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  1. #1
    Doctor of Scentology DrSmellThis's Avatar
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    Post Atta known to Pentagon as Al Queda, before coming to U.S., well before 9/11

    visit-red-300x50PNG
    http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0509280150sep28,1,3686073.story?coll=chi-news-hed&ctr

    ack=1&cset=true


    We're talking about Rumsfeld's own secret Pentagon intel agency. So why did they let a

    known terrorist into the U.S., and allow him to train to take off an airplane?

    Did they not even have him under

    surveillance?
    DrSmellThis (creator of P H E R O S)

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    Moderator belgareth's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by DrSmellThis
    http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0509280150sep28,1,3686073.story?co

    ll=chi-news-hed&ctrack=1&cset=true


    We're talking about Rumsfeld's own secret Pentagon intel agency. So

    why did they let a known terrorist into the U.S., and allow him to train to take off an airplane?

    Did they not

    even have him under surveillance?
    Would you mind posting the article? The link requires a log in.
    To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.

    Thomas Jefferson

  3. #3
    Doctor of Scentology DrSmellThis's Avatar
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    Default The full Chicago Tribune article

    Atta known to Pentagon before 9/11

    By John Crewdson and Andrew Zajac
    Washington Bureau


    Published September 28, 2005

    WASHINGTON -- Four years after the nation's deadliest terror attack, evidence is

    accumulating that a super-secret Pentagon intelligence unit identified the organizer of the Sept. 11 hijackings,

    Mohamed Atta, as an Al Qaeda operative months before he entered the U.S.

    The many investigations of Sept. 11,

    2001, have turned up a half-dozen instances in which government agencies possessed information that might have led

    investigators to some part of the terrorist plot, although in most cases not in time to stop it.

    But none of

    those leads likely would have taken them directly to Atta, the Egyptian architecture student who moved to the U.S.

    from Germany to take flying lessons and later served as Al Qaeda's U.S. field commander for the attacks.

    Had

    the FBI been alerted to what the Pentagon purportedly knew in early 2000, Atta's name could have been put on a list

    that would have tagged him as someone to be watched the moment he stepped off a plane in Newark, N.J., in June of

    that year.

    Physical and electronic surveillance of Atta, who lived openly in Florida for more than a year, and

    who acquired a driver's license and even an FAA pilot's license in his true name, might well have made it possible

    for the FBI to expose the Sept. 11 plot before the fact.

    Atta is presumed to have been at the controls of

    American Airlines Flight 11 when it struck the north tower of the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001.

    The FBI

    has reviewed the voluminous records of its extensive Sept. 11 investigation and can find no mention of Atta before

    Sept. 11, a senior FBI official said. If the Pentagon knew about Atta in 2000 and failed to tell the FBI, the

    official said, "It could be a problem."

    Anthony Shaffer, a civilian Pentagon employee, says he was asked in the

    summer of 2000 by a Navy captain, Scott Phillpott, to arrange a meeting between the FBI and representatives of the

    Pentagon intelligence program, code-named Able/Danger.

    But he said the meeting was canceled after Pentagon

    lawyers concluded that information on suspected Al Qaeda operatives with ties to the U.S. might violate Pentagon

    prohibitions on retaining information on "U.S. persons," a term that includes U.S. citizens and permanent resident

    aliens.

    Information unearthed

    The Washington-based FBI agent who was Shaffer's liaison has recalled, in

    interviews with her superiors, that Shaffer told her his group had unearthed important information on suspected Al

    Qaeda operatives with links to the U.S., but without mentioning Atta's name.

    When Shaffer, who is also a

    lieutenant colonel in the Army Reserve, asked to whom at the FBI that information should be communicated, the agent

    gave him the name and phone number of an official at FBI headquarters, according to the senior FBI official.



    Shaffer explained in a telephone interview that although Able/Danger never had knowledge of Atta's whereabouts, it

    had linked him and several other Al Qaeda suspects to an Egyptian terrorist, Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman, who had been

    linked to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and later was convicted for conspiring to attack the U.S. Atta arrived

    in the U.S. some seven years after that bombing. But Shaffer and his attorney, Mark Zaid, emphasize that Able/Danger

    never knew where Atta was, only that he was connected to Abdel-Rahman and Al Qaeda.

    "Not to say they were

    physically here, but the data led us to believe there was some activity related to the original World Trade Center

    bombing that these guys were somehow affiliated with," Shaffer said.

    Asked by Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.),

    chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, at a hearing last week whether Atta, who lived for 15 months in Florida

    under a temporary student visa, was a "U.S. person," a senior Pentagon official answered, "No, he was not."

    The

    official, William Dugan, was asked why the Pentagon had not given the Able/Danger data to the FBI.

    "We're a lot

    smarter now than we were in 1999 and 2000," replied Dugan, who testified that the Pentagon instead destroyed the

    huge volume of material gathered by Able/Danger, which was disbanded in late 2000.

    Erik Kleinsmith, a former

    Army major who worked with Able/Danger, testified at the hearing that he continued to wonder whether, if Able/Danger

    "had not been shut down, [whether] we would have been able to assist the United States in some way" to prevent the

    Sept. 11 attacks.

    Zaid, who also represents James D. Smith, a private contractor employed by the Pentagon to

    work on Able/Danger, said that until last summer Smith had on his office wall a copy of a chart of Al Qaeda

    suspects, produced more than a year before Sept. 11, that had Atta's name and photograph.

    "He showed it to

    anybody who came by--`Look what we had,'" Zaid testified. "And he would just shake his head, `What if, what if,

    what if....'"

    Specter sharply criticized the Pentagon for refusing to allow Shaffer, Phillpott, Smith and

    others who recall seeing the chart to appear and answer the committee's questions.

    "It looks to me as if it

    could be obstruction of the committee's activities," the senator said.

    Specter added that he was especially

    "dismayed and frustrated" by the committee's inability to hear from Shaffer and Phillpott, whom he described as

    "two brave military officers [who] have risked their careers to come forward and tell America the truth."



    Pentagon to permit testimony

    Following the hearing, Specter announced that the Pentagon had agreed to allow

    Shaffer, Phillpott and three other witnesses to testify in public next month, though a Specter aide said Tuesday

    that the Pentagon now insisted the hearings be closed.

    The Defense Department initiated its own investigation of

    Able/Danger's activities several weeks ago. After more than 80 interviews with Pentagon personnel, investigators

    reported that two individuals in addition to Shaffer, Phillpott and Smith recalled seeing the Atta chart before

    Sept. 11.

    Kleinsmith, who is no longer affiliated with the Pentagon, testified that he was ordered by a Defense

    Department lawyer to comply with Pentagon regulations by destroying the Able/Danger data. He said he did not

    remember seeing Atta's name or photo on the materials he destroyed, but that he believed Shaffer, Phillpott and the

    three other employees "implicitly when they say they do."

    Shaffer said that before Sept. 11 neither he nor

    anyone else associated with Able/Danger attached any special significance to Atta, or to any of the other Al Qaeda

    suspects the intelligence effort had unearthed.

    Nor would they have had reason to. In early 2000, when Shaffer

    said he first saw Able/Danger charts identifying suspected Al Qaeda members with links to the U.S., Atta and two

    other Sept. 11 hijack pilots, Marwan al-Shehhi and Ziad Jarrah, were living and studying in Hamburg, Germany.

    "I

    was the one that carried the charts down to Tampa, to Capt. Phillpott," then Able/Danger's operations officer,

    Shaffer said.

    Able/Danger was an experiment in a new kind of warfare, known as "information warfare" or

    "information dominance." One of the program's missions was to see whether Al Qaeda cells around the world could be

    identified by sifting huge quantities of publicly available data, a relatively new technique called "data

    mining."

    The data miners used complex software programs, with names like Spire, Parentage and Starlight, that

    mimic the thought patterns in the human brain while parsing countless bits of information from every available

    source to find relationships and patterns that otherwise would be invisible.

    Over its 18-month lifetime,

    Able/Danger gathered an immense amount of data, the equivalent, Specter said, of one-quarter of the contents of the

    Library of Congress.

    Although data mining can be a powerful technique, there is a danger that false connections

    will be made along the lines of "six degrees of separation," the popular theory that any two people on Earth can be

    linked through their relationships to no more than six other people.

    Data points matched

    The Atta-Al Qaeda

    connection, Shaffer said, was made by Smith, who then worked for a Pentagon contractor named Orion Scientific.

    Atta's photo, Shaffer said, was obtained by Smith from someone in California who had connections to "a foreign

    source" who monitored radical mosques in Europe.

    "J.D. Smith took eight data points that were common to the

    original World Trade Center bombers in 1993," with whom Abdel-Rahman had been associated, Shaffer said. "From those

    eight data points, he matched the profile."

    Atta, whose full name was Mohammed El-Amir Awad el Sayid Atta,

    called himself Mohamed el-Amir while living in Germany, and thus would not have been readily identifiable as

    "Mohamed Atta."

    He switched to the surname Atta as he prepared to move to the U.S., according to German police

    documents. A Senate aide said Specter was negotiating with the Defense Department over the conditions under which

    Shaffer and the other Pentagon witnesses would be permitted to appear before the Judiciary Committee and answer the

    senators' questions.

    "I think the Department of Defense owes the American people an answer about what went on

    here," Specter declared.

    Clues pieced together in years following attacks

    Post-Sept. 11 investigations have

    revealed instances that seem, in hindsight, to have been chances for the CIA or FBI to thwart the attacks.

    1.

    MAY 1998

    HIJACK WARNING

    - In September 2005 it was revealed that the independent

    commission that

    investigated the Sept. 11 attacks found that the

    Federal Aviation Administration had been warned as early as

    1998 that Al Qaeda "might try to hijack a commercial jet and slam it into a U.S. landmark." The FAA viewed this

    possibility as "unlikely" and a "last resort," the report said.

    2. JAN. 15, 2000

    THE CIA AND FBI

    -

    Investigations into Sept. 11 paid much attention to the CIA's failure to tell the FBI that one of the Sept. 11

    hijackers, Khalid al-Mihdhar, had apparently moved to the U.S., where he was taking flying lessons with another

    hijacker, Nawaf al-Hazmi, in San Diego.

    3. JAN. 31, 2000

    DUBAI ARREST

    - One of the most promising leads

    came from Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates, where in January 2000 authorities detained Sept. 11 hijack pilot Ziad

    Jarrah as he was returning to Hamburg from a twomonth sojourn with Mohamed Atta and fellow hijacker Marwan al-Shehhi

    in Osama bin Laden's Afghan training camps.

    It was during those two months that bin Laden and Khalid Sheikh

    Mohammed decided that Atta and his friends were the ideal candidates to conduct the operation, according to the

    Sept. 11 commission report.

    As Jarrah was questioned by the Dubai airport police, he knew the general outlines

    of the plot, though the date and targets would not be decided for more than a year.

    According to a senior UAE

    official who spoke on the condition that he not be identified, while Jarrah was in custody the Dubai police informed

    the American Embassy that a young Lebanese student had been detained on his way back to Europe from Afghanistan. The

    embassy contact, the official said, asked that Jarrah be arrested.

    When the Dubai police explained they had no

    grounds for an arrest, the embassy contact replied that the police should let Jarrah go.

    Jarrah flew from Dubai

    to Amsterdam and then to Hamburg, where he reconnected with Atta, al-Shehhi and Ramzi Binalshibh.

    U.S. officials

    dispute the UAE official's account, saying they never learned of the Jarrah airport stop until Sept. 18, 2001.



    4. JULY 5, 2001

    THE "PHOENIX MEMO"

    - What has become known as "the Phoenix memo" was written in July 2001

    by an FBI agent in that city who took notice of the number of Middle Eastern students enrolling in Arizona flight

    schools and wondered whether some of them might be terrorists.

    The agent suggested the FBI compile visa

    information on foreigners applying to flight schools, although such an effort would have missed the Sept. 11

    hijackers, who had graduated from flight school months before.

    5. AUG. 15, 2001

    MOUSSAOUI'S ARREST

    -

    Zacarias Moussaoui was arrested on immigration charges in Minneapolis three weeks before Sept. 11 after he raised

    the suspicions of a flight school instructor by paying for his lessons in cash and demanding to learn to fly a

    Boeing 747.

    When Minneapolis FBI agents asked FBI headquarters in Washington for permission to see what was on

    Moussaoui's laptop, they were denied. In fact, Moussaoui had been sent to the U.S. by Al Qaeda to undergo flight

    training, and aides to bin Laden had arranged for Moussaoui to receive at least $15,000, according to the Sept. 11

    commission report.

    When the laptop was finally searched in the wake of Sept. 11, it contained nothing linking

    Moussaoui to the plot.

    6. SEPT. 10, 2001

    SATELLITE CALLS

    - Investigators have made much of two satellite

    telephone calls between Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia, monitored and recorded the day before the hijackings by the

    U.S. National Security Agency.

    In one conversation, a party in Afghanistan announces that "The match begins

    tomorrow." In the second conversation, a different person warns that "Tomorrow is zero hour."

    The conversations,

    in Arabic, weren't translated by the NSA until Sept. 12, but were probably too general to have led investigators to

    the plot.
    DrSmellThis (creator of P H E R O S)

  4. #4
    & Double Naught Spy InternationalPlayboy's Avatar
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    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by belgareth
    Would you mind posting the article? The link requires a log in.
    When coming across

    a site that requires registration but is otherwise free, such as the Chicago Tribune and other major newspaper

    sites, try http://www.bugmenot.com for an anonymous login username and password. I learned about that

    site from http://obscurestore.typepad.com/, "The Obscure Store and Reading Room."

  5. #5
    Moderator belgareth's Avatar
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    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by DrSmellThis
    http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0509280150sep28,1,3686073.story?co

    ll=chi-news-hed&ctrack=1&cset=true


    We're talking about Rumsfeld's own secret Pentagon intel agency. So

    why did they let a known terrorist into the U.S., and allow him to train to take off an airplane?

    Did they not

    even have him under surveillance?
    Thanks Doc.

    The real question is why the FBI was not notified of

    his presence. The CIA and NSA are not allowed to mount operations withing the US (Yeah, I have my doubts too but

    let's stick to the story line ). They do have an obligation to notify agencies responsible for security within

    the borders of potential probelms. I'd think an Al Queda operative would qualify as a problem.
    To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.

    Thomas Jefferson

  6. #6
    Moderator belgareth's Avatar
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    Default

    My memory is failing me,

    wasn't Rumsfield appointed by Bush?
    To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.

    Thomas Jefferson

  7. #7
    Doctor of Scentology DrSmellThis's Avatar
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    Default Ghost responsibility and the folly of mechanism: You're doing a heck of a job, Rummy!

    Yes. I hope Bush doesn't "find out" Rumsfeld was

    responsible for that. He'd be sure to get promoted.

    You're right that the main specific responsibility was to

    notify the FBI. I should have been clearer about where I was coming from with those questions:

    The context to

    that specific responsibility is a collective responsibility, as U.S. security and intelligence professionals, to

    stop the known terrorist from coming here and planning a terrorist attack under everyone's nose. Someone has to be

    responsible for that, and if everyone is only responsible for their specific task within that, no one is.

    I'm

    tired of a government where no one is responsible for anything, because everything has multiple parts;

    and everyone is only responsible for "their part" of something. (Obvious examples in today's news are the Katrina

    mess, and prisoner tortures; but there are countless others.).

    Even if the "buck" is supposed to stop at

    someone's desk, they will blame those lower down the chain; claiming they couldn't possibly have controlled or

    managed all the details and people.

    It's "ghost responsibility." It theoretically exists somewhere, but you

    can't see it, feel it, or put your finger on it. (Digital music is like this too, but I don't want to digress.

    )

    It's part of the machine era, where a machine is only the sum of its parts. People are both machines, and

    parts of a larger machine with no human identity. No machine or mechanistic process can have responsibility.



    Examples include the corporation, the "pheromone-determined relationship"; (a slight stretch but the same

    underlying idea, with the mechanism being biological) and the assembly line. It plays into our misguided faith in

    mechanism.

    One result of this foolish mindset is that only gullible and cowardly peons are held

    responsible (enjoy your hard time, Lindy). Another is that efforts to "put a soul in the machine" are labelled crazy

    conspiracy theories, etc.

    You can cheat to win, by taking advantage of this foolishness, if you're a

    thug.

    Your defense is to identify with the machine, to masquerade as a mechanism; and that frees you to engage in

    actual conspiracy with impunity. Do more choose to conspire more often, given all that freedom and immunity? You

    bet! Just look around you. Or read today's news.

    Though the solution might not be to have everyone be held

    equally and absolutely responsibile for everything in which they have a part, there is a middle ground on which

    people can take responsibility for the big picture, and are held responsible for taking that responsibility.



    People are typically punished for trying to take responsibility like this in the system we now have (e.g.,

    Ambassador Joe Wilson, the many fired CIA "whistle blowers", my own job history, though I'd rather be Joe Wilson

    than Lindy Englund ). Mechanisms are not allowed to think, after all. But only by allowing and expecting this

    mindfulness can we add some soul to the machine, and protect ourselves from thugs who will use the machine to do us

    in.

    In this anti-mechanistic light, I suspect that the FBI wasn't told of that obvious, unmistakeable,

    unforgettable danger because someone with power didn't want the FBI to know, and those without as

    much power were either too gullible, or too afraid to push it. Legalism aside, to assume mere incompetence with this

    situation is to grant an irrational benefit of the doubt, not to avoid paranoia.

    The implications are not

    pretty, unfortunately.

    We know there was Administrative pressure from the start to divert attention and intel

    resources away from Al Queda, to facilitate invading Iraq -- a project that would be well served by building a

    special, secret intelligence agency with no congressional oversight, as Rumsfeld did, under Bush's

    direction.

    That is about the least conspiratorial interpretation possible for a rational person, though

    not the only one I have in mind (Hint: PNAC. I'll leave it at that.). This restrained interpretation

    nonetheless implies that no one in this administration ever gave a rat's ass about our safety and security -- only

    the security of their power agenda. The blatant, omni-arrogant appointment of ruthless power broker Karl Rove to

    head the Katrina reconstruction and award the contracts to cronies supports that thesis neatly. This "machine,"

    masterfully exploited as a weapon against innocents by thugs, has no soul by design, not by mere political

    default.

    I trust that explains my original questions.
    Last edited by DrSmellThis; 09-29-2005 at 02:48 AM.
    DrSmellThis (creator of P H E R O S)

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    Moderator belgareth's Avatar
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    Default

    That's what I thought.

    Obviously this has been going on for some time as Atta came to the US prior to the Bush regime and Rumsfield

    building his organization. It sounds to me like we need to consider the entire intelligence organization not simply

    blame the existing power structure and/or political party. It goes right back to my strong belief that the

    government structure we have, regardless of elected leadership, is fatally flawed. I will not disagree that it is a

    mechanism ruled by thugs but the evidence seems to indicate that other thugs were at work during previous

    administrations.

    What you describe is in part scapegoat-ism. The whistle-blowers who should be protected are

    getting hung while others, the leaders, are not being held responsible. Certainly, if Englund is guilty she should

    be punished. How about the officers running the detention center, why are they not being held responsible for the

    actions of their subordinates? Why is Rove not being punished for his crimes? There's a whole long list that goes

    back many years but it all boils down to accountability. Regardless of politics, personal opinions or party

    affiliation, if a person is responsible for something, hold them 100% responsible. If a person commits a crime or

    allows one to be committed, apply the same laws across the board. No other standard can be applied and still

    honestly expect a just system.
    To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.

    Thomas Jefferson

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    Moderator belgareth's Avatar
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    Default Humm, maybe...

    According to the

    email, this beast was caught roaming the streets of New Orleans. They claim it was looking to eat people/bodies

    found there. I'm a bit sceptical because they claim the army killed it. If so, where's the blood? Where are the

    bullet holes? No visible signs of trauma. I know how a man with an M16 would deal with a monster that size. The

    vehicle does not have a license plate that I can see either. Make your own decision about it. It's an impressive

    beast anyway. 21 feet long and 4,500 pounds.
    Attached Images Attached Images
    To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.

    Thomas Jefferson

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    Moderator belgareth's Avatar
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    To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.

    Thomas Jefferson

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    Doctor of Scentology DrSmellThis's Avatar
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    Doctor of Scentology DrSmellThis's Avatar
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    Default No congressional oversight on 80% of U.S intelligence, since conducted by Pentagon

    Republicans See Signs That Pentagon Is Evading Oversight

    By Douglas Jehl / Washington Post



    WASHINGTON, Sept. 28 - Republican members of Congress say there are signs that the Defense Department may be

    carrying out new intelligence activities through programs intended to escape oversight from Congress and the new

    director of national intelligence.

    The warnings are an unusually public signal of some Republican lawmakers'

    concern about overreaching by the Pentagon, where top officials have been jockeying with the new intelligence chief,

    John D. Negroponte, for primacy in intelligence operations. The lawmakers said they believed that some intelligence

    activities, involving possible propaganda efforts and highly technological initiatives, might be masked as so-called

    special access programs, the details of which are highly classified.

    "We see indications that the D.O.D. is

    trying to create parallel functions to what is going on in intelligence, but is calling it something else,"

    Representative Peter Hoekstra, Republican of Michigan and chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said in an

    interview.

    Mr. Hoekstra said he believed that the purpose might be to obscure the extent of Pentagon

    intelligence activities and to keep them outside Mr. Negroponte's designated orbit.

    Even under the new

    structure headed by Mr. Negroponte, the Pentagon's activities are widely understood to make up about 80 percent of

    an annual intelligence budget whose details remain classified but that is widely understood to total about $80

    billion a year. Since the Sept. 11 attacks, the Pentagon is understood to have carried out a major expansion of its

    intelligence programs, including human spying efforts by Special Operations Forces and an arm of the Defense

    Intelligence Agency, whose missions have expanded into areas traditionally the purview of the Central Intelligence

    Agency.

    The House and Senate Intelligence Committees have been pressing Stephen Cambone, the under secretary of

    defense for intelligence, for more information about the Pentagon's human spying. But the concerns now being voiced

    by Mr. Hoekstra and others appear to extend more broadly.

    In the interview, Mr. Hoekstra declined to be

    specific, citing concerns about classification and the general sensitivity of the issue. But as an indication of the

    committee's sentiments, another Republican lawmaker cited an unclassified report issued by the committee in June,

    which said the panel believed that "it does not have full visibility over some defense intelligence programs" that

    do not clearly fall under particular budget categories.

    The report said the committee believed that "individual

    services may have intelligence or intelligence-related programs such as science and technology projects or

    information operations programs related to defense intelligence that are embedded in other service budget line

    items, precluding sufficient visibility for program oversight."

    "Information operations" is a military term

    used to describe activities including electronic warfare, psychological operations and counterpropaganda

    initiatives.

    A version of the intelligence authorization bill that was passed by the House this summer calls on

    Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, in consultation with Mr. Negroponte, to provide Congress with "a comprehensive

    inventory of Department of Defense intelligence and intelligence-related programs and projects." Those who would

    receive such a report would include the House Intelligence Committee, its Senate counterpart and the armed services

    committees in both chambers of Congress.

    As part of the intelligence overhaul that Congress ordered last year,

    Mr. Negroponte, as director of national intelligence, is supposed to oversee 15 intelligence agencies whose

    activities fall under a budget category known as the National Intelligence Program. Mr. Negroponte has less

    authority over programs that fall under another category, the Military Intelligence Program, which are intended to

    provide tactical and strategic support to military commanders.

    But the concern expressed by Mr. Hoekstra and

    others is focused on a third category of programs involving intelligence activity but not labeled as such, and

    included within the budgets of the individual military services.

    "Greater transparency into these programs and

    projects will enhance Congressional oversight and permit identification of potentially duplicative programs in other

    services," the committee said in its recent report, issued in June to accompany the intelligence authorization act

    for the fiscal year 2006.

    In the interview, Mr. Hoekstra said the committee had been told that the Pentagon was

    creating parallel structures "so they don't have to deal with the D.N.I.," the abbreviation for the new

    intelligence chief.

    A Pentagon spokesman, Lt. Col. Christopher Conway, declined to comment on the issue,

    referring questions to Mr. Negroponte's office. A spokesman for Mr. Negroponte, Carl Kropf, described coordination

    between Mr. Negroponte's office and the Pentagon as "excellent" on budget issues.

    "Successfully integrating

    D.O.D.-unique intelligence programs and missions into the National Intelligence Program requires full transparency,"

    Mr. Kropf said. "Such transparency exists today."
    DrSmellThis (creator of P H E R O S)

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    Default Rather narrow minded of them.

    Seattle Considers Ban on Lap Dances By GENE JOHNSON, Associated Press Writer



    Sun Oct 2, 7:23 AM ET



    SEATTLE - Strippers who venture too near the laps of their

    dollar-bill-waving patrons have exposed an unexpected prudish streak in this West Coast bastion of tolerance and

    liberalism.


    Fearing a rash of new cabarets after a federal judge

    struck down the city's 17-year moratorium on new strip clubs, the City Council is planning to vote Monday to impose

    some of the strictest adult-entertainment regulations of any big city in the

    country.


    No lap dances. No placing dollar bills in a dancer's

    G-string. And the clubs must have what one council member likens to "Fred Meyer" lighting, a reference to the

    department store chain.


    "It's wiping out an entire industry in

    Seattle," said Gilbert Levy, a lawyer for Rick's gentleman's club.


    Seattle's queasiness over naked dancing contradicts its usual freewill attitude, which traces its roots to

    the days when the city had a thriving business separating gold prospectors from their gold at local brothels and

    saloons. Anti-war demonstrations are routine here, a gay population has thrived for nearly a century, and residents

    voted two years ago to make enforcing marijuana laws the police department's lowest

    priority.


    "Seattle had always had that reputation for being a

    wide-open town, so it's an almost-normal kind of Seattle controversy — what is sin?" said local historian David

    Wilma, comparing the strip club dilemma to the early 20th century debate over whether to regulate the gambling dens

    and brothels that permeated Seattle's Pioneer Square district. "One hundred years ago, it wasn't about public

    health. It was about what is offensive."


    Between 1986 and 1988, the

    number of cabarets in Seattle jumped from two to seven. Concerned residents persuaded the city to impose a 180-day

    moratorium, to keep the number where it was while officials studied the social effects of the clubs and whether

    zoning regulations were needed.


    Over the next two decades, the City

    Council repeatedly extended the moratorium as a way of avoiding the politically sensitive issue of deciding in which

    neighborhoods to allow strip clubs. The number of cabarets in the city fell to four. By contrast, Atlanta has

    roughly three dozen.


    Last year, a man who hoped to open a club

    downtown sued. U.S. District Judge James Robart sided with him last month, ruling the moratorium an unconstitutional

    restraint on free speech. The city could wind up paying the man millions of dollars in

    damages.


    In anticipation of the ruling, however, Democratic Mayor

    Greg Nickels came up with rules designed to make it easier to police strip clubs and to discourage new clubs from

    opening. The rules include requiring dancers to keep 4 feet from customers, barring the use of private rooms,

    barring customers from giving money directly to entertainers, and increasing the minimum lighting — think

    parking-garage brightness.


    The rules would also make the entertainers

    employees of a club instead of private contractors, which the city believes will make it easier to go after club

    owners when violations occur. In Seattle, most dancers pay about $150 per shift for the privilege of dancing in the

    club, and keep what they make in fees and tips.


    Several suburban

    communities around Seattle already have the 4-foot rule, one reason clubs seek to open in Seattle, Nickels argues.

    The regulations "are necessary to protect the public health, safety, and general welfare of the citizens of

    Seattle," he wrote in a letter to City Council. Some council members say the regulations may go too far, but the

    measure appears to have enough support.


    Technically, the city already

    bans "touching" between a dancer and customer, but city officials dispute whether that means sexual touching or all

    touching. At any rate, they say it's impossible to enforce and completely ignored in the

    clubs.


    "How do you know there's no touching unless you're one of

    the participants?" said Mel McDonald, the city official charged with strip club regulation. "It's dark in there.

    You don't know whether they're half-an-inch away or not. With the 4-foot rule, it's a lot less subjective. Our

    vice people can enforce it without buying a dance."


    City Council

    meetings to consider the rules have drawn protests from more than 100 of the city's 554 licensed dancers, many

    toting young children. Tiffiny Neatrour, a 24-year-old dancer at Sands Showgirls, said she wouldn't be able to

    afford to support her two daughters, ages 1 and 5, without the $400-$600 a day she makes — almost all of it from lap

    dances. While she's working, her mom or sister helps babysit.


    "I

    don't know why they're bothering. We're not doing prostitution in there, at all," Neatrour said. "I'd be making

    a lot more money if I was. If they want to go after prostitution why don't they go after the escort

    services?"


    City Council member Richard McIver, whose Finance

    Committee has held hearings on the regulations, said he is concerned about the effect the regulations could have on

    the dancers, but "I'm not an employment counselor." He supports the rules because police and city officials have

    testified that they are needed to regulate the clubs and cut down on alleged "secondary effects" such as

    prostitution.


    Last year, about 197,000 people visited the city's

    clubs, not including the Lusty Lady peep show, generating $79,000 in admissions taxes. But one of McIver's aides,

    Paul Elliott, said the general public doesn't seem terribly interested in the debate. The council has received

    about three dozen letters and e-mails concerning the new rules, most of them opposed to the regulations.



    "We get more e-mails about putting synthetic turf on the Lowell

    Heights playfield," Elliot said.


    To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.

    Thomas Jefferson

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    Doctor of Scentology DrSmellThis's Avatar
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    Anywhere you have

    libertarianism you have backlash by the control freak cultures. But the northwest U.S. is a land of opposites. You

    also have a lot of fundamentalism out here, despite the greater openmindedness.

    Oregon is a bit more libertarian

    than Washington. All their strippers are going to be coming down I5 to Portland now!

    There are already

    more strip clubs here per capita than anywhere in the U.S. My favorite is stripper Karaoke. You can sing Johnny Cash

    in a black suit and bowtie while strippers accompany you. Killer!
    DrSmellThis (creator of P H E R O S)

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    Lucky for you. The nearest

    strip place here is Hot Springs, which has a bunch.

    I think there's supposed to be on in Texarkana, but I doubt

    its worth visiting.

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    Moderator belgareth's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by DrSmellThis
    Anywhere you

    have libertarianism you have backlash by the control freak cultures. But the northwest U.S. is a land of opposites.

    You also have a lot of fundamentalism out here, despite the greater openmindedness.

    Oregon is a bit more

    libertarian than Washington. All their strippers are going to be coming down I5 to Portland now!

    There

    are already more strip clubs here per capita than anywhere in the U.S. My favorite is stripper Karaoke. You can sing

    Johnny Cash in a black suit and bowtie while strippers accompany you. Killer!
    In my experience I find that

    anywhere you have people you have the control freak culture. Some people just have to try to force others to do what

    they think is best for them.
    To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.

    Thomas Jefferson

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    Doctor of Scentology DrSmellThis's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by belgareth
    In my

    experience I find that anywhere you have people you have the control freak culture.
    One could say,

    correctly, that anywhere you have people, you have any and every human quality exhibited. So it's hard to

    understand this as a reply, other than as expressing a vague sense of disagreement.
    DrSmellThis (creator of P H E R O S)

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    Moderator belgareth's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by DrSmellThis
    One could

    say, correctly, that anywhere you have people, you have any and every human quality exhibited. So it's hard to

    understand this as a reply, other than as expressing a vague sense of disagreement.
    You said "Anywhere you

    have libertarianism" I was simply observing that the tendancy is far from being restricted or associated with

    libertarianism. Though my post was from plain amussement and not politically motivated I suspect that most people

    view Seattle as a bastion of liberals and democrats rather than libertarians. At least that is the way the vote

    typically swings in elections. As a point of fact, the article even mentions liberalism. Was there some point to the

    remark about libertarians?
    Last edited by belgareth; 10-03-2005 at 01:55 PM.
    To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.

    Thomas Jefferson

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    Doctor of Scentology DrSmellThis's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by belgareth
    You said

    "Anywhere you have libertarianism" I was simply observing that the tendancy is far from being restricted or

    associated with libertarianism. Though my post was from plain amussement and not politically motivated I suspect

    that most people view Seattle as a bastion of liberals and democrats rather than libertarians. At least that is the

    way the vote typically swings in elections. Was there some point to the remark about libertarians?
    The point

    was made in the post, and I see no need to defend anything. But I will attempt to clarify the apparent

    misunderstanding.

    Since you bristle when people stereotype Texans in the forum, it should be easy for you to

    hear that your implicit characterization of Northwesterners as "liberals" is a bit simplistic. A lot of people would

    tell you that libertarianism (this concept is in no way limited to "Civil Libertarians") is a palapable way of life

    out here, both in terms of law and culture, and that this obvious cultural tendency influences many political

    persuasions, across all party lines. There is a general independent streak that, for example, caused political

    mavericks and party misfits Kucinich and Nader to base their recent presidential campaigns out of this area, rather

    than in a simply Democratic state (many Dems hate Nader). There is also an obvious rebel attitude in State politics

    that gives the Feds headaches, on a regular basis, no matter the party affiliation. I think it's fair to say that

    this culture is more intense in Oregon, but is still present in Washington.

    It shouldn't be a stretch to imagine

    that when a community of people tend to express and tolerate a wider range of freedoms overtly, as is the case with

    a libertarian culture, there'd be some who would be made more uncomfortable than otherwise and actively seek to

    squash that expression to protect their own emotions. Just as I said, there would tend be a backlash by the control

    freak culture, as people's control issues are triggered.

    In fact this is what I have observed. For example, you

    have more gay culture here than most places, but also a more active anti gay culture than would be typical (Google

    "Lon Mabon" for a good example).
    Last edited by DrSmellThis; 10-03-2005 at 02:41 PM.
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    Doc,

    Implicit

    characterization? Huh? Who asked you to defend anything? I certainly didn't.

    I did not characterize the

    Northwesterners as liberals. We seem to be talking ninety degrees to one another. You characterized them as

    libertarian, or at least that is what I think you said. Is it incorrect? The article characterized them as liberals

    in the first paragraph. My only comment that could be considered pointing that direction was in my most recent post

    when I observed that the vote in that area tends to be liberal/democratic. That is no more than an observable fact,

    you are welcome to check out for yourself. I'd be very interested to learn more about the libertarian culture in

    Seattle or the surrounding area, it's frankly news to me but I haven't paid a lot of attention to the subcultures

    in that area. Do you have references I could follow up?

    For the rest, It's still true that no matter where you

    go or the political bias of the area, there is always a subset, usually a minority, who insist on telling others how

    to live. Unfortunately, here in the bible belt they seem to be a rather large minority. I suspect it has something

    to do with spending too much time in the hot sun without a hat on. California was pretty badly that way too, I'm

    not sure what to blame it on there. Maybe mercury in their drinking water, that would explain a lot.

    I am

    still rather surprised and somewhat amused to learn that an area long considered by most the country as very liberal

    (you are welcome to check that out as well) would have such a silly attitude towards something so (From my point of

    view) harmless. Here, they are trying hard to shut down the flesh palaces but it isn't surprising considering their

    rather narrow minded, southern baptist viewpoint on such things. Didn't I at one point post an article about the

    lady that was arrested for selling vibrators near here? Many people here actually thought it was the right thing to

    do!
    To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.

    Thomas Jefferson

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    Doctor of Scentology DrSmellThis's Avatar
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    You are welcome to "check out"

    whether or not we are liberals and/or have libertarian tendencies out here.

    Readers can verify that the other

    question about liberals and libertarians was addressed.
    DrSmellThis (creator of P H E R O S)

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    Moderator belgareth's Avatar
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    Doc, I'm curious, are you

    saying you are a libertarian?
    To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.

    Thomas Jefferson

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    One reason I live out here is

    that facet of Northwest culture. It's like the adventurers, free spirits, misfits, and pioneers hid themselves away

    in the farthest corner of the country. We don't want people from California or anywhere else moving here, so we

    tell everyone how rainy it is. (a sign once posted on the border: "Welcome to Oregon. Now buh-bye!")

    I think

    it's great, for example, that Oregon has no sales tax, and medical MJ; that it opted out of the FBI

    "anti-terrorism" task force; that you can walk barechested through downtown as a woman, that it often tells the

    Feds to f_ck off (under Clinton too). We do things differently out here (a popular mainstram bumper sticker: "Keep

    Oregon weird").

    But I hope you of all people are not thinking that "libertarian" = Civil Libetarian. On the

    other hand, someone could have a misconception about my "political" philosophy, based on how certain issues have

    been approached.
    Last edited by DrSmellThis; 10-05-2005 at 10:24 AM.
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    Quote Originally Posted by DrSmellThis
    But I hope

    you of all people are not thinking that "libertarian" = Civil Libetarian. On the other hand, someone could have a

    misconception about my "political" philosophy, based on how certain issues have been approached.
    That's

    why I asked, to avoid any misunderstanding.
    To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.

    Thomas Jefferson

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    I do get the spellings mixed

    up: "Libertarian" versus "libetarian"? All I know is I'm not a party member, and wouldn't want to be.

    Politics

    is a strange thing. There really isn't any perfect -- or even clearly good -- political party or system; if you

    listen to eveybody's argument, and then look around you. Why?

    Humanity works through life stories and history,

    not simplistic political platforms. We learn, struggle and we grow. We are where we are. So politics, to be

    successful, to match the creatures it serves, needs to be cultural "teliography" -- history told into the future,

    and based in where each of us is now. You could call this idea "narrative politics".

    Part of this idea is that

    every political improvement is based on, and presumes, a change in consciousness. Politics are a fun house mirror of

    the people's consciousness.

    A political story, unlike an abstract platform, can capture shifts in consciousness

    in real time. The consciousness isn't reduced to the abstract conclusion of the story.

    We can expand our

    consciousness, but are limited by it. Consciousness in history changes like a Rubik's Cube from Hell, so it ain't

    easy. It's a chess match played against ourselves, the unachievable object being to elimenate the game and the

    competition.

    We both know all this and don't. If the process were clear, acknowledged, and deliberate, we could

    take more control of our own future history. We could also better understand our own lives, and political

    beliefs.

    OK. I can hear the Belgareth mind ticking, "But what is the practical solution, what actions are we

    going to take?"

    But there is no good, simplistic platform for what to do about taxes, welfare, or foreign policy.

    If you tried to make one, and were honest with yourself, you might discover that everything depends on various

    situations some people are now in, and where we all want to go. So just let it go.

    The only politics that can

    wrap itself around this state of affairs is a story, a narrative. That means the story rules, and the political

    platform can only be discerned upon reflection on this story. We look for common stories of the people, and common

    themes. The platform is based on those themes, as they fit with the future history told by the policy maker, who

    also has a personal life story he or she wants others to relate to. There is no policy or law that cannot be told as

    a compelling story, one that fits in with the bigger stories.

    So there is no principle, like "small government".

    If government were magically and suddenly made very small, and say, public assitance or other functions were

    elimenated, it would be a mega-disaster, and many abstract principles are like this. This is just a simple example,

    where the principle is bad by definition because it is not in form of a story.

    Or instead of having a tax

    platform, like "flat tax for everybody, 20%", you would have a big story that included a tax story within it, by

    virtue of the big story. The tax story would have many moments in it, like any other story. Neither raising or

    cutting any particular tax could be interpreted, necessarily, as reflecting a "big taxes" or "small taxes"

    principle. The coherence and understandability comes from the quality of the story, not the "simplicity" of the

    principle. (BTW, remember all the rants on black and white thinking, about how proud fools are, about how simplistic

    they are? It all goes together. I continually define what I mean by "holistic", by writing holistic things like

    this.)

    All such political principles are let go for the time being, as they are divisive and simplistic. We

    instead have a shared awareness of ourselves, and imagined life for ourselves and others. Under this idea, you might

    need small government for time/place/function X, but big government for Y, and no government for Z.

    Political

    "principles" are slave to the story if they are to function at all: "we have to help this person in this situation,

    working with their self understanding, and this is how we are going to make it work".

    The challenge is to tell a

    coherent story about the big picture that fits with all the individual stories of people and policies. It is a

    political method. That is where the effort goes. It is the hard road, and demands rigorous professionalism

    from its practitioners, the politicians.

    We might seem to do some of that now, but it's actually pretty

    chaotic. The process is only narrative by accident (you can't make people not be storytellers...), not by design

    (...so you may as well accept it). So instead of a tax story, you have a bloated, nonsensical, ineffective tax code,

    made of countless fragments patched together with snot, boogers, manure and duct tape. As a story, it

    sucks.

    It's about having a political methodology, one that transcends your platform or affiliation. The story is

    the method.

    By making it all coherent, deliberate, clear, and acknowledged, we might finally function as one

    self-aware mind, in a particular place, going somewhere. For example, you'd have to systematically collect

    people's stories, identify themes, and constantly recheck those themes for current validity. The same goes for

    foreign relations. We should be collecting stories from Iraqis.

    The apparent "problem" with implementing this

    here is that we have a constitution and established systematic way of doing things, so there is little room for big

    picture thinking. But that is just another way to say, "we are here, now". That is indeed part of the story that

    needs to be told.
    Last edited by DrSmellThis; 10-05-2005 at 10:03 PM.
    DrSmellThis (creator of P H E R O S)

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    Excellent answer, Doc. Thank

    you. However, by the same token, don't simplify my beliefs either. They are considerably more complex than labels

    can be made to fit. There is much in your belief I believe as well though we are looking at the problem differently

    thus are coming to somewhat different conclussions. Not bad, just different.

    Is my mental ticking so loud that

    you can hear me from 2/3 of the way across the country? Hummm, should have that adjusted, maybe it needs

    lubrication? But you are correctly implying that I am thinking about how to address the issues, what to do about

    it, how can it be fixed. Simply put, our single biggest problem is our government. It is too large, saps too much of

    the resources and is a heavy burden on each and every person in this country. The mistaken mentality that we work

    for and are beholden to the government for every need is all-pervasive when the reality is exactly the opposite.

    Personal responsibility and human dignity are the keys to a truly progressive future in a fair and just society.



    Quote Originally Posted by DrSmellThis
    So there is no principle, like "small government". If government were magically and suddenly

    made very small, and say, public assitance or other functions were elimenated, it would be a mega-disaster, and many

    abstract principles are like this. This is just a simple example, where the principle is bad by definition because

    it is not in form of a story.
    You apparently misunderstand my position and have forgotten things I've

    said. Government cannot magically be made suddenly small and you cannot simply eliminate most functions. That would

    result in uncounted horrors to make the worst war scenerio seem like a summer stroll. I never claimed otherwise. On

    the other hand, government programs are in part designed to create dependency on them. Lets look at the welfare

    system as a prime example but not the only one by far. It is incidently one of the things I think Bill Clinton did

    right but did not take far enough.

    For many years, generations, welfare was structured so you could not easily

    transition from welfare to gainful employment and nothing was done to help people or encourage them to do so. If you

    were on welfare and started earning money you were immediately penalized. Obtaining any type of job trianing was a

    major pain in the rear end. If you got through job trainiing and found a job you were immediately dumped out of the

    system. There was no transition. The fear of the unknown was too great for many people and the lack of incentive

    made matters worse. As a result we have generations of people who have never supported themselves, have never earned

    a living and who have virtually no self esteem, they don't know that they can stand on their own two feet and be

    productive. All they know how to do is be dependent on government largess.

    Alternatively, if a person is on

    welfare, offer them choices. You can take job training and we will help you by making it easy to get involved in it.

    We'll put a roof over your head, feed you, clothe and care for your children. In return, you must make an honest

    effort to learn a marketable skill. Once you've done that, we will help you obtain subsidised work that will in

    time lead to non-subsidised work. A certain precentage of top performers will be offered jobs within the system

    performing all the needed administrative work rather than hire from the general labor pool. If you prefer not to go

    through job training you can always perform less skilled tasks within the system such as providing child care and

    housekeeping services to those who are in job training or working, etc. No problem, it's your choice to make.



    The third option? We are of course, not going to let you starve. You see that big, brick building over there?

    Yeah, that's the one. It's called a dorm. You get a bed to sleep on, three meals a day though they may not be

    exactly what you want they are wholesome, a dispensary in case you get ill, we'll even issue you clothing and

    provide laundry services. Oh, did I mention the kids? Yes, of course. The school bus stops outside at 7:45, be sure

    they are on it. Money? What for? You have everything you need to live. Oh, you want cigarettes, alcohol, drugs or

    play around cash! Sorry, the first three are forbidden here in the first place. In the second, they are luxuries

    which we do not provide. Still want them? Not a problem, see the first two options above.

    Harsh? Not at all!

    Each and every person is given every opportunity and nobody is required to go hungry. Sure, there are all sorts of

    details and exceptions to work out. I could write a book on it and still not cover it all. The important part is

    that over a period of years it would reduce a branch of government down to a manageable size while giving back to

    whole generations of people their self esteem.

    The same can be applied to every portion of the government. It

    all starts with education. Today's school system does not teach people to think, it does not teach people to act as

    a part of the society. Start when a child is young, pre-kindergarten, make them think about what they do and why

    they do it. Hold them accountable for themselves from day one. Teach them that they are part of a society and are

    responsible for their actions within that society. Then teach them why. Teach them facts but teach them how to use

    those facts to the best interest of everybody involved. Teach them that they only recieve what they earn and teach

    them why they should help others.

    This has gone rather long and only covers one small portion of a very big

    picture. My big picture is an integrated one where all the pieces work together and there is none of today's us and

    them propaganda. The rich are not evil for achieving and the poor are not lazy and worthless. Each and every person

    is expected to achieve to their ability and will be justly rewarded for their achievements.
    To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.

    Thomas Jefferson

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    I actually didn't mean to

    imply anything about your personal politics there, but was just using you as a hypothetical example to make a point!

    Sorry if it came across in another way. Thanks for playing!

    I especially liked how you put your reply in a sort

    of narrative form. In that form I found lots of things I could agree with. You are on the right track with that

    method, IMHO. We all need to listen to each others stories, tell more and more coherent stories, and look for

    commonalities.

    I agree government is too big in general (despite claims that I talked about wanting to raise

    taxes in a PM, when I said I'd never just come out and say that in some blanket fashion. Maybe we could please let

    that one go for good now, to be in present reality, or else find the PM, thanks? ). Curiously, Republicans gained

    power by people like Gingrich talking about small government (OK, that and stealing elections). But if anything

    Republicans have talked about small government, while making it grow hugely bigger every year. By comparison,

    Clinton and Democrats have seemed to me to believe in smaller government these days, if you go by what actually

    happens overall. (This is one of the things I hate about calling anyone left of center or talking progressive values

    a "tax and spend liberal" or "liberal". Anyhow...)

    I've always thought there's a way to do everything cheaper,

    redefine the roles of the branches of government, etc. (I once worked in DC as a useless government beurocrat,

    evaluating Reagan's block grant program for mental health, which was in the spirit of shifting things to states. I

    wrote a nice, long government report for NIMH, summarizing the program's performance for all 50 states and

    suggesting changes, that no one read!) I also believe that people want a way out and a hand up, to be active in

    their own lives; not just to hang out on welfare. By the same token there are people who are poor for very good

    reasons, and it isn't easy or even possible for every person to make it, even if they try to do everything the

    right way, without help of various kinds and degrees.

    Ultimately you just want everyone fulfilling their

    potentials, to make society rich in real terms. Everyone has something they can contribute. This merits a lot of

    attention and effort on all our parts.

    As I've said, government spending is way more about priorities, and

    values -- or more accurately, the story that expresses those -- than it is the amount of dollars spent.

    Cuts in

    spending these days are often penny wise/pound foolish -- for instance transferring health care/mental health

    care/substance abuse care to the emergency rooms and prisons due to program cuts, or cutting out prevention. The

    fools think they're saving money, because they haven't put the whole story together. Only with a coherent story,

    top to bottom, can spending can be wise, effective and efficient. This is where progressive, holistic thinking is so

    valuable, in the storytelling.
    DrSmellThis (creator of P H E R O S)

  28. #28
    Moderator belgareth's Avatar
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    Ok, you call it a story, I call

    it a system but we mean much the same thing. Fair enough.

    Sorry to insist Doc, but at one time you did make that

    statement. Unfortunately, I'm a fairly prolifiic writer and have to clean out my email box often. I imagine you

    have a similar problem. It isn't worth the effort of rehashing it so I'll drop it now.

    Personally, I strongly

    think both major parties are at best liars and fools and at worst incompetent, self serving thieves. I can't think

    of a single member of either that I would allow into my home unless I was well armed and had time to watch them

    around my valuables, daughters and dog. Even then I'd be reluctant as I really hate to waste ammunition and getting

    rid of dead bodies is so much trouble.

    In another email we agreed about the spending cuts, makes no

    sense whatsoever. All it really does is move the debt to a later date and enlarge it through repairing damage rather

    than prevention. As you say, penny wise and pound foolish.
    Of course I want everybody fulfilling their potential,

    that's a big part of human dignity. A person who has their ability to do for themselves taken away from them has no

    self respect. In my world vision human dignity is one of the most important points. Even my efforts here to help

    others revolve around helping them to help themselves in most cases. To paraphrase a cliche "I do not believe in

    handouts, only in giving a hand."
    To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.

    Thomas Jefferson

  29. #29
    Doctor of Scentology DrSmellThis's Avatar
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    And I am sorry to insist that

    you misinterpret/take out of context/misremember! But thanks for dropping it! T'ain't worth the effort, when I

    say so many other things you could throw in my face without dispute. There's no shortage, and in general I don't

    mind being confronted with my stuff at all, as it's a healthy challenge to increase integrity. It can even be fun

    playing the fool from time to time! So I wish I could see what I wrote.

    It makes sense that an engineer would

    talk system and a psychologist story. The relation between story and system is interesting. A system is like a

    precipitate of a story, a reflection of it, but the story still rules the system, like the programmer the program.

    But yeah we are talking something mutually compatible and consistent there.
    DrSmellThis (creator of P H E R O S)

  30. #30
    Moderator belgareth's Avatar
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    As an addendum about dignity

    I'd like to add a story.
    Many years ago when I was in college I worked in a resturant. There was a man who washed

    dishes there who had held the job for 5-6 years already. He was mentally retarded and lived in a group home. He rode

    his bicycle to work every day, was always early and always stayed late. He wasn't bright enough to hold any kind of

    a conversation but he was very proud of himself. His work area was always clean and well ordered, he never left the

    job undone. He once told me that he was the only person in his group home who didn't take a dime from the state, he

    supported himself and was very proud of that fact. For all I know he may still be washing dishes there. It wasn't

    the job so much as the pride at doing for himself that took him to work every day. The guy had a ton of dignity.



    No matter their limitations each of us has something we can do for ourselves or to help others. It is part of us

    to want to do and when that is taken away it leaves a void deep inside. Many resort to drugs and alcohol to try to

    fill that void, it doesn't work. Let's stop rejecting those, stop paying them off and forgetting them. Let's give

    them the opportunities they deserve to make their way in this world under their own steam.
    To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.

    Thomas Jefferson

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