ViceZilla’s Views

The height of governmental bureaucracy and stupidity has been achieved in flying colors by the Department of Homeland Security over it’s new rules regarding of all things fishermen! I’m all for securing our borders effectively and responsibly, but these new rules by the DHS leaves me wondering who they have on staff that puts rules like this on paper.

When the 2008 charter season begins next month, U.S. citizens paying to fish on Lake Erie will have to bring either a passport or two other IDs if they plan to cross the northern border’s invisible watery line. When they get back to shore in the USA, they’ll have to drive to a local government reporting station and pose for pictures. They won’t be posing with their fish, but for Customs officers via a videophone connection.

So what exactly are these new rules supposed to do? If you are an American citizen on American soil, then go onto a body of water in a boat, stay on the boat, then return to American soil, what’s the problem? It’s not like they are crossing the lake, getting off the boat in Canada, getting drunked up on Canadian beer, buying a few souvenirs, then returning to the States. Technically they are staying on American land for their entire trip, so why all the Gestapo rules?

If the Department’s intention was to kill the fishing charter businesses along the Great Lakes, they’re doing a good job of it!

Thanks to Richard for pointing this stupidity out.

Technorati Tags: Lake Erie, Department of Homeland Security, Government Stupidity, Fishing Charters

Tags: War on Terror by vicezilla
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President Bush has lost his mind! How in the hell, can ANYONE view the present situation in Iraq as a “positive moment?” The cease fire and the it’s extension by al-Sadr’s Mehdi militia was a positive moment. The cease fire, as estimated by the U.S. Military, was a major factor for the 60% decline in violence in Iraq towards the end of last year.

Now with the cease fire in peril, and violence quickly expanding across the southern region of Iraq, those in charge of the Washington war spin machine want us to believe that this is a ‘positive’ thing that is happening! First it was described as an ‘opportunity,’ then it was because the ‘surge was so successful‘, and now the President himself declares that Iraq is experiencing a ‘positive moment.’

During an interview with the Times of U.K., Bush noted that despite ’substantial gains’ since the US military surge began last year, much work was needed to ‘maintain the success we’ve had’. Does he not realize that any and all of the successes his beloved ’surge’ accomplished last year is on the verge of being erased? Or maybe he does realize it.

Why else would this violence be viewed as ‘positive?’ It can’t, because its not positive in any way shape or form! Next thing you know, Bush will want another ’surge’ to quell the out of control violence in the region.

Read more of the Times interview here

Technorati Tags: Bush, War in Iraq, Basra, Cease Fire

Tags: Bush Administration, War on Terror by vicezilla
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KBR, the once subsidiary of Haliburton is being sued by nine former employees for knowingly exposing them to sodium dichromate, a cancer causing substance, while working in Iraq. Really? KBR, the same company that supplies unsafe water to our troops in Iraq, that KBR? Somehow that just doesn’t surprise me.

KBR, like Haliburton is making money hand over fist from the war in Iraq. Their number one purpose is to make money, lots and lots of money, which thanks to Bush and Company they are achieving. So why would they be concerned about trivial stuff like safety for their employees if its going to interfere with getting the money to start rolling in? In the summer of 2003, that is exactly what happened. A choice between profit or safety had to be made. Guess which one prevailed?

As Reported by the Boston Globe:

When the American team arrived in Iraq in the summer of 2003 to repair the Qarmat Ali water injection plant, supervisors told them the orange, sand-like substance strewn around the looted facility was just a “mild irritant,” workers recall….

But the chemical turned out to be sodium dichromate, a substance so dangerous that even limited exposure greatly increases the risk of cancer. Soon, many of the 22 Americans and 100-plus Iraqis began to complain of nosebleeds, ulcers, and shortness of breath….

Because of a deadline to get the plant, a crucial part of Iraq’s oil infrastructure, these employee’s lives were put in danger all because of profit, KBR’s profit. The supervisor’s claim about the orange substance being a mild irritant was only to KBR’s bottom line if the site had to be shut down and cleaned up before work could begin. If they thought it was only a “mild irritant,” they obviously had it tested to find out what it was. But if they tested it properly, then you would think they would have found out that it was more, much more than a mild irritant. So which is KBR guilty of, negligence, or ignorance?

It may well be negligence, because under a World War 2 law called the Defense Base Act, employers are protected from employee lawsuits, except in rare cases in which it can be proven that the company intentionally harmed its employees or committed outright fraud. KBR obviously knows of this law, and may have thought that a pleading of ignorance will get them off the hook. Anything to keep those greased wheels of the profit machine turning. But their greed may be what ultimately does them in.

To avoid payroll taxes for its American employees, KBR hired the workers through two subsidiaries registered in the Cayman Islands, part of a strategy that has allowed KBR to dodge hundreds of millions of dollars in Social Security and Medicare taxes. So technically, lawyers claim that KBR is not an employer protected by federal law, but rather a third party which can be sued.

It will be interesting to watch this saga unfold as KBR obviously wants to be on both sides of the fence. They feel that money should only flow in one direction, into their bank accounts.

Read More

Technorati Tags: KBR, Employee Safety, Sodium Dichromate, Iraq, Contractor, Haliburton

Tags: War on Terror by vicezilla
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With the writ of Habeas Corpus dead, the spying on American Citizens deemed ‘necessary’, making it illegal to protest the Iraq war, and now the legalization of torture by the CIA, only serves to move President Bush’s police state closer to fruition.

President Bush’s veto of a bill that would ban the CIA from using harsh interrogation methods saying, “the bill Congress sent me would take away one of the most valuable tools in the war on terror, so today I vetoed it.” Bush claimed the CIA must retain use of “specialized interrogation procedures” that the military does not need. The military methods are designed for questioning “lawful combatants captured on the battlefield,” while intelligence professionals are dealing with “hardened terrorists” who have been trained to resist the techniques in the Army manual.

By Bush giving authority to the CIA to use torture, or more specifically waterboarding, it is allowing the agency to commit crimes against humanity under the guise of anti terror legislation. By ignoring international law, and the laws of this country, his veto today has turned the CIA into America’s modern day Gestapo.

Today the CIA, as was the Gestapo was in 1935, given authority to operate without judicial oversight, meaning essentially that it operates outside of the law. Bush’s secret police if you will.

The similarities between the Gestapo and Bush’s CIA are disturbingly similar, most notably that as long as the CIA carries out the will of the leadership, it is acting legally. Not to mention the authority to imprison people indefinitely with no access to legal representation, and using torture to get confessions of plots against the state.

Bush has already outlawed the right to free expression and dissent, which is a cornerstone of US democracy, by issuing an executive order giving him the authority to confiscate the assets of whoever opposes the US led war in Iraq. This coupled with his overturning of the Posse Comitatus Act, a law which prohibited him from using the military in domestic law enforcement issues, can now declare martial law in a “major public emergency” and use military force to suppress public disorder.

Bush has quietly given himself the authority to completely and utterly control this country the way he wants to, all under the guise of “anti-terror legislation.” Yet with each law passed, it seems to be followed by a new, more ominous threat, requiring even more sweeping laws to be enacted which erode our Constitutional rights and freedoms even more.

He claims he enacts these laws to protect America from terrorist threats, but who will protect America from his laws?

Technorati Tags: Bush, Police State, Terrorism, Torture, CIA

Tags: War on Terror by vicezilla
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It’s 3AM, the phone in the White House rings. Something is happening in the world….

We’ve all heard Hillary’s ad, and listened to all the sniping back and forth about who is more qualified to ‘take the call’ at 3 AM. Between this ad making the headlines and Bush’s “we are going to be attacked at any minute” speeches, nobody will be sleeping at 3AM so we can all take turns waiting for the phone to ring!

According to Gen. Gene Renuart, head of the U.S. military command responsible for homeland defense, an attack against the United States seems imminent. He claims that recorded messages from al Qaeda leaders such as Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahri show the group responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks is “looking for a way to have a big impact again.”

Even Bush said during his speech today, marking the five year anniversary of the Department of Homeland Security, that terrorists were plotting another attack as he spoke. He said “U.S. security agencies must take the words of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden “very seriously” when he says operations are in preparation.”

Obviously Bush is ratcheting up the ‘terror threat’ rhetoric to bolster his case for telecom immunity again. Only this time he is using Osama bin Laden by name to really get the point across. One question though about Osama’s name coming up again, is why is he still on the loose? Shouldn’t finding Osama be a higher priority than scaring the living daylight out of us by saying “he’s gonna get us again”?

I’m starting to think Osama bin Laden is more valuable in name to Bush than he is dead or alive. Because it’s been seven years since 9/11, and many things have happened except Osama bin Laden remains on the loose. So I might suggest Bush put the fear card away, and go out and find this guy, rather than treating him like some mysterious, mythical God of evil and using his name to further his own political fear attacks.

Technorati Tags: Bush, Osama bin Laden, Fear Tactics, Terrorism, Telecom Immunity

Tags: Bush Administration, War on Terror by vicezilla
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