confidence in putting profits before safety, as Jason Leopold notes in this guest article about other BP violations:

The troubles of oil giant BP are not limited to its Gulf of Mexico operations, where a deadly blast aboard a drilling rig two weeks ago ruptured an oil well 5,000 feet below the sea’s surface and triggered a massive oil leak that is now the size of a small country.

The oil conglomerate is also facing serious charges from the Labor Department’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) that it “willfully” failed to implement safety measures at its Texas City refinery, the third largest in the country, following an explosion that killed 15 employees and injured 170 others five years ago.

OSHA found BP to be in violation of more than 300 health and safety regulations and, in 2005, fined the company $21.4 million, at the time the largest in OSHA’s history. In 2007, BP paid a $50 million fine and pleaded guilty to a felony for not having written guidelines in place at the refinery and for exposing employees to toxic emissions.

BP was placed on three years’ probation and the Justice Department agreed not to pursue additional criminal charges against the company as long as BP agreed to undertake a series of OSHA-ordered corrective safety measures at the refinery. BP also settled with the victims’ families for $1.6 billion.

Several investigations launched in the aftermath of the refinery explosion concluded that BP’s aggressive cost-cutting efforts in the area of safety, the use of outdated refinery equipment and overworked employees contributed to the blast.
John Bresland, chairman of the independent U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB), said the blast occurred “when a distillation tower flooded with hydrocarbons and was over-pressurized, causing a geyser-like release from the vent stack. The hydrocarbons found an ignition source [a truck that backfired] and exploded.”

Bresland, whose organization spent two years probing the circumstances behind the explosion, said CSB’s investigation “found organizational and safety deficiencies at all levels of the BP Corporation.”

“Our investigation team turned up extensive evidence showing a catastrophe waiting to happen,” Bresland said on March 24, the fifth anniversary of the refinery explosion. “Cost-cutting had affected safety programs and critical maintenance; production pressures resulted in costly mistakes made by workers likely fatigued by working long hours; internal audits and safety studies brought problems to the attention of BP’s board in London, but they were not sufficiently acted upon. ”

Failure to Comply
Since the settlement, according to OSHA, BP has not only failed to comply with its terms but has knowingly committed hundreds of new violations that continue to endanger its refinery workers.

“When BP signed the OSHA settlement from the March 2005 explosion, it agreed to take comprehensive action to protect employees,” Labor Secretary Hilda Solis said in a statement last October. “Instead of living up to that commitment, BP has allowed hundreds of potential hazards to continue unabated.”

“The fact that there are so many still outstanding life-threatening problems at this plant indicates that they still have a systemic safety problem in this refinery,” added acting Assistant Labor Secretary for OSHA Jordan Barab.

OSHA then imposed a record $87 million fine against the company, surpassing the previous record – also against BP – in 2005.
A Justice Department spokesperson did not respond to questions as to whether BP’s alleged failure to comply with its settlement agreement would expose the company to further criminal charges. However, last October, Angela Dodge, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney’s office in Houston, said the Justice Department “will take all appropriate actions to ensure the plea agreement is not violated.”

Some of BP’s new violations have already resulted in additional fatalities at the refinery, according to OSHA.

On July 22, 2006, OSHA said a contractor was crushed between a “scissor lift and a pipe rack.” On June 5, 2007, another contractor was electrocuted “on a light circuit in the [refinery’s] process area.” On Jan. 14, 2008, an employee was killed when the top head of a pressure vessel blew off. On Oct. 9, 2008, a contractor was hit by a front-end loader and died from his injuries.

BP has vehemently denied OSHA’s charges and has formally contested the proposed penalties.

“We continue to believe we are in full compliance with the Settlement Agreement … we strongly disagree with OSHA’s conclusions,” said Texas City Refinery Manager Keith Casey. “We believe our efforts at the Texas City refinery to improve process safety performance have been among the most strenuous and comprehensive that the refining industry has ever seen.”

BP says it invested $1 billion on safety and operational improvements at the refinery and believed it had more time to fulfill its commitments under the settlement agreement, according to a letter that BP attorney Thomas Wilson sent to OSHA. BP may end up fighting the charges in federal court.

Still, as highlighted in a January 2007 report issued by a panel chaired by former Secretary of State James Baker III, systemic issues related to BP’s process safety were not limited to its Texas City refinery, but rather were widespread.

In 2007, BP had entered into a settlement with OSHA over safety issues at the Husky refinery in Toledo, Ohio, a 50-50 joint venture between BP and Canadian-based Husky Energy, Inc.
During an inspection last September, OSHA found that BP was in compliance with the earlier agreement but discovered “numerous violations at the plant not previously covered” by the settlement.

In March, OSHA issued a new set of charges against BP in March for “willful” violations at Husky, “including 39 on a per-instance basis, and 20 alleged serious violations for exposing workers to a variety of hazards including failure to provide adequate pressure relief for process units,” issues that appear to be identical to those that led to the Texas City explosion in 2005.

“OSHA has found that BP often ignored or severely delayed fixing known hazards in its refineries,” Solis said. “There is no excuse for taking chances with people’s lives. BP must fix the hazards now.”

Also notable about the nearly two dozen alleged violations at Husky was that one matches allegations leveled against BP a year ago by a whistleblower who said the company had been operating its Gulf Coast drilling platform Atlantis without a majority of the necessary engineering and design documents, a violation of federal law.

Atlantis is the world’s largest and deepest semi-submersible oil and natural gas platform, located about 200 miles south of New Orleans. The whistleblower said BP was risking a catastrophic oil spill even worse than the disaster now unfolding in the Gulf of Mexico after the Deepwater Horizon platform exploded and sank two weeks ago.


May 8 2010

Saturday Night show, May 8, 2010 – 9pmEST 6pmPST

Segment 1 – Media Matters
Segment 2 – Barking from the Floor – Audio from Wall Street
Segment 3 – Audio from CSPAN-Debate on Prosecuting Detainees
Segment 4 – Interview with Col. Morris Davis
Segment 5 – Interview with Jason Leopold on BP/Halliburton catastrophe

Listen Now

Listen NowWe hope you’ll join us on our debut show here at VeracityRadio.com Our listening link will be available before airtime. CLICK HERE TO LISTEN I think we have a stellar lineup for you: 1. ) Media Matters For America’s Brian Frederick on Michael Scheuer’s apocalyptic obsessions 2.) Jason Leopold on BP’s devastation to the Gulf and related threads 3.) Ret. Guantanamo Chief Prosecutor Col. Morris Davis 4.) Andy Worthington discusses the latest information on Gitmo detainees It has been a busy news week and we hope to go over some of those stories tonight. Stay tuned for call-in opportunities as we work out our phone wiring.


May 5 2010

Col. Morris Davis-Perfecting a More Perfect Union

(editors note: I want to thank Col. Morris Davis for letting us reprint his words here for you to share.)

My father was a 100 percent disabled veteran of World War II. He left home a healthy man in the prime of life and returned seriously disabled by a broken back during a training accident. My earliest memories are of him going to the Bowman-Gray Hospital at Wake Forest University for multiple surgeries, spending weeks at home in bed in a full-body plaster cast, his back and leg braces and crutches, and the hand-controls that let him drive without using the gas or brake pedals. Like many of his generation – and like many of the men and women I see now at Walter Reed Army Medical Center – there was never a word of bitterness over what he lost, only pride in his country and a bond with others who served in defense of democracy.

Robert Hutchins, former Dean of the Yale Law School and Chancellor of the University of Chicago, said “The death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination from ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference, and undernourishment.”

I believe that living in a democracy is a privilege, not a right, and each citizen has a duty to do his or her part to ensure the privilege isn’t lost to future generations. That was a lesson I learned from my father at an early age. I joined the Air Force a few months after he died and served for 25 years, in part because of his example.

Volunteers for military service aren’t apathetic or indifferent about democracy. They pledge to support and defend the Constitution, and many make the ultimate sacrifice; I saw proof every morning when I drove by the white stone markers aligned in rows at Arlington National Cemetery on my way to work. We owe them a duty to do more than just passively surrender to the challenges we face; we have an obligation to participate in working towards solutions.

It says something when we cast nearly as many votes to select the next American Idol as we do to select the next American president, when more can name the “Plus Eight” that belong to Jon and Kate than the eight members of the Supreme Court remaining when Justice John Paul Stevens (Navy veteran) retires, and when Tiger Woods wrecking his marriage and his SUV is the lead story on the national news. Too many of us are too absorbed with the superficial world of celebrities and the schadenfreude of their calamitous lives.

The most basic duty of citizenship is participation, something Americans do less than citizens of most other countries. Almost all eligible voters in Australia – about 95 percent – cast ballots in national elections; typically a little more than half of eligible voters in the U.S. do the same. That’s a sad fact. There is no excuse for being uninformed on issues and there is no excuse for not voting. In my view, you forfeit the right to pontificate if you’re too lazy to participate.

I’m involved in the Coffee Party, a group that promotes civil discussion about issues and greater public participation in the political process. I don’t believe any political party or any group along the ideological spectrum has a monopoly on good ideas, and I believe we should be able to discuss issues and ideas without hurling insults and threats. We seem to lose sight of the fact that we’re all in this together.

We have the power and the ability to prove Hutchins wrong and to advance the ideal the Founding Fathers envisioned – continuing to perfect the union, doing justice, insuring domestic tranquility, providing for the common defense, promoting the general welfare, and passing these privileges along to those that follow – if we just have the will.


May 5 2010

All About The Staffers

Voting isn’t the end of a process, but a sort of beginning. So why do so many voters treat it as a finishline instead of a hiring date? Imagine if employers in other fields did this. You start your job after a rigorous process with interviewers, fill out elaborate forms, turn in your resume, buy a new wardrobe and then…everyone leaves and expects you to handle everything.

When an election is finished and the oaths of office are taken, do you know which staffers are hired to do the work of writing the bills, handling constituent issues, and competing for vocal space for your pet issues?

I am by no means the perfect citizen. I do however have a facility for working with my representative’s staff and would like to invite you to considering getting to know yours. In my case, I have a representative who easy to get along with but doesn’t always vote my way on everything. But that isn’t my largest concern. I am more concerned with not knowing what to ask, how to ask it, or having a scope of what Congress can achieve when it comes to matters close to heart.

The staff at my reps office respond to me with quality information and leads. They are quick to point out when they really have no ability to help and direct me to better resources. I’ve had to consult with them about pending legislation, existing legislation, understanding the different portions of our government and how best to relate to them. In my business field, I have interests vital to growth and regulations. I know precisely which staffer to call if I want a response that helps. My Rep doesn’t necessarily know all these answers.

When we had an issue with immigration last year for a family member, the staff went into overtime to explain to us the options in this ever growing morass of immigration law. When I needed to get up to the minute information on pending legislation regarding FISA, the staff was quick to let me know what changes were happening.

I’m probably in a unique district where my representative will call me from time to time. If yours does not, then I’d hold them to that. My representative seems to have at least a sense of the employee/employer relationship bestowed by the constituents. But it is sad to say that I doubt many of my district neighbors know the hard work his staff does for us each and every day without much of a thanks.

Even if you need to hold your representative accountable for some bad deed or decision, you might also need to see what staff that person hired. Are they hiring quality staff or just ideologue buddies from their latest winger thinktank, either right or left?

Either way, if you know the staff under your representative, you’ll have a fairly complete view of Your business; the districts business as well.

SO HERE’S TO THE STAFFERS!!!
Thank you!

Congress isn’t made up of just 435 in one chamber and 98- in the other. Those staffers matter. If you can learn to talk with them, your participation in this ‘democracy’ might be more effective
Share your stories of working with staffers at our site, VeracityRadio.com


Apr 30 2010

New CSPAN video library and its impact on blogging and research

I’ve been recording television news for over a decade. The greatest bulk of recordings are from CSPAN. With hundreds of hours of hearings, press conferences, speeches, and special presentations, CSPAN has kept my VCRs, DVDRs, and computers busy for so long I can’t fathom the time. What started as a need to gather actualities from public officials morphed into watching for the sparse moments of accountability.

Well CSPAN has really outdone itself with its latest offering. According to them, their entire video library is online. I’ve scanned it and let me tell you, it is quite impressive. Clearly this isn’t every video feed ever covered, but they have done a really good job at referencing important materials that are key to any research of public government and private voices about governance.
Try for yourself: CSPAN Library

Or if you type in a keyword like Rumsfeld, you can get over 400 videos so far:
Rumsfeld

As a blogger, a researcher, and a media hound, I have to be able to find relevant source material fairly quickly or I can either lose focus on the story, be interrupted with pressing current events, or lose leads on information. It is a relief that I am able to say to myself, “Ok, George Bush spoke about Abu Zubaydah on September 6, 2006, being a high value detainee”, and then deciding I need to go back and visit the words and account before compared to what is publicly known later.

There are times when the video record can completely change my understanding of older issues. I might notice a congress member for the first time, be reminded of one who is now gone (Tom Delay, Tom Daschle, Ted Kennedy), or one who was grilled before our eyes, Alberto Gonzales.

I love that I can now search to precise moments in time where officials testified, spoke publicly, or were the subjects of other panel inquiry. We’ll be filling in several older articles with CSPAN video and creating a weekly archives visit to key moments in our history.

We’ll still be digitizing the tapes we have just in case CSPAN ever takes the library down, but we are deeply thankful and impressed with their efforts.
To Start us of this post, lets visit the speech George Bush gave to the CIA on September 26, 2001:

There are some videos that do not have embed tags, but you can watch them at CSPAN’s site and link to them from articles or your favorite social media pages. But when the videos can be embedded into a blogger’s page it helps the reader complete the picture with contemporary coverage by the only channel focused on watching U.S. government process and related politics.


Apr 29 2010

Conservative and Liberal Pillagers Master the Art of Pandering

By Morris Davis
Reprinted from AndyWorthington.co.uk

If it was a crime to misappropriate a word or phrase — to treat it like you own it and toss it around arbitrarily whenever it suits your purposes — then some prominent conservatives and liberals would be serving hard time. Of course there don’t seem to be any real consequences when there’s literal theft in the world of politics, so it’s a pipe dream to imagine there would be any consequences for pillaging the vocabulary, but it’s still a good thought.

Conservatives stole the word “patriot.” They hot-wired the ignition and drove it away like they had the title in their back pocket. Join the Tea Party and become a Tea Party Patriot. Go to the TPP website and “join the fight for liberty.” Buy Karl Rove’s book and read how Dick Cheney is a patriot. If you think Sarah Palin is wonderful and President Obama is a socialist then you’re a patriot, too. The clear message is that if you haven’t embraced the far right agenda then by default you have to be an unpatriotic liberty hater.

As a military veteran who spent a quarter-century in uniform, I take offense when people like Beck, Palin, Limbaugh, Hannity, O’Reilly, Gingrich, Cheney (Dick and Liz), Rove, Malkin, Coulter, and Dick Morris — a dozen chest thumping right wing war hawks who’ve amassed personal fortunes wrapping themselves in the patriot banner and stoking the anger of the base with their “you’re either with us or against us” blather, but who felt they had more important things to do when each of them had the opportunity to serve in the nation’s armed forces — imply that veterans who answered the call of duty but don’t ascribe to their hateful fear-based ideology are unpatriotic and something other than “real Americans.” It’s disappointing, too, that so many ordinary Americans are drawn to these PINOs (Patriots In Name Only) like mosquitoes to the alluring blue light in a bug zapper. There are patriots of all stripes who love this country. No one, and no one ideology, has the right to treat the word like it’s theirs exclusively.

Liberals like to throw around the phrase “rule of law.” Let the Iranians or the North Koreans do something we don’t approve of and we excoriate them for their lack of respect for the rule of law. President Obama goes on a secret trip to Afghanistan and encourages Afghan President Hamid Karzai to institutionalize the rule of law. The administration’s nominee to head the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, Dawn Johnsen, withdraws from further consideration for the post and the White House releases a statement praising her “commitment to the rule of law.”

The rule of law means everyone — let me repeat, everyone — is accountable to laws that are publicly promulgated, equally enforced and independently adjudicated. The Torture Statute, publicly promulgated federal law codified in the United States Code, says torture is a criminal offense. Likewise, the United Nations Convention Against Torture, to which the United States is signatory, requires the investigation of allegations of torture and the criminal prosecution of offenders. There is no opt-out provision in either statute that lets the government choose to ignore the law when it’s not politically expedient or might prove to be unpleasant.

So how can the Obama administration say with a straight face that the United States is the champion of the rule of law and others should step up and follow our example when the administration deliberately ignores criminal accountability for the torture of some of the detainees captured in the global war on terrorism? Susan Crawford, who until recently served as the head of the Defense Department’s Office of Military Commissions, told Bob Woodward in an interview published in the Washington Post in January 2009 why she refused to send charges against Mohammed al Qahtani, the alleged 20th hijacker, to trial. She said, “We tortured al Qahtani. His treatment met the legal definition of torture.”

Susan Crawford is no left-leaning human rights zealot; she was General Counsel of the Army during the Reagan administration, Dick Cheney’s Inspector General at the Defense Department, and she was appointed to her military commission post by Defense Secretary Bob Gates during the Bush-Cheney years. So what was the rule of law loving Obama administration’s reaction to this admission by a senior Defense Department official that our government engaged in torture?  Key the sounds of crickets chirping.

In an age when the public seems to have the attention span of a gnat, buzz words and trite slogans get traction. It doesn’t matter if there is any real substance behind the words so long as they stick. Maybe that’s acceptable in commercial marketing, but it’s not in democratic governance. We have a right to expect better from those who purport to pull the levers of power. When they’re talking the talk they should mean what they say. The two sides have pretty much succeeded in trashing our country; the least they can do is stop trashing our vocabulary.


Apr 27 2010

Center for Constitutional Rights- The Torture Team

This site is a must see for accountability resources. Thanks to the Center for Constitutional Rights for this work.


Apr 23 2010

Cheney’s best was “go f— yourself”

When Dick Cheney spouted off to Patrick Leahy, he accomplished the best thing he ever did. Who says so? Dick says so.

“That’s sort of the best thing I ever did.”, he exclaimed to Dennis “I lost my principles and backbone on 9/11” Miller. When put into perspective on the entirety of his career, his public activities and the consequences of his fanatical push to control as many parts of the world as he could…this was his finest hour.

Now, I know that Cheney was being rather silly here with Miller. It does show the level at which he operates. In his world, he’s absolutely sure of each of his decisions. He shows no remorse for any decision he’s asked about.

“Mr. Cheney do you regret that we didn’t find WMD?”, “No.”

“Do you regret that we tortured people?”, “Not at all.”

“Do you regret eavesdropping on American conversations and data so you could control everything in your little War on Terror?”, “No, we took appropriate action to save lives.”

“What was your finest hour?”, “Telling Patrick Leahy to go Fuck himself.”

What a testimony to this piss and vinegar draft dodger who talks tough but only puts others’ lives on the line. Dick, it is easy to talk tough when others do your fighting. Your finest hour wasn’t your military service for this country to match your military driven exploits later as a civilian bureaucrat. Your finest hour wasn’t found in an honest campaign to save American lives. No, your finest hour was walking through the halls of governance and telling a political opponent to go “fuck yourself” because he dared do his job of oversight.

Mr. Cheney, you’re an unindicted war criminal. I guess I don’t begrudge you reminiscing about your finest moment with a low level crow like Miller in your little echo chamber chit-chat. It fits you, well.


Apr 21 2010

A little bit of reality about Texas secession

I was born in Missouri. I’m not really someone who thinks about who I am in terms of Missouri when I consider the “show me” slogan, then I can say I like that I was born there. However, I grew up in Texas where the majority of my family was from. We have been living in this state, Oklahoma, Louisiana and Arkansas for about 7 to 10 generations on average. Many in my family were here before statehood, were in Oklahoma when it was “Indian territory”, and to this day I still find more and more information about my family and my wife’s family who is also deeply rooted for many generations from the first settlers in the Panhandle of Texas. Heck, even my brother worked in the Texas Senate as a staffer.

Now down here in Texas, we like things our way. This comes as no surprise to anyone because I’m sure that’s true just about anywhere. I’m sure there are some uppity Canadians near Calgary or some very territorial Arizonans near Tombstone. But I have to say that, in Texas, we really know how to build a myth and tall tale like few others.

The Lone Star State is more than a name; it is an attitude. Stand Alone, Act Tough, Be Independent, and most of all, don’t eat Salsa made in New Jersey

Having journeyed around the state I know that it is more diverse in land than people. But mostly it is a state that lags behind in many areas while doing pretty well in others. Our education system is a wreck. We were one of the few states to stay solvent during the crisis by having stored up reserves for a rainy day. And we have a part time legislature that meets, get this…on the second Tuesday in January of each odd-numbered year for a total of 140 days.

Move into the modern era? Not any time soon.

(Note: I grew up right next to NASA, with kids of NASA employees, and live in one of the most advanced cities when it comes to research, medical, and other…but those are not the rules of thumb for the state so don’t get distracted by exceptions.)

All of this greatness must come from a divine source, certainly. Texas must be so unique that it doesn’t really need the United States, right?

Well the Texas Legislature didn’t think so in March of 1866 when it voted to rescind the previous decision to secede and went even further to specifically declare the right to secede “distinctly renounced”. But today the Governor of Texas lies pathologically from a myth he wants to revive on top of the evidence that such a myth is settled law. Texas already said to itself, without need for the Supreme Court of the United States, we do not have the right to secede:

An Ordinance, Declaring the Ordinance of Secession Null and Void

March 15, 1866

“Be it ordained by the people of Texas in Convention assembled, That we acknowledge the supremacy of the Constitution of the United States, and the laws passed in pursuance thereof; and that an Ordinance adopted by a former Convention of the people of Texas on the 1st day of February, A.D. 1861, entitled “An Ordinance to Dissolve the Union between the State of Texas and the other States, united under the compact styled ‘Constitution of the United States of America,'” be and the same is hereby declared null and void; and the right heretofore claimed by the State of Texas to secede from the Union, is hereby distinctly renounced. Passed 15th March, 1866.

SOURCE:

The Constitution of the State of Texas, as Amended by the Delegates in Convention Assembled, Austin, 1866. Austin: Printed at the Southern Intelligencer Office, 1866, p. 32.”

Now the reason I know this law so well is that every year we have a celebration if you will, or a memorial if you want, to Juneteenth. This is the day the Union soldiers under Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger (ironically his first ever battle was in Missouri) arrived and said:

“On June 19, 1865

The people of Texas are informed that, in accordance with a proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free. This involves an absolute equality of personal rights and rights of property between former masters and slaves, and the connection heretofore existing between them becomes that between employer and hired labor. The freedmen are advised to remain quietly at their present homes and work for wages. They are informed that they will not be allowed to collect at military posts and that they will not be supported in idleness either there or elsewhere.“

Now mind you, Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation was to take effect on January 1, 1863, 3 years before Texas slaves would be finally freed. It would be another year before the Texas Legislature would codify the reality of secession on March 15, 1866.

The governor of Texas should know this. He has no respect for this because basically he’s a posturing political prick in the same nature as the posturing political prick before him, George W. Bush. He dresses the part as if he’s walked right out of a scene in “Maverick”. As a citizen of this state, I’m not going to let him go on this without at the least pointing out the history he ignores and the consequences of his ignorance.

Essentially he is ignoring some of the key reconciliation actions that took place at the end of the Civil War and the additional insult leaped upon slaves in Texas by not releasing them until the U.S. military arrived and made them do so. Each year we celebrate Juneteenth and his rhetoric flies in the face of this celebration.

But worse than that, Mr. Perry sets up a political stance that is based in lies while addressing national issues, state issues, and leading those who listen to him down a failed path of political nonsense. I happen to not want a national mandate. He says he doesn’t want a national mandate. I don’t want an inflated Federal system. He says he doesn’t want an inflated Federal system. I can do this without floating on myths about my state. He bathes in lies about the state, expresses his hypocrisy by taking Federal resources while pandering to Texas nationalists, and acts frequently as a unitary executive dictator. (SEE: HPV virus mandatory vaccinations, overturned by his own party and supported by Texas Dems.)

One need not lie about their history to stand for or against something. But to lie about my state, the State of Texas in order to make a political point, well…as we say down here, them’s may be fightin’ words.

UPDATE: For the couple of folks here who insist on some other “illegal government” claims or that somehow the March 15, 1866 order to rescind the previous secession claims aren’t settled law, feel free to call the Texas Legislative Library in Austin: 512-463-1252 and ask if there were ever any updates to this legal activity. They will clearly tell you that 1.) they get a lot of calls lately on this, and 2.) it has no updates since March 15, 1866. I do my research well in advance of print. As I said my brother worked in the Texas Senate so this isn’t all that hard to settle when you know who to call. Go ahead and ask them, settle it for yourselves.


Apr 21 2010

Worthington: Judge in Slahi case demolished US al-Qaida claims.

Andy Worthington has a new article:
Mohamedou Ould Salahi: How a Judge Demolished the US Government’s Al-Qaeda Claims

He points out the stack of cards that is the Bush/Cheney administration’s detainee terrorism policy. Basically, take in prisoners on bounties, give them no chance to hear what they are accused of,  arrange for them to be tried in the courts with the lowest level of evidential standards, then proclaim yourself the victor in “the war on terror”.

Worthington has done exhaustive research into the cases and backgrounds of most of the detainees. He has demonstrated very well that the government is resting the majority of its case on hearsay from detainees that were captured and sold to Americans for money.