Cheney On Invading Iraq In 1992

Bush ‘threatened retaliation’ against countries that refused to back Iraq war

The Daily Star | By Agence France Presse (AFP) | Thursday, September 27, 2007

MADRID: US President George W. Bush threatened nations with retaliation if they did not vote for a UN resolution backing the Iraq war, according to a transcript published Wednesday of a conversation he had with then-Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar. In the transcript of a meeting on February 22, 2003 - a month before the US-led invasion of Iraq - published in the El Pais daily, Bush tells Aznar that nations like Mexico, Angola, Chile and Cameroon must know that the security of the US is at stake.

During the meeting on his ranch in Texas, Bush says that Angola stood to lose financial aid while Chile could see a free-trade agreement held up in the US Senate if they did not back the resolution, the left-wing paper said.

The confidential transcript was prepared by Spain’s ambassador to the US at the time, Javier Ruperez, the paper said.

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U.S. Needs ‘Long-Term Presence’ in Iraq, Gates Says

The New York Times | By David S. Cloud | September 27, 2007

WASHINGTON, Sept. 26 - Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates told Congress on Wednesday that he envisioned keeping five combat brigades in Iraq as a “long-term presence.”

Mr. Gates told the Senate Appropriations Committee, “When I speak of a long-term presence, I’m thinking of a very modest U.S. presence with no permanent bases, where we can continue to go after Al Qaeda in Iraq and help the Iraqi forces.”

He added that “in my head” he envisioned a force as a quarter of the current combat brigades.

There are now 20 combat brigades in the country, a number that is scheduled to drop to 15 by next summer. Mr. Gates has previously expressed hope that if security conditions in the country continue to improve, force levels in Iraq could drop to 10 brigades by the end of 2008.

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Congress Quietly Approves Billions More for Iraq War

The Nation | Posted 09/28/2007 @ 11:48am

The Senate agreed on Thursday to increase the federal debt limit by $850 billion — from $8.965 trillion to $9.815 trillion — and then proceeded to approve a stop-gap spending bill that gives the Bush White House at least $9 billion in new funding for its war in Iraq.

Additionally, the administration has been given emergency authority to tap further into a $70 billion “bridge fund” to provide new infusions of money for the occupation while the Congress works on appropriations bills for the Department of Defense and other agencies.

Translation: Under the guise of a stop-gap spending bill that is simply supposed to keep the government running until a long-delayed appropriations process is completed — probably in November — the Congress has just approved a massive increase in war funding.

The move was backed by every senator who cast a vote, save one.

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Mystery man’s key role in move to change Electoral College rules

(09-26) 17:38 PDT SAN FRANCISCO — Until this week, Missouri attorney Charles “Chep” Hurth III was best known for a headline-grabbing incident a decade ago in which he bit a young female law student on the butt in a bar.Now Hurth, the city attorney for New Haven, Mo. (population 1,800), is the agent for a deep-pocketed group that donated $175,000 to fund a Republican-backed effort that would reshape the landscape of presidential politics in California.

Hurth has emerged as an unlikely lead player in connection with the ballot measure that seeks to change the way California allocates its Electoral College votes in the presidential election. His actions on behalf of the group Take Initiative America are being examined by the state’s Fair Political Practices Commission after accusations from Democrats that the group is hiding the source of its money.

It’s not the first time Hurth has been part of an effort that Democrats say has been aimed at changing the outcome of a presidential election. In 2004, he was the legal agent behind a GOP-funded group called Choices for America, which solicited donations from Republicans for another controversial signature drive - to help independent candidate Ralph Nader get on the presidential election ballot in key states, documents show.

Hurth didn’t answer repeated phone calls seeking comment this week. But those who know him say they’re mystified at his connections to such a high-profile issue that would shape politics half way across the country.

“To my knowledge, he’s not involved in local politics to any degree,” says Steve Roth, city administrator in tiny New Haven, which is 50 miles from St. Louis. He says Hurth has been on retainer as city attorney since 2004, billing $100 an hour in his work for the town, and “he’s a nice guy.”

But Hurth is the registered agent for Take Initiative America, a tax-exempt group formed Sept. 10, 2007, according to the organization’s incorporation documents. A day later, the group made its hefty donation to fund petition-gathering that would get the so-called Presidential Election Reform Act on the June ballot.

The donation was the only reported contribution to the ballot-measure campaign, according to financial documents released earlier this week.

The proposed ballot measure would change the winner-take-all election rules for the 55 electoral votes in Democratic-leaning California. It would allocate the electoral votes based on the popular vote winner in each individual congressional district - providing an unexpected windfall for Republicans.

Leading Democratic presidential candidates and Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean have charged that the effort is a Republican dirty trick to change the election rules in the middle of the 2008 presidential campaign.

But Hurth’s utter lack of connections to politics in California has raised cries of foul play and suggestions that a major GOP presidential candidate could be behind the matter.

Democrats say Hurth violated the spirit if not the letter of California campaign finance laws because he would not disclose the source of his group’s funding.

“Under the law, you’re prohibited from making a contribution through an intermediary without disclosing the true donor,” said San Francisco attorney James Harrison, representing Californians for Fair Elections, a Democratic group opposing the measure. “That’s considered money laundering.”

Jonathan Wilcox, the spokesman for the Missouri-based Take Initiative America group, said Hurth’s organization is a nonpartisan, grassroots effort working for election reform. But he insisted, “We have a national network of donors … and we will comply with all disclosure laws.”

Roman Porter, spokesman for the state Fair Political Practices Commission, when asked Wednesday about the Democrats’ charges, said. “We’re aware of the concern regarding this situation, and we’re reviewing it.”

Hurth also chaired First Class Funding, a 2005 educational reform campaign supported by conservatives and another big political donor, Patrick Byrne, the chief executive officer of the Internet shopping site Overstock.com based in Salt Lake City. Byrne has donated to candidates of both parties as well as the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth effort against 2004 Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts.

But Byrne, reached Wednesday, said he has no connection to Hurth’s current group or the California Electoral College measure.

“I have not put any money into it, nor have I been asked to donate money,” Byrne said in a telephone interview.

The proposed ballot measure, written by Sacramento attorney Thomas Hiltachk - who has represented the state GOP and Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger - has the potential of shaking up the presidential race.

Under its proposed district-by-district system, Kerry - who won California’s popular vote in 2004 - would have received just 33 electoral votes, and Republican President Bush would have earned 22 votes - more than the number awarded in Illinois (21), Pennsylvania (21) or Ohio (20).

Supporters are using paid signature-gatherers to collect roughly 434,000 signatures needed by the end of November to qualify the measure for the June ballot. They said 40,000 have been gathered to date.

But Democrats said the effort is less about reform and more about changing the outcome of the 2008 race. They suggested it’s not hard to connect the dots between Hurth and conservative causes, including the presidential campaign of GOP presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani.

Hurth donated $2,000 in March to the Giuliani campaign, and his fundraising associate in Choices for America, Nevada-based conservative strategist Steve Wark, has been a major donor and fundraiser for Giuliani.

Hiltachk’s partner Charles Bell, a deputy treasurer for the proposed initiative, has given $1,300 to Giuliani, and another Hiltachk law firm partner, Charlotte McAndrews, has donated $2,300 to the former New York mayor’s campaign.

Wilcox, the spokesman for the Hurth group, was previously a spokesman for Bill Simon - the former California GOP candidate for governor who is Giuliani’s campaign co-chair and chief policy adviser.

Kevin Eckery, the spokesman for the proposed ballot measure, said “whether it’s a front for presidential candidates - even if it was, what’s the big deal?”

“We’ve said all along that some of the people we would approach for fundraising are contributors to various presidential candidates,” he said. “If somebody wants to support us because we’re trying to create a voting system that’s fairer … what’s the problem?”

But Jarrod Agen, a spokesman for Giuliani, strongly denied any connection to the California electoral ballot measure campaign.

“We are absolutely not involved in that effort. We’ll play by whatever the rules that Californians decide are in their best interest,” he said.

Asked if Hurth has been involved with Giuliani in any capacity, Agen said that he has donated but “he is not involved in the campaign strategy.”

This week’s media scrutiny for Hurth marks a decided shift from 1990 when he became the focus of national news coverage over an unusual lawsuit.

Hurth, then a third-year law student at St. Louis University, was taken to court by a young woman who said he grabbed her in a bar and bit her on the buttocks so hard she required medical attention - then laughed and high-fived his friends.

Hurth testified that he had told her she should take it as a compliment.

The female attorney sued him and took something else instead - a jury’s award of $27,500 for damages.

E-mail Carla Marinucci at cmarinucci@sfchronicle.com
San Francisco Chronicle | Carla Marinucci | Thursday, September 27, 2007

Giuliani Party Seeks $9.11 Per Person

Monday, September 24, 20007

AP

A supporter of Rudy Giuliani’s is throwing a party that aims to raise $9.11 per person for the Republican’s presidential campaign.

Abraham Sofaer is having a fundraiser at his Palo Alto, Calif., home on Wednesday, when Giuliani backers across the country are participating in the campaign’s national house party night.

But Sofaer said he had nothing to do with the “$9.11 for Rudy” theme.

“There are some young people who came up with it,” Sofaer said when reached by telephone Monday evening. He referred other questions to Giuliani’s campaign.

“I’m just providing support for him. He’s an old friend of mine,” Sofaer said of Giuliani.

Sofaer was a State Department adviser under President Reagan and is a fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution

Giuliani’s campaign had no immediate comment.

According to the invitation, “$9.11 for Rudy” is an “independent, non-denominational grass-roots campaign to raise $10,000 in small increments to show how many individual, everyday Americans support `America’s Mayor.’”

Giuliani was mayor of New York during the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

California could be 3rd state to ban forced RFID implants

Tuesday, September 25, 2007

Stateline.org

Orr Shtuhl

It would be an interesting feature of an employee’s first day: sign a contract, fill out a W-2 and roll up your sleeve for your microchip injection.

Sounds like sci-fi, but it’s happened, and now a handful of states are making sure their citizens will never be forced to have a microchip implanted under their skin.

If Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) signs a bill passed Sept. 4, California would join Wisconsin and North Dakota in banning human implanting of these tags without consent. Read more

Gordon Brown’s vision: UK as a work camp

Tuesday, September 25, 2007 

London Telegraph

Andrew Gimson

Conference Sketch

Gordon Brown received his most enthusiastic applause before he had spoken: there was real warmth in the greeting extended to the new Prime Minister as he arrived on the podium.

But as Comrade Brown addressed the party, he achieved a most dispiriting effect.

It was admirable stuff, at least in parts, but there was so much of it and such unrelieved earnestness and such a continual and relentless emphasis on hard work.

Comrades, we are building a land fit for workaholics and if you cancel your holiday in order to get the new tractor factory finished on time, you are a hero of our time.

The Prime Minister has resolved that for the greater good of us all, he will turn Britain into a work camp. Read more

US plans to disintegrate Iraq

Tuesday, September 25, 2007 

Press TV 

The US Senate is planning to vote on a proposal backed by Democratic Senator Joseph Biden to divide war-torn Iraq based on ethnic lines.

Advocates of the plan, which is to be voted as soon as Tuesday, claim that the plan would allow US troops to eventually go home without leaving chaos behind.

The Plan, which calls for an autonomous federation of Kurdish, Shia and Sunni regions has come under fire by critics, who say Iraq’s ethnic groups who live side-by-side in cities and inter-marry are not divided by lines on a map.

The bipartisan Iraq Study Group, which delivered recommendations in December, warned division could trigger mass population flows, the collapse of the Iraqi security forces and ethnic cleansing by strengthened militias.

Congress debate begins on North American Union

Resolution calls for end of NAFTA superhighway, abandonment of integration with Canada, Mexico

A House resolution urging President Bush “not to go forward with the North American Union or the NAFTA Superhighway system” is - according to its sponsor Rep. Virgil Goode, R-Va., in an exclusive WND interview - “also a message to both the executive branch and the legislative branch.”As WND previously reported, on Jan. 22 Goode introduced H.C.R. 40, titled “Expressing the sense of Congress that the United States should not engage in the construction of a North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) Superhighway System or enter into a North American Union with Mexico and Canada.”

The bill has been referred to the House Subcommittee on Highways and Transit of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.

WND asked Goode if the president was risking electoral success for the Republican Party in 2008 with his insistence on pushing for North American integration via the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America, or SPP.

“Yes,” Goode answered. “You won’t hear the leadership in the Republic Party admit it, but there are many in the House and Senate who know that illegal immigration has to be stopped and legal immigration has to be reduced. We are giving away the country so a few very rich people can get richer.”

How did he react when President Bush referred to those who suggest the SPP could turn into the North American Union as “conspiracy theorists”?

“The president is really engaging in a play on words,” Goode responded. “The secretary of transportation came before our subcommittee,” he explained, “and I had the opportunity to ask her some questions about the NAFTA Superhighway. Of course, she answered, ‘There’s no NAFTA Superhighway.’ But then Mary Peters proceeded to discuss the road system that would come up from Mexico and go through the United States up into Canada.”

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