Who got to Haiti first?

Port-au-Prince, Haiti--Who got there first? The Cubans, many-of-whom were already there in their usual form: as doctors. Why were they already there? Because the developed world is on their neck in Haiti and the place has been mismanaged before the earthquake and since the time of Columbus when the island of Hispaniola was first conquered and settled, primarily for exploitation. Cuba is part of this same legacy of colonialism and understands its effects, say what you will about the regime there. Hispaniola has been a hellhole for centuries, ever since the first white men planted their flags on its shores. The abuse is ongoing.

That's the part that never changes in poor Haiti, that first black republic, something they've been punished for ever since. Don't let anyone fool you on this central point: Haiti was a disaster before the earthquakes, a prototypical example of where the rest of us might be headed, including the centuries of ecological devastation spurred-on by the desire to exploit, to profit, from the misery of enslaved others. What the world should be doing is pledging to rebuild Haiti and its economy and to leave the place alone. We know that's not going to happen anytime soon.

But make no mistake: The Cubans made it to the Haitian-side of Hispaniola first, and not simply thanks to proximity. Will we have a rerun of Katrina? We already have, and under a black president. It took American forces three days to reach Haiti in significant numbers, just more abuse and negligence, the depriving of people of basic human rights.

Some updates on the "Stormy Daniels bombing" in New Orleans

New Orleans, Louisiana--This story is going to be one for the ages. At this point, it becoming very unclear which side the story tends. Did someone try to send Stormy Daniels political adviser Brian Welsh (a Democratic adviser) a message not to run in Louisiana's senatorial race against David Vitter, or did the man have car troubles? There appear to be no solid answers.

According to TPM today by way of the N.O.F.D.:

"It was a fire. The car didn't explode," said Public Information Officer Jonathan Pajeaud. An arson investigation is underway and foul play hasn't been ruled out. But, Pajeaud said, Welsh told firefighters he'd recently gotten electrical work done on his1996 Audi, and investigators are also looking into that as a possible cause." (New Orleans Fire Dept: Car Of Porn Star's Political Adviser Did Not Explode," Talking Points Memo, 07.29.2009: http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/2009/07/new-orleans-fire-dept-car-of-welsh-didnt-explode.php)

We might know in two weeks what actually happened, or not. Just two days later, Daniels herself was arrested for domestic abuse of her husband. Mmm-hmm.

It appears in the Talking Points Memo piece that only the N.O.F.D. is investigating, but in the AP coverage this seems less certain:

New Orleans police and the FBI did not immediately comment.

Welsh said he had no suspects, but feared someone caused the explosion.

"Maybe there is a reason, more of an intentional reason for the car blowing up," Welsh said. "I want to get more facts."

Welsh said he was uncertain if the explosion was connected to his work with Daniels.

"Clearly, if someone tried to blow up my car, it's cause for concern; it's not cause for me to stop doing my job, stop me from talking about the things that are important," Welsh said. "If anybody had been walking by when that car blew up, they would have been seriously injured or killed."

"I really wish this had not happened," Welsh, 38, said. "I need a car."("Porn star mulling La. Senate race has a tough week," AP, 07.29.2009: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hyLJlwzURe_3jwj6ltFjyPW0TcRAD99OB45O0)

Hey, don’t we all need a good car? Wake me up when someone knows what’s happening here…

Are some of Louisiana Senator David Vitter's supporters domestic terrorists?

New Orleans, Louisiana--To put it mildly, whomever attempted to murder Brian Welsh--political adviser to porn star Stormy Daniels is trying to send him and the potential candidate a very obvious message: don't run against incumbent Republican Senator David Vitter. There's no other word but terrorism for this, domestic terrorism.

An act of domestic, political terrorism has happened once again on the streets of America and nobody's paying very much attention, if at all. This event happened the day before yesterday on the streets of New Orleans, but I have yet to see it get any play in the mainstream press. Yet, this is a very serious threat to the integrity of our political process, and the likelihood that this clown had sympathies with the Democratic Party are slim-to-none.

And so, this must come from the far right. Considering that it was probably a pipe-bomb, and that it was a solitary individual, the arrow already points decidedly to-the-right. Welsh stated yesterday:

“No one has seen anything like this before…not in such a dramatic fashion,” Welsh told ABC-26. “It’s too early for me to go pointing fingers. I’d like to hear officially what happened and then we can take it from there. If someone’s trying to send me a message like this, it’s not going to work.”

Daniels is considering a run for the Louisiana senate seat currently occupied by incumbent Republican David Vitter whose been linked to the “D.C Madam,” Deborah Jeane Palfrey. Vitter's cell phone number turned up numerous times in Palfrey's records. ("Political Advisor to Stormy Daniels Hit by Car Bomb," XBIX News Wire.com, 07.28.2009)

I'd agree that it's too early to point fingers at specific groups on the right, and I applaud his reaction of not being deterred, but they weren't doing this for the Democrats--there's no indication of this at all. But I do believe that this comes from the extremist right and that it's time to bring in the FBI, not that I care for the institution, but this is a high crime.

Welsh is wrong about "No one has seen anything like this before," this has happened, though not quite the same way, but it has been dramatic before; one just needs to recall the assassination of Bobby Kennedy, the violence of the Civil Rights era, or even the attempt on George Wallace's life in 1972. Then there's government-sponsored terrorism. Sometime around October 6, 1976, the anti-Castro Cuban terrorist group Alpha 66 (backed by elements of our government) placed a bomb on a Cuban airliner:

All 73 people aboard died in the Oct. 6, 1976 disaster, including 19 members of

Cuba's junior national fencing team returning from Caracas, most of them
teen-agers.

Two Cubans were jailed in Venezuela for masterminding the attack. One was
Orlando Bosch, a physician who left the United States after he was paroled from
a 10-year prison sentence for firing a rocket at a Polish ship anchored in Miami.

The other was Luis Posada Carriles, a former CIA agent who was trained as a
demolition expert for the Bay of Pigs.

Posada Carriles escaped from jail in Venezuela in 1985, reportedly disguised as a
priest. ("Bay of Pigs fiasco spawned anti-Castro plotters," CNN, 04.17.2001)

The CIA's great, but it's good to have friends in the Vatican too. These are just a few other examples, and there have been numerous others from the white supremacist movement over the years. No one would call anti-Castro Cubans leftists.

Alpha 66 was and still is allowed to operate from the swamps of Florida, incidentally. This is not to suggest that the New Orleans bomber was an anti-Castro Cuban (keep up with me, please), but to illustrate that there have been patterns of this criminal activity from the right many times before, and this isn't including the Oklahoma City bombing.

But the very recent murder by Scott Roeder (possibly inspired by the Army of God) of George Tiller, a Kansas abortion doctor, and the shooting-spree by white supremacist James von Brunn at the National Holocaust Museum were most certainly meant to instill fear in others and can be counted as acts of domestic terrorism from the far right. The key word here is "coercion," to prevent or to make someone do something that an individual or a groups wants as a result of the act. Yes, there is the possibility that this was some "lone nut" (either way, they were, let's be frank) who simply wanted to do it for personal reasons--certainly a possibility. Yeah?

Terrorism is known as a form of "asymmetrical warfare," in the parlance of counterterrorism, which jibes very closely with far right rhetoric and the formulation of the "lone wolf/lone-wolf fighter" approach advocated by such white hate luminaries as--once again--Tom Metzger and Alex Curtis. But who would benefit the most from a bombing that ended the campaign of a candidate running for the specific senate seat that porn star Stormy Daniels is setting her sights on?

The answer is pretty obvious: David Vitter. Granted, Daniels doesn't have a real chance of winning, and her candidacy is satirical--to remind Louisianans that Vitter used the prostitution services of the late Deborah Jeane Palfrey (aka the "DC Madam")--but there's nothing wrong with that, and her right to do so is protected under the First Amendment rights to freedom of speech and assembly, never mind the democratic right to run for public office. Whomever put the bomb in Welsh's car is an enemy of the democratic process itself and should be arrested and put on trial for their actions.

"Political Advisor to Stormy Daniels Hit by Car Bomb," XBIX News Wire.com, 07.28.2009: http://www.xbiznewswire.com/view.php?id=111062

ABC26's interview with Brain Welch from yesterday: http://www.abc26.com/videobeta/watch/?watch=4521787e-8dab-4de5-b48b-028fd8c72ac3&src=front

"Bay of Pigs fiasco spawned anti-Castro plotters," CNN, 04.17.2001: http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/bay-of-pigs/plotters.htm

From the Palfrey trial transcripts: April 7th, 2008 excerpt

Ed.--This excerpt comes from the opening day of the trial of Deborah Jeane Palfrey. The witness for the government being questioned is Mark Hines, beginning at the bottom of page 12 and ending on the bottom of page 20. Palfrey always contended to me and others on the defense team that she thought the investigation into her began around May/June of 2004 in the Baltimore IRS office, apparently brought to their attention by USPS investigators.

I'm unaware of the entire extent of discovery materials she was given by the prosecution, but basically rang true at the time, and in a way it still does. Except for one thing. The real inquiry into the "DC Madam" began in August, 2001. Until reading the trial transcript, I was completely unaware of this fact, partly because press coverage of the trial was almost non-existent, and what little there was lacked any substance or detail.

Eventually, either I, the government, or someone else will post it online in toto, and the public can finally judge for themselves how fair her trial proceedings were, and all of the roads the government didn't go down.

For example: why couldn't they have gotten her for underreporting her income? A source informs me that this would have been the easiest of charges to prosecute.

Why didn't they do it? I have my suspicions, and it includes Palfrey and the government both lying about how much money she earned, and that she hid a lot of it. My guess is that they're either still investigating to find it, or they've already located most of it. She made a lot more money than anyone's reporting. The text has been broken-up for easier reading. Page breaks are noted. It appears that the investigation into Palfrey actually did originate in Washington D.C. and not in Baltimore, but in Linthicum, Maryland as Palfrey and author Bill Keisling once contended...

... "DIRECT EXAMINATION

22 BY MS. BUTLER [Ed.--Nice typo, Butler is a "Mr."]:

23 Q Good afternoon.

24 A Good afternoon.

25 Q State your full name and spell your last name, please. [Page Break]

13

1 A My name is Mark Hines. Last name is spelled H-i-n-e-s.

2 Q Mr. Hines, where do you work?

3 A I'm employed as a Assistant Special Agent in Charge with
4 the Postal Service Office of Inspector General.

5 Q And just briefly, what does the Inspector General's
6 office do?

7 A The Postal Service AIG is the internal law enforcement
8 arm of the postal service, and we investigate fraud, waste,
9 and abuse within the postal system and also employment conduct
10 issues.

11 Q And how long have you been with that office?

12 A I started work with them in 2005.

13 Q Okay. Where were you before that?

14 A Prior to that I was employed as a U.S. Postal Inspector
15 in New Orleans, Louisiana.

16 Q Okay. And how long were you there?

17 A I was there from 2003 to 2005.

18 Q Okay. And before that, where were you?

19 A I was employed as a postal inspector in the Washington
20 Division, the Washington Metro area.

21 Q And how long were you there?

22 A I was employed as a postal inspector in Washington
23 between 1994 and 2003.

24 Q Okay. And just briefly, describe what the Postal
25 Inspection Service does. [Page Break]

14

1 A Postal Inspection Service is the external law enforcement
2 branch of the postal service. They investigate violations of
3 postal law and external attacks on the postal system.
4 Examples of that would be robbery of a post-office,
5 a burglary of a post-office, dangerous mailings or illicit
6 mailings going through the postal system and mail fraud.

7 Q Okay. In about 2000, what was your assignment within the
8 Postal Inspection Service at that time?

9 A In 2000, I was assigned to the Prohibited Mailings Team.
10 That was a team that investigated illicit items and contraband
11 being mailed through the postal system.

12 Q Okay. And was there a specific place or location where
13 you were -- primarily would do that?

14 A Yes, sir. I was assigned -- my last duty station was the
15 incoming mail facility at BWI Airport.

16 Q Baltimore/Washington International Airport?

17 A Yes, sir.

18 Q Okay. And what was your -- what was your assignment at
19 that time? What was your job description?

20 A It had two functions. One function was to profile
21 express mail system for illicit mailings containing
22 contraband; that would be narcotics and also illicit funds.

23 Q Okay. And you said two functions.

24 A Yes, sir.

25 Q What's the second function? [Page Break]

15

1 A The other function was to investigate violations
2 involving postal money orders.

3 Q Okay. Now, let's sort of make sure everyone's operating
4 from the same place in terms of knowledge. Express mail, what
5 is that, just briefly?

6 A Express mail is the service provided by the U.S. Postal
7 Service, an overnight delivery service. You can go to the
8 counter at a post-office, pay a larger fee than you would
9 normally, to mail a first-class envelope, and then that item
10 has a control number assigned to it and it's delivered in a --
11 in an expedited fashion, overnight typically.
12 The other aspect of express mail is that you can
13 track its process through the postal system by the use of that
14 assigned control number.

15 Q And you mentioned money orders. What -- just, again,
16 just briefly, what is a money order?

17 A Postal service money order is a financial instrument
18 that's available to postal customers. You can go into a
19 post-office and with currency purchase a negotiable instrument
20 similar to a check or a money order you might get at a
21 7-Eleven or another outlet.
22 In turn, that document, you can convey to somebody
23 else and it can be cashed at a post-office or it can be
24 deposited like a check at a bank.

25 Q And a money order, does it show who purchased the money [Page Break]

16

1 order on the face of the document?

2 A There is a portion on the face of the document for the
3 person remitting it to write the purchaser of the money order
4 and the sender of the money order, although it's not always
5 completed.

6 Q Okay. And in your assignment at BWI, what were you
7 looking for in terms of express mail labeling and in terms of
8 money orders?

9 A During the course of my assignment, we would look for
10 patterns of suspicious mailing activity; we would look at that
11 through the paperwork which would be the express mail labels
12 from these postal mailings. We would also look at live mail
13 that would go out to the postal service facility, the
14 processed incoming express mail for the D.C. Metro area and
15 also outbound express mail coming from the D.C. Metro area,
16 again, for suspicious mailings.

17 Q What were you looking for? What, in particular, were you
18 looking for? What were you trying to find?

19 A In particular, what we were looking for was in the
20 mornings, we were looking for inbound mailings that typically
21 contained drugs, illegal controlled substances, and then in
22 the evening, at the outbound mail, outbound express mail, we
23 were looking for illicit funds, currency, and also postal
24 money orders and other negotiable instruments.

25 Q And did there come a time when you focused on a business [Page Break]

17

1 called Pamela Martin & Associates?

2 A We did, yes, sir.

3 Q And how did that come about?

4 A In August of 2001 [Ed--My emphasis.], I had been profiling for outbound
5 express mailings and came across an express mail piece going
6 to Venetia, California, which had also come to my attention
7 during our review of Postal Service Express Mail labels.

8 Q Okay. And based on that, what did you do?

9 A With that particular piece, I tried to investigate what I
10 could about the sender, the recipient, and the goal was to
11 obtain a federal search warrant to open the mail piece and
12 determine whether contraband, in other words, illicit funds
13 were within that mail piece.

14 Q Did you have sufficient information at that time to
15 obtain a warrant for that piece of information?

16 A I had sufficient information to seek one.

17 Q Okay. Did you actually obtain one, though, at that time?

18 A I did not.

19 Q Okay. So what did you do with that package then?

20 A The package was returned to the mail stream for delivery.

21 Q And did you follow up on that at all?

22 A I did. That mail piece and the information that I found
23 out, which I attempted to get a search warrant on the basis
24 of, developed further through a longer term investigation and
25 became the first mail piece of a series of suspicious [Page Break]

18

1 mailings.

2 Q Okay. And did you look at patterns or other -- you say
3 other mailings. What did you do to look at other mailings
4 that were going to that post-office box? What did you do?

5 A There were a couple of initial investigative steps. We
6 reviewed the mailing history for express mailings going to
7 this particular address in Venetia, which was P.O. Box 1211 in
8 Venetia, 94510 is the ZIP code, Venetia, California.
9 Over an extended period of time, we developed about
10 247 mailings emanating from the Washington Metro area going to
11 this P.O. box.
12 We also did a mail cover tracking to --

13 Q Describe -- before you go too far, what is a mail cover?

14 A Mail cover is an investigative tool available to law
15 enforcement where law enforcement is authorized to review
16 incoming mail, the face of incoming mail going to a given
17 delivery address based on a criminal investigation. So, for a
18 period of 30 days or 60 days, we can review who is sending
19 mail to a given subject of an investigation.

20 Q And as part of that, what information did you develop
21 through that mail cover?

22 A What it developed was that the box holder of P.O. Box
23 1211 in Venetia was a Deborah Jeane Palfrey and that this
24 individual was associated with an out-call escort service
25 named Pamela Martin & Associates. [Page Break]

19

1 Mail directed to that P.O. box came in the name of
2 Deborah Jeane Palfrey, Pamela Martin, Pamela Martin &
3 Associates and combinations thereof. The mail cover that we
4 did illustrated a quantity of express mailings similar to the
5 ones that we had already tracked through our historical
6 documents, and those documents and the mail cover results
7 indicated that about 25 female senders were mailing express
8 mails and the grand total was 247 of them to this P.O. box in
9 Venetia.

10 Q And for what period of time are you talking about?

11 A The records that I reviewed were between the year 2000
12 and 2002.

13 Q Okay. And did you take steps in the local area to
14 determine if you could identify the women who were sending
15 those documents to Venetia, California?

16 A Yes, I did.

17 Q What steps did you take?

18 A We used address checks checking through the postal system
19 to see who receives mail at a given address; in this case, the
20 return address on the mailings. We have also used Department
21 of Motor Vehicle checks and Auto Track, which is a
22 commercially available address check system to try to identify
23 the mailers such as they appeared on the return address
24 portion of these express mails.

25 Q Okay. Were you able to identify any individuals who were [Page Break]

20

1 actually sending documents to Venetia, California?

2 A Yeah, approximately 25 of them.

3 Q Okay. And did you identify specifically by name any
4 individuals? Without giving their names, were you able to --
5 not just get the names of the persons but to identify -- to
6 figure out who they were, where they lived, that type of
7 thing?

8 A Yes, we were able to figure out many aspects of their
9 background.

10 Q Okay. And did you take steps at the post-offices
11 themselves to see if you could track those individuals'
12 actions relative to sending those express mail packages?

13 A Yeah. During the course of the investigation, I dealt
14 with many different postal employees, from window clerks who
15 sold the express mail service, to delivery employees who
16 delivered the express mailing in California and other
17 locations, and those individuals did provide me with
18 information.

19 Q And did you also take steps on the California end of
20 things to see if you could identify further who Deborah
21 Palfrey was and that type of thing?

22 A Yes, I did. The steps on the California end were to
23 determine whether or not, first of all, Ms. Palfrey held this
24 P.O. box, and in review of our postal records is each P.O. box
25 is a P.O. box application, a Form 1093." ...

Will we see Katrina II?

The Gulf Coast--I doubt it, there's too much to lose, but never count the GOP out for screw-ups, incompetence, and indifference for the lives of other Americans. But nature is going to do her do, whether we like it or not. This is comforting.

And isn't it lovely? Isn't it wonderful that Gloria Vanderbilt's love child Anderson Cooper is down in New Orleans, readied to report rumor-as-fact again so he can get another promotion to support his materialistic lifestyle? Who said good things don't come out of disasters? They were lying, but we're used to that here.

And isn't it comforting to know that no substantial upgrades or changes have been made to the levee system in New Orleans? Can you feel it? Can you feel that American can-do spirit? I sure can, and I love it, I feel proud!!

And imagine all of the would-be documentarians out there with their HD video-cameras, poised to record more of the disintegration of America, and maybe not making a truckload of money like the producers and distributors who sell the cable rights and the DVDs, mind you, but having something kick-ass on their infotainment and McBlogger™ resumes?

No, it's a great time to be an American, especially if you have those really big-stilts and those boots to walk over the top of the wreckage. Harry Shearer, I share your angst.

Yes, there's a spirit in the air, alright...and it's time to call-in an exorcist, pronto, shit!

[Ed.--Some jackass commenter named "Anonymous" has suggested that I'm being "untruthful" in calling Cooper Gloria Vanderbilt's "love child," that he was actually born in-wedlock...as though I care about such trivialities. Right, he was born in-wedlock, but he's still a stupid, over-ambitious moronic bastard. Big deal.]

The GOP Convention: Hurricane Gustav is coming! Hurricane Gustav is coming! Hurricane Gustav is coming!

Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota--God, this is my own little humble prayer (and curse) on the Republican Party, perhaps the most violent, exploitative, criminal enterprise the world has ever known: may NOT ONE human being die in New Orleans or along the Gulf Coast, but make it clear that the Bush administration has done NOTHING to properly repair things in New Orleans, because that's the fact.

Make the Republican obstructionism of aid to the Gulf Coast loud-and-clear while Vice President George W. Bush and President Dick Cheney are attempting speech during the convention. Make-it-plain that Karl Rove is not a "genius," but a catastrophe with lots of money behind him, expediting chaos for America in a way only a monkey could manage.

And let this--God--wreck the GOP, let it bring-about their demise as a criminal party. And God, splinter the Democratic Party after that, because they're hardly any better. German soldiers of during WWI and WWII wore "Gott mitt uns" on their belt-buckles, just as the GOP claims that you are on their side. This is doubtful.

Now we're hearing that John McCain is altering the program at the convention in-response to the hurricane that is bearing-down on New Orleans once again, just three-years from the time that a GOP-led government failed us all. And they have kept doing so ever since with all the other disasters that have happened since then. And now, we're hearing that Vice President Bush isn't going to speak at the GOP's convention and is heading down to the Gulf--that must be a relief!

The GOP is right: government doesn't work...when they're in office.

The Missing-Thread in Coverage of the Spitzer Scandal

New York City--Soon-to-be former governor of New York, Eliot Spitzer, has a lot to be proud of and ashamed of. When he was New York State's Attorney General, he was busting many of the same shady lending and mortgage firms who were bailed-out by the fed and J.P. Morgan today. $200 billion was given in-loans to Bank of America (current owner of Countrywide, now under investigation), Citigroup, Merrill Lynch, and all the other sub-prime lenders--namely Bear-Stearns--who have run amok in a regulation-free environment thanks to the Bush administration looking the other way. But then along came state Attorney Generals like Spitzer.

Was the federal bust of Spitzer selective--was it payback for all the busts the former "Sheriff of Wall Street" made? We don't know this yet, but it's a possibility. The timing is very curious: just a few days before the bailout, we get the break in the Spitzer story and his name is thrust into-the-foreground.

What about the other clients identified in the investigation? If they're Republicans, we're not going to find-out anytime soon. Recall that Senator Vitter's presence on wiretaps of a 2001 investigation in New Orleans were suppressed for years by the Bush Justice Department. Then there were all the "mysterious" break-ins during 2007 at the campaign headquarters of Barack Obama, Mitt Romney, and the offices of Senator Christopher Dodd.

It's a real twilight time. But all that aside, one has to wonder if the newly-appointed Governor Paterson will be initiating any new investigations on Wall Street. Taking-down Spitzer surely had the aim of limiting them, underscoring the stupidity of his actions.

Historians are likely to be stunned at how selective most of the Justice Department investigations were under the Bush administration, and how Congress looked-aside when it was obvious for all to see. Funny how Americans are the last to know their own history. This aspect of the whole story is likely to be neglected into oblivion, down the memory hole, but the questions and suspicions are going to be there, forever. They'll just be classified until all the primary players are dead.

"National Security" will be the tired refrain, which in some respects is accurate: if Americans knew half of what's going-on under the color of authority, they might revolt. With all of the economic-woes created by this unprecedented era of corruption, it's unsurprising that both parties are alright about domestic surveillance--they might need it to survive our wrath when things have gotten so bad from their actions.

But if you look at how the exposure of Republican Senator David Vitter was handled and look at Spitzer's case, the Democratic governor's treatment certainly appears to be selective and blatantly partisan. This is not coming from a fan of the Democratic Party. Not only that, but it should be noted that the Spitzer case has a strange parallel with the blank inaction to impeach the vice president and president for far more heinous crimes. Calls for impeachment from the Republicans was resounding, while we can readily recall the sound of crickets on-their-part when it comes to their own.

Centrally, these would be war crimes, but the scope and depth of the Bush administration's overarching crimes are going to be marveled at for generations. Remember reading about slavery, or the Holocaust? Remember saying to yourself, "Were they stupid? Why did they put-up with that?!" Welcome to why not, your wondering is over. Have fun looking in the mirror tomorrow morning, then write, call, e-mail, and contact your representative and ask them what the hell they actually do there in Washington D.C. Better yet, if you have no ties to the establishment, why not run for office? Do what you do best.