“Everything has changed since 9-11.” What is “everything?“

What is included in the “everything” that Bush insists has changed? Has his faith changed? Is democracy not still the best form of government? Is freedom not still a desirable virtue? Is not America still the world’s only superpower by far? Didn’t people hate, envy or fear the US before Sept. 11? Was not terrorism a threat before that day? Didn’t Al-Qaeda exist, threaten and attack America before then? In fact, Sept. 11 didn’t change much other than America itself.

What Sept. 11 has done is give the Bush administration a blank check to act recklessly.

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The fix is is

Army drops Halliburton penalty

The Army on Tuesday abruptly reversed itself and decided to pay all of Halliburton Co.’s fees to house and feed U.S. troops in Iraq and Kuwait after the company threatened to legally challenge the effort to penalize it.

Hours later, a spokeswoman for the Army Field Support Command in Rock Island, Ill., said the 15% penalty for the company’s KBR subsidiary amounting to an estimated $60 million a month would not be levied.

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Yikes

Giant waves hurling boulders inland from British coasts:

Massive waves created by violent storms off Britain and Ireland are ripping off chunks of cliff and hurling them inland over distances.

North Atlantic storms are creating waves over 20 metres high, powerful enough to tear rocks up and throw them as far as 50 metres inland in places.

These boulders can be up to 50 tonnes and three metres in size.

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RNC and the Central Park rally permit

Judge to rule Monday in ANSWER/NCA lawsuit for rally permit

The drama of the free speech battle in New York City riveted the attention of a packed courtroom filled with supporters and media today as the attorneys for the National Council of Arab Americans and the A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition exposed the shifting rationales given by the City of New York for the denial of permits in Central Park as nothing but a pretext to silence opponents of the Bush administration’s domestic and foreign policies.

ANSWER said, if granted the permit, they would merge their rally, scheduled for this Saturday Aug 29, with the UfJP march on Aug 29. The judge then asked New York City officials why they aren’t accepting this deal! So, it looks quite a lot more promising for a permit than it did just a few days ago. The judge rules on Monday.

Republicans brace for protests

President Bush’s “advisers said they were girding for the most extensive street demonstrations at any political convention since the Democrats nominated Hubert H. Humphrey in Chicago in 1968,” the New York Times reports.

“But in contrast to that convention, which was severely undermined by televised displays of street rioting, Republicans said they would seek to turn any disruptions to their advantage, by portraying protests by even independent activists as Democratic-sanctioned displays of disrespect for a sitting president.”

The current President richly deserves, and has certainly earned, all the disrespect that is coming to him. “Authority will be respected when authority is respectable.”

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