Justice Dept "Influence of Drug Trafficking Organizations" in the United States; Various theories connecting 9/11 to Sibel Edmonds, drug money, heroin, PROMIS and those Israelis watched by the DEA

"When I ran into the drugs I was told that if I mentioned the money to the drugs around 9/11 that would be the end of me."

--Indira Singh

The 9/11 terror plot itself, intersected with the activities of a drug trafficking network of international scope, in ways that form a "crystal clear" picture of what was going on -- to quote Sibel Edmonds.

Fintan Dunne, Editor BreakForNews.com (at this link, Daniel Ellsberg's support of Edmonds is noted - Ellsberg was cool on Colbert Report this week)

SIBEL: Essentially, there is only one investigation – a very big one, an all-inclusive one. Completely by chance, I, a lowly translator, stumbled over one piece of it. But I can tell you there are a lot of people involved, a lot of ranking officials, and a lot of illegal activities that include multi-billion-dollar drug-smuggling operations, black-market nuclear sales to terrorists and unsavory regimes, you name it. And of course a lot of people from abroad are involved. It's massive. So to do this investigation, to really do it, they will have to look into everything.

CD: But you can start from anywhere –

SIBEL: That's the beauty of it. You can start from the AIPAC angle. You can start from the Plame case. You can start from my case. They all end up going to the same place, and they revolve around the same nucleus of people. There may be a lot of them, but it is one group. And they are very dangerous for all of us.

'The Stakes Are Too High for Us to Stop Fighting Now', An interview with FBI whistleblower Sibel Edmonds by Christopher Deliso

Now THIS is what I call a map. This comes directly from the National Drug Intelligence Center in the Department of Justice, National Drug Threat Assessment 2006, January 2006. Today I'm going to post a lot of stuff that I certainly don't consider the Gospel Truth. It's purely for your careful consideration with barrels of salt. So let's kick things off with the DOJ:

And this is just funny. I suspect the purple patches are notorious 'rebel zones' in the War on Drugs, where the federal and state government policies have split apart entirely. But they forgot eastern Tennessee... and of course everywhere else.

We will be returning to the one about the Russian-Israeli crime organizations. Florida drug money is connected to some of the loose ends around 9/11. The 9/11 drug money connection has many potential angles, but first note here that the DEA marks Miami as a key heroin and cocaine distribution area.

Now we're going into stuff that seems hard to believe, and beyond here, I don't claim that any of these people are telling the truth.

This is just a small slice of the material on the internet about how the rich & powerful skim huge amounts of cash out of the addicted masses of America through the profitable geopolitics of illicit drugs. Some people claim there is a strong connection between drug trafficking and 9/11 financing. Certainly all the players in Afghanistan since 1979 have been up to their ears in it, including the CIA and its favored contractors (who make up around half the CIA personnel these days).

This is certainly part of a trend towards the criminalization of war, which corresponds to the increasing privatization of war. We will have more on this angle in the coming days. Even if there are no operational links to the real September 11 conspiracy itself, the drug-militarization angle really needs to be investigated seriously, perhaps by a Democratic Congress with subpoena and immunity powers. Even snooping at possible loose 9/11 connections immediately reveals a world awash in drug money, with Bush and the Establishment generating vast cash flows from conflict zones - and enforcing loyalties among players from Afghanistan to South America by aligning these cash flows with military force. Sometimes privatized paramilitary forces. Why not?

"Kill the Messenger:" Sibel Edmonds is on the radar a bit more than usual, as they have apparently whipped up a documentary to expose more of her surreal role in the weird world of intelligence after 9/11, named appropriately enough, Kill the Messenger. (perhaps she shouldn't be trusted, one guy suggests) A blog supporting Edmonds' film, sibeledmonds.blogspot.com is operated by Lukery at wotisitgood4.blogspot.com, who has covered her case in detail. To recap what I have posted before, Edmonds worked as a translator at the FBI, where she discovered a conspiracy within her unit to cover up a Turkish espionage ring in the United States. One of her co-translators was spoofing the wiretaps for FBI agents, and when Edmonds tried to bring this to her superiors, they suppressed the whole thing. Also Dennis Hastert was taking big bribes from the Turks, and there is some kind of global nuclear parts trafficking conspiracy connected to the AQ Khan network and some Israeli mobster types - probably Marc Rich type guys. The guys running the secret nuclear trafficking network were enemies of the CIA's Brewster-Jennings counter-proliferation operations and Valerie Plame, adding yet another twisted concourse to that scandal. And the AIPAC stuff and Chalabi are laterally related, since so much of it revolves around the same neo-con cats in DC and their foreign allies.

Lukery summarized:

Sibel makes 2 specific related claims: a) Sibel claims that she has information which proves that senior officials knew that there were plans to attack America months before 9/11.

Specifically: "There was general information about the time-frame, about methods to be used but not specifically about how they would be used and about people being in place and who was ordering these sorts of terror attacks. There were other cities that were mentioned. Major cities with skyscrapers." and "President Bush said they had no specific information about 11 September and that is accurate but only because he said 11 September," she said. There was, however, general information about the use of airplanes and that an attack was just months away."
b) Sibel claims that she has evidence of a global multi-billion dollar smuggling/dealing network of weapons and drug which is hidden in plain view. Of course, there is also the requisite money-laundering infrastructure. She claims that the network comprises senior american government officials, terrorists, and 'unsavoury regimes.'

and they merge, giving us: "drug trafficking, money laundering, foreign names and American names directly involved in the financing of the 9-11 attacks on WTC (World Trade Center) and the Pentagon."

After a mere 3 months in the FBI, Edmonds publicly claims that all this stuff was going on, covered up at numerous levels in the federal government – though Ashcroft-era gag orders prevent her from sharing many aspects of the story. A virtual hailstorm of individual criminal conspiracies, involving top neo-cons, drug trafficking, all kinds of crazy shit. She has mentioned Coleen Rowley as an ally in the whistleblower field.

There is another potential side to this: Edmonds is herself possibly a red herring, a player or a dupe in the conspiracy, posing as an opponent. Conspiracy gurus suggest she might be a "limited hangout," or a channel to expose parts of the story, and fill other parts with disinformation. Edmonds comes from a prominent family in Turkey, so perhaps she has a bit of Turkish partisanship against some groups back home. One blogger named xymphora suggested she speaks the conspiracy-ese a bit too well:

"Edmonds sometimes makes me a bit nervous as she seems overly adept with the terms and arguments of conspiracy theory for someone who is supposed to have been a lowly FBI translator (it's like she's been reading Peter Dale Scott!). Is she part of the battle in Washington between the Bush Administration enablers involved in the drugs/arms business who don't mind directly or indirectly supporting al Qaeda if it is good for business, and those old-fashioned types who still consider that dealing with American enemies is treason?"

And she gives interviews with patently crazy people like Tom Flocco. Here is a fragment tying some of the neo-cons to some nasty shit:

Although Grossman "has not been as high profile in the press" FBI whistleblower Sibel Edmonds cryptically told me the other day, "don't overlook him – he is very important." She was not speaking about the Plame affair, though Grossman did indeed have a key role there, as we will see.

According to her, Grossman was one of three officials – the other two, she says, are Richard Perle and Douglas Feith – who had been watched by both Valerie Plame's Brewster Jennings & Associates CIA team, and by the major FBI investigation of organized crime and governmental corruption on which she herself was working until being terminated in April 2002.

Marc Grossman has served in a number of interesting countries and positions over the past 29 years. From 1976-1983, at a pivotal point in the Cold War, he was employed at the U.S. embassy in Pakistan – America's key regional ally, through which millions of dollars in weapons and other "aid" were delivered by Pakistan's ISI intelligence service to the mujahedin following the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979.

Grossman is definitely part of the Valerie Plame scandal, no doubt.
Well, it all still makes her story worth adding to the mixture. Here is the documentary trailer. Please let's take some bets if this will be aired in the United States.

Florida drug money angles (and there are many!) There was this funny story about one of the flight school proprietors in Florida who trained the 9/11 hijackers. The flight school owner was caught with 43 pounds of heroin just after the 9/11 hijackers got to his school, and somehow this story never got fully explored. See MadCowProd.com for a lot of amusing tales of south Floridian drug trafficking. It's worth considering what the site's proprietor Daniel Hopsicker says, "THE 9.11 HEROIN CONNECTION" is "The Biggest Censored Story of the 21st Century." He cites Thomas Pynchon: "If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don’t have to worry about answers."

More recently, and quite funny, is the "SkyWay Aircraft" case, where Tom DeLay's buddy + Homeland Security defense contractor accidentally getting busted with 5.5 tons of cocaine on a DC9 connected with the Titan defense contractor. Naturally, the DEA ducking and covering from obvious political pressure ensued. Good times. And perhaps this link is connected to Zacharias Moussaoui and 9/11 financing. (Bonus: MadCowProd says Adnan Kashoggi finances the 9/11 Truth Movement? Now that's what I call a conspiracy!)

Ruppert on Hawalas, PTECH, PROMIS, 9/11 and some heroin networks, BCCI-style. From Mike Ruppert's FromTheWilderness.com last year, "PTECH, 9/11, and USA-SAUDI TERROR: PART II" which offers some evidence that PROMIS software connected to 9/11, and possible narcotics / heroin money connections to 9/11. Ruppert himself offers a theory that advanced software like PROMIS was capable of manipulating computers throughout the financial sphere and the federal government. Ruppert's book Crossing the Rubicon suggests that Dick Cheney could have executed 9/11 himself by using PROMIS and other whizbang technologies to, for example, insert extra radar blips in air traffic control towers across America. It seems kind of like a Deus Ex Machina conspiracy argument to me, but it is still an interesting, if far-fetched hypothetical argument that raises serious questions about how PROMIS and the rest of the fed's information technology really is run. At a dense 675 pages, crossing the Rubicon is one hell of a book, summarized thusly:

"In my book I make several key points:
1. I name Vice President Richard Cheney as the prime suspect in the mass murders of 9/11 and will establish that, not only was he a planner in the attacks, but also that on the day of the attacks he was running a completely separate Command, Control and Communications system which was superceding any orders being issued by the FAA, the Pentagon, or the White House Situation Room;
2. I establish conclusively that in May of 2001, by presidential order, Richard Cheney was put in direct command and control of all wargame and field exercise training and scheduling through several agencies, especially FEMA. This also extended to all of the conflicting and overlapping NORAD drills -- some involving hijack simulations -- taking place on that day.
3. I demonstrate that the TRIPOD II exercise being set up on Sept. 10th in Manhattan was directly connected to Cheney's role in the above.
4. I also prove conclusively that a number of public officials, at the national and New York City levels, including then-Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, were aware that flight 175 was en route to lower Manhattan for 20 minutes and did nothing to order the evacuation of, or warn the occupants of the South Tower. One military officer was forced to leave his post in the middle of the attacks and place a private call to his brother - who worked at the WTC - warning him to get out. That was because no other part of the system was taking action.
5. I also show that the Israeli and British governments acted as partners with the highest levels of the American government to help in the preparation and, very possibly, the actual execution of the attacks."
"There is more reason to be afraid of not facing the evidence in this book than of facing what is in it."

Approach #2: Peter Dale Scott's "The Global Drug Meta-Group: Drugs, Managed Violence, and the Russian 9/11". haven't looked through all of it, but it seems an interesting source to begin looking at how the gears really turn in Central Asia and thereabouts.

it also seems possible that the U.S. government might contemplate using Hizb ut-Tahrir and the meta-group for political changes in Russia itself, even while combating the Islamism of al-Qaeda elsewhere. This would be far from the first time that the U.S. Government had used drug-trafficking proxies as assets, and would do a lot to explain the role of the U.S. in 2001 in restoring major drug traffickers to power in Afghanistan. Dubious figures like Nukhaev, Khodorkovskii, and Khashoggi have already shown their interest in such initiatives; and western business interests have shown their eagerness to work with these allies of the meta-group.

It is fitting to think of most U.S. intelligence assets as chess pieces, moved at the whim of their controllers. That is however not an apt metaphor for the meta-group, which clearly has the resources to negotiate and to exert its own influence interactively upon the governments it works with.

Since first hearing about the meta-group's role in the Russian 9/11, I have pondered the question whether it could have played a similar role in the American 9/11 as well. At this point I have to say that I have found no persuasive evidence that would prove its involvement. The fact remains that two informed and credible witnesses, Sibell Edmonds and Indira Singh, have spoken independently of the importance of international drug trafficking in the background of 9/11.

The Bush Administration has paid Sibell Edmonds the tribute of silencing her on the grounds of national interest. She has nonetheless made it clear that what she would talk about concerns that part of the world where the meta-group has influence:

SE [Sibel Edmonds]: It's interesting, in one of my interviews, they say "Turkish countries," but I believe they meant Turkic countries – that is, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and all the 'Stans, including Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, and [non-Turkic countries like] Afghanistan and Pakistan. All of these countries play a big part in the sort of things I have been talking about.

CD [Chris Deliso]: What, you mean drug-smuggling?

SE: Among other things. Yes, that is a major part of it. It's amazing that in this whole "war on terror" thing, no one ever talks about these issues.[120]

Indira Singh, who lost her high-tech job at J.P. Morgan after telling the FBI about Ptech and 9/11, was even more dramatic in her public testimony at a Canadian event:

I did a number of things in my research and when I ran into the drugs I was told that if I mentioned the money to the drugs around 9/11 that would be the end of me.[121]

The False Dilemmas of 9/11 Theories

I said earlier that by suppressing awareness of the role of drug-trafficking in our society, we give drug traffickers a de facto franchise to exert political influence without criticism or opposition. An example of this is the discussion of 9/11 in America, which usually fails to consider the meta-group among the list of possible suspects.

I have tried to suggest in this paper that in fact the meta-group had both motive – to restore the Afghan opium harvest and increase instability and chaos along the trade routes through Central Asia – and opportunity – to utilize its contacts with both al-Zawahiri in al Qaeda and the CIA in Washington. It is furthermore the best candidate to explain one of the more difficult anomalies (or indeed paradoxes) of the clues surrounding 9/11: that many of the clues lead in the direction of Saudi Arabia, but some lead also in a very different direction, towards Israel.[122]

Here it is worth quoting again the well-informed remark of a Washington insider about the meta-group's predecessor, BCCI: "Who else could wire something together to Saudi Arabia, China, Israel, and the U.S.?"[123] The current meta-group fills the same bill, for it unites supporters of Muslim Salafism (Saidov) with at least one Israeli citizen (Kosman).

The meta-group's involvement in the Russian 9/11 of course does nothing to prove its involvement in the American one. However awareness of its presence – as an unrecognized Force X operating in the world – makes previous discussions of 9/11 seem curiously limited. Again and again questions of responsibility have been unthinkingly limited to false dilemmas in which the possible involvement of this or any other Force X is excluded.

An early example is Michael Moore's naïve question to President Bush in Dude, Where's My Country: "Who attacked the United States on September 11 – a guy on dialysis from a cave in Afghanistan, or your friends, Saudi Arabia?"[124] A far more widespread dilemma is that articulated by David Ray Griffin in his searching critique of the 9/11 Commission Report:

There are two basic theories about 9/11. Each of these theories is a "conspiracy theory." One of these is the official conspiracy theory, according to which the attacks of 9/11 were planned and executed solely by al-Qaeda terrorists under the guidance of Osama bin Laden....Opposing this official theory is the [sic] alternative conspiracy theory, which holds that the attacks of 9/11 were able to succeed only because they were facilitated by the Bush administration and its agencies.[125]

Griffin of course is not consciously excluding a third possible theory – that a Force X was responsible. But his failure to acknowledge this possibility is an example of the almost universal cultural denial I referred to earlier. In America few are likely to conceive of the possibility that a force in contact with the U.S. government could be not just an asset, but a force exerting influence on that government.

My personal suggestion to 9/11 researchers is that they focus on the connections of the meta-group's firm Far West, Ltd. – in particular those which lead to Khashoggi, Berezovskii, Halliburton and Dick Cheney, and Diligence, Joe Allbaugh, and Neil Bush.

As a grain of salt, we should remember that Florida is so thoroughly laden with drug money that it is quite likely people would catch false leads to September 11 among the huge forest of shady people getting rich from the Business. The loose end about how the DEA was tracking Israelis who lived virtually around the corner from the 9/11 hijackers is an interesting one, but perhaps the density of shady business in Hollywood, Florida is just that high, one block of criminal enterprises after another. This IS Florida we're talking about.

The Israeli 9/11 angles are still worth checking out – the supposed Mossad front company Urban Moving Systems and the rest. From one of America's most respected Jewish periodicals, Forward:

Spy Rumors Fly on Gusts of Truth: Americans Probing Reports of Israeli Espionage
MARCH 15, 2002
By MARC PERELMAN, FORWARD STAFF

"Despite angry denials by Israel and its American supporters, reports that Israel was conducting spying activities in the United States may have a grain of truth, the Forward has learned.

However, far from pointing to Israeli spying against U.S. government and military facilities, as reported in Europe last week, the incidents in question appear to represent a case of Israelis in the United States spying on a common enemy, radical Islamic networks suspected of links to Middle East terrorism.

In particular, a group of five Israelis arrested in New Jersey shortly after the September 11 attacks and held for more than two months was subjected to an unusual number of polygraph tests and interrogated by a series of government agencies including the FBI's counterintelligence division, which by some reports remains convinced that Israel was conducting an intelligence operation. The five Israelis worked for a moving company with few discernable assets that closed up shop immediately afterward and whose owner fled to Israel.

Other allegations involved Israelis claiming to be art students who had backgrounds in signal interception and ordnance. (See related story, Page 8.)

Sources emphasized that the release of all the Israelis under investigation indicates that they were cleared of any suspicion that they had prior knowledge of the September 11 attacks, as some anti-Israel media outlets have suggested.

The resulting tensions between Washington and Jerusalem, sources told the Forward, arose not because of the operations' targets but because Israel reportedly violated a secret gentlemen's agreement between the two countries under which espionage on each other's soil is to be coordinated in advance.

Most experts and former officials interviewed for this article said that such so-called unilateral or uncoordinated Israeli monitoring of radical Muslims in America would not be surprising. In fact, they said, Israeli intelligence played a key role in helping the Bush administration to crack down on Islamic charities suspected of funneling money to terrorist groups, most notably the Richardson, Texas-based Holy Land Foundation last December.

"I have no doubt Israel has an interest in spying on those groups," said Peter Unsinger, an intelligence expert who teaches justice administration at San Jose University. "The Israelis give us good stuff, like on the Hamas charities." According to one former high-ranking American intelligence official, who asked not to be named, the FBI came to the conclusion at the end of its investigation that the five Israelis arrested in New Jersey last September were conducting a Mossad surveillance mission and that their employer, Urban Moving Systems of Weehawken, N.J., served as a front.

After their arrest, the men were held in detention for two-and-a-half months and were deported at the end of November, officially for visa violations. However, a counterintelligence investigation by the FBI concluded that at least two of them were in fact Mossad operatives, according to the former American official, who said he was regularly briefed on the investigation by two separate law enforcement officials.

"The assessment was that Urban Moving Systems was a front for the Mossad and operatives employed by it," he said. "The conclusion of the FBI was that they were spying on local Arabs but that they could leave because they did not know anything about 9/11."

However, he added, the bureau was "very irritated because it was a case of so-called unilateral espionage, meaning they didn't know about it."

Spokesmen for the FBI, the Justice Department and the Immigration and Naturalization Service refused to discuss the case. Israeli officials flatly dismissed the allegations as untrue. However, the former American official said that after American authorities confronted Jerusalem on the issue at the end of last year, the Israeli government acknowledged the operation and apologized for not coordinating it with Washington.

The five men — Sivan and Paul Kurzberg, Oded Ellner, Omer Marmari and Yaron Shmuel — were arrested eight hours after the attacks by the Bergen County, N.J., police while driving in an Urban Moving Systems van. The police acted on an FBI alert after the men allegedly were seen acting strangely while watching the events from the roof of their warehouse and the roof of their van............

A retired corporate lawyer, Gerald Shea, put together all the government reports on Israeli DEA groups he could find, and corroborated the locations of Israeli groups the DEA monitored and where in Florida the 9/11 hijackers lived when they were training. The results had interesting geographic distribution (which correlates with the Russian-Israeli organizations in Florida admittedly monitored by the Department of Justice as I noted above). These maps are from the Shea's PDF file:

All righty then. That's a lot of heady stuff to consider. I'll note again that I am not a true believer in anything in today's post. I just want to offer some of the interesting things out there on the internet today. I strongly believe that the Republican establishment in America today is very complicit in international drug trafficking – especially since we've got a lot of the same guys who ran cocaine angles in Central America during the Iran-Contra affair. Past behavior is a guide towards future actions, if not ironclad proof.

Arbitrage is power: the buying and selling of goods across geographic space supports the global "shadow economy" that makes up a huge proportion of economic activity. Whoever controls the space, controls the money. Half of Afghanistan's economy is heroin production, for example. Follow the cash: it's one heck of a loose end of September 11, and the war on terror.

Go vote in the primary already!

Primaries are going on in Minnesota today and you should roll over to that.

The Star Tribune has a nice feature on their site called MyVote that tells you where to go and what the choices are.

Turnout is usually pretty low so your vote makes a bigger difference than the general, and for matters like the DFL 5th district (of which I am not a part), it's way more important than the November election. Best of luck to all the candidates, especially, here, Judge Ostby, who threw out my charges after I got arrested because the police tampered with evidence!!

Ellison endorsed by local American Jewish World paper

Just after I noted the tricky matter between Keith Ellison and the Jewish community over in the Fifth District, I get an email from the Ellison campaign proclaiming that he's been endorsed by the local paper American Jewish World. They seem to think he's sort of a Muslim Wellstone, and that's pretty sweet. Here's the email in full:

Keith Ellison for U.S. Congress

Dear Friend,

Keith Endorsed by American Jewish World!

Keith Ellison’s historic campaign for Congress gained the extremely valued and valuable endorsement today of the influential Twin Cities newspaper American Jewish World.

Keith said, “I am humbled, and just plain thrilled, by the confidence the American Jewish World has placed in my vision of a just future where there are no throw-away people and peace is our guiding principle. Indeed, this is a collective vision of tens of thousands of us in our uniquely progressive district, a vision we have built together out of our most deeply-held values.

“I am proud that the American Jewish World has honored us with their support and has joined our extraordinary coalition of progressive people of good will who represent all faiths, all colors and all our neighborhoods.”

“This is how we will win – by creating a powerful force of real people unified behind a passion for justice.”

Below are excerpts from their endorsement, with our highlighting added:

“Regarding the 5th District DFL Primary, there are three fairly conventional candidates who would bring particular strengths to service in the U.S. House and would likely provide competent representation for their constituents. However, voters could make an emphatic statement – one that would gain national and international attention – by casting their ballots for Keith Ellison. The 43-year-old state representative would bring a singular passion and intelligence to the job of representing citizens of Minnesota Fifth District; in many ways, Ellison represents the progressive populist vision that Minnesota lost with the untimely passing of Paul Wellstone in 2002.”

“Ellison acted as the lawyer for the House DFL caucus in an ethics proceeding against former representative Arlon Lindner, who contended that gays were not victims of Nazi oppression in the Holocaust. Ellison understands the importance of guarding against Holocaust denial and revisionism, and links the lessons of the Shoah to more recent cases of genocide in Rwanda and Darfur. Further, he supports the State of Israel and the continuation of U.S. aid to Israel. He holds to the mainstream position of a negotiated two-state solution regarding the long-standing Israeli-Palestinian conflict.”

“We all know that nobody is perfect and no political candidate is without shortcomings. We are now in Elul, the last month of the Hebrew year and the month preceding Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur…During this period of heightened spirituality, we find ourselves considering the choices before us as citizens of a free nation. We cannot take our civil liberties for granted, especially in the face of well-reported government actions to curb our constitutional rights and consolidate political power. In the trying times ahead, we will need courageous political leadership and we must hold our elected representatives accountable.”

“We think that Keith Ellison has the attributes to be a dynamic and effective representative in Congress. In Ellison, we have a moderate Muslim who extends his hand in friendship to the Jewish community and supports the security of the State of Israel. He is a person with a vision of a more humane and equitable society and he is the candidate we favor in the Fifth District DFL election.’

Somalia: D'OH! Another fine moment in foreign policy; Odds of Minneapolis West Bank Islamic militia takeover = 3%

In a subtle irony that only the Somalis could pull off, Mogadishu has been captured by Islamic militias after more than a decade of chaotic civil war. Apparently the kiss of death for the more secular warlords was when word got around that the CIA was paying them to keep fighting the Islamic guys. Summary from DailyKos: Bush searches for "Plan B" for Somalia.

While wandering around the Cedar-Riverside area last night (there was a benefit for the Arise Bookstore at Bedlam Theatre) I was reminded yet again that this little patch of Minneapolis has deep connections to a place on the most opposite pole of the international political system imaginable. I considered that the odds of an Islamic militia taking over the Minneapolis' West Bank area, given the HAMAS in the other West Bank, and Mogadishu, well, the odds must be up to like 3% by now.

WaPo reports that the guns have mostly stopped firing in the battered capital:

The thugs manning the roadblocks are gone. The warlords are on the run. And the guns in a city long regarded as among the world's most heavily armed have fallen silent. Most, in fact, have disappeared from view.

Since Islamic militias took control of this city last week, U.S. and other Western officials have worried that Mogadishu's new leaders would impose a severe, Taliban-style government and harbor terrorists. But after 15 years of deadly chaos, residents interviewed expressed jubilation that somebody has made their city safe, and that for now, the daily crackle of gunfire is finally gone.

"Our ears are resting now," said Diiriye Jimcaale, 45, who has been unemployed since the onset of inter-clan warfare forced him to close his small clothing shop in 1991. Anxiety remains, both about the militias' ability to maintain order and about the possibility that extremist elements within the movement will go too far in imposing Islamic rule. Residents speak of a wave of cinema closings after the militias took control of the city June 5. Rumors circulated that public showings of the televised World Cup soccer tournament would be banned.

But on this Friday night, sounds of the match floated through Mogadishu. The streets bustled with activity. The city's largest market, near the site where two U.S. helicopters crashed in 1993, as depicted in the movie "Black Hawk Down," hummed with business. Cab driver Yusuf Ali Muhammed, 39, felt so safe that he left his longtime bodyguard at home, saving himself $5 in security fees, he said. Wielding an AK-47 rifle, as his guard did each night as they drove through the city, is now prohibited. Yet even without it, Muhammed said that he could now go anywhere in the city at any time. Before, he stuck to the few neighborhoods he knew best.

More commentary about the new Somalia situation, and an op-ed from Omar Jamal in today's Star Tribune. Jamal is saying that it's gonna be Taliban-style:

Osama bin Laden, the leader of Al-Qaida, praised the bravery of the militia and its victory in kicking the "infidels" out of Somalia. He further infiltrated the militias by funding and sending experts to train them.

The warlords were oblivious to the Trojan horse that Bin Laden had sent them. Al-Qaida continued to try to get a foothold in Mogadishu, while the warlords continued to pillage and drag an already impoverished people into more suffering.

There's been good reporting in the Strib about the local reaction. Eric Black's story from June 10 ought to be read: Somalis ponder the possibility of peace: News that Islamic fundamentalists are behind the new calm in Mogadishu sparks a flurry of opinion among Minnesota Somalis:

Somali faces crowd around a coffeehouse table in Minneapolis, listening intently, speaking passionately, interrupting occasionally, expressing opinions about a swarm of questions that arise from the latest developments in Mogadishu. They believe, or maybe just hope, that peace may be breaking out in the war-ravaged capital of their homeland. Out pour the views:

Yes, the victory of an Islamist coalition in the battle for Mogadishu is a good thing. But not if they turn out to be Taliban-style Islamists. But they aren't. Well, some of them are. Are there Al-Qaida-linked terrorists hiding in Mogadishu? Yes, I know it for a fact. No, it's a rumor. Foreigners could never hide in Somalia, because everyone knows everyone. We hate terrorists. Make sure you tell your readers that. We are making new lives in America and grateful to be in Minnesota.
[.....]
The Starbucks Somalis don't have answers to the biggest questions. Can the Islamists hold the capital? Will they try to take over the whole country? Will they work with the transitional government? Are they harboring terrorists? Will Washington tolerate their rise? But almost every opinion is represented. Then a break in the cacophony as a new face arrives. The others defer for a trice to the respected editor of a Somali newspaper, the Warsan Times. The news is a mixture of good and bad, says editor Hassan Shabac. "The warlords who have put our people through 16 years of hell have been driven from their strongholds."

The killing has stopped, for the moment. The bus fare to cross Mogadishu has plummeted from 3,500 Somali shillings last week to 1,000 shillings, because buses don't have to pay the warlords for permission to pass. Most heads at the table nod.

The Union of Islamic Courts is a coalition of two factions, with very different characteristics, Shabac calmly continues. The moderate faction could probably work out a deal with the provisional government. Some around the table have voiced hopes that a deal between the provisional government and the moderate Islamists will complete the struggle to end Somalia's 16 years of stateless limbo.

But then Shabac drops the other shoe, which bodes ill for the young men's hopes and the old men's dreams. The other faction, Shabac says, is made up of Islamic hard-liners from the Al-Ittihad organization. Their agenda: Impose an Islamic caliphate on the whole country and eventually the whole region of Africa. Their Wahabbi-style Islam is so strict "it would make life under the Taliban look like paradise."

The locally produced Warsan Times, with a decidedly idiosyncratic website layout, opines:

US INVOLVEMENT IS SEEN NECESSARY TO END SOMALI CONFLICT
Us has been blamed for providing financial and military support to the anti terrorism coalition that are fighting to survive in Mogadishu against the powerful umbrella of Somali active religious zealots. It may be too late for US to get involved in Somali politics when the religious guys destroy Somali federal government and force Somali president Mr. You to ask Ethiopia for political asylum in six months from now.

It was well known that the Alitihad organization was training nine years in Marka, Somalia peacefully, so they can easily overtake Somalia without strong resistance. It is to my surprise that and also to many Somali scholars who are carefully studying Somali politics that anti terrorism terrorists where able to withstand the wrath of Islamic Para-military punishment this long.

Somali warlords have lost grounds so as popular support to defeat Islamic soldiers, because of them not finding a reasonable solution to Somali conflict, therefore, Somali people are willing to support religious guys because somehow they were able to bring peace and prosperity to those they rule. Somalis are tired of being jerked right to left by worlds with empty promises. These warlords are interest oriented while carefully drafting temporary agendas for the rest of the people they rule.

US have actively tried to facilitate food and rations to millions of displaced starving Somali people but they failed and lost many soldiers in the process. Now, for the world peace will it be easy for US government to stabilize Somalia by ending the Somali civil war and establishing responsible government in Mogadishu? For those who don’t remember this is how that good will ended.

US has lost many brave soldiers in the process of capturing elusive general Mr. Aided who was the most powerful general in Somali nation at the time, however, the liberal US government cut and ran after losing 18 exceptional brave US marines. Let me say this the withdrawal was important, because it gave the impression that America was vulnerable to terrorism and that if casualties were high enough they could be coerced into abandoning hazardous overseas commitments.

I don't know about that. What the hell could the US really have done to stabilize Somalia after the 'Black Hawk Down' incident anyway?

It's been a rough 15 years for Somalia, and I wish them all the best. It's too bad that the UN-organized provisional government (and its representatives who base themselves in Minnesota) couldn't bring about a better situation on their own terms, but it's quite possible that this new Islamic government is more interested in 'delivering the goods' of peace, quiet and prosperity than imposing harshly radical, Talban-style repression.

But if they do, it'll probably fall to the denizens of Cedar-Riverside to straighten things out. Time for another cup of coffee.

Pawlenty: Shrewd Moves in MN transportation, Borat movie on the way

The long promised Lots of Goodies:

Dear Leader Pawlenty has seen the massive 35W-Highway 62 crosstown rebuilding/redesign fall apart, because for some reason he thought that since the state doesn't have the money, he could convince contractors to shoulder the costs themselves, and pay them back later.

I am drinking two cups of coffee now so I can drill through all-a this. First of all see the Ali G video with TV news anchor Sam Donaldson. He's a game guest, in particular with repeating Cohen's obscene gestures. There was a trailer for a new Borat movie this fall but it got taken down by Fox within hours. JAGSHEMASH! Can Cohen stay sharp with Borat and Ali G, or will people be sick of it by then? I don't know, but the many Borat clips on YouTube are sweet.

Trey Parker and Matt Stone's "Favorite memo ever": watering down the South Park movie to satisfy the MPAA: (via the excellent celebrity-jabber What Would Tyler Durden Do? site)

More coming in a bit. The coffee is making me flush so I'm gonna take a shower

Sometimes you gotta have a life

I really promise that there will be forthcoming photos and goodies from the DFL convention. Today I got a haircut and checked out some more job stuff. Now I am going to have a social life. I think we could say that the number of words on this site are inverse to Dan's productive activity, and for that I ought to be saluted so far this week. However I can still post a couple photos.

Sen. Becky Lourey gives a press interview after the first gubernatorial ballot. The intrepid MPR reporter Tom Scheck is the cue ball behind the guy in the green Kelley shirt.

The Teamsters were the muscle behind the event - controlling the doors and such. This was after the first ballot, during intense floor delegate lobbying operations.

Consulting with future Attorney General Matt Entenza about important matters - and making that Macalester grad look short!

I promise there will be updates later. For now, life rolls on.

What am I doing here?

There is another round of the Minnesota state Republican Convention at 8 AM today (Saturday). I'm crashing now, got up hella early at 8 Friday too. David (i.e. "Roy")'s fan belt ripped apart when he stopped by to check the scene. Therefore he's snoozing on the futon now. More later. In the meantime, look at this Hades-esque situation. Pawlenty was speaking at the time. There are a lot of strange details to say later. For now, this photo says it all. No editing here at all - Blood Red is Gubernatorial.

State Republican convention investigations

Looks like I'm going to handle the booth a bit for Politics in Minnesota at the Republican state convention down at the Minneapolis convention center this afternoon, Friday & Saturday. I woulda been able to make some bank if I could do the DFL convention at Rochester, but it looks like I'll have to deal with the Chunkies graduating from high school next Saturday.

Mordred sends word that he's busy moving out of his apartment in Tucson and I think going to Santa Fe. But he sent along a REALLY sweet video of one North Carolina Republican's Vernon Robinson's ad for Congress.

His platform is basically pretty straightforward:

Vernon Robinson's Public Policy Views in a Nutshell
I am pro-Constitution, pro-national sovereignty, pro-military, pro-veteran, pro-growth, pro-business, pro-property rights, pro-marriage, pro-adoption, pro-farmer, pro-school choice, pro-states' rights, pro-religious freedom, pro-Pledge of Allegiance, pro-death penalty, pro-gun, and pro-life.

I will secure our borders and demand the vigorous enforcement of our immigration laws. I support market-based reforms of government entitlement programs such as Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid.

I am unabashedly and unalterably opposed to racial quotas, special rights for homosexuals, the United Nations, the proliferation of frivolous lawsuits, women in combat, pork barrel spending, useless government programs and agencies, onerous regulations, and all tax hikes.

Securing Our Borders

Our current immigration policy is a treasonable threat to both public health and national security. We do not need a wall to secure our borders. Five thousand Marines and 100 UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles) can do the job tomorrow. We must also make English the official language of the United States. Any local government or college that interferes with immigration enforcement should lose its federal aid. Finally, automatic citizenship for those born here must be replaced with the baby adopting the citizenship of the mother. These steps must precede any guest worker program.

.....Defending Marriage and Traditional Values

I will always fight for what's right and you will always know where I stand. We cannot redefine marriage as any grouping of adults and children. I will vigorously oppose homosexual marriages, marriage-lite proposals and adoptions, as well as "gay" Scoutmasters. While my opponent believes that those in a drag queen parade and Rosa Parks are both civil rights leaders, I will join the dozens of Congressmen who sponsored an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that provides that "Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman."

There was also some funny stuff about stopping the "feminization" of the military and shutting down bases in Japan, Germany and Korea.

I can only hope that the denizens of the MN GOP are half as entertaining.

Northstar, Red Rock rail lines score $$ from Legislature, but Bupkis for Central Corridor

Quality times at The Artists' Quarter last night. B3 Organ Night, AKA AQuesday, is pretty much the cornerstone of St. Paul culture, Mickey's Diner being the other cornerstone.

At the end of this session, fairly good news all around for transit in the Twin Cities, and the relatively astronomical gas prices definitely seem to be pushing these projects past the Legislature's tipping point. Every day I see lots of people commuting downtown on the buses belonging to the various suburban transit authorities like Maple Grove. The Strib reported that basically ridership is WAY up right now, to the point where some suburban routes are almost breaking even. Delightful! (I don't feel like talking about the stadiums. As always, circuses win over bread. Shocking.)

I got a happy notice yesterday from the Northstar guys:

Dear Daniel,

This weekend, the Minnesota Legislature overwhelmingly approved a bonding bill that includes $60 million for Northstar Commuter Rail. This was the final state commitment needed for construction of the state's first commuter rail line. The Governor is expected to sign the bill into law in the coming days, which will allow the state to seek federal matching funds for construction of the Northstar project.

The Northstar Corridor Development Authority (NCDA) will complete its application to the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) for a 50 percent federal funding match. The FTA recently provided encouragement for the project to proceed with final design and hopes to lock in its funding by this fall.

Northstar's success at the State Capitol is in large part due to the help of thousands of supporters like you. Thanks for your support! We're on track for Northstar to begin carrying passengers in 2009!
Duane Grandy
NCDA
Chair

For more local advocacy on this check Transit for Livable Communities. The Red Rock Corridor also managed to get some preliminary planning funding from the Legislature. Red Rock would run from downtown St. Paul to Hastings:

Unfortunately, the Central Corridor, the planned rail or rapid bus connection between downtown Minneapolis and St. Paul, did not score any cash at all for preliminary funding.

There are currently public meetings on the Central Corridor, so things will take a while to shake out, I guess. More on that stuff here and here in the PioPress and Strib here. People seem mostly positive., Literally right now, as I was about to post this, I got the following email from Transit for Livable Communities:

Dear Dan,

The final public hearing on the Central Corridor Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) is tonight. TLC encourages transit advocates to testify at this hearing and get your voice heard.

TLC endorses light rail transit as the best alternative on the corridor, and we urge you to support this position strongly in your comments. However, we agree there are many additional issues that must be addressed by the counties and cities over the next two years. We suggest that you identify them in your comments as well.

For more information, please see the resources below that explain TLC's support for LRT and present other key issues that need to be addressed for the corridor's success. (The links will take you to our website.)
TLC's Position Statement on Central Corridor
TLC's Tips on How to Testify
TLC's Talking Points For LRT on Central Corridor
Other Resources (Maps, FAQ's, and more)

Background on the Central Corridor DEIS Process

The Ramsey County Regional Railroad Authority is required to complete a Central Corridor Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS). The statement provides a description of current transportation conditions in the corridor and describes three transit options for the corridor:

1: Improvements to the current bus system
2: Bus Rapid Transit - BRT has buses running on a separate, dedicated right of way or on city streets but separated from other traffic. BRT could run on University Avenue but would be mixed with traffic at the University of Minnesota and in the downtowns of Minneapolis and St. Paul.
3: Light Rail Transit - LRT features electric trains running on tracks, located either on city streets or separate from streets and traffic. The trains can be relatively short, with two or three cars. LRT could run on University Avenue.

The DEIS document is available on the Central Corridor website www.centralcorridor.org and at local libraries in print form. The DEIS answers five key questions:

1. What do Central Corridor stakeholders say they need from a transit system?
How does each option enhance mobility and accessibility for area residents and visitors?
2. What is the effect on economic development?
3. What is the impact on nearby communities and the environment?
4. What is the cost to build each option?

How can the public get involved?
It is important for this planning effort to reflect the community's views about this issue. The final public hearing for the Central Corridor Draft Environmental Impact Statement is tonight:
Wednesday, May 24, 6:30 PM, Central High School, 275 North Lexington Parkway, St. Paul. An open house for questions and answers will precede the hearing from 3:30 to 6:30 PM.

How to Comment on the DEIS:
You can submit your comments during the 45-day comment period, which ends on June 5, 2006[......]
What happens next?:
After this comment period, and in consideration of comments received, the Central Corridor Coordinating Committee will make a recommendation on a preferred alternative to the Metropolitan Council in June. The Metropolitan Council will select the locally preferred alternative. The Preliminary Engineering phase, once federal approvals are received, can then begin on the selected alternative--this process is expected to take 2 years.

Maybe I will go to that but probably not. I suppose I would see folks I know. Well, the gears are definitely turning and all that shit in the Mideast is helping push it along. I guess there is a small local advantage to total national catastrophe?

Daily Kos makes it to Minneapolis today

I am going over to see Markos Moulitsas Zúniga at Arise Books at noon. Hell yah. Then probably go drinking. That's as good as it gets in the Blogosphere. MNSpeak notes:

Internationally known blogger and new age political pundit Markos "Daily Kos" Zuniga will be in town today for his "Crashing the Gate" book tour. Markos will be autographing books starting at noon at the Arise! Bookstore. Then he will be doing an interview on All Things Considered at 2:30 until 3:00 pm, and finally the Lambert and Janecek Show from 5:00 until 5:30 pm. Following that, he will be swinging by Drinking Liberally at the 331 Club in the evening for the after party.

Minneapolis, MN
Tuesday, May 2nd, 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m.
Reception at 331 Club
Hosted by Drinking Liberally - Minneapolis Chapter
331 Northeast 13th Avenue
Minneapolis, MN

Also tomorrow:
St. Paul, MN
Wednesday, May 3rd, 7:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m.
Breakfast at Louisiana Cafe
613 Selby Ave
St. Paul, MN

Winning the Macalester Lottery and seeking Global One World Government approval: I shake Kofi's hand; plus antiwar protest notes

This is a belated note from the Springfest/Kofi/CheebaDANZA weekend. Springfest kicked ass, the weather held out, the organizers put on an excellent event. I couldn't say any more without risking a federal indictment. And the next day, my roommate offered me a ticket to go see Kofi Annan. I was pretty scrubby, which was exactly how it ought to be.

I still have some backdoor access around Macalester, so when I got rejected (ticket in hand) from the Kofi speech, after marveling at the bitching donors who believed their millions could get them into the Fieldhouse, I managed to sneak into the lunch, and get a seat way up near the front. This, in turn, has caused me to appear in Macalester Propaganda:

As the least well-dressed lunch guest, with the filthy jeans I grabbed running out the door at 8:20 that morning, all was right. The venerable and well-dressed Alex Flores (looking up at far right in the photo above) took three good photos.

As he went down these stairs, surrounded by shrewd members of the State Department security detail, I went to Kagin's side elevator, down to the ground floor. A Mac guard ushered me out of the building with some other folks, but I lingered near the entrance. In no time, Kofi popped around the corner, I asked if I could shake his hand, and I wished him luck.

Along with Springfest and a variety of shadow activities, I pretty much hit the Macalester triple bank shot that weekend... Finally mastered the damn place, about two years too late.

As for the University antiwar protest, well damn, it was really rainy. But still entertaining. I would say that I liked it when the protesters hit the military recruiters' office with metaphorical red paint. (photo from MN Daily story)

However, as recent news stories about police investigations of protests at the 2004 New York Republican convention reveal, the cops look at any potential illegal protest conduct as a probable cause to search you and wiretap you and whatever else. Therefore if a dangerous internet anarchist terrorist like me were to say "that was pretty sweet when they painted the recruiters' office," this would apparently justify total surveillance for the rest of my life.

In any case, I thought it was ironic that they arrested several protesters while the adjacent police horses pooped all over the sidewalk. Red paint and manure was everywhere. But we ought to call it "terrorist latex" and "freedom cakes".

Ducking probable cause and pneumonia - photo by Jenny @ the U

Concert at MCTC nixed, student walkout organizers threatened

I'll throw in this bit from Citypages. looks like the news broke that the concert was cancelled yesterday. Fucking weak, it's CheebaDANZA all over again:

City Pages - The Blotter - Kids Don't Follow: April 27, 8:48 PM

Kids Don't Follow

In what is being described by organizers as "the largest youth antiwar demonstration in Minnesota since the Vietnam era," thousands of students are planning to walk out of classes tomorrow in protest of the war in Iraq and military recruitment in schools. But at least two area schools (Central and Jefferson) are threatening students with suspension. The students will hold a press conference this afternoon at 3:30 at Minneapolis Technical and Community College (1501 Hennepin Ave., Mpls.), the site of a proposed peace concert for tomorrow that also got unplugged. Here are the students' statements:

Appeal from Jefferson High students

We are three students from Jefferson High School in Bloomington, MN. We are being threatened with suspension for passing out fliers advertising the April 28 walkout. We aren't allowed to wear shirts that say "I'm walking out for peace." We aren't even allowed to SAY the word walkout.

First we attempted to get posters approved through official ways. We got called in and told that advocating the walkout by distributing any material or voicing any knowledge of it happening was going to cause a disruption to the school learning environment.

We got a National Lawyers Guild lawyer to write a letter to our principal explaining that Tinker vs. Des Moines gives us the right to organize the walkout in school, but this made no difference. In our meeting with the Principal today [4/26] their lawyer had given them a response to the NLG letter, claiming that it does not fall under protected free speech.

Our right to free speech and protest, as well as the rights of our fellow Youth Against War and Racism chapter members, have been denied. Basically we refuse to be censored for our right to practice our political freedoms including telling people an event is going on. We will continue to pass out leaflets and they will probably continue confiscating or suspending people handing them out.

Here's what we'd like for you to do: call our administration. Demand that our rights are supported. Flood their offices with phone calls and emails reminding them that teenagers are people with rights, because they seem to have forgotten. The numbers are below.

Bloomington Schools Superintendent,
Gary Prest
952-681-6402
gprest@bloomington.k12.mn.us

Peace and Love,
Alex Uhrich, Libby Tousignant, Ben Zabel
Jefferson Youth Against War and Racism
Contact us at: nirvanaguy18@gmail.com

Appeal from Central High Students

At St. Paul Central High School, our chapter of Youth Against War and Racism has been planning for the antiwar walkout on Friday, April 28 in solidarity with other Twin Cities YAWR chapters. We are protesting against military recruiters in our schools as well as against the war as a whole.

We have produced a variety of leaflets explaining our cause and encouraging students to join us. Over the past week, we have begun to pass the fliers out more intensely. As a result, our school administrators and our principal, Mary Mackbee, have attempted to prevent us from passing them out.

On Wednesday, April 26, before school, many of our fliers were confiscated by Ms. Mackbee while they were being distributed. We were told that we would be punished if they were found passing out any more fliers. The school staff have been instructed to assign detention to any student caught distributing fliers. Later in the day, when we attempted to get back the fliers that had been confiscated, we were then told that, if we were found passing out leaflets, we would be suspended for "willful disobedience."

Our First Amendment rights cannot be ignored. Regardless of any claims made by the school that we are under their supervision, our fundamental democratic right to freedom of expression cannot be abridged. The schools might claim that we are creating a disruption, however a much greater disruption is being created for us by the military recruiters in our schools and by the loss of funding that our schools must deal with due to taxpayer money being spent on war instead of education.

We cannot allow them to continue to prevent us from expressing ourselves. For this reason, we ask that you help us to protect our democratic freedom and our right to free expression.

We ask that you call or e-mail our District Superintendent, Lou Kanavati, and demand that we be allowed to exercise our basic right to expression and distribute antiwar fliers, brochures, or other documents free of censorship or threats.

Superintendent Lou Kanavati
651/767-8150
Lou.Kanavati@spps.org

Thank you,
Sean Foltin and Shane Davis
Central High Youth Against War and Racism
Contact us at: acolyteofthecpc@yahoo.com

Yet another student walkout Friday in my neighborhood, but does it do any good?

There is another student walkout today and it will wind from the University campus to my very own neck of the woods at Loring Park. I would probably like to take photos, but a certain shady lawyer type has my camera. It's probably just as well, so I can take in the scene, instead of trying to Document it as usual. But the visuals will surely be good.

It is a paradox or something. Street marches are a fairly outdated way of attempting to change policies, and the typical media blackouts – or worse, the caricatures that the participants unwittingly blunder into – really don't move the ball down the field. Just some more fucking students looking for a skip day, as someone put it to me.

But on the other hand, the news is all around us that a war in Iran is already gearing up, the United States has decided to fuck over the Palestinians in another shrewd move, and of course the Iraq meat grinder continues to rip apart families near and far. There has to be a way to transform this crisis into a physical manifestation that can offer resolve and hope to the counter-movements against it.

Some of the people in that crowd will have family and friends inside the machine somewhere, trying to stay alive until the tour is up, and it is the responsibility of those left behind to try to swipe at the war policy. And the protest serves another purpose too: it reminds this oh-so-'radical' – now really a majority – of the American public that we are not alone in this fight, not separate, not just alone, shrouded in the darkness of our computer screens, following the latest disaster.

It reminds us that there is a society with real bonds that can't be broken... Not by recruiters, not by Tony Snow, not by the pervasive fear that blankets this sad nation.

Details from the U AWOL group here:

twin cities antiwar
** W A L K O U T **
Friday April 28

** Noon Rally at University of Minnesota, Northrop Plaza
(map: http://yawr.org/april28/map.html)
** High schoolers: leave class 10:30am. Bus, carpool, or march to U of M rally
* Rally followed by march through downtown Minneapolis to…
* Free Concert at 3pm at MCTC by Loring Park, featuring Desdamona, Kanser, I Self Divine, A New Day, Two Wurds, more. Bring a bag lunch.

We are walking out to demand:
* END the occupation of Iraq NOW! to fund education and social needs
* NO! to military recruitment in our schools
* YES! to equal access to higher education
* YES! to living wage jobs for youth
* STOP racist attacks on immigrants and civil liberties

Last November 2nd, thousands of Twin Cities students - from over 40 schools in 16 districts - walked out to protest the war. Up to 2000 rallied and marched at the U of M, and a new youth movement was born.
But the war has dragged on and the violence in Iraq has increased dramatically. More and more young soldiers are coming home dead or maimed. Conservative estimates suggest over 100,000 Iraqis have been killed in the three years of occupation. Over 70 percent of U.S. troops in Iraq think the occupation should be ended, reflecting the opinion of U.S. workers and youth at home. Yet Congress keeps giving Bush hundreds of billions more for this corrupt war for oil and empire. Meanwhile our schools crumble, tuition rises out of reach, living wage jobs are disappearing, and the politicians are whipping up anti-immigrant racism to deflect the blame for these problems from themselves. Its time to step up our resistance!

Organized by:
** Youth Against War and Racism / 612.760.1980 / http://yawr.org
** U of M Anti-War Organizing League / http://www.tc.umn.edu/~awol/ / umnawol@gmail.com
** Socialist Alternative / 612.226.9129 / http://www.socialistalternative.org/
** MCTC Students Against War and Racism

Endorsed by: La Raza Student Cultural Center, Women's Student Activist Collective, Equal Access Coalition, Belfry Center for Social and Cultural Activities, Anti-War Committee, Freedom Road Socialist Organization, Daybreak Newspaper, North Country Co-op, Arise! Books and Resource Collective, Welfare Rights Committee, Twin Cities Peace Campaign, Green Party (4 th and 5 th Districts), Counter-Propaganda Coalition, Jack Pine Community Center

Among the huddled masses, yearning to breathe free; taking Zarqawi PSY OPS to Clear Channel ain't easy, nor good for my perceived character

The whole psy ops thing last week distracted me from what I wanted to write about, the immigration rally in St. Paul a week ago. I randomly ran into Eliot Brown in an alley in St. Paul on Saturday and he said he'd happened to take a photo of me among the crowd. Thanks!

I have gotten a haircut since the photo. But anyway. I gotta go to Wisco now for a family dinner; my uncle Dan got engaged, which is nice. On Wednesday I took the PSY OPS case to my Republican boss' call-in radio show on KTLK. In a segment about 7 minutes long, I was somewhat surprised to receive a Sean Hannity-style 7 or 9 blathering ad hominem attacks from my employer that I had no opportunity to rebut. I have the recording and will probably post it up, but altogether it was disheartening yet somewhat amusing. I informed the ClearChannel audience that the military was doing psychological warfare on their brains, and there's evidence out there. This made her panic, and my age (22) and my status (graduated) from a college (Macalester) were the only available battering rams to attempt to discredit what I was saying and fill up time.

Upon hearing the recording, a wise friend pointed out to me she's right, what the hell have I got to back up my credibility? The same basic bag of tricks will be employed against people like me, and it requires a more agile response, simply because the truth, in and of itself, rarely works these days.

Yah, it was disheartening. But the clanging bells of the Basilica last night and today helped remind me what Hunter Thompson entered on his typewriter before he blew his brains out.

Counselor.

This seems to have been a reference to the Gospel of John (ch. 14), as a contributor to RawStory explained.

“And I will pray the Father, and he will give you another Counselor, to be with you for ever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him; you know him, for he dwells with you, and will be in you.”

As the RawStory guy said (and I posted last August):

Thompson surely would have felt drawn to the Gospel of John, the most lyrical and mystical of the four Gospels. It’s there that we find the pronouncement: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” It is a decree that has resonated with writers from Twain to Whitman to Fitzgerald to Miller—a revelation that words are transcendent, that a writer’s vocation is more than just a job. It should be a calling, wherein the “Spirit of truth” (Counselor) is followed unfailingly. No mean trick.

For following your Counselor often means discovering things that aren’t fit for polite company. It’s never pleasant to find evil growing among the peonies. Or in the hearts of your elected officials. Better to be “vaguely happy” than uncomfortable. Thompson, though, never fell for that devil’s lie. He knew that even though the truth often cuts like a razor, it also serves as a “Comforter” when the jackals begin circling. Because as Thompson recognized, the jackals don’t really give a damn whether you speak the truth or not. They are coming after us all one day. But facing the bastards down is a whole lot easier when you’ve got the truth by your side.

We are faced with annihilationist ideology, applied for partisan Republican political purposes. I find it plainly disturbing that my education on the Holocaust has been the key to unlocking the meaning of the Zarqawi figure. Those rare occasions when I have caught the current of history and made it halt for a moment, have been among the key times I really felt fully alive, intervening in the flow of events. The radio bit doesn't rise to that level, but it shows me how rocky and difficult the road ahead will be.

The top defenders of the Republican empire know their myths are shallow and evaporating daily. I know because I can hear the fear in their voice.

At that level, the truth makes a good Counselor.

Politics in Minnesota.com is Big Pimpin

There has been a lack of updates this week as I focused on getting real work done - and making the all-important bank. I have been redesigning the Politics in Minnesota website, so it looks much cooler. Our organization has gotten weird press this year, because of the MDE lawsuit - which is quite a strange subject that I really won't get into right now. However, I think everyone should check out what's going on with the PIM site, and we are working on making the whole thing really kick ass. And there will be a blog on the way, which will be way fun. Right on.

Check out the new page for the Politics in Minnesota: The Directory. Now you can actually see what Peter and I worked our butts off to produce. They're still on sale, so buy one already!!

Jonathon 'The Impaler" Sharkey: Satanist for MN Governor: The new Jesse for our times

Here in Minnesota we always have a special spot for the ironic political campaign. Wellstone and Ventura cut against the typical style, but they fit their times somehow. And now, another candidate has emerged from esoteric wiccan pentagrams and two (two!) covens. He also offers to impale terrorists and drug dealers at the state capitol, as a dramatic Star Tribune story detailed today.

Satanism and the Vampyres Witches and Pagans party: The Agenda:

6) Any one found committing an act of terrorism in Minnesota will be IMPALED by me at the State Capital. If the US DOJ wants to prosecute me for it, then I will take my chances in Court, for I do not believe an American Jury will convict me of brutally killing a terrorist!

I particularly liked how the capitol graphic was filched from the Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Board.

His turn to THE DARK SIDE:

Just like Anakin, my main concern was to help save the life of the woman I loved dearly. However, Susan returned my unconditional love and caring by having me wrongly incarcerated for 150-days (as a result of IUPUI Law Professor Joel Schumm) I was vindicated, almost 3-months after spending 150-days in jail!

As a result of Susan's actions, I fully turned to "The Dark Side" and dedicated my life to serving Lucifer.

Unlike Susan, I will not attack an innocent person through my hatred. I prefer to use the blessings and gifts that come from Vampyrism and WitchCraft to attack those who prey on the innocent.
[....]

My sister has a saying, "Evil Begets Evil!" Well, starting in 2007, it will be the criminals who realize first hand, that there is someone more evil than they are, who cares about the safety and well-being of the innocent!

WAR, WHAT'S IT GOOD FOR? There are also high plans as he intends to run for President.

Though my Magikal Path Name is: Lord Ares, I do not believe that Americans should die needlessly in Iraq or any other country.

As Governor of Minnesota I will NOT allow any of our National Guard soldiers to be deployed to Iraq or any other combat area in the world.
Upon becoming President I will immediately recall ALL servicemen and women from combat areas around the world. Additionally, I will have President George W. Bush charged and tried for the murders of every American that has been killed in Iraq as a result of him sending them into War. Upon being convicted, I think everyone knows what his punishment will be.

That sets a new bar for rhetorical gestures in gubernatorial campaigns. Adjusting the discourse with guerilla ontology. He also goes way back with Jeb Bush, which is really quite strange. He has apparently been an apparatchik of the Florida Republican Party, so who knows what dark reaches his connections go to.

So we will surely follow this one as it develops. Jonathon Sharkey is a great name for a Satanist.

Jesse Mortenson's Green bid for 64A Macalester legislative district featured in Star Tribune

I had heard that my former Macalester classmate Jesse Mortenson '05 was considering a run for the State House — and indeed, he is not the only recent Macalester grad to consider a run. Apparently, Jesse is the first Green Party candidate to shoot for a spot at the Capitol, which makes me wonder what the hell the rest of them are doing. (official Green Party press release on it)

Fortunately for Jesse, his campaign got some good press with a Doug Grow column in the Star Tribune today ('Pol's fundraiser won't be typical DFL bean feed'), mentioning a planned vegan fundraising dinner next month. The column rambles on about the difference between Republican and Democrat food fundraisers, mentions the Al Juhnke "hotdish law."

Anyway, I think it is great that Mortenson is going for this. Certainly in 64A, he has a better shot of winning Green than almost anywhere else in the state, save Dinkytown or the relative Green strongholds of Minneapolis.

He is only two years younger than the House's youngest, freshman Rep. Andy Welti (D) of the Rochester countryside area. And his core platform — anti-Wal-Mart & Big box retail organizing, single-payer health care, more renewable energy and demanding an end to the Iraqi occupation — all of these issues will certainly find their supporters around Macalester. (needless to say, I pretty much agree with his take on these issues)

The main potential problem is that some older, richer Macalester graduate in the neighborhood could likely snap up the DFL endorsement. If s/he is not such a hot candidate, Jesse would certainly have a sporting chance in November. City Hall Scoop reported that Ian Keith, an elementary school teacher, announced for the race in November. In that case, with no other contenders (?), Jesse is the more interesting candidate, hands-down.

In our time at Mac, Jesse and I found ourselves aligned in cliques that were sometimes mutually hostile — namely his occasional spats with some in The Mac Weekly, in particular during my time as an editor there during the controversial 'need-blind' days. Mortenson was criticized for talking too much at Macalester College Student Government LB meetings, for throwing monkey wrenches rather than working constructively, in other words all the usual accusations leveled against the activist set around Mac. I secretly never saw any of this as a problem, because the MCSG is often something of a farce, and I supported anything improving the quality of the theatre therein. In any case, he did a lot to raise awareness of broader problems that many preferred not to face.

So Jesse had a mixed public image among some at Macalester. In person, I always found him friendly, informed and connected, a kind of utilitarian progressive who took a keen interest in the activities and structures of governments and corporations. There are quite a few protesters-of-the-week at Macalester, who talk a lot of talk. Jesse is not of that class: as a grassroots progressive, he seriously walks the walk.

After the Brian Rosenberg wars, I can only imagine the fun of seeing Jesse squaring off against Phil Krinkie and Steve Sviggum. With a little luck and a lot of elbow grease... If he has been up at Midway building some kind of stealth coalition among small business owners and activists at the Midway Citizen Consumer Community Coalition and Metro Independent Business Alliance, he might be able to pull off an unlikely pro-business Green campaign that other progressives could try nationwide. Where did all the people on that stage come from?

Naturally, Sociology chair Terry Boychuk had nothing but glowing things to say about Jesse's candidacy in the Dec. 9 (or Dec. 2?) Mac Weekly story that announced his campaign.

After all, Macalester students only end up running the whole world, so what chance could Mortenson have in one of Minnesota's most liberal districts? My grandfather, Daniel S. Feidt, was elected to the Minnesota House in 1936 at age 28, on his second try. He got to the Senate two years later, where he stayed until 1961. Like Mortenson, he was of an independent streak and was wary of party machines, preferring the independent structure of the Legislature in those days.

I'll add a bit from his 1957 pamphlet, Minnesota's Non-Party Legislature, an ode to the dead nonpartisan system. I think that Mortenson would appreciate it:

It is understandable why party leaders desire to increase their power by gaining control of the Minnesota legislature, but the view of the independent voter is different, he does not want his legislator, alderman or school board member, to be subject to party responsibility.

He does not want a political climate to develop where there might be brought back to Minnesota's scene the paid political hack, the ward healer or the ward boss.

The independent wants Minnesota to remain as it is -- the cleanest political state in the nation and the independent wants his public official, be he legislator or alderman, to be responsible to the voters, not to some party boss.

…Minnesota has the opposite of the party boss system; it has its own system -- a non-boss system, in which every legislator is free to decide what is in the best interest for his constituents and what is in the best interest of the state on each issue. The Minnesota system, in my judgment, is infinitely more in the interest of the public.

So my warmest regards to Jesse Mortenson's independent effort in 64A. It will be a difficult year, but surely a rewarding one. I'll be following this one closely.

(Campaign photo shamelessly ganked from Jesse's official announcement entry on his campaign site, JesseMortenson.com)

Janecek & Lambert not quite yanked off the air

Well Sarah Janecek and Brian Lambert completed their first radio show on KTLK this evening. For the first time around it was pretty good -- nearly as good as my first time on WMCN back in 2002. There was good discussion of the 2006 elections, the NSA wiretapping thing, and a long talk with a guest about Mike Tice. There were even some call-ins. So it is all working out.

Dan awake at 4 AM, dealing with China

Sorry for the lack of updates. I have decided that the Internet was better off without my collected musings the last few days.

Meanwhile in the middle of the night, I am working on managing the photos from the Minnesota trade mission to China as Sarah Janecek sends them over. I was surprised to find that AOL Instant Messenger works through the Great Red Firewall....

Anyway I am very tired so I am going to bed now. But it's an interesting thing to be checking out. See PoliticsInMinnesota.com for the blog of the trip. Night!

November 2 Antiwar rally at University

I arrived in the middle of an antiwar rally at the University of Minnesota yesterday, as approximately 1000 people, mostly students, came to mark the 2000th US military death, the indictment of Lewis Libby, and a rapidly shifting national political situation.

When the newly-formed Youth Against War and Racism group met at the Loring Park Coffee House in March to plan a fall student protest, they couldn't have foreseen how America's view of the war would shift by then: the Downing Street Memos showed the "intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy" of invasion, I. Lewis Libby was indicted for damaging national security while trying to discredit a war critic, and worst of all, more than 2000 American service personnel were killed.

On Wednesday afternoon, activists staged dozens of protests nationwide, as about 1000 people, including hundreds of Minneapolis high school students, rallied on the U's East Bank to mark the strange year that's passed since Bush's re-election. YAWR students demanded that Minneapolis schools ban military recruiters (as a Minnesota Daily video documents), though such a move could endanger their federal funding under the No Child Left Behind Act. "War leaves every child behind," read one protester's sign.

As the protest spilled off the Mall into Washington Avenue, turning east towards the military recruiting offices, Minneapolis City Councilman Dean Zimmermann was spotted standing high atop a utility box, attempting to count the crowd. More than a dozen counter-protesters lined up in front of the offices with signs such as "Peace through Strength" and "The leaders of tomorrow should be in class today!" Protesters responded by shouting that "the leaders of tomorrow are getting practice today!"

Across the spectrum, America is becoming a majority anti-war country. 53% of Americans believe that the administration "deliberately misled the public" on WMD issues, a Gallup/CNN poll discovered last week. Meanwhile, reports in the Italian media suggested that before the war, Italian military intelligence and the Pentagon's secret Office of Special Plans channeled these lies, including the Niger uranium forgeries, into the White House.

Who could blame high school students for war anxiety? The same Pentagon bureaucracy that ruthlessly targets Sunni tribesmen selects students based on intelligence like their grades, ethnicity and income. What student could believe a war with 27 rationales? They see their friends and family disappear, only to return injured, psychologically damaged, exposed to depleted uranium and IEDs, or worse, draped under a flag.

One anonymous black-clad protester, masked with a bandana, told me that he and his associates represented the Minnesota branch of the Anarchist Black Cross organization. His principal reason for protesting? "Revolution," he said, revealing the core of our nation's spirit - to rebel, grow, prosper. It still flourishes: in October, Ipsos Public Affairs found that 50% of Americans agreed that "if President Bush did not tell the truth about his reasons for going to war with Iraq, Congress should consider holding him accountable by impeaching him."

After the street protest, at the Oak Street Cinema a teach-in was held to teach students how to challenge recruiters in their schools. The protest was also organized by the Anti-War Committee, Socialist Alternative and the Anti-War Organizing League.

Bush at UN: it might be time for a bathroom break; Tal Afar as Ethnic Civil War; Iraqi Super Provinces; Gazans visit Egypt

Colin Kennedy emailed me this excellent Reuters photo. Apparently Bush noted to Condi Rice at the UN World Summit, "I think I may need a bathroom break?" Not exactly decisive sounding leadership for going to the Pot. But either way I think it sets the tone.

"Nightmare is over as study says cheese doesn't cause bad dreams." A weird little Apple story.

HongPong.com enters Google Blog Search, and finds out the site is enmeshed in other people's conspiracy theories... It seems to update pretty quickly too. Oddly enough, the first "hongpong.com" hit turns up a link to a story on freedomforyou.blogspot.com... the paragraph that follows is certainly a weird enough thing to say. Oh the places that link to me...

Israel, Mossad, Iran and a Nuclear False Flag Attack...
...Since the US Army War College already acknowledges that the Mossad "has capability to target US forces and make it look like a Palestinian/Arab act," it may well be that the FBI has finally realized how dangerous the Israeli Fifth Column is, having begun to tighten the noose around the legendary Israeli spying operation in America by arresting Larry Franklin, Doug Feith's deputy in the Office of Special Plans, origin of the fraudulent Iraqi weapons of mass destruction intelligence. Not yet indicted, but identified as Co-Conspirator 1 and 2 along with Franklin are the two top AIPAC operatives to whom he passed higly classified intel: Steven Rosen, head of Policy and Keith Weissman, Iran specialist. Israeli sources expect Weissman and Rosen to be indicted for espionage in the coming weeks. [<--- that one is my link - Dan ]
Perhaps the two largest factions of the New World Order, Skull and Bones and the Zionists are now going into open warfare, as the Bush Administration attempts to clean out the neoconservatives, discipline the Israeli military and enforce the two state solution.

Uhm, for the record, I really disagree that Skull and Bones and "the Zionists" are the two major factions of anything at all... I keep looking around for this New World Order and all I seem to find are crazy people. Damn! :-) Nonetheless freedomforyou has a fairly classic conspiracy tale about Mohammed Atta, the "Able Danger" intelligence project that supposedly uncovered some of the 9/11 hijackers, and why not, a massive heroin smuggling operation being covered up by the government. Like I said, classic. Keep on going, Starfish Prime!

Katrina klusterfuck: Billmon tries to find enough Pepto-Bismol to swallow the nasty slime of spin and madness. As always Atrios is holding it down on the matter along with Josh Marshall, who is putting together a Katrina Timeline. William Rivers Pitt on "Washing Away the Conservative Movement" is very worth reading. In a nutshell his point is that the Grover Norquist "Starve the Beast" philosophy is dead because the first task of government is to look after the citizens, and it just don't work when you've starved it. Also "Wake of the Flood" is damn good. I liked this bit from Stirling Newberry:

The Days of Death and the Wings of Victory:
Every age buries the last, but the old age digs its own grave. And that is what Bush is doing, digging the grave of the 20th Century. It was a gleaming century that launched itself into space, it was a brutal century that killed millions. It was the century that fed more people, and cured more diseases than all the others. It was a century that saw more die in famines than in all the others.

The waste of that century has killed New Orleans. It is not the flooding, but the toxic wastes of decades that makes it uneconomical to rebuild the shattered streets of the Crescent City. It is not colonialism, but oil that drew us into Iraq. And we need not point out that Saddam came to power because of the Cold War realpolitick. But it is ours to bury the past, not to blame it. There are those who refuse to deal with reality, and think that simply distancing themselves from what was is enough - and there are many millions more who simply do not understand that the era of extraction, the era of oil and the era of a small closed affluent world surrounded by an ocean of dictatorships, deprivation and destitution is over.

........The coming weeks will strain the faith of those who have watched and waited s