Clinton, Trump, And Spit Buckets.

Courtesy globalresearch.ca

Courtesy globalresearch.ca

Simon Moya-Smith outlines the current plot lines in the political show. If you’re feeling a bit more serious, you can read Steve Russell’s take on the debate. Right now, I’m thinking maybe weed and ice cream are the way to go. Yep.

Right now, somewhere in America, Anthony Weiner is taking another dick pic.

In New York, however, earlier today, I imagine Hillary Clinton was popping throat lozenges like a Vicodin addict, and Donald Trump was backstage pulling on his fingers because he’s convinced that if he does this twice daily for 30-minute intervals, his puny digits will stretch and the jokes will cease.

But he’s wrong. The jokes will never cease, and his fingers will never grow, and Clinton will keep on coughing for reasons unknown (to us, anyway), and Weiner will snap pic after pic after pic of his dick – because if there’s anything he loves more than sexting strangers it’s seeing his phallic name in headlines for doing so.

There’s been an overwhelming shared and looming sense of loss and fear in this country since Bernie Sanders dropped out of this rotten presidential race at the Democratic National Convention in July. How did the fracking lady and the reality television shill make it this far?

“How could it be that these two are the best America has to offer?” a man muttered into his Lefthand Milk Stout at a pub here in Denver recently. He looked like a sports fan who has lost all hope in his team. So I bought him another beer and said, “Hey, at least we’ve still got legal weed and ice cream, huh?” That cheered him up a bit, I think.

I was recently at a local pot dispensary on the west side where they’ve got tightly-rolled joints and edibles that would calm a rhino, or at minimum, Chris Christie.

But that’s another story for another day. About tonight’s debate:

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39.

whitehouse.gov

whitehouse.gov

James Earl “Jimmy” Carter Jr., made no public mention of American Indians during his entire first year in office.

The 39th president of the United States, Carter only briefly mentioned Indians in his first State of the Union Address, a 12,000-word speech delivered to Congress in January 1978. Even then, Carter’s remarks were vague.

“The Administration has acted consistently to uphold its trusteeship responsibility to Native Americans,” he told Congress. “In 1978, the Administration will review Federal Native American policy and will step up efforts to help Indian tribes assess and manage their natural resources.”

The reference, likely the work of Carter’s speechwriter, Chris Matthews, set the tone for an administration that—in the beginning—largely ignored Indians. In fact, by the end of 1978, the Carter administration had decided not to announce any formal presidential Indian policy at all, historian George Pierre Castile wrote in his 2006 book Taking Charge: Native American Self-Determination and Federal Indian Policy, 1975-1993.

“Absent a presidential message, the policy of self-determination remained in place by default, but never seems to have gotten a clear endorsement by the Carter domestic policy staff,” Castile wrote. “Indian matters were dealt with piecemeal.”

Carter, who took office in January 1977, followed Richard M. Nixon and Gerald R. Ford—two presidents who championed for the end of Indian termination and ushered in an era of self-determination. Yet Carter, who inherited the new approach to Indian Affairs, maintained minimal involvement and thrust primary responsibility for Indians on the Interior Department.

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Trump & Santorum, One Bad Mixture.

AP photo.

AP photo.

Trump’s pandering to the religious right has gotten worse. He’s now brought on Santorum, in a bid to protect Catholics from the big, bad wolf of something or other.

Trump has hired the former U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania, Rick Santorum, as an advisor for his Catholic Advisory Council.

Santorum, who ended his campaign for president in February, is one of 35 people slated for the council. In a press release announcing the council, Trump included a list of “issues of importance to Catholics.” The topics on the list include religious liberty, pro-life, judicial nominations, education, healthcare, jobs and taxation, and safety and security.

In June, Santorum signed an antigay “pledge in solidarity to defend marriage,” that claims marriage should only exist “between one man and one woman.” Santorum has also said he would reinstate the ban on ‘don’t ask don’t tell.’ The former U.S. Senator has also defended ‘religious liberty’ in the past, and it is something that Trump comments on, in his list of “issues of importance to Catholics.”

On the topic of religious liberty, Trump said, “Religious liberty is enshrined in the First Amendment to the Constitution. It is our first liberty and provides the most important protection in that it protects our right of conscience. Activist judges and executive orders issued by Presidents who have no regard for the Constitution have put these protections in jeopardy. If I am elected president and Congress passes the First Amendment Defense Act, I will sign it to protect the deeply held religious beliefs of Catholics and the beliefs of Americans of all faiths. The Little Sisters of the Poor, or any religious order for that matter, will always have their religious liberty protected on my watch and will not have to face bullying from the government because of their religious beliefs.”

Nothing like announcing you plan to go backwards, as far and as fast as you can go.

The Advocate has the story.

Sacred Burial Ground Sold to Dakota Access.

Courtesy LandofDakota.com Cannonball Ranch, which is full of sacred burial sites and artifacts, was sold on September 22 to Dakota Access LLC.

Courtesy LandofDakota.com
Cannonball Ranch, which is full of sacred burial sites and artifacts, was sold on September 22 to Dakota Access LLC.

No words. None. Okay, a few. If the owners, who reside in Flasher, were all that concerned about liability, why didn’t they offer the land for sale to Standing Rock? I smell shit. A whole lot of bullshit.

Cannonball Ranch in North Dakota has been sold to Dakota Access LLC. The ranch is not the site of the Standing Rock Camp where protectors are taking a stand against the Dakota Access pipeline, but the ranch has hundreds of burials and artifacts.

MyNDNow reports the land was sold by David and Brenda Meyer on September 22 for liability reasons. David Meyer told MyNDNow that there were just too many people on the property.

“It’s a beautiful ranch, but I just wanted out,” he said.

Standing Rock Sioux Tribal Chairman David Archambault II made a statement at the Protecting Native Land and Resources, Rejecting North Dakota Pipeline Forum:

“Recently, they purchased the Cannonball Ranch, yesterday the transaction was final, the documents are signed and recorded with the county and the money was transferred. So the owner of the Cannonball Ranch, where we’re demonstrating, what we’re protecting, has now been sold to the pipeline company so it’s really disturbing to me because the intention is all wrong. Without having any further review and without understanding what the process was… it’s not fair. It’s not right and the company is going to try to move forward without any consideration of tribes. I am not asking that you stop this pipeline, I’m asking that you do a full EIS [Environmental Impact Statement].”

Read his full statement on the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe Facebook page.

On the same day as the Cannonball Ranch sale, more than 1,200 archaeologists and museums sent a letter to President Barack Obama, the Department of Justice, the Department of the Interior and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers urging a full Environmental Impact Statement be completed as well as a survey of cultural resources along the pipeline’s route.

“The destruction of these sacred sites adds yet another injury to the Lakota, Dakota, and other Indigenous Peoples who bear the impacts of fossil fuel extraction and transportation. If constructed, this pipeline will continue to encourage oil consumption that causes climate change, all the while harming those populations who contributed little to this crisis,” reads part of the letter.

Via ICTMN.  See comments for additional info.

The Rewards of Being A Dirty Rotten Judge: $203,100 A Year.

Judge Walter S. Smith Jr. (right) swears Felipe Reyna in as an Associate Justice of the 10th Court of Appeals in January 2004. (Baylor University).

Judge Walter S. Smith Jr. (right) swears Felipe Reyna in as an Associate Justice of the 10th Court of Appeals in January 2004. (Baylor University).

Appointed to the Western District of Texas by President Ronald Reagan in 1984, Walter S. Smith Jr. quickly developed a reputation as one of Texas’ harshest federal judges. People who worked with him knew he had a temper.

That’s what a former clerk in Smith’s Waco office says she had in mind when he forced himself on her in the late 1990s. After harassing the woman at work one morning, Smith called her into his office, wrapped his arms around her and shoved his tongue down her throat as he pressed his erection into her, according to a deposition the woman gave in 2014. He tried to direct her toward the couch even as she pulled away and kept saying no.

“I just panicked, and all I thought about was his anger, you know,” the woman testified. “And I was like how am I going to get out of here without making him angry.”

A panel of judges with the federal Fifth Circuit appeals court began investigating Smith after a Dallas lawyer named Ty Clevenger filed a complaint against the judge in 2014. Clevenger wants Congress to impeach Smith for his conduct toward women in his office. In late 2015, the Fifth Circuit judges didn’t recommend impeachment, but rather handed Smith the super serious punishment of barring him from hearing any new cases for a full year. They’ve also asked that the court’s so-called Judicial Council keep investigating Smith for allegations of additional sexual misconduct.

But as the Express-News first reported yesterday, Smith, 75, submitted his resignation to President Barack Obama last week. Which means that, as a retired federal judge, he’ll draw an annuity equal to his current salary of $203,100 per year – for the rest of his life.

There’s much more at the linked article, be warned, there is a great deal of detail about the sexual abuse and harassment. Too little happened to this horrible excuse of a human being, and now, he’s managed to put himself in the cosy position of receiving a great deal of money every year until he dies. Perhaps that won’t be long, given his age, but whether he lives one year or twenty more years, this is a slap in our collective faces of just how rotten the system happens to be. This man has seen little punishment for what he put his co-worker through, and now he gets to be rewarded by a guaranteed golden salary. Saying serious reform is needed is a serious understatement.

Full story at San Antonio Current. Content Note: extensive detail of sexual abuse and harassment.

Joss Whedon’s Save the Day!

Some of America’s biggest stars — including actors Robert Downey Jr and Scarlett Johansson — appear in a short video, taking potshots at Donald Trump while rallying voters to the polls on election day.

[…]

Save the Day was founded by Joss Whedon, director of two installments of the hit “The Avengers” films, among other works.

Via Raw Story.

Read Your Own Writing? Absolutely Not!

hell-cover

There’s an in-depth, heart-rending article at Solitary Watch, about William “Billy” Blake, now in his 29th year of solitary confinement, having been sentenced to 77 years in solitary. Blake wrote an essay which has been included in the slim volume Hell Is A Very Small Place: Voices from Solitary Confinement. The editors naturally sent a copy of the book to all those writers who contributed, but the powers who be have decided that it’s much too dangerous for Blake to read his own writing. Yep. I highly recommend the whole article, just excerpts here.

One of Blake’s essays about living in isolation, “A Sentence Worse Than Death,” was published in the first anthology of narratives about solitary. Although the book, titled Hell is a Very Small Place: Voices from Solitary Confinement, was released in February, Blake has yet to hold a copy in his hands.

Jean Casella, co-director of Solitary Watch and co-editor of the book, reports that two copies of Hell Is a Very Small Place were mailed to Blake at Great Meadow Correctional Facility in upstate New York, where he is currently incarcerated. They were sent directly by the publisher, in accordance with policies laid out by the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (DOCCS), but the copies never reached him.

Great Meadow Correctional Facility—referred to by most individuals serving time there as “Comstock,” after the small town where it is located—forwards all books entering the prison to the Facility Media Review Committee (FMRC). In deciding whether to allow access to a publication, the FMRC operates under a code of directives, or rules. After the evaluation, incarcerated individuals are issued an Inmate Disposition Notice, informing them of the FMRC’s decision.

Weeks after it was sent to him, Blake received a notice informing him that he was being denied access to his book.

The reason for the denial of Blake’s book reads: “Publication which incites disobedience towards law enforcement officers or prison personell [sic], presents clear and immediate risk of lawlessness, violence, anarchy, or rebellion agiainst [sic] governmental authority.” The notice flags fourteen page numbers but fails to mention the content in violation or where on the pages that content can be found—both of which are required by DOCCS Directive 4572.

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Witnessing history – Thank you DAPL.

11

Dave Archambault Sr. has a terrific column up at Native Sun News Today:

…Nothing much has changed for Indian Nations and their tribal members since Dee Brown’s book was written 46 years ago. Nothing – Until just recently! For some unexplainable reason, the book has miraculously come to life near a small Indian village in North Dakota, called Cannonball. In live and living color, just as the book revealed tragic treatment of Indian Nations in chapter after chapter, comes Tribal Nation after Tribal Nation announcing their arrival to the “Spirit Camp.” Here throngs of water and land protectors are gathering in a fight against corporate greed. Accounts of injustices and struggles in Indian country echoes throughout the camp and serves to strengthen the resolve to stop the Dakota Access Pipeline. “I want to cheer and cry I’m so happy to see the support that arrives daily and hourly,” said Chairman of Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, Dave Archambault II.

The words to describe the happening are hard to find. Never in the history of the America’s has so many Tribes come together is such a unified way. This joining is about expressing solidarity in behalf of Mother Earth and to also condemn the number one enemy of Mother Earth – Greed.

It is here beside the Cannonball and Missouri Rivers, that it appears the world is watching. It is here, that the Standing Rock Sioux have drawn the line against a history of crooked dealings and disrespect for all Native rights.

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Standing Rock Testifies Before United Nations.

Standing Rock Sioux Tribal Chairman Dave Archambault II, flanked by (left) United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Victoria Tauli-Corpuz and Andrea Carmen, executive director of the International Indian Treaty Council, at the 33rd Session of the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva on September 20. Courtesy Standing Rock Sioux Tribe.

Standing Rock Sioux Tribal Chairman Dave Archambault II, flanked by (left) United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Victoria Tauli-Corpuz and Andrea Carmen, executive director of the International Indian Treaty Council, at the 33rd Session of the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva on September 20. Courtesy Standing Rock Sioux Tribe.

Standing Rock Sioux Chairman David Archambault II called on the United Nations on Tuesday to halt construction of the Dakota Access oil pipeline through tribal treaty territory and formally invited United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Victoria Tauli-Corpuz to visit the reservation.

“I am here because oil companies are causing the deliberate destruction of our sacred places and burials,” he told the United Nations Human Rights Commission in Geneva on September 20. “Dakota Access wants to build an oil pipeline under the river that is the source of our nation’s drinking water. This pipeline threatens our communities, the river and the earth. Our nation is working to protect our waters and our sacred places for the benefit of our children not yet born.”

Speaking at the 33rd Session of the U.N. Human Rights Council, which runs from September 13 through 30, Archambault outlined the ways in which the pipeline and the treatment of water protectors by the company’s employees had violated the protectors’ human rights.

“Thousands have gathered peacefully in Standing Rock in solidarity against the pipeline,” he said in a statement from the tribe afterward. “And yet many water protectors have been threatened and even injured by the pipeline’s security officers. One child was bitten and injured by a guard dog. We stand in peace but have been met with violence.”

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Trump’s Satanic Panic.

Donald Trump in Cleveland prayer huddle -- (YouTube screen grab)

Donald Trump in Cleveland prayer huddle — (YouTube screen grab)

Right Wing Watch reports that there was an evangelical huddle yesterday, with laying on of hands and praying to block out a satanic attack on Trump. A concentrated one. Is that the same thing as concentrated juice? Lucifer gets such a bad rap. (See Drunk With Blood: God’s Killings in the Bible by Steve Wells.) It’s that nasty Jehovah you need to worry about, well, if they were real.

Today, Donald Trump attended the Midwest Vision and Values Pastors Leadership Conference in Cleveland alongside his vice presidential running mate Mike Pence and campaign surrogates Ben Carson, Michael Cohen and Omarosa Manigault. The event was hosted by pro-Trump pastor Darrell Scott and co-hosted by Trump’s “liaison for Christian policy” Frank Amedia. Boxing promoter Don King introduced Trump at the gathering.

Scott, who hosted the event at his New Spirit Revival Center, told the audience that a “nationally known” preacher warned Trump before he launched his campaign “that if you choose to run for president, there’s going to be a concentrated Satanic attack against you.”

“He said there’s going to be a demon, principalities and powers, that are going to war against you on a level that you’ve never seen before and I’m watching it every day,” Scott said.

Later, Scott’s wife, Belinda Scott, prayed over Trump: “God we ask you right now that Your choice is this choice.”

“God, I ask that you would touch this man, Donald J. Trump,” she continued, “give him the anointing to lead this nation.”

I’m pretty sure Trump is touched already. I’m not sure with what, but it’s not good. Via RWW.

I do believe I’ll be rude.

co3fnk5vyauzlsn

Siobhan at Against the Grain has a post up about the latest anti-transgender peoples campaign of yet another conservative, bigoted, paranoid Christian group. They are all ‘family’ something or other, this one is Family Policy Alliance. I’ll just go with Fapa. Fapa apparently thinks they are oh-so-brilliant, with their latest attempt to spread bigotry, hate, and fear: they want people to ask them for permission to pee, or whatever else they plan to do in the lav. They have a website, full of women boo-hooing over the possibility that male genitals might be lurking behind a closed door. Well, maybe full isn’t the right word. They are soliciting stories, though! I’m rude enough to suggest that all manner of people send stories in – there really isn’t a rule the story has to be a hateful piece of bigotry, it’s just an expectation. They have a hashtag on twitter, which isn’t going that well for them. I think the Fapa should be completely drowned out. I can think of all kinds of things I’d apply #AskMeFirst to in the case of conservative, hateful, immoral Christians. I bet everyone else can, too.

Personally, I think it would be grand if every person of this particular persuasion had to #AskMeFirst if it was alright for them to continually try to legislate hate. Naturally, once they got their no, it would expected of them to take that answer gracefully and respectfully.

Ah, that was a nice fantasy, wasn’t it?

I think it’s time for people to get quite rude, in the nicest way possible, of course.

Via Against the Grain.

Oh, There’s An Idea. A Really Bad One.

cs5oscyvmaa3awd

Audience Member: I had a question about, there’s been a lot of violence in the black community – I want to know, what would you do to help stop that violence, you know, black-on-black crime…

Trump: Right, well, one of the things I’d do, Ricardo, is I would do stop-and-frisk. I think you have to. We did it in New York, it worked incredibly well and you have to be proactive and, you know, you really help people sort of change their mind automatically, you understand, you have to have, in my opinion, I see what’s going on in Chicago, I think stop-and-frisk. In New York city it was so incredible, the way it worked. Now, we had a very good mayor, but New York City was incredible, the way it worked, so I think that could be one step you could do.

Alexandra Jaffe: Trump will propose nationwide stop-and-frisk to address violence in black community 2nite on Hannity.

Trump will be yakking on tonight about instituting Stop ‘n’ Frisks, citing the disastrous, unconstitutional mess that took place in New York. He seems to think that’s just an incredibly brilliant idea, and that’s going to “cure” all that black violence, and of course, it will make black people vote for him. Yep.

Via Twitter and Raw Story.

No DAPL: The Optics Say Birmingham 1963…

Stand with Standing Rock #No DAPL

ict_editoon_091616

Alex Jacobs has an excellent column up at ICTMN.

The Optics Say Birmingham 1963, but It’s Standing Rock 2016, Or could it be Selma 1965, Bloody Sunday, when the President had to federalize the National Guard. Many of the water and land protectors may feel it’s like the Greasy Grass Fight in 1876, Alcatraz 1969 or Wounded Knee 1973. A new generation of activists are being passed the drums and pipes. But right now they need lawyers and funds to bail them out of North Dakota jails. Dozens more were arrested at the Red Warrior Camp including media with their cameras (probably to be used as evidence). If hundreds of the protectors went in to get arrested that would shut down the system. Perhaps shut down the camps too, but more people will come to sneak past the checkpoints, just like 1973.

The land they are on, folks keep calling it private property or Army Corps of Engineers land. But the Oceti Sakowin say the land was theirs until the Army Corps of Engineers at the behest of North Dakota politicians came in and flooded Standing Rock and Cheyenne River lands where Lake Oahe is now. There was no consultation and no compensation for their homelands, for this violation of the Ft. Laramie Treaty of 1868. Now it’s where the Dakota Access Pipeline threatens to be built 100 feet below, crossing the Missouri River three times. The Indians say the whites flooded the river, stole their land and left them nothing but poverty.

What we Natives are fighting, among many things, is the perceived numbers against us. We cannot deny that we are the very bottom 2% of the population. For every person talking about #NoDAPL and #Standing Rock, nine are arguing over various media distractions. But don’t get mad, just get even. Keep talking, texting, tweeting, posting, writing about #NoDAPL, Sacred Stone, Red Warrior, the indigenous activists coming from around the world and Lawrence O’Donnell too. Billionaire Kelcy Warren set-up his Energy Transfer Partners as a Master Limited Partnership (MLP) company which does not pay taxes. North Dakota politicians are in lock step with the oil & gas industries, Congressman Kevin Cramer as an energy advisor – and climate change denier – to Donald Trump (see no evil), Senator John Hoeven who sits on both Native American and Energy Committees (hear no evil), and Senator Heidi Heitcamp’s non-sequitur responses who also sits on a Native American Committee (say no evil). Is this a pattern of conflict of interests in North Dakota?

Natives are told to go home, do your protest legally, petition the government as citizens do and depend on the courts. Sovereignty, treaties, environmental justice?

Kelcy Warren and the ETP strategy is to keep buying up weaker pipeline, oil & gas companies, because the price of oil is low. The plan for DAPL/ETP in Iowa was all this dirty fracked Bakken oil in the pipelines was for domestic consumption. But Congress changed the 40 year ban to allow U.S. companies to export crude oil, this dirty fracked Bakken oil, to counter the oil price war the Saudis have unleashed on the world. All thanks to Warren’s friend, ex-Texas Governor Rick Perry who joined the board of ETP and lobbied to end the ban.

It’s no longer about American Energy Independence but outright profits for the U.S. and foreign banks who’ve invested in a futures deal to get cheap oil to their countries. The biggest problem for the citizenry (and for ETP) is that these huge pipelines need to be full to maximize profits. Bakken crude is dirty and needs to be heated to move better. This bakes the soil and along with oil and brine spills, the once black fertile land becomes useless. ETP heats, cools, or liquefies the oil & gas for its 70,000 miles of pipelines and is aiming for a goal of 150,000 miles. ETP says, “this is a growth project” and they are “exceptionally well positioned to capitalize on U.S. energy exports.” So forget any carbon reduction and pollution treaties, this sets the stage for more fracking and environmental degradation for years.

[…]

But the nation and the world is watching now. I remember the story, the Crow scouts told Lt. Col. Custer the day they looked down at the biggest gathering of Indians anyone had seen. You don’t have enough bullets for all the Indians down there. Custer didn’t believe, didn’t care about those numbers.

We got to think like that, that whatever they think they got, we got more. They fight for a paycheck. We fight for all we got and all we will have and all that we lost. We got them now. Now it’s them stuck in the past trying to impose a nationwide system of pipelines that will degrade the environment for the next 50 years. The Native water and land protectors, #NoDAPL, the Raging Grannies, farmers and ranchers of Iowa, Bold Nebraska now Bold Alliance that took down Keystone XL, all need to prepare to fight for the future. The country needs to rebuild its infrastructure, go into debt if need be to create millions of jobs not just thousands, with new transmission lines for all manner of green energy projects and not just pipelines. This is the time to start the switch to renewables.

Remember The Greasy Grass River 140 years ago. They don’t have enough “bullets” if we all stand up.

I’m just going to add a reminder here: when you read or hear “light and sweet” or “like olive oil” in regard to oil, remember that you’re drinking oil’s kool-aid. It’s marketing. They want people to think of honey or other food, because in our minds, we consign honey, syrup, or plant oils to the good category. If this oil was that manner of good, it wouldn’t poison land and water. If this oil was that manner of good, the white people of Bismarck wouldn’t have gotten upset about the pipeline running north of them. It’s toxic. It’s poison. It kills. It renders water into death, not life. It is inimical to life. Oil is invested in this type of marketing so that people won’t question, won’t try to stop them. They count on such marketing to keep the majority of people on their side of things.

Via ICTMN.