The Haymarket massacre or why we don't work like slaves

You ever wonder why we work a 40 hour week and get weekends off? Well you can thank your local laborers union for that one. Back in 1886 the workers in Chicago were trying to get the work day shortened from 12 hours to 8. Imagine your work day being 13 or 14 hours long. They had a commute back then either on foot or street car as best as I can figure. The average wage back then was between $1 and $2.25 per day. In Chicago companies hired their own armed guards to intimidate and harass workers. A strike at the McCormick Harvesting Machine Co. now called International Harvester had a force of 400 police (hired Pinkerton men by some accounts) to protect strike breakers. The workers had gone on strike because McCormick lowered wages to $9 a week. The strike had started in Feb 1886 and gained momentum with a nation wide union push for an 8 hour work day. Strikers outside the plant had gathered to hear speeches by August Spies who encouraged the strikers to remain united but be nonviolent. When the whistle blew at the end of the work day the strikers stormed the gates. Police shot and killed six people some strikers and a few innocent bystanders. The labor organizers called for a rally on May 4 in Haymarket square. The gathering took place with a large gathering of police. All was so peaceful that the mayor had stopped by to listen and walked home as the last speaker was speaking. As the crowd was starting to break up a group of police started to disperse the crowd. Someone threw a bomb into the police line and mayhem insued. In the end six policemen were killed and it's witnesses stated later that many of the police were killed by friendly fire. Eight of the strikers and leaders were brought to trial. Seven were sentenced to death one was given a 15year sentence. After extensive appeals two had their sentences commuted one comitted suicide in prison by setting off a dynamite cap in his mouth that had been smuggled in. Four were hanged but they did not die immidiately. After all was said and done the governor of the state in 1893 found all the men innocent. The greatest travesty of justice in American history that has been long forgotten and never taught in schools. Ask your kids even your grown kids if they know anything about this.

The decider will tell you when your meat is safe

Herr Bush has decided to tell you when your beef is safe to eat. This should just make the pig and chicken farmers happy. Seems a certain beef producer is not permitted to test all of their beef for mad cow disease because that would give them an unfair advantage in the market place. Pay close attention to government logic when you read the article.

http://tinyurl.com/5ds4ln

Isn't this why we have regulations in the first place to encourage companies to do the right thing? Most companies are so focused on the bottom line that they'll do anything to avoid doing an expensive test in the first place. I can only hope that some day somehow all of this stupidity will catch up to the Shrub and kill him. Like the expression goes "hoisted on his own petard." Hope he gets one of those untested steaks from a downer cow. It's a slow and painful death you know.

Z friday beaver

Ever wonder why I post pictures of beavers on friday? A trick I learned from fellow blogger Pyalgia who posts boobies. It increases your traffic. And you never know somebody from a far off land might post a comment here. Remember this is part of the back roads of the internet. So watch out there's wild life out here.

Sarah Palin

After reasearching this woman I don't think I'd hire her to be dog catcher. Where to begin? A degree in journalism from Idaho with a minor in politics. A city counsil member of a town of around 5000. A few failed moments as governor. And the only real thing she has going for her is gender. And that is not the main issue here. As McCain has been blasting away at Obama's lack of experience who does McCain pick? Someone with less experience. All I can say is the debates should be interesting.
On the face value I'd say Ms. Palin is the type of politician you'd just love to vote out of office. You know the type. The ones at council meetings who waste a massive amount of time on trivial issues and get nothing done. I could be wrong about her I usually give people some benefit of the doubt. But this is definitely not someone I'd want to step in as president. Just wondering if Ambien Johnny had a brain fart in the middle of the night when he picked her. Also wondering if John has given up on the campaign. Realizing a loss he picks somebody he owes a favor. Or has this been the strategy of the republican party for a while now?

Here's the wiki background on her go there and decide for yourself. If you find something there or anywhere that makes her qualified please let me know.

Palin

Interesting speech

Obama covered just about all of the points I've covered in this blog at one time or another. I don't expect him to wave some magic wand and magically transform the nation but he has the right ideas. It's all a matter of balance. You can't take massive amounts of money from the middle class, give it to the rich and expect that to some how trickle down to the rest of the nation. As he pointed out real income has dropped by $2000 since Bush took office. More people are loosing their jobs with more to come even after Bush leaves. Gas prices are up. Health care costs are up. Forclosures are at an all time high. Bankruptcys are at an all time high. Companies that are closing and laying off people give their CEOs big bonuses as their parting gift. The workers are faced with unemployment and no health care.
The most important part of his speech was a reminder. A reminder of who this country belongs to and that would be the people of this nation and not an elitest group of haves and have mores. We have seen what the last 8 years have brought so how can anyone vote for McCain when McCain voted for Bush 90% of the time last year and 100% the year before? I wouldn't put my faith in a 10% chance of change. So it's time for us to take back this country and get busy rebuilding the infrastructure, increasing educational, changing energy policy, providing health care and getting the money back into the hands of those who actually spend it, the middle class.

Top two primary

The state of Washington after many years of 'vote for your favorite candidate' primaries went to a strict party line primary. The voters didn't like this and changed it by a petition vote last year. After a supreme court decision the state now has a top two primary. Simply put the top two vote getters in a primary go to the general election whether they be both democrat or republican. This has had a very interesting effect on the electoral process. In at least six races the choice will be a democrat against a democrat and in one race an independent made it to the final round.
Needless to say the republicans are furious about all this and are threatening to sue the state to change this. The last time I checked the government is supposed to be run by and for the people of the state. It should be interesting to see what grounds they will use for this suit. The people of the state came up with the system. They voted and passed the system and it passed the judgment of the supreme court. So the republicans are against the will of the people and that is why they have been locked out of the process. I believe they can thank Mr. Bush for poisoning their party.
I am hopeful that in this political shift that more independents can get a voice in the process. I have not seen many independents on the general election ballots and have never seen one actually win office. Now if we can just do something about the lobbying and PACs this country just might get back on track.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2008126012_elexlegislature20m.html

Just when you thought you'd seen it all

Watching one of those futuristic programs on the science channel came across "Claytronics". It's hard to really discribe this research for a new technology. It is defined as programable matter. The best example I can think of would be the movie Terminator where solid robots can morph into any size or shaped object one could imagine. Well folks the whiz kids at Carnegie Mellon University are working on just that 'cantoms' nono material with computer built in that can take and change shape to any desired form.
I can only imagine what this new technology will do for the psyche of future generations. On the positive side are benefits in medicine, housing, energy, and a host of dangerous jobs that need non human replacments. On the negative side are the new weapons that could be created in a moments notice and like the Terminator would be unstoppable.
Claytronics


If you want to see some other interesting bits of the future:

Future tech

Joe Biden

After doing some brief research on Joe the only thing I can come up with is a bit of plagerism in one speech he gave 20 years ago. If that is a disqualification for the VP spot then I'd say he looks like a saint compared to Cheney or Romney. Oh and looking into the background of Romney we find that he did what most democrats would do to solve the budget crisis in Massachusetts he raised taxes and cut spending. Ah oh better not let the republicans hear this. The republicans have taken a position of lowering taxes while spending more than any admin in U.S. history. And to all the corporations out there Romney raised the corporate taxes to do it.
So what does Joe Biden bring to the formula? He brings years of experience in foreign affairs having served on committees under both the republican and democratic administrations going as fas back as the 1970s. Not to mention the following judiciary sub committees:

Subcommittee on Antitrust Competition Policy and Consumer Rights
Subcommittee on Crime and Drugs (chairman)
Subcommittee on Human Rights and the Law
Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security, and Refugees
Subcommittee on Technology Terrorism and Homeland Security

Although Joe is no superstar of a politician I'd say he hasn't done too badly over the course of his career

Baby Beaver for friday

I'm glad somebody is out there taking these beaver shots because I'm nowhere near any beaver dams.

And of course if you'd rather see some boobies my friend Py usually has some up on friday at
pygalgia

Darn late again with the friday beaver. Watching the runners and divers. Gee I remember when I could do that.

A reason not to vote McCain

A hat tip to the North Country Liberal for the following article. Written by a fellow POW of John McCain the doctor gives a fairly complete history of McCain and why he would not vote for him.

The real McCain

Nature flew by

Wow I just saw a bald eagle fly by my window. Hope he takes care of the rodent population around here. And no you can't borrow him he's a protected species at least for now.

Hey everybody it's hantavirus time

Not to scare the bejesus out of you but you might want to be cautious if you find rodent droppings around your place. Hantavirus is not something to take lightly. I've done a few clean ups of this type and while it's not rocket science you do need to be careful. We've just had two deaths in our state from the virus. The virus spread by deer mice is more common in the southwest especially when the winters have been warm. The article below mentions spraying a solution of 1 1/2 cups of bleach to one gallon of water. I would add using a disposable paper suit and good 1/2 face respirator. And don't forget to spray your shoes with the solution.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2008124924_apwahantavirusdeath3rdldwritethru.html?syndication=rss

McBush

Not much to post in the last few days. Russia is going to do what Russia will do in Georgia and there's nothing Bush can do to stop them. The news seems to try and justify Bushs' blustering which might have been remotely justifyiable had it not been for the fact that citizens of South Ossetia the bulk of which have Russian citizenship had voted back in the early 90s to side with Russia creating their own government.
But I digress, this is about McCain or McNasty or McSame or McLame or McShame or any of the other variations out there. The most recent is McBush. I like that one because if you do a comparison of the two you come up with just about the same guy. A real flip flopper who when confronted with the facts and failing to spout the party line blames the messenger, the messenger's dog, liberals, democrats, communists, homos, or even people who haven't been in power for seven years or longer.

Bush
Born with a silver spoon in his mouth his family background dates back to Prescot Bush who during WWII had business with German steel companies that supported the German war machine. Never tried or convicted of this crime the assets of this criminal act were sold and kept in the family for future generations. George the younger went to Yale. Wonder how daddy got him in there? Must have been his connections with alumni members of the Skull and Bones Club one of those secret societies who main purpose is to promote each other for higher office. George the lesser gets into the Guard after college even though there's an 18 month waiting list for us underlings. He liked it so much he didn't bother to show up for his duty in Alabama. He was too busy campaigning for a politician at the time. When it was time to show up for an annual physical required to be able to fly he didn't bother with that either. So now you know why people now call him AWOL.

McBush
Son and grandson of two navy admirils John the III went to the Naval Academy. He didn't seem to fare as well graduating fifth from the last of his class. McBush the younger crashed two aircraft even before going to Vietnam. One incident involved McBush doing a "wet" start of the aircraft. That causing an explosive noise much like a kid causing his car to backfire only on a grander scale. Here's a video of the event:

McBush on the Forrestal

You might notice that McBush won't release his navy record about this. All of the navy records have been scrubbed clean about this incident. Wonder if there's any shipmates willing to give an account of that day.

So if you think Bush has done a great job of screwing up our country just imagine what this idiot could do. Two aircraft and one aircraft carrier and 131 are dead at the hands of this clown.

What would Friday night be without....

Okay I know I'm late it's Saturday. Watching Phelps get his 7th. Gee I thought his mom was going to faint.

We don't care about the facts you're still guilty

As I said in an earlier post. Our exemplary judicial system run by Bush cronies has not a clue about a fair and balanced legal system. Oh did I say fair and balanced? Yeah fair and balanced like Faux News as long as you're not actually looking for the truth. This reminds me of a bad western where the 'hangin judge' comes to town and for the blood thirsty town folk to have their gallows celebration complete with refreshments and parasols for the ladies. Whiskey all around boys there's gunna be a hangin. Thought the guy was innocent? Oh the verdict doesn't matter they'll just hang em anyway. They're just towel heads ya know so they all must be terrorists. All related to Bin Ladin you know.

Gitmo justice

Ah yes and they must get this started before the elections. Notice how republicans indicted won't have their trials until next year. How convienient. And you can get away with an act of treason (outing a CIA operative) and nothing happens.

This is plain BS

A law suit filed against Saudi Arabia for the 911 attacks was dismissed.
Bull
When they interviewed a member of the Bin Ladin family several months after the attacks she stated that Saudis cheered when the towers went down. That there were fund raisers to finance to the operation with oil rich shakes giving gold, jewels and cars to the cause.
I guess that's what happens when you're tied to the Bush crime family.

Bush wacked amend. 6

Sixth amendment
Right to a fair and speedy public trial, Notice of accusations, Confronting one's accuser, Subpoenas, Right to counsel

Where to begin? Fair? How can a trial be fair if the cards are stacked against you? When the evidence is held secret and the defense has no chance to see and refute the evidence.
Speedy? Being held for five years might be speedy if you were a redwood tree.
Public? The U.S public only hears of a trial only when a sentence is about to be released.
Notice of accusations? You are labeled an enemy combatant apparently that's the only notice needed.
Confronting one's accuser? Again we don't know because the process is secret.
Subpoenas? We don't need no stinking subpoenas. We just render those we suspect.
Right to counsel? Nope you don't get that until just before the trial and when you do there is no attorney client priveledge. Any conversation you have between you and your laywer may be recorded and used against you in our kangaroo court. And it doesn't matter anyway because you are guilty and even if you aren't we're going to keep you locked up for years to come and there's nothing you can do about it.

I think this whole thing is a farce. Even military courts have higher standards and they have always been considered draconian. Does this not remind you of the movie Hang em High?

All I can say is thank god this error is almost over.

Bush wacked amend. 5

Fifth Amendment
Indictments; Due process; Self-incrimination; Double jeopardy, and rules for Eminent Domain.
Most people think of the 5th amendment and think of self incrimination (peading the 5th) It's a bit more than that.
Indictments - The formal accusations brought against a person of a criminal offense. There were several of the "enemy combatants" who were american citizens who received no indictments but were merely held for years at Guantanimo. Some individuals were rendered (kidnapped) and sent to be tortured in other countries see the diagram below

click to enlarge
Due process - is the principle that the government must respect all of a person's legal rights, instead of just some or most of those legal rights, when the government deprives a person of life, liberty, or property. In the laws of the United States, this principle gives individuals a varying ability to enforce their rights against alleged violations thereof by governments. Due process has also been frequently interpreted as placing limitations on laws and legal proceedings, in order for judges instead of legislators to guarantee fundamental fairness, justice, and liberty. Interesting to note that even with the packing of the nations courts with lock step republicans the Supreme Court has twice overturned Bushs' made up laws. Even someone accused of murder has some fundamental rights to defend themselves. That is true in nearly every country unless of course the country is run by a dictator.
Habeas corpus
On January 17, 2007, Attorney General Gonzales asserted in Senate testimony that while habeas corpus is "one of our most cherished rights," the United States Constitution does not expressly guarantee habeas rights to United States residents or citizens.[8] As such, the law could be extended to U.S. citizens and held if left unchecked.
As Robert Parry writes in the Baltimore Chronicle & Sentinel:
“ Applying Gonzales’s reasoning, one could argue that the First Amendment doesn’t explicitly say Americans have the right to worship as they choose, speak as they wish or assemble peacefully.
Ironically, Gonzales may be wrong in another way about the lack of specificity in the Constitution’s granting of habeas corpus rights. Many of the legal features attributed to habeas corpus are delineated in a positive way in the Sixth Amendment.

Self incrimination

I can only guess how much information has been gleened from tourture methods carried out in Gitmo and other courtries where interrogation techniques have been less than humane. Even the FBI was aware that military and CIA interrogators were using techniques that they themselves would not use and questioned the legality of the practices. One might say but hey these aren't Americans and they are not on American soil, but there have been violations of the Geneva Convention and international law. It was estimated that of all those being held at Gitmo that only about 125 had any ties to any of the terror groups and the rest were merely caught up in various raids in Afghanastan. It was common knowledge that anyone turning in a suspected terrorist would get several thousand dollars from the U.S. military. In a country with no work and all of the monthly allotments cut who wouldn't turn in their enemys guilty or not?  If you're going to bring democracy to another nation (which is a choice of that nation and not a mandate) you do so by example and not by immitating some tin horn dictatorship with torture and indefinite imprisonment. And who of us wouldn't incriminate ourselves after being tortured whether true or not.
This administration has traded fear for our civil rights. You can only use that argument for so long. I'm not buying it anymore. We as a nation were once respected for our freedoms and sense of justice. We are slowly falling to the status of a bananna republic.

The leader of the free world?

Great job Mikey now somebody git me nother beer

Bush wacked amend. 4

The Fourth Amendment specifies that any warrant must be judicially sanctioned for a search or an arrest, in order for such a warrant to be considered reasonable. Warrants must be supported by probable cause and be limited in scope according to specific information supplied by a person (usually a peace officer) who has sworn by it and is therefore accountable to the issuing court.

Note the words probable cause that the republicans seem to overlook. Judging from the events of the past several years this misadministration has been doing warrantless wiretaps for some time now. And just how did they propose to use this information as evidence in any court when information obtained without a warrant is not admissable as evidence? There is the fundamental violation of the fourth amendment in not seeking a warrant. So there is the FISA law in which a warrant must be obtained by that court. But this group seems to be too lazy to go to the court but instead goes directly to the phone companies and demands they cooperate. Some companies cooperated and a few did not. When lawsuits were brought against the phone companies for violating the fourth amendment all was lumped under national security and therefore secret. There was no independent review to determine if the phone conversations were indeed a violation of the amendment. Case closed. It's interesting to note that to get a warrant from a FISA court is simple process. Very few warrants have been turned down by the court. It is even possible to obtain a warrant within three days after an event if the cause is proven to the court.
Now we have the new FISA legislation that has given retroactive immunity from prosecution to the phone companies which leads me to believe that they did indeed violate our laws.
Once again our MSM is perpetuating misinformation on the warrantless wiretaping a violation of your fourth amendment rights. McCain is siding with Bush in saying that warantless wiretapping is legal. It is not. They also think that this is a popular program. It is not.
For more information and evidence of this administrations illegal deeds:
Actual evidence



And finally we have the republicans justifications for illegal wiretapping that they state is in the constitution. Again as I mentioned above they omit those two words in the constitution that mean all the difference in the world - probable cause.






FISA debate

Random things

A few days ago was the aniversary of the day we dropped some nasty bombs on Japan. This was the only time in history and we were the only nation to use nuclear weapons against another nation. I recall back in the 60s corporations thinking that they could actually use nukes as a new form of TNT blasting mountains for road work and minning operations. Guess somebody forgot to tell them about the radio active fallout. With that in mind let's take a look at why we need to put the brakes on both the production of weapons and it's use as an energy source.

Let's not go nuclear

Like Billy Cook might say We're all just monkeys on this rock. Let's not blow it up or poison it.

In other news I really don't give a flying squat about John Edwards' affair. Because 1. He's not running for president and 2. John (Mr family values) McCain was fooling around with Cindy while married to Carol Shepp. And McCain is running for president.

Lastly I have no idea why Russia is wasting it's time invading Georgia. Seems no country invades another unless there some prize involved. Georgia has no great resources. It's only advantage is it's location. Russia wants to lay oil and gas piplines through the country.

I'll post on the fourth amendment (Bush wacked) at a later time. It's so long it might not come for a day or two.

Bush wacked amend. 3

Third amendment
No quartering of soldiers in private houses during peace time, i.e. no Declaration of War has been announced

I had almost given up on finding the transgressions concerning this one until I stumbled on an article written by one retired Air Force officer on the subject. Brought to light the fact that the core concept behind the amendment was the drain of resources of the homeowner by the occupying troops whether it be for a day, a week, a month or longer. Considering the Iraq war has gone on for 5 years and is expected to continue longer the costs have been saddled on the American public not just 'us' but our children and grandchildren. These costs are just the same as if an army had taken up residence in our homes ate our food, drove our cars and ran the heat as if it were free.

It's a bit of a long read but very well written. I'm sure this may be the general consensus of the military but since they are not permitted to speak ill of the current administration while in uniform they must wait until retired before speaking their mind.


Surprise article

Friday night beaver

Beavers with guns

We have the right to bear arms. Why not arm bears? That would make hunting really fun. Give the bear a fighting chance.

Bush wacked amend. 2

Second amendment
The right to bear arms - The Bush administration like this one so much that they decided to sell arms to both the Suunis and Shea in southern Iraq.
Then there's Mary Lou McFate aka Mary Lou Sapone (her married name). As McFate she wrote letters on behalf of gun control groups. As Sapone she listed hobbies such as hunting, trapping, fishing and shooting sports. Basically she was a paid mole for the NRA. I'll bet she votes republican (just a guess). She was expelled as a board member of a nonviolence group last week and is expected to be expelled from another today. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080808/ap_on_re_us/nra_mole_1
In all honesty I'm not against guns but I think it's a responsibility of the NRA to train all gun owners in gun safety. Some type of gun safety certificate should be required whether from the NRA or other qualified company. It just makes sense. Too many kids have been killed playing with guns.

Bush wacked

Wow, Wayne asked me if I could make a list of the Bush transgressions. I'd like to but I don't know if there's enough room on the server to hold that much information. So I'll give a basic summary using our constitution and divide it into the amendments that this misadministration has violated. Let's try just 3 or 4 at a shot lest this turn into something as long as War and Peace

First Amendment - freedom of religion - prohibiting establishment of a religion over another.
That is of course unless you're a Muslim in which case you are a suspect terrorist until proven otherwise. Cat Stevens was denied entry into the U.S. because he had converted.
We don't hold one religeon over another unless you're a televangelist making big donations and parrot the party lines. Pat Robertson calling for the assination of Hugo Chavez (How Christian of you Pat). And after elected Bush and Co referred to them (the religious right) as "wakos".
Freedom of speech
Unless of course you're wearing a T shirt with any arabic lettering. "We will not be silent" in english and arabic got one passenger a seat at the back of the plane and he had to cover the message.
Wearing a support our troops T shirt got Cindy Shean removed and arrested from an event in DC even though she was there as a guest of a Senator.
Free speech zones- special areas set up for protesters far away from the main event.
Freedom of the Press
Don't be black at a McCain rally even if you're from the press. That will get you removed as well as anyone standing up for you.
Not to forget CBS editing important parts of reportage because it might embarrass McCain.
Freedom of Assembly
As long as it's not on a public road leading to the Bush compound in Crawford Texas.
Freedon of Petition
Unless you are the state of California wanting to make environmental standards higher than the national average. The EPA now run by Bush cronies won't let you.

Wow this is really starting to get long and I've only done a brief sumary of one amendment. Think I'll change this and only do one amendment per day. As this is just an off the top of my head piece I think my head might explode. Now if I can just find the music to go with it - Ooooo that smell.

More Bush BS

If the following article below doesn't just piss you off then you are not paying attention. While OUR roads are falling apart, our economy is tanking. People are loosing their homes. Jobs are being eliminated. Banks are failing. We're hit with higher prices of food and fuel and soon higher prices for everything. While all of this is going on here, the poor Iraqis can't get it together to even spend the money WE gave THEM to rebuild which was $48 billion according to GAO. And remember $9 billion of that went missing. And to add insult to injury they have a budget surplus of up to $79 billion. And what did we get for our estimated $400 billion dollars? Did we get $12 a barrel oil like was promised before Shrub took office? Of course not. Shrub, Cheney and the good ole oil boys got the elevator and we got the shaft.

Dr. Iraq calling it's time for your walletectomy

What to do now?

This has to be the worst economy since the late 70's early 80's. Prior to the 4th of July holiday I was told that there was tons of work after the holiday. I was gearing up to have a long run of get er done work schedules. When I called the week after the 4th the boss was on vacation and wouldn't be back for a week or more. Called back 10 days later and nothing. Called the union hall to see what was happening. Nothing! Over 400 on the out of work lists. Usually in an election year there's at least some make work government project that keeps the peasants working and not taking up torches and pitch forks calling for the heads of those in power. Not this year. They were oh so kind enough to extend unemployment checks for 13 weeks but with no good news in the future or indication that the economy will turn around any time soon.
At this point I'm considering a career move but to what? Eighteen plus years of doing the same thing really doesn't make for saleable skills. Yes haz mat is technical and yes I can learn just about anything but which direction. I had considered teaching haz mat at one point but at present with no demand for workers that's not an option. I need about another five or six years savings to be able to retire. Background includes photography, building maintenance and of course haz mat. I'm open to suggestions.

A late friday animal funny

Ahhhaaag! That's the last time I go out and mix beer and tequila!