Sunday, October 12, 2008

The End of the Rule of Law in America

US troops are back home in America to wage war upon the people of the US. New laws make public dissent of any kind --however peaceful --an act of 'terrorism'. Congress was threatened with martial law, literally blackmailed, into passing the infamous and ineffective bailout! The threat of martial law, therefore, is not only in the official record, it is made clear with the arrival of US troops withdrawn from Iraq to patrol US streets, control crowds, deal with 'civil unrest'. Bluntly --they are here to wage war on you unless you happen to be among the one percent who owns more than 90 percent of the nation's total wealth.

It was in 1999 that the government contracted to Kellogg, Brown and Root [KBR], a subsidiary of Dick Cheney's Halliburton, huge contracts to build a FEMA archipelago of 800 camps in secret locations across the US. They have ovens. They have --at their disposal --the government's recent acquisition of about 500,000 plastic coffins. What is the 'innocent' explanation for this secret that is no secret?

There is no innocent explanation! The new laws seem designed to fill up the camps. Peaceful activists may be arrested, detained and denied 'Due Process of Law' if anyone in authority but 'deems' one to be a 'terrorist'. Any public dissent of any type --however peaceful --is defined to be an act of 'terrorism'. Free speech is dead. You may no longer express a contrary opinion where it can be heard and thus 'deemed' to be an act of terrorism. This has been true in airports for some time now.
According to diplomat and author Peter Dale Scott, the KBR contract is part of a Homeland Security plan titled ENDGAME, which sets as its goal the removal of "all removable aliens" and "potential terrorists."

--SF Gate, San Francisco Chronicle, Rule by fear or rule by law?
The Army Times --hardly a 'conspiracy site' --issued a complete story about a combat brigade that has been withdrawn from Iraq to civilian duty in the US --duty that will include shooting at American citizens with 'rubber bullets', tasering folk, stopping vehicular traffic, using shields' and 'batons'!
The 1st BCT’s soldiers also will learn how to use “the first ever nonlethal package that the Army has fielded,” 1st BCT commander Col. Roger Cloutier said, referring to crowd and traffic control equipment and nonlethal weapons designed to subdue unruly or dangerous individuals without killing them.”

They may be called upon to help with civil unrest and crowd control or to deal with potentially horrific scenarios such as massive poisoning and chaos in response to a chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear or high-yield explosive, or CBRNE, attack.

...

The package includes equipment to stand up a hasty road block; spike strips for slowing, stopping or controlling traffic; shields and batons; and, beanbag bullets.

“I was the first guy in the brigade to get Tasered,” said Cloutier, describing the experience as “your worst muscle cramp ever — times 10 throughout your whole body.

“I’m not a small guy, I weigh 230 pounds ... it put me on my knees in seconds.”

--Army Times, Brigade homeland tours start Oct. 1
What does the the government fear from citizens who would otherwise be happy with their governments if they were not daily threatened and blackmailed with martial law?


The Congress was literally blackmailed and threatened. There were warnings of drastic drops in the stock markets. The bailout was passed --under duress --but the stock market collapsed anyway!
Fraud-busters such as Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Los Angeles, have complained about these contracts, saying that more taxpayer dollars should not go to taxpayer-gouging Halliburton. But the real question is: What kind of "new programs" require the construction and refurbishment of detention facilities in nearly every state of the union with the capacity to house perhaps millions of people?

Sect. 1042 of the 2007 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), "Use of the Armed Forces in Major Public Emergencies," gives the executive the power to invoke martial law. For the first time in more than a century, the president is now authorized to use the military in response to "a natural disaster, a disease outbreak, a terrorist attack or any other condition in which the President determines that domestic violence has occurred to the extent that state officials cannot maintain public order."

The Military Commissions Act of 2006, rammed through Congress just before the 2006 midterm elections, allows for the indefinite imprisonment of anyone who donates money to a charity that turns up on a list of "terrorist" organizations, or who speaks out against the government's policies. The law calls for secret trials for citizens and noncitizens alike.

Also in 2007, the White House quietly issued National Security Presidential Directive 51 (NSPD-51), to ensure "continuity of government" in the event of what the document vaguely calls a "catastrophic emergency." Should the president determine that such an emergency has occurred, he and he alone is empowered to do whatever he deems necessary to ensure "continuity of government." This could include everything from canceling elections to suspending the Constitution to launching a nuclear attack. Congress has yet to hold a single hearing on NSPD-51.

U.S. Rep. Jane Harman, D-Venice (Los Angeles County) has come up with a new way to expand the domestic "war on terror." Her Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act of 2007 (HR1955), which passed the House by the lopsided vote of 404-6, would set up a commission to "examine and report upon the facts and causes" of so-called violent radicalism and extremist ideology, then make legislative recommendations on combatting it.

According to commentary in the Baltimore Sun, Rep. Harman and her colleagues from both sides of the aisle believe the country faces a native brand of terrorism, and needs a commission with sweeping investigative power to combat it.

--

--SF Gate, San Francisco Chronicle, Rule by fear or rule by law?
Perhaps the 'new programs' referred to are the sweeping laws which, in fact, create a police state. A new program is most certainly the use of the US military for 'crowd control' and 'civil unrest'. I would have expected this criminal affront to the Constitution from a gopper --but from a Democrat, it is the unkindest cut of all! Et tu, Brute!
Earlier this week, Congressman Michael C. Burgess from the 26th District of Texas, went public on Monday stating live on Infowars nationwide radio broadcast, that House speaker Nancy Pelosi had declared House Rule 136A, effectively putting the House under "Martial Law" rules, a dictatorial measure only activated during times of national emergency.

Analysts and Congressmen alike have equated these threats;to "fearmongering" and described as a form of "economic terrorism" carried out powerful banking interests in order to secure the record $850 billion payout to the banks by the American people.

Physical Martial law may be invoked by the President of the United States in case of any deemed "state of emergency". Martial Law has not been put into practice since Lincoln, where several Congressmen were arrested or put under house arrest. In 1878, Congress passed the Posse Comitatus Act, which forbids military involvement in domestic law enforcement without congressional approval. However, both the Military Commissions Act of 2006 and USNORTHCOM has increased its direct involvement with US civilian administration. Additionally, the John Warner Defense Authorization Act of 2007, and President Bush's recent PD51 may possibly rescind previous limits by suspending Government as well as other Constitutional guarantees such as habeas corpus.

--Representatives Were Threatened with "Martial Law" if Bailout Bill Did Not Pass

That US troops are deployed in order to wage war upon the people of the US is evidence that the Police State has already been declared. It's a Bush fait accompli. US Troops have no legitimate business patrolling US streets in the absence of a 'real' emergency. A Bush pretext will provide one!

If the high court had not been packed with the likes of Scalia, Alito, Roberts, and Thomas one might might have believed that such draconian, totalitarian measures would be struck down. One is no longer confident. The measure will stand because our once free nation is no longer. It will stand because what previous courts had declared to be protected rights under the First Amendment have been trashed by Bush and his co-conspirators in the judiciary.

The use of US troops against US citizens is, in fact, against federal law and the Constitution. Everything that the Army Times says the Brigade is trained for violates the original prohibition against the use of the military as a Posse Comitatus.

Has this nation already acted in violation of the Posse Comitatus Act? The horrifying use of tanks, armored personnel carriers and other weapons of war in the military-style assault on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco was but a preview, a harbinger of things to come.
The allegations of child molestation were investigated in the intervening two years, twice, by Texas welfare department authorities and found to be baseless. The Sheriff's department investigated the allegations of illegal guns and these claims were found to be baseless. The investigations were peaceful. There were no problems.

Mark Breault, however, continued to make his baseless and slanderous allegations against the Branch Davidians. The Cult Awareness Network turned up the pressure.

The newspapers called Breault a "private investigator who has tracked the Davidians for two and a half years." "Tracked"? They had lived at the Mt. Carmel Center since 1935. How much "tracking" did it take? "Investigator"? Ha. He's a self-proclaimed "prophet" with a vendetta against the Branch Davidians. And who paid him so handsomely that he could afford to "track" them for 2-1/2 years, anyway? Did the media bother to check any of this out? Never.

...Calling a religion a "cult" and putting out false information across the media about "child molesting" and "weapons caches" is exactly the same technique that was used by the Nazis to portray the Jews as filthy, disgusting people, so they could be killed. It is the same technique used by every tyrannical government, to kill an unpopular and potentially vocal adversarial group. But in this country, we are supposed to have freedom of religion. It would seem that is a pipe dream.

...

So, America, we have cold-blooded killers running our country. Isn't it about time you put down your beer, got up off the sofa, and did something about it?

--Linda Thompson, What Hapened at Waco
The ATF attack on Mt. Carmel should have been a wake up call. If anyone in the Clinton administration deserved impeachment, it should have resulted from what happened in Waco. But --no! There was no GOP outrage because the GOP might have ordered worse themselves and did not wish to establish a precedent that they didn't want to live with later. I can't recall a single word uttered by the GOP in defense of the Constitution. I cannot recall a single GOP voice raised in defense of the guaranteed right of religion or free speech!

I cannot recall a single GOP voice raised to protest the violations of Due Process of Law! I cannot recall a single GOP voice in opposition to the jack-booted thugs who brought to an end a rule of law in America! The GOP would, instead, try to impeach the president for a blow job --an act that is not even a crime!

The GOP coveted Clinton his position because, as the record has proven, they intended to make of the White House a platform from which they would establish their own dictatorship. Under Bush, it is a fait accompli.

In the meantime, some 800 FEMA camps are readied --with ovens and Nazi-like barracks --to receive dissenters. Here's an excerpt from one person's report of a visit to a KBR FEMA camp:
"The first one we observed was in Palmdale, California. It is not operating as a prison at the moment but is masquerading as part of a water facility. Now why would there be a facility of this nature out in the middle of nowhere with absolutely no prisoners?

The fences that run for miles around this large facility all point inward, and there are large mounds of dirt and dry moat surrounding the central area so the inside area is not visible from the road. There are 3 large loading docks facing the entrance that can be observed from the road. What are these massive docks going to be loading?

We observed white vans patrolling the area and one came out and greeted us with a friendly wave and followed us until we had driven safely beyond the area. What would have happened had we decided to enter the open gate or ask questions?

This facility is across the street from the Palmdale Water Department. The area around the Water Department has fences pointing outward, to keep people out of this dangerous area so as not to drown. Yet, across the street, the fences all point inward. Why? To keep people in? What people? Who are going to be it’s occupants? There are also signs posted every 50 feet stating: State of California Trespassing Loitering Forbidden By Law Section 555 California Penal Code."
I believe that the 'goddamned piece of paper' --otherwise known as the Constitution of the United States --makes the use of armed forces against American citizens on American soil a matter of 'high treason' i.,e the government waging 'war' upon the people, a matter that is expressly forbidden by the "Goddamn Piece of Paper", Article III:
Section 3. Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort. No person shall be convicted of treason unless on the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act, or on confession in open court.

The Congress shall have power to declare the punishment of treason, but no attainder of treason shall work corruption of blood, or forfeiture except during the life of the person attainted.

--US Constitution, Article III
Under the 'goddamned piece of paper' (know to us as the US Constitution) the people of the US are the 'sovereign'. We ARE the United States --by law! By waging war upon us --the people of the United States --Bush has already committed mass murder and high treason. [See: Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution]

Additionally --
No soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.

--US Constitution, Amendment III
There is also the matter of the abusive use of military personnel to violate the Constitutional rights of US citizens:
Whoever, except in cases and under circumstances expressly authorized by the Constitution or Act of Congress, willfully uses any part of the Army or the Air Force as a posse comitatus or otherwise to execute the laws shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both.

US Codes, § 1385. Use of Army and Air Force as posse comitatus
of the U.S. Army against the American people?

-- Of course, none of this means anything to George W. Bush, a would be dictator for whom the rule of law means nothing, the Constitution is 'just a goddamned piece of paper". Bush is the price we pay for our failure as a nation to value the gift of intelligence. We might have done better had we paid attention to the great philosopher who wrote of the 'moral imperative to be intelligent'.

Bush is an incompetent boob who has, in fact, bankrupted the nation, violated the Constitutional rights of US citizens and has waged war upon them with acts of high treason and mass murder --capital crimes for which he should stand trial for his life. The charges to include thousands of violations of US Codes, Title 18, Section 2441.
(a) Offense.— Whoever, whether inside or outside the United States, commits a war crime, in any of the circumstances described in subsection (b), shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for life or any term of years, or both, and if death results to the victim, shall also be subject to the penalty of death.

--TITLE 18 > PART I > CHAPTER 118 > § 2441. War crimes

Winston Churchill wrote:
""The power of the Executive to cast a man into prison without formulating any charge known to the law, and particularly to deny him the judgment of his peers, is in the highest degree odious and is the foundation of all totalitarian government whether Nazi or Communist."

-- Winston Churchill, Nov. 21, 1943"
Bush repeatedly asserts a power to imprison anyone without charges --no phone call, no lawyer, no hearing, no trial! The Army Times stated that the troops --formerly in Iraq --will be used domestically for 'crowd control' in cases of civil unrest. And within days of the Army Times 'story', it was revealed that the Bush administration had threatened 'Martial Law' if the bailout bill was not passed. Therefore, we are already living in a police state. And there is likewise a warning.
People must see clearly the futility of maintaining the fight for social goals within the framework of civil debate. When the forces of oppression come to maintain themselves in power against established law; peace is considered already broken.

--Ernesto "Che" Guevara, Guerilla Warfare
It was stated recently that the troops will be on 'our side'. Well --our troops will be taking their orders from the government. And the government is NO LONGER on our side.

And --on our side against whom? More phony terrorists?

The 'terrorists' ARE the government and, as Che would have put it: the peace is already broken.

Government is legitimate ONLY to the extent that it lives up to its SOCIAL CONTRACT with the people. The government of the US has broken that contract! Repeatedly and with impunity. This 'government' is illegitimate!


Scott Ritter: "Pick Your City"

The war waged upon the people of the US will get worse and the people will push back. The people --as a body -- must declare now that no decree now issued is valid, no unjust law enforceable! The revolution has begun and the illegitimate government in DC has won the first several rounds. With US troops in the streets, it is naive to believe that upon a landslide win by Obama, the entrenched militarists will simply fold up their tents and ride willingly into that dimming sunset.

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Friday, October 10, 2008

On the Brink of Collapse, Palin-McCain Indulge Smear Jobs and Distractions

McCain-Palin refuse to talk about the fact that the US and the world face the biggest economic collapse since the GOP brought you the Great Depression. McCain Palin want to talk about someone Obama might have met when he was eight years old!

Palin-McCain want the US to repeat the GOP/ideological strategies that brought us to this point: 1) enriching the tiny elite which alone have benfited from GOP tax cuts, bailouts, and preferential treatments; 2) raising the tax burden on everyone else who must take up the slack. In other words, McCain-Palin want to keep on raping the nation and blaming the victim. It's the GOP way. Rather than rewarding this gang of crooks with an election win, I want to round up the Bush administration and put it on trial at the Hague, charge it with war crimes, crimes against the peace, torture and other violations of Geneva and Nuremberg.

To distract you, McCain-Palin resort to tired old GOP tactics --smear jobs and distractions.

McCain’s course correction reflects a growing case of nerves within his high command as the electoral map has shifted significantly in Obama’s favor in the past two weeks.

“It’s a dangerous road, but we have no choice,” a top McCain strategist told the Daily News. “If we keep talking about the economic crisis, we’re going to lose.”

--New York Daily News:

McCain's attitudes about the corporate takeover of the us government dates to the role his played in the Savings and Loan Scandal of the 80s and 90s when McCain was accused of 'improperly aiding his political patron, Charles Keating' who was chairman of the Lincoln Savings and Loan Association at the time. An investigation by the bipartisan Senate Ethics Committee resulted in McCain getting reprimanded for his role. McCain is, in fact, the only major party Presidential nominee in US history to have been "...rebuked, censured or otherwise admonished after a Congressional investigation." [See: Keating Economics: John McCain and hte Making of a Financial Crisis]

Two bailouts in a period of some two weeks or less hasn't worked. Panicked investors withdrew 52 billion from US managed stock and bond funds in a period of a week or less. Investors had already withdrawn $72.3 billion in September --the biggest withdrawal ever in a single month.

Years ago, I wrote in 'The Opinion' that GOP strategy was best summed up: just keep on doing whatever makes you sick! Even then, the numbers were unmistakable: every Democratic president since FDR had outperformed every GOP President in every key economic index, notably, job growth and overall GDP. Moreover, Bill Clinton had reversed a trend begun with Reagan's tax cut for the rich. It was Reagan's tax cut that not only triggered a depression of some two years --the worst since the Great Depression --it triggered a trend that is always worse under GOP regimes: the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. This trend abated in Clinton's second term only to resume with Bush and yet another round of GOP largesse to those who don't need it.

That was not the only trend reversed by Bill Clinton. The ratio of gross national debt to to GDP was at its lowest level since 1931 when Ronald Reagan took office. Under Reagan, it did not last long. Ronald Reagan ran up historically high debt and deficit --a trend that 'skyrocketed' through twelve years of Reagan/Bush. The official charts from every agency prove conclusively that Bill Ciinton had reversed those pernicious trends as well. Another myth is that Reagan was one of the best Presidents for job creation. In reality, he's among the worst:
Job Growth Per Year Under Most Recent Presidents8


Johnson 3.8%
Carter 3.1
Clinton 2.4
Kennedy 2.3
Nixon 2.3
Reagan 2.1
Bush 0.6

--U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of Economic Analysis.

But this week, Larry King let a GOP spinmesiter and paid shill get away with characterizing 'unemployment' under Jimmy Carter as 'immense'. Briefly --that is a BALD FACED LIE and to be expected from the GOP. Check the official numbers above. One should expect a morally bankrupt party like the GOP to attack Carter's record. Carter's record on every issue is far, far superior to the miserable performances turned in by EVERY GOP President since 1900.

The GOP is a party of liars. They will lie to you because they lie to themselves daily. It's the only way they can get through the day. If GOPPERS had ever faced the truth about themselves, they would have shot themselves a long time ago.

It took a return to GOP mismanagement, greed and incompetence to undo the good that had been done in Clinton's eight years in the Oval Office. Now the national debt is the highest it's been since 1955 (53 years ago).
Bush did three things to skyrocket the debt from $5.7 trillion to $10 trillion:
  • He lowered taxes on the rich (by far the biggest item)
  • He invaded Iraq instead of winning in Afghan-Pakistan (another $600 B).
  • He loosened controls on Wall Street.
McCain backed all three policies:
  • He backed Bush's tax cuts for the rich and now wants to give them bigger tax cuts.
  • He was gung-ho for the Iraq war from the start.
  • When Katie Couric asked Sarah Palin to name one time McCain suggested regulating Wall Street, she couldn't—because he never did. He crowed in the Wall Street Journal how he was always against regulation.
  • Bush did three things to skyrocket the debt from $5.7 trillion to $10 trillion:
    • 1. He lowered taxes on the rich (by far the biggest item).
    • He invaded Iraq instead of winning in Afghan-Pakistan (another $600 B).
    • He loosened controls on Wall Street.
    As it happens, McCain backed all three policies:
    • He backed Bush's tax cuts for the rich and now wants to give them bigger tax cuts.
    • He was gung-ho for the Iraq war from the start.
    • When Katie Couric asked Sarah Palin to name one time McCain suggested regulating Wall Street, she couldn't—because he never did. He crowed in the Wall Street Journal how he was always against regulation.

--Z facts.com
What if you went to a doctor who told you: 'just keep on eating the greasy foods, lazing around the house, hitting the bottle! Don't take any responsibility for your own health; blame it all on your neighbors!

Bill Clinton's was the ONLY successful presidency since Jimmy Carter left the White House. The GOP would like you to just keep on doing whatever it is that's making the nation sick, bankrupt, deteriorating, collapsing. The GOP has nothing new to offer. At the cost of the republic itself, we have learned the hard way that everything the GOP has ever said has been a lie. Nothing has worked! It's all bullshit!

Addendum: it's not bad enough that the GOP has deliberately bankrupted the nation, Bush worked assiduously to assume dictatorial powers as he put into place a huge federal bureacracy whose only raison d'etre is to spy on you, intimidate you and deny you due process of law. There is a word for this: TYRANNY!


Naomi Wolfe on Tyranny and the US Police State

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Thursday, October 09, 2008

McCain's 'Gaffe' Appeals to Throw-back Base

McCain did not 'gaffe' when he denounced an 'over head projector' at the world famous Adler Planetarium. McCain was, rather, sucking up to the GOP base of Palinesque reactionaries and 'anti-science' types.

McCain won't lose a single vote despite the fact that the Adler never got the money that McCain says it got. This is not about projectors or money. It's about the problem McCain has with 'truth'. The item in question is hardly an 'over head' projector.
Last night, during the presidential debate in Nashville, Tennessee, Senator John McCain made the following statement:

McCain: “While we were working to eliminate these pork barrel earmarks he (Senator Obama) voted for nearly $1 billion in pork barrel earmark projects. Including $3 million for an overhead projector at a planetarium in Chicago, Illinois. My friends, do we need to spend that kind of money?”

To clarify, the Adler Planetarium requested federal support – which was not funded – to replace the projector in its historic Sky Theater, the first planetarium theater in the Western Hemisphere. The Adler’s Zeiss Mark VI projector – not an overhead projector – is the instrument that re-creates the night sky in a dome theater, the quintessential planetarium experience. The Adler’s projector is nearly 40 years old and is no longer supported with parts or service by the manufacturer. It is only the second planetarium projector in the Adler’s 78 years of operation.

Science literacy is an urgent issue in the United States. To remain competitive and ensure national security, it is vital that we educate and inspire the next generation of explorers to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering and math. Senator McCain’s statements about the Adler Planetarium’s request for federal support do not accurately reflect the museum's legislative history or relationship with Senator Obama.

The Adler has approached the Illinois Congressional delegation the last few years for federal assistance with various initiatives. These have included museum exhibitions, equipment and educational programs we offer to area schools, including the Chicago Public Schools. We have made requests to Senators Durbin and Obama, as well as to 6 area Congressmen from both political parties. We are grateful that all of the Members we have approached, including Senator Obama, have deemed our activities worthy of their support, and have made appropriations requests on our behalf, as they have for many worthy Illinois nonprofit organizations.

As a result of the hard work of our bipartisan congressional delegation, the Adler has been fortunate to receive a few federal appropriations the past couple of years. However, the Adler has never received an earmark as a result of Senator Obama's efforts. This is clearly evidenced by recent transparency laws implemented by the Congress, which have resulted in the names of all requesting Members being listed next to every earmark in the reports that accompany appropriations bills.

--Adler Planetarium, Statement About Sen John McCain's Comments at the Presidential Debate [links to PDF file]
The GOP put together the coalition from hell --anti-intellectuals, gun nuts, bigots, chauvinists, child pornographers, anti porn zealots, fascist oil barons, radical fundamentalists and Palinesque believers in claptrap -- a flat earth and Alley Oops who co-habit with dinosaurs.

The miracle is that when all of them get together in what is called the GOP National Convention, they STILL cannot win the White House unless they steal it!

Monday, October 06, 2008

Vatican Flaunts Gross Hypocrisy, calls Democrats "A Party of Death"

A 'religion' responsible for millions of deaths over hundreds of years labels 'democrats' a 'party of death'. Selective memory or deliberate lie?

The Vatican --of course --has a really 'great' record on 'death'!

I am being sarcastic.
The Prefect of the Vatican's Supreme Court of the Apostolic Signature has accused the U.S. Democratic party of "transforming itself into a party of death”. Raymond Burke, former Archbishop of St. Louis, lashed out at high profile Catholics — vice presidential candidate Joe Biden and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi — for misrepresenting Church teaching on abortion.

--Vatican labels U.S. Democrats ‘party of death’
Was it not Pope Urban who exhorted impoverished Europeans to commit mass murder and atrocities throughout the Middle East in what are now called the 'Crusades? Historical accounts describe knee deep blood rushing like rivers through the streets of Jerusalem.

How many innocent folk were burned because someone in the Catholic Church 'DEEMED' them to be heretics or witches?

The current Pope Benedict XVI, formerly Josef Ratzinger, is accurately described as a hard-line enforcer of Church dogma, responsible for persecuting and suppressing what is called "liberation theology" in Latin America. He worked to ban, censor or excommunicate "liberal clerics" throughout Europe and North America. It earned him some labels including: “Der Panzerkardinal” and “grand inquisitor”.

And what was that spot of bother about how the Vatican supported Hitler and did precious little to prevent a Holocaust?

Isn't it the Vatican that is responsible for the spread of aids in South America and Africa because it forbids the use of condoms?

And, more recently, the Vatican is calling DEMOCRATS the 'party of death' when --in fact --it was the GOP regime of George W. Bush that invaded a sovereign nation upon a pack of lies, committed mass murder and in the process prosecutable war crimes, crimes against humanity and heinous torture in violation of EVERY international prohibition. Where was the Vatican outrage? Where is it now?

Sure --Bush had some Democratic support in the Congress which ought to be dealt with with lots of primary losses and forced resignations.

But to call the 'Democrats' a party of death is just plain stupid --deliberately misleading --when in fact it is the GOP that is no longer a political party, it's a crime syndicate and a kooky cult to boot!

Note to the Vatican: do a fact check! You're NOT infallible and you don't speak for any God that I believe in.

The Vatican would do well to practice what it preaches! The Vatican would do well to address the issue constructively as opposed to throwing around epithets in areas where the church is utterly without credibility.

Given the billions who have either been murdered, killed, maimed tortured or otherwise just trashed in the name of 'God', perhaps the world would be better off without the Catholic church, or, for that matter 'religion' itself. Clearly --religion, rather than being the source of salvation, is invariably the rationalization by which religious, self-righteous bigots rationalize and perpetrate mass murder in the name of 'God'. I don't think 'God' approves. I don't think 'God' approves of 'religion'!