Friday, November 12, 2004

IRAQ: FALUJJAH RESISTANCE

Jihad Unspun: Muhaideen Make Signifgant Gains; Executed Well Planned Attacks

On Thursday, Fallujah Mujahideen managed to make significant gains against occupation forces as the US were forced to admit they are meeting with stiff resistance. While mainstream press continues the façade that only 18 soldiers have been lost and that the will have the city under control by Saturday, the reality of the situation that JUS has been reporting is finally beginning to be echoed in Arab press.

As details of fighting in and around of Falluja are slowly surfacing, a clear picture of Mujahideen’s professional pre-battle planning based on accurate anticipation of enemies moves is emerging. Mujahideen are now seizing the opportunities this advance planning has provided by shelling occupation forces, attacking them on the ground, ambushing them and forcing them to retreat every step of the way. An undisclosed number of Americans have been captured as well.

Also on Thursday evening, Iraqi Mujahideen bombed an ice factory in the center of the al-Jawlan neighborhood where US occupation forces invaders had parked vehicles and stored equipment. The factorys had a floor space of nearly 5,000 square meters and inside Humvees for carrying equipment. Large numbers of tanks and armored vehicles surrounded the factory.

Mujahideen suspected the Americans would use the factory as a storage depot or headquarters and therefore they mined the building prior to the US assault. Thursday night Mujahideen forces bombarded the bobby-trapped factory with mortars, setting off a thunderous explosion followed by massive secondary blasts that were still continuing at the time of this filing. The explosions were so massive that fireballs could be seen five kilometers away.

IRAQ: FALLUJAH RESISTANCE

Jihad Unspun: “Resistance Is Unshakable Mountain” Says Captured General; American Contractor Seized

An American General was among those captured by Mujahideen forces on Thursday after having to abandon their vehicles under Mujahideen fire.

The incident came after the Mujahideen lured the Americans into city center and forcing them to split into six groups, the Mujahideen destroyed 14 tanks on the main street linking the old road to Ramadi. US occupation forces have recently resorted to using tanks instead of personnel carriers to storm the city after realizing that their personnel carriers were easily hit and destroyed. As the tanks blazed, no soldiers came out of the destroyed tanks that usually carry 9 soldiers on board.

IRAQ: FALLUJAH

ICH: Iraq: the unthinkable becomes normal by John Pilger

Mainstream media speak as if Fallujah were populated only by foreign "insurgents". In fact, women and children are being slaughtered in our name

Edward S Herman's landmark essay, "The Banality of Evil", has never seemed more apposite. "Doing terrible things in an organised and systematic way rests on 'normalisation'," wrote Herman. "There is usually a division of labour in doing and rationalising the unthinkable, with the direct brutalising and killing done by one set of individuals . . . others working on improving technology (a better crematory gas, a longer burning and more adhesive napalm, bomb fragments that penetrate flesh in hard-to-trace patterns). It is the function of the experts, and the mainstream media, to normalise the unthinkable for the general public."


IRAQ: FALLUJAH WAR CRIMES

Asia Times: A thousand Fallujahs by Pepe Escobar

Once again the US has been caught in a giant spider's web. Fallujah now is a network: it's Baghdad, Ramadi, Samarra, Latifiyah, Kirkuk, Mosul. Streets on fire, everywhere: Hundreds, thousands of Fallujahs - the Mesopotamian echo of a thousand Vietnams. The Iraqi resistance has even regained control of a few Baghdad neighborhoods.

Baghdad residents say there are practically no US troops around, even as regular explosions can be heard all over the city. Baghdad sources confirm to Asia Times Online that the mujahideen now control parts of the southern suburb of ad-Durha, as well as Hur Rajab, Abu Ghraib, al-Abidi, as-Suwayrah, Salman Bak, Latifiyah and Yusufiyah - all in the Greater Baghdad area. This would be the first time since the fall of Baghdad on April 9, 2003, that the resistance has been able to control these neighborhoods

There are at least 120 mosques in Fallujah. A consensus is emerging that almost half of them have been smashed by air strikes and shelling by US tanks - something that will haunt the United States for ages

According to residents, the city is now littered with thousands of cluster bombs. In an explosive accusation - and not substantiated - an Iraqi doctor who requested anonymity has told al-Quds Press that "the US occupation troops are gassing resistance fighters and confronting them with internationally banned chemical weapons". The Washington Post has confirmed that US troops are firing white-phosphorus rounds that create a screen of fire impervious to water

The wounded in Fallujah are in essence left to die. There is not a single surgeon in town. And practically no doctors as well, as the Pentagon decided to bomb both the al-Hadar Hospital and the Zayid Mobile Hospital.

"CHECK IT"

IRAQ: FALLUJAH

Jihad Unspun: Mujahideen Control Majority Of Fallujah
Americans Expelled From Three Districts

In news just in, the tactical decision taken by the Mujahideen to open up two roads leading to the city centre has turned out to be very effective.

According to sources close to the Mujahideen, as a result of heavy shelling on civilian neighborhoods all around the perimeters of the city, a decision was made to move the battle into the center of town by opening two main roads that lead into Fallujah central.

The first road opened was "Nisan 7", which is 17 -20 meters wide and stretches from the rail network north of Fallujah, passes by the Al-Mualimeen zone, on to Nisan 7 to Al-Forqan Mosque and ends in the Al-Shuhada neighborhood. The second road opened was "Tharthar Street", which is 15 -18 meters wide extends from railway station, from where the Americans are handling forward control, passes through the Al-Ghuaifi neighborhood and ends at Officers neighborhood. After opening the two roads, Mujahideen made a tactical withdrawal from the city's perimeters to permit the Americans to enter the two roads. The plan was successful; the Americans are now on the two roads just where the Mujahideen wanted them to be.

IRAQ: FALLUJAH

BBC: Eyewitness: Defiance amid carnage

As US forces battle insurgents in streets strewn with rubble and corpses, the BBC News website spoke by phone to Fadhil Badrani, an Iraqi journalist and resident of Falluja who reports regularly for Reuters and BBC World Service in Arabic.

I went for a walk around the city last night after the Americans pulled back.

It was very quiet - often the only sounds coming from the movement of fighters along streets and rooftops.

In places, it was also very dark, with only the occasional rocket or flare lighting the way.

Wherever I went, I found broken buildings and bodies - local people and fighters killed on the streets.

IRAQ: FALLUJAH

Rense: Fallujah - America's Guernica

On April 26, 1937, the Nazi Luftwaffe dropped 100,000 pounds of bombs on the peaceful Basque village of Guernica, Spain on the urging of the Fascist Generalisimo Francisco Franco. At the end of the day, Guernica was in total ruins and 1,654 Basque civilians had been slaughtered and 889 wounded. The world in those days was horrified by the deed. Generalisimo Franco initially denied to the press that the raid ever took place. Later, when photographs of the massacre were published, the Fascist Franco blamed the destruction of Guernica and the killings on those who defended it.

Guernica" is back. This time it is not about the Nazi Luftwaffe dropping bombs on a village in Spain but about the USA dropping bombs and massacring hundreds of civilians that include women and children in the town of Fallujah, Iraq. As Franco in "Guernica", the USA military is denying that it is targeting civilians, but censored reports are filtering out of Iraq that say that over half of the Mosques in the city lie in ruins and that US Marines are utilizing outlawed lethal gasses against the city's defenders which are also causing massive casualties among the civilians that remain in the city. Other reports in the Arab media talk about hundreds of civilian casualties under the rubble of homes that were hit by USA bombs during the initial military "softening" of the city. Gruesome photographs of the dead are reminiscent of the survivor's account of "Guernica" as quoted above.

IRAQ: FALLUJAH RESISTANCE

NBC: More Than 200 U.S. Fallujah Casualties Reported

U.S. soldiers and Marines launched a large attack Thursday into the southern half of Fallujah, where insurgents still holding, opening a second phase in the offensive, U.S. officials said

IRAQ: FALLUJAH

Al-Jazeera: 'Scores of civilians' killed in Falluja

Muhammad Abbud said he watched his nine-year-old son bleed to death at their Falluja home, unable to take him to hospital as fighting raged in the streets and bombs rained down on the Iraqi city

Residents say scores of civilians have been killed or wounded in 24 hours of fighting since US-led forces pushed deep into the city on Monday evening

Thursday, November 11, 2004

IRAQ: FALLUJAH

Asia Times: Satan hides in a hospital
by Pepe Escobar

Everything one needed to know about the true, unspinnable foreign policy of the second George W Bush administration is represented by the "capture" of the first strategic target in the assault on Fallujah: the general hospital, on the left bank of the Euphrates, now totally cut off from the city. According to the Bush administration world view, this is the house where Satan lives.

Bush-installed interim Iraqi Prime Minster Iyad Allawi announced with a smile of victory that he personally ordered the capture of the hospital. So maybe it was not the Pentagon: it was an unelected politician asking a foreign occupation army to attack a hospital in his own country and preventing doctors and ambulances from entering a city under siege.

The assault, dubbed Operation Phantom Fury, perversely started on Laylat e-Qadr, the most important and holy night of the year for the Islamic world.

In terms of the information war, the hospital was indeed the most strategic of targets. During the first siege of Fallujah in April, doctors told independent media the real story about the suffering of civilian victims. So this time the Pentagon took no chances: no gory, disturbing photos of the elderly, women and children - the thousands unable to leave Fallujah in advance of this week's offensive, the civilian victims of the relentless bombing.

"CHECK IT"

USA: VIDEO OF TANKS IN LA

Indymedia: Video of Tanks at anti-war protest in LA

LOS ANGELES, November 9, 2004 - At 7:50 PM two armored tanks showed up at an anti-war protest in front of the federal building in Westwood. The tanks circled the block twice, the second time parking themselves in the street and directly in front of the area where most of the protesters were gathered. Enraged, some of the people attempted to block the tanks, but police quickly cleared the street. The people continued to protest the presence of the tanks, but about ten minutes the tanks drove off. It is unclear as to why the tanks were deployed to this location. Uploaded here is video from the event.

"Disturbing"

USA: NEW ATTORNEY GENERAL

CCR: New Attorney General-Geneva Concventions "quaint" and "obsolete"

On November 10, 2004 in New York, NY the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) voiced strong opposition to the nomination of White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales to replace Attorney General John Ashcroft. Citing the infamous leaked January 25, 2002, Gonzales’ memo justifying the suspension of the Geneva Conventions in the war on terror, CCR Legal Director Jeffrey Fogel said, “To call the Geneva Conventions, which were put in place after the atrocities of World War II to govern the future conduct of war and prevent such horrors from ever occurring, ‘quaint’ and ‘obsolete’ is to go back down a path we thought we would never travel again.”

MIDDLE EAST: ARAFAT DIES

Uri Avnery: Uri Avnery views the life and achievements of Yasser Arafat

Uri Avnery looks back on the life and achievements of Yasser Arafat, from liberating the Palestinian people from Arab rulers, to leading the armed struggle against Israel, to his decision to reach an agreement with Israel on the basis of a two-state solution. "Israel will lose a great enemy, who could have become a great partner and ally... As for me, I respected him as a Palestinian patriot, I admired him for his courage, I understood the constraints he was working under, I saw in him the partner for building a new future for our two peoples. I was his friend."

MIDDLE EAST: ARAFAT DIES 11.11.2004

Reuters: Arafat, Icon of Palestinian Cause, Dead at 75

PARIS (Reuters) - Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, who rose from guerrilla icon to Nobel peace prize-winner but ended up isolated and locked in conflict with Israel, died in a French hospital on Thursday. He was 75.

The announcement of the death of the Palestinian president, who symbolized his people's fight for an independent state but failed to achieve it in his lifetime, ended days of confusion over his condition as he lay comatose behind a veil of secrecy.



Wednesday, November 10, 2004

IRAQ: FALLUJAH RESISTANCE

Middle East Online: House-to-house warfare in Fallujah

Insurgents have chosen mobility to counter far superior US artillery and missiles in battle of Fallujah.

IRAQ: FALLUJAH

Chicago Tribune: At Least 200 Iraqi Troops Abandon Fallujah Offensive

U.S. military officials said Monday that at least 200 Iraqi troops had deserted their posts in the American-led offensive on Fallujah.

The troops supporting the nation's interim government are facing pressure from some Iraqi religious groups and threats from insurgents.

Prominent Iraqi Muslim clerics, including influential Sunnis and top aides to rebel Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr, condemned the Iraqi troops serving alongside Americans in Fallujah. The insurgent council that has controlled Fallujah for the past six months threatened to behead Iraqi troops who entered the city to "fight their own people."

IRAQ: FALLUJAH

Reuters: Fighting Rages in Iraq's Falluja After Night Lull

U.S. warplanes launched air strikes in the Iraqi city of Falluja on Wednesday amid fierce fighting between U.S.-led forces and rebels.

Machinegun, mortar and rocket fire shook the Sunni Muslim city as planes made several bombing runs over the northwestern Jolan district within 15 minutes, a Reuters reporter said.

Smoke was rising from houses just beyond Falluja's captured rail station, where Marines and Iraqi forces have a base.

Marines said their opponents showed no signs of giving up, even though U.S. forces penetrated to the center of the city, west of Baghdad, after an offensive launched on Monday night.

IRAQ: FALLUJAH

BBC News: 'Watching tragedy engulf my city'

US and Iraqi forces are locked in desperate street battles against insurgents in the Iraqi city of Falluja. The BBC News website spoke by phone to Fadhil Badrani, a journalist in Falluja who reports for the BBC World Service in Arabic.

"Now they are firing back at the houses, at anything that moves. It is war on the streets.

The American troops look like they have given up trying to go into buildings for now and are just trying to control the main roads."

cannot say how many people have been killed but after two days of bombing, this city looks like Kabul.

Large portions of it have been destroyed but it is so dangerous to leave the house that I have not been able to find out more about casualties.

USA: VOTE FRAUD

Buzzflash: BuzzFlash > Contributor > Incredible As It May Seem, MSNBC Covers Voting Problems

Just watched Keith Olbermann on MSNBC in which he did a story on election problems. He said that there were 90,000 more votes cast in Ohio than registered voters (he went through a list of counties and said how many voters were registered in each and how many extra thousands of votes were recorded).

He reported how in Florida counties, heavily-leaning dem counties went overwhelmingly for Bush -- the first time these counties have ever voted Repub. He showed charts with numbers, etc., it was very compelling.

He said that all the irregularities in Florida and Ohio have happened in counties using non-paper-trail e-voting from the companies run by Bush's friends.

He interviewed a reporter from the Cincinnati paper who discussed how homeland security barred reporters from witnessing the voting in some of the major minority areas in town, that this was the first time the press was ever kept out of and barred from witnessing the voting. The Sec of State in Ohio says that it was under orders from Bush's Homeland Security chief, who said that these cities in Ohio were under a highly increased threat of terrorism during the election. For this reason, only one entrance was open for the voting in these (largely democratic) areas, and the press was barred from coming in to see the voting, or to have the usual offices in the building they have had in every past year

Tuesday, November 09, 2004

IRAQ: RESISTANCE

Al-Basrah: Iraqi Resistance Report for 5 November 2004 through 7 November 2004.

Al-Fallujah – ar-Ramadi Province.

US savagely pounds al-Fallujah late Friday night.

In a dispatch posted at 12:55am Saturday morning local time (11:55pm Friday night Mecca time) the al-Fallujah correspondent of Mafkarat al-Islam reported that the northern, eastern, and southern parts of the city were at that hour under an extremely fierce US bombardment. In the north, the al-Jaghifi neighborhood was under US fire, in the east of the city American shells were raining down on al-‘Askari neighborhood, while the industrial zone and the ash-Shuhada’ neighborhoods were the American targets in the southern part of al-Fallujah.

The savage US bombardment began at 11:25pm local time Friday night and was still under way as the correspondent filed his report.
A Mafkarat al-Islam dispatch posted at 2:30am Saturday local time (1:30am Saturday Mecca time) reported that the US bombardment was still continuing.

IRAQ: FALLUJAH

Al-Jazeera: Hospital hit as fighting rages in Falluja

Warplanes have bombed a government clinic in the centre of Falluja as US ground forces engaged in pitched battles with fighters defending the city.


Residents said the one-storey Popular Clinic which had been receiving wounded anti-US fighters and civilians was hit overnight as US-led forces pressed into the city.

The residents said on Tuesday it was impossible to reach the clinic because of heavy bombing and US tanks in the area.

The clinic's telephones were no longer working.

IRAQ: FALLUJAH RESISTANCE

Reuters: US Chopper Shot Down In Falluja - Witness

A U.S. helicopter was shot down over Falluja on Tuesday as U.S.-led forces were pressing home an offensive on the rebel-held city.

"I saw the helicopter collide with a rocket. It turned into a ball of fire and fell to the ground," said Reuters reporter Fadel al-Badrani. "There was smoke everywhere."

IRAQ

Rense: American Options In Iraq by William R. Polk

Iraq is in a terrible condition, its society has been torn apart, scores of thousands have been killed and even more wounded, its infrastructure has been shattered, dreadful hatreds have been generated. Today, there are no good options -- only better or worse -- alternatives. Three appear possible:

The first option has been called "staying the course." In practice that means continued fighting. France 'stayed the course' in Algeria in the 1950s as America did in Vietnam in the 1960s and as the Israelis are now doing in occupied Palestine. It has never worked anywhere. In Algeria, the French employed over three times as many troops, nearly half a million, to fight roughly the same number of insurgents as America is now fighting in Iraq. They lost. America had half a million soldiers in Vietnam and gave up. After forty years of warfare against the Palestinians, the Israelis have achieved neither peace nor security.

The author is a former Member of the U.S. State Department's Policy Planning Council, responsible for the Middle East, he was Professor of History at the University of Chicago and Founding-Director of its Center for Middle Eastern Studies.





Monday, November 08, 2004

USA: THE APOCALYPSE IS COMING

Check: Rapture Ready Index

The Purpose For This Index
The Rapture Index has two functions: one is to factor together a number of related end time components into a cohesive indicator, and the other is to standardize those components to eliminate the wide variance that currently exists with prophecy reporting.

The Rapture Index is by no means meant to predict the rapture, however, the index is designed to measure the type of activity that could act as a precursor to the rapture.

You could say the Rapture index is a Dow Jones Industrial Average of end time activity, but I think it would be better if you viewed it as prophetic speedometer. The higher the number, the faster we're moving towards the occurrence of pre-tribulation rapture.




VENUZELA

Heise: USA finanzieren "demokratische Bestrebungen" nach Intervention und Putsch

Weitere US-Einflussnahmen in Venezuela: Finanzierung und Unterstützung aus dem Norden für die Opposition

Die Strategie der Opposition, die sich in Venezuela selbst wenig Hoffnungen auf eine breite Unterstützung machen kann, zielt darauf Entscheidungen der Regierung als Willkür einer Diktatur zu präsentieren und durch Rücktritte, die Behinderung verwaltungstechnischer Vorgänge und das Anstacheln von gewalttätigen Zusammenstößen auf den Straßen, ein Bild weitgehender Instabilität und Unregierbarkeit zu präsentieren, um so den internationalen Druck auf Venezuela zu erhöhen. Die führenden Sektoren der Opposition hoffen dadurch einen erneuten Militärputsch oder eine US-Intervention zu hervorzurufen. Dafür demonstrierten sie auch vor der US-Botschaft in Caracas mit Schildern wie "1. Hussein; 2. Aristide; 3. Chávez".

IRAQ: FALLUJAH WAR CRIMES

Al Jazeera: Battle of Falluja under way

Fierce fighting is raging in Falluja after interim PM Iyad Allawi gave US-led forces the go-ahead for a full-scale attack on the besieged Iraqi city

Allawi: "I gave my authority to the multinational forces, Iraqi forces. We are determined to clean Falluja from the terrorists."
"Puppet Allawi doesn't hold any authority"

Iraqi special forces stormed the hospital at about 2am (2300 GMT Sunday) without firing a shot, blindfolding and dragging people into halls and kicking down doors.

All the hospital staff and doctors have been arrested," said a doctor at the hospital Dr Ahmad Ghanim.

"We are now in a very small and poorly-equipped alternative clinic. We are only 4-5 doctors with 5 assistants. " Ghanim said.

The doctor added that US forces had grounded all ambulances and fired on and disabled the hospital's only car. Doctors were also running short of medicines.
The hospital director said earlier that the facility was surrounded. "They are telling us over loud speakers that if we leave the building we will be shot at," Dr Salih al-Isawi said, adding that an ambulance that tried to exit the facility was fired upon.
"It seems that the americans went to the israeli warcrime school"

IRAQ: FALLUJAH WAR CRIMES

BBC: US strikes raze Falluja hospital

A hospital has been razed to the ground in one of the heaviest US air raids in the Iraqi city of Falluja

MIDDLE EAST: ARAFAT POISONED?

Jerusalem Post: Aide alleges Israel poisoned Arafat

Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat was poisoned by Israel, one of his advisers said Sunday.

The option is being seriously considered by the PA, which has sent blood samples to the US and Germany to confirm or rule out the option, he said.

Arafat suffers symptoms similar to those of former PFLP military leader Wadi'a Hadad, he said.

Hadad was poisoned in the late 1970s by a close aide who was allegedly recruited by the Mossad, the adviser said, although the official reason for his death was cancer.

"It took Hadad eight weeks to die... he also entered a coma", he said, "Unless they find an antidote, Arafat will die," he added.

IRAQ: FALLUJAH

Observer: Remaining Falluja Residents Face Extreme Danger US Troops To Regard All As 'Potential Insurgents'

US Troops To Regard All As 'Potential Insurgents'

Marines near Falluja call last year's invasion of Iraq 'the first war'. This, then, is the second. They plan to retake the rebel-held city of Falluja and from there crush the insurgency throughout the Sunni Triangle, west of Baghdad.

Last week thousands more combat troops, joined by Iraqi security forces, arrived to back the marines who will lead the assault - expected to begin as early as tomorrow.

'Although it is inevitable that there are some casualties in a city like this, we have done everything we can to let people know coalition forces are here,' said Shupp. 'That's one of the reasons why we have such a large show of force, so people realise they should really evacuate.' More than half the townspeople are believed to have left. Anyone still in the city will be regarded as a potential insurgent and all cars treated as possible suicide bombs.

"So anybody who's not leaving fallujah is now regarded as a insurgent and will be shot..that is a warcrime and they even announce that in public. To clear a city under occupation from its inhabitants is regardet as ethnic cleansing by international law. If you target a whole population and don't differ between civilians and insurgents..that's a war crime of the worst kind. The USA is there to spread Democracy and Western Values isn't it? And then they ask why do they hate us? Heil Bush!"






IRAQ: FALLUJAH

NY Times: Invasion of Fallujah Begins

Sunday 07 November 2004

Fallujah - Explosions and heavy gunfire thundered through the outskirts of Fallujah on Sunday night and early Monday as American soldiers and marines swept toward strategic bridges, hospitals and other objectives in what appeared to be the first stage of a long-expected invasion of the city.

Hours earlier, Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, faced with an outbreak of insurgent violence across the country, declared emergency law for 60 days across most of Iraq. The proclamation gave him broad martial powers that allow him to impose curfews, order house-to-house searches and detain suspected criminals and insurgents.

"We declared it today and we are going to implement it whenever and wherever it is necessary," Dr. Allawi told pool reporters inside the fortified compound that houses the headquarters of the interim Iraqi government. "This will send a very powerful message that we are serious."

Troops were on the move by 9 p.m. to the west and south of Fallujah, just across the Euphrates River, and after two hours of steady pounding by American guns, tanks, Bradley armored vehicles, artillery and AC-130 gunships, at least one objective - a hospital less than a mile from downtown Fallujah - had been secured by American special forces and the Iraqi 36th commando battalion.

Tracer fire lit up the sky as the operation began, helicopters crisscrossed the battlefield, and at least one American vehicle was fired upon with a rocket-propelled grenade as American and Iraqi forces converged on the hospital, called Al-Fallujah. Shortly before midnight, American forces were exchaning gunfire across a strategic bridge near the hospital with four to five insurgent positions on the other side.





USA: ELECTION THEFT

Rense: House Dems Ask GAO To Investigate Voting Machines


Common Dreams: Evidence Mounts That The Vote Was Hacked
When I spoke with Jeff Fisher this morning (Saturday, November 06, 2004), the Democratic candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives from Florida's 16th District said he was waiting for the FBI to show up. Fisher has evidence, he says, not only that the Florida election was hacked, but of who hacked it and how. And not just this year, he said, but that these same people had previously hacked the Democratic primary race in 2002 so that Jeb Bush would not have to run against Janet Reno, who presented a real threat to Jeb, but instead against Bill McBride, who Jeb beat.

"Election night, I'd been doing live election coverage for WDEV, one of the radio stations that carries my syndicated show, and, just after midnight, during the 12:20 a.m. Associated Press Radio News feed, I was startled to hear the reporter detail how Karen Hughes had earlier sat George W. Bush down to inform him that he'd lost the election. The exit polls were clear: Kerry was winning in a landslide. "Bush took the news stoically," noted the AP report.

But then the computers reported something different. In several pivotal states.

Conservatives see a conspiracy here: They think the exit polls were rigged. "


Greg Palast: Kerry Won - Here Are The Facts
I know you don't want to hear it. You can't face one more hung chad. But I don't have a choice. As a journalist examining that messy sausage called American democracy, it's my job to tell you who got the most votes in the deciding states. Tuesday, in Ohio and New Mexico, it was John Kerry.

Most voters in Ohio thought they were voting for Kerry. At 1:05 a.m. Wednesday morning, CNN's exit poll showed Kerry beating Bush among Ohio women by 53 percent to 47 percent. The exit polls were later combined with-and therefore contaminated by-the tabulated results, ultimately becoming a mirror of the apparent actual vote. Kerry also defeated Bush among Ohio's male voters 51 percent to 49 percent. Unless a third gender voted in Ohio, Kerry took the state.


TWD: Palm Beach County Logs 88,000 More Votes Than Voters
According to the official election results posted on the Palm Beach County election website, 542,835 ballots were cast for a presidential candidate while only 454,427 voters turned out for the election (including absentee). This leaves a discrepancy of 88,408 votes cast for the presidential candidates.

Palm Beach County's supervisor of elections is Theresa LePore who is known for the 2000 Presidential Election and the notorious "butterfly ballot" that caused confusion among seniors and other Floridians.

Other election oddities occurred throughout Florida with some counties registering a 400% increase in expected voter turnout among Republicans while Democrats supposedly experienced a -60% decline in expected support within certain counties. The 50+ counties experiencing the high percentage fluctuations in expected turnout used optical scan voting machines on November 2nd.

Vote discrepancies were also found in Gahanna, Ohio which gave an extra 4,000 votes to President Bush. The error was explained away by Franklin County administrators as a "glitch" in the electronic voting system.


Truthout: Broward Machines Count Backward
Fort Lauderdale - It had to happen. Things were just going too smoothly.

Early Thursday, as Broward County elections officials wrapped up after a long day of canvassing votes, something unusual caught their eye. Tallies should go up as more votes are counted. Thats simple math. But in some races, the numbers had gone . . . down.

Officials found the software used in Broward can handle only 32,000 votes per precinct. After that, the system starts counting backward.

Why a voting system would be designed to count backward was a mystery to Broward County Mayor Ilene Lieberman. She was on the phone late Wednesday with Omaha-based Elections Systems and Software.



USA: THE BUSH VOTER

Rense: God's Anointed One Was Elected

What you are about to read is an actual email Jeff Rense received...

Mr. Rense,

Hello! I believe what we have here as far as the 2004 elections is a close tie between the devil and God. Not Kerry and Bush. And God prevailed obviously and placed the most morale person in office during the "end times".

Abortion and Christanity are reasons for my voting for Bush along with the gay marriage ban! I have been rejoicing since Bush's (the good Lord aboves Win!) victory. He is a family and moral man and believes in the sanctity of marriage, honesty, anti-choice/pro life. He is going back to the beliefs of our founding fathers of the U.S.A.

Of course since God is with Bush the world hates him because they don't want to turn to the bible and away from their vile-sinful lifestyles that are abominable to God. Jesus was hated by the world too. Doesn't it make since when you are born again TRULY through the blood of Christ the world would hate you too? Well, that is Bush. Wake-up. Bush sincerely cares about this nation because he has the love of God living within him. So, it is ones choice to accept Christ or not. If not they send themselves to hell by living in opposition to Gods rule. Don't blame him.

God Bless,
(Name removed)