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POPSThe Greying of Canada Will there be a national strategy to cope with the massive numbers of aging Canadians or creation of a national home-care program for seniors? "The older we get, it seems, the longer we want to live – and, indeed, are living. Like almost every other developed country, Canada is greying, big-time, as the population bulge known as baby boomers closes in on senior status, with the first wave turning 65 in 2011. They will live longer than their forebears; not only has Canadian life expectancy doubled in the past century, to 82 for men and 85 for women, but many more of us will live to be 100." "I tell old people: you have to pay attention to what you like, what gives you pleasure. I love clothes. I love food. I still cut out recipes even though I can't cook any more. I love to read. If you love reading, you've got it for life. I'm grateful to my friends and my children. I know there are grand gardens around the city but I couldn't be happier with my little garden."
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POPSConflict Over Spying Led White House to Brink Cont.... Joel Brenner and Vito Potenza, the two men wilting under Addington's wrath, had driven 26 miles from Fort Meade, the NSA's eavesdropping headquarters in Maryland. They were conducting a review of their agency's two-year-old special surveillance operation. They already knew the really secret stuff : The NSA and other services had been unleashed to turn their machinery inward, collecting signals intelligence inside the United States. What the two men didn't know was why the Bush administration believed the program was legal.
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POPSThe putsch that imperiled America "Others have been less scrupulous for reasons that do them even less credit than ideological fanaticism. Take, for example, former Pentagon general counsel William J. Haynes II. In a sworn statement, Air Force Col. Morris Davis -- the former top prosecutor in the Office of Military Commissions -- says he resigned after being pressured by Haynes to move forward with politically "sexy" prosecutions even though Morris believed the evidence against the defendants had been obtained by torture. Davis said he also told Haynes that a few acquittals at Guantanamo, if warranted, would send a message that the commissions sitting there were fair, just as the not-guilty verdicts against some Nazi defendants had done for the Nuremberg trials. Haynes' response was emphatic, according to Morris: "We can't have acquittals! We've got to have convictions! ... If we've been holding these guys for so long, how can we explain letting them get off?""
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POPSinteractive guide: Who in the Bush administration broke the law, and who could be prosecuted
Each scandal is represented by a colored circle that encompasses the people who are implicated. As it's easy to see, many of the players here are mixed up in two, three, or more of the alleged crimes. Hence all the overlapping circles (Venn-diagram heaven!). The best way to make sense of this legal tangle is to mouse over the title of an individual scandal, which will highlight everyone implicated. For example, the wiretapping bubble ensnares George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, David Addington, John Ashcroft, John Yoo, and Alberto Gonzales. At the same time, Ashcroft and Gonzales fall into the overlapping circle for monkey business related to DoJ hiring. Mouse over a person's name for information on how each person is involved. Mouse over the title of each circle for specifics about the particular scandal. And if all else fails, fall back on this golden rule of wrongdoing in the White House: All roads lead to Gonzales.
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POPSAnother Terrorist Kangaroo Trial With alot at Stake So the government caught bin Laden's driver, we are told to believe, but yet they lost bin Laden? Right! It's all a lie and another show trial for a fictitious account to justify a fake war for regime changes. It is not only Mr Hamdan's future that will be determined by the trial. There is great concern among members of the Bush administration that they too could find themselves before foreign or international courts for the role they played in facilitating and encouraging the torture of detainees. The infamous "torture memos" circulated by Vice-President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, Charles Addington, and two former administration figures, Douglas Feith and Alberto Gonzales, covertly approved the abuse of prisoners by the CIA. These men were publicly warned recently by Lawrence Wilkerson, chief of staff to Colin Powell when Mr Powell was Secretary of State, to "never travel outside the US
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POPSWhite House Ignored Detainee Innocence As far as I can figure out, this is the Bush admin. worrying that it might be embarrassed by the ham-handedness of their wide net approach to collecting detainees. Instead of admitting that they may have gone a little overboard, they kept innocent people in prison. This creates a new class of political prisoner -- the inconvenient and unrectified mistake.
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POPSDemand The U.S. House Censure Rep. Delahunt NOW! Also, more action alerts include: Tell YOUR Rep. to Co-Sponsor the "Affordable Gas Price Act" As usual, the government doesn't have a solution to the problem -- the government IS the problem! House bill H.R. 2415, short-titled the "Affordable Gas Price Act," was introduced on May 21, 2007. The official title of the bill states its purpose: "To reduce the price of gasoline by allowing for offshore drilling, eliminating Federal obstacles to constructing refineries and providing incentives for investment in refineries, suspending Federal fuel taxes when gasoline prices reach a benchmark amount, and promoting free trade." So for over a year now, Congress has had available to them legislation that reduces gas prices by reforming government polices that artificially inflate the price of gas. And not one of them has even had the guts to sign on as a co-sponsor.
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POPSDelahunt Is Glad Addington Is Al-Qaida Target Congressman Delahunt's response was, "I'm glad they finally have a chance to see you." Mr. Delahunt now denies he meant what he said. But what he clearly said was "I'm glad they finally have a chance to see you." Al Qaeda now knows the face of one of the men who relentlessly pursues its henchmen and deals with their interrogations. Mr. Addington volunteered for public service, not a death sentence with Congressional encouragement. Delahunt is both a vile liar and a cowardly lion willing to roar down at Mr. Addington while encouraging terrorists to do his dirty work in a war he has been ineffective at stopping. Congressman Delahunt's email address is william.delahunt@mail.house.gov. Congressman Delahunt can be reached at 202-225-3111 and by fax at 202-225-5658 Or, you can ask Barack Obama yourself at (866) 675-2008 http://youtube.com/watch?v=AEDR7ghl7AU
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POPSDelahunt To Addinton: Maybe AL Qaeda Will See You On C-Span Another insight into the testimony before the House Judiciary. With this kind of behavior I can understand the contempt one might feel towards the inquisitors. He wasn't interested in a dignified or responsible discussion with Addington; he was interested in being a smart-mouth Congressman who revealed his lack of decorum needed for his office.
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POPSEasing of laws that led to torture hatched in secret And why did they do this? "Only one of the five War Council lawyers remains in office: David Addington, the brilliant but abrasive longtime legal adviser and now chief of staff to Cheney. His primary motive, according to several former administration and defense officials, was to push for an expansion of presidential power that Congress or the courts couldn't check."
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POPSBush Is Right to Worry If Waterboarding Is Defined as Torture
"I have to say that I am both glad and amazed that the Bush administration is with it enough to worry. That is a good sign. And they should worry, because they should be indicted, at least. I hope that they are, and that, indeed, it does "go all the way up to the president." One of the Attorney General's jobs should be making sure not only that the laws are enforced, but also that the laws are actual laws -- not opinions by John Yoo or David Addington or some other administration apologist. There is an exact definition of what a law is in this country, and it is not the same as a partisan legal opinion. One of the enraging things about the Bush administration is the way that they have consistently written their own rules, as if governing the nation is like playing a game of stealing the flag, where the stronger team, when it finds itself losing, simply changes the score or the rules until they either technically "win" or wear out the other side..."
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POPSCHENEY'S LAW" --on FRONTLINE this TUESDAY EVENING
On Tuesday, in "Cheney's Law," Kirk tells one of the most significant stories of our times. Kirk outlines how two men - Vice President Dick Cheney and his legal adviser, David Addington - used a little-known group inside the Justice Department to interpret the law so as to greatly enhance presidential power. Their assertion of virtually unlimited presidential authority to conduct the war on terror, both abroad and at home, raises profound constitutional questions. Especially controversial is the role of Congress to act as a check on executive power. But it would be a revolt inside the Justice Department itself -- triggered by a conservative law professor, Jack Goldsmith, appointed by the president -- that would finally lead to a "no" to Cheney's lawyer, David Addington. For awhile, under Attorney General John Ashcroft, that "no" stood. But when Ashcroft left and President Bush appointed his old friend Alberto Gonzales as attorney general, some of the "no's" were then reconsider
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POPSThe Terror Presidency Excerpts from the much-talked-about book by Jack Goldsmith, recounting his days of advising the White House on the legal boundaries of American executive power. Goldsmith explains how he was made to sign off on the unprecedented orders of presidential authority we know and love today. He famously was present at the dramatic hospital-room showdown on national surveillance between Gonzales, Card and a frail Ashcroft, calling it "the most amazing scene I'd ever witnessed." Goldsmith resigned 10 months in. They believed cooperation and compromise signaled weakness and emboldened the enemies of America and the executive branch. When it came to terrorism, they viewed every encounter outside the innermost core of most trusted advisers as a zero-sum game that if they didn't win they would necessarily lose.
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POPSCheney Aide Threatened Terror To Silence DoJ Lawyer When Goldsmith cautioned that the NSA eavesdropping program was a potential violation of the FISA court, shortly before controversy about the issue erupted in the media, Addington scorned him with the threat of a new 9/11, screeching, “We’re one bomb away from getting rid of that obnoxious court."