Why am I blocked from YouTubeforObama? http://hk.youtube.com/user/PeskyAtheist Please tell me.
ACORN Obama Campaign RESPONSE
(Please copy this message and post it everywhere. Send to media. Blog it. Post it.)
(This is a reply from watchdog@barackobama.com ~Neil)
Thanks for sending in the email about ACORN. This smear has been gaining popularity lately as people look for explanations for our economic crisis -- and smear artists looking to destroy Barack see an opening. Every word of it is dishonest and manipulative.
Email smears like this are part of a broader, shadowy strategy to scare people who aren't very familiar with Barack by spreading false information.
Here are the facts:
Barack Obama was never an ACORN community organizer.Barack was never an ACORN trainer and was never an employee of ACORN.ACORN was not part of Project Vote, the successful voter registration drive Barack led in 1992.As an attorney, Barack worked with the U.S. Department of Justice to represent ACORN and other voter's rights groups in a lawsuit to enforce the widely praised federal Motor Voter Law in Illinois.The Huffington Post has laid out the evidence showing the truth about Barack, ACORN, and these smears. See: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/05/smears-contradicted-obama_n_132098.htmlhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/03/obama-camp-debunks-voter_n_131686.html
Barack Obama was never an ACORN community organizer.
Barack was never an ACORN trainer and was never an employee of ACORN.
ACORN was not part of Project Vote, the successful voter registration drive Barack led in 1992.
As an attorney, Barack worked with the U.S. Department of Justice to represent ACORN and other voter's rights groups in a lawsuit to enforce the widely praised federal Motor Voter Law in Illinois.
The Huffington Post has laid out the evidence showing the truth about Barack, ACORN, and these smears. See:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/05/smears-contradicted-obama_n_132098.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/03/obama-camp-debunks-voter_n_131686.html
There's no way to stop these dangerous, misleading viral emails one-by-one, but together we can take the political process back from the cynical politics of deception. We can all start by spreading the truth about Barack Obama.
Forward this email to everyone else who received the ACORN smear, then head to Fight The Smears <http://www.fightthesmears.com> to get details about more smears and see what else you can do: Fight The Smears: http://www.fightthesmears.com
Here are a few facts about Barack Obama that people might be interested to learn: * Barack Obama is working for middle class Americans. The Obama-Biden tax plan includes a tax cut of $1,000 for more than 150 million working Americans. The plan will also eliminate income taxes altogether for more than 7 million senior citizens who make less than $50,000 per year. Finally, Obama's plan will provide an average of $500 to 10 million homeowners, the majority of whom earn less than $50,000 per year. Learn more about the Obama-Biden tax plan: http://www.barackobama.com/issues/economy/#tax-relief http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/publications/url.cfm?ID=411693* Barack Obama knows that the problems we're facing in this election are too serious to let the politics of manufactured controversy and fake outrage dominate. He wants to bring our troops home from Iraq, so we can focus on Afghanistan and track down the terrorists who attacked us. And he's proposed a detailed plan for using alternative energy sources to relieve America's dependence on foreign oil within 10 years and put millions of Americans to work.See more about Obama's plan for change here: See Barack's detailed plan for America: http://my.barackobama.com/page/content/planforchange_ad/* After being raised by a single mother and by his grandparents in a modest household, Barack studied hard and won scholarships and loans to attend Columbia University and later Harvard Law School, where he became president of the Harvard Law Review. After law school, he returned to Chicago, where he helped disadvantaged citizens work for better jobs and better schools. Barack later went on to teach constitutional law at the University of Chicago, helping to educate the community leaders of tomorrow. Read more about Barack Obama: http://www.barackobama.com/learn/meet_barack.php
Here are a few facts about Barack Obama that people might be interested to learn: * Barack Obama is working for middle class Americans. The Obama-Biden tax plan includes a tax cut of $1,000 for more than 150 million working Americans. The plan will also eliminate income taxes altogether for more than 7 million senior citizens who make less than $50,000 per year. Finally, Obama's plan will provide an average of $500 to 10 million homeowners, the majority of whom earn less than $50,000 per year. Learn more about the Obama-Biden tax plan: http://www.barackobama.com/issues/economy/#tax-relief
http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/publications/url.cfm?ID=411693
* Barack Obama knows that the problems we're facing in this election are too serious to let the politics of manufactured controversy and fake outrage dominate. He wants to bring our troops home from Iraq, so we can focus on Afghanistan and track down the terrorists who attacked us. And he's proposed a detailed plan for using alternative energy sources to relieve America's dependence on foreign oil within 10 years and put millions of Americans to work.
See more about Obama's plan for change here: See Barack's detailed plan for America: http://my.barackobama.com/page/content/planforchange_ad/
* After being raised by a single mother and by his grandparents in a modest household, Barack studied hard and won scholarships and loans to attend Columbia University and later Harvard Law School, where he became president of the Harvard Law Review. After law school, he returned to Chicago, where he helped disadvantaged citizens work for better jobs and better schools. Barack later went on to teach constitutional law at the University of Chicago, helping to educate the community leaders of tomorrow. Read more about Barack Obama: http://www.barackobama.com/learn/meet_barack.php
Please forward this to anyone you know who has received this smear email about Barack. Together we can make sure these negative and divisive attacks don't affect this election.
Thanks for your help,
Obama for America
INVITATION TO ALL MORMONS TO VOTE THEIR CONSCIENCE
LDS Church encourages member involvement in political process
By Carrie A. MooreDeseret News
Published: Monday, Sept. 22, 2008 12:28 a.m. MDT
While the LDS Church has long affirmed its political neutrality regarding political parties, platforms and candidates, it is reminding its members of their duty to vote and of the church's right to speak out on political and social issues.
In a letter sent to priesthood leaders dated Sept. 11 to be read from the pulpit in LDS congregations nationwide on Sunday, the church's First Presidency titled its message "Political participation, voting and the political neutrality of the Church."
Church leaders each year read a statement of political neutrality from the pulpit and encourage members to get involved in the political process, but this year's letter differed from previous years in the urgency with which it encourages individual political participation.
"As citizens, we have the privilege and duty of electing office holders and influencing public policy. Participation in the political process affects our communities and nation today and in the future," the letter reads.
"Latter-day Saints as citizens are to seek out and then uphold leaders who will act with integrity and are wise, good, and honest. Principles compatible with the gospel may be found in various political parties."
"Therefore, in this election year, we urge you to register to vote, to study the issues and candidates carefully and prayerfully, and then to vote for and actively support those you believe will most nearly carry out your ideas of good government," the letter said.
As in the past, the letter affirms the church's "neutrality regarding political parties, platforms, and candidates. The Church also affirms its constitutional right of expression on political and social issues."
In June, the First Presidency sent a letter to church leaders in California — also to be read from the pulpit — asking church members to "do all you can" to uphold traditional marriage. The move came following a ruling earlier this year by the California Supreme Court that overturned a previous referendum outlawing gay marriage.
Voters there will decide in November whether to approve the proposed amendment, and opponents have grown increasingly vocal in their criticism of the church's stance and the political involvement of its members.
E-mail: carrie@desnews.com
-----
First Presidency Issues Letter on Political Participation
SALT LAKE CITY | 22 September 2008 | The following letter was issued by the First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on September 11, 2008, to be read to Church congregations throughout the United States: Political Participation, Voting, and the Political Neutrality of the Church As citizens we have the privilege and duty of electing office holders and influencing public policy. Participation in the political process affects our communities and nation today and in the future. Latter-day Saints as citizens are to seek out and then uphold leaders who will act with integrity and are wise, good, and honest. Principles compatible with the gospel may be found in various political parties. Therefore, in this election year, we urge you to register to vote, to study the issues and candidates carefully and prayerfully, and then to vote for and actively support those you believe will most nearly carry out your ideas of good government.The Church affirms its neutrality regarding political parties, platforms, and candidates. The Church also affirms its constitutional right of expression on political and social issues. Sincerely yours,
Thomas S. Monson Henry B. Eyring Dieter F. Uchtdorf The First Presidency
Greetings!LDS Members are invited to join Mormons for Obama!This is a group dedicated to bringing together members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (LDS or Mormon) who support Barack Obama.We encourage all people to participate with their local Obama groups (i.e. Utah for Obama).Please read Obama's speech on faith.Also, please use the blog feature for discussions, and make announcements over the listserv. The listserv is now moderated.The Mormons for Obama email discussion group can be found here.Visit the Mormons for Obama Store!Some other Mormon groups for Obama:Oregon Mormons for Obama 08AZ Mormons for ObamaLatter Day Saints (Mormons) for ObamaDFW Mormons for Obama
Greetings!
LDS Members are invited to join Mormons for Obama!
This is a group dedicated to bringing together members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (LDS or Mormon) who support Barack Obama.
We encourage all people to participate with their local Obama groups (i.e. Utah for Obama).
Please read Obama's speech on faith.
Also, please use the blog feature for discussions, and make announcements over the listserv. The listserv is now moderated.
The Mormons for Obama email discussion group can be found here.
Visit the Mormons for Obama Store!
Some other Mormon groups for Obama:
Oregon Mormons for Obama 08
AZ Mormons for Obama
Latter Day Saints (Mormons) for Obama
DFW Mormons for Obama
Share what you think have been FOX's ugliest momentsDear [Pesky], It is deeply detrimental to the longterm interests of democracy when Democrats praise and support FOX News. This would be true regardless of who that Democrat is, but it's particularly heinous when Terry McAuliffe, the former chairman of the Democratic National Committee, is singing their praises. "Let me congratulate FOX," McAuliffe said this past week, "because you were the first ones to call [the Pennsylvania primary] for Hillary Clinton." McAuliffe, who is also chairing Clinton's Presidential committee, actually echoed the FOX mantra by calling them "fair and balanced." What is so dangerous about McAuliffe's praise is that FOX is now using his words as a TV ad to prove just how fair and balanced they are. The rest of us know the truth: Watch the video: http://bravenewfilms.org/watch/26883200/36988?utm_source=rgemail Jonathan put together this video as a reminder of how exceedingly unfair and imbalanced FOX actually is. These are just a few gems to let McAuliffe and others know that FOX is the foe, has always been the foe, and will continue to be the foe of accurate reporting. Please help us in this quest by sharing what you think have been FOX's ugliest moments. Then Digg this story and spread the word. We will send the list to McAuliffe as a firm reminder that he must not applaud FOX! Yours,Robert Greenwald,and the Brave New Team ---Brave New Films is located at 10510 Culver Blvd., Culver City, CA 90232. You can get our latest videos on email, iTunes, RSS, Facebook, and YouTube here. To stop receiving the latest videos from us, click here.
Share what you think have been FOX's ugliest moments
Dear [Pesky],
It is deeply detrimental to the longterm interests of democracy when Democrats praise and support FOX News. This would be true regardless of who that Democrat is, but it's particularly heinous when Terry McAuliffe, the former chairman of the Democratic National Committee, is singing their praises.
"Let me congratulate FOX," McAuliffe said this past week, "because you were the first ones to call [the Pennsylvania primary] for Hillary Clinton." McAuliffe, who is also chairing Clinton's Presidential committee, actually echoed the FOX mantra by calling them "fair and balanced." What is so dangerous about McAuliffe's praise is that FOX is now using his words as a TV ad to prove just how fair and balanced they are. The rest of us know the truth:
Watch the video: http://bravenewfilms.org/watch/26883200/36988?utm_source=rgemail
Jonathan put together this video as a reminder of how exceedingly unfair and imbalanced FOX actually is. These are just a few gems to let McAuliffe and others know that FOX is the foe, has always been the foe, and will continue to be the foe of accurate reporting.
Please help us in this quest by sharing what you think have been FOX's ugliest moments. Then Digg this story and spread the word. We will send the list to McAuliffe as a firm reminder that he must not applaud FOX!
Yours,Robert Greenwald,and the Brave New Team
---Brave New Films is located at 10510 Culver Blvd., Culver City, CA 90232. You can get our latest videos on email, iTunes, RSS, Facebook, and YouTube here. To stop receiving the latest videos from us, click here.
Dear Friend,
A recent report by the Associated Press has revealed that the Republican National Committee is pulling together a joint fund with John McCain called the "Victory Committee." Its goal is to raise $120 million -- which they're sure to spend trying to destroy our candidates.
We've seen this before -- we know they're already launching attacks on Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. And while they're tearing them down, they'll try to spin John McCain to the American people.
It's a $120 million makeover fund, designed to make everyone forget about the last eight years of John McCain, George Bush, the war, the economy, Katrina, and a stunning lack of competency.
We can't let John McCain and the RNC get away with it -- Hillary and Barack need us to fight back while they're trying to win the nomination.
That's why I'm making an urgent request for you to help us with a contribution today -- we have to keep up. They've got a head start, but we can stay competitive if you make a contribution right now:
http://www.democrats.org/competitive
This $120 million fund is about more than just money and negative ads though -- it goes to the core of what John McCain pretends to be.
As a "maverick reformer," he has repeatedly claimed to be a crusader for campaign finance reform, but he has shown little regard for campaign finance law. At the same time, he's staffed the highest levels of his campaign with Washington lobbyists, with one of them going so far as to work out of McCain's campaign bus.
I emailed at the end of February about McCain's decision to break the law and unilaterally withdraw from primary matching funds. We filed a complaint with the FEC that many of you signed your support for, but it has been unable to act.
So yesterday, we sued the FEC to force an investigation into whether McCain has violated campaign finance law. We refuse to let his campaign go unchecked, and we'll do whatever it takes to make sure he is held accountable.
It takes a lot to raise $120 million, but John McCain's staff of lobbyists knows they can count on checks from their friends and special interests. They can't raise the money they need without it.
So this is what we're up against -- a $120 million fundraising push, an opponent who's already broken campaign finance law, a team of lobbyists who have plenty of friends to help them get the cash they need to trash our candidates, and an FEC that is unable to act on our complaint.
We need to stay competitive, and the only way to do that is for you to make a contribution right now:
Your contribution means we stay competitive. It means we can go out and respond to the Republican attacks while Hillary and Barack work to become our party's nominee.
And your support means we can show the Republicans that, as in 2005, 2006 and 2007, Democrats plan to compete everywhere -- and win.
Thanks for all that you do,
Howard Dean
Contributions or gifts to the Democratic National Committee are not deductible as charitable contributions for federal income tax purposes.
DNC, 430 S. Capitol St. SE, Washington DC 20003
Press Contacts: Joe Conn & Rob Boston Phone: 202-466-3234 Fax: 202-466-2587www.au.org/press Forward this message to family and friends View this email in your web browser
April 17, 2008
Tax Aid To Religion Harms Faith And Draws Government Into Religious Affairs, Interfaith Coalition Tells Appeals Court
Religious, Civil Liberties Organizations Urge Court To Strike Down City Grants To Detroit Houses Of Worship
Using public funds to repair Detroit houses of worship violates the U.S. Constitution and threatens the independence of religious groups, a coalition of religious and civil liberties groups has told a federal appeals court.
In a friend-of-the-court brief filed today, seven organizations urged the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to rule against aid to churches that was distributed by the City of Detroit Downtown Development Authority in 2006.
The money was given to three downtown churches to repair their facades and for landscaping and lighting upgrades to spruce up sections of the city prior to the Super Bowl. A federal district court said the aid did not advance religion.
Organizations joining on the brief included the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty; American Jewish Committee; Hadassah, the Women’s Zionist Organization of America; the Hindu American Foundation; Americans United for Separation of Church and State; The Interfaith Alliance Foundation and Americans for Religious Liberty.
“Americans have a long tradition of offering voluntary support to houses of worship,” said the Rev. Barry W. Lynn, Americans United executive director. “Coercing taxpayers to provide this aid is a monumental violation of the right of conscience.”
The legal brief in American Atheists, Inc. v. City of Detroit Downtown Development Authority argues that government aid to religion usually ends up doing more harm than good.
“The lessons of history are compelling: Governmental aid to construct and maintain houses of worship degrades religion and distorts government,” asserts the brief.
The brief goes on to argue, “[T]he grant recipients here are not just religiously affiliated: They are full-fledged churches. So the district court’s approval of public funding for repairs would have been especially noxious to those who adopted the First Amendment…. And it would have been equally offensive to those who sought to maintain their cherished religious freedom by ensuring that their houses of worship could never develop an unhealthy dependence on governmental largesse.”
The brief draws extensively on history and cites the works of religious liberty pioneers such as James Madison, Thomas Jefferson, Roger Williams and others.
* * * *
Americans United is a religious liberty watchdog group based in Washington, D.C. Founded in 1947, the organization educates Americans about the importance of church-state separation in safeguarding religious freedom.
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A joint project of Americans Unitedfor Separation of Church and Stateand The Interfaith Alliance Foundation
Americans United for Separation of Church and State * 518 C Street NE, Washington, DC 20002Phone (202) 466-3234 * Fax (202) 466-2587 * auactivist@au.org * www.au.org
THIS POST IS ABOUT AWARENESS:
OBAMA HAS BITTER PILL TO SWALLOW: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2228OBAMA ADMITS REMARKS ON SMALL TOWN AMERICA WERE WRONG, BUT REFUSES TO APOLOGIZE: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2222OBAMA BLUNDER MAY GIVE HILLARY THE OPENING SHE NEEDS: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2226BILL CLINTON FOUNDATION LINKED TO CHINA FIRM: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2229OBAMA, JIMMY HOFFA JR., TOUT ECONOMIC POPULISM: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2227CHENEY "INTERESTED" IN OBAMA'S PASTOR OF 20 YEARS: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2217RICHARDSON SAYS HE ENDORSED OBAMA BECAUSE HE WAS UPSET: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2225TV ADS DO A LOT OF TALKING FOR DEMS IN PENNSYLVANIA: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2223EXPERIENCE NOT ALWAYS THE DECIDER: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=1588GOVERNOR RENDELL A BIG VOICE FOR HILLARY IN PENNSYLVANIA: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2232BLOODY WEEK: 19 AMERICAN TROOPS KILLED IN IRAQ: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2224If you subscribe or go to PoliticalCount.com, it shows that you care about the 2008 election, you care about issues, and you care about people in your community, in our country and the world. (PLEASE NOTE: IN THE STATE OF FLORIDA, THE SITE IS KNOWN AS FLORIDACOUNTS.COM).
OBAMA HAS BITTER PILL TO SWALLOW: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2228
OBAMA ADMITS REMARKS ON SMALL TOWN AMERICA WERE WRONG, BUT REFUSES TO APOLOGIZE: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2222
OBAMA BLUNDER MAY GIVE HILLARY THE OPENING SHE NEEDS: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2226
BILL CLINTON FOUNDATION LINKED TO CHINA FIRM: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2229
OBAMA, JIMMY HOFFA JR., TOUT ECONOMIC POPULISM: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2227
CHENEY "INTERESTED" IN OBAMA'S PASTOR OF 20 YEARS: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2217
RICHARDSON SAYS HE ENDORSED OBAMA BECAUSE HE WAS UPSET: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2225
TV ADS DO A LOT OF TALKING FOR DEMS IN PENNSYLVANIA: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2223
EXPERIENCE NOT ALWAYS THE DECIDER: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=1588
GOVERNOR RENDELL A BIG VOICE FOR HILLARY IN PENNSYLVANIA: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2232
BLOODY WEEK: 19 AMERICAN TROOPS KILLED IN IRAQ: http://www.floridacounts.com/index.php?news=2224
If you subscribe or go to PoliticalCount.com, it shows that you care about the 2008 election, you care about issues, and you care about people in your community, in our country and the world.
(PLEASE NOTE: IN THE STATE OF FLORIDA, THE SITE IS KNOWN AS FLORIDACOUNTS.COM).
Check out this article! It describes the close attachment of John McCain and the Republican Party to the Rev. John Hagee in San Antonio. Rev. Hagee preaches an Armageddon theology in which he calls for the U.S. to attack Iran. Top republicans flock to this guy's church services. http://www.washingtonspectator.com/articles/20080401ministerofwar.cfm Scary stuff!
EVANGELICAL POLITICS
John McCain's Minister of Warby Lou Dubose | April 1, 2008 JOHN MCCAIN NEEDED AN EVANGELICAL TO EMBRACE and send a message to the Christian right that he will do their bidding, even if he's not quite one of them. He settled on San Antonio End-Timer John Hagee. McCain has never been tight with the nation's evangelical community. While running for the Republican presidential nomination in 2000, he described Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson as "agents of intolerance." When George W. Bush visited Bob Jones University in Greenville, South Carolina, in 2000, McCain was unforgiving. He assumed that the Christian university's official position on the Roman Catholic Church—it is the "Great Whore of Babylon" and its Pope is "the Anti-Christ"—could be turned against Bush, along with Bob Jones U's official ban on interracial dating. "If I had been invited to go to Bob Jones," McCain said in 2000, "sure, I'd have gone. And I'd have told them 'Get out of the 16th and into the 21st century. What you're doing is racist and cruel.' Instead, Governor Bush went there and never said a word. I would never ever do such a thing." Bush beat McCain in South Carolina, with the support of the Christian right. Since then McCain has been ingratiating himself with the nation's evangelicals. In 2006 he delivered the commencement speech at Liberty University, with the university's founder Jerry Falwell at his side. McCain would go on to say that the Constitution defines the United States as a Christian nation. Somewhere along the way, he changed his religious affiliation from Episcopalian to Baptist. And now John Hagee. PREACHING PROSPERITY—The social critic Lenny Bruce used to say, "Show me a preacher who has two suits where there is another man who has none, and I'll show you a fraud." Bruce died long before the advent of the Prosperity Gospel, which spawned a generation of millionaire ministers. The Rev. John Hagee is decidedly in the two-suit category. In 2003 San Antonio Express-News reporter Analisa Nazareno wrote a long investigative profile of Hagee's ministry. Nazareno reported that Hagee's compensation package was $1.25 million a year. Hagee and his wife, Diana (who has earned more than $100,000 a year from the church business), lived (and still live) in a 5,200-square-foot classical revival house in an exclusive gated community in San Antonio. The house is valued at $736,960 on the 2007 tax rolls. A Hagee trust owns a 7,969-acre ranch in South Texas. And the Hagees own more than $1 million worth of unimproved property in San Antonio, according to the local tax assessor. The campus of Hagee's Cornerstone Church includes a spacious 5,000-seat sanctuary and a 50,000-square-foot media center, from which Hagee says he broadcasts to 115 television stations and 110 radio stations. Nazareno described a media conglomerate, Global Evangelism Television (GET), that has brought in more than $18 million a year. In 2003 John Hagee was the highest-paid director of a non-profit corporation in San Antonio. By 2004 he was the highest-paid preacher in the country, according to FreeGoodNews, a Christian non-profit advocacy group that monitors the compensation packages of ministers. (Hagee's financial figures are no longer available. He merged his non-profit GET with Grace Church, which has no physical location and no phone number, so it is no longer required to file annual financial disclosures with the IRS. While he was filing, however, salaries were set by a non-profit board controlled by the Hagee family.) Three paragraphs into her story, the Express-News reporter got to Hagee's revenue source: An emotional, energetic half-hour of song praising the glory of God passes. Then Hagee tells ushers at his 5,000-seat Cornerstone Church to "take their positions." With the dozens of men bearing glinting platters in the aisles, and six cameramen capturing the moment, Hagee instructs church members to hold their money toward the heavens. The thousands repeat after him: "Give and it shall be given." "When you give, it qualifies you to receive God's abundance," he tells his listeners. "If God gives to you before you give to him, God himself will become a liar. . . . If you're not prospering, it's because you're not giving."John Hagee's accumulated net worth derives from contributions and the sale of his books, videos, and tapes. Spend a Sunday at Cornerstone and it becomes evident that the basic tenet of the Prosperity Gospel—when you give, you receive God's abundance—isn't working for most congregants. Rev. Hagee battens on 18,000 working-class whites and Hispanics who call Cornerstone their spiritual home. This is a Wal-Mart congregation that spends one day a week in the tony San Antonio suburb where Hagee built his church. TWENTY MILLION ARMAGEDDONITES—Hagee's theology is at best bizarre and at worst toxic. It is rooted in the teachings of apostate Anglican preacher John Nelson Darby, who left the Church of England in the 1820s to found his own sect. Pre-millennial Dispensationalism divides the world into seven epochs, or "dispensations." According to Darby's eschatological calendar, mankind is nearing the end of the penultimate dispensation. The final dispensation will be 1,000 years of peace, which arrive after Christ's defeat of the Anti-Christ (and Satan) at Armageddon. For Hagee, this is not a metaphor but a place in the Middle East. Hagee's eschatology also involves "the Rapture"—the physical ascent into Heaven of sanctified and reborn Christians. Before all that can come to pass, however, certain biblical prophecies have to be fulfilled: the reunification of biblical Israel under Jewish control; the in-gathering of the world's Jewry to the parts of their ancestral home made up of Israel, Judea and Samaria; the rebuilding of the Temple (on the spot now occupied by one of three of Islam's most sacred mosques); etc. Hagee's focus on End-Times prophecy has turned him toward American foreign policy in Israel and Palestine. He's not alone. American Conservative co-publisher John Basil Utley cites Christian writer Gary North's estimate that 20 million Americans are Armageddonites. "Many of them," Utley writes, "have an ecstatic belief in the cleansing power of apocalyptic violence." John Hagee is committed to the cleansing power of apocalyptic violence. He preaches it. He writes about it. And he puts his money—or his congregants' money—where his theology is. Hagee has raised more than $8.5 million for Israel, much of it used to relocate Jews from the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe to settlements in the West Bank—to Hagee the eastern extension of biblical Israel. Only after a critical mass of Jews have been concentrated in Greater Israel can the End-Times prophecies begin to unfold. ISRAEL'S PROPHETIC ROLE—Hagee's attitude toward Jews is peculiar. He loves them, but only so much and for so long. In his book Jerusalem Countdown: A Prelude to War, Hagee blames the Jews for the anti-Semitism that has dogged them for 5,000 years. "It was the disobedience and rebellion of the Jews, God's chosen people, to their covenental responsibility to serve only the one true God, Jehovah, that gave rise to the opposition and persecution that they experienced beginning in Canaan and continuing to this very day," he writes. Hagee claims that Jews are responsible for "birth[ing] the seed of anti-Semitism that would arise and bring destruction to them for centuries to come . . . it rises from the judgment of God upon his rebellious chosen people." Nonetheless, these Jews must return to Israel—the Holocaust helped that along, attempts to create a Palestinian state are slowing it down—before the apocalyptic conflagration at Armageddon can take place. Then Christ can return. Those Jews who recognize Christ at his Second Coming as the Messiah will be saved, but most will perish. Some Pre-millennial Dispensationalists have calculated the precise number of Jews who will survive Armageddon, the Rapture and all that: 144,000; that is, 12,000 representatives of each tribe of Israel. Go figure. THE CATHOLIC QUESTION—Despite his protestations to the contrary, Hagee is also hard on Catholics. In a bizarre video clip posted online by Wisconsin law professor Ann Althouse, Hagee stands before an elaborate iconographic chart depicting the Christian cosmogony. At the End Times end of the timeline a slutty woman in a red dress rides a three-headed feline monster. In her hand the woman holds a Eucharistic chalice. Pointer in hand, Pastor Hagee elaborates: "This is the Great Whore of Revelation 17. This is the Anti-Christ system. This is the apostate Church," he says. "In this cup, if you read it in the Book of Revelation, is the blood of the saints. This is talking principally about the blood of the Jewish people. Where? From the Crusades that happened back here. From the Spanish Inquisition. From the Holocaust. When Adolph Hitler came to power he said, 'I'm not going to do anything in my lifetime that hasn't been done by the Roman Church in the past 800 years. I'm only going to do it on a greater scale and more efficiently. . . .'" "God said, 'I gave you the time to repent but you did not,'" he explains. "This false cult system that was born in Genesis 10 and progressed through Israel and became Baal worship, God said the day is going to come when I cause this beast to devour this apostate system. So you can say very clearly that while the church is in heaven, this false system is going to be devoured by the Anti-Christ." Catholics take issue with that. As do some Jews, whose blood ends up in the chalice for what appears to be their own fault. All this would be harmless enough (perhaps) if confined to Rev. Hagee's temple. But John Hagee has a constituency that extends beyond his congregation. He used that constituency to build a foreign-policy advocacy organization—Christians United for Israel (CUFI)—that is now pressing for a pre-emptive war with Iran. CUFI brought 4,500 End Times activists to Washington for its July 2006 inaugural event, followed by a day of lobbying on the Hill. Hagee was straightforward in announcing his agenda: "The United States must join Israel in a pre-emptive military strike against Iran to fulfill God's plan for both Israel and the West," he said. He saw this step as "a biblically prophesied End Time confrontation . . . which will lead to the Rapture, Tribulation . . . and the Second Coming of Christ." A REPUBLICAN RELIGION?—John McCain has been pressed to renounce Hagee. He cannot. Louis Farrakhan, the Nation of Islam leader, whose unsolicited "endorsement" created a problem for Sen. Barack Obama, can preach religious hate. But he works on the fringe of American religion and politics and is an unlikely guest at anyone's White House. The influence of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright—Obama's longtime pastor who is cut from a different cloth than Farrakhan—doesn't extend beyond the African-American community in Chicago. The Republican Party, on the other hand, is deeply invested in John Hagee and his followers. On the Sunday before the 2006 election, for example, Texas governor Rick Perry and sixty other candidates (almost all Republicans) stood before the altar at Cornerstone Church with Hagee, each candidate angling for an election-day bounce with evangelical voters. But John Hagee is bigger than Texas. In 2000 he was on presidential candidate George W. Bush's "values team." Since then the right wing of the Republican Party has responded to Pastor Hagee's altar call. In 2002, Republican majority leader Tom DeLay was the keynote speaker at Hagee's "Night to Honor Israel." In 2006 Hagee met with Elliot Abrams, Bush's fervently pro-Israel deputy national security adviser. Hagee later said he and Abrams are largely in agreement regarding Middle East policy. Senators Sam Brownback (R-KS) and Rick Santorum (R-PA) attended the 2006 Washington, D.C., kickoff of Christians United for Israel, standing by as Hagee called for an End Times war on Iran. Senators John Cornyn and Kay Bailey Hutchison, old acolytes from Texas, were also present. (Under Karl Rove's tutelage, Cornyn started his political career with a pilgrimage to Cornerstone Church.) Party chair Ken Mehlman joined Hagee on the speaker's platform. President Bush sent a pre-recorded message. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) got most of the media attention at CUFI's second annual gathering, in 2007, because the Jewish senator compared Hagee to Moses. But Republican house whip Roy Blunt (R-MO) attended and John McCain also joined the pro-Israel Christians when they met in Washington in July. McCain praised Hagee for "doing the Lord's work in Satan's city." That's not San Antonio but Washington. This Palm Sunday John Hagee was in the pulpit in San Antonio, preaching his "Vote the Bible" sermon. Hagee warmed up the 8:30 a.m. crowd with hymns, some sung by his son (Pastor Matt), who is being groomed to take over the family business. Then the senior pastor used "Jabez's Prayer" as a prelude to the collection, asking congregants who were tithing to hold their envelopes above their heads. God answered Jabez's prayer "to bless me and enlarge my territory." The prayer is used by Prosperity Gospel ministers to encourage giving so that God will give back. The sermon was a bellicose endorsement of John McCain, without mentioning the candidate by name. "The surge in Iraq is working," Hagee roared. "Voting the Bible" means refusing to vote for any candidate who will "cut and run" from Iraq. Hagee told his congregation that an account of "first just war" is found in Genesis 14. As Hagee explicates the text, the 318 men Abram led across the desert in pursuit of enemies who had attacked his family were "Abram's Israeli commando unit" avenging and killing "ancient Iraqis." "Jesus was no peacenik!" Hagee said. "Jesus is going to fight in it himself, against the enemies of Israel!"—in the battle of Armageddon. Hagee's Christian Zionists return to Washington, D.C., in July. They will hear from the usual neocon suspects: William Kristol, Frank Gaffney, Daniel Pipes, Clifford May. The secular architects of the Iraq War are now pushing war with Iran and again are eager to sit down with extremist Christians who can help make it happen. Sen. Joe Lieberman will be back, this time to deliver the keynote speech at the "Night to Honor Israel." John McCain is not yet listed on the program. Copyright © 2008 Public Concern Foundation Inc.
John McCain's Minister of Warby Lou Dubose | April 1, 2008
JOHN MCCAIN NEEDED AN EVANGELICAL TO EMBRACE and send a message to the Christian right that he will do their bidding, even if he's not quite one of them. He settled on San Antonio End-Timer John Hagee.
McCain has never been tight with the nation's evangelical community. While running for the Republican presidential nomination in 2000, he described Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson as "agents of intolerance." When George W. Bush visited Bob Jones University in Greenville, South Carolina, in 2000, McCain was unforgiving. He assumed that the Christian university's official position on the Roman Catholic Church—it is the "Great Whore of Babylon" and its Pope is "the Anti-Christ"—could be turned against Bush, along with Bob Jones U's official ban on interracial dating.
"If I had been invited to go to Bob Jones," McCain said in 2000, "sure, I'd have gone. And I'd have told them 'Get out of the 16th and into the 21st century. What you're doing is racist and cruel.' Instead, Governor Bush went there and never said a word. I would never ever do such a thing."
Bush beat McCain in South Carolina, with the support of the Christian right. Since then McCain has been ingratiating himself with the nation's evangelicals. In 2006 he delivered the commencement speech at Liberty University, with the university's founder Jerry Falwell at his side. McCain would go on to say that the Constitution defines the United States as a Christian nation. Somewhere along the way, he changed his religious affiliation from Episcopalian to Baptist.
And now John Hagee.
PREACHING PROSPERITY—The social critic Lenny Bruce used to say, "Show me a preacher who has two suits where there is another man who has none, and I'll show you a fraud." Bruce died long before the advent of the Prosperity Gospel, which spawned a generation of millionaire ministers. The Rev. John Hagee is decidedly in the two-suit category.
In 2003 San Antonio Express-News reporter Analisa Nazareno wrote a long investigative profile of Hagee's ministry. Nazareno reported that Hagee's compensation package was $1.25 million a year. Hagee and his wife, Diana (who has earned more than $100,000 a year from the church business), lived (and still live) in a 5,200-square-foot classical revival house in an exclusive gated community in San Antonio. The house is valued at $736,960 on the 2007 tax rolls. A Hagee trust owns a 7,969-acre ranch in South Texas. And the Hagees own more than $1 million worth of unimproved property in San Antonio, according to the local tax assessor.
The campus of Hagee's Cornerstone Church includes a spacious 5,000-seat sanctuary and a 50,000-square-foot media center, from which Hagee says he broadcasts to 115 television stations and 110 radio stations. Nazareno described a media conglomerate, Global Evangelism Television (GET), that has brought in more than $18 million a year.
In 2003 John Hagee was the highest-paid director of a non-profit corporation in San Antonio. By 2004 he was the highest-paid preacher in the country, according to FreeGoodNews, a Christian non-profit advocacy group that monitors the compensation packages of ministers. (Hagee's financial figures are no longer available. He merged his non-profit GET with Grace Church, which has no physical location and no phone number, so it is no longer required to file annual financial disclosures with the IRS. While he was filing, however, salaries were set by a non-profit board controlled by the Hagee family.)
Three paragraphs into her story, the Express-News reporter got to Hagee's revenue source:
An emotional, energetic half-hour of song praising the glory of God passes. Then Hagee tells ushers at his 5,000-seat Cornerstone Church to "take their positions." With the dozens of men bearing glinting platters in the aisles, and six cameramen capturing the moment, Hagee instructs church members to hold their money toward the heavens. The thousands repeat after him: "Give and it shall be given." "When you give, it qualifies you to receive God's abundance," he tells his listeners. "If God gives to you before you give to him, God himself will become a liar. . . . If you're not prospering, it's because you're not giving."
With the dozens of men bearing glinting platters in the aisles, and six cameramen capturing the moment, Hagee instructs church members to hold their money toward the heavens. The thousands repeat after him: "Give and it shall be given."
"When you give, it qualifies you to receive God's abundance," he tells his listeners. "If God gives to you before you give to him, God himself will become a liar. . . . If you're not prospering, it's because you're not giving."
John Hagee's accumulated net worth derives from contributions and the sale of his books, videos, and tapes. Spend a Sunday at Cornerstone and it becomes evident that the basic tenet of the Prosperity Gospel—when you give, you receive God's abundance—isn't working for most congregants. Rev. Hagee battens on 18,000 working-class whites and Hispanics who call Cornerstone their spiritual home. This is a Wal-Mart congregation that spends one day a week in the tony San Antonio suburb where Hagee built his church.
TWENTY MILLION ARMAGEDDONITES—Hagee's theology is at best bizarre and at worst toxic. It is rooted in the teachings of apostate Anglican preacher John Nelson Darby, who left the Church of England in the 1820s to found his own sect. Pre-millennial Dispensationalism divides the world into seven epochs, or "dispensations." According to Darby's eschatological calendar, mankind is nearing the end of the penultimate dispensation. The final dispensation will be 1,000 years of peace, which arrive after Christ's defeat of the Anti-Christ (and Satan) at Armageddon. For Hagee, this is not a metaphor but a place in the Middle East. Hagee's eschatology also involves "the Rapture"—the physical ascent into Heaven of sanctified and reborn Christians.
Before all that can come to pass, however, certain biblical prophecies have to be fulfilled: the reunification of biblical Israel under Jewish control; the in-gathering of the world's Jewry to the parts of their ancestral home made up of Israel, Judea and Samaria; the rebuilding of the Temple (on the spot now occupied by one of three of Islam's most sacred mosques); etc.
Hagee's focus on End-Times prophecy has turned him toward American foreign policy in Israel and Palestine.
He's not alone.
American Conservative co-publisher John Basil Utley cites Christian writer Gary North's estimate that 20 million Americans are Armageddonites. "Many of them," Utley writes, "have an ecstatic belief in the cleansing power of apocalyptic violence."
John Hagee is committed to the cleansing power of apocalyptic violence. He preaches it. He writes about it. And he puts his money—or his congregants' money—where his theology is. Hagee has raised more than $8.5 million for Israel, much of it used to relocate Jews from the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe to settlements in the West Bank—to Hagee the eastern extension of biblical Israel. Only after a critical mass of Jews have been concentrated in Greater Israel can the End-Times prophecies begin to unfold.
ISRAEL'S PROPHETIC ROLE—Hagee's attitude toward Jews is peculiar. He loves them, but only so much and for so long. In his book Jerusalem Countdown: A Prelude to War, Hagee blames the Jews for the anti-Semitism that has dogged them for 5,000 years.
"It was the disobedience and rebellion of the Jews, God's chosen people, to their covenental responsibility to serve only the one true God, Jehovah, that gave rise to the opposition and persecution that they experienced beginning in Canaan and continuing to this very day," he writes.
Hagee claims that Jews are responsible for "birth[ing] the seed of anti-Semitism that would arise and bring destruction to them for centuries to come . . . it rises from the judgment of God upon his rebellious chosen people."
Nonetheless, these Jews must return to Israel—the Holocaust helped that along, attempts to create a Palestinian state are slowing it down—before the apocalyptic conflagration at Armageddon can take place. Then Christ can return. Those Jews who recognize Christ at his Second Coming as the Messiah will be saved, but most will perish. Some Pre-millennial Dispensationalists have calculated the precise number of Jews who will survive Armageddon, the Rapture and all that: 144,000; that is, 12,000 representatives of each tribe of Israel.
Go figure.
THE CATHOLIC QUESTION—Despite his protestations to the contrary, Hagee is also hard on Catholics. In a bizarre video clip posted online by Wisconsin law professor Ann Althouse, Hagee stands before an elaborate iconographic chart depicting the Christian cosmogony. At the End Times end of the timeline a slutty woman in a red dress rides a three-headed feline monster. In her hand the woman holds a Eucharistic chalice.
Pointer in hand, Pastor Hagee elaborates: "This is the Great Whore of Revelation 17. This is the Anti-Christ system. This is the apostate Church," he says. "In this cup, if you read it in the Book of Revelation, is the blood of the saints. This is talking principally about the blood of the Jewish people. Where? From the Crusades that happened back here. From the Spanish Inquisition. From the Holocaust. When Adolph Hitler came to power he said, 'I'm not going to do anything in my lifetime that hasn't been done by the Roman Church in the past 800 years. I'm only going to do it on a greater scale and more efficiently. . . .'"
"God said, 'I gave you the time to repent but you did not,'" he explains. "This false cult system that was born in Genesis 10 and progressed through Israel and became Baal worship, God said the day is going to come when I cause this beast to devour this apostate system. So you can say very clearly that while the church is in heaven, this false system is going to be devoured by the Anti-Christ."
Catholics take issue with that. As do some Jews, whose blood ends up in the chalice for what appears to be their own fault.
All this would be harmless enough (perhaps) if confined to Rev. Hagee's temple. But John Hagee has a constituency that extends beyond his congregation. He used that constituency to build a foreign-policy advocacy organization—Christians United for Israel (CUFI)—that is now pressing for a pre-emptive war with Iran. CUFI brought 4,500 End Times activists to Washington for its July 2006 inaugural event, followed by a day of lobbying on the Hill.
Hagee was straightforward in announcing his agenda: "The United States must join Israel in a pre-emptive military strike against Iran to fulfill God's plan for both Israel and the West," he said. He saw this step as "a biblically prophesied End Time confrontation . . . which will lead to the Rapture, Tribulation . . . and the Second Coming of Christ."
A REPUBLICAN RELIGION?—John McCain has been pressed to renounce Hagee. He cannot. Louis Farrakhan, the Nation of Islam leader, whose unsolicited "endorsement" created a problem for Sen. Barack Obama, can preach religious hate. But he works on the fringe of American religion and politics and is an unlikely guest at anyone's White House. The influence of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright—Obama's longtime pastor who is cut from a different cloth than Farrakhan—doesn't extend beyond the African-American community in Chicago. The Republican Party, on the other hand, is deeply invested in John Hagee and his followers.
On the Sunday before the 2006 election, for example, Texas governor Rick Perry and sixty other candidates (almost all Republicans) stood before the altar at Cornerstone Church with Hagee, each candidate angling for an election-day bounce with evangelical voters.
But John Hagee is bigger than Texas. In 2000 he was on presidential candidate George W. Bush's "values team." Since then the right wing of the Republican Party has responded to Pastor Hagee's altar call. In 2002, Republican majority leader Tom DeLay was the keynote speaker at Hagee's "Night to Honor Israel." In 2006 Hagee met with Elliot Abrams, Bush's fervently pro-Israel deputy national security adviser. Hagee later said he and Abrams are largely in agreement regarding Middle East policy.
Senators Sam Brownback (R-KS) and Rick Santorum (R-PA) attended the 2006 Washington, D.C., kickoff of Christians United for Israel, standing by as Hagee called for an End Times war on Iran. Senators John Cornyn and Kay Bailey Hutchison, old acolytes from Texas, were also present. (Under Karl Rove's tutelage, Cornyn started his political career with a pilgrimage to Cornerstone Church.) Party chair Ken Mehlman joined Hagee on the speaker's platform. President Bush sent a pre-recorded message.
Joe Lieberman (I-CT) got most of the media attention at CUFI's second annual gathering, in 2007, because the Jewish senator compared Hagee to Moses. But Republican house whip Roy Blunt (R-MO) attended and John McCain also joined the pro-Israel Christians when they met in Washington in July. McCain praised Hagee for "doing the Lord's work in Satan's city." That's not San Antonio but Washington.
This Palm Sunday John Hagee was in the pulpit in San Antonio, preaching his "Vote the Bible" sermon. Hagee warmed up the 8:30 a.m. crowd with hymns, some sung by his son (Pastor Matt), who is being groomed to take over the family business.
Then the senior pastor used "Jabez's Prayer" as a prelude to the collection, asking congregants who were tithing to hold their envelopes above their heads. God answered Jabez's prayer "to bless me and enlarge my territory." The prayer is used by Prosperity Gospel ministers to encourage giving so that God will give back.
The sermon was a bellicose endorsement of John McCain, without mentioning the candidate by name. "The surge in Iraq is working," Hagee roared. "Voting the Bible" means refusing to vote for any candidate who will "cut and run" from Iraq. Hagee told his congregation that an account of "first just war" is found in Genesis 14. As Hagee explicates the text, the 318 men Abram led across the desert in pursuit of enemies who had attacked his family were "Abram's Israeli commando unit" avenging and killing "ancient Iraqis."
"Jesus was no peacenik!" Hagee said. "Jesus is going to fight in it himself, against the enemies of Israel!"—in the battle of Armageddon.
Hagee's Christian Zionists return to Washington, D.C., in July. They will hear from the usual neocon suspects: William Kristol, Frank Gaffney, Daniel Pipes, Clifford May. The secular architects of the Iraq War are now pushing war with Iran and again are eager to sit down with extremist Christians who can help make it happen. Sen. Joe Lieberman will be back, this time to deliver the keynote speech at the "Night to Honor Israel."
John McCain is not yet listed on the program.
Copyright © 2008 Public Concern Foundation Inc.
FROM THE REDDEST OF THE RED STATES:
Utah superdelegate Wayne Holland endorses Obama!Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2008 14:15:34Subject: Utah superdelegate Wayne Holland endorses Obama!From: Nikki Norton nikkinorton23@hotmail.comUtah Democratic Party Chairman Wayne Holland formally endorsed Sen. Barack Obama for president today.Read: http://my.barackobama.com/page/group/UtahforObama/listserv-message/GwgGxDW5 Holland's announcement gives Obama one more coveted superdelegate as he continues to compete with New York Sen. Hillary Clinton for the nomination. Read more here: http://utahamicus.blogspot.com/2008/04/chair-of-utah-democratic-party.html Email Wayne and say thanks:wholland@utdemocrats.org Or call him to say thank you: 801-328-1212 (office)
Utah superdelegate Wayne Holland endorses Obama!
Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2008 14:15:34
Subject: Utah superdelegate Wayne Holland endorses Obama!
From: Nikki Norton nikkinorton23@hotmail.com
Utah Democratic Party Chairman Wayne Holland formally endorsed Sen. Barack Obama for president today.
Read: http://my.barackobama.com/page/group/UtahforObama/listserv-message/GwgGxDW5 Holland's announcement gives Obama one more coveted superdelegate as he continues to compete with New York Sen. Hillary Clinton for the nomination. Read more here: http://utahamicus.blogspot.com/2008/04/chair-of-utah-democratic-party.html Email Wayne and say thanks:wholland@utdemocrats.org Or call him to say thank you: 801-328-1212 (office)
PESKY REPLIED TO RHONDA BARNES Tuesday, April 08, 2008 7:33 PM: di·ver·si·ty–noun, plural -ties. 1. the state or fact of being diverse; difference; unlikeness. 2. variety; multiformity. It seems to me your message, in and of itself, is "questionable content". You advertise yourself as "Diversity": diversity of what? The fine points of difference between various Christian sects? Are these what you are claiming as "Senator Obama's standards"? I don't think you quite understand what Senator Obama's standards ARE. Please feel free to invite Barack Obama here to speak for himself if you feel that is the case. If I have misunderstood his message I would very much like to know about it now, before election day arrives. "Diversity"... last time I checked, I am an atheist and soldierette is a Christian. Last time I checked, we had the same goal in mind: get Senator Obama into the White House. I was under the impression you shared that goal. Perhaps I was wrong.----- Original Message ----- From: Rhonda Barnes To: Diversity4Obama Sent: Tuesday, April 08, 2008 6:52 PMSubject: [DiversityforObama] Please use respectful conversation in our emailTo our Diversity Members As administrator of our group I have had many complaints about how some of our dialog has been in the past 4-5 weeks. I am specifically asking "peskyathiest" and "solierette" to be more respectful and keep up to Senator Obama's standards in this campaign. Remember that each of us have the right to report any "questionable" contant to the Obama campaign. At the same time, our country has "freedom of speech". Yet the purpose of this group is to bring diversity together, not tear us apart. Please let all of us respect each other. We are also not hear to tear down Hillary or any other candidate. Let's stick to the issues. Our goal is to help support Senator Obama. Thank you.Rhonda Barnes-Pouliot-------------------------------------------------------------------------This email was sent to 482 members of Diversity4ObamaListserv email address: DiversityforObama@groups.barackobama.comIN A PRIVATE MESSAGE TO PESKYATHEIST JUST MOMENTS AFTER WRITING THE ABOVE MESSAGE TO THE GROUP, RHONDA BARNES SENT A MESSAGE VIA PESKY'S BLOG STATING:You are being removed form our group Rhonda (Barnes) Pouliot 4/8/08 9:31PMSender: Rhonda (Barnes) Pouliot Subject: You are being removed form our group Received: 4/8/08 9:31PM I am sorry, but due to many complaints and also my assessment that you have crossed the line from normal healthy debates to actual harassment and vulgarity I do not believe you are adding value to our cause to help get Senator Obama elected.Rhonda Barnes PouliotIN MY ESTIMATION, RHONDA BARNES' ACTION IS CLEARLY REFLECTIVE OF THE ZERO ACCEPTANCE OF DIVERSITY WITHIN HER GROUP. I THINK SHE SHOULD RENAME HER GROUP OR CEASE BEING ITS ADMINISTRATOR.
di·ver·si·ty–noun, plural -ties. 1. the state or fact of being diverse; difference; unlikeness.
2. variety; multiformity.
It seems to me your message, in and of itself, is "questionable content". You advertise yourself as "Diversity": diversity of what? The fine points of difference between various Christian sects? Are these what you are claiming as "Senator Obama's standards"? I don't think you quite understand what Senator Obama's standards ARE. Please feel free to invite Barack Obama here to speak for himself if you feel that is the case. If I have misunderstood his message I would very much like to know about it now, before election day arrives. "Diversity"... last time I checked, I am an atheist and soldierette is a Christian. Last time I checked, we had the same goal in mind: get Senator Obama into the White House. I was under the impression you shared that goal. Perhaps I was wrong.
----- Original Message ----- From: Rhonda Barnes To: Diversity4Obama Sent: Tuesday, April 08, 2008 6:52 PMSubject: [DiversityforObama] Please use respectful conversation in our emailTo our Diversity Members As administrator of our group I have had many complaints about how some of our dialog has been in the past 4-5 weeks. I am specifically asking "peskyathiest" and "solierette" to be more respectful and keep up to Senator Obama's standards in this campaign. Remember that each of us have the right to report any "questionable" contant to the Obama campaign. At the same time, our country has "freedom of speech". Yet the purpose of this group is to bring diversity together, not tear us apart. Please let all of us respect each other. We are also not hear to tear down Hillary or any other candidate. Let's stick to the issues. Our goal is to help support Senator Obama. Thank you.Rhonda Barnes-Pouliot-------------------------------------------------------------------------This email was sent to 482 members of Diversity4ObamaListserv email address: DiversityforObama@groups.barackobama.com
----- Original Message ----- From: Rhonda Barnes To: Diversity4Obama Sent: Tuesday, April 08, 2008 6:52 PMSubject: [DiversityforObama] Please use respectful conversation in our email
To our Diversity Members As administrator of our group I have had many complaints about how some of our dialog has been in the past 4-5 weeks. I am specifically asking "peskyathiest" and "solierette" to be more respectful and keep up to Senator Obama's standards in this campaign. Remember that each of us have the right to report any "questionable" contant to the Obama campaign. At the same time, our country has "freedom of speech". Yet the purpose of this group is to bring diversity together, not tear us apart. Please let all of us respect each other. We are also not hear to tear down Hillary or any other candidate. Let's stick to the issues. Our goal is to help support Senator Obama. Thank you.Rhonda Barnes-Pouliot
-------------------------------------------------------------------------This email was sent to 482 members of Diversity4ObamaListserv email address: DiversityforObama@groups.barackobama.com
IN A PRIVATE MESSAGE TO PESKYATHEIST JUST MOMENTS AFTER WRITING THE ABOVE MESSAGE TO THE GROUP, RHONDA BARNES SENT A MESSAGE VIA PESKY'S BLOG STATING:
You are being removed form our group Rhonda (Barnes) Pouliot 4/8/08 9:31PMSender: Rhonda (Barnes) Pouliot Subject: You are being removed form our group Received: 4/8/08 9:31PM I am sorry, but due to many complaints and also my assessment that you have crossed the line from normal healthy debates to actual harassment and vulgarity I do not believe you are adding value to our cause to help get Senator Obama elected.Rhonda Barnes Pouliot
You are being removed form our group Rhonda (Barnes) Pouliot 4/8/08 9:31PM
Sender: Rhonda (Barnes) Pouliot Subject: You are being removed form our group Received: 4/8/08 9:31PM I am sorry, but due to many complaints and also my assessment that you have crossed the line from normal healthy debates to actual harassment and vulgarity I do not believe you are adding value to our cause to help get Senator Obama elected.
Rhonda Barnes Pouliot
IN MY ESTIMATION, RHONDA BARNES' ACTION IS CLEARLY REFLECTIVE OF THE ZERO ACCEPTANCE OF DIVERSITY WITHIN HER GROUP. I THINK SHE SHOULD RENAME HER GROUP OR CEASE BEING ITS ADMINISTRATOR.
PLEASE ALSO SEE . . .
Barack Obama Endorse Church/State Separation AND All About Church/State Separation
&
AN ATHEIST'S OPEN LETTER TO ALL THEIST OBAMA SUPPORTERS
Thank you, Solja. This atheist would be more than proud to call you -- a Christian -- my Friend.It's at trying times like this that genuine human beings like you somehow manage to renew my belief in the essential goodness of other human beings. It's human beings like you that renew my hope that reason will someday eradicate all the absurdities that divide the human race. In people like you I see the hope that someday our children or grandchildren will speak of racial & religious divides as conditions of the past. You are a diamond amongst lumps of coal.But I think you are wasting your breath trying to reason with the people you just addressed; truth & justice isn't what matters most to the greedy & power-hungry likes of those who intentionally prey on herd mentality.I can be a patient man . . . and time is on the side of reason.~PeskyAtheist"The wolves prey upon the lambs in the darkness of the night, but the bloodstains remain upon the stones in the valley until the dawn comes and then the sun reveals the crime to all." ~Kahlil Gibran
Thank you, Solja. This atheist would be more than proud to call you -- a Christian -- my Friend.
It's at trying times like this that genuine human beings like you somehow manage to renew my belief in the essential goodness of other human beings. It's human beings like you that renew my hope that reason will someday eradicate all the absurdities that divide the human race. In people like you I see the hope that someday our children or grandchildren will speak of racial & religious divides as conditions of the past. You are a diamond amongst lumps of coal.
But I think you are wasting your breath trying to reason with the people you just addressed; truth & justice isn't what matters most to the greedy & power-hungry likes of those who intentionally prey on herd mentality.
I can be a patient man . . . and time is on the side of reason.
~PeskyAtheist
"The wolves prey upon the lambs in the darkness of the night, but the bloodstains remain upon the stones in the valley until the dawn comes and then the sun reveals the crime to all." ~Kahlil Gibran
----- Original Message ----- From: Soldierette!! To: Diversity4Obama Sent: Saturday, April 05, 2008 2:24 PMSubject: Re: [DiversityforObama] Enough
Y'all are all such a bunch of hypocrits. It's sad when people act like they can't read and go off on someone simply because he wants a right to speak his opinions, JUST like everyone else in this group.
Pesky doesn't HAVE to agree with you. Hell, I don't agree with y'all most of the time, because you're one-sided. Your way or the high way, or do you say it? The high road? Phsst! It's all a bunch of bullsh*t how y'all have treated him.
Look, I am a Christian woman. My mom was raised in a holiness church, which by all accounts, is now called church of christ. As a kid growing up in DC, I attended Presbyterian, Baptist and Methodist churches. I married a Catholic, and divorced the same. My current friend is the son of a southern preacher and teaches Sunday school, and my closest friend is in Iraq. He's not only the son of a preacher (his mom), but his 6 uncles and aunts are ALL preachers as well. My own kids went to a Lutheran church for most of their childhood. Out of allllll of these people that I know or are associated with, NOT ONE OF THEM judges people on their beliefs in God. You are acting like the very people that our soldiers are fighting in Iraq! They think that THEIR God is THE God of ALL Gods, and are not only willing to die for their God, but they are willing to kill others because of their beliefs, however seemingly radical to us.
Now I just got online for the day and my email is filled with a bunch of bullies jumping on one man that simply wanted a voice. So WHAT he's an Atheist! WHO ARE YOU TO JUDGE HIM? Those without sin, please cast the first stone! Judge NOT or else be judged! Are you sitting there on your fake pews passing judgment on that man because he doesn't believe what you believe? Because it can NOT be what he has said in this group because ALL he's continously said is that WE SHOULD NOT PARTICIPATE IN SMEARING HILLARY CLINTON, BUT THAT WE SHOULD ALL HAVE FULL ACCESS TO ALL INFORMATION REGARDING THIS ELECTION.
What the hell is wrong with that? Are you people illiterate or something?
After seeing the BLATANT discrimination against the man because of his religion, having God in my heart for EVERYONE, NOT JUST THOSE WHO BELIEVE WHAT I BELIEVE, there is no way that I can just sit here on the fence and watch as if I don't see what you're doing to him.
LOOK AT HIS PROFILE PICTURE. He is NORMAL! http://my.barackobama.com/page/community/blog/PeskyAtheist
He doesn't have HORNS or a TAIL or anything like that. You encounter Atheists every day of your life and you just don't know it because people sometimes treat them JUST LIKE this group has been treating "PeskyAthiest". Do you realize how many people don't actually believe there's a higher power? What makes you RIGHT and them wrong? You have no PROOF of anything! What you have is FAITH that there is actually a God up there. There's a lot of people who ask for proof, and I see nothing wrong with that. As I said, I am a Christian, but who the hell am I to judge someone else' beliefs? I don't know much about the Jewish faith but I worked once for a Jewish attorney and his wife. I loved these people like family because they were nice to me and respected me as a person. I asked a lot of questions about their beliefs because I did not know anything about it. The ONE thing that I took away from those conversations is that they believe in God, and that Jesus died on the cross, but they do not believe that he arose. I wasn't offended by it. That's what they believe, even though it is different from what I have been taught.
So my point is, YOU ARE NOT THE AUTHORITY ON GOD! Stop the blatant and OBVIOUS discrimination against him because he has done nothing wrong in this group! If he were black, I'd call you all racists! It's the same thing! You gang up on him based on his screenname, which happens to be a declaration of his religious beliefs.
But then you put "Hussein" as your own middle name as a sign of solidarity. So is Barack the ONLY person that is worthy of this same level of respect? This same level of tolerance is not afforded to another Barack supporter? Because after all, "Hussein" is associated (thanks to the media) with terrorism and radical muslims (who believe that you ALL should die because of where you were born). Hypocrits!
And the last thing I'm going to say about what I saw in an email was someone (you know who you are Mr.) who antagonized "PeskyAtheist" in his private email. This was NOT in the group. It was through one-on-one email. PeskyAtheist cussed him out in email, and well he should have. Try that with me and you'll get worst! Nobody has to put up with your blatant BS. He didn't disrespect this group. He replied to a disrespectful group member privately then that member posted that private email in the group, as PROOF that PeskyAtheist disrespected the group. Are you kidding me? And the people in this group accept that? You, sir, are a hypocritical troublemaker and a FAKE. Then all of the SHEEP and FOLLOWERS just pile on the man as to make it appear that everyone agrees in the group. Well, I don't! It's WRONG and you guys are LIARS when you continue to say that he did something wrong. YOU ARE THE ONES THAT ARE WRONG, and just because you are more vocal (negativity usually gets more press!), doesn't make you right.
You need to check yourselves because MY God don't like ugly!
Solja~
On Sat Apr 5 12:14 , "Ronald R. Bisson " sent:
Can't be a Man, reminds me to much of my former wife: a lovely woman a great mother, but I will say I have been happily divorced for 25 years this month.
----- Original Message ----- From: <anetboddie@aol.com>To: "Diversity4Obama" <DiversityforObama@groups.barackobama.com>Sent: Saturday, April 05, 2008 1:26 PMSubject: [DiversityforObama] Re: Re: Enough
> DITTO. There was no reasoning with this individual. I do find it> interesting that although no one seems to know this person we all are> assuming that this is a male. Then again I may be wrong now that I> think about it. I believe that this is the teen age nephew or something> of one of the members. This person does appear to be very immature.> Perhaps someone might remember the email from a woman about getting her> nephew involved. Now I'm concerned somewhat that he may gain access> under another I.D. or via the relative that introduced him.>>> -----Original Message-----> From: carlosg903@aol.com> To: Diversity4Obama <DiversityforObama@groups.barackobama.com>> Sent: Sat, 5 Apr 2008 12:48 pm> Subject: [DiversityforObama] Re: Enough>>> Re: Pesky>> Tanya> "ditto"...I took the "high road" by blocking his emails.>> To the group members and all other groups who may receive this; Shall> we All Join the "High Road"?>> Carlos> "Realizing the Obama Faith for 08">>> -----Original Message-----> From: Tanya <tanyafaison@yahoo.com>> To: Diversity4Obama <DiversityforObama@groups.barackobama.com>> Sent: Sat, 5 Apr 2008 2:36 am> Subject: [DiversityforObama] Re: Re: Re: Enough already>> Ive blocked Peskys address in my emails. I was in another group where> he acted argumentative...Just an option for those that are sick of it,> because he doesnt stop.
THIS BLOG POST WAS MADE FOR EVERYONE, BUT IT WAS MADE ESPECIALLY FOR ALL ATHEIST-CENSORING PRO BARACK OBAMA THEIST-DOMINATED GROUPS --(Particularly the Diversity4Obama & One Million MySpace Friends for Obama'08!* groups)-- WHERE CONTROLLING MEMBERS THINK THAT BARACK OBAMA WOULD CONDONE THEIR ANTI-AMERICAN BEHAVIOR ON HIS OWN WEBSITE:MY BARACK OBAMA BLOG: Barack Obama Only Presidential Candidate to Endorse Separation of Church and State1 FREEDOM FIRST VIDEO: Everything You Always Wanted to Know about the Separation of Church and State … but Were Afraid to Ask! Bill of RightsAmendment ICongress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
THIS BLOG POST WAS MADE FOR EVERYONE, BUT IT WAS MADE ESPECIALLY FOR ALL ATHEIST-CENSORING PRO BARACK OBAMA THEIST-DOMINATED GROUPS --
(Particularly the Diversity4Obama & One Million MySpace Friends for Obama'08!* groups)
-- WHERE CONTROLLING MEMBERS THINK THAT BARACK OBAMA WOULD CONDONE THEIR ANTI-AMERICAN BEHAVIOR ON HIS OWN WEBSITE:
MY BARACK OBAMA BLOG: Barack Obama Only Presidential Candidate to Endorse Separation of Church and State
1 FREEDOM FIRST VIDEO: Everything You Always Wanted to Know about the Separation of Church and State … but Were Afraid to Ask!
Bill of RightsAmendment ICongress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
Bill of Rights
Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
Obama Wins Most Texas Delegates 3/31/2008WASHINGTON (AP) — Sen. Barack Obama has won the overall delegate race in Texas thanks to a strong showing in Democratic county conventions this past weekend.Obama picked up seven of nine outstanding delegates, giving him a total of 99 Texas delegates to the party's national convention this summer. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton won the other two, giving her a total of 94 Texas delegates, according to an analysis of returns by The Associated Press.Texas Democrats held both a presidential primary and caucus. Clinton narrowly won the popular vote in the state's primary March 4, earning her 65 national convention delegates to Obama's 61.Precinct caucuses began immediately after polls closed primary night and quickly devolved into chaos in many parts of the state because of an unprecedented turnout of more than 1 million Democrats. The state party was never able to provide complete results from the caucuses, which is why the AP withheld nine delegates.The precinct caucuses elected delegates to about 280 county and state senate district conventions on Saturday. The AP awarded the remaining delegates based on results from Saturday's conventions, showing Obama with about 58 percent of vote, compared to 42 percent for Clinton.Obama won 38 delegates through the caucus/convention system, and Clinton won 29.The final delegate allocation will be decided at the party's state convention June 6-7, and the numbers could change if either campaign is unable to maintain the level of support they had over the weekend.Obama leads the overall race for the Democratic nomination with 1,631 delegates, including separately chosen party and elected officials known as superdelegates. Clinton has 1,501, according to the latest AP tally. Copyright © 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. FROM LINK
3/31/2008
WASHINGTON (AP) — Sen. Barack Obama has won the overall delegate race in Texas thanks to a strong showing in Democratic county conventions this past weekend.
Obama picked up seven of nine outstanding delegates, giving him a total of 99 Texas delegates to the party's national convention this summer. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton won the other two, giving her a total of 94 Texas delegates, according to an analysis of returns by The Associated Press.
Texas Democrats held both a presidential primary and caucus. Clinton narrowly won the popular vote in the state's primary March 4, earning her 65 national convention delegates to Obama's 61.
Precinct caucuses began immediately after polls closed primary night and quickly devolved into chaos in many parts of the state because of an unprecedented turnout of more than 1 million Democrats. The state party was never able to provide complete results from the caucuses, which is why the AP withheld nine delegates.
The precinct caucuses elected delegates to about 280 county and state senate district conventions on Saturday. The AP awarded the remaining delegates based on results from Saturday's conventions, showing Obama with about 58 percent of vote, compared to 42 percent for Clinton.
Obama won 38 delegates through the caucus/convention system, and Clinton won 29.
The final delegate allocation will be decided at the party's state convention June 6-7, and the numbers could change if either campaign is unable to maintain the level of support they had over the weekend.
Obama leads the overall race for the Democratic nomination with 1,631 delegates, including separately chosen party and elected officials known as superdelegates. Clinton has 1,501, according to the latest AP tally.
Copyright © 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
FROM LINK
Open Letter to Hillary Clinton From a Wellesley College Alumna
February 19, 2008
by Linn Cohen-Cole
Dear Hillary,
By polling logic, I should be your supporter - Democrat, older woman, white, liberal. I was even in a dorm with you in college. I have pulled for you for years. But something this past summer fundamentally changed my responsibility to my children and grandchildren. In the time I have left in my life to protect them and others, I need to speak out.
I saw a News Hour piece on Maharastra, India, about farmers committing suicide [see here and here]. Monsanto, a US agricultural giant, hired Bollywood actors for ads telling illiterate farmers they could get rich (by their standards) from big yields with Monsanto’s Bt (genetically engineered) cotton seeds. The expensive seeds needed expensive fertilizer and pesticides (Monsanto, again) and irrigation. There is no irrigation there. Crops failed. Farmers had larger debt than they’d ever experienced.
And farmers couldn’t collect seeds from their own fields [see here and here] to try again (true since time immemorial). Monsanto “patents” their DNA-altered seeds as “intellectual property.” They have a $10 million budget and a staff of 75 devoted solely to prosecuting farmers [here]. Since the late 1990s (about when industrial agriculture took hold in India), 166,000 Indian farmers have committed suicide and 8 million have left the land.
Farmers in Europe, Asia, Africa, Indonesia,South America, Central America and here, have protested Monsanto and genetic engineering for years.
What does this have to do with you?
You have connections to Monsanto through the Rose Law Firm where you worked and through Bill who hired Monsanto people for central food-related roles. Your Orwellian-named “Rural Americans for Hillary” was planned withTroutman Sanders, Monsanto’s lobbyists.
Genetic engineering and industrialized food and animal production all come together at the Rose Law Firm, which represents the world’s largest GE corporation (Monsanto), GE’s most controversial project (DP&L’s - now Monsanto’s - terminator genes) [here], the world’s largest meat producer (Tyson), the world’s largest retailer and a dominant food retailer (Wal-Mart) [here].
The inbred-ness of Rose’s legal representation of corporations which own controlling interests in other corporations there and of corporate boards sharing members who are also shareholders of each other’s corporations there, is so thorough that it is hard to capture. Jon Jacoby, senior executive of the Stephens Group - one of the largest institutional shareholders of Tyson Foods, Walmart, DP&L - is also Chairman of the Board of DP&L and arranged the Wal-Mart deal. Jackson Stephens’ Stephens Group staked Sam Walton and financed Tyson Foods. Monsanto bought DP&L. All represented at Rose.
You didn’t just work there, you made friends. That shows in the flow of favors then and since. You were invited onto Walmart’s board, you were helped by a Tyson executive to make commodity trades (3 days before Bill became governor), netting you $100,000, Jackson Stephens strongly backed Bill for Governor, and then for President (donating $100,000).
Food and friends, in Clinton terms: Bill’s appointed friend Mike Espy, Secretary of Agriculture, who immediately significantly weakened federal chicken waste and contamination standards, opening the door to major expansion of Tyson’s chicken factory farms. Espy resigned, indicted for accepting bribes, illegal contributions, money laundering, illegal dispersal of USDA subsidies, …. Tyson Foods was the largest corporate offender.
But what Bill did for Monsanto “genetic engineering” goes beyond inadequate concepts of giving corporate friends influence: He unleashed genetic engineering into the world. And then he helped close off people’s escape from it.
Genetic engineering is many orders of magnitude different from “normal” (even polluting) business in its potential biologic ramifications. The warning myth of Pandora’a Box - letting irretrievable things rush out into nature - has become real. The harrowing change to the world from nuclear fission and fusion is the closest parallel.
What did Bill do?
1. Bill’s put Monsanto people in at the FDA, as US Agricultural Trade Representatives, on International Biotechnology Consultive Forums, and more … (http://www.commondreams.org/headlines/072600-03.htm) or http://www.monitor.net/monitor/9904b/monsantofda.html or http://www.mindfully.org/GE/Revolving-Door.htm
2. Bill’s FDA gave Monsanto permission to market rBGH (a GE bovine growth hormone), the first genetically engineered product let loose on us (or did tomatoes with fish DNA get there first?).
3. Despite reports of bovine illness and death, Bill’s FDA did not recall it or put warnings on it. Even “a very angry, very vocal nationwide consumer base” had no impact.
4. Bill’s FDA wouldn’t even label rBGH as “present” in milk.
5. When dairy farmers tried to label their own milk rBGH-free so the public could choose [more on rBGH and labelling here], Bill’s USDA threatened all dairies that their products could be confiscated from stores. Michael Taylor, USFDA Deputy Commissioner, was formerly Monsanto’s counsel.
6. How were consumers to protect their family, given Bill’s FDA enforced public blindness, except to buy only organic? But Bill’s FDA tried to close off that last escape, proposing to include in “organic” standards, “the dirty three” a: genetic engineering of plants and animals, use of irradiation in food processing and use of municipal sewage sludge as a fertilizer. The FDA backed down.
Had this gone through, Monsanto could have finally labeled rBGH milk … as “organic.” And animal waste from factory farms, a pollution nightmare for Tyson and others, could have been sold as fertilizer.
USDA head Dan Glickman: “This is probably the largest public response to an [Agriculture Department] rule in modern history.” In fact the response was 20 times greater than anything ever before proposed by the USDA.
Personally, I resent years of effort to protect my children and now grandchildren, from that crap.
Politically, Bill sided against small farmers and against the public’s right to know, and with Monsanto.
A snap shot of our food:
Oils: Sheep died in India after feeding on Bt cotton fields. We feed our children Bt cotton, as cottonseed oil in peanut butter and cookies.
Grains: 49% of US corn acreage was planted in Bt corn in 2007. A French study proved Monsanto’s GMO corn causes kidney and liver toxicity.
Soft drinks and candy have highly concentrated Bt corn, in the form of high fructose Bt corn syrup. The US food system depends most on two crops, soy (90% GMO, 90% of traits owned by Monsanto) and corn, the largest crop (60% GMO, nearly 100% Monsanto traits). “[E] ssentially our entire food supply is genetically modified, to the benefit of one company.” The Grocery Manufacturers of America in 2000 estimated that 70 percent of US food contains GM traits.
Meat: Steroids bulk up atheletes. Monsanto steroids bulk up animals - more weight, more profit. We feed our children steroids in meats. Is this why our children are fattening, like Hansel and Gretel?
Poultry: Bill’s USDA weakened chicken waste and contamination standards and attempted to allow sewage sludge as fertilize crops. I will say more about disease from industrialized poultry farms waste, at the end of this letter.
Milk: Over 30 scientific publications have shown increased levels of IGF-1 in milk with rBGH increases risks of breast cancer by up to seven-fold, also increasing colon and prostate cancers risks. Canada, 29 European nations, Norway, Switzerland, Japan, New Zealand, Australia, and South Africa ban U.S. rBGH dairy products. Bill’s USFDA put no restrictions, no warning labels (not allowing labels at all).
American children eat that food and drink that milk, Hillary. Coincidentally, American children are increasingly fat and sick.
Here, Bill ignored pleas for labeling. Abroad, Bill ignored intense international objections over the same issue - unlabeled US food exports - badly straining trading relations. Monsanto’s “good ole boy,” he betrayed American families at the deepest levels conceivable - their family’s health and their democratic right to know. He betrayed our rural life and American family farmers - backing corporation deceit and control, over honesty and clean farming.
But, Hillary, it is one thing to not label a regular ‘ole food product to sell it, and quite another to sell a suspected-dangerous food product (rBGH), but Bill’s administration didn’t label (or stop) a well-known, terrifying threat - Mad Cow Disease.
Bill’s FDA’s August, 1997 regulation permitted “known TSE-positive [Transmissible spongiform encephalopathy] material to be used in pet food, pig, chicken and fish feed,” only requiring the label to read “Do not feed to cattle and other ruminants” in the US.
Monsanto added to the problem. “There is evidence that rbST use [Monsanto’s GE bovine growth hormone] reduces the useful lifespan of a dairy cow. … Given that the incubation period for BSE is at least three to five years and perhaps longer, rbST-treated cows could harbor “hidden” BSE. That is, they might be infected but still asymptomatic when sent to slaughter.” http://www.consumersunion.org/food/bgh-codex.htm
Bill let TSE into our entire food chain. And who owned the feed and slaughter and genetic engineering corporations which benefitted?
Please, tell me, Hillary, what he could possibly have gotten in friendship or favors, that could ever justify his exposing millions of people to this?
With genetic engineering itself, Bill did something to the whole world, which tried to object. Words are inadequate to express how astoundingly immoral, beyond human bounds and conceit and power, that was.
“Even for the biggest “winners,” it is like winning at poker on the Titanic.” Jerry Mander: Facing the Rising Tide
He had no right
Do you hear that?
Bill had sex from Monica Lewinsky. That’s “dinky immoral.” That’s chicken feed immoral - excuse the Tyson pun, excuse the TSE-laced pun. Bill let genetic engineering lose on NATURE itself.
Our way of life is likely to be more fundamentally transformed in the next several decades than in the previous one thousand years…Tens of thousands of novel transgenic bacteria, viruses, plants and animals could be released into the Earth’s ecosystems…Some of those releases, however, could wreak havoc with the planet’s biospheres. — Jeremy Rifkin, Biotech Century
Bill did this to us, like it was some nothing and he, some big dumb ass Southern boy, just smiling and getting in good with the Big Boys, thinking about as much about the consequences of something this immense and about us human beings out here, as he thought about you, when he was unfaithful with Monica. Just one big fool getting off on the power and used to getting away with things.
Terminator genes, developed by DP&L, a Rose Firm client, prevent seeds from “working” after only one season. Farmers “must” repurchase (patents and suing not certain enough control, it seems). Those “killing” genes pose the apocalyptic risk of breaking out into nature. Natural seeds could fail, too. Nature could fail.
Far-fetched?
GMO fields are already contaminating normal species Berkeley Professor of Microbiology, Ignacio Chapela, wrote an open letter, warning the Mexican government about just this breaking out phenomenon happening in maize
And it has already happened with weeds - pesticide resistant GMO seeds break lose and weeds become pesticide-resistant Superweeds. [here]
But Bill’s USDA spokesman, Willard Phelps said the USDA wanted the technology to be `widely licensed and made expeditiously available to many seed companies.’
Genetic Engineering is often justified as a human technology, one that feeds more people with better food. Nothing could be further from the truth. With very few exceptions, the whole point of genetic engineering is to increase sales of chemicals and bio-engineered products to dependent farmers. — David Ehrenfield: Professor of Biology, Rutgers University [also see previous link]
Hillary, one third of the world’s bee colonies have collapsed [here]. Gone. Farmers in India are killing themselves. Farmers and bees. Since organic farmers in India are fine and organic farmers report no colony collapse [here], what does these farming catatrophes say about “industrial agriculture” [here]
Mad Cow Disease is another direct result of industrial agriculture. And now ……. transnational poultry factories are implicated as the source of bird flu [here]. Small scale poultry farms and wild birds seem not to be the problem [just as small farmers are not the issue in Mad Cow Disease], and yet “initiatives are multiplying to ban outdoor poultry, squeeze out small producers and restock farms with genetically modified chickens. … http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/feb2006/2006-02-27-01.asp “Of the few outbreaks that did occur in [Laos], more than 90% broke out in commercial poultryoperations, not free-ranging flocks.”
Monsanto (and others) is currently working with the USDA to force small farmers to tag every animal with a global tracking device (NAIS - National Animal Identification System). Allegedly related to food safety, Monsanto and others would be creating a vast corporate digital library on every move of small farmers’ livestock.
But small farmers do not create the contaminated environments, do not supply the feed, do not grind up diseased animals into feed (how Mad Cow began) and then sell it. In fact, their farming methods, free range and small scale, are significantly healthier and safer for animals and food than the massive concentration of animals by corporate industrial agriculture.
Monsanto is also aggressively pushing for state laws to limit farmers’ right to choose what to plant and the public’s right to exclude GE plants from their communities.
Cattle bloated by steroids, lapse and loss of 10,000 year old normal seeds [here], immense pollution from factory farms [here], deadly-disease-ridden feed, world-wide bee colony collapse, poisoned soil and depleted water supplies, Superweeds, lawsuits against farmers, loss of family farms, and … India farmers killing themselves in what may be the largest mass suicide in recorded human history (on average … one farmer suicide every 30 minutes since 2002 - The Hindu 1.30.08) - that is industrial agriculture.
Monsanto and Tyson are two of the largest industrial agricultural corporations in the world. Industrial agriculture is represented by your Rose Law Firm.
Your claim to care about food safety is terrifying double-speak given what Bill did and who you take donations from. Your idea of a Department of Food Safety would centralize control of food - in whose corporate connected hands? You talk tough about labeling food - ah, but “foreign” food - a sleight of hand tricking a public desperate for safe US food. You talk about food safety but Bill degraded food in every imaginable way and prevented minimally sane labeling.
I am a person before I am a woman. Your gender means nothing. It is a media distraction. Your policies on health and food and women and children, are meaningless in the face of connections that have threatened those groups profoundly, connections you have never denounced.
Monsanto uses child labor in India, primarily very young girls, exposing them to a lethal pesticide 13-14 hours a day, for pennies in pay. But you take donations from their lobbyists. You say you care about black people but as the poorest people in this country, they are least able to buy organic and are forced to eat the contaminated foods Bill let into our food system. The National Black Farmers Association has a boycott out on all Monsanto products.
Do you eat organic?
So, who are you with, hapless black consumers and black farmers, or Monsanto? Mothers left to give their children rBGH milk, or Monsanto? Women exposed to 7 times greater risk of breast cancer, or Monsanto? Desperate farmers in India and young children forced into child labor in cottonseed factories there, or Monsanto? Animals suffering [here] from lives in filthy cages and disgusting feedlots, shot up with steroids and hormones and antibiotics, or Monsanto? Our children who eat candy with high fructose Bt corn syrup associated with kidney and liver toxicity, or Monsanto?
Edwards was right about your corporate connections. I just didn’t understand until I saw that PBS show and read about Monsanto, how personally affected my children and grandchildren, and all people around the world, have been.
I will not vote for you. I will vote for someone who will commit themselves to work on behalf of small farmers and real food and decent treatment of animals and to end this industrialized agricultural nightmare that is taking us off a cliff.
Linn Cohen-Cole, Atlanta
Disclaimer: I am not a scientist. I have read for months on this subject, and am including only a tiny portion of the horrifying things I have learned. I am expressing my opinion as person and may be wrong. Perhaps things are swell out there and rBGH is fabulous and TSE-laced feed is great, and genetic engineering is the best thing since manna. But I am scared for my family and I have not only a right to say so but an obligation to do so. I am angry that Monsanto was allowed the influence it had and has done the things it definitely seems to have. I am disgusted by industrialization of every tender and beautiful part of our world and hope, for all our children’s sake, we are not too late to pull back.
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Obama Says Clinton Should Keep RunningJOHNSTOWN, Pa. — Barack Obama refused Saturday to go along with other Democrats who are calling for Hillary Rodham Clinton to step away from the race for the Democratic presidential nomination."My attitude is Senator Clinton can run as long as she wants," Obama said.Obama told reporters he did not agree with one of his supporters, Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy, when he said earlier this week that Clinton cannot win the nomination and should therefore drop out. "I hadn't talked to Pat about it," Obama said.At stops throughout the day, Clinton raised the question of whether she should leave the race — eliciting loud jeers from supporters."There are some people who say we should just stop these elections. 'Enough people have already voted, what's a few million more?'" Clinton said in Louisville, Ky. "I don't know about you but I'm glad Kentucky is going to be voting and you'll be choosing because it's such an important election." The state holds its primary May 20.Campaigning in Pennsylvania, her husband, Bill Clinton, said party insiders looking to resolve the contest should step back and allow the process to move forward."We just need to relax and let this happen. Nobody's talking about wrecking the party," the former president said. "Everywhere I go, all these working people say: 'Don't you dare let her drop out. Don't listen to those people in Washington, they don't represent us.'"The campaign on Saturday released a fundraising e-mail, signed by Bill Clinton, asking supporters to challenge talk of his wife departing the race by sending a check to her campaign."There's no better way to tell Hillary that you support her staying in than to make a contribution to her campaign," he wrote.Obama offered a bit of tough love to Pennsylvania voters, saying some industrial and manufacturing jobs may not return to this steel region, but others could take their place.Clinton also stressed job creation at campaign stops in Indiana and Kentucky, vowing to help manufacturers transition to new industries like clean energy and ending tax breaks for American companies that ship jobs overseas."I think this election, particularly here in Indiana, is about jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs," the former first lady said.Jobs and the economy are front and center in the remaining primary contests between the two Democratic hopefuls. Pennsylvania, which holds its primary April 22, has seen its manufacturing base and especially its steel industry weakened in recent decades, as has Indiana, which votes May 6.While campaigning in Ohio, another big manufacturing state, both Clinton and Obama criticized free trade deals and insisted the other candidate was not as reliable a protector of U.S. jobs. Clinton won that state's March 4 primary.In Johnstown, a woman employed at a call center told Obama that 200 of her co-workers had lost jobs after the work was outsourced to India. She blamed free trade and asked what the Illinois senator would do about it."I don't want to make a promise that I can bring back every job that's left Johnstown. It's just not true. Some of those jobs aren't going to come back," Obama answered."What I can do is try ... to create an environment in which jobs are being created," he said, adding that they "may not be the same jobs that left and don't come back."Speaking in Indianapolis, Clinton tied many of the region's economic woes to U.S. trade policy and to President Bush's laissez-faire approach to China, where numerous America jobs have been shipped in recent years."We are now deeply in debt. We owe money to everybody, not just to China but to Mexico and practically any other country you can think of. We are $9 trillion in debt," she said.Obama, who is on a six-day bus tour through Pennsylvania, toured a factory that makes the wires that eventually become Slinky toys. He played with a Slinky through the visit.Asked whether voters might be turned off by talk of some jobs not coming back, Obama said he was trying to give the phone worker a clear answer."The point I was making is that the same jobs are probably not going to come back. We're not going to suddenly see Bethlehem Steel reopen," he said. "What we're going to see is potentially some specialty steel of the sort that we saw at Johnstown Wire that has created a niche that can grow."Also Saturday, former Democratic contender John Edwards made his first public comments on the race since dropping out two months ago."I have a very high opinion of both of them," Edwards said of Obama and Clinton at the Young Democrats of North Carolina convention. "We would be blessed as a nation to have either one of them as president."At the same event, Chelsea Clinton said her travels have opened her eyes to sexism."I didn't really get how much sexism there still was in our country until I was at a rally with my mom in New Hampshire, and someone came up to me and said, 'I just can't see a woman being commander in chief,'" the former first daughter said.She has always been supported by both the men and women in her family, she said. "I have been so profoundly more grateful than I have ever been over the past few months for my parents because of that."© 2008 Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
Obama Says Clinton Should Keep Running
JOHNSTOWN, Pa. — Barack Obama refused Saturday to go along with other Democrats who are calling for Hillary Rodham Clinton to step away from the race for the Democratic presidential nomination.
"My attitude is Senator Clinton can run as long as she wants," Obama said.
Obama told reporters he did not agree with one of his supporters, Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy, when he said earlier this week that Clinton cannot win the nomination and should therefore drop out. "I hadn't talked to Pat about it," Obama said.
At stops throughout the day, Clinton raised the question of whether she should leave the race — eliciting loud jeers from supporters.
"There are some people who say we should just stop these elections. 'Enough people have already voted, what's a few million more?'" Clinton said in Louisville, Ky. "I don't know about you but I'm glad Kentucky is going to be voting and you'll be choosing because it's such an important election." The state holds its primary May 20.
Campaigning in Pennsylvania, her husband, Bill Clinton, said party insiders looking to resolve the contest should step back and allow the process to move forward.
"We just need to relax and let this happen. Nobody's talking about wrecking the party," the former president said. "Everywhere I go, all these working people say: 'Don't you dare let her drop out. Don't listen to those people in Washington, they don't represent us.'"
The campaign on Saturday released a fundraising e-mail, signed by Bill Clinton, asking supporters to challenge talk of his wife departing the race by sending a check to her campaign.
"There's no better way to tell Hillary that you support her staying in than to make a contribution to her campaign," he wrote.
Obama offered a bit of tough love to Pennsylvania voters, saying some industrial and manufacturing jobs may not return to this steel region, but others could take their place.
Clinton also stressed job creation at campaign stops in Indiana and Kentucky, vowing to help manufacturers transition to new industries like clean energy and ending tax breaks for American companies that ship jobs overseas.
"I think this election, particularly here in Indiana, is about jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs," the former first lady said.
Jobs and the economy are front and center in the remaining primary contests between the two Democratic hopefuls. Pennsylvania, which holds its primary April 22, has seen its manufacturing base and especially its steel industry weakened in recent decades, as has Indiana, which votes May 6.
While campaigning in Ohio, another big manufacturing state, both Clinton and Obama criticized free trade deals and insisted the other candidate was not as reliable a protector of U.S. jobs. Clinton won that state's March 4 primary.
In Johnstown, a woman employed at a call center told Obama that 200 of her co-workers had lost jobs after the work was outsourced to India. She blamed free trade and asked what the Illinois senator would do about it.
"I don't want to make a promise that I can bring back every job that's left Johnstown. It's just not true. Some of those jobs aren't going to come back," Obama answered.
"What I can do is try ... to create an environment in which jobs are being created," he said, adding that they "may not be the same jobs that left and don't come back."
Speaking in Indianapolis, Clinton tied many of the region's economic woes to U.S. trade policy and to President Bush's laissez-faire approach to China, where numerous America jobs have been shipped in recent years.
"We are now deeply in debt. We owe money to everybody, not just to China but to Mexico and practically any other country you can think of. We are $9 trillion in debt," she said.
Obama, who is on a six-day bus tour through Pennsylvania, toured a factory that makes the wires that eventually become Slinky toys. He played with a Slinky through the visit.
Asked whether voters might be turned off by talk of some jobs not coming back, Obama said he was trying to give the phone worker a clear answer.
"The point I was making is that the same jobs are probably not going to come back. We're not going to suddenly see Bethlehem Steel reopen," he said. "What we're going to see is potentially some specialty steel of the sort that we saw at Johnstown Wire that has created a niche that can grow."
Also Saturday, former Democratic contender John Edwards made his first public comments on the race since dropping out two months ago.
"I have a very high opinion of both of them," Edwards said of Obama and Clinton at the Young Democrats of North Carolina convention. "We would be blessed as a nation to have either one of them as president."
At the same event, Chelsea Clinton said her travels have opened her eyes to sexism.
"I didn't really get how much sexism there still was in our country until I was at a rally with my mom in New Hampshire, and someone came up to me and said, 'I just can't see a woman being commander in chief,'" the former first daughter said.
She has always been supported by both the men and women in her family, she said. "I have been so profoundly more grateful than I have ever been over the past few months for my parents because of that."
© 2008 Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
OBAMA 08! (The National Academy of Sciences keeps all US Presidents well-informed.)
Science, Evolution, and Creationism ... Read this FREE online!Full Book | PDF Summary | Podcast
Science, Evolution, and Creationism ...
Read this FREE online!
Full Book | PDF Summary | Podcast
The National Academies Press The National Academies Press (NAP) was created by the National Academies to publish the reports issued by the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, the Institute of Medicine, and the National Research Council, all operating under a charter granted by the Congress of the United States.
The National Academies Press
The National Academies Press (NAP) was created by the National Academies to publish the reports issued by the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, the Institute of Medicine, and the National Research Council, all operating under a charter granted by the Congress of the United States.
Spies Among Us By Laurie Singh - Mar 17th, 2008 at 6:00 am EDTSEE LINK
Spies Among Us
By Laurie Singh - Mar 17th, 2008 at 6:00 am EDT
SEE LINK
Mar 28 20084:03 pmCondoleezza Rice Speaks on America’s “Birth Defect”Two weeks ago, when Barack Obama was on flames for his pastor’s statements, and some, almost equating being black to being anti-American. I wondered what Condoleezza Rice, flying around the world as our Secretary of State, how does that black American feel about race in America? Yesterday, a Washington Times reporter asked Condoleezza Rice about the upcoming 40th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr’s death and how she thinks race relations have developed since then. ~ “Rice hits U.S. ‘birth defect’ Obviously, Barack Obama opened this box, Condoleezza refused to take sides politically, saying only that she heard Barack Obama’s speech and it was “important” that Mr. Obama “gave it for a whole host of reasons.” Judging by the openness of her answer, calling the history of race in America a “birth defect” and explaining the context of the founders vs. blacks in this country and how it affects generational thinking, even today, it’s obvious she was with Barack all the way. The preview.. “I sit in my office and the portrait immediately over my shoulder is Thomas Jefferson. And sometimes I think, what would he think of this black woman Secretary of State as his successor? What would he think that the last two successors have been black Americans..” Take a listen.
Mar 28 2008
4:03 pm
Condoleezza Rice Speaks on America’s “Birth Defect”
Two weeks ago, when Barack Obama was on flames for his pastor’s statements, and some, almost equating being black to being anti-American. I wondered what Condoleezza Rice, flying around the world as our Secretary of State, how does that black American feel about race in America?
Yesterday, a Washington Times reporter asked Condoleezza Rice about the upcoming 40th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr’s death and how she thinks race relations have developed since then. ~ “Rice hits U.S. ‘birth defect’
Obviously, Barack Obama opened this box, Condoleezza refused to take sides politically, saying only that she heard Barack Obama’s speech and it was “important” that Mr. Obama “gave it for a whole host of reasons.”
Judging by the openness of her answer, calling the history of race in America a “birth defect” and explaining the context of the founders vs. blacks in this country and how it affects generational thinking, even today, it’s obvious she was with Barack all the way.
The preview..
“I sit in my office and the portrait immediately over my shoulder is Thomas Jefferson. And sometimes I think, what would he think of this black woman Secretary of State as his successor? What would he think that the last two successors have been black Americans..”
Take a listen.
Barack Obama on "The View" (FOUR PARTS - March 28,2008):1 - Hot Topics-The Hotel Bible-Pastor Wright2 - Obama and his relationship with Pastor Wright3 - The first three things you will do4 - Campaign Tone and TaxesProvided by YouTube user pe11201REF LINK
Barack Obama on "The View" (FOUR PARTS - March 28,2008):
1 - Hot Topics-The Hotel Bible-Pastor Wright
2 - Obama and his relationship with Pastor Wright
3 - The first three things you will do
4 - Campaign Tone and Taxes
Provided by YouTube user pe11201
REF LINK
Dean Says Attacks Getting Too Personal
