Oswald/Ruby Conversation Didn't Happen

The District Attorney of Dallas County has just released 15 boxes of paperwork and other items concerning the Kennedy assassination. The items have been locked in the safe at the DA's office for more than 40 years.

One of the items that's stirring up some controversy is a transcript of a purported meeting between Lee Harvey Oswald and his killer, Jack Ruby. A Dallas attorney said he saw the two together in Ruby's strip club a few weeks before Kennedy was killed. The transcript is his recreation of what he said he overheard that night.

There's only one problem with the transcript -- it's not true. The transcript was sent to the FBI at the time and they investigated it. They determined there was no real substance to it.

Not only was Oswald a loner and a non-drinker, making it unlikely he would meet anyone in a bar, but it was definitely determined that at the time this was supposed to have happened, Oswald was 15 miles away. He was in Irving with his wife and her housemate.

The attorney who wrote the transcript was given a lie detector test, and the only truthful thing he said was that he was drunk when he overheard the imaginary conversation.

The conversation just didn't take place. There is still absolutely no credible evidence that Oswald and Ruby ever met before the day that Ruby shot Oswald (shown above).

The sad part is that there are many conspiracy theorists who will believe this and will be perfectly willing to ignore that it has been proven not to be true. This will just serve to obfuscate the truth like Oliver Stone's JFK movie. Stone's movie contained many lies, but it is still believed by many people.

Some people believe what they want to believe, regardless of any facts.

Texas Looks Like A Toss-Up Now

A few weeks ago, it looked liked Texas would be an easy victory for Hillary Clinton. She was at least 20 points ahead in a state that both candidates had pretty much ignored. But then Barack Obama reeled off 8 wins in a row, most of them by significant margins, and began to cut into some demographics that most pundits thought belonged to Clinton.

Now it looks like the race has really tightened up in Texas. A new CNN/Opinion Research poll shows the race is virtually deadlocked. The poll shows Clinton at 50% and Obama at 48%. That is well within the 4.5% margin of error and makes the race a toss-up with two weeks to go.

Why is this happening? One reason is the momentum that Obama has shown. He now looks like the real deal, and many more people are starting to believe he could actually win -- not only the party nomination, but also in the general election in November.

Clinton could fix the momentum problem by winning in Wisconsin today, and at least one poll shows her in the lead there. However several other polls show Obama leading. It's probably going to be a tighter primary than the one's held last week though, and with the way the polls have been wrong this year, it should be interesting.

The other thing is the ethnic vote in Texas. It has generally been considered that Obama has the African-American vote and Clinton has the Hispanic vote. I do think Obama will get 80-90% of the black vote, but I don't think the Hispanic vote is nearly that sure a thing for Clinton. She will get a majority of the Hispanic vote, but I see Obama as making inroads, especially among younger Hispanics.

I tend to believe the CNN poll. I think it is a dead heat right now in Texas. But things have changed a lot in Texas in the last two weeks, and there are still two weeks to go. Who knows how it will stand on March 4th?

Pakistan Votes Against Musharraf / Bush

President Bush has pinned a lot of America's hopes in winning the Afghani war upon President Musharraf of Pakistan. As the results of the parliamentary election in Pakistan come in, it looks like that may have been a major mistake. Musharraf has shown that he cannot control the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan, and now it looks like he won't even be able to control what happens in the rest of Pakistan.

Musharraf has suffered a crushing defeat in the parliamentary election. In fact, nearly all of the leaders of his party, including the party leader, have been defeated. It looks like the party may be able to hold on to only 20-30 seats in the 272-member national assembly.

Meanwhile, both of the major parties opposing Musharraf seem to be doing very well. The party of Benazir Bhutto who was killed recently, the Pakistan People's Party, will win about 110 seats. The party of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, Pakistan Muslim League-N, will win around 100 seats.

This will make it very hard for Musharraf to rule in Pakistan -- maybe impossible. In fact, there are some who believe the new parliament may even try to remove Musharraf from office.

This also has to be seen as a rebuff to the policies of the Bush administration. Everyone inside and outside of Pakistan knew that Musharraf was the chief proponent of Bush's policies in that part of the world.

Even if he is able to hang on to the presidency, it is unlikely that Musharraf will be able further Bush's goals for the reason. Musharraf is now even more of a "lame duck" than Bush himself.

What does this mean for Afghanistan? Only time will tell. But right now, it doesn't look too good.

Railroad Commission Fails To Protect Citizens

If you had any doubt as to why the current Republicans running the Texas Railroad Commission (TRC) need to be replaced, all you need to do is look at how they handled the case of Atmos Energy. Their handling of Atmos Energy shows just how corporate-friendly the TRC really is.

Several cities had asked the TRC to not allow Atmos to pass on some outrageous company expenses to their ratepayers. Atmos was trying to pass on expenses like $900 hotel rooms, $100 meals, $0.85 a mile car expenses and millions of dollars in legal fees. Company officials didn't mind living high off-the-hog, because their ratepayers (you and I) were the ones footing the bill.

It was hoped that the TRC would refuse to let Atmos pass these outrageous expenses to their customers. But we should have known better. Last week the Republican-controlled TRC gave Atmos what it wanted and approved the expenses.

TRC Chairman Michael Williams said the expenses "could raise concern" and an argument could be made for denying them. But he said it would only cost the ratepayers even more when the company took the matter to court.

Can you believe that? He's trying to claim he's saving the ratepayers money by letting the company pass on these exorbitant expenses to them. That shows just how much they're in the pockets of the corporate interests. He'll probably now claim to have cut our food expenses since we'll have less money to spend that way.

The Republicans have sold out to the corporate interests. The only way to get any fairness back in the system is to replace these Republicans with honest Democrats. We can begin to do that in the coming election.

We have an excellent candidate running for a position on the Texas Railroad Commission -- Dale Henry. Dale Henry (pictured above) will put the interests of the citizens of Texas first. I urge all Democrats to take the first step in solving this problem by voting for Dale Henry in the Democratic primary on March 4th.

Songs That Still Kick Ass

You can't do much better than Long John Baldry's "Don't Try To Lay No Boogie Woogie On The King Of Rock And Roll"

Navy To Shoot Down Satellite

A few days ago, we learned that a 10-ton U.S. spy satellite had stopped working and was going to fall back to the earth sometime in early March. The satellite is about the size of a small bus and is too large to burn up completely on re-entry. Complicating matters is the fact that it contains a large quantity of a poisonous rocket fuel called hydrazine.

The government has no idea where the satellite might fall. Even if the satellite doesn't hit anything (or anyone), the hydrazine could form a poisonous cloud around the wreckage.

The U.S. government has now decided to try and destroy the satellite before it re-enters the atmosphere. They are going to have a Navy cruiser try to blow the satellite up with an sm-3 missle. They hope a direct hit will break the satellite up into pieces small enough to burn up on re-entry. They also believe a good hit will burn up the hydrazine fuel and remove that danger.

The Navy has modified some software on the sm-3 to help it recognize the satellite, and if they don't get a good enough hit with the first missle, they may try again.

Both the Chinese and Russian governments don't like the idea. The Russian government thinks this is just a test of the U.S. missle defense system. The Chinese say it could damage world security. I think the Chinese are upset because they did the same thing last year (destroyed a satellite with a missle) and received a lot of criticism for it, including criticism from the U.S.

But no matter who doesn't like it, it's still a good idea to destroy the satellite in space. It's just too dangerous since we don't know where it will fall. By the time we figure out where it will fall, it'll be too late to shoot it down.

Candidate Differences On Gitmo Inmates

President Bush has kept prisoners in Guantanamo for years now. He has held them without charges and even tortured them. But the one thing he has not done, is convict any of them on serious charges. An Australian was convicted by the military tribunal (read kangaroo court), but was sentenced to only a few months jail time.

Now it's obvious that we cannot go on holding hundreds of prisoners without charges. The only thing that is being accomplished is the destruction of our reputation for fairness and justice in the eyes of the rest of the civilized world. It is long past time to either convict these prisoners in a fair trial or release them.

That is just what the Democratic candidates want to do. Clinton advisor Lee Feinstein says, "While the policies at Guantanamo have hurt America's image, this is more than just an image problem. Senator Clinton believes those who have committed crimes against the United States should be brought to justice. And that justice is long overdue. Proper military commissions are established to expedite battlefield justice, but the deeply flawed military commissions set up by the Bush administration and blessed by the Republican Congress in 2006 have only delayed the administration of justice in these cases."

Senator Clinton believes the prisoners should be brought to trial in either our civilian courts or regular military courts, with all the rights that are guaranteed by those courts. Senator Obama agrees.

Obama says the "trials are too important to be held in a flawed military commission system that has failed to convict anyone of a terrorist act since the 9/11 attacks and that has been embroiled in legal challenges. As I have said in the past, I believe that our civilian courts or our traditional system of military courts martial are best able to meet this challenge and demonstrate our commitment to the rule of law."

In other words, both Clinton and Obama would reestablish the rule of law and rehabilitate our reputation among civilized nations. They understand that you cannot have one set of laws for the people you like and another set for the people you don't like. The rule of law must apply to everyone equally, or it is worthless.

But the presumptive Republican nominee, John McCain, does not believe that. He wants to continue the ridiculous and unfair policies of the Bush administration. We already knew that he wouldn't mind keeping our troops in Iraq "for a hundred years", and has changed his mind about torture -- he now thinks it is OK.

But he also wants to continue Bush's military commissions. The commissions that deny the right to a lawyer, allow for secret information to be used, deny the right to cross-examine witnesses, and allow the use of info gathered by torture.

McCain's aide Randy Scheunemann says, "The last thing Senator McCain wants to see is Khalid Sheik Mohammed getting all the legal protections of someone who is arrested for a traffic violation or a criminal violation in the United States."

McCain believes that those people who he doesn't like should have less rights than his friends. Quite simply, he doesn't believe in the rule of law being equally applied to everyone. This should scare the hell out of all Americans. How do you know you won't be the next person he thinks doesn't deserve equal protection under the law?

Obama and Clinton believe in equal protection under the law. McCain doesn't. Could the choice be any clearer?

A New Country On The World Stage

Yesterday, the world witnessed the birth of a new nation. The Republic of Kosovo declared its independence from Serbia. Since 1999, Kosovo has been supervised by the United Nations. There have been negotiations for the last couple of years to try and figure out a workable status for Kosovo to remain a part of Serbia, but nothing could be decided that was acceptable to all parties.

In 2001, the United Nations administration helped Kosovo form a constitutional framework. This created a 120 member Kosovo Assembly elected by the people, which chooses a President and a Prime Minister. Yesterday, the Assembly passed a Declaration of Independence from Serbia, and Prime Minister Hashim Thaci read it to the international media. That marked the birth of the independent nation -- the Republic of Kosovo.

This probably needed to happen. Kosovo is largely composed of Albanian Muslims. After the "ethnic cleansing" by the Serbians in the late 90's, I don't know how anyone could expect Kosovo to trust that they would ever be treated fairly by the Serbians again. Too many people were killed or expelled from their homes.

It is expected that the United States, Great Britain, France and possibly a few other Western nations will recognize the new country. However, this will not help relations between the West and Russia. Russia backs the Serbs and opposes the creation of the Republic of Kosovo. They have told Serbia to oppose this move in every way short of violence.

While I support the new nation and hope the United States does recognize its existence, we need to understand the ramifications of this move. We must tread carefully and exercise our best diplomatic efforts, or we could be witnessing the birth of a new cold (or hot) war.

Bill Clinton Comes To Amarillo

Bill Clinton came to the heart of one of the reddest areas in Texas yesterday -- the Texas Panhandle. To those who didn't think Clinton could draw a crowd here in Amarillo, I'd have to say you were wrong. When I arrived, the crowd trying to get in snaked down the hall, around the corner, down another hall and doubled back, and then outside the door and around the corner.

Amazingly, they managed to squeeze all those people into the Grand Plaza. Employees at the Civic Center told me there were only 1100 seats, and when I finally got in, I noticed there were at least as many people standing as the ones lucky enough to get seats. There had to be over 2000 people there, and I would say that is a conservative estimate.

Clinton gave a rousing speech as he usually does. He just always seems to be at ease in front of a crowd. There are few politicians that can work a crowd as well as Bill Clinton can, and he was in good form yesterday. I don't know how many votes he got for Hillary, but the crowd got the show they came to see.

Some of you may be wondering why I was at the Clinton speech, since I have already declared my support for Barack Obama. Well, you have to realize that Amarillo, as much as I've grown to like it here, is located very near the ass-end of the universe.

We don't get too many political heavyweights dropping by to see us, and Bill Clinton is definitely a political superstar. I didn't care who he was supporting, it was just nice to be able to see him in person. While I have no doubt there were many supporters of Hillary Clinton there, I think there were also a lot of sight-seers like myself there also.

I appreciate Bill Clinton coming to Amarillo, and I really enjoyed seeing him. However, I will be voting for Barack Obama in the March 4th election, and then again at the precinct convention that night.

P.S. -- I apologize for the poor quality of the picture above. I'm just not much of a photographer.

U.S. Soldiers Attack Their Friends In Iraq

We have more evidence of just how big a mess Bush has put our soldiers in. It seems that our soldiers have been attacking Iraqis who are fighting on our side. It would be bad enough if this was an isolated instance, but it has happened several times in the last few weeks.

The biggest reason for the recent drop in violence in Iraq, especially among our troops, has been the Iraqi civilian brigades known as the Awakening Movement. These are Sunnis who have joined the United States forces in fighting al-Queda in Iraq. These groups have been a huge help to U.S. troops.

But evidently, the U.S. troops aren't getting enough training or enough intelligence, because they have been attacking fighters from the Awakening Movement without provocation. And the Iraqis don't like it. While they are trying to help us, they must be as afraid of our troops as the enemy. It looks like our soldiers can't tell their friends from their enemies in Iraq.

Because of this, the AM fighters in at least two provinces are saying they will no longer fight with U.S. troops. In Babil and Diyala provinces, our troops are once again on their own. This is not making progress -- this is going backwards. You can't blame the AM fighters. Why should they help our troops when we are attacking them?

This is just more evidence why we must get our troops out of Iraq. Bush has placed them in the middle of a civil war, where they can't tell their friends from their enemies. Instead of winning friends, we are losing them. Is it any wonder that the casualties are starting to rise again?

It is time to bring our troops home. We have already lost too many lives trying to control Iraqi oil and salvage Bush's pride.

Van Os Speaks Out On Surveillance Bill

The other day, I wrote about how the Senate Democrats caved in and passed Bush's ridiculous and unconstitutional act that would allow him to eavesdrop of anyone anywhere anytime. Now, Texas progressive David Van Os has spoken up on the matter. Frankly, his words are better than mine, so I reprint them here for your edification:

Tuesday, February 12, 2008, was a dark day in the United States Senate for the people and Constitution of the United States of America. The Senate passed a bill to enshrine permanently the disgraceful law enacted in August 2007 to expand the powers of the President to engage in electronic surveillance of private communications without judicial warrants; in effect, to legalize the illegal wiretapping program that the criminal Bushite administration first hid from the public, then admitted to in 2005 after being exposed.

Not only does the bill give the criminal president the power to perform actions for which he should have already been impeached and criminally prosecuted; not only does the bill trample on the Fourth Amendment of the Bill of the Rights of the U.S. Constitution; but also, it deprives citizens of due process of law in the courts by giving the giant telephone companies retroactive immunity for illegally wiretapping telephones and invading their customers' privacy rights.

As the New York Times put it, "After more than a year of wrangling, the Senate handed the White House a major victory on Tuesday by voting to broaden the government's spy powers and to give legal protection to phone companies that cooperated in President Bush's program of eavesdropping without warrants."

Shamefully, 19 Democratic Senators, led by Intelligence Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller, voted with the Republican lemmings to pass the bill. Did the voters who went to the polls in 2006 to repudiate Bushite policies expect Senate Democrats to continue to condone the criminal president's assault on the Bill of Rights and the rule of law? I don't think so.

There is still hope. The House of Representatives passed a different bill that does not grant retroactive telephone company immunity, and that does not give the criminal president as much expanded power as the Senate bill. The House and Senate bills now go to conference committee. FLOOD NANCY PELOSI WITH YOUR EMAILS DEMANDING THAT THE HOUSE NOT GIVE IN TO THE SENATE BILL.

David Van Os

Free Speech Or Incitement ?

A couple of years ago, a Danish newspaper printed a series of 12 cartoons featuring the Islamic prophet Mohammed. The cartoons sparked demonstrations and riots by Muslims around the world. They said the cartoons were disrespectful to their religion.

Until last Tuesday, it was generally thought the matter was over. But on that day, Danish police arrested three Muslims who were plotting to murder the cartoonist who had drawn the "offensive" cartoons. Even though the event was two years in the past, these criminals were plotting to kill a human being in the name of their religion.

In response to this, 12 Danish newspapers banded together and reprinted one of the cartoons -- it showed Mohammed with a turban in the shape of a bomb with a lit fuse. The papers said they reprinted the cartoon to show their commitment to free speech.

Not surprisingly, some Muslim groups are saying the papers are just trying to cause trouble by rekindling the dispute.

I'm afraid I'm going to have to agree with the newspapers on this matter. You simply cannot give in to threats from any group -- not even religious groups. Once a newspaper refuses to print something because of threats, it opens itself up to threats from all kinds of people. Then free speech is dead.

These newspapers did the right thing. This wasn't just aimed at Muslims, but anyone who would try to stop free speech with threats and violence.

It has been said that if you've never been offended, then you don't live in a free country. Freedom requires free speech, and sometimes that speech will be offensive. It's just part of the price of freedom.

Can House Dems Stand Up To Bush ?

Last week, the Democrats in the Senate knuckled under to Bush again. Instead of standing up for the privacy rights of American citizens, they gave in to pressure from Bush and passed the unconstitutional Protect America Act.

This act, which would end soon if not extended by Congress, allows the Executive branch to snoop on anyone it wants to without needing a court-issued search warrant. It also would grant immunity to any telecommunications company that cooperated in this surveillance.

I am still shocked by the Senate Democrats who helped to pass this bill. Once again they have shown they are too weak and timid to stand up to the most unpopular president in our history. If they can't stand up to Bush, how are we to believe they will ever have the backbone to fight for citizen's rights.

Evidently, they still haven't figured out that a main reason voters have shunned them in the past is because they perceive them to be weak. This latest action has done nothing to change that perception. Personally, I think this is a leadership problem.

Senator Reid has been a continuing disappointment in his leadership of the Senate Democrats. Under his leadership, the Democrats have been unable to stand up to Bush on any issue. He talks tough, and then gives in every time. When the new Senate convenes after the next election, it is time to elect new leadership for the Democrats -- someone who is not afraid to stand up to the Republicans and fight for the constitutional rights of all Americans.

Fortunately, the House Democrats are made of a little sterner stuff (I hope). The version of the Protect America Act that they passed did not contain the immunity provision for telecommunications companies, although frankly, they shouldn't have passed any version of this ridiculous bill.

Today, they rejected Bush's plea to vote on and pass the Senate version of the bill. Speaker Pelosi said they needed time to debate it. Instead, they passed contempt citations for two members of the Bush administration (one current and one former member). Since Bush had said he will order the Justice Department to not honor the citations, they even authorized the Judiciary Committee to take the matter to court for enforcement.

At least for one day, they have shown they can stand up to the Bush administration. Now they need to follow through and refuse to re-authorize the unconstitutional Protect America Act. There is no need to authorize such broad eavesdropping powers. If the FBI or CIA needs to listen in on calls and messages, let them get a search warrant as our Founding Fathers intended when they wrote the Constitution.

With a national election coming up, these House Democrats need to show Americans they are not the cowardly weaklings their Senate brethren have turned out to be. Americans will not vote for those too weak to defend their beliefs. That's one reason they voted Republican in the past few years. The Republican's beliefs are faulty, but they're not afraid to defend them.

Democrats have a golden opportunity in the upcoming election, but they need to show they deserve to be returned to power. Americans will not vote for cowards.

Texas Sex Toy Ban Overturned

It looks like Texas will have to be dragged into the 21st century kicking and screaming. Texas has a long history of wanting to invade the privacy of it's citizens -- especially in the bedroom. Texas was one of the last states to have anti-sodomy laws, until the courts struck down the law (Lawrence v. Texas).

The latest invasion into the private bedroom behavior of is citizens is the ban on the sale of sex toys. I don't know why the legislators and law offials of this state think they have to dictate the private behavior of Texans, but they do. It's not like anyone is being forced to buy these sex toys.

Until yesterday, Texas was one of only three states to ban the sale of sex toys -- the other two being Alabama and Mississippi. Now, only Alabama and Mississippi are left, because a federal district court struck down the Texas law.

The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals said the law violated the 14th amendment right to privacy. They said, "Just as in Lawrence, the state here wants to use its laws to enforce a public moral code by restricting private intimate conduct. The case is not about public sex. It is not about controlling commerce in sex. It is about controlling what people do in the privacy of their own homes because the state is morally opposed to a certain type of consensual private intimate contact. This is an insufficient justification after Lawrence."

Once again, the federal government has kicked the state out of our bedrooms. But you'd better lock the bedroom door, because as long as the Republican fundies are in charge they will try to get back in.

For a group that claims to be so moral, these Republicans sure do have a lot of interest in the private sexual lives of Texas citizens. They act more like a group of perverted voyeurs.