"Mission Accomplished"? "Mission Impossible"!

Taliban fight intensifies in Afghanistan

BY JAMES RUPERT
Newsday Staff Correspondent

May 19, 2006

KABUL, Afghanistan -- Taliban guerrillas fought Afghan police and U.S. and Canadian troops yesterday in some of southern Afghanistan's fiercest battles since the United States ousted the Islamic militant movement from power in 2001.

An American police trainer and a Canadian officer were among the scores killed since Wednesday in a series of attacks that included a ground assault on a village, suicide car bombings against military vehicles, and firefights with Western troops.

The past two days underscore what appears to be a major Taliban offensive to strengthen the influence of the movement in the south as U.S. forces there hand off combat roles to arriving NATO units. In one of two significant ground battles raging since Wednesday, Capt. Nichola Goddard, 26, was killed in Kandahar province, the first Canadian woman soldier ever to die in a combat role.

That battle was at Panjwai, a village district only 15 miles from Kandahar, the hub of southern Afghanistan's economy and politics. In Helmand province, just west of Kandahar, hundreds of Taliban attacked Afghan police and government offices Wednesday in the town of Musa Qala. Afghan officials said 13 policemen died, while reports of Taliban dead ranged from nine to 50.

Beyond Afghanistan's deep south, a Taliban stronghold, the attacks were by suicide car bombs.

Hmmmmm...we have dozens of people dying in Iraq each day under an unstable regime, in the Palestinian sector, there are terror bombings trying to take out the government there, Guantanamo is turning into a battle royale, Chechnya is still in unrest, and now the Taliban have reared their ugly heads.

So where's the President? Beating up on Burma, and insisting that immigrants do something he's never mastered, speak English.

Nice. Very nice.

Mine's Bigger

Oh. My. Fucking. God.

The inmates at Gitmo gave a whole battalion of Marines problems and all they were armed with was THIS?!?!?!?!

Good grief, it's no wonder we can't find Osama. We're too busy learning to defend ourselves against an attacker bearing FRUIT!

The Coolest Store You Will Ever See

The New Apple Store: Midtown Manhattan

This is really cool. The store will be open 24/365, so if I get the jones for the latest iPod at 2AM on Thanksgiving night, I can scoot over and pick it up. You'll know where to find me.

Mets v. Yankees

LET'S GO METS!

Two up, one down! Maybe this team really IS that good!

Obligatory "AWWWWWWWWWWWW!" Moment

Brooklyn DA offers commendation for 'Undercover Kitty'


BY ANTHONY M. DESTEFANO
Newsday Staff Writer


May 19, 2006
True to form, Fred the placid undercover cat was a model of good behavior Thursday as he received one of the annual law enforcement appreciation awards given out by Brooklyn District Attorney Charles J. Hynes.

The friendly "Detective Fred," as Hynes called him, purred in satisfaction as the veteran prosecutor gave him a special plaque for his effort that led to the arrest earlier this year of a suspected bogus veterinarian.

"I told him a grateful county gives honor to you," said Hynes after the special awards ceremony at the Brooklyn Marriott Hotel.

Fred, a 1-year-old American shorthair, was actually one of 21 honorees -- the rest two-legged police officers, detectives, fire marshals and court officers -- cited for risking their lives to save others or apprehend suspects.

Also honored with Fred was undercover detective Stephanie Jones, who works for Hynes and who took part in the case against Steven Vassall, the Brooklyn man accused of posing as a fake veterinarian. The charges against Vassall, who has plead not guilty, are pending.

Fred got more publicity earlier this week when Newsday reported that he was on his way to be certified for use in pet therapy as part of Hynes' "Legal Lives" program to tell school children about the importance of kindness to animals.

Anybody who knows me even a little (just look at the upper right hand corner of this blog), knows I'm a sucker for cats. Especially tabbies.

Tabbies are the cats I most associate with the street, and since I grew up on the street (admittedly, the streets of the Upper East Side, but hey, I was the only blonde-haired, blue-eyed kid in a Sicilian gangster neighborhood, and I was in high demand from the girls. You do the math.), I have a deep affinity for them.

My experiences with tabbies are that they are tough, smart, affectionate and loyal. My father adopted one from a construction site where he was working, and we kept that cat for eleven years.

OK, "kept" might be too strong a word, as we used to let it into our "backyard" (more like an alleyway that got some sunshine on occasion), where he would promptly leap to the roof of the radio-station-masquerading-as-a-church next door (long time Pacifica listeners will know the station instantly), and disappear and do whatever it is cats do on the street.

He was vasectomized, so I had no concerns about him being dragged into a paternity suit.

I liked to imagine he was the friendly cat at the Irish bar on the corner, getting the occasional piece of bacon tossed to him. I'd run into him occasionally when I was staggering home from some boitê on the UES at one in the morning, and he'd always escort me home. Good little bouncer.

One night, he didn't come home, no matter how much we'd call out the back window. Yea, people in Manhattan used to do that, just like in the old movies from the Lower East Side: "Ma! T'row me down a jelly sammich!" "Bobby, you get in here THIS INSTANT!"

My mom and I pulled on some clothes (hey, it was hot and the building wasn't wired for A/C. We sat in our underwear a lot.), and roamed the neighborhood looking. It must have been quite the site to see a teenager and a middle aged woman walking around, whispering into manholes and basement bulkheads.

We did that for a few days, and then decided to wait a while and see what happened. About a week after disappearing, Mikko came wandering back along the path he usually clambered home on: up the fire escape of the building on the side street, make the leap to the annex to the restaurant, up to the church roof, then down to the ground, then make the eight foot leap up, scraping his hind paws on the brick, and up to the roof across from our backyard.

He didn't look much worse for the wear, a little skinnier, with the slightest odor of burned oil on him. Best as we could figure, he must have gotten trapped in a boiler room somewhere and feasted on the mice and waterbugs.

Mmmmmmm, that's good eatin'!

The other tabby I've "owned"? That's a story for another day, but his tale is even more remarkable.

New York
Detective Fred
cats
undercover cat

When It Rains, It Pours!

Literally. Go check the weather for NYC.

But....remember that good news I said I had?

It just doubled. More to come.

Darfur Update

Tina Susman of Newsday is doing some stellar reporting from Darfur. This story has been "backburnered", undeservedly, by domestic immigration issues. Gee....can't imagine why....Let's see what's she's reporting on:

Using rape as a weapon of war

May 14, 2006

NYALA, Sudan -- The gunmen eyed the 11 women for a few moments, as if scanning a menu. Then they chose three: Buthereina Hassab el-Dama, her sister and their cousin.

"These two men who took me - one was doing the action, and the other was threatening me with a gun," el-Dama, 22, recalled, adjusting the lavender shawl framing her face and narrow shoulders.

Rape is a word few people can bring themselves to utter here, least of all those who have been through it, but el-Dama's euphemism was clear as she shared her story in the fading light of a hot, Saturday afternoon. It is a common story in Darfur, where human rights groups say soldiers and militiamen loyal to the Arab-dominated government have used rape as a weapon in their war against non-Arab tribes - a charge the government denies but that is supported by scores of reports based on victims' stories.

Nobody knows how many women have been victims of war-related rapes here, because of reluctance to report the crime, but victims' advocates say the number is in the tens of thousands. The signing of a peace deal May 5 between the government and the main rebel group isn't likely to change that, they say, because of the lack of security on the ground in Darfur.

"In war, any tactic an aggressor can use to demoralize his enemy works in his favor. Rape does just that," said Janet Kerr, a psychologist and sexual violence expert who works in the Kalma displacement camp, outside Nyala, with the international aid group Doctors Without Borders. "It is a very effective way to undermine an enemy."

In a four-month period last year, Doctors Without Borders treated nearly 500 rape victims at various locations in Darfur and said in a report that this was "only a partial representation" of the actual number.

We all know rape happens in war. Rape is ultimately about power and aggression, and rape is ultimately a dominance tactic: rape a woman or a man, and youu've more than humiliated her, you've subjugated her. That's why rape is such an underreported crime and why the anti-abortion activists are so wrong about the issue of "choice": oftentimes, it's not the woman's choice to BE pregnant in the first place.

Other reporting from Darfur:

Starved for a solution

May 15, 2006

NYALA, Sudan -- A 5-month-old boy who, at 7 1/2 pounds looked as fragile as a newborn, sucked formula through a thin tube positioned against his emaciated mother's chest. Some day, when his mother is able to provide milk to nourish her son, it is hoped he will have learned to associate her breast with food and be weaned from the tube.

Until then, Martam Mohamed Khamis and her tiny boy, Abdul Rahman Suliman, are full-time residents of one of the most troubling symbols of Darfur's 3-year-old war: a therapeutic feeding center for children on the verge of starvation.

By the end of April, malnutrition was affecting 15 percent of the population in South Darfur, where this feeding center is located. That is a sharp increase from three months earlier and a sign of deteriorating conditions in the region, where international aid groups had cut malnutrition rates from 21.7 percent in 2004 to about half that last year.

But an upsurge in fighting since January has increased the number of those needing food and medical assistance. So has a drop in international donations to UN agencies such as the United Nations' World Food Program, which last month had received just $238 million, or 32 percent, of the $746 million it needed for Darfur in 2006. The shortfall is so great that starting May 1, the agency resorted to what its Darfur director, Carlos Veloso, called "drastic measures." It halved rations to the 3 million people it is feeding in Darfur, bringing their daily caloric count from 2,100 to 1,050.

In this harsh environment, where people must walk several miles in searing heat through soft sand to fetch water and firewood, and where cooking is an energy-consuming, time-intensive exercise involving stirring and mashing of the dried rations, aid workers worry about the cut's impact.

"If this continues, I'm afraid we'll go back to where we were in 2004, and all the gains we made in Darfur will be lost," said the program's Penny Ferguson.

Nevermind that, as I related earlier this year, people are killed for merely poking their heads out in public to fetch a pail of water.

So why is this being hushed up? Let me let Tina explain:

Where the Despair Begins

May 14, 2006


NYALA, Sudan --[....]

"These things happen every day," said Naser Bashier Kambal of the Amel Center for Treatment and Rehabilitation of Torture Victims, a Sudanese organization that helps victims of Darfur's war. "It's something systematic that is going on," said Kambal. "If they find women, they rape. If they find men, they kill. Every day such things happen and no one intervenes. They just move on."

Kambal's words capture the plight of Darfur, a region about the size of Texas, where a war between black African rebels and Sudan's Arab-dominated regime evolved into a state-sponsored ethnic cleansing campaign that, by some estimates, has killed 400,000 civilians and left millions struggling to survive.

Although the government and one of the three main rebel groups signed a (ed note: U.S.-brokered ) peace accord May 5, nobody expects things to change quickly for people like Fatina. Two rebel groups oppose the deal, and the government has yet to accept the idea of UN peacekeepers to implement the agreement. In addition, the plan gives the government a full five months to disarm the dreaded janjaweed - months during which there will be no formidable force on the ground to protect civilians.

Say it with me loud, but not proud:

George W. Bush - FAILURE!

snarkasm, snarcasm, snarky

Bush
Darfur
Tina Susman

Passed On From A Friend

Ten Things To Ponder

Number 10 - Life is sexually transmitted.

Number 9 - Good health is merely the slowest possible rate at which one can die.

Number 8 - Men have two emotions: Hungry and Horny. If you see him without an erection, make him a sandwich.

Number 7 - Give a person a fish and you feed them for a day; teach a person to use the Internet and they won't bother you for weeks.

Number 6 - Some people are like a Slinky...not really good for anything, but you still can't help but smile when you see one tumble down the stairs.

Number 5 - Health nuts are going to feel stupid someday, lying in hospitals dying of nothing.

Number 4 - All of us could take a lesson from the weather. It pays no attention to criticism.

Number 3 - Why does a slight tax increase cost you two hundred dollars an a substantial tax cut saves you thirty cents?

Number 2 - In the 60's, people took acid to make the world weird. Now the world is weird and people take Prozac to make it normal.

AND THE NUMBER 1 THOUGHT FOR 2006 - We know exactly where one cow with mad-cow-disease is located among the millions and millions of cows in America but we haven't got a clue as to where thousands of terrorists are located. Maybe we should put the Department of Agriculture in charge of Homeland Security?

Now We're Talking!

Who'da figured that the New York State gubenatorial race would become a hotbed of progressive ideas?

Here you have Eliot Spitzer with a commanding lead over his nominal primary opponent, Tom Suozzi, and a significant lead over "the other guy" (aka the stooge the NYS GOP puts up against Spitzer).

While Suozzi could make some news and noise going out on a limb and proposing congestion pricing on state highways, Spitzer can sit back and talk about how green the grass is, and how we can make it even greener by fertilizing a few times a season.

But no:

Spitzer pushes for universal Internet access

By Justin Rocket Silverman
amNewYork staff writer

May 16, 2006


Citing a 1934 law that ensured telephone service for every American household, state Attorney General Eliot Spitzer said Monday that the federal government must now make the same guarantee for Internet access.

Until that happens, the gubernatorial candidate proposes that New York State take responsibility for ensuring there is no velvet rope blocking the entrance to the World Wide Web.

"We must make New York State the most connected and technologically advanced place to live and do business in the world," Spitzer said during a speech in Manhattan at the Personal Democracy Forum, which examined the intersection of technology and politics. "The problem isn't a lack of resources, it's a lack of imagination and a lack of leadership."

Yet as Spitzer himself pointed out Monday, the goal of universal Internet access could require a major shift in the way broadband, DSL and dial-up connections are provided.

Only one-third of New York City residents have high-speed connections at home, and there are vast swaths of upstate counties where high-speed service is simply not offered because providers don't think they can make a profit.

He emphasized that he does not want the state to give away Internet service for free, but decried current conditions where a family in the South Bronx pays twice as much as a family in South Korea for service that is only half as fast.

There you go! In a nutshell, the trouble with America, its education system, and its government: in an information society, we need to provide information as if it was a utility.

See, I think there are some things that cry out for government regulation, being the liberal that I am. Things like water, electricity, telephone service, and yes, information, demand careful government oversight in order to realize the fruits of these technologies and resources.

When AT&T was a monopoly, they could afford to spend money on research and development and because of that, not only did telephony improve (to the point where America became the first nationally wired nation of the size that it is), but advances in other fields as diverse as astronomy and biology took hold.

Why? Because while AT&T was limited in the amount they could charge their customers, there was no limit to the profit they could make on that money. Ergo, they spent on things that would help them lower their costs.

We got reasonably cheap phone service (no, it wasn't "market competition" cheap, but I'll get to that in a moment), improved service, and connectivity. When competition was forced upon AT&T (the breakup in 1984), things did not markedly improve. In fact, there was not one single new technology developed after 1984 that was not already in the works in 1984, or at least mapped out on a drawing board somewhere.

Yes, there were improvements in cell phone service, but have you ever seen what European or Asian cell phones can do, as compared to our "free market" services?

In Finland, you can buy a soda from a machine using your cell phone. They've been able to do that for years. Only recently, have we started to see the slightest hint of that technology here in America.

Why? Because Europe standardized their phone signal. Government regulation forced the phone companies to design their technology around that one standard.

I'll have more on this discussion in the coming weeks. Let me get back to Spitzer's idea.

Universal internet access from home is an idea whose time has come. There's a deep divide in this nation between the wired and the unwired. The opinions you see reflected on the internet, on this blog and on EVERY OTHER BLOG, are those posted by people with the means (e.g. money) to afford a computer, even if that computer is at their workplace, or the local library.

Decisions that affect our country get their impetus, in part, from the Net. What we've created in the past ten years (I say this as one of the original Prodigy subscribers and someone who's lurked The Well and EchoNY from before the WWW) is a digital serfdom: those who aren't "linked" are doomed to be led around by those who are.

That has to change. It's only fair. Thank you, Eliot.

New York
Eliot Spitzer
Universal Internet Acces
Tom Suozzi

tags technorati : Top 50

A Contest (Of Sorts)

If you were going to rename this blog, what would you name it?

I'm serious. I'm thinking of names for this blog (something a bit more clever than "Carl's Beer-Laden Rants") to use.

Things that I've come up with on my own:

- Thematic Schematic

- Winter's Edge

- An Unperfect Actor On A Stage

- The Mars Of Malcontents

- Reality Broker

- The Long/Short Fund

Any other ideas? Anybody like any of these names?

In Ten Days....

Very Exciting News To Share

Keep your eyes open. This is a killer.

Best. Take. Ever. On. Immigration. "Reform."

Courtesy Jesus' General. Buy the mug.

Are They Even Trying Anymore?

Because this is a time-sensitive post, as the New York Times tends to archive quickly, I'll quote extensively:

Rising Diabetes Threat Meets a Falling Budget

By IAN URBINA
Published: May 16, 2006
In Worcester, Mass., scientists are boxing up their test tubes at a shuttered laboratory where just two years ago they isolated a chemical that triggers diabetes.

In Oklahoma City, health workers faced with soaring rates of Type 2 diabetes, the most common form of the disease, question whether they can afford to continue to offer classes where diabetics learn how to avoid foot amputations.

In Columbia, S.C., diabetes educators say they need more money to expand a program that uses the pulpit in black churches to preach the importance of a healthy diet and exercise.

Across the country, health care officials who rely on federal money to help stem the growing epidemic of Type 2 diabetes say they have become increasingly frustrated and alarmed.

Diabetes is the only major disease with a death rate that is still rising — up 22 percent since 1990 — and it has emerged as the leading cause of kidney failure, blindness and nontraumatic amputation.

But public health experts say federal spending on the disease has historically fallen short of what is needed. And now the government has cut diabetes funds in the budgets for this year and next, despite the explosive growth of a disease that now figures in the deaths of 225,000 Americans each year.

[....]The number of Type 2 diabetics in the United States has doubled in the past two decades, to an estimated 20 million, when undiagnosed cases are included, making the disease the country's fastest-growing public health problem. Epidemiologists predict that one in three American children born in 2000 will join the ranks of those afflicted with Type 2.

This year, the federal government is spending $1.1 billion to study diabetes, less than a quarter of what is spent to study cancer. The government spends 10 times more per patient on cancer research, and the death rate for that disease, unlike that for diabetes, has begun to fall.

Epidemiologists say the disparity is partly explained by lingering but outdated perceptions of diabetes as a slow-moving condition that preys on the old and obese, not more recent views of it as an expanding danger that is striking people at earlier ages. [....]

Disease research is often underwritten by advocacy groups and pharmaceutical companies, but the federal government is by far the chief financier. From the viewpoint of pure economics, some health experts say it is hard to fathom why the federal government does not spend more on diabetes, which the American Diabetes Association has estimated costs the United States economy about $132 billion per year for treatment and lost productivity at work. Federal spending for both research and treatment, meanwhile, is $1.2 billion annually.

"That means the federal government is putting less than 1 percent of what this disease costs us into research and development," said Dr. C. Ronald Kahn, president of the Joslin Diabetes Center in Boston, a leading research institution. "Even the tire industry spends at least 3 percent of their total sales on research and development."

(emphases added)

Disgusting. But check out this graphic to get even angrier...

Any of my FReeper lurkers care to explain this to me? How a Federal agency can have its budget nearly doubled, and yet only see an incremental increase in spending to prevent and cure a disease of epidemic proportions?

I'm waiting...

snarkasm, snarcasm, snarky

Bush
diabetes

An Idea Whose Time Has Come

Lawmaker revisits NYC secession

By Chuck Bennett
amNewYork Staff Writer


May 15, 2006
New York City -- the 51st state. It's an old idea being revived once again in the City Council.

Months before the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861, New York City Mayor Fernando Wood proposed seceding from the state and creating the "Free City of Tri-Insula" to keep the lucrative cotton trade with the South alive.

A little over a hundred years later in 1969, writers Norman Mailer and Jimmy Breslin ran for mayor and council speaker on a statehood campaign.

And now Queens Councilman Peter Vallone Jr. says he is "deadly serious" about having the Big Apple secede from the Empire State.

"The only reason we are in bad financial condition is because of Albany," he said, citing the $3.5 billion in taxes the city pays to Albany but isn't returned in funding. "We just want our own money back."

Vallone, an ambitious politicians and son of the former council speaker Peter Vallone, wants a citywide referendum to create a commission to study secession and the creation of a "Greater New York."

Personally, he likes the idea of calling the new state -- which would be the 10th largest in the union -- Gotham or just New York.

But to ever get there, secession would need approval voters, the Legislature, the governor, Congress and then the president.

Count me in on this one. It's about time New York City got the respect of statehood. We pay into the Federal and state governments far more than we receive back from either of them. With two Senators and twenty-someodd Congressmen, we'd finally be able to exploit our political muscle directly, rather than be told what to do by a state that you could squeeze the population of into a small corner of one of our outer boroughs.

We'd be able to have an income tax imposed on people who fled the city for "a better life" outside, while still sponging up our services when they come into work and take their paychecks home. As it stands now, we can't do that. We have to have our municipal budgeting, planning, and infrastructure approved by the state legislature AND governor. That's just silly: no body in Rochester gives a rats' ass about how many subway lines there are in Queens, yet they hold partial veto power over it!

Fifty-first state. We'd even get our own odd star....

snarkasm, snarcasm, snarky
New York

tags technorati : Top 50

Mother's Day

It seems, as I peruse the liberal blogtopia (©Skippy), everyone is posting paeans (today, we'll pronouce it "payons" not "peeons" as the proper pronunciation would dictate) to their moms.

My mom is a self-centered egoist who I spent most of my adult life "thanking" for bearing and raising me by trying to live my life according to her wishes. I think I'm owed a "Carl's day" for that.

Mothers have this strange hold over us all, and yet when you analyze the situation, it's a frightfully tyrannical position they hold. The sole mom I have respect for is my daughter's mom, who put up with me (and still does, in her way) for thirty years in various forms: friend, lover, wife, and friend again.

So, if you have a good relationship with your mom and are spending time today thanking her, then Happy Mother's Day. I did my son-ly duty, visited my mom, gave her her flowers, and was informed that I'm needed to drive her to see my dad (whom she has hated for fifty years, so why she bothers is beyond me) on Father's Day. I walked out.

My day. Go fig. But then, she's always had this way of imposing her wishes on her children with not a thought to their own wants and needs.

Karma Crash In Texas

Doctors puzzled over bizarre infection surfacing in South Texas

Web Posted: 05/12/2006 10:51 AM CDT


Deborah Knapp
KENS 5 Eyewitness News



If diseases like AIDS and bird flu scare you, wait until you hear what's next. Doctors are trying to find out what is causing a bizarre and mysterious infection that's surfaced in South Texas.

Morgellons disease is not yet known to kill, but if you were to get it, you might wish you were dead, as the symptoms are horrible.

"These people will have like beads of sweat but it's black, black and tarry," said Ginger Savely, a nurse practioner in Austin who treats a majority of these patients.

Patients get lesions that never heal.

"Sometimes little black specks that come out of the lesions and sometimes little fibers," said Stephanie Bailey, Morgellons patient.

Patients say that's the worst symptom — strange fibers that pop out of your skin in different colors.

"He'd have attacks and fibers would come out of his hands and fingers, white, black and sometimes red. Very, very painful," said Lisa Wilson, whose son Travis had Morgellon's disease.

While all of this is going on, it feels like bugs are crawling under your skin. So far more than 100 cases of Morgellons disease have been reported in South Texas.

"It really has the makings of a horror movie in every way," Savely said.

While Savely sees this as a legitimate disease, there are many doctors who simply refuse to acknowledge it exists, because of the bizarre symptoms patients are diagnosed as delusional.

"Believe me, if I just randomly saw one of these patients in my office, I would think they were crazy too," Savely said. "But after you've heard the story of over 100 (patients) and they're all — down to the most minute detail — saying the exact same thing, that becomes quite impressive."

Travis Wilson developed Morgellons just over a year ago. He called his mother in to see a fiber coming out of a lesion.

"It looked like a piece of spaghetti was sticking out about a quarter to an eighth of an inch long and it was sticking out of his chest," Lisa Wilson said. "I tried to pull it as hard as I could out and I could not pull it out."

The Wilson's spent $14,000 after insurance last year on doctors and medicine.

"Most of them are antibiotics. He was on Tamadone for pain. Viltricide, this was an anti-parasitic. This was to try and protect his skin because of all the lesions and stuff," Lisa said.

However, nothing worked, and 23-year-old Travis could no longer take it.

"I knew he was going to kill himself, and there was nothing I could do to stop him," Lisa Wilson said.

Just two weeks ago, Travis took his life.

Stephanie Bailey developed the lesions four-and-a-half years ago.

"The lesions come up, and then these fuzzy things like spores come out," she said.

She also has the crawling sensation.

"You just want to get it out of you," Bailey said.

She has no idea what caused the disease, and nothing has worked to clear it up.

"They (doctors) told me I was just doing this to myself, that I was nuts. So basically I stopped going to doctors because I was afraid they were going to lock me up," Bailey said.

Harriett Bishop has battled Morgellons for 12 years. After a year on antibiotics, her hands have nearly cleared up. On the day, we visited her she only had one lesion and she extracted this fiber from it.

"You want to get these things out to relieve the pain, and that's why you pull and then you can see the fibers there, and the tentacles are there, and there are millions of them," Bishop said.

So far, pathologists have failed to find any infection in the fibers pulled from lesions.

"Clearly something is physically happening here," said Dr. Randy Wymore, a researcher at the Morgellons Research Foundation at Oklahoma State University's Center for Health Sciences.

Wymore examines the fibers, scabs and other samples from Morgellon's patients to try and find the disease's cause.

"These fibers don't look like common environmental fibers," he said.

The goal at OSU is to scientifically find out what is going on. Until then, patients and doctors struggle with this mysterious and bizarre infection. Thus far, the only treatment that has showed some success is an antibiotic.

"It sounds a little like a parasite, like a fungal infection, like a bacterial infection, but it never quite fits all the criteria of any known pathogen," Savely said

No one knows how Morgellans is contracted, but it does not appear to be contagious. The states with the highest number of cases are Texas, California and Florida.

The only connection found so far is that more than half of the Morgellons patients are also diagnosed with Lyme disease.

For more information on Morgellons, visit the research foundation's Web site at www.morgellons.org.

Karma's a bitch, ain't it, Texas? You inflicted us with a disease that's not quite a fungus, not quite a bacterial infection, and not quite a parasite...OK, maybe it's a parasite.

Here's A Chance To Show The World Real America

We know it's coming. We can start mobilizing our resources now. We can show the Muslim world that Americans can walk the walk that they talk.

Indonesia volcano on "danger" status

By Tomi Soetjipto Sat May 13, 5:43 AM ET
JAKARTA (Reuters) - Indonesia raised the alert status of the Mount Merapi volcano to the highest level on Saturday, prompting a compulsory evacuation of thousands of residents living on the slopes, officials said.

"This morning we raised the status of Merapi to the top alert, which is the red code. Every resident has been ordered to evacuate," Subandrio, head of the Merapi section at the Center for Volcanological Research and Technology Development, told Reuters.

Residents said they could see lava flowing and thick smoke rising from Merapi, one of the most dangerous volcanoes in the Pacific "Ring of Fire" that has been rumbling for weeks.

"I could see the lava clearly from my home this morning. Then they ordered us to evacuate our village," said Anton, a 25-year-old resident of Boyong village, around 8 km (5 miles) from Merapi.

We fucked it up with the tsunami. We can do better. Want to bet Bush won't?

Why should we care?

Most Javanese, who make up the bulk of Indonesia's 220 million people, are Muslim, but many cling to a spiritual past and believe a supernatural kingdom exists on top of Merapi.

Get to emailing your Congresscritters and your Senators, and start the ball rolling on relief efforts, now. Turn the Lincoln and the Enterprise back from the Persian Gulf and steam them now to the Seventh Fleet to assist in Southeast Asia.

This is a whole lot more important than whether in ten years Iran will have a nuke. It just doesn't matter if we can persuade the rest of the Muslim world we mean no harm. They've forgotten the Serbo-Croatian salvation we did. They forgot how we saved millions of Muslims. We can do better here.

Porn Actresses Can Be Funny

Here's a great back-and-forth (or in-and-out as the case may be) on one of those Nigerian bank scam deal.

No, this isn't really "Tiffany Minx", it's some guy pretending to be her. It's quite the ironic little twist on the "something for nothing" aspect of the Nigerian scam, and you gotta love this:

From Peter Aka to Tiffany Mynx (Original Email) 11/1
From the office of: Dr.Peter Aka(C.B.N)
Private EMAIL :(cbn_updatektt@post.com)
Personal Number:234 80 33007631.

ATTN:BENEFICIARY CONTRACTOR :

NOTE: THE INFORMATION IN THIS MESSAGE AND IN ANY ATTACHMENTS, CONTAINS CONFIDENTIAL INFORMATION AND IS INTENDED SOLELY FOR THE ATTENTION AND USE OF THE NAMED ADDRESSEE (S). IT MUST NOT BE DISCLOSED TO ANY PERSON(S) WITHOUT AUTHORIZATION. IF YOU ARE NOT THE INTENDED RECIPIENT, OR A PERSON RESPONSIBLE FOR DELIVERING IT TO THE INTENDED RECIPIENT, YOU ARE NOT AUTHORIZED TO AND MUST NOT, DISCLOSE, COPY,DISTRIBUTE, OR RETAIN THIS MESSAGE OR ANY PART OF IT.

RE: UNPAID CONTRACT SUM

After waiting to hear from you or your Nigeria partners for a long time now, I decided to make this direct approach to you in other not to let it be as if I have anything in mind against you. I do not know if you have asked yourself why each time the release of these fund is approved, all of a sudden, the payment will be stopped or one problem or the other will come up. If you have not asked this question or you do not know, this is an opportunity for me to tell you.

Some time ago, your Nigerian friend I mean the people that introduced you to the project approached me through my dear Wife who works with the federal Ministry of Finance and requested me to assist them conclude a money transfer deal they had with you, they requested me to assist them by removing the original contractors name, companys name and bank particulars from Central bank of Nigeria (CBN) vetting computer and replacing them with your name and your bank details in order to make you appear as the rightful beneficiary of this funds. I agreed on condition that they will pay me $100,000 as soon as your name appears as the beneficiary.I did as agreed and demanded to be paid but your friends started telling me stories. They even told me that you promise to send money to me. Do you know that up till now, I have not received a single cent from them and have not set my eyes on any of them.

Based on their attitude, I decided to stop the funds release movement because I cannot be denied of my right in my own office considering the risk as it might affect my job. Secondly, I know the source of the funds and you did not execute any contract in
Nigeria, although I am the only person privileged to know this information and it is a fact. Why I am making this clear to you is that I can see that you are still making efforts spending money in order to conclude this project. Now I am ready to forget the past, I do not need the $100,000 any longer from you but a share of 25% of the total sum. I need your assurance that those your colleagues will be totally keep out of this transaction, I know that none of them is aware of this transaction after trying their best to conclude it without my consent.

Finally, I need your promise that no official of the
Central bank of Nigeria will be aware of my involvement in this regard. Now re-assure me that you will be willing to offer me the 25% of the fund, that you will assist my wife and personal assistant to establish a foreign account in your country where my share will be lodged.

If you are ready to conclude this business with me, you can contact me immediately on (EMAIL:(cbn_updatektt@post.com).

so that we can have chat over this issue once and for all so that we can move forward. But if the reverse is the case, do not bother yourself to reach me.

Regards, DR. Peter Aka
DIRECTOR (K.T.T UNIT) C.B.N.

From Tiffany Mynx to Peter Aka (11/4)

Hello Peter Aka,

I received your email but I think it was a mistake. My name is Tiffany and I live in California. Sorry if this was not for me but if there is some way I can help you, let me know.

XOXO

Tiffany Mynx

From Peter Aka to Tiffany Mynx (Nov. 8)

Dear Tiffany Minx,

Thanks very much for your kind message,and on your acceptance to assist in this transaction.As you have seen through my message where i work,such a sensitive possition in the Apex Bank of the federation.

Yes we can work together and you can be of an assistance to us.But first let me have your private mobile phone and fax numbers to enhance our communication.

Here is my direct phone number 234 1 7754554.or 234 8037218281.please call me immediately as soon as you received this mail for us to finalize, also please your Bank particulars will be highly needed to enable us secure fresh approval on behalf of your name.

Expecting your urgent response.

Best Regards.

Dr Peter Aka.

From Tiffany Mynx to Peter Aka (11/8)

Dear Peter Aka,

Thank you for the message. The best way to reach me is through email as I am on the road all the time. I work in the adult entertainment industry. I log on all the time from my laptop so don?t hesitate to write. You can trust me with this transaction as I am a woman of high morals.

XOXO

Tiffany Mynx

EBOLA MONKEY NOTE: Adult Entertainment Industry & high morals, see the irony? He won't.
From Peter Aka to Tiffany Mynx (Nov. 12)
DEAR MR TIFFANY MINX,

THANKS YOUR MESSAGE.I AM HONESTLY SORRY FOR THE DELAY IN REPLYING YOUR MESSAGE.I WAS OUT OF STATION ON OFFICIAL ENGAGEMENT.I AM HAPPY TO HEAR THAT YOU ARE PRIVATE PERSON,SAME LIKE ME. BECAUSE OF MY POSITION THAT I'M PRESENTLY OCCUPLYING. FURTHER EXPLANATION/ADDITIONAL INFORMATION YOU MAY WISH TO KNOW ARE.I AM PETER AKA,I WORK WITH KTT/TELEX DEPT OF THE CENTRAL BANK OF NIGERIA.I ALSO HEAD THE TREASURY SECTION.IAM FROM THE NORTHERN PART OF THE COUNTRY THAT IS HIGHLY DOMINATED BY MOSLEMS,BUT IT HAPPENS THAT I COME A CHRISTIAN HOME IN JOS PLATEUE
STATE.THIS IS MY 12YEARS OF SERVICE WITH THE APEX BANK.

I AM MARRIED WITH THREE CHILDREN,MY FIRST SON IS IN THE UNIVERSITY OF LAGOS,MY SECOND SON IS ABOUT TO ENTER AND MY DAUGTHER IS STILL IN COLLEGE.IAM 45 YEARS OF AGE.I WILL SEND YOU MY PICTURE AS WE PROGRESS.

NOW TO THE TRANSACTION,THIS MONEY IS $25.6MILLION THAT ME AND MY COLLEAGUES WORKING WITH ME DISCOVERED THAT WAS FLOATING IN THE BANK,WE STARTED ON THE ARRANGEMENT TO MOVE THE MONEY OUT OF THE COUNTRY,WHICH HAVE PERFECTED.WE WANT YOU NOW TO RECIEVE THE MONEY ON OUR BEHALF AND HELP US INVEST IT INTO ANY PROFITABLE BUSINESS THAT YOU MAY DEEM FIT.WE PLAN MOVING THE
MONEY OUT IN CASH THROUGH DIPLOMATIC CHANNEL TO ONE OF THESE AFRICAN COUNTRIES,FROM THERE YOU CAN OPEN A DOMICILLARY ACCOUNT AND THEN TRANSFER TO YOUR BANK ACC,ANY WHERE YOU WISH.WE WILL ALSO SIGN AN AGGREEMENT WITH YOU.

I WILL GIVE DETAILS,YOU MAY WISH TO KNOW WHEN I GET YOUR MESSAGE.

THANK YOU ,

DR PETER AKA.

THANK

EBOLA MONKEY NOTE: If he responds to this next email, we know we are dealing with a card carrying idiot.

From Tiffany Mynx to Peter Aka (11/13)

Wow, that certainly is a mouthful. No pun intended. Well, I guess I should tell you a little about me.

Date of Birth: 10/10/1971
Given name: Shannon Cummings (Tiffany Mynx/Minx is my stage/acting name but that's what I prefer to be called)
Birth place: Upland, California, USA
Height: 5 ft. 3 in.
Measurements: 34D-23-36
Hobbies: Fishing
Marital status: Divorced; two sons

I mainly dance now instead of making movies. I'm not a real religious person.

Let me tell you how I got to where I am today. I was doing okay as a stripper but there was so much competition. Until one day one of my driver/bodyguards called and to tell me that he worked on movie sets part time. He went on to tell me that my girlfriend and I should stop by the studio because they needed a couple of extra girls and I could make some good money. I said, "sure." So there I was, in a room full of girls. There was a door in the room that would open, and they would call us in one at a time. When it was my turn, I was walked into a room with a man sitting behind a desk. He asked me to take off my clothes. He told me he liked me and wanted me for the job. Now he mentions to me that he wants me to do two sex scenes. I couldn't believe it, I didn't know what to do or what I should do. Well, you guessed it. I did the job and they called me back again the next week for another gig. My first movie was, "The D.J." and the second picture was called, "The Good the Bad and the Horny." Both movies were shot for V.C.A.. I worked with Tony Tedeshi both times and we became friends. He asked me what agency I worked for, and I couldn't answer because I had no idea there were agencies in the adult film industry. He took me to my first agency and it was there that I meet all sorts of important directors, producers, and other people. Suddenly I was working all the time and I felt really good about myself. I felt alive, beautiful energetic and sexy. It was the first time in my life I had good money, a job and some self-respect. Do you know what I mean? Since then I've starred in over 1000 movies. Anyway, what was it like growing up Christian in a Muslim area? I've always wanted to go to Nigeria to see the Eiffel Tower and all those crazy kangaroos that are always up to their zany tricks. I hear the French can be really rude. Do you snow Ski?

You said your son goes to THE UNIVERSITY OF LAGOS. Do they have a football team? What are they ranked in the BCS? Is it a party school? I think Van Wilder went the THE UNIVERSITY OF LAGOS. Are your other two children going there? Or will they go to Stanford, Harvard, or Brigham Young University? Maybe they could go to ass-clown school or something. Don't mind me, I'm a nosey person. I've attached a recent photo of me at a wet t-shirt contest that I won at Flash Dancers.

Talk to you soon,

Tiffany Minx



EBOLA MONKEY NOTE: Not only did he respond, he put it in italics. Tiffany's picture must have knocked him sideways.

From Peter Aka to Tiffany Mynx (Nov. 14)

Dear Tiffany M,

Thanks very much for your mail that explained little about yourself. Iam very happy to know little about yourself. Shannon i must confess that you are such a pretty and sexy looking woman that know man would like to miss. I like you for been open to me and i quite appreciate it.

Now let me tell you something about this transaction that i would like you to take serious.we have perfected every arrangement for sucessful conclution of this transaction,no risk involved. All has been taken care off.we have agreed with colleagues to invest this money into film production possibily to build a big STUDIO for you to manage on our behalf untill we resign from our positions.we will compensate with 15% of the total amount,for all the committement, like travelling to the agreed venue and every other expenses that you will make.

pls let know serious you are to do this transaction with us.let me have your private telephone numbers to enhance our communication.my phone is 234 80 3721 82 81, pls i will you to call me. I will let you have my picture on next mail to you.
pls keep this transaction secret.

urgently expecting your reply.
DR PETER AKA.

From Peter Aka to Tiffany Mynx (Nov. 16)

DEAREST SHANNON,

I HOPE GOT MY MAIL OF 14TH ? PLS I AM ANXIOUSLY WAITING TO HEAR FROM YOU. I BELIEVE YOU HAVE BEEN VERY BUSY. EVERYTHING IS READY. EXPECTING TO KNOW YOUR POSITION.

REGARDS TO YOUR SONS.

PETER AKA.

EBOLA MONKEY NOTE: Lets see if I can freak him out.

From Tiffany Mynx to Peter Aka (11/18)

Dear Peter AKA,

Thank you for your beautiful responses. Sorry it took me so long to get back to you. I was on location filming a movie. It is to be called "All Holes Filled (The K-Y Connection). It will feature a lot of DP's, facials, farts and dwarfs. It was a blast. I have another film that I will be shooting this week called "Black Cock, White HO HO HO." Obviously, we are aiming for a holiday theme. Should be buckets of fun.

I read your email and I have no idea what you are talking about. Remember, I'm a BLONDE. What traveling venue are you talking about?

I hope to talk to you soon. Oh, one more question. You always sign your name Peter AKA. I assume the AKA means Also Known As. What are you also know as? I figure it's something like Peter AKA Big Willie Style or something. Please let me know because my curiosity has gotten the best of me.

To Infinity and Beyond,

Tiffany M.

PS - Are you really a doctor? If so, can you tell me what the best medicine is for Wynonaryder Syndrome.

EBOLA MONKEY NOTE: Nope, no freaking him out. After the last two emails, I knew I could say anything.

From Peter Aka to Tiffany Mynx (Nov. 18)

Dear Tiffany M
Thanks for your mail .It is well understood. I know you are very busy person,but please i want to appeal to you attention on this transaction. It is all about money that we want invest through you,the arrangement to move the funds have been concluded, we are waiting to get a good response from you. We are saying that there will be need for us to meet in country with much financial restriction,so that we can sign some agreement with you and hand over the money for purpose.

Iam not a medical doctor i do not know the medicine for that.

Pls take this transaction seriously. you can call me on my private # 234 80 3721 8281 for further discusion on this matter.
Expecting to hear from you soon.

My regards to the boys.
DR Peter Aka.

It goes on for quite a while longer. Suffice it to say that Peter promises "Tiffany" a big time movie contract and a trip to Ghana to film a movie with an African actor named "Sex Machine", meanwhile poor Peter Aka is thinking he's going to get some from a blonde American porn star AND get his hundreds of thousands of dollars! Alas, poor "Tiff" has been hung up by the Amsterdam Secret Service (A.S.S.)...and the pictures get more and more descriptive...

This Is Just Sad

Insufficient combat stress help for US troops faulted

By Will Dunham

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Only 22 percent of U.S. troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan seen at risk for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder have been referred by Pentagon officials for mental health evaluation, a report has found.

Thursday's report by the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, found the Pentagon did not provide reasonable assurance that troops who needed referral for evaluation for combat-related stress actually got it.

Investigators found that 9,145 of 178,664 troops -- about 5 percent -- who served in Iraq or Afghanistan may have been at risk for developing Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder based on responses they gave to a Defense Department questionnaire. Among Army soldiers, the figure was 6.4 percent.


Of those at risk, the report found that Pentagon health care providers referred 22 percent for further mental health evaluations, with the rate differing among Army, Marine Corps, Navy and Air Force personnel.

The study looked at troops deployed through the end of September 2004.

So the data is at least two years old, AND was only one-third of the man-hours troops have fought in this war.

Want to bet those percentages now read more like ten percent of the troops, 13% of Army soldiers and 11% seeking assistance?

The report said the Pentagon did not identify the factors that its health-care providers used in determining which troops merited mental-health referrals.

Which is kind of like diagnosing AIDS based on a breathalyzer, I suspect.

Time and time again, I have sung the praises of the GAO and the Comptroller General, David Walker. Thank god SOMEONE, no matter how marginalized he has been made, is making a stink about this in a position to do something about it. I only wish more Congresscritters, Dems and Repubs, took a little more interest in the folks who, as Michael Moore said at the end of "Farenheit 9-11"

the very people forced to live in the worst parts of town, go to the worst schools, and who have it the hardest are always the first to step up, to defend us. They serve so that we don't have to. They offer to give up their lives so that we can be free. It is remarkably their gift to us. And all they ask for in return is that we never send them into harm's way unless it is absolutely necessary.

We'll be paying for this war with our tax dollars for generations. These soldiers, they'll be paying with their lives.

Shame on you, Wimp and Blimp.

Bring this report to the attention of your Congresscritter and your local paper. This needs to get out there.

snarkasm, snarcasm, snarky

Bush
Cheney
Iraq

o/~ He Steals From The Poor And Gives To the Rich...o/~

Not only does this say it all, it says it better than I can:

New tax cuts benefit rich

May 12, 2006


Plagued with a cratering job approval rating, congressional Republicans - whose claim to fame is tax-cutting - moved this week to give voters more: More deficits, more gimmicks, more fiscal irresponsibility and $70 billion more in tax cuts.

How happy that makes you probably depends on how rich you are. If you earn $50,000 a year, your tax cut will be roughly $47. If you make $1 million a year, it will be $42,000.

Showering the richest with tax cuts while leaving Washington strapped for money to pay for such things as the war in Iraq and shoring up Medicare and Social Security is the work of politicians whose eyes are riveted on the next election rather than the government's balance sheet.

Champions of the tax cuts will credit them with stimulating a surging economy that will increase tax revenue. Don't bank on it. Tax cuts can stimulate a sluggish economy. But there is scant evidence that they ever generate enough growth to pay for themselves. Their impact on the massive global economy is marginal, particularly when lashed to the drag of persistent federal deficits and borrowing.

BINGO!

It took three, count 'em, three budget-busting tax cuts to have even a marginal impact on our economy. The jobless rate hasn't budged downward in months, if not years, gas prices are soaring, inflation is STILL a problem, the Fed is raising interest rates yet again, your mortgages are getting more and more expensive while your house's value is flattening out.

Republicans bank on tax cuts to win votes. But that formula will lose steam as more voters come to realize that the cuts go overwhelmingly to the affluent few while the debt - much of it held by foreign nations - burdens us all.

While the rich outsource our jobs and their money. Don't believe me? Check out how many hedge funds have moved their bases of operation to the Caymans or Bermuda. Not only for the tax haven this creates, but for the simple fact that they can play the currency exchanges. When Bush took office, you could buy an euro for about $0.80. Now it will cost you about $1.25.

That's a 56% decline in the value of the dollar. Any questions?

Major provisions of the bill passed this week in Congress will extend the reduced 15-percent tax rate on capital gains and dividends for two years to 2010, and patch the alternative minimum tax for one year.

The AMT has to be reined in. Intended to ensure that millionaires couldn't skillfully use deductions to avoid paying any income tax, it now inflates the tax bills of people earning as little as $75,000 a year. Particularly hard hit are taxpayers who are married with kids, own a home and pay high state and local taxes. That's Long Island writ large.

Congress should fix the AMT permanently. But the temporary patch jobs allow officials to count the revenue an unattended AMT would generate in future years. That reduces the size of projected deficits, even though the year-to-year patches mean that revenue will never materialize. Dealing honestly with the AMT would mean foregoing other tax cuts, which Washington is unwilling to do. In fact, there's another unaffordable $20 billion tax cut in the works.

Read that again: the budget deficit is understated annually by $20 billion dollars. Let's say the budget deficit is $300 billion annually. You're adding another 5-10% of it without even a single dollar being spent.

Cutting taxes willy-nilly when Washington is deep in debt and costs are soaring makes as much sense as asking for a pay cut when you're borrowing to buy gas and for a new roof. Something to remember come November.

Could not have said it better myself.

snarkasm, snarcasm, snarky

Bush
tax cut
Congress
Republicans