media watch
Robert Fisk shows us how CNN censors the news, and tells us what to expect from them during the war in Iraq.

Consumer confidence is closing in on a 10 year low. I guess that tax cut really didn't work after all.

The Independent in London reports on US progress in our nation building in Afghanistan. The account, that you aren't going to see in the American press, discuesses how the CIA has been paying off Afghani warlords who use their private armies to control trade routes and oppose the American-installed "official" Afghani administratgion in Kabul, "night letters" appearing in cities that call for jihad against foreign enemies, a Desert Storm veteran talking about how patrolling Afghanistan is far more dangerous when compared to Iraq, finding huge weapons depots that have been left over from their war against the former Soviet Union, the lack of money from the world community to help rebuild Afghanistan, and the regrouping of the Taliban. Here's how the article ends: "Another Western observer summed up his views more acidly. 'If the Americans think this is success, then outright failure must be pretty horrible to behold.'"

Makes one wonder about what is about to become of Iraq...

John Ashcroft has turned his attention to the other unending war, the War on Drugs, by busting dozens of people for the high crime of selling pipes and bongs. To defend this action, DEA chief John Brown said, “People selling drug paraphernalia are in essence no different than drug dealers. They are as much a part of drug trafficking as silencers are a part of criminal homicide.” Wow. Part of drug trafficking, eh? I guess all of those bong dealers must be knee deep in the trenches of Columbia, fighting paramilitary forces with the drug lords.

Ironically enough, you would have to be on some type of drugs to believe that that's happening.