Dysviz I like this

7:52am

Mishaps mark John McCain's record as naval aviator
latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-aviator6-2008oct06 [latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-aviator6-2008oct06] ,0,7633315.story?view=print
Library of Congress
This photo provided by the Library of Congress shows John McCain, front right, with his squadron in 1965.
Three crashes early in his career led Navy officials to question or fault his judgment.
By Ralph Vartabedian and Richard A. Serrano, Los Angeles Times Staff Writers
October 6, 2008
John McCain was training in his AD-6 Skyraider on an overcast Texas morning in 1960 when he slammed into Corpus Christi Bay and sheared the skin off his plane's wings.

McCain recounted the accident decades later in his autobiography. "The engine quit while I was practicing landings," he wrote. But an investigation board at the Naval Aviation Safety Center found no evidence of engine failure.




The crash was one of three early in McCain's aviation career in which his flying skills and judgment were faulted or questioned by Navy officials.

In his most serious lapse, McCain was "clowning" around in a Skyraider over southern Spain about December 1961 and flew into electrical wires, causing a blackout, according to McCain's own account as well as those of naval officers and enlistees aboard the carrier Intrepid. In another incident, in 1965, McCain crashed a T-2 trainer jet in Virginia.

After McCain was sent to Vietnam, his plane was destroyed in an explosion on the deck of an aircraft carrier in 1967. Three months later, he was shot down during a bombing mission over Hanoi and taken prisoner. He was not faulted in either of those cases and was later lauded for his heroism as a prisoner of war.

As a presidential candidate, McCain has cited his military service -- particularly his 5 1/2 years as a POW. But he has been less forthcoming about his mistakes in the cockpit.

The Times interviewed men who served with McCain and located once-confidential 1960s-era accident reports and formerly classified evaluations of his squadrons during the Vietnam War. This examination of his record revealed a pilot who early in his career was cocky, occasionally cavalier and prone to testing limits.

In today's military, a lapse in judgment that causes a crash can end a pilot's career. Though standards were looser and crashes more frequent in the 1960s, McCain's record stands out.

"Three mishaps are unusual," said Michael L. Barr, a former Air Force pilot with 137 combat missions in Vietnam and an internationally known aviation safety expert who teaches in USC's Aviation Safety and Security Program. "After the third accident, you would say: Is there a trend here in terms of his flying skills and his judgment?"

Jeremiah Pearson, a Navy officer who flew 400 missions over Vietnam without a mishap and later became the head of human spaceflight at NASA, said: "That's a lot. You don't want any. Maybe he was just unlucky."

Naval aviation experts say the three accidents before McCain's deployment to Vietnam probably triggered a review to determine whether he should be allowed to continue flying. The results of the review would have been confidential.

The Times asked McCain's campaign to release any military personnel records in the candidate's possession showing how the Navy handled the three incidents. The campaign said it would have no comment.

Navy veterans who flew with McCain called him a good pilot.

"John was what you called a push-the-envelope guy," said Sam H. Hawkins, who flew with McCain's VA-44 squadron in the 1960s and now teaches political science at Florida Atlantic University. "There are some naval aviators who are on the cautious side. They don't get ou

Oct 5, 11:18pm

kennysideshow.blogspot.com/2008/10/secrets-of-federal-reserve.html [kennysideshow.blogspot.com/2008/10/secrets-of-federal-reserve.html]

Secrets of the Federal Reserve
It's an appropriate time to dig into the history of the Federal Reserve. To convince others of the need to abolish the Fed it helps to know the background in order to engage in meaningful dialog.
Eustace Mullins' account is good place to start.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

by Eustace Mullins

Foreword
Introduction by Ezra Pound
Chapter One: Jekyll Island
Chapter Two: The Aldrich Plan
Chapter Three: The Federal Reserve Act
Chapter Four: The Federal Advisory Council
Chapter Five: The House of Rothschild
Chapter Six: The London Connection
Chapter Seven: The Hitler Connection
Chapter Eight: World War One
Chapter Nine: The Agricultural Depression
Chapter Ten: The Money Creators
Chapter Eleven: Lord Montagu Norman
Chapter Twelve: The Great Depression
Chapter Thirteen: The 1930's
Chapter Fourteen: Congressional Expose
Appendix
Biographies
Bibliography
Questions and Answers
Foreword

In 1949, while I was visiting Ezra Pound who was a political prisoner at St. Elizabeth's Hospital, Washington, D.C. (a Federal institution for the insane), Dr. Pound asked me if I had ever heard of the Federal Reserve System. I replied that I had not, as of the age of 25. He then showed me a ten dollar bill marked "Federal Reserve Note" and asked me if I would do some research at the Library of Congress on the Federal Reserve System which had issued this bill. Pound was unable to go to the Library himself, as he was being held without trial as a political prisoner by the United States government. After he was denied broadcasting time in the U.S., Dr. Pound broadcast from Italy in an effort to persuade people of the United States not to enter World War II. Franklin D. Roosevelt had personally ordered Pound's indictment, spurred by the demands of his three personal assistants, Harry Dexter White, Lauchlin Currie, and Alger Hiss, all of whom were subsequently identified as being connected with Communist espionage.

I had no interest in money or banking as a subject, because I was working on a novel. Pound offered to supplement my income by ten dollars a week for a few weeks. My initial research revealed evidence of an international banking group which had secretly planned the writing of the Federal Reserve Act and Congress' enactment of the plan into law. These findings confirmed what Pound had long suspected. He said, "You must work on it as a detective story." I was fortunate in having my research at the Library of Congress directed by a prominent scholar, George Stimpson, founder of the National Press Club, who was described by The New York Times of September 28, 1952: "Beloved by Washington newspapermen as 'our walking Library of Congress', Mr. Stimpson was a highly regarded reference source in the Capitol. Government officials, Congressmen and reporters went to him for information on any subject."

Oct 5, 11:16pm

I did research four hours each day at the Library of Congress, and went to St. Elizabeth's Hospital in the afternoon. Pound and I went over the previous day's notes. I then had dinner with George Stimpson at Scholl's Cafeteria while he went over my material, and I then went back to my room to type up the corrected notes. Both Stimpson and Pound made many suggestions in guiding me in a field in which I had no previous experience. When Pound's resources ran low, I applied to the Guggenheim Foundation, Huntington Hartford Foundation, and other foundations to complete my research on the Federal Reserve. Even though my foundation applications were sponsored by the three leading poets of America, Ezra Pound, E.E. Cummings, and Elizabeth Bishop, all of the foundations refused to sponsor this research. I then wrote up my findings to date, and in 1950 began efforts to market this manuscript in New York. Eighteen publishers turned it down without comment, but the nineteenth, Devin Garrity, president of Devin Adair Publishing Company, gave me some friendly advice in his office. "I like your book, but we can't print it," he told me. "Neither can anybody else in New York. Why don't you bring in a prospectus for your novel, and I think we can give you an advance. You may as well forget about getting the Federal Reserve book published. I doubt if it could ever be printed."

This was devastating news, coming after two years of intensive work. I reported back to Pound, and we tried to find a publisher in other parts of the country. After two years of fruitless submissions, the book was published in a small edition in 1952 by two of Pound's disciples, John Kasper and David Horton, using their private funds, under the title Mullins on the Federal Reserve. In 1954, a second edition, with unauthorized alterations, was published in New Jersey, as The Federal Reserve Conspiracy. In 1955, Guido Roeder brought out a German edition in Oberammergau, Germany. The book was seized and the entire edition of 10,000 copies burned by government agents led by Dr. Otto John.

The burning of the book was upheld April 21, 1961 by judge Israel Katz of the Bavarian Supreme Court. The U.S. Government refused to intervene, because U.S. High Commissioner to Germany, James B. Conant (president of Harvard University 1933 to 1953), had approved the initial book burning order. This is the only book which has been burned in Germany since World War II. In 1968 a pirated edition of this book appeared in California. Both the FBI and the U.S. Postal inspectors refused to act, despite numerous complaints from me during the next decade. In 1980 a new German edition appeared. Because the U.S. Government apparently no longer dictated the internal affairs of Germany, the identical book which had been burned in 1955 now circulates in Germany without interference.

I had collaborated on several books with Mr. H.L. Hunt and he suggested that I should continue my long-delayed research on the Federal Reserve and bring out a more definitive version of this book. I had just signed a contract to write the authorized biography of Ezra Pound, and the Federal Reserve book had to be postponed. Mr. Hunt passed away before I could get back to my research, and once again I faced the problem of financing research for the book.

Oct 5, 11:16pm

My original book had traced and named the shadowy figures in the United States who planned the Federal Reserve Act. I now discovered that the men whom I exposed in 1952 as the shadowy figures behind the operation of the Federal Reserve System were themselves shadows, the American fronts for the unknown figures who became known as the "London Connection." I found that notwithstanding our successes in the Wars of Independence of 1812 against England, we remained an economic and financial colony of Great Britain. For the first time, we located the original stockholders of the Federal Reserve Banks and traced their parent companies to the London Connection.

This research is substantiated by citations and documentation from hundreds of newspapers, periodicals and books and charts showing blood, marriage, and business relationships. More than a thousand issues of The New York Times on microfilm have been checked not only for original information, but verification of statements from other sources.

It is a truism of the writing profession that a writer has only one book within him. This seems applicable in my case, because I am now in the fifth decade of continuous writing on a single subject, the inside story of the Federal Reserve System. This book was from its inception commissioned and guided by Ezra Pound. Four of his protégés have previously been awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, William Butler Yeats for his later poetry, James Joyce for "Ulysses", Ernest Hemingway for "The Sun Also Rises", and T.S. Elliot for "The Waste Land". Pound played a major role in the inspiration and in the editing of these works--which leads us to believe that this present work, also inspired by Pound, represents an ongoing literary tradition.

Although this book in its inception was expected to be a tortuous work on economic and monetary techniques, it soon developed into a story of such universal and dramatic appeal that from the outset, Ezra Pound urged me to write it as a detective story, a genre which was invented by my fellow Virginian, Edgar Allan Poe. I believe that the continuous circulation of this book during the past forty years has not only exonerated Ezra Pound for his much condemned political and monetary statements, but also that it has been, and will continue to be, the ultimate weapon against the powerful conspirators who compelled him to serve thirteen and a half years without trial, as a political prisoner held in an insane asylum a la KGB. His earliest vindication came when the government agents who represented the conspirators refused to allow him to testify in his own defense; the second vindication came in 1958 when these same agents dropped all charges against him, and he walked out of St. Elizabeth's Hospital, a free man once more. His third and final vindication is this work, which documents every aspect of his exposure of the ruthless international financiers to whom Ezra Pound became but one more victim, doomed to serve years as the Man in the Iron Mask, because he had dared to alert his fellow-Americans to their furtive acts of treason against all people of the United States.

Oct 5, 11:13pm

n my lectures throughout this nation, and in my appearances on many radio and television programs, I have sounded the toxin that the Federal Reserve System is not Federal; it has no reserves; and it is not a system at all, but rather, a criminal syndicate. From November, 1910, when the conspirators met on Jekyll Island, Georgia, to the present time, the machinations of the Federal Reserve bankers have been shrouded in secrecy. Today, that secrecy has cost the American people a three trillion dollar debt, with annual interest payments to these bankers amounting to some three hundred billion dollars per year, sums which stagger the imagination, and which in themselves are ultimately unpayable. Officials of the Federal Reserve System routinely issue remonstrances to the public, much as the Hindu fakir pipes an insistent tune to the dazed cobra which sways its head before him, not to resolve the situation, but to prevent it from striking him. Such was the soothing letter written by Donald J. Winn, Assistant to the Board of Governors in response to an inquiry by a Congressman, the Honorable Norman D. Shumway, on March 10, 1983. Mr. Winn states that "The Federal Reserve System was established by an act of Congress in 1913 and is not a 'private corporation'." On the next page, Mr. Winn continues, "The stock of the Federal Reserve Banks is held entirely by commercial banks that are members of the Federal Reserve System." He offers no explanation as to why the government has never owned a single share of stock in any Federal Reserve Bank, or why the Federal Reserve System is not a "private corporation" when all of its stock is owned by "private corporations".

American history in the twentieth century has recorded the amazing achievements of the Federal Reserve bankers. First, the outbreak of World War I, which was made possible by the funds available from the new central bank of the United States. Second, the Agricultural Depression of 1920. Third, the Black Friday Crash on Wall Street of October, 1929 and the ensuing Great Depression. Fourth, World War II. Fifth, the conversion of the assets of the United States and its citizens from real property to paper assets from 1945 to the present, transforming a victorious America and foremost world power in 1945 to the world's largest debtor nation in 1990. Today, this nation lies in economic ruins, devastated and destitute, in much the same dire straits in which Germany and Japan found themselves in 1945. Will Americans act to rebuild our nation, as Germany and Japan have done when they faced the identical conditions which we now face--or will we continue to be enslaved by the Babylonian debt money system which was set up by the Federal Reserve Act in 1913 to complete our total destruction? This is the only question which we have to answer, and we do not have much time left to answer it.

Because of the depth and the importance of the information which I had developed at the Library of Congress under the tutelage of Ezra Pound, this work became the happy hunting ground for many other would-be historians, who were unable to research this material for themselves. Over the past four decades, I have become accustomed to seeing this material appear in many other books, invariably attributed to other writers, with my name never mentioned. To add insult to injury, not only my material, but even my title has been appropriated, in a massive, if obtuse, work called "Secrets of the Temple--the Federal Reserve". This heavily advertised book received reviews ranging from incredulous to hilarious. Forbes Magazine advised its readers to read their review and save their money, pointing out that "a reader will discover no secrets" and that "This is one of those books whose fanfares far exceed their merit." This was not accidental, as this overblown whitewash of the Federal Reserve bankers was published by the most famous nonbook publisher in the world.

After my initial shock at discovering that the most influential literary personality of the twentieth century, Ezra Pound, was imprisoned in "the Hellhole" in Washington, I immediately wrote for assistance to a Wall Street financier at whose estate I had frequently been a guest. I reminded him that as a patron of the arts, he could not afford to allow Pound to remain in such inhuman captivity. His reply shocked me even more. He wrote back that "your friend can well stay where he is." It was some years before I was able to understand that, for this investment banker and his colleagues, Ezra Pound would always be "the enemy".

Eustace Mullins
Jackson Hole, Wyoming 1991

Source: the7thfire.com/Politics%20and%20History/Secrets_of_the_Federal_Reserve/secr... [the7thfire.com/Politics%20and%20History/Secrets_of_the_Federal_Reserve/secr...]

~~~~~~~~~~~

Also see:

The Secret Criminal Society of the Federal Reserve

The Federal Reserve's War Against the Human Race

The Federal Reserve: History and Conspiracy

Jeckyll Island and the Federal Reserve

How and Why

Oct 5, 11:00pm

www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/chi-oped0504chapmanmay04,0,6238795.column
chicagotribune.com

With friends like these ...
McCain finds his own radical friend

See photos of Bill Ayers, a former member of the Weather Underground who in 1995 hosted a campaign event for Obama

Steve Chapman

May 4, 2008

Can a presidential candidate justify a long and friendly relationship with someone who, back in the 1970s, extolled violence and committed crimes in the name of a radical ideology -- and who has never shown remorse or admitted error? When the candidate in question is Barack Obama, John McCain says no. But when the candidate in question is John McCain, he's not so sure.

Obama has been justly criticized for his ties to former Weather Underground member Bill Ayers, who in 1995 hosted a campaign event for Obama and in 2001 gave him a $200 contribution. The two have also served together on the board of a foundation. When their connection became known, McCain minced no words: "I think not only a repudiation but an apology for ever having anything to do with an unrepentant terrorist is due the American people."What McCain didn't mention is that he has his own Bill Ayers -- in the form of G. Gordon Liddy. Now a conservative radio talk-show host, Liddy spent more than 4 years in prison for his role in the 1972 Watergate burglary. That was just one element of what Liddy did, and proposed to do, in a secret White House effort to subvert the Constitution. Far from repudiating him, McCain has embraced him.

Oct 5, 11:00pm

How close are McCain and Liddy? At least as close as Obama and Ayers appear to be. In 1998, Liddy's home was the site of a McCain fundraiser. Over the years, he has made at least four contributions totaling $5,000 to the senator's campaigns -- including $1,000 this year.

Last November, McCain went on his radio show. Liddy greeted him as "an old friend," and McCain sounded like one. "I'm proud of you, I'm proud of your family," he gushed. "It's always a pleasure for me to come on your program, Gordon, and congratulations on your continued success and adherence to the principles and philosophies that keep our nation great."

Which principles would those be? The ones that told Liddy it was fine to break into the office of the Democratic National Committee to plant bugs and photograph documents? The ones that made him propose to kidnap anti-war activists so they couldn't disrupt the 1972 Republican National Convention? The ones that inspired him to plan the murder (never carried out) of an unfriendly newspaper columnist?

Liddy was in the thick of the biggest political scandal in American history -- and one of the greatest threats to the rule of law. He has said he has no regrets about what he did, insisting that he went to jail as "a prisoner of war."

All this may sound like ancient history. But it's from the same era as the bombings Ayers helped carry out as a member of the Weather Underground. And Liddy's penchant for extreme solutions has not abated.

In 1994, after the disastrous federal raid on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, he gave some advice to his listeners: "Now if the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms comes to disarm you and they are bearing arms, resist them with arms. Go for a head shot; they're going to be wearing bulletproof vests. ... Kill the sons of bitches."

He later backed off, saying he meant merely that people should defend themselves if federal agents came with guns blazing. But his amended guidance was not exactly conciliatory: Liddy also said he should have recommended shots to the groin instead of the head. If that wasn't enough to inflame any nut cases, he mentioned labeling targets "Bill" and "Hillary" when he practiced shooting.

Given Liddy's record, it's hard to see why McCain would touch him with a 10-foot pole. On the contrary, he should be returning his donations and shunning his show. Yet the senator shows no qualms about associating with Liddy -- or celebrating his service to their common cause.

How does McCain explain his howling hypocrisy on the subject? He doesn't. I made repeated inquiries to his campaign aides, which they refused to acknowledge, much less answer. On this topic, the pilot of the Straight Talk Express would rather stay parked in the garage.

That's an odd policy for someone who is so forthright about his rival's responsibility. McCain thinks Obama should apologize for associating with a criminal extremist. To which Obama might reply: After you.

------------------------------

E-mail: schapman@tribune.com

Copyright © 2008, Chicago Tribune

Oct 5, 9:49am

dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/10/5/102537/780/724/620665 [dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/10/5/102537/780/724/620665]

Sarah Palin palling around with secessionists


Sarah Palin's husband Todd was a member of the Alaska Independence Party until 2002.

The director of Division of Elections in Alaska, Gail Fenumiai, told TPMmuckraker that Todd Palin registered in October 1995 to the Alaska Independence Party, a radical group that advocates for Alaskan secession from the United States.

Besides a short period of a few months in 2000 when he changed his registration to undeclared, Todd Palin remained a registered member of AIP until July 2002 when he registered again as an undeclared voter.

Moreover, members of the AIP suggest that Sarah herself was once a member of the pary. The LA Times reports:

Video footage shows AIP Vice Chairman Dexter Clark describing Palin at the 2007 North American Secessionist Convention as an "AIP member before she got the job as a mayor of a small town -- that was a nonpartisan job. But you get along to go along. She eventually joined the Republican Party, where she had all kinds of problems with their ethics, and well, I won't go into that." ...Apparently with Palin in mind, Clark then went on to urge AIP members to "infiltrate" the major parties.

The McCain camp denies she was a member.

But what they can't deny is that as the sitting govenor of Alaska she made a video address to the AIP convention this year. You Tube Link.

Here is the transcript:

I'm Governor Sarah Palin and I am delighted to welcome you to the 2008 Alaskan Independence Party Convention in the golden heart city of Fairbanks. Your party plays an important role in our state's politics. I've always said that competition is so good, and that applies to political parties as well. I share your party's vision of upholding the constitution of our great state. My administration remains focused on reining in government growth so individual liberty and opportunity can expand. I know you agree with that. We have a great promise to be a self-sufficient state, made up of the hardest-working, most grateful Americans in our nation. So as your convention gets underway I hope that you all are inspired by remembering that all those years ago, it was in this same city that Alaska's constitution was born. And it was founded on hope and trust and liberty and opportunity. I carry that message of opportunity forward in my administration, as we continue to move our state ahead and create positive change. So I say good luck on a successful and inspiring convention. Keep up the good work, and God bless you.

Oct 2, 6:25pm

Embedded in Pink

Code Pink has become a lightning rod for contemporary activism - from both the right and

inthesetimes.com/article/3921/embedded_in_pink [inthesetimes.com/article/3921/embedded_in_pink] .

By ANNE ELIZABETH MOORE


At a November press conference at the Heritage Foundation, President Bush singled out Code Pink -- along with what he called "MoveOn.org bloggers" -- for setting a dangerous, radical agenda for U.S. politics.
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It's July in Austin, Texas. I'm wearing an electric pink cape screeching to a milling audience of several hundred who await the appearance of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). It's uncomfortable for many reasons, but I'm a reporter embedded in the antiwar movement. This is my job.

A team of seven rose-hued women surrounds me, all of us yelling in unison. Most of the women are better dressed, at least as far as the occasion calls for -- hooker boots, glittery logos, lassos, tights and masks -- and sport heroic monikers like "The Hammer of Common Sense," "Justicia" and "Voice of the People."

The lone male with us wears comically short prison grays, oversized plastic shackles and a giant paper-mache head meant to resemble the noggin' of the president of the United States.

"Impeach Bush," his flyers proclaim.

We're at Netroots Nation, where Pelosi has been invited to respond to audience queries. Tensions had been high since the appearance was announced. Progressives balked online about her refusal to call congressional hearings to impeach Bush, a position she's doggedly held since the 2006 mid-term elections.

Possibly to quell Pelosi's discomfort, event organizers took most questions in advance (none of that pesky democracy here!), and demanded the crowd limit "interruptions." In other words -- as some bloggers posited in real time at the event -- they wanted Code Pink to keep quiet.

But interruptions came from elsewhere, not from the Austin chapter of Code Pink "Sheroes," whose members kept quiet for the most part. They formed a silent line across the back of the room in front of the row of video cameras, directly in Pelosi's line of sight.

`Silly and girly'

Code Pink has come to be viewed as a gaggle of smart but silly women, an unkempt listserv, and a mismatched array of girly accoutrements, housed on Capitol Hill, in a space known simply as the D.C. House.

In 2002, Medea Benjamin, Jodie Evans, Starhawk and Diane Wilson founded the organization, beginning with a four-month White House vigil and joined by 100 dedicated, brightly clad adherents. The group has become a lightning rod for criticism of the antiwar movement -- and of contemporary activism.

At a November press conference at the Heritage Foundation, President Bush singled out Code Pink -- along with what he called "MoveOn.org bloggers" -- for setting a dangerous, radical agenda for U.S. politics. This attitude is also echoed in our supposedly left-leaning media.

Oct 2, 6:25pm

"The Daily Show" regularly stages parodies of Code Pink's tactics of strategic irritation, satirizing interruptions at congressional debates, and openly mocking protesters at military recruiting stations.

Salon.com writer Cintra Wilson calls the group "an eyesore," not unlike "an irritating children's birthday party."

Many activists have privately expressed similar wishes that Code Pink would just go away. As one well-dressed lefty confided to me in Austin after I'd stowed my cape: "Crap. Code Pink."

Grievances

The criticisms slung at Code Pink hint toward sex, class, race and age biases still harbored in the political left. The middle-aged, upper-middle class white ladies who have traditionally made up the group's core might seem better placed at the heads of kindergarten classrooms or behind the desks of libraries.

The underlying sentiment: `What could they possibly have to complain about? They are white! They are comfortable!'

For starters, they have much to opine about: a tanking economy, an illegal war, and a stripping of our constitutional rights. In fact, these middle-aged ladies are using their positions of comfort for the public good, agitating not for better coffee at PTA meetings, but for an ousting of military recruitment facilities from school campuses.

"These `middle-aged ladies' are my daily inspiration," Code Pink Campaign Manager Dana Balicki explains. And she's in her 20s. "I've witnessed women go from total discomfort with e-mailing to organizing local protests using Facebook and creating their own action blogs, leaving photos and YouTube videos in their wake."

Code Pink's D.C. House mama, Desiree Fairooz, joined the group two years ago because of "the creativity, the `in-your-face' tactics, and the persistence," she says.

You might have seen photos of Fairooz in the media -- images of her with her hands covered in blood, confronting Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice about war crimes.

Since last spring, Fairooz led a Code Pink team to Capitol Hill every day for a year to call for votes against a $165 billion Iraq War budget increase, which Congress passed in May. It's a defeat that still stings.

"This is only the most recent, and perhaps most egregious betrayal," says Medea Benjamin. "It was so obviously a political ploy to avoid another vote on war funding before the November elections."

Even Sen. Barack Obama's recently proposed timeline to pull out of Iraq hasn't slowed Code Pink. Because of his pledge to shift focus onto the war in Afghanistan, the group has a new, secret campaign that will kick off after the election.