Day: August 17, 2006

I’ve had the bug to do some true, from-the-ground-up, non-D20 RPG design, which I haven’t done in quite a while.

The Adamant Entertainment Blog has details.

It’s actually a project that I started up about 3 years ago, and has been burrowing around my skull ever since. I think the time is right.

A Federal Judge has ruled that the U.S. government’s warrantless wiretapping program is unconstitutional and ordered it ended immediately.

Halle-fucking-lujiah.

Of course, the Bush junta will most likely just ignore this, claiming “National Security,” “Executive Privelege,” or “Because I Said So.” Of course, I’m expecting that the mainstream media will instead breathlessly cover the latest chapter of the JonBenet Ramsey CelebriTragiPorn, so perhaps this story will die a quiet death.

Here’s a PDF of the ruling. Save it. Show it to your kids someday, as a historical document, marking the moment when someone tried to put this nation back on track.

The best quote from the whole thing, which is just begging to be made into a T-shirt, bumper stickers, etc. and plastered everywhere:

“….the Office of the Chief Executive has itself been created, with its powers, by the Constitution. There are no hereditary Kings in America and no powers not created by the Constitution.”

Craig Murray is the former British ambassador to the Central Asian Republic of Uzbekistan. Since leaving the UK Government, he’s become an outspoken critic of Western policies in the region. He’s just published an article on his website about the alleged Airline Bombing Plot, which is well worth reading.

“I have been reading very carefully through all the Sunday newspapers to try and analyse the truth from all the scores of pages claiming to detail the so-called bomb plot. Unlike the great herd of so-called security experts doing the media analysis, I have the advantage of having had the very highest security clearances myself, having done a huge amount of professional intelligence analysis, and having been inside the spin machine.

So this, I believe, is the true story.

None of the alleged terrorists had made a bomb. None had bought a plane ticket. Many did not even have passports, which given the efficiency of the UK Passport Agency would mean they couldn’t be a plane bomber for quite some time.”

He goes on, providing more details, before concluding:

“In all of this, the one thing of which I am certain is that the timing is deeply political. This is more propaganda than plot. Of the over one thousand British Muslims arrested under anti-terrorist legislation, only twelve per cent are ever charged with anything. That is simply harrassment of Muslims on an appalling scale. Of those charged, 80% are acquitted. Most of the very few – just over two per cent of arrests – who are convicted, are not convicted of anything to do terrorism, but of some minor offence the Police happened upon while trawling through the wreck of the lives they had shattered.

Be sceptical. Be very, very sceptical.”

The latest Zogby Poll indicated that Bush’s numbers have continued to sink, even with the unveiling of this “plot” — so maybe the country has finally woken up and smelled the bullshit. I can only pray that this is the case…..although it makes me very frightened as well: If the staged unveiling of a “MAJOR TERRORIST THREAT!!!OMGWTF!!!!” didn’t save his approval rating, how long will it be before Rove and the rest of the NeoCon Cabal decide that we need to have an actual attack to serve as a Reichstag Fire to drive up support?