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Arafat is dead 
Yasser Arafat, Sept. 25, 1969
Palestinian Leader Arafat Dies at 75 Associated Press
Yasser Arafat, who triumphantly forced his people's plight into the world spotlight but failed to achieve his lifelong quest for Palestinian statehood, died Thursday at age 75.
The French military hospital where he had been treated for nearly a month said he died at 3:30 a.m. The Palestinian leader spent his final days there in a coma.
Palestinian Cabinet Minister Saeb Erekat and Tayeb Abdel Rahim, a top Arafat aide, confirmed that Arafat died in a conversation with reporters at Arafat's headquarters in the West Bank city of Ramallah. [more]
What are your values?
Jesus speaks through the Republicans
I hope the election of George W. Bush is seen as a wake-up call to all the liberal Democrats who oppose God's will.
It is His doing that George W. Bush is still our president. Millions of born-again Christians helped win this election through our prayers and votes. Jesus speaks through the Republicans.
The Democrats will not be able to win elections until they renounce their sinful ways and stop encouraging abortions, gayness, and trying to take away our guns.
Earl Balboa
Amen. Pass the ammo.
(link via Daily Kos)
Gonzales -- Torture's OK
Gonzales to Succeed Ashcroft, Sources Say by Scott Lindlaw
President Bush has chosen White House counsel Alberto Gonzales, a Texas confidant and the most prominent Hispanic in the administration, to succeed Attorney General John Ashcroft, sources close to the White House said Wednesday.
The White House hinted that formal word from the president could come later Wednesday. "I would not rule out an announcement today," White House spokesman Scott McClellan said.
(...)
Gonzales' career has been linked with Bush for at least a decade, serving as general counsel when Bush was governor of Texas, and then as secretary of state and as a justice on the Texas Supreme Court.
Gonzales has been at the center of developing Bush's positions on balancing civil liberties with waging the war on terrorism -- opening the White House counsel to the same line of criticism that has dogged Ashcroft.
For instance, Gonzales publicly defended the administration's policy -- essentially repudiated by the Supreme Court and now being fought out in the lower courts -- of detaining certain terrorism suspects for extended periods without access to lawyers or courts.
He also wrote a controversial February 2002 memo in which Bush claimed the right to waive anti-torture law and international treaties providing protections to prisoners of war. That position drew fire from human rights groups, which said it helped led to the type of abuses uncovered in the Abu Ghraib prison scandal. [more]
Question: How long till conservatives start accusing anyone who opposes Gonzales of being racist?
From The Enron Photo Album we find out a few things about Alberto Gonzales, White House Counsel. Gonzales helped Bush keep his DUI a secret, he has been in charge of keeping Cheney's Enron meetings a secret, and he used to work for Enron's law firm.
Sound like a real upstanding, ethical, law-abiding kind of guy. Just the kind that Bush likes to have around.
The price of "liberation"
Counting the casualties
A statistically based study claims that many more Iraqis have died in the conflict than previous estimates indicated
The American armed forces have long stated that they do not keep track of how many people have been killed in the current conflict in Iraq and, furthermore, that determining such a number is impossible. Not everybody agrees. Adding up the number of civilians reported killed in confirmed press accounts yields a figure of around 15,000. But even that is likely to be an underestimate, for not every death gets reported. The question is, how much of an underestimate?
A study published on October 29th in the Lancet, a British medical journal, suggests the death toll is quite a lot higher than the newspaper reports suggest. The centre of its estimated range of death tolls‹the most probable number according to the data collected and the statistics used‹is almost 100,000. And even though the limits of that range are very wide, from 8,000 to 194,000, the study concludes with 90% certainty that more than 40,000 Iraqis have died. [more]
Where are the Christians?
Confessing Christ in a World of Violence
(...)
In this time of crisis, we need a new confession of Christ.
1. Jesus Christ, as attested in Holy Scripture, knows no national boundaries. Those who confess his name are found throughout the earth. Our allegiance to Christ takes priority over national identity. Whenever Christianity compromises with empire, the gospel of Christ is discredited.
We reject the false teaching that any nation-state can ever be described with the words, "the light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it." These words, used in scripture, apply only to Christ. No political or religious leader has the right to twist them in the service of war.
2. Christ commits Christians to a strong presumption against war. The wanton destructiveness of modern warfare strengthens this obligation. Standing in the shadow of the Cross, Christians have a responsibility to count the cost, speak out for the victims, and explore every alternative before a nation goes to war. We are committed to international cooperation rather than unilateral policies.
We reject the false teaching that a war on terrorism takes precedence over ethical and legal norms. Some things ought never be done - torture, the deliberate bombing of civilians, the use of indiscriminate weapons of mass destruction - regardless of the consequences.
3. Christ commands us to see not only the splinter in our adversary's eye, but also the beam in our own. The distinction between good and evil does not run between one nation and another, or one group and another. It runs straight through every human heart.
We reject the false teaching that America is a "Christian nation," representing only virtue, while its adversaries are nothing but vicious. We reject the belief that America has nothing to repent of, even as we reject that it represents most of the world's evil. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God (Rom 3:23).
4. Christ shows us that enemy-love is the heart of the gospel. While we were yet enemies, Christ died for us (Rom. 5:8, 10). We are to show love to our enemies even as we believe God in Christ has shown love to us and the whole world. Enemy-love does not mean capitulating to hostile agendas or domination. It does mean refusing to demonize any human being created in God's image.
We reject the false teaching that any human being can be defined as outside the law's protection. We reject the demonization of perceived enemies, which only paves the way to abuse; and we reject the mistreatment of prisoners, regardless of supposed benefits to their captors.
5. Christ teaches us that humility is the virtue befitting forgiven sinners. It tempers all political disagreements, and it allows that our own political perceptions, in a complex world, may be wrong.
We reject the false teaching that those who are not for the United States politically are against it or that those who fundamentally question American policies must be with the "evil-doers." Such crude distinctions, especially when used by Christians, are expressions of the Manichaean heresy, in which the world is divided into forces of absolute good and absolute evil.
The Lord Jesus Christ is either authoritative for Christians, or he is not. His Lordship cannot be set aside by any earthly power. His words may not be distorted for propagandistic purposes. No nation-state may usurp the place of God.
We believe that acknowledging these truths is indispensable for followers of Christ. We urge them to remember these principles in making their decisions as citizens. Peacemaking is central to our vocation in a troubled world where Christ is Lord.
Bombs away
The 'Christian Nation' Bombs Again by Dr. Teresa Whitehurst
(...)
Few people in America, like those in this Southern, conservative-Christian, military area, have any idea that kids and old folks in Iraq are being killed, or that families are being split apart because of our "pro-life," "pro-family" president's zeal to control Iraq. Or, if they do, they'll simply repeat, "I'd rather we take the killing over there, than risk it happening here." So much for loving thy neighbor or praying for enemies this kind of Christianity is all about self-preservation and the ends justifying the means. I always tell newcomers that if they want to know the culture they should read the signs the signs on cars, that is. That's where one can quickly learn what pro-war Christianity is all about.
There are a zillion or so "W" and "Bush/Cheney" stickers along every roadway and in every parking lot. These adorn windows and bumpers and trunks, serenely nestled next to flags, Marine decals, "Power of Pride" bumper stickers and yellow ribbons that say, "Support Our Troops." Pickup trucks have entire rear windows blanketed with large American flags, in the center of which are superimposed large, peeved-looking eagles glaring suspiciously out at the world.
Also on these bumpers are Christian Broadcasting Network stickers warning against gay marriage, affixed next to or beneath "In Case of Rapture This Car Will Be Unmanned" and "One Nation Under God!" Not to be outdone by all the U.S. flags, large Confederate flag stickers explain, "It's a White Thang." All of these, in an entertaining array of combinations, keep company with personalized license plates that preach, "Chrst 4You" or "Im 4Givn" or "Repnt Now."
My, what a brave new Christianity we have here in Bush's America! [more]
Screams will not be heard by Madelyn Bunting
(...)
One last piece of fantasy is that there is unlikely to be anything "final" about this assault. Already military analysts acknowledge that a US victory in Falluja could have little effect on the spreading incidence of violence across Iraq. What the insurgents have already shown is that they are highly decentralised, and yet the quick copying of terrorist techniques indicates some degree of cooperation. Hopes of a peace seem remote; the future looks set for a chronic, intermittent civil war. By the time the bulldozers have ploughed their way through the centre of Falluja, attention could have shifted to another "final assault" on another "militant stronghold", as another city of homes, shops and children's playgrounds morphs into a battleground.
The recent comment of one Falluja resident is strikingly poignant: "Why," she asked wearily, "don't they go and fight in a desert away from houses and people?" Why indeed? Twentieth-century warfare ensured a remarkable historical inversion. Once the city had been the place of safety to retreat to in a time of war, the place of civilisation against the barbarian wilderness; but the invention of aerial bombardment turned the city into a target, a place of terror. [more]
Not good
Iraqi PM Allawi's Family Targeted by Kidnappers Reuters
Three members of Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi's family have been kidnapped by gunmen, a spokesman for the Iraqi interim government said on Wednesday.
A first cousin of the prime minister, the cousin's wife and another family member were seized from their home in Baghdad on Tuesday morning, spokesman Georges Sada said.
He gave no further details on the circumstances of their abduction, but a police source said there had been a short gun battle at the home in a southwestern district of the capital before the people were seized.
Sada said no demands had so far been made by the kidnappers.
"This is a close cousin -- Allawi's father and his father are brothers," Sada told Reuters.
Hundreds of Iraqis have been kidnapped by criminal gangs in a wave of abductions in recent months, with more wealthy individuals such as doctors and businessmen most regularly targeted. Most are released after the payment of ransom.
Over the same period, scores of foreigners have been seized, with many of them handed over to Islamic militant groups who have threatened to kill them if demands are not met. More than 35 foreign hostages have been killed, several by beheading.
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