Local C-U Anti-War Protesters Mocked by the Daily Show
If you take a look at the Daily Show and watch the episode “March of the Peaceniks”, you’ll see C-U’s own anti-war protesters mocked by John Stewart…
Awesome.
Related Posts:If You Can’t Beat ‘Em, Indict ‘Em
The saying goes; a motivated prosecutor could indict a ham sandwich if they wanted to. Tom Delay has been indicted on conspiracy charges after years of this prosecutor trying. First it was Abramoff, but after realizing that scandal implicated Democrats (in fact over 200 Congressmen started “fixing their paperwork”) and it was ok’d by the House of Representatives lawyers, they had to drop that one. Now they got a conspiracy charge that was cooked up to give this prosecutor jurisdiction he would not otherwise have. That’s not to say that he’s innocent, but it is to say that the Democrat’s plan to power is not to beat Republicans at the polls, it’s to invent charges against them. Call it the Rush Limbaugh treatment.
Here are some quotes from Democrats on the development:
But Nancy Pelosi, House Democratic leader, called his indictment “the latest example that Republicans in Congress are plagued by a culture of corruption at the expense of the American people”.
And from Tom McMahon of the DNC:
People ask what the difference is between the two parties, and this indictment gives one clear answer.
Republicans are committed to pushing the legal limits to collect checks from special interests who want to use government for their own narrow purposes. Democrats are committed to funding our party with contributions from ordinary Americans so that when we take power, the government will represent the people.
You can make your personal commitment to changing the culture of corruption by getting your Democracy Bond — a monthly commitment to contribute to the Democratic Party:
Need we bring up some examples of Democrat corruption?
These people are all rich before they get into office and they take large pay cuts once elected, so they take perks. This isn’t something that is a Democrat or a Republican agenda because both parties are guilty of it. Need we bring up former disgraced Presidents that committed perjury?
The message the DNC is sending out is, “Get the corrupt Republican cronies out of office! We want our corrupt cronies in!”. That’s about as intelligent it is. And to be fair, that’s exactly the platform of the Illinois GOP against the Democrats in ’06. It swings both ways, but as a state that’s about to go on two consecutive governors in two terms getting indicted (who were from opposing parties) let’s at least be honest about corrupt being a political value, not a partisan value.
The lesson for the GOP, however, is that conservativism pays. If you are doling out millions in pork, eventually the money is going to get traced back to you. You won’t ever get bought or bribed if you aren’t in the business of wasting taxpayer money. The timing of DeLay announcing that fiscal conservativism is dead is nothing short of ironic here.
Thanks to OTB, Political Teen, Kit, others.
Related Posts:What is it with Anti-semites?
David Green, local anti-semite, writes in to the DailyIllini on the occasion of Simon Wiesenthal’s death to spew his hateful diatribe. He has nothing against Wiesenthal, he just can’t stand to let them man pass in peace without taking a swipe at the Jews and the US for being evil regimes. He much prefers us to be happier and more just regimes like Soviet Russia, Saddam’s Iraq, the Taliban’s Afghanistan, Hitler’s Germany, or some other of the joyous left-wing paradises out there.
For reference, this was the column he was writing in response to.
Related Posts:Coalition for Darfur: Anarchy and the UN
Another great post up on the situation in Sudan. On the 65th Birthday of the UN, it should be quite telling that in a nation where they are supposedly active, the reality is that people are still dying and the nation is descending into anarchy.
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As Darfur descends into anarchy, the United Nations appears unable to do any more than express concerns and continue to ask the parties involved to cease their violent attacks.
After rebels attacked and took control of the town of Sheiria last week, the Sudanese army said it was prepared to retake the town, to which the rebels replied that they would “repulse anything from the Sudanese government’s army.”
The upsurge in violence forced thousands more out of the villages, swelling the ranks of the internally displaced that already numbers nearly 2 million.
As the violence was raging, even the UN’s own Special Representative Jan Pronk, a man who tends to see everything in Sudan through rose-colored glasses, was forced to admit that the violence was spiraling out of control. He was joined by the US government, which stated that the “uptick in violence … is of concern to us” and the UN’s genocide advisor, Juan Mendez, who acknowledged that Khartoum had done little to disarm militias or end the “culture of impunity” that exists in Darfur.
Pronk went on to state that the UN must give the Sudanese government and rebels an ultimatum to compel them to reach some sort of peace
agreement and even made the startling admission that, thus far, the UN has utterly failed to deal with Darfur
Pronk said that when the Darfur conflict began U.N. humanitarian officials agitated for the Security Council to take up the conflict, which it refused to do.A “massive force” was needed [in 2003] then to guarantee security but instead several thousand African Union troops and monitors had to carry the burden. And now the council needed to plan for how to keep the peace in case a peace deal was signed.
Pronk was quoted elsewhere as saying
He said the war situation in Sudan was “everybody’s failure” and could have been avoided if the international community had acted quickly.How could the present day situation have been avoided?
“I think there should have been intervention in 2003,” Pronk said, adding that while the occurrence of genocide in the country was debatable, “There was mass slaughter of people. It needed humanitarian intervention.”
Of course, the international community did not act quickly, nor are they acting quickly now.
In fact, while Darfur burned, the BBC reported that American and British intelligence officials, along with representatives of the UN, China and 12 African nations were in Khartoum discussing cooperation on counter-terrorism operations in the region.
Hosting the conference is part of a sustained diplomatic push by Sudan to shake off its pariah status … When the opportunity for this second regional conference on counter-terrorism came up, Sudan competed for the right to host it … The decision of the CIA to agree to come to Sudan shows the pragmatism of the intelligence community against the continuing political desire of America to punish Sudan for what has happened in Darfur.
Khartoum continues to work to “shake off its pariah status,” with Sudanese Ambassador Khidir Haroun Ahmed publishing an op-ed in the Washington Times today claiming that “After two decades of brutal civil war, Sudan is emerging as a reminder that engagement, dialogue and intensive diplomacy can resolve seemingly intractable problems and permit a country to look to the future with optimism.”
Meanwhile, the violence and anarchy Khartoum unleashed is now spilling over into neighboring Chad, a country that is already host to an estimated 200,000 refugees from Darfur
A group of unidentified armed men in military uniform crossed into Chad from Sudan early on Monday, killing 36 herders and stealing livestock, the Chadian government said.
The violence, in addition to threatening the people of Darfur, is also threatening the relief work that sustains them, as U.N. Emergency Relief Coordinator Jan Egeland noted yesterday
“If it (the violence) continues to escalate, we may not be able to sustain our operations for 2.5 million people requiring life-saving assistance,” he said, adding: “In Darfur, it (aid distribution) could all end tomorrow. It is as serious as that.”
As Eric Reeves never fails to remind us,
in December 2004, Egeland warned that 100,000 people could die a month if humanitarian organizations are forced to suspend operations in Darfur.
Despite all of this, Pronk still managed to recently declare that progress was being made on implementing the Comprehensive Peace Agreement between the North and South and on efforts to reach peace in Darfur.
Such a statement is utterly feckless and shameful.
As Gerald Caplan, author of “Rwanda: The Preventable Genocide,” wrote last week
But what we are learning from Darfur, which we never remotely imagined, is that even naming a genocide is an utterly inconsequential exercise in hot air … despite the apparent concern of many western leaders, despite the pressure from elements of civil society, the catastrophe in Darfur is explicitly allowed to continue … As always, everything takes precedence over the suffering and death of hundreds of thousands
of distant, exotic others. It won’t be the last time.”
After two years, 400,000 deaths, and an estimated 3.5 million now entirely dependent on humanitarian aid, it must be stated that the UN and every one of its member nations have failed the people of Darfur and, in all likelihood, will continue to do so for the foreseeable future.
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