6 Comments so far

1. Brown February 4th, 2007 5:27 pm

   Isn’t ironic that the Bu(ll)sh(it) administration has things so twisted and tied in knots that some of the military’s highest ranking officers have now become the one’s calling for diplomacy?! If WE THE PEOPLE don’t get organized and make VERY LOUD noises about impeachment of the two highest criminals in the land — and have them tried as criminals — where will this nightmare of a corrupt and dishonorable U.S.A. eventually land?

2. smoky February 4th, 2007 9:30 pm

   The administration is not working in the U.S. interests. When they went into Iraq it was not because of 911, but part of the PNAC agreement, written by neo cons years earlier,(Look up Project for the New American Century) some of whom had worked for Israel. Congress is partly afraid to do anything because they are afraid of the Israeli lobby in the U.S. which pretty much dominates foreign policy in the middle east. Congress is probably waiting for AIPAC to make a decision on what to do. These actions will not help Israel, but will cause caos in the Persian gulf, explode the price of oil, Unite anti U.S. forces and help the oil companies amass greater sums of money. This could also excite Iran to attack Israel, perhaps bombing their nuclear facilities in the Israeli desert. If the administration was working in U.S. interests they would talk to Iran rather than threaten it.

3. ezeflyer February 5th, 2007 11:27 am

   Without a doubt, our government is in the hands of plutocrats, theocrats, neo-cons, big corporations and other jerks. We are plunging headlong into disaster unless something is done quickly to wrest our government from their hands. Like the Terminator, we put representatives there to help us but they have morphed into something horrible, have taken over and now threaten our very existence.

   There is an interesting concept proposed by presidential candidate Mike Gravel that would return our lost democracy. He calls it The National Initiative for Democracy. Here are some excerpts from his website:

   The Concept of the National Initiative

   The central power of government in a democracy is lawmaking –– not voting. He who makes the rules controls the game. Laws determine if, when, how and which citizens can vote. Governments throughout history have been tools of oppression; they need not be. Ordinary American citizens can gain control of their government by becoming lawmakers, stemming government growth and turning it to public benefit.

   Are the people qualified to be lawmakers? Well, they’re qualified enough to give their power away on Election Day to manipulating politicians who say almost anything to get elected. It’s easier to make decisions affecting one’s self-interests (after consulting with knowledgeable sources, if one chooses) than it is to select representatives (agents) bent on power. One hopes these representatives have knowledge of the issues and the integrity to place their constituents’ interests above their own. That’s a tall order for human nature.

   The problem: How do Americans become lawmakers? Voting on bond issues is lawmaking. Twenty-four states already let people make laws at the state and local levels, but, unfortunately, under the control of representative government. Congress is not about to really empower the people. The result: the government continues to grow, and democracy slouches toward one-party tyranny and the loss of freedom.

   The answer: the National Initiative for Democracy, a legislative package sponsored by The Democracy Foundation (www.ni4d.us), a non-profit IRS 501 C (3) corporation, that includes an Amendment to the Constitution and a Federal Law. The Democracy Amendment 1) amends the Constitution asserting the legislative powers of the people, 2) outlaws the use of monies not from natural persons in initiative elections, 3) creates an Electoral Trust (vital to maintain citizen lawmaking independent of representative government) and defines the role of its trustees, and 4) legitimizes the national election conducted by Philadelphia II, a non-profit IRS 501 C (4) corporation, giving Americans the opportunity to vote on the National Initiative.

   The Democracy Act is a proposed federal law that 1) sets out deliberative legislative procedures (copied from Congress and vital for intelligent lawmaking) to be used for initiative lawmaking by citizens, 2) defines the limited powers of the Electoral Trust that administers the legislative procedures on behalf of the people, and 3) defines the electoral threshold that must be reached for the National Initiative to become the law of the land. It is important to understand that the National Initiative does not alter the existing structure or powers of representative governments. Rather, it adds an additional check –– the people –– to our system of Checks and Balances, while setting up a working partnership between the people and their elected representatives. Once the people become lawmakers, they will be able to reform many of the dysfunctional practices of representative government by initiative laws enacted by a majority of voting citizens.

   How can the National Initiative become law if it’s not enacted by the Congress? There are only two venues within our government structure where constitutions, constitutional amendments, and laws can be enacted into law: the people or their elected representatives. For those who insist on retaining representative government’s legislative monopoly, they’ll forever remain stuck in a system that either refuses to or is incapable of reforming itself. Those who are prepared to turn to the people for much needed changes in government must first appreciate that the Framers in 1787 did not provide specific procedures in the Constitution for the people to amend the Constitution or make laws. The Framers did provide amending procedures for themselves in Article V of the Constitution, perpetuating their control of government. Naturally, conventional wisdom now holds that Article V is the only way to amend the Constitution.

   Article V is how the government amends the Constitution, not how the people would do it. If the people had to use Article V to amend the Constitution they would need permission from two-thirds of the Congress and three-fourths of the state legislatures. This would mean that the creator of our government, the people, would have to get permission from their elected representatives, the createes of the people, to amend the Constitution. This logic is ludicrous. The constituent power of the people –– the source of all political power –– cannot be subject to the power of its creation. James Madison had it right when he said that the people could just do it. The people can amend and legislate as long as the process they employ is fair, transparent and reasonable. Today’s technology permits us to ask all American citizens if they wish to be empowered as lawmakers by enacting the National Initiative in a process that is fair, transparent and reasonable.

   AMERICA DOES NOT HAVE A
   GOVERNMENT “BY THE PEOPLE”

   The United States of America is not, in fact, a democracy. In a democracy, the people are the government. Today, we elect people to run the government for us. The people we elect do not, for the most part, run the country in the interest of the people, they run it in the interest of themselves. We are led to believe that we must put our trust in these people. We, the people, do not have the power to create laws in our interest. This leads to an extreme imbalance of power in the government versus the people.

   To solve these problems and create a true balance of power, The Democracy Foundation has created a plan named the National Initiative for Democracy.

   The powerful elites who control our government will self-servingly argue that the People are not qualified or do not know enough to be trusted to make laws. To counter those opposed to empowering the People, one needs only look to the record of the last 100 years in the 24 states where the People make laws by initiative. In those states the People have legislated responsibly, and many times more so than their elected representatives. Civil service, campaign finance reform, and women’s right to vote are but a few examples of the progressive legislation initiated by the People.

   The experience of Switzerland is even more instructive. Switzerland, a poor, multi-ethnic, multi-lingual, hardscrabble country without natural resources, decided, 140 years ago, to adopt a constitution that brought the People into the operation of government as lawmakers. Even the acclaimed Alexis de Tocqueville had serious doubts that this Swiss experiment in direct democracy would work. The result is without precedent in human history; Switzerland has evolved into the most successfully governed and wealthiest nation in the world.

   The National Initiative has been developed and refined over the past decade by former Senator Mike Gravel (D. Alaska, 1969 – 1981) and his colleagues. The Democracy Foundation, a nonprofit 501 c 3 organization, is sponsoring the National Initiative. Philadelphia II, a separate nonprofit organization, is conducting an election on National Initiative at votep2.us, giving the people the opportunity to vote for and enact the National Initiative into law. Both are organizations are led by Senator Gravel.

   For more, visit:
   http://www.ni4d.us/

4. Gail February 5th, 2007 2:20 pm

   “Tehran’s nuclear programme must be resolved through diplomacy.”

   Diplomats from around the globe who attended meetings at Davos have said the same thing. We can only hope that President Bush does not make any foolish moves against Iran which would create total chaos in the Middle East and inevitably reverberate globally.

5. corvo February 6th, 2007 9:57 am

   Ex-generals are in no position to stop anything. If they’d been interested in stopping the matter, they’d have to still be a part of the war machinery.

6. bnrunohirope December 10th, 2007 5:00 am

   titvywizapyre…

   expanozosera…

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