:: NEWS COCKTAIL aka BlahBlahBlog ::

:: 11.29.2004 ::

:: "U.S. Death Toll in Iraq Nears Record" ::

WASHINGTON (AP) - The U.S. military death toll in Iraq rose by at least three Monday and the November total is approaching the highest for any month since the American-led invasion was launched in March 2003.

posted by me

:: 8:59:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Online music update ::

Trial to Unmask Kazaa Owners
From Wired News
In a copyright-infringement trial under way this week in an Australian federal court, music industry representatives say they plan to make public the secretive ownership structure of the Kazaa file-trading network. By Patrick Gray.

posted by me

:: 6:22:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Not down w/ SCO ::

Hackers deface SCO site
By Matt Hines
CNET News.com

Image: Screen shot of SCO hack

Hackers defaced SCO Group's Web site on Monday, targeting the company's controversial claims to elements of the Linux operating system.

In a hack that began sometime before 5:30 a.m. PST Monday, someone placed a graphic atop SCO's home page that read "we own all your code" and "pay us all your money." The spoof used the same fonts and colors employed throughout the company's site, along with a copy of the software maker's official logo. By 8:30 a.m. PST, the altered graphic had been removed.

SCO representatives did not immediately return calls seeking comment.

Monday's hack is the latest in a string of attacks launched against SCO. Earlier this year, the company watched helplessly as a variant of the MyDoom computer virus crippled its site, forcing SCO to resort to an alternate Web address.

Read more here.

CNET reader comment
SCO Deserves It
Posted by: Onizuka
SCO, like MicroSoft, is a company that has no concept of innovation. Theft and blind accusations are where the money is for these two companies.

If I had a dollar for every line of code Micro$oft has stolen, I'd be richer than ol' Gates. Then again, if I had that money I'd become an investor in Apple Computers and watch them innovate and create 90% of the standards out there today.

posted by me

:: 6:07:00 PM [+] ::
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:: So Weird ::

From Chuck Shepherd's News of the Weird

People Different From Us
Jackie Lee Shrader, 49, and his son, Harley Lee, 24, had a brief shootout with .22-caliber handguns, provoked when the pair confronted each other over how to cook skinless chicken for dinner (Bluewell, W.Va., September). And Niccolo Rossodivita, 62, shot Billy Cordova, 40, twice in the chest after Cordova followed him around their house prolonging their argument over Jesus Christ's correct name (Wasilla, Alaska, September). And Angela Morris, 19, was charged with assaulting her boyfriend by pouring boiling oil on him during an argument over a Bible verse the two had been reading together (Eugene, Ore., May). [Charleston Daily Mail-AP, 9-29-04] [Frontiersman (Wasilla), 9-27-04] [ABC News-AP, 5-20- 04]

More Scenes of the Surreal
(1) According to a September Washington Post dispatch from a Culpeper, Va., conference of people obsessed with spotting the alleged, 7-foot-tall Sasquatch, which is said to be roaming the woods of America, many attendees ("East Coast Bigfoot community") seem consumed by the West Coast Bigfoot community's supposed arrogance. That is, Western witnesses seem to regard Eastern witnesses as delusional, in that Sasquatch obviously lives west of the Rockies. (2) Thomas Patrick Remo, 50, was arrested in September in Dallas and charged with practicing medicine (gynecology) without a license; Remo had a stream of female customers who apparently did not think it odd that the exams were free and that he ran his office out of a self-storage locker. [Washington Post, 9-30-04] [Houston Chronicle-AP, 9-30-04]

Readers' Choice
Initially, Florida artist Maria Alquilar refused to correct a series of misspelled names in a $40,000 historical mural she did for the city of Livermore, Calif., claiming that "words" were not important to her art, comparing her errors to Michelangelo's "David" (imperfect in the sense that one of the testicles is lower than the other). After receiving much hate mail from Livermore taxpayers, suggesting that she must have a learning disability for not detecting "(Albert) Eistein," "(William) Shakespere," "(Paul) Gaugan," "(Vincent) Van Gough," and seven other misspellings, Alquilar agreed to fix her mural in early 2005 (but wants an additional $6,000 for her trouble). [San Francisco Chronicle, 10-8-04, 10-15- 04]

Send your Weird News to Chuck Shepherd, P.O. Box 18737, Tampa FL 33679 or WeirdNews@earthlink.net

posted by me

:: 8:49:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Oliver the Great? ::

Will the real Oliver Stone please stand up?
By Joe Williams
Post-Dispatch Film Critic
11/26/2004

CHICAGO - Look at the evidence: The man promoting the recently opened "Alexander" is not the real Oliver Stone.

Granted, the man who greeted me last week at a Chicago hotel room is a fast-talking, tall and affable fellow who could pass for the great director, and he immediately tried to establish our ideological rapport by asking me if I think Michael Moore is going to be audited by the IRS. But when he quoted from an article of mine - an essay denouncing my peers as gutless pawns of the military-industrial complex - he revealed a familiarity with my files that's downright scary.

Then the man who's so politically engaged that he has the home phone number of Fidel Castro claimed he didn't get to follow the recent American elections because he was living in "France."

It gets weirder.

While it's no surprise that the director who made a biopic about Richard Nixon would be fascinated by a tormented figure like Alexander the Great, the man who calls himself Stone is enthusiastic in his praise for the warrior king of ancient Greece. The filmmaker says he's been studying the life of Alexander since reading a comic-book version as a kid in New York in the '50s. Val Kilmer, who co-stars as King Philip, the father of Alexander (played by Colin Farrell), has said that Stone was daydreaming about the project when they made "The Doors" in 1991.

Why the interest? "Let your mind go back to Alexander's time," he says in an infectiously animated voice. "You don't know where the end of the world is. You have these people, the Persians, who came to Greece a couple of hundred years beforehand and desecrated the shrines, and your father had been planning a retaliatory invasion all his life. But your mind is on the bigger goal. And your teacher, Aristotle, tells you that the great heroes of myth - Achilles, Hercules, Dionysius - have all gone eastward.

"You have to understand that purity. In those days, men killed with their arms and their hands and their legs. They killed with their eyes, and they could see the man they were killing. Alexander was the first king in history to weep for the men who died. And he includes those he conquered. He never wiped out anything he didn't have to. He lets the people worship local gods. He has a child with an Oriental woman. He encourages his soldiers to interbreed. And the beauty is, after he dies, the whole region prospers. Slaves are freed. Science goes back and forth. Great cities are built.

"The whole concept of the just war has been polluted and diluted. World War I and World War II were bad enough, but then there was Vietnam. My Vietnam movies ('Born on the Fourth of July,' 'Heaven and Earth' and the Oscar-winning 'Platoon') didn't do a damn thing to awaken us to what we were doing, and now we have these wars where we don't see the enemy we kill."

Stone says the parallels to the current occupant of the White House - a second-generation ruler who is waging a protracted war in the Middle East - are coincidental, but he adds that the analogy is not inherently negative. "With this American empire that we're building in Iraq and Afghanistan and maybe next Iran, who knows how it will turn out? Depending on who writes the history books, Bush may become known as 'George the Great.' "

If Stone, who fought in Vietnam, is developing a more ambivalent attitude toward power, it's not for lack of doing his homework. The big-budget "Alexander" may be the most meticulously detailed (if morally muddy) film of his distinguished career, a career in which he's specialized in large-scale biographies of powerful men.

"Critics are looking for slices of life, independence, honesty, blah-blah-blah," he says. "That's great, but there's other things too, you know?"

Read more here.

posted by me

:: 6:57:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Report from the browser wars ::

Firefox cutting into IE's lead
By Paul Festa
Staff Writer, CNET News.com

As Firefox marks its 5 millionth download and moves to retail stores, a survey showed Microsoft's heavyweight Internet Explorer slipping below 90 percent market share.

OneStat.com, an Amsterdam, Netherlands-based provider of Web traffic measurement services, said that according to numbers gleaned from 2 million Web surfers around the world, the Mozilla Foundation's new Firefox releases appear to be cutting into Microsoft's still commanding lead in the browser market.

"It seems that people are switching from Microsoft's Internet Explorer to Mozilla's new Firefox browser," Niels Brinkman, OneStat.com co-founder, said in a statement.

OneStat's statistics, based on the Web surfers' activity in 100 countries, showed that IE's market share slipped to 88.9 percent in the third week of November, down 5 percentage points from its share in May.

Mozilla-based browsers, including Firefox, rose to 7.4 percent, up 5 percentage points from May.

The new figures come on the heels of another survey that showed IE on a downward trend. Earlier this month, WebSideStory reported that IE was continuing to slip, claiming 92.9 percent of Web surfers in October versus 95.5 percent in June.

Mozilla heralded its download numbers as a sign of progress for the open-source browser.

Read more here.

posted by me

:: 6:23:00 PM [+] ::
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:: "REPUBLICAN CHALLENGES PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION BASED ON EXIT POLLS" ::

Found at GregPalast.com
from The New York Times

An international election observer mission - from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the European Parliament, the NATO Parliamentary Assembly and the Council of Europe - released a preliminary report on Monday declaring that the election did not meet democratic standards.

The observers' findings were seconded by Republican Senator Richard G. Lugar of Indiana, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Citing the disturbing fact that official results diverged sharply from a range of surveys of voters at polling places, Lugar said, "A concerted and forceful program of election-day fraud and abuse was enacted with either the leadership or cooperation of governmental authorities."

Other prominent Western observers were unsparing in their criticism of the state's conduct of the election.

"Fundamental flaws in Ukraine's presidential election process subverted its legitimacy," the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs, sponsored by the Democratic Party in the United States, declared in its preliminary report. The institute, cited "systematic intimidation, overt manipulation and blatant fraud" that were "designed to achieve a specific outcome irrespective of the will of the people."

-- New York Times

This reporter was unable to reach Senator Lugar regarding the inconsistency of official election results and exit polls in the USA; the intimidation of minority voters in Florida and Ohio; nor the failure to count two million ballots cast, half by African-American voters, in America's first post-democratic election held earlier this month.

Eastern bloc observers noted that balloting in Ohio, New Mexico and Florida did not meet Ukrainian standards, but applauded America's attempt to restore democratic institutions after the overthrow of elected government in 2000.

----------

Greg Palast is author of the New York Times bestseller, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy, now available on a 5 CD audio set read by Amy Goodman, Jim Hightower, Al Franken, Janeane Garofalo, Ed Asner, Alec Baldwin, Shiva Rose, Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, Alexandra Paul and Jello Biafra.

To hear a segment of the book or receive Greg’s investigative reports click here.

posted by me

:: 2:23:00 PM [+] ::
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:: "E-voting faces new scrutiny" ::

from CNET News.com
By Robert Lemos, Richard Shim and Evan Hansen

A newly announced federal investigation of the November election will bring fresh scrutiny on the performance of e-voting machines, but election experts said they believe any impact will be limited to future political contests.

On Tuesday, five Democratic representatives said the Government Accountability Office agreed to their request to review complaints that election machine technology and procedural issues had prevented some votes from being counted in the recently completed presidential election.

Read more here.

posted by me

:: 10:44:00 AM [+] ::
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:: More Conspiracy Nation stuff ::

Author Releases Book On Kennedy Assassination Theory
Livingstone Believes Evidence Was Faked
KSBW CA

SALINAS, Calif. -- On Nov. 22, 1963, President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas. Ever since then, conspiracy theories have lived on. And one of the nation's leading and most vocal conspiracy theorists and authors lives on the Monterey Peninsula.

Harvard educated Harry Livingstone has made a life's work of the Kennedy assassination. He has recently released two new books on the subject and talked to Action News about them.

When Kennedy was fatally shot as his motorcade traveled through Dallas, shock and grief overcame the nation. Rumors of a conspiracy gained credence as questions went unanswered.

"The bottom line is, Kennedy was being driven into an ambush," Livingstone said.

Livingstone has written volumes on the Kennedy assassination over his 40-year search of what happened in Dallas.

"We know exactly what happened," Livingstone said. "This was a radical-rightist takeover of the (United States) on Nov. 22, 1963. That's the truth. The proof that backs it up is the total fabrication of the evidence, in the case, the medical evidence, the visual evidence, photographs, X-rays, films, the fabrication of the case against Lee Harvey Oswald who was a patriot."

Livingstone believes the evidence was faked to cover up the conspiracy and support the theory that a single gunman -- Oswald -- killed Kennedy.

"The bottom line is, it is definitely established beyond a shadow of a doubt that all of the medical evidence in this case in fake. Even the autopsy report appears to be tampered with. Even the autopsy doctors have insisted that the wounds are not in the correct place," Livingstone said.

Livingstone said that Kennedy's real wounds would show that Kennedy was hit several times, and that some shots were fired from in front of the limousine. Some of Kennedy's brain splattered a motorcycle cop riding behind the car, according to Livingstone

"The point is that, that defined a trajectory from that motorcycle policeman, named Bobby Hargas, through Kennedy's head to the storm drain just to the right of the car," Livingstone said.

And the author claims to have new evidence about the bullet that hit Texas Gov. John Connally, who was seated in the front of the limousine.

"The pictures I'm just publishing now, which have never been shown before from the film, show that John Connally wasn't hit until several seconds after Kennedy is hit in the throat," Livingstone said.

Read more here.

posted by me

:: 10:59:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Online Music update ::

File Sharing Growing Like a Weed
From Wired News
Contrary to messages from the music industry, not all file sharing rips off artists. Weed, a peer-to-peer song-sharing program, provides a way for people to share music and pay artists. By Katie Dean.

ALSO
Music industry tests digital-only releases

Does a free download equal a lost sale?

Senate passes scaled-back copyright measure

posted by me

:: 9:11:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Conspiracy Planet ::

The “Manchurian Candidate”: Lee Harvey Oswald?
from Indy News Chiapas, Mexico
By Jerry Leonard

An American soldier is taken behind enemy lines and brainwashed as an unwitting assassin by communists in league with American political figures. This soldier then returns to the States to kill a presidential candidate as part of a political scheme to escalate and exploit Cold War tensions.

Sound familiar? It does if you’ve seen the classic movie “The Manchurian Candidate.”

Now consider this modified scenario: An American soldier is first brainwashed as an assassin and to behave as a communist by agents of his own government, then sent behind enemy lines as a defector, only to return to the States and assassinate an American president.

But this is no movie plot. Years of research have convinced me this is exactly what happened in the assassination of John F. Kennedy in 1963.

Before you dismiss this as yet another JFK conspiracy theory, look at how much it explains in light of what we’ve learned about the CIA’s skillful use of mind control and fake defectors over years of anti-communist operations.

· In a program known as MKULTRA, the CIA spent billions of dollars secretly perfecting mind control technology. Brutal methods of eliciting confessions from captured enemy agents (electric shock, sensory deprivation, hypnosis and truth drugs such as LSD) were developed on hundreds of unwitting victims. Used operationally for many years, this counterintelligence technology is now coming to light in the Abu Ghraib prison-torture scandal.

· In addition to “defensive” techniques, CIA researchers sought to develop countermeasures against human weaknesses identified by the MKULTRA tests to create "torture-proof" American agents who could be sent into enemy territory on intelligence missions or be used to infiltrate enemy organizations as convincing double-agents and provocateurs.

· But the CIA didn’t stop here. They also developed methods to brainwash so-called "involuntary assassins" who would not question orders to kill on command in Cold War operations. According to declassified government documents published by the New York Times, such agents would carry out actions “even against such fundamental laws of nature as self-preservation.”

Indeed, a CIA memo (NYT, 1978) describing an experiment using "involuntary assassins written before the JFK assassination predicted the details surrounding the crime with eerie precision. According to the declassified memo from the 1950s, as a “trigger mechanism” for a “bigger project” a defector would be manipulated to kill an American official under the influence of CIA mind control and then be “disposed of” after being taken into custody for the crime. Flash forward a few years to 1963. A defector (Oswald) kills an American official (Kennedy) and is then “disposed of” in police custody (by Jack Ruby). The “trigger mechanism” (death of a president) clears the way to a “bigger project”: escalation of the Cold War on an unprecedented scale.

The parallels are striking. But is there supporting evidence for the scenario of Oswald being unwittingly manipulated as an intelligence pawn in a similar operation?

Read more here.

posted by me

:: 8:59:00 PM [+] ::
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:: "Veteran reporter recalls JFK assassination" ::

from The Paris News, TX
By Charles Richards

At 12:30 p.m. on this day 41 years ago, President John F. Kennedy was riding through downtown Dallas in a motorcade when the shots rang out that took his life.

Like Sept. 11, 2001, would later become, Nov. 22, 1963, became a day that all of us old enough would forever remember where we were and what we were doing at the moment we heard that the president had been shot as he and the First Lady sat in an open air-vehicle beside Texas Gov. John Connally and his wife.

I was a 22-year-old senior at Texas Tech, picking up some laundry at the cleaners, when a bulletin news report came over the radio in the store.

Minutes later, I ran into the Journalism Building, where other members of the staff of the Toreador, as the student newspaper was known at the time, were gathered around a teletype machine to see the news of the assassination as it clicked off at 66 words per minute.

Read more here.

ALSO
from DallasNews.com
Review: Echoes of dark days
LBJ recordings give insight into national tragedy

And more on the game...
Freak-show vibe is saddest part of JFK anniversary

posted by me

:: 8:44:00 PM [+] ::
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:: "The conspiracy game" ::

JFK's assassination is turned into computer entertainment
By Paul Kelbie, Scotland Correspondent
The Independent UK
23 November 2004

For years, experts have argued over who killed President John Kennedy and whether it was the work of a lone gunman.

Now, after four decades of endless speculation, a Scottish-designed computer game has been accused of plumbing new depths by turning one of the most controversial political killings in history into "interactive entertainment".

From the sixth floor window of a virtual reality book depository in Dallas, Texas, anyone with a computer and about £6 can take the place of Lee Harvey Oswald and relive the infamous assassination. A "blood effects" button can be pressed for those who prefer extra gore.

Launched on the 41st anniversary of the assassination, JFK:Reloaded has been branded "despicable" by aides to the late president's surviving brother, Ted Kennedy.

The new British-made "docu-game" aims to simulate the final moments of the President's life and offers up to £53,800 in prize money for the first person to most accurately recreate the three shots credited with killing Kennedy and sparking a worldwide industry of conspiracy theorists.

Although it is the first independent venture for the Glasgow-based company Traffic, which designed the interactive game, many of the 10-strong team, who took 10 months to research and six months to program the game, have experienced working on some of the most notorious interactive titles of the past few years - including the original Grand Theft Auto, State of Emergency and Killzone, some of which have been blamed for a rise in real-life violent gun crime.

According to Traffic, the aim is to generate interest in one of the most important moments in US history among a new audience, who may be experienced in the ways of new technology but probably know little about what happened in Dallas on 22 November 1963.

The game, which can only be downloaded from the internet, for $9.99 (£6), provides links to background information on the president and the facts and theories surrounding his assassination.

Yesterday the company denied that JFK:Reloaded glorified the assassination. "Although the actual act is violent the game itself concentrates on whether it is possible to do what Lee Harvey Oswald is supposed to have done," said Dean Barrett, a company spokesman.

"It is amazing the way some people have reacted. The topic has been the subject of films and books for years, but because somebody makes it part of an interactive entertainment piece that is somehow more offensive."

Read more here.

ALSO
from BBC News Online
JFK shooting game provokes anger

from The Australian
Fury over JFK assassin game

from The Houston Chronicle
Video game re-creates slaying of Kennedy

from MSNBC.com
Nov. 22, Now a Game

posted by me

:: 8:23:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Florida 2K4 ::

Report: Florida data suggests e-voting problems
By Robert Lemos
Staff Writer, CNET News.com

Researchers at the University of California at Berkeley published on Friday a statistical analysis of irregularities in Florida voter behavior that contends that the voting patterns favored President Bush to the tune of 130,000 to 260,000 votes.

The report, by four U.C. Berkeley researchers, analyzed the statistical relationships between Florida's Nov. 2 results of the election and a variety of factors, including historical trends in Florida, racial factors and county size. According to the analysis, people using electronic voting machines tended to favor President Bush in proportion to the number of registered Democrats in each county.

The group stressed that the results were not proof of any errors in counting the vote, but merely suggested that some link existed between the type of machine used to tally votes and the margin by which President Bush won.

"Without a paper trail, statistical comparisons of jurisdictions that used e-voting are the only tool available to diagnose problems with the new technology," the researchers stated in the report.

The paper was authored by Michael Hout, a professor of sociology at U.C. Berkeley, and three other researchers. The analysis found a statistical relationship between electronic voting machines and votes for President Bush, which seems to have accounted for anywhere from 130,000 votes to 260,000 votes. Hout was not immediately available for comment.

Read more here.

posted by me

:: 3:04:00 PM [+] ::
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:: "Protests Target Bush Presence at Summit" ::

SANTIAGO, Chile (AP) - Police on Friday clashed with rock-throwing protesters demonstrating against the planned presence of President Bush at a weekend summit of 21 Pacific Rim countries that they likened to a rich man's club.

The street clashes market the fourth straight day of confrontations between police and protesters opposed to the two-day annual gathering of the leaders for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, hosted this year by Chile.

Riot police used water cannons and tear gas to break up the protest and detained about 25 people, said Marco Riquleme, leader of the group that organized the unauthorized demonstration.

Thousands of protesters marched through downtown Santiago later Friday in a government-authorized protest far from the summit site. The marchers also expressed outrage at holding the summit in Chile, the presence of Bush and the war in Iraq.

Local media reports estimated as many as 15,000 people joined the government-authorized march. Organizers claimed the number was closer to 30,000. Police wouldn't give an estimate.

The demonstrators at both protests likened the summit to a rich man's club that does nothing for the poor, but the planned arrival of Bush brought out the most anger.

Marchers held up posters saying: "Bush, you stink," and "Terrorist Bush." Some chanted: "Bush, listen: Chile is not for sale!" and "Bush, fascist, thief, murderer!"

"We have seen what APEC means to us: Turning our workers into cheap force for the businesses," said labor union activist Saul Villegas.

Maria Ines, a housewife, said: "My protest is against Bush. No one gave permission to go into Iraq. He thinks he's God!"

Read more here.

posted by me

:: 12:23:00 PM [+] ::
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:: "E-Vote Probe Urged" ::

Researchers: Florida Vote Fishy
From Wired News
President Bush received up to 260,000 more votes than he should have in Florida counties that used touch-screen voting machines, according to an academic analysis. The researchers call on Florida to examine the results. By Kim Zetter.

posted by me

:: 3:23:00 PM [+] ::
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:: The Leonid Meteor Shower 2004 ::

Modest Peak Expected Nov. 16-19
Joe Rao
SPACE.com Night Sky Columnist

Next week brings us the return of the famous Leonid Meteor Shower, a meteor display that over the past several years has brought great anticipation and excitement to sky watchers around the world.

Solely from the standpoint of viewing circumstances, this will be a favorable year to look for these meteors, since the Moon will be only a thin crescent and will have set in the west long before the constellation Leo (from where the meteors get their name) begins to rise. This is in stark contrast to 2002 when a nearly full Moon lit up the sky like a spotlight and wiped out all but the brightest meteors.

Last year, conditions were much better; the Moon had slimmed to a narrow crescent in the predawn morning sky and offered little hindrance. But this year, the Moon will be out of the sky completely, offering perfect viewing conditions.

The Leonid meteors are debris shed into space by the Tempel-Tuttle comet, which swings through the inner solar system at intervals of 33 years. With each visit the comet leaves behind a trail of dust in its wake.

Lots of the comet's old dusty trails litter the mid-November part of Earth's orbit and the Earth glides through this debris zone every year. Occasionally we'll pass directly through an unusually concentrated dust trail, or filament, which can spark a meteor storm resulting in thousands of meteors per hour. That's what happened in 1999, 2001 and 2002.

Since the Tempel-Tuttle comet passed the Sun in 1998, it was in those years immediately following its passage that the Leonids put on their best show.

But now, the comet - and its dense trails of dust -- have all receded far beyond Earth's orbit and back into the outer regions of the solar system. So odds are that there is little, if any chance of any unusual meteor activity.

Times of (prospective) peak activity

In the 2004 Observer's Handbook of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada, meteor experts Margaret Campbell-Brown and Peter Brown, indicate that this year's peak activity should occur on the morning of Nov. 17.

They cite 9:00 GMT, which corresponds to 4 a.m. EST and 1 a.m. PST. This is the moment when the Earth will be passing closest to the orbit of the long-departed comet, and when our planet seemingly is most likely to encounter some residual comet material. This time is highly favorable for North Americans, especially those in the eastern United States and eastern Canada.

But while Leonid rates are unpredictable, it is unlikely that more than a dozen meteors per hour will be seen this year during peak activity, at least for viewer's with dark skies away from cities.

Other meteor researchers, however, such as Jeremie Vaubaillon of France, David Asher of Ireland and Esko Lyytinen of Finland have examined Leonid prospects for this year and also suggest watching for some meteor activity two days later, on Nov. 19.

For instance: sometime around 6:40 GMT (1:40 a.m. EST) on the 19th, the Earth might interact with material that was shed by comet Tempel-Tuttle back in the year 1333. But at best, only about 10 Leonids per hour may be seen. Lyytinen even suggests that because of gravitational perturbations affecting these particles after making 20 trips around the Sun, that this sparse activity might actually take place several hours earlier, which would favor observers in Europe.

Later that same day, the Earth could possibly sweep through a fresher and somewhat more concentrated trail of material dating back to 1733. Perhaps a brief bevy of 30 to 60 Leonids per hour may seen, but the time frame when these meteors are predicted to be most numerous (approximately 19:00 to 22:00 GMT) favors observers in Asia and Australia (where it will be the early morning hours of Nov. 20).

How to watch

The meteors will appear to emanate from out of the so-called "Sickle" of Leo, but prospective viewers should not concentrate on that area of the sky around Leo, but rather keep their eyes moving around to different parts of the sky.

Because Leo does not start coming fully into view until the after midnight hours, that would be the best time to concentrate on looking for the Leonid meteors.

The hours after midnight are generally best for watching for "shooting stars" anyway, because before midnight we are riding on the back side of the Earth in its orbit around the Sun, whereas after midnight we are on the front or advancing side. After midnight the only meteoroids escaping collision are those ahead of the Earth and moving in the same direction with velocities exceeding 18.5 miles per second. All others we will either overtake or meet head-on. But before midnight, when we are on the backside, the only meteoroids we encounter are those with velocities high enough to overtake the Earth.

Therefore, on the average, morning meteors appear brighter and faster than those we see in the evening.

And because the Leonids are moving along in their orbit around the Sun in a direction opposite to that of Earth, they slam into our atmosphere nearly head-on, resulting in the fastest meteor velocities possible: 45 miles per second (72 kilometers per second). Such speeds tend to produce bright meteors, which leave long-lasting streaks or trains in their wake.

ALSO from Space.com
How Meteor Showers Work
Meteor Watching Tips
The Power of a Shooting Star

AND from MSNBC.com
Your guide to the Leonid meteor show

posted by me

:: 8:44:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Mayhem @ 1600 ::

Another Man Jumps Fence at White House

WASHINGTON (AP) - Just hours after a man set himself on fire on Pennsylvania Avenue, another man jumped the fence onto White House grounds.

WTOP has learned that around 5 p.m. Monday, the man scaled the six-foot high fence, landed on the other side, and was pounced-on by the uniformed Secret Service.

This happened just hours after the Secret Service put the flames out on another man. D.C. Fire and EMS spokesman Alan Etter says the 52-year-old man suffered serious burns to his head, back, arms and face.

Officials do not know what sparked either man to do what he did.

posted by me

:: 8:23:00 PM [+] ::
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:: "Give It Away" ::

Music Is Not a Loaf of Bread
From Wired News
When Wilco released Yankee Hotel Foxtrot online for free in 2001, the album's popularity soared and Wilco became a commercial success. Front man Jeff Tweedy tells Wired News' Xeni Jardin why the music industry is dead wrong about file sharing.

ALSO
from Wired News

Dark Side of the Band

Washington Dems Get Out The Vote

Do Blogs Change the News?

posted by me

:: 10:23:00 AM [+] ::
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:: So Weird ::

From Chuck Shepherd's News of the Weird

LEAD STORY
Ultra-Orthodox California rabbi Nachum Shifren, 53, cuts a dashing figure on the beach at Malibu, where he is the legendary surfer "Shifty," easily spottable on 20-foot waves by his long beard, according to a September profile in the San Diego Union-Tribune. In his spare time (he says he is ready to ride 24/6, allowing for the Sabbath), he has conducted "Passover surfaris" and beach bar-mitzvahs, and his lectures on Deuteronomy include the observation that "surf punks" paddled out into the Red Sea during the Jews' exodus from Egypt. "(T)he whole religious experience," he told the reporter, "the outer body experience, is encompassed in the act of surfing." [San Diego Union-Tribune, 9- 23-04]

Almost All True
Three of these four things really happened, just recently. Are you cynical enough to figure out the made-up story? (a) The government of Vietnam is said to be moving to lethal injection for capital punishment because its firing squads, populated with volunteers, too often nervously miss. (b) An airplane hangar in a Los Angeles suburb was found filled with bags of empty soda cans, to a height of 10 feet, with police believing a gang has been stealing cans from homeless people. (c) A California county is systematically ticketing drivers who appear to be high only on kava herbal tea. (d) A Missouri man fled a court hearing on an animal abuse charge but was captured a few minutes later hiding in a doghouse.

Answer to Almost All True: (a), (c) and (d) are true. [Chicago Sun-Times-Daily Telegraph (London), 10-21-04] [Reuters, 10-25- 04] [Southeast Missourian, 10-11-04]

Send your Weird News to Chuck Shepherd, P.O. Box 18737, Tampa FL 33679 or WeirdNews@earthlink.net

posted by me

:: 1:03:00 AM [+] ::
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:: "KERRY WON OHIO" ::

JUST COUNT THE BALLOTS AT THE BACK OF THE BUS
In These Times
Friday, November 12, 2004

Most voters in Ohio chose Kerry. Here's how the votes vanished.

By Greg Palast

This February, Ken Blackwell, Ohio's Secretary of State, told his State Senate President, "The possibility of a close election with punch cards as the state's primary voting device invites a Florida-like calamity." Blackwell, co-chair of Bush-Cheney reelection campaign, wasn't warning his fellow Republican of disaster, but boasting of an opportunity to bring in Ohio for Team Bush no matter what the voters wanted. And most voters in Ohio wanted JFK, not GWB. But their choice won't count because their votes won't be counted.

The ballots that add up to a majority for John Kerry in Ohio -- and in New Mexico -- are locked up in two Republican hidey-holes: "spoiled" ballots and "provisional" ballots.

OHIO SPOILED ROTTEN
American democracy has a dark little secret. In a typical presidential election, two million ballots are simply chucked in the garbage, marked "spoiled" and not counted. A dive into the electoral dumpster reveals something special about these votes left to rot. In a careful county-by-county, precinct-by-precinct analysis of the Florida 2000 race, the US Civil Rights Commission discovered that 54% of the votes in the spoilage bin were cast by African-Americans. And Florida, Heaven help us, is typical. Nationwide, the number of Black votes "disappeared" into the spoiled pile is approximately one million. The other million in the no-count pit come mainly from Hispanic, Native-American and poor white precincts, a decidedly Democratic demographic.

Ohio Republicans, simultaneously in charge of both the Bush-Cheney get-out-the-vote drive and the state's vote-counting rules, doggedly and systematically insured the spoilage pile would be as high as the White House.

Vote spoilage comes in two flavors. There are "overvotes" -- too many punches in the cards -- and "undervotes." Here we find the hanging, dimpled and "pregnant" chads created by old, dysfunctional punch card machines, in which the bit of paper covering the hole doesn't fall out, but hangs on. Machines can't read these, but we humans, who know a hole when we see one, have no problem reading these cards ... if allowed to. This is how Katherine Harris defeated Al Gore, by halting the hand count of the spoiled punch cards not, as is generally believed, by halting a "recount."

Whose chads are left hanging? In Florida in 2000 federal investigators determined that Black voters' ballots spoiled 900% more often than white voters, mainly due to punch card error. Ohio Republicans found those racial odds quite attractive. The state was the only one of fifty to refuse to eliminate or fix these vote-eating machines, even in the face of a lawsuit by the ACLU.

Apparently, the Ohio Republicans like what the ACLU found. The civil rights group's expert testimony concluded that Ohio's cussed insistence on forcing 73% of its electorate to use punch card machines had an "overwhelming" racial bias, voiding votes mostly in Black precincts. Blackwell doesn't disagree; and he hopes to fix the machinery ... sometime after George Bush's next inauguration. In the meantime, the state's Attorney General Jim Petro, a Republican, strategically postponed the trial date of the ACLU case until after the election.

Fixing a punch card machine is cheap and easy. If Ohio simply placed a card-reading machine in each polling station, as Michigan did this year, voters could have checked to ensure their vote would tally. If not, they would have gotten another card.

Blackwell knows that. He also knows that if those reading machines had been installed, almost all the 93,000 spoiled votes, overwhelmingly Democratic, would have closed the gap on George Bush's lead of 136,000 votes.


JIM CROW'S PROVISIONAL BALLOT
Add to the spoiled ballots a second group of uncounted votes, the 'provisional' ballots, and -- voila! -- the White House would have turned Democrat blue.

But that won't happen because of the peculiar way provisional ballots are counted or, more often, not counted. Introduced by federal law in 2002, the provisional ballot was designed especially for voters of color. Proposed by the Congressional Black Caucus to save the rights of those wrongly scrubbed from voter rolls, it was, in Republican-controlled swing states, twisted into a back-of-the-bus ballot unlikely to be tallied.

Unlike the real thing, these ballots are counted only by the whimsy and rules of a state's top elections official; and in Ohio, that gives a virtually ballot veto to Secretary of State Blackwell.

Mr. Blackwell has a few rules to make sure a large proportion of provisional ballots won't be counted. For the first time in memory, the Secretary of State has banned counting ballots cast in the "wrong" precinct, though all neighborhoods share the same President.

Over 155,000 Ohio voters were shunted to these second-class ballots. The election-shifting bulge in provisional ballots (more than 3% of the electorate) was the direct result of the national Republican strategy that targeted African-American precincts for mass challenges on election day.

This is the first time in four decades that a political party has systematically barred -- in this case successfully -- hundreds of thousands of Black voters from access to the voting booth. While investigating for BBC Television, we obtained three dozen of the Republican Party's confidential "caging" lists, their title for spreadsheets listing names and addresses of voters they intended to block on any pretext.

We found that every single address of the thousands on these Republican hit lists was located in Black-majority precincts. You might find that nasty and racist. It may also be a crime.

Before 1965, Jim Crow laws in the Deep South did not bar Blacks from voting. Rather, the segregationist game was played by applying minor technical voting requirements only to African-Americans. That year, Congress voted to make profiling and impeding minority voters, even with a legal pretext, a criminal offence under the Voting Rights Act.

But that didn't stop the Republicans of '04. Their legally questionable mass challenge to Black voters is not some low-level dirty tricks operation of local party hacks. Emails we obtained show the lists were copied directly to the Republican National Committee's chief of research and to the director of a state campaign.

Many challenges center on changes of address. On one Republican caging list, 50 addresses changed from Jacksonville to overseas, African-American soldiers shipped Over There.

You don't have to guess the preferences registered on the provisional ballots. Republicans went on a challenging rampage, while Democrats pledged to hold to the tradition of letting voters vote.

Blackwell has said he will count all the "valid" provisional ballots. However, his rigid regulations, like the new guess-your-precinct rule, are rigged to knock out enough voters to keep Bush's skinny lead alive. Other pre-election maneuvers by Republican officials -- late and improbably large purges of voter rolls, rejection of registrations -- maximized the use of provisional ballots which will never be counted. For example, a voter wrongly tagged an ineligible "felon" voter (and there's plenty in that category, mostly African-Americans), will lose their ballot even though they are wrongly identified.


KERRY BLACKS OUT
It was heartening that, during his campaign, John Kerry broke the political omerta that seems to prohibit public mention of the color of votes not counted in America. "Don't tell us that in the strongest democracy on earth a million disenfranchised African Americans is the best we can do." The Senator promised the NAACP convention, "This November, we're going to make sure that every single vote is counted."

But this week, Kerry became the first presidential candidate in history to break a campaign promise after losing an election. The Senator waited less than 24 hours to abandon more than a quarter million Ohio voters still waiting for their provisional and chad-spoiled ballots to be counted.

While disappointing, I can understand the cold calculus against taking the fight to the end. To count the ballots, Kerry's lawyers would, first, have to demand a hand reading of the punch cards. Blackwell, armed with the Supreme Court's Bush v. Gore diktat, would undoubtedly pull a "Kate Harris" by halting or restricting a hand count. Most daunting, Kerry's team would also, as one state attorney general pointed out to me, have to litigate each and every rejected provisional ballot in court. This would entail locating up to a hundred thousand voters to testify to their right to the vote, with Blackwell challenging each with a holster full of regulations from the old Jim Crow handbook.

Given the odds and the cost to his political career, Kerry bent, not to the will of the people, but to the will to power of the Ohio Republican machine.

We have yet to total here the votes lost in missing absentee ballots, in eyebrow-raising touch screen tallies, in purges of legal voters from registries and other games played in swing states. But why dwell on these things? Our betters in the political and media elite have told us to get over it, move on.

To the victors go the spoils of electoral class war. As Ohio's politically ambitious Secretary of State brags on his own website, "Last time I checked,” Blackwell said, “Katherine Harris wasn't in a soup line, she's in Congress."



NEW MEXICO GOES KERRY - BUT WHO'S COUNTING?
Why single out Ohio? So it also went in New Mexico where ballots of Hispanic voters (two-to-one Kerry supporters) spoil at a rate five times that of white voters. Add in the astounding 13,000 provisional ballots in the Enchanted State -- handed out "like candy" to Hispanic, not white, voters according to a director of the Catholic Church's get-out-the-vote drive -- and Kerry wins New Mexico. Just count up the votes ... but that won't happen.

Investigative reporter Greg Palast is author of The Best Democracy Money Can Buy (Penguin 2004).

Oliver Shykles and Matthew Pascarella of GregPalast.com contributed to this article.

View Greg Palast's BBC Television film, "Bush Family Fortunes," now available on DVD, here.

posted by me

:: 10:11:00 PM [+] ::
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:: "THE ARCHITECTS OF DEFEAT" ::

From an e-newsletter
By Arianna Huffington

Twelve days before the election, James Carville stood in a Beverly Hills living room surrounded by two generations of Hollywood stars. After being introduced by Sen. John Kerry’s daughter, Alexandra, he told the room — confidently, almost cockily — that the election was in the bag.

“If we can’t win this damn election,” the advisor to the Kerry campaign said, “with a Democratic Party more unified than ever before, with us having raised as much money as the Republicans, with 55% of the country believing we’re heading in the wrong direction, with our candidate having won all three debates, and with our side being more passionate about the outcome than theirs — if we can’t win this one, then we can’t win shit! And we need to completely rethink the Democratic Party.”

Well, as it turns out, that’s exactly what should be done. But instead, Carville and his fellow architects of the Democratic defeat have spent the last week defending their campaign strategy, culminating on Monday morning with a breakfast for an elite core of Washington reporters.

At the breakfast, Carville, together with chief campaign strategist Bob Shrum and pollster Stan Greenberg, seemed intent on one thing — salvaging their reputations.

They blamed the public for not responding to John Kerry’s message on the economy, and they blamed the news media for distracting voters from this critical message with headlines from that pesky war in Iraq. “News events were driving this,” said Shrum. “The economy was not driving the news coverage.”

But shouldn’t it have been obvious that Iraq and the war on terror were the real story of this campaign? Only these Washington insiders, stuck in an anachronistic 1990s mind-set and re-fighting the ’92 election, could think that the economy would be the driving factor in a post-9/11 world with Iraq in flames. That the campaign’s leadership failed to recognize that it was no longer “the economy, stupid,” was the tragic flaw of the race.

In conversations with Kerry insiders over the last nine months, I’ve heard a recurring theme: that it was Shrum and the Clintonistas (including Greenberg, Carville and senior advisor Joe Lockhart) who dominated the campaign in the last two months and who were convinced that this election was going to be won on domestic issues, like jobs and healthcare, and not on national security.

As Tom Vallely, the Vietnam War veteran whom Kerry tapped to lead the response to the Swift boat attacks, told me: “I kept telling Shrum that before you walk through the economy door, you’re going to have to walk through the terrorism/Iraq door. But, unfortunately, the Clinton team, though technically skillful, could not see reality — they could only see their version of reality. And that was always about pivoting to domestic issues. As for Shrum, he would grab on to anyone’s strategy; he had none of his own.”

Vallely, together with Kerry’s brother, Cam, and David Thorne, the senator’s closest friend and former brother-in-law, created the “Truth and Trust Team.” This informal group within the campaign pushed at every turn to aggressively take on President Bush’s greatest claim: his leadership on the war on terror.

“When Carville and Greenberg tell reporters that the campaign was missing a defining narrative,” Thorne told me this week, “they forget that they were the ones insisting we had to keep beating the domestic-issues drum. So we never defended John's character and focused on his leadership with the same singularity of purpose that the Republicans put on George Bush's leadership. A fallout of this was that the campaign had no memorable ads. In a post-election survey, the only three ads remembered by voters were all Republican ads — and that was after we spent over $100 million on advertising."

Cam Kerry agrees. “There is a very strong John Kerry narrative that is about leadership, character and trust. But it was never made central to the campaign,” he said. “Yet, at the end of the day, a presidential campaign — and this post-9/11 campaign in particular — is about these underlying attributes rather than about a laundry list of issues."

It was the “Truth and Trust Team” that fought to have Kerry give a major speech clarifying his position on Iraq, which he finally did, to great effect, at New York University on Sept. 20. “That was the turning point,” Thorne, who was responsible for the campaign’s wildly successful online operation, told me. “John broke through and found his voice again. But even after the speech the campaign kept returning to domestic issues, and in the end I was only able to get just over a million dollars for ads making our case.”

Despite a lot of talk about “moral values,” exit polls proved that Iraq and the war on terror together were the issues uppermost in people’s minds. And therefore as Thorne and Vallely, among others, kept arguing, if the president continued to hold a double-digit advantage on his leadership on the war on terror, he would win. But those in charge of the Kerry campaign ignored this giant, blood-red elephant standing in the middle of the room and allowed themselves to be mesmerized by polling and focus group data that convinced them the economy was the way to go.

“We kept coming back from the road,” said James Boyce, a Kerry family friend who traveled across the country with Cam Kerry, “and telling the Washington team that the questions we kept getting were more about safety and Iraq than healthcare. But they just didn’t want to hear it. Their minds were made up.”

Boyce, along with Cam Kerry, were instrumental in bringing to the campaign four of the more outspoken 9/11 widows, including Kristin Breitweiser, who had provided critical leadership in stopping the Bush administration from undermining the 9/11 Commission. "We told the campaign," Breitweiser told me, "that we would not come out and endorse Kerry unless he spoke out against the war in Iraq. It was quite a battle. In fact, I got into a fight with Mary Beth Cahill on the phone. I actually said to her: 'You're not getting it. This election is about national security.' I told her this in August. She didn't want to hear it."

The campaign’s regular foreign policy conference calls were another arena where this battle was fought, with Kerry foreign policy advisor Richard Holbrooke taking the lead against the candidate coming out with a decisive position on Iraq that diverged too far from the president’s. Former Colorado Sen. Gary Hart consistently argued against Holbrooke, and Delaware Sen. Joseph Biden expressed his disagreement with this ruffle-no-feathers approach directly to Kerry. But until the Sept. 20 speech in New York, it was Holbrooke who prevailed — in no small part because his position dovetailed with the strategic direction embraced by Shrum and campaign manager Mary Beth Cahill.

Jamie Rubin, the Clinton State Department spokesman, had also argued that Kerry should stick close to the Bush position, and even told the Washington Post that Kerry, too, would probably have invaded Iraq. Kerry was reportedly apoplectic but did not ask for Rubin’s resignation, thereby letting the damage linger for two weeks before Rubin told Ron Brownstein of The Los Angeles Times that he was not speaking for the candidate.

Just how misguided the campaign’s leadership was can be seen in the battle that took place between Vernon Jordan, the campaign’s debate negotiator, and Cahill and Shrum. “They were so opposed,” someone close to the negotiations told me, “to Jordan’s accepting the first debate being all about foreign policy, in exchange for a third debate, that Jordan and Cahill had a knock down, drag out argument. It was so bad that Jordan had to send her flowers before they could make up.” It was a familiar strategic battle with Jordan siding with those who believed that unless Kerry could win on national security, he would not win period.

Behind the scenes, former President Clinton also kept up the drumbeat, telling Kerry in private conversations right to the end that he should focus on the economy rather than Iraq or the war on terror, and that he should come out in favor of all 11 state constitutional amendments banning gay marriage — a move that would have been a political disaster for a candidate who had already been painted as an unprincipled flip-flopper. Sure, Kerry spoke about Iraq here and there until the end of the race (how could he not?), but the vast majority of what came out of the campaign, including Kerry’s radio address 10 days before the election, was on domestic issues.

Another good illustration of how the clash played out was the flu vaccine shortage, which ended up being framed not as a national security issue (how can you trust this man to keep you safe against biological warfare when he can’t even handle getting you the flu vaccine?), but as a healthcare issue with the Bush campaign turning it into an attack on trial lawyers.

“This election was about security,” Gary Hart told me. But when he suggested that Kerry should talk about jobs and energy and other issues in the context of security, Hart said, he was “constantly confronted with focus group data, according to which the people wanted to hear a different message focused on the economy.”

The last few days of the campaign, in which national security dominated the headlines — with the 380 tons of missing explosives in Iraq, multiple deaths of U.S. soldiers, insurgents gaining ground and the reappearance of Osama bin Laden — show how Kerry could have pulled away from Bush if, early on, his campaign had built the frame into which all these events would have fit.

How the campaign handled the reappearance of Bin Laden the Friday before the election says it all. “Stan Greenberg was adamant,” a senior campaign strategist told me, “that Kerry should not even mention Osama. He insisted that because his polling showed Kerry had already won the election, he should not do anything that would endanger his position. We argued that since Osama dominated the news, it would be hard for us to get any other message through. So a compromise was reached, according to which Kerry issued a bland statesman-like statement about Osama (followed by stumping on the economy), and we dispatched Holbrooke to argue on TV that the reappearance of Bin Laden proved that the president had not made us safer.”

As at almost every other turn, the campaign had chosen caution over boldness. Why did these highly paid professionals make such amateurish mistakes? In the end, it was the old obsession with pleasing undecided voters (who, Greenberg argued right up until the election, would break for the challenger) and an addiction to polls and focus groups, which they invariably interpreted through their Clinton-era filters. It appears that you couldn’t teach these old Beltway dogs new tricks. It’s time for some fresh political puppies.

Arianna's Latest Blog Entries

posted by me

:: 3:44:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Vets for Peace ::

Principal apologizes for speakers at Veterans Day assembly

BELLINGHAM (AP) — Two members of Veterans for Peace got a standing ovation when they addressed a high-school Veterans Day assembly, but their appearance prompted a letter of apology from the principal.

Sehome High School officials received some complaints that yesterday's event was too one-sided, principal Jim Kistner said. He told The Bellingham Herald that staff members had said that graphic descriptions of war had upset a number of students.

"I want to apologize for making any student or staff member uncomfortable because the presentation at Sehome's Veterans Day Assembly today was used to advance a particular political agenda," Kistner wrote in the letter distributed to students.

"Our community speakers had agreed that this assembly would honor our veterans. We deeply regret that they did not."

"I completely disagree with that last statement," Marshall Petryni, 17, a student organizer of the assembly, said in a telephone interview today with The Associated Press.

"A bunch of kids came up to me after — some were crying, some gave me hugs," Petryni said.

One of the speakers, Mark Polin, who served in the Navy from 1979 to 1997, told the gathering of nearly 1,000 students that Veterans Day was originally Armistice Day — commemorating an end to war.

In a telephone interview today from his Bellingham home, Polin said he was at the assembly "to honor the warrior and not the war. The way to honor veterans is to not keep repeating the same mistakes and sending young men and women to their deaths."

Army veteran Ben Sherman, author of "Medic: The Story of a Conscientious Objector in the Vietnam War," described war casualties in detail to the students and unfurled a scroll with the names of the more than 1,100 U.S. troops killed so far in Iraq.

They were introduced to the audience by Dr. Bob Olson of Bellevue, a World War II veteran who founded the Bellingham chapter of Veterans for Peace, Sherman said, noting that three generations of veterans were represented.

"We weren't there to tell them to believe one way or another," he said today his Mercer Island home. "We were there to say, 'Here's the cost. Maybe your generation will find ways it won't cost that much.' Any veteran who's been in a war will tell you there has to be a better way to solve our problems than this."

The men received standing ovations, and students gathered afterward to shake their hands.

"It wasn't your normal Veterans Day ceremony," Sherman said, adding, "If he'd had three generals talk about how wonderfully we're doing in Iraq ... would he then write a letter to parents about how only one side of the story was told? That side is always told."

Read more here.

posted by me

:: 10:44:00 PM [+] ::
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:: News Release ::

Green and Libertarian Presidential Candidates to Demand Ohio Recount

David Cobb and Michael Badnarik, the 2004 presidential candidates for the Green and Libertarian parties, today announced their intentions to file a formal demand for a recount of the presidential ballots cast in Ohio.

“Due to widespread reports of irregularities in the Ohio voting process, we are compelled to demand a recount of the Ohio presidential vote. Voting is the heart of the democratic process in which we as a nation put our faith. When people stand in line for hours to exercise their right to vote, they need to know that all votes will be counted fairly and accurately. We must protect the rights of the people of Ohio, as well as all Americans, and stand up for the right to vote and the right for people’s votes to be counted. The integrity of the democratic process is at stake,” the two candidates said in a joint statement.

The candidates also demanded that Ohio Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell, a Republican who chaired the Ohio Bush campaign, recuse himself from the recount process.

ALSO
Ralph Nader Calls for Recount

Good News From Bev Harris

Vote Theft Round 2: And so the sorting and discarding of Kerry votes begins

Rumors of irregularities fuel debate on election

posted by me

:: 10:33:00 PM [+] ::
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:: "Diebold to Settle E-Voting Suit" ::

From Wired News
The company will pony up $2.6 million to settle a lawsuit over allegedly flawed electronic voting systems it sold to California counties. Surprise: E-vote activists still aren't happy.

posted by me

:: 10:01:00 PM [+] ::
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:: "Quote Marks" ::

From Wired News
"My friend said St. Expedite is all about delivering information fast."
— Devotees of a mystery saint insist his powers echo the meaning of his name.

posted by me

:: 10:23:00 PM [+] ::
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:: "Court Ruling Halts Guantanamo Proceedings" ::

GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba (AP) - A U.S. federal court ruled Monday that Osama bin Laden's driver was entitled to a legal hearing on whether he is a prisoner of war - a landmark opinion that could prevent military trials of alleged enemy combatants held at Guantanamo Bay.

The government said it would immediately seek a stay of that ruling and file an appeal.

It was the first time a federal court halted legal proceedings before U.S. military commissions, resurrected from World War II, at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base. No trials have been held, although tentative trial dates for four detainees had been scheduled.

A U.S. District Court judge in Washington halted the pretrial proceedings of Salim Ahmed Hamdan, 34, of Yemen, after his lawyers filed a petition. Hamdan - who is charged with conspiracy to commit war crimes, murder and terrorism and says that he never supported terrorism - was to be the first detainee tried, on Dec. 7.

The judge rejected the U.S. government's contention that Hamdan and other detainees are not prisoners of war but enemy combatants, a classification affording fewer legal protections under the Geneva Conventions. Hamdan was declared an enemy combatant last month by a review tribunal during a hearing his lawyer was barred from.

"Unless and until a competent tribunal determines that petitioner is not entitled to protections afforded prisoners of war under Article 4 of the Geneva Convention ... of Aug. 12, 1949, he may not be tried by military commission for the offenses with which he is charged," U.S. District Judge James Robertson said.

"There is nothing in this record to suggest that a competent tribunal has determined that Hamdan is not a prisoner of war under the Geneva Conventions."

Read more here.

posted by me

:: 9:17:00 PM [+] ::
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:: "House Dems Seek Election Inquiry" ::

From Wired News
Three congressmen are asking the General Accounting Office to investigate irregularities with voting machines during the presidential election, but they don't anticipate a change in election outcome. By Kim Zetter.

posted by me

:: 9:10:00 AM [+] ::
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:: So Weird ::

From Chuck Shepherd's News of the Weird

LEAD STORY
Most of the Japanese World War II suicide-mission dive-bombers ("kamikazes") were successful, but a few failed pilots are still alive (their missions aborted because of weather or equipment failure), according to a Los Angeles Times dispatch in September. These days, they resent being compared to extremist-Islamic suicide bombers, who, the kamikazes say, act out of hatred rather than love of country and who do not always aim at military-only targets. On the other hand, one of the survivors said that many kamikaze "volunteers" were, contrary to legend, reluctant to die but caught up in patriotic fervor. [Los Angeles Times, 9-25-04]

Almost All True
Three of these four things really happened, just recently. Are you cynical enough to figure out the made-up story? (a) Two men removed the ATM from a Milwaukee gas station, chained it to their bumper, and drove away, dragging it through the streets, as if no one might notice. (b) A lawyer cost the European Commission the equivalent of $1.2 million when a document was not "delivered" on time because the lawyer had mistakenly faxed the blank sides of each page. (c) University of Nebraska researchers, on a grant from Monsanto Corp., began a six-week study, living in an unsanitary, 40-pet home to test an odor-displacement spray. (d) A local woman was ticketed (and later fined the equivalent of $200) at Rome's Trevi Fountain as she was explaining its history to her out-of-town guests but did not have a tour guide's license.

[Psst. Answer to Almost All True: (a), (c) and (d) are true.]

Send your Weird News to Chuck Shepherd, P.O. Box 18737, Tampa FL 33679 or WeirdNews@earthlink.net

posted by me

:: 10:23:00 PM [+] ::
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:: Two Americas? ::

Bush, Kerry Voters Differ on View of U.S.
NANCY BENAC
Associated Press
SJ Mercury News

WASHINGTON - The nation is emerging from the 2004 presidential election with two very different portraits of itself sketched by two very different halves of its population.

George Bush's voters go to church more often than John Kerry's and are more likely to oppose gay marriage and abortion. They are more likely to own guns and to feel better-off financially than they did four years ago.

Sure, they are concerned about terrorism. But they are more concerned about "moral values."

Most think things are going well for the United States in Iraq, and that the war has made America more secure.

They are satisfied with the Republican Bush administration; many are enthusiastic.

Voters who supported the Democratic nominee, by contrast, are more worried about the economy. They view "moral values" and terrorism as lesser concerns. They go to church, but less frequently. Few see any improvement in their financial situation over the past four years.

They gave their votes to the Massachusetts senator because they thought he represented hope for change. They are far more worried about events in Iraq and the job situation at home. Almost half feel angry at the administration.

It all adds up to two different mindsets, reinforcing the idea of a schism in the political landscape.

Bush's victory left Emma Starr, a writer from New York, feeling devastated and more than a bit disconnected from the other half of America.

"We should have two distinct nations," she said after getting word of Kerry's concession as she left a Brooklyn food co-op. "Why should we be forced to live together under the rule of an evil dictator?"

For every voter like Starr, there was at least one like Clifford Barneman, a psychologist from Little Egg Harbor Township in New Jersey. He voted for Bush as a "man of his word" who had strong values.

Read more here.

posted by me

:: 9:55:00 AM [+] ::
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:: The Moore Report ::

17 Reasons Not to Slit Your Wrists
By Michael Moore

Dear Friends,

Ok, it sucks. Really sucks. But before you go and cash it all in, let's, in the words of Monty Python, “always look on the bright side of life!” There IS some good news from Tuesday's election.

Here are 17 reasons not to slit your wrists:

1. It is against the law for George W. Bush to run for president again.

2. Bush's victory was the NARROWEST win for a sitting president since Woodrow Wilson in 1916.

3. The only age group in which the majority voted for Kerry was young adults (Kerry: 54%, Bush: 44%), proving once again that your parents are always wrong and you should never listen to them.

4. In spite of Bush's win, the majority of Americans still think the country is headed in the wrong direction (56%), think the war wasn't worth fighting (51%), and don’t approve of the job George W. Bush is doing (52%). (Note to foreigners: Don't try to figure this one out. It's an American thing, like Pop Tarts.)

5. The Republicans will not have a filibuster-proof 60-seat majority in the Senate. If the Democrats do their job, Bush won't be able to pack the Supreme Court with right-wing ideologues. Did I say "if the Democrats do their job?" Um, maybe better to scratch this one.

6. Michigan voted for Kerry! So did the entire Northeast, the birthplace of our democracy. So did 6 of the 8 Great Lakes States. And the whole West Coast! Plus Hawaii. Ok, that's a start. We've got most of the fresh water, all of Broadway, and Mt. St. Helens. We can dehydrate them or bury them in lava. And no more show tunes!

7. Once again we are reminded that the buckeye is a nut, and not just any old nut -- a poisonous nut. A great nation was felled by a poisonous nut. May Ohio State pay dearly this Saturday when it faces Michigan.

8. 88% of Bush's support came from white voters. In 50 years, America will no longer have a white majority. Hey, 50 years isn't such a long time! If you're ten years old and reading this, your golden years will be truly golden and you will be well cared for in your old age.

9. Gays, thanks to the ballot measures passed on Tuesday, cannot get married in 11 new states. Thank God. Just think of all those wedding gifts we won't have to buy now.

10. Five more African Americans were elected as members of Congress, including the return of Cynthia McKinney of Georgia. It's always good to have more blacks in there fighting for us and doing the job our candidates can't.

11. The CEO of Coors was defeated for Senate in Colorado. Drink up!

12. Admit it: We like the Bush twins and we don't want them to go away.

13. At the state legislative level, Democrats picked up a net of at least 3 chambers in Tuesday's elections. Of the 98 partisan-controlled state legislative chambers (house/assembly and senate), Democrats went into the 2004 elections in control of 44 chambers, Republicans controlled 53 chambers, and 1 chamber was tied. After Tuesday, Democrats now control 47 chambers, Republicans control 49 chambers, 1 chamber is tied and 1 chamber (Montana House) is still undecided.

14. Bush is now a lame duck president. He will have no greater moment than the one he's having this week. It's all downhill for him from here on out -- and, more significantly, he's just not going to want to do all the hard work that will be expected of him. It'll be like everyone's last month in 12th grade -- you've already made it, so it's party time! Perhaps he'll treat the next four years like a permanent Friday, spending even more time at the ranch or in Kennebunkport. And why shouldn't he? He's already proved his point, avenged his father and kicked our ass.

15. Should Bush decide to show up to work and take this country down a very dark road, it is also just as likely that either of the following two scenarios will happen: a) Now that he doesn't ever need to pander to the Christian conservatives again to get elected, someone may whisper in his ear that he should spend these last four years building "a legacy" so that history will render a kinder verdict on him and thus he will not push for too aggressive a right-wing agenda; or b) He will become so cocky and arrogant -- and thus, reckless -- that he will commit a blunder of such major proportions that even his own party will have to remove him from office.

16. There are nearly 300 million Americans -- 200 million of them of voting age. We only lost by three and a half million! That's not a landslide -- it means we're almost there. Imagine losing by 20 million. If you had 58 yards to go before you reached the goal line and then you barreled down 55 of those yards, would you stop on the three yard line, pick up the ball and go home crying -- especially when you get to start the next down on the three yard line? Of course not! Buck up! Have hope! More sports analogies are coming!!!

17. Finally and most importantly, over 55 million Americans voted for the candidate dubbed "The #1 Liberal in the Senate." That's more than the total number of voters who voted for either Reagan, Bush I, Clinton or Gore. Again, more people voted for Kerry than Reagan. If the media are looking for a trend it should be this -- that so many Americans were, for the first time since Kennedy, willing to vote for an out-and-out liberal. The country has always been filled with evangelicals -- that is not news. What IS news is that so many people have shifted toward a Massachusetts liberal. In fact, that's BIG news. Which means, don't expect the mainstream media, the ones who brought you the Iraq War, to ever report the real truth about November 2, 2004. In fact, it's better that they don't. We'll need the element of surprise in 2008.

Feeling better? I hope so. As my friend Mort wrote me yesterday, "My Romanian grandfather used to say to me, 'Remember, Morton, this is such a wonderful country -- it doesn't even need a president!'"

But it needs us. Rest up, I'll write you again tomorrow.

Yours,
Michael Moore
MMFlint@aol.com

posted by me

:: 12:51:00 PM [+] ::
...

:: "Sleepover protests Bush's policies" ::

Boulder High School students seeking to make voices heard
By Berny Morson, Rocky Mountain News

BOULDER - Students were preparing to spend the night at Boulder High School Thursday to protest policies of the Bush administration.

About 50 students carrying guitars and boxes of crackers and Froot Loops took over part of the library at the end of the school day. They vowed not to leave until they had a chance to meet with elected officials.

Under an agreement with Principal Ron Cabrera, they were allowed to stay the night, but must clean up and be gone by 7 a.m., when the library opens.

A teacher and several parents agreed to be chaperones, Cabrera said.

It was not clear if they would meet with elected officials. A spokesman for U.S. Rep. Mark Udall, whose district includes Boulder, said no one from the congressman's office was scheduled to attend.

Stephen Lobanov Rostovsky, 17, a senior, said the protest is meant to get adults to hear their opinions.

Rostovsky said he talks to elected leaders, "but there's no assurance for me that someone will actually take me seriously."

"This is going to hopefully change that by letting people know that adolescents are there and by saying, 'We're not going to take this. We want a voice, too. We want a place in this democracy. . . . We should have a say.' "

The students' list of grievances cites the war in Iraq, which they called "unjust and misguided."

The students also oppose federal regulations requiring schools to admit military recruiters or lose funding.

Read more here.

posted by me

:: 12:23:00 PM [+] ::
...

:: "Jumping to Conclusions?" ::

"A political candidate who jumps to conclusions without knowing the facts is not a person you want as your commander in chief." ~ George W. Bush, 10/27/04, Lititz, Pennsylvania (Reuters News Service)

posted by me

:: 1:01:00 AM [+] ::
...

:: The Moore report ::

From MichaelMoore.com

My first thoughts after the election...

Cpl. Roberto Abad, Sgt. Michael D. Acklin II, Spc. Genaro Acosta, Pfc. Steven Acosta, Capt. James F. Adamouski, Pvt. Algernon Adams, Sgt. Brandon E. Adams, Spc. Clarence Adams III, 1st Lt. Michael R. Adams, Pfc. Michael S. Adams, Lt. Thomas Mullen Adams, Spc. Jamaal R. Addison, Lance Cpl. Patrick R. Adle, Capt. Tristan N. Aitken, Spc. Segun Frederick Akintade, Lance Cpl. Nickalous N. Aldrich, Spc. Ronald D. Allen Jr., Sgt. Glenn R. Allison, Lance Cpl. Michael J. Allred, Capt. Eric L. Allton, Cpl. Nicanor Alvarez, Cpl. Daniel R. Amaya, Pfc. John D. Amos II, Lance Cpl. Brian E. Anderson, Airman 1st Class Carl L. Anderson Jr., Petty Officer 2nd Class Michael C. Anderson, Spc. Michael Andrade, Pfc, Spc. Yoe M. Aneiros, Lance Cpl. Levi T. Angell, Army Spc. Edward J. Anguiano, Chief Warrant Officer Andrew Todd Arnold, Lance Cpl. Alexander S. Arredondo, Spc. Richard Arriaga, Staff Sgt. Jimmy J. Arroyave, Spc. Robert R. Arsiaga, Sgt. Evan Asa Ashcraft, Pfc. Shawn M. Atkins, Maj. Jay Aubin, Capt. Matthew J. August, Lance Cpl. Aaron C. Austin, Spc. Tyanna S. Avery-Fedder, Lance Cpl. Andrew Julian Aviles, Pfc. Eric A. Ayon, Sgt. 1st Class Henry A. Bacon, Sgt. Andrew Joseph Baddick, Staff Sgt. Daniel A. Bader, Staff Sgt. Nathan J. Bailey, Spc. Ronald W. Baker, Spc. Ryan T. Baker, Sgt. Sherwood R. Baker.

Pfc. Chad E. Bales, 1st Lt. Kenneth Michael Ballard, Maj. Spc. Solomon C. Bangayan, Lt. Col. Dominic R. Baragona, Pfc. Mark A. Barbret, Pfc. Collier E. Barcus, Sgt. Michael C. Barkey, Spc. Jonathan P. Barnes, Command Sgt. Maj. Edward C. Barnhill, Lance Cpl. Aric J. Barr, Sgt. Michael Paul Barrera, Maj. Carlos Barro Ollero, Sgt. Douglas E. Bascom, Spc. Todd M. Bates, Sgt. 1st Class Michael Battles Sr., Gunnery Sgt. Ronald E. Baum, Spc. Alan N. Bean Jr., Spc. Bradley S. Beard, Spc. Beau R. Beaulieu, Capt. Ryan Beaupre, Spc. James L. Beckstrand, Sgt. Gregory A. Belanger, Cpl. Christopher Belchik, Sgt. Aubrey D. Bell, Pfc. Wilfred D. Bellard, Staff Sgt. Joseph P. Bellavia, Sgt. 1st Class William M. Bennett, Spc. Robert T. Benson, 1st Lt. David R. Bernstein, Spc. Joel L. Bertoldie, Staff Sgt. Stephen A. Bertolino Sr., Staff Sgt. Marvin Best, Cpl. Mark A. Bibby, Sgt. Benjamin W. Biskie, Sgt. Michael E. Bitz, Sgt. Jarrod W. Black, Chief Warrant Officer Michael T. Blaise, Capt. Ernesto M. Blanco, Command Sgt. Maj. James D. Blankenbecler, Spc. Joseph M. Blickenstaff, Spc. Nicholas H. Blodgett, Sgt. Trevor A. Blumberg, Lance Cpl. Jeremy L. Bohlman, Gunnery Sgt. Jeffrey E. Bohr Jr., Lance Cpl. Todd J. Bolding, Sgt. Dennis J. Boles, Sgt. 1st Class Craig A. Boling, Petty Officer 3rd Class Doyle W. Bollinger Jr, Sgt. 1st Class Kelly Bolor, Staff Sgt. Stevon A. Booker.

Chief Warrant Officer Clarence E. Boone, Capt. John J. Boria, Pfc. Rachel K. Bosveld, Spc. Mathew G. Boule, Staff Sgt. Elvis Bourdon, Pvt. 1st Class Samuel R. Bowen, Staff Sgt. Hesley Box Jr., Pvt. Noah L. Boye, Lance Cpl. Aaron Boyles, Spc. Edward W. Brabazon, Cpl. Travis J. Bradach-Nall, Staff Sgt. Kenneth R. Bradley, Staff Sgt. Stacey C. Brandon, Spc. Artimus D. Brassfield, Pfc. Joel K. Brattain, Pfc. Jeffrey F. Braun, Chief Warrant Officer William I. Brennan, Staff Sgt. Steven H. Bridges, Spc. Kyle A. Brinlee, Staff Sgt. Cory W. Brooks, Sgt. Thomas F. Broomhead, Sgt. Andrew W. Brown, Tech. Sgt. Bruce E. Brown, Lance Cpl. Dominic C. Brown, Cpl. Henry L. Brown, Pfc. John E. Brown, Spc. Larry K. Brown, Spc. Lunsford B. Brown II, 1st Lt. Tyler H. Brown, Spc. Philip D. Brown, Pfc. Timmy R. Brown Jr., 1st Lt. Tyler H. Brown, Cpl. Andrew D. Brownfield, Petty Officer 3rd Class Nathan B. Bruckenthal, Lance Cpl. Cedric E. Bruns, 2nd Lt. Todd J. Bryant, Sgt. Ernest G. Bucklew, Spc. Roy Russell Buckley, Pfc. Paul J. Bueche, Lt. Col. Charles H. Buehring, Lance Cpl. Brian Rory Buesing, Sgt. George Edward Buggs, Spc. Joshua I. Bunch, Staff Sgt. Christopher Bunda, Staff Sgt. Michael L. Burbank, Staff Sgt. Richard A. Burdick, Spc. Alan J. Burgess, Lance Cpl. Jeffrey C. Burgess, Pfc. Tamario D. Burkett, Sgt. Travis L. Burkhardt.

Pfc. David P. Burridge, Pfc. Jesse R. Buryj, Pfc. Charles E. Bush Jr., Pvt. Matthew D. Bush, Pfc. Damian S. Bushart, Sgt. Jacob L. Butler, Capt. Joshua T. Byers, Cpl. Juan C. Cabralbanuelos, Pfc. Cody S. Calavan, Sgt. Juan Calderon Jr, Sgt. Charles T. Caldwell, Spc. Nathaniel A. Caldwell, Staff Sgt. Joseph Camara, Spc. Michael C. Campbell, Sgt. Ryan M. Campbell, Spc. Marvin A. Camposiles, Spc. Isaac Campoy, Spc. Ervin Caradine Jr., Spc. Adolfo C. Carballo, Pfc. Michael M. Carey, Cpl. Richard P. Carl, Pfc. Ryan G. Carlock, Pfc. Benjamin R. Carman, Staff Sgt. Edward W. Carmen, Spc. Jocelyn L. Carrasquillo, Sgt. Frank T. Carvill, Capt. Christopher S. Cash, Spc. Ahmed A. Cason, Pfc. Jose Casanova, Lance Cpl. James A. Casper, Capt. Paul J. Cassidy, Staff Sgt. Roland L. Castro, Sgt. Sean K. Cataudella, Lance Cpl. Steven C. T. Cates, Pfc. Thomas D. Caughman, Staff Sgt. James W. Cawley, Spc. Jessica L. Cawvey, Petty Officer 3rd Class David A. Cedergren, Lance Cpl. Manuel A. Ceniceros, Cpl. Kemaphoom A. Chanawongse, Spc. James A. Chance III, Staff Sgt. William D. Chaney, Chief Warrant Officer Robert William Channell Jr., Spc. Jason K. Chappell, Pfc. Jonathan M. Cheatham, Sgt. Yohjyh L. Chen, Lance Cpl. Marcus M. Cherry, 2nd Lt. Therrel S. Childers, Spc. Andrew F. Chris.

Staff Sgt. Thomas W. Christensen, Spc. Brett T. Christian, Spc. Arron R. Clark, Staff Sgt. Michael J. Clark, Lance Cpl. Donald J. Cline Jr., Pfc. Christopher R. Cobb, Lance Cpl. Kyle W. Codner, 1st Sgt. Christopher D. Coffin, Pvt. Bradli N. Coleman, Cpl. Gary B. Coleman, 2nd Lt. Benjamin J. Colgan, Sgt. Russell L. Collier, Sgt. 1st Class Gary L. Collins, Lance Cpl. Jonathan W. Collins, Chief Warrant Officer Lawrence S. Colton, Spc. Zeferino E. Colunga, Sgt. Robert E. Colvill, Sgt. Kenneth Conde Jr., Sgt. Timothy M. Conneway, Spc. Steven D. Conover, Capt. Aaron J. Contreras, Lance Cpl. Pedro Contreras, Sgt. Jason Cook, Command Sgt. Major Eric F. Cooke, Sgt. Dennis A. Corral, Chief Warrant Officer Alexander S. Coulter, 2nd Lt. Leonard M. Cowherd, Spc. Gregory A. Cox, Pfc. Ryan R. Cox, Lance Corporal Timothy R. Creager, Sgt. Michael T. Crockett, Staff Sgt. Ricky L. Crockett, Sgt. Brud J. Cronkrite, Lance Cpl. Kyle D. Crowley, Pvt. Rey D. Cuervo, Pfc. Kevin A. Cuming, Spc. Daniel Francis J. Cunningham, Staff Sgt. Darren J. Cunningham, Spc. Carl F. Curran, Cpl. Michael Edward Curtin, Staff Sgt. Christopher E. Cutchall, Pfc. Brian K. Cutter, Pfc. Anthony D. D'Agostino, Spc. Edgar P. Daclan Jr., Capt. Nathan S. Dalley, Lance Cpl. Andrew S. Dang, Spc. Danny B. Daniels II, Pvt. 1st Class Torey J. Dantzler, Pfc. Norman Darling, Capt. Eric B. Das.

Spc. Shawn M. Davies, Pvt. Brandon L. Davis, Staff Sgt. Craig Davis, Staff Sgt. Donald N. Davis, Spc. Raphael S. Davis, Staff Sgt. Wilbert Davis, Staff Sgt. Jeffrey F. Dayton, Pvt. Jason L. Deibler, Spc. Lauro G. DeLeon Jr., Sgt. Felix M. Delgreco, Sgt. Jacob H. Demand, Staff Sgt. Mike A. Dennie, Spc. Darryl T. Dent, Pfc. Ervin Dervishi, Spc. Daniel A. Desens, Pfc. Michael R. Deuel, Pvt. Michael J. Deutsch, Petty Officer 3rd Class Christopher M. Dickerson, Cpl. Nicholas J. Dieruf, Spc. Jeremiah J. DiGiovanni, Spc. Jeremy M. Dimaranan, Spc. Michael A. Diraimondo, Spc. Anthony J. Dixon, Spc. Ryan E. Doltz, Sgt. Michael E. Dooley, Chief Warrant Officer Patrick D. Dorff, Petty Officer 2nd Class Trace W. Dossett, Lance Cpl. Scott E. Dougherty, 1st Sgt. Robert J. Dowdy, Pfc. Stephen P. Downing II, Spc. Chad H. Drake, Pvt. Jeremy L. Drexler, Cpl. Jason L. Dunham, Staff Sgt. Joe L. Dunigan Jr., Spc. Robert L. DuSang, Spc. William D. Dusenbery, 2nd Lt. Seth J. Dvorin, Petty Officer 2nd Class Jason B. Dwelley, Pfc. Sheldon R. Hawk Eagle, Staff Sgt. Richard S. Eaton Jr., Cpl. Christopher S. Ebert, Sgt. William C. Eckhart, Spc. Marshall L. Edgerton, Pfc. Shawn C. Edwards, Spc. Andrew C. Ehrlich, Sgt. Aaron C. Elandt, Spc. William R. Emanuel IV, Lance Cpl. Mark E. Engel, Spc. Peter G. Enos, Senior Airman Pedro I. Espaillat Jr.

Pfc. Analaura Esparza Gutierrez, Sgt. Adam W. Estep, Pvt. Ruben Estrella-Soto, Pfc. David Evans, Cpl. Mark A. Evnin, Pfc. Jeremy Ricardo Ewing, Sgt. Justin L. Eyerly, Pvt. Jonathan I. Falaniko, Sgt. James D. Faulkner, Pfc. Raymond J. Faulstich Jr., Capt. Brian R. Faunce, Capt. Arthur L. Felder, 2nd Lt. Paul M. Felsberg, Spc. Rian C. Ferguson, Master Sgt. Richard L. Ferguson, Master Sgt. George A. Fernandez, Staff Sgt. Clint D. Ferrin, Spc. Jon P. Fettig, Cpl. Tyler R. Fey, Sgt. Jeremy J. Fischer, Sgt. Paul F. Fisher, Lance Cpl. Dustin R. Fitzgerald, Pfc. Jacob S. Fletcher, Spc. Thomas A. Foley III, Sgt. Timothy Folmar, Gunnery Sgt. Elia P. Fontecchio, Spc. Jason C. Ford, Capt. Travis A. Ford, Chief Warrant Officer Wesley C. Fortenberry, Sgt. 1st Class Bradley C. Fox, Spc. Craig S. Frank, Lance Cpl. Phillip E. Frank, Staff Sgt. Bobby C. Franklin, Pvt. Robert L. Frantz, Pvt. Benjamin L. Freeman, Sgt. David T. Friedrich, Spc. Luke P. Frist, Spc. Adam D. Froehlich, Pvt. Kurt R. Frosheiser, Pfc. Nichole M. Frye, Sgt. 1st Class Dan H. Gabrielson, Lance Cpl. Jonathan E. Gadsden, Capt. Richard J. Gannon II, Spc. Tomas Garces, Lance Cpl. Derek L. Gardner, Cpl. Jose A. Garibay, Spc. Joseph M. Garmback Jr., Sgt. Landis W. Garrison, Sgt. Justin W. Garvey, Spc. Israel Garza.

1st Sgt. Joe J. Garza, Pfc. Juan Guadalupe Garza Jr, Spc. Christopher D. Gelineau, Lance Cpl. Cory Ryan Guerin, Cpl. Christopher A. Gibson, Pvt. Jonathan L. Gifford, Pvt. Kyle C. Gilbert, Command Sgt. Maj. Cornell W. Gilmore, Petty Officer 3rd Class Ronald A. Ginther, Pfc. Jesse A. Givens, Spc. Michael T. Gleason, Cpl. Todd J. Godwin, 2nd Lt. James Michael Goins, Spc. Christopher A. Golby, Spc. David J. Goldberg, Lance Cpl. Shane L. Goldman, Cpl. Armando Ariel Gonzalez, Lance Cpl. Benjamin R. Gonzalez, Cpl. Jesus A. Gonzalez, Cpl. Jorge Gonzalez, Lance Cpl. Victor A. Gonzalez, Cpl. Bernard G. Gooden, Pfc. Gregory R. Goodrich, Sgt. 1st Class Richard S. Gottfried, Spc. Richard A. Goward, 2nd Lt. Jeffrey C. Graham, Sgt. Jamie A. Gray, Petty Officer 2nd Class Michael J. Gray, Sgt. Tommy L. Gray, Lance Cpl. Torrey L. Gray, Cpl. Jeffrey G. Green, Lt. Col. David S. Greene, Pfc. Devin J. Grella, Spc. Kyle A. Griffin, Staff Sgt. Patrick Lee Griffin Jr., Cpl. Sean R. Grilley, Pvt. Joseph R. Guerrera, Chief Warrant Officer Hans N. Gukeisen, Pfc. Christian D. Gurtner, Lance Cpl. Jose Gutierrez, Pfc. Richard W. Hafer, Staff Sgt. Guy S. Hagy Jr., Spc. Charles G. Haight, Lance Cpl. Michael J. Halal, Pfc. Deryk L. Hallal, Pvt. Jesse M. Halling, Pfc. Andrew Halverson, Chief Warrant Officer Erik A. Halvorsen, Capt. Kimberly N. Hampton, Sgt. Michael S. Hancock.

Pfc. Fernando B. Hannon, Sgt. Warren S. Hansen, Sgt. James W. Harlan, Sgt. Atanacio Haro Marin, Staff Sgt. William M. Harrell, Sgt. Foster L. Harrington, Pfc. Adam J. Harris, Sgt. Kenneth W. Harris Jr., Pfc. Torry D. Harris, Pfc. Leroy Harris-Kelly, Pfc. John D. Hart, Sgt. Nathaniel Hart, Sgt. 1st Class David A. Hartman, Sgt. Jonathan N. Hartman, Staff Sgt. Stephen C. Hattamer, Staff Sgt. Omer T. Hawkins II, Sgt. Timothy L. Hayslett, Chief Warrant Officer Brian D. Hazelgrove, Sgt. David M. Heath, Spc. Justin W. Hebert, Pfc. Damian L. Heidelberg, Pfc. Raheen Tyson Heighter, Spc. Jeremy M. Heines, Staff Sgt. Brian R. Hellerman, Staff Sgt. Terry W. Hemingway, Cpl. Matthew C. Henderson, 1st Lt. Robert L. Henderson II, Staff Sgt. Kenneth W. Hendrickson, Sgt. Jack T. Hennessy, Spc. Joshua J. Henry, Pfc. Clayton W. Henson, Spc. Armando Hernandez, Spc. Joseph F. Herndon II, Pfc. Edward J. Herrgott, Spc. Jacob B. Herring, Sgt. 1st Class Gregory B. Hicks, Spc. Christopher K. Hill, Spc. Stephen D. Hiller, Sgt. Keicia M. Hines, Pfc. Melissa J. Hobart, Sgt. Nicholas M. Hodson, Sgt. 1st Class James T. Hoffman, Spc. Christopher J. Holland, Staff Sgt. Aaron N. Holleyman, Staff Sgt. Lincoln D. Hollinsaid, Spc. James J. Holmes, Spc. Jeremiah J. Holmes, Cpl. Terry Holmes, Airman 1st Class Antoine J. Holt, Pfc. Sean Horn, Master Sgt. Kelly L. Hornbeck.

Staff Sgt. Jeremy R. Horton, Capt. Andrew R. Houghton, Lance Cpl Gregory C. Howman, Pfc. Bert E. Hoyer, Spc. Corey A. Hubbell, Pfc. Christopher E. Hudson, 1st Lt. Doyle M. Hufstedler, Staff Sgt. Jamie L. Huggins, Spc. Eric R. Hull, Cpl Barton R. Humlhanz, Lance Cpl. Justin T. Hunt, Spc. Simeon Hunte, 1st Lt. Joshua C. Hurley, Lance Cpl. James B. Huston Jr., Lance Cpl. Seth Huston, Pvt. Nolen R. Hutchings, Pfc. Ray J. Hutchinson, Pfc. Gregory P. Huxley Jr., Spc. Benjamin W. Isenberg, Spc. Craig S. Ivory, Pfc. Leslie D. Jackson, Spc. Morgen N. Jacobs, Chief Warrant Officer Scott Jamar, Cpl. Evan T. James, 2nd Lt. Luke S. James, Spc. William A. Jeffries, Petty Officer 2nd Class Robert B. Jenkins, Sgt. Troy David Jenkins, Spc. Darius T. Jennings, Pfc. Ryan M. Jerabek, Sgt. Linda C. Jimenez, 1st Lt. Oscar Jimenez, Capt. Christopher B. Johnson, Spc. David W. Johnson, Pfc. Howard Johnson II, Spc. John P. Johnson, Pfc. Markus J. Johnson, Spc. Maurice J. Johnson, Hospital Corpsman 3rd Class Michael Vann Johnson Jr., Spc. Nathaniel H. Johnson, Staff Sgt. Paul J. Johnson, Chief Warrant Officer, Pfc. Rayshawn S. Johnson, Pvt. Devon D. Jones, Capt. Gussie M. Jones, Staff Sgt. Raymond E. Jones Jr., Spc. Rodney A. Jones, Lt. Kylan A. Jones- Huffman, Sgt. Curt E. Jordan Jr., Sgt. Jason D. Jordan.

Staff Sgt. Phillip A. Jordan, Cpl. Forest J. Jostes, Spc. Spencer T. Karol, Spc. Michael G. Karr Jr., Spc. Mark J. Kasecky, 1st Lt. Jeffrey J. Kaylor, Spc. Chad L. Keith, Lance Cpl. Quinn A. Keith, Lance Cpl. Bryan P. Kelly, Cpl. Brian Kennedy, Chief Warrant Officer Kyran E. Kennedy, Staff Sgt. Morgan D. Kennon, 1st Lt. Christopher J. Kenny, Spc. Jonathan R. Kephart, Cpl. Dallas L. Kerns, Chief Warrant Officer Erik C. Kesterson, Capt. Humayun S. M. Khan, Spc. James M. Kiehl, Pt. Jeungjin Na Kim, Staff Sgt. Kevin C. Kimmerly. Spc. Levi B. Kinchen, Staff Sgt. Lester O. Kinney II, Pfc. David M. Kirchhoff, Staff Sgt. Charles A. Kiser, Lance Cpl. Nicholas Brian Kleiboeker, Spc. John K. Klinesmith Jr., Sgt. Floyd G. Knighten Jr., Petty Officer 3rd Class Eric L. Knott, Spc. Joshua L. Knowles, Staff Sgt. Lance J. Koenig, Cpl. Kevin T. Kolm, Pfc. Martin W. Kondor, Chief Warrant Patrick W. Kordsmeier, Capt. Edward J. Korn, Sgt. Bradley S. Korthaus, Cpl. Jakub Henryk Kowalik, Sgt. Elmer C. Krause, Pvt. Dustin L. Kreider, Pfc. Bradley G. Kritzer, Capt. John F. Kurth, Sgt. 1st Class William W. Labadie Jr., Sgt. Joshua S. Ladd, Sgt. Michael V. Lalush, Lance Cpl. Alan Dinh Lam, Spc. Charles R. Lamb, Spc. James I. Lambert III, Pfc. James P. Lambert, Sgt. Jonathan W. Lambert, Capt. Andrew David Lamont, Staff Sgt. Sean G. Landrus, Gunnery Sgt. Shawn A. Lane.

Pfc. Moises A. Langhorst, Spc. Tracy L. Laramore, Spc. Scott Q. Larson Jr., Chief Warrant Officer Matthew C. Laskowski, Staff Sgt. William T. Latham, Pfc. Karina S. Lau, Cpl. Jeffrey D. Lawrence, Staff Sgt. Mark A. Lawton, Lance Cpl. Travis J. Layfield, Staff Sgt. Rene Ledesma, 2nd Lt. Ryan Leduc, Cpl. Bum R. Lee, Pfc. Ken W. Leisten, Staff Sgt. Jerome Lemon, Spc. Cedric L. Lennon, Pfc. Farad K. Letufuga, Spc. Justin W. Linden, Spc. Roger G. Ling, Spc. Joseph L. Lister, Staff Sgt. Nino D. Livaudais, Sgt. Dale T. Lloyd, Sgt. Daniel J. Londono, Spc. Ryan P. Long, Spc. Zachariah W. Long, Pfc. Duane E. Longstreth, Sgt. Edgar E. Lopez, Lance Cpl. Juan Lopez, Sgt. Richard M. Lord, Staff Sgt. David L. Loyd, Capt. Robert L. Lucero, Pfc. Jason C. Ludiam, Lance Cpl. Jacob R. Lugo, Pfc. Jason N. Lynch, Pfc. Christopher D. Mabry, Lance Cpl. Gregory E. MacDonald, Lance Cpl. Cesar F. Machado-Olmos, Pfc. Vorn J. Mack, Lance Cpl. Joseph B. Maglione, Spc. William J. Maher III, Staff Sgt. Toby W. Mallet, Chief Warrant Officer Ian D. Manuel, Pfc. Pablo Manzano, Pfc. Lyndon A. Marcus Jr., Staff Sgt. Paul C. Mardis Jr., Cpl. Douglas Jose Marencoreyes, Master Sgt. Jude C. Mariano, Spc. James E. Marshall, Sgt. 1st Class John W. Marshall, Pfc. Ryan A. Martin, Staff Sgt. Stephen G. Martin.

Sgt. Francisco Martinez, Pfc. Francisco A. Martinez Flores, Pfc. Jesse J. Martinez, Spc. Michael A. Martinez, Pfc. Oscar A. Martinez, Spc. Jacob D. Martir, Sgt. Arthur S. Mastrapa, Chief Warrant Officer Johnny Villareal Mata, Lance Cpl. Ramon Mateo, Spc. Clint Richard Matthews, Lance Cpl. Ramon Mateo, Cpl. Matthew E. Matula, Staff Sgt. Donald C. May Jr, Pfc. Joseph P. Mayek, Spc. Patrick R. McCaffrey Sr., Lance Cpl. Joseph C. MacCarthy, Pfc. Ryan M. McCauley, Cpl. Brad P. McCormick, 1st Lt. Erik. S. McCrae, Spc. Donald R. McCune, Spc. Dustin K. McGaugh, Pfc. Holly J. McGeogh, Sgt. Brian D. McGinnis, Spc. Michael A. McGlothin. Petty Officer 2nd Class Scott R. McHugh, Hospitalman Joshua McIntosh, Spc. David M. McKeever, Spc. Eric S. McKinley, Pvt. Robert L. McKinley, Staff Sgt. Don S. McMahan, Sgt. Heath A. McMillin, 1st Lt. Brian M. McPhillips, Cpl. Jesus Martin Antonio Medellin, Spc. Irving Medina, Spc. Kenneth A. Melton, Cpl. Jaygee Meluat, Petty Officer 3rd Class Fernando A. Mendezaceves, Gunnery Sgt. Joseph Menusa, Staff Sgt. Eddie E. Menyweather, Spc. Gil Mercado, Spc. Michael M. Merila, Spc. Christopher A. Merville, Sgt. Daniel K. Methvin, Pfc. Jason M. Meyer, Sgt. Eliu A. Miersandoval, Spc. Michael G. Mihalakis, Pfc. Matthew G. Milczark, Cpl. Jason David Mileo, Pfc. Anthony S. Miller, Pfc. Bruce Miller Jr., Staff Sgt. Frederick L. Miller Jr.

Sgt. 1st Class Marvin L. Miller, Sgt. Joseph Minucci II, Sgt. First Class Troy L. Miranda, Spc. George A. Mitchell, Sgt. Keman L. Mitchell, Sgt. Michael W. Mitchell, Spc. Sean R. Mitchell, Pfc. Jesse D. Mizener, Staff Sgt. Jorge A. Molinabautista, Pfc. Anthony W. Monroe, 1st Lt. Adam G. Mooney, Lance Cpl. Jason William Moore, Pfc. Stuart W. Moore, Sgt. Travis A. Moothart, Spc. Jose L. Mora, Sgt. Melvin Y. Mora, Pfc. Michael A. Mora, Master Sgt. Kevin N. Morehead, Capt. Brent L. Morel, Petty Officer 3rd Class David J. Moreno, Sgt. Gerardo Moreno, Spc. Jaime Moreno, Pfc. Luis A. Moreno, Spc. Dennis B. Morgan, Staff Sgt. Richard L. Morgan Jr., Pfc. Geoffery S. Morris, Pfc. Ricky A. Morris Jr., Lance Cpl. Nicholas B. Morrison, Sgt. Shawna M. Morrison, Sgt. Keelan L. Moss, Spc. Clifford L. Moxley Jr., Sgt. Cory R. Mracek, Sgt. Rodney A. Murray, Sgt. Krisna Nachampassak, Spc. Paul T. Nakamura, Spc. Nathan W. Nakis, Pvt. Kenneth A. Nalley, Chief Warrant Officer Christopher G. Nason, Maj. Kevin G. Nave, Spc. Rafael L. Navea, Spc. Charles L. Neeley, Staff Sgt. Paul M. Neff II, Pfc. Gavin L. Neighbor, Spc. Joshua M. Neusche, Cpl. Dominique J. Nicolas, Lance Cpl. Joseph L. Nice, Spc. Isaac Michael Nieves, Lance Cpl. Patrick R. Nixon, Spc. Allen Nolan, Spc. Marcos O. Nolasco.

Sgt. William J. Normandy, Spc. Joseph C. Norquist, 1st Lt. Leif E. Nott, Staff Sgt. Todd E. Nunes, Spc. David T. Nutt, Cpl. Mick R. Nygardbekowsky, Spc. Donald S. Oak Jr., Pfc. Branden F. Oberleitner, Lance Cpl. Patrick T. O'Day, Spc. Charles E. Odums II, Spc. Ramon C. Ojeda, Cpl. Terry Holmes Ordonez, Cpl. Brian Oliveira, Spc. Justin B. Onwordi, Spc. Richard P. Orengo, Lt. Col. Kim S. Orlando, Lance Cpl. Eric J. Orlowski, 1st Lt. Osbaldo Orozco, Pfc. Cody J. Orr, Staff Sgt. Billy J. Orton, Sgt. Pamela G. Osbourne, Lance Cpl. Deshon E. Otey, Pfc. Kevin C. Ott, Sgt. Michael G. Owen, Lance Cpl. David Edward Owens Jr, Sgt. Fernando Padilla- Ramirez, Pvt. Shawn D. Pahnke, Spc. Gabriel T. Palacios, Capt. Eric T. Paliwoda, 1st Lt. Joshua M. Palmer, Staff Sgt. Dale A. Panchot, Pfc. Daniel R. Parker, Pfc. James D. Parker, Pfc. Kristen Parker, Cpl. Tommy L. Parker Jr., Sgt. Harvey E. Parkerson III, Sgt. David B. Parson, Staff Sgt. Esau G. Patterson Jr., Master Sgt. William L. Payne, Sgt. Michael F. Pedersen, Staff Sgt. Abraham D. Penamedina, Spc. Brian H. Penisten, Sgt. Ross A. Pennanen, Staff Sgt. Gregory V. Pennington, Pfc. Geoffrey Perez, Staff Sgt. Hector R. Perez, Sgt. Joel Perez, Spc. Jose A. Perez III, Pfc. Luis A. Perez, Lance Cpl. Nicholas Perez.

Spc. Wilfredo Perez Jr., Petty Officer 1st Class Michael J. Pernaselli, Staff Sgt. David S. Perry, Pfc. Charles C. Persing, Staff Sgt. Dustin W. Peters, Spc. Alyssa R. Peterson, Staff Sgt. Brett J. Petriken, Staff Sgt. James L. Pettaway Jr., Staff Sgt. Erickson H. Petty, Pfc. Jerrick M. Petty, Lt. Col. Mark P. Phelan, Pfc. Chance R. Phelps, Sgt. 1st Class Gladimir Philippe, Sgt. Ivory L. Phipps, Capt. Pierre E. Piche, Pfc. Lori Piestewa, Capt. Dennis L. Pintor, Spc. James H. Pirtle, Pfc. Jason T. Poindexter, 2nd Lt. Frederick E. Pokorney Jr., Staff Sgt. Andrew R. Pokorny, Spc. Justin W. Pollard, Spc. Larry E. Polley Jr., Sgt. Darrin K. Potter, Pfc. David L. Potter, Sgt. Christopher S. Potts, Spc. James E. Powell, Lance Cpl. Caleb J. Powers, Cpl. Dean P. Pratt, Pfc. James E. Prevete, Pvt. Kelley S. Prewitt, Sgt. Tyler D. Prewitt, Pfc. James W. Price, 1st Lt. Timothy E. Price, Lance Cpl. Mathew D. Puckett, Sgt. Jaror C. Puello- Coronado, Staff Sgt. Michael B. Quinn, Staff Sgt. Richard P. Ramey, Sgt. Christopher Ramirez, Spc. Eric U. Ramirez, Pfc. William C. Ramirez, Pfc. Christopher Ramos, Spc. Tamarra J. Ramos, Pfc. Brandon Ramsey, Pvt. Carson J. Ramsey, Sgt. Edmond L. Randle, Pfc. Cleston C. Raney, Capt. Gregory A. Ratzlaff, Spc. Rel A. Ravago IV, Spc. Omead H. Razani.

Spc. Brandon M. Read, Pfc. Christopher J. Reed, Pfc. Ryan E. Reed, Sgt. Tatjana Reed, Staff Sgt. Aaron T. Reese, Spc. Jeremy F. Regnier, Sgt. 1st Class Randall S. Rehn, Sgt. Brendon C. Reiss, Staff Sgt. George S. Rentschler, Sgt. Sean C. Reynolds, Lance Cpl. Rafael Reynosa- Suarez, Sgt. Yadir G. Reynoso, Cpl. Demetrius L. Rice, Sgt. Ariel Rico, Spc. Jeremy L. Ridlen, Pfc. Diego Fernando Rincon, Cpl. Steven A. Rintamaki, Sgt. Duane R. Rios, Capt. Russell B. Rippetoe, Pfc. Henry C. Risner, Sgt. 1st Class Jose A. Rivera, Cpl. John T. Rivero, Spc. Frank K. Rivers Jr., Sgt. Thomas D. Robbins, Sgt. Todd J. Robbins, Lance Cpl. Anthony P. Roberts, Lance Cpl. Bob W. Roberts, Spc. Robert D. Roberts, Staff Sgt. Joseph E. Robsky, Sgt. Moses D. Rocha, Pfc. Marlin T. Rockhold, Pfc. Jose Francis Gonzalez Rodriguez, Cpl. Robert M. Rodriguez, Spc. Philip G. Rogers, Sgt. 1st Class Robert E. Rooney, Cpl. Randal Kent Rosacker, Staff Sgt. Victor A. Rosales, Pfc. Richard H. Rosas, Sgt. Scott C. Rose, Sgt. Thomas C. Rosenbaum, Sgt. Randy S. Rosenberg, Spc. Marco D. Ross, Sgt. Lawrence A. Roukey, Capt. Alan Rowe, Spc. Brandon J. Rowe, Sgt. Roger D. Rowe, 2nd Lt. Jonathan D. Rozier, Spc. Isela Rubalcava, Pfc. Aaron J. Rusin, Sgt. John W. Russell.

1st Lt. Timothy Louis Ryan, Chief Warrant Officer Scott A. Saboe, Spc. Rasheed Sahib, Cpl. Rudy Salas, Cpl. William I. Salazar, 1st Lt. Edward M. Saltz, Capt. Benjamin W. Sammis, Spc. Sonny G. Sampler, Spc. Gregory P. Sanders, Pfc. Leroy Sandoval Jr., Spc. Matthew J. Sandri, Staff Sgt. Barry Sanford, 1st Lt. Neil Anthony Santoriello, Spc. Jonathan J. Santos, Pfc. Brandon R. Sapp, Staff Sgt. Cameron B. Sarno, Staff Sgt. Scott D. Sather, Lance Cpl. Jeremiah E. Savage, Capt. Robert C. Scheetz Jr., Spc. Justin B. Schmidt, Spc. Jeremiah W. Schmunk, Pfc. Sean M. Schneider, Cpl. Dustin H. Schrage, Maj. Mathew E. Schram, Lance Cpl. Brian K. Schramm, Spc. Christian C. Schulz, Master Sgt. David A. Scott, Pfc. Kerry D. Scott, Spc. Stephen M. Scott, Spc. Marc S. Seiden, Capt. Christopher Scott Seifert, Pfc. Dustin M. Sekula, Lance Cpl. Matthew K. Serio, Sgt. Juan M. Serrano, Staff Sgt. Wentz Jerome Henry Shanaberger III, Spc. Jeffrey R. Shaver, Maj. Kevin M. Shea, Spc. Casey Sheehan, Sgt. Kevin F. Sheehan, Sgt. Daniel Michael Shepherd, Sgt. Alan D. Sherman, Lt. Col. Anthony L. Sherman, Pfc. Harry N. Shondee Jr., Lance Cpl. Brad S. Shuder, Capt. James A. Shull, Pfc. Kenneth L. Sickels, Lance Cpl. Dustin L. Sides, Cpl. Erik H. Silva, Pvt. Sean A. Silva, Sgt. Leonard D. Simmons.

Pfc. Charles M. Sims, Lance Cpl. John T. Sims Jr., Spc. Uday Singh, Spc. Aaron J. Sissel, Pfc. Christopher A. Sisson, Pfc. Nicholas M. Skinner, Petty Officer 3rd Class David Sisung, 1st Lt. Brian D. Slavenas, Pvt. Brandon Ulysses Sloan, Lance Cpl. Richard P. Slocum, Lance Cpl. Thomas J. Slocum, Pfc. Corey L. Small, Sgt. Keith L. Smette, Capt. Benedict J. Smith, Sgt. Benjamin K. Smith, Pfc. Brandon C. Smith, 2nd Lt. Brian D. Smith, Chief Warrant Officer Bruce A. Smith, Cpl. Darrell L. Smith, 1st Sgt. Edward Smith, Chief Warrant Officer Eric A. Smith, Pfc. Jeremiah D. Smith, Lance Cpl. Matthew R. Smith, Lance Cpl. Michael J. Smith Jr., Spc. Orenthial J. Smith, Sgt. 1st Class Paul R. Smith, Capt. Christopher F. Soelzer, Sgt. Roderic A. Solomon, Cpl. Adrian V. Soltau, Maj. Charles R. Soltes Jr., Sgt. Skipper Soram, Pfc. Armando Soriano, Cpl. Tomas Sotelo Jr., Pfc. Kenneth C. Souslin, Spc. Philip I. Spakosky, Pfc. Jason L. Sparks, Cpl. Michael R. Speer, Staff Sgt. Trevor Spink, Maj. Christopher J. Splinter, Sgt. Marvin R. Sprayberry III, Pvt. Bryan N. Spry, Sgt. Maj. Michael B. Stack, Pfc. Nathan E. Stahl, 1st Lt. Andrew K. Stern, Staff Sgt. Robert A. Stever, Maj. Gregory Stone, 2nd Lt. Matthew R. Stovall, Pfc. William R. Strange, Sgt. Kirk Allen Straseskie, Pfc. Brandon C. Sturdy.

Spc. William R. Sturges Jr., Spc. Paul J. Sturino, Lance Cpl. Jesus A. Suarez Del Solar, Spc. Joseph D. Suell, Spc. John R. Sullivan, Spc. Narson B. Sullivan, Lance Cpl. Vincent M. Sullivan, Staff Sgt. Michael J. Sutter, Pfc. Ernest Harold Sutphin, Chief Warrant Officer Sharon T. Swartworth, Spc. Thomas J. Sweet II, Staff Sgt. Christopher W. Swisher, Maj. Paul R. Syverson III, Sgt. Patrick S. Tainsh, Sgt. DeForest L. Talbert, Sgt. 1st Class Linda Ann Tarango-Griess, Spc. Christopher M. Taylor, Maj. Mark D. Taylor, Capt. John R. Teal, Staff Sgt. Riayan A. Tejeda, Lance Cpl. Jason Andrew Tetrault, Spc. Joseph C. Thibodeaux, Master Sgt. Thomas R. Thigpen Sr., Cpl. Jesse L. Thiry, Sgt. Carl Thomas, Staff Sgt. Kendall Thomas, Spc. Kyle G. Thomas, Sgt. Anthony O. Thompson, Spc. Jarrett B. Thompson, Sgt. Humberto F. Timoteo, Capt. John E. Tipton, Pfc. Joshua K. Titcomb, Spc. Brandon T. Titus, Spc. Brandon S. Tobler, Sgt. Lee D. TodacheeneCpl. John H. Todd III, Sgt. Nicholas A. Tomko, Master Sgt. Timothy Toney, Pfc. George D. Torres, Lance Cpl. Michael S. Torres, 2nd Lt. Richard Torres, Spc. Ramon Reyes Torres, Lance Cpl. Elias Torrez III, Sgt. Michael L. Tosto, Spc. Richard K. Trevithick, Pfc. Andrew L. Tuazon, Staff Sgt. Roger C. Turner Jr., Pvt. Scott M. Tyrrell, 2nd Lt. Andre D. Tyson, Spc. Eugene A. Uhl III, Lance Cpl. Drew M. Uhles.

Rick A. Ulbright, Pfc. Daniel P. Unger, Spc. Robert Oliver Unruh, 1st Sgt. Ernest E. Utt, Sgt. Michael A. Uvanni, Staff Sgt. Gary A. Vaillant, Lance Cpl. Ruben Valdez Jr., Sgt. Melissa Valles, Spc. Allen J. Vandayburg, Spc. Josiah H. Vandertulip, Chief Warrant Officer Brian K. Van Dusen, Lance Cpl. John J. Vangyzen IV, Lance Cpl. Gary F. Van Leuven, Staff Sgt. Mark D. Vasquez, Spc. Frances M. Vega, 1st Lt. Michael W. Vega, Staff Sgt. Paul A. Velazquez, Cpl. David M. Vicente, Sgt. 1st Class Joselito O. Villanueva, Cpl. Scott M. Vincent, Staff Sgt. Kimberly A. Voelz, Staff Sgt. Michael S. Voss, Spc. Thai Vue, Lance Cpl. Michael B. Wafford, Sgt. Christopher A. Wagener, Sgt. Gregory L. Wahl, Staff Sgt. Allan K. Walker, Sgt. Jeffery C. Walker, Sgt. Donald Ralph Walters, Pvt. Jason M. Ward, Pfc. Nachez Washalanta, Lance Cpl. Christopher B. Wasser, Pvt. David L. Waters, Staff Sgt. Kendall Damon Waters-Bey, Maj. William R. Watkins III, Petty Officer 2nd Class Christopher E. Watts, Chief Warrant Officer Aaron A. Weaver, Spc. Michael S. Weger, Staff Sgt. David J. Weisenburg, Spc. Douglas J. Weismantle, Pfc. Michael Russell Creighton Weldon, Lance Cpl. Larry L. Wells, Chief Warrant Officer Stephen M. Wells, Spc. Jeffrey M. Wershow, Spc. Christopher J. Rivera Wesley, Sgt. James G. West, 1st Lt. Alexander E. Wetherbee, Spc. Donald L. Wheeler, Sgt. Mason Douglas Whetstone, Pfc. Marquis A. Whitaker.

Staff Sgt. Aaron Dean White, Lt. Nathan D. White, Sgt. Steven W. White, Lance Cpl. William W. White, Pfc. Joey D. Whitener, Spc. Chase R. Whitman, Spc. Michael J. Wiesemann, Cpl. Joshua S. Wilfong, Sgt. Eugene Williams, Lance Cpl. Michael J. Williams, Spc. Michael L. Williams, Sgt. Taft V. Williams, 1st Lt. Charles L. Wilkins III, Sgt. 1st Class Christopher R. Willoughby, Spc. Dana N. Wilson, Command Sgt. Maj. Jerry L. Wilson, Staff Sgt. Joe N. Wilson, Lance Cpl. Lamont N. Wilson, Lance Cpl. Nicholas Wilt, 1st Lt. Ronald Winchester, Spc. Trevor A. Wine, Lance Cpl. William J. Wiscowiche, Spc. Robert A. Wise, Spc. Michelle M. Witmer, Pfc. Owen D. Witt, Spc. James R. Wolf, 2nd Lt. Jeremy L. Wolfe, Sgt. Elijah Tai Wah Wong, Sgt. Brian M. Wood, Capt. George A. Wood, Spc. Michael R. Woodliff, Spc. James C. Wright, Pfc. Jason G. Wright, 2nd Lt. John T. Wroblewski, Lance Cpl. Daniel R. Wyatt, Pfc. Stephen E. Wyatt, Sgt. Michael E. Yashinski, Sgt. Henry Ybarra III, Pfc. Rodricka A. Youmans, Sgt. Ryan C. Young, Lance Cpl. Andrew J. Zabierek, Spc. Nicholas J. Zangara, Spc. Mark Anthony Zapata, Pfc. Nicholaus E. Zimmer, Cpl. Ian T. Zook, Lance Cpl. Robert P. Zurheide Jr.

May they rest in peace.

And may they forgive us someday.

-- Michael Moore

posted by me

:: 9:43:00 PM [+] ::
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