Fw: The War on Islam and The UN Secretary General

 

----- Original Message -----

From: Karim A G

To: Karim A G

Sent: Friday, December 17, 2004 8:00 AM

Subject: The War on Islam and The UN Secretary General

 

The Event

 

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Zul qa'da 2 1425H / December 14, 2004 A.D.

 

 

The War on Islam and The UN Secretary General

 

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The Stand

 

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Sayyid Fadlullah:We have to accomplish this mission of dialogue to present the civilized image of Islam and confrontation of the anti-Islamic discrimination; whoever backs away might be committing another crime against Islam that might not be less than the distortion crime committed by the others.

 

 

Asked in his weekly seminar the following question: How do you view the last position of the UN Secretary General, Kofi Anan, that rejects discrimination against Islam?

 

The Religious Authority, Sayyid Muhammad Husayn Fadlullah, said:

 

It might naïve to consider September 11, 2001 as the date in which enmity against Islam began… We believe that hostility towards Islam was actually initiated by the conservative and colonial schools of thought whose hostility was evident long before 9/11. Furthermore, we have to point out to the long history of hostile actions, against Muslims in the colonial era and by means of indirect hegemony later on.

 

Yet the events of 9/11 which were used as a pretext to execute preset plans, contributed in the emergence of a new stage in the war against Islam, whether by abusing Muslims in the Western countries or the Media wars that targeted Islam as a religion, the Islamic concepts as a doctrine and the Islam as a way of life.

 

Such actions lead us to the only logical conclusion that the hostility towards Islam is part of pre-redesigned project that aims at providing a ready made enemy to the Westerners after the fall of the Soviet Union.

 

Thus, many of these practices enjoy the support of the governments they are committed in, or implicitly encouraged or not duly punished so as to suggest that they can be repeated. We have seen how religious, along with certain generals and other civilians, officials have attacked Islam and its prophet without any condemnation for such aggression or discouragement of stereotypes and prejudices against Islam … Meanwhile, the American President was issuing an executive memorandum ordering to follow up and document any action against Jews even if it were only criticism, to the extent that any objection to the brutal Israeli actions against the Palestinians is considered as anti-Semitic.

 

We call upon the Vatican that felt that the so-called war on terrorism has a negative effect on the Christians, to assume a strong position that joins the Muslims in their confrontation of the arrogant powers… We also like to express our appreciation of the call of the UN Secretary General to devise a strategy to confront anti-Islamic and discriminating actions.

 

It is a courageous stand being the only one issued by such an official of an international status, and because it indicates that the anti-Islamism actions in the West have reached an unprecedented level in its persecution and aggression, and demands consequently, an international response to protect the Muslim and his beliefs.

 

But, at the same time we call, along with the Secretary General, to uphold the law and take all the measures that would stop these crimes from going on, so that the issue will not remain in the sphere of verbal condemnation.

 

We warn against this on going effort to influence the Western citizens and brainwash their minds so that they will endorse the direct targeting of Arab and Muslim countries and resources.

 

They are doing so by concentrating on that the problem lies in Islam, and they ignore the fact that these crises are a direct result of the Western project and the Western and American support of the Israeli project… We want the Muslims to turn their backs to their sectarian setback and become aware of the magnitude of the war waged against them and against the very presence of Islam.

 

That is a dire need for an Arab and Islamic campaign on all political cultural and media fronts to support the Secretary General's initiative.

 

An all out effort should be embarked to present Islam to the entire world, focusing on its civilized image in the face of those who are trying to distort it both from the inside and the outside. We should also start an open and civilized dialogue especially with the West, since the problem might lie in the ignorance of the other or our own ignorance of the modern ways that are accepted by both the other and Islam.

Fw: Contest the Vote

----- Original Message -----

From: "Doug Salzmann" <doug@kalliergo.net>

To: <undisclosed-recipients:>

Sent: Thursday, December 16, 2004 11:04 PM

Subject: FWD: Contest the Vote

<http://www.contestthevote.org>

There's no question: the election *should* be contested. (See the piece
from yesterday's Columbus Free Press, posted below.)

These folks are gonna need a *lot* more signatures to have any chance at
all of getting Wimpy Barbara's help.  So, give 'em yours, please.

And pass this on.

-Doug


================
ORIGINAL MESSAGE:

Dear friend,

Questions are swirling around whether the election was conducted honestly
or not. We need to know -- was it or wasn't it?

When Congress reconvenes in January, at least 14 members of the House of
Representatives will challenge the validity of the 2004 election. They
will request an immediate investigation into many problems and
irregularities encountered in the election.

According to the Electoral Count Act of 1887, one senator and one House
Representative are required to contest an election prior to inauguration.
We have the representatives; we still need a senator. Please let Senator
Barbara Boxer know that we want her to be that senator.

The signed petitions will be delivered to her in person by a coalition of
representatives from a variety of concerned organizations and individuals.
Join us in encouraging Senator Boxer : www.ContestTheVote.org

Thanks.




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<http://www.freepress.org/departments/display/19/2004/986>

American democracy hangs by a thread in Ohio
by Bob Fitrakis, Steve Rosenfeld and Harvey Wasserman

December 15, 2004



As the whole world watches, American democracy may be hanging by a thread
in Ohio.

Monday, December 13, saw a triple play that will live in electoral infamy. 
But every new day brings still more stunning revelations -- this time from
Toledo -- of vote theft and fraud and a towering wall of resistance and
sabotage against a fair recount of the votes that allegedly gave George W.
Bush four more years in the White House.

Three major events made December 13 a monument to electoral theft:  a
lawsuit filed in the morning at the Ohio State Supreme Court demanding a
recount of all Ohio ballots; a Congressional hearing held in Columbus City
Council chambers filled with angry, high-profile testimony of vote fraud
and disenfranchisement and the illegal sabotaging of a recount; and then,
at noon, a block away at the statehouse, the vote of Ohio's twenty
illegitimate electors designating their choice of George W. Bush to be
president.

On Tuesday, demonstrators staged the latest in a long string of protests
at the statehouse.  And at an evening hearing in Toledo, stunning new
sworn testimony revealed that Diebold technicians have tainted official
voting machines before a recount could be done, irrevocably compromising
the process.

The December 13 lawsuit was filed in the presence of Rev. Jesse Jackson,
who compared it to the attempts to win voting rights for African-American
citizens in the era of Dr. Martin Luther King.

The suit seeks to overturn Ohio's presidential vote.  It asked an
immediate court order to stop Republican presidential electors from
meeting and voting for George W. Bush.

Republican election officials prevented a vote count from starting until
that very morning.  Supervised by Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell,
co-chair of the Bush-Cheney re-election campaign, Ohio simply ignored all
challenges to the vote count and all requests for a recount.  Within hours
the Bush electors cast their votes, even though the bitterly contested
ballots that allegedly gave them standing as electors had not been
recounted. 

In other words, while every legal remedy to determine who won Ohio's
presidential election was being pursued, the state's Republican political
machine blocked the rights of those seeking to verify the vote.

"Today, in the state capital of Ohio, we are witnessing a crime against
democracy, a crime against the right to vote and a crime against the
Constitution," said John Bonifaz, founder of the National Voting Rights
Institute and attorney for the Green and Libertarian Parties in the
recount. Ohio Republicans have "no right to convene a meeting of the
presidential electors prior to the completion of the recount," he said.

Bonifaz's remarks came amidst testimony at the second field hearing on
the 2004 election held by Democratic members of the House Judiciary
Committee. Last week in Washington, the committee opened what it said
would be the first in an ongoing series of investigations into what
happened on Election Day, when exit polls showed John Kerry heading toward
victory but after midnight the returns shifted and network television
declared Bush the victor.

"At the outset of this hearing, I would like to announce that 10 members
of Congress, including myself, have written to (Ohio) Gov. Taft asking him
to either delay or treat as provisional the vote of Ohio's presidential
electors," Rep. John Conyers, the senior Democrat on the Judiciary
Committee said at the outset. "The closer we get to Columbus and the
Ohio presidential election, the worse it looks. Each and every day it
becomes increasingly clear that the Republican power structure in this
state is acting as if it has something to hide."

Ironically, Democratic State Senator Ray Miller of Columbus had secured
the North Hearing Room in the statehouse.  But Republicans cancelled that,
and forced the gathering to convene at city hall, a block away.

Thus Ohio Republicans snubbed Conyers and Reps. Stephanie Tubbs-Jones
(D-OH), Ted Strickland (D-OH), Jerold Nadler (D-NY), Maxine Waters (D-CA)
as well as Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr (D-IL).

Packed to overflowing, the nearly four hour hearing hosted new disclosures
about election irregularities and fraud on Nov. 2, while also pursuing
remedies to account for the vote and delay the Electoral College
certification of the president.

Prime target in the hearings was GOP Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell,
who supervised the state's elections while also serving as co-chair of the
Bush-Cheney campaign.  Calls for Blackwell's removal were constantly
repeated.

Conyers noted that Blackwell has ordered local election boards to not
allow citizens to review poll registers of voters, a lockdown that is an
apparent violation of Ohio state law.

David Cobb, the Green Party presidential candidate, told the panel that he
had confirmed reports that an employee of one electronic voting machine
manufacturer had come to one county election office and had taken apart
the county tabulator of voting machine results, apparently replacing
parts, before that county had conducted its recount. Such an action would
taint any recount.  "This could be a serious matter," Conyers replied,
asking Cobb to meet privately with committee staff to further investigate
the matter.

Rev. Jesse Jackson told the congressmen that over the weekend he had
spoken to John Kerry, who has since sent a letter to each of the state's
88 county election boards, saying he supported three areas of inquiry in
the recount. Jackson said Kerry wanted "forensic computer experts" to
examine voting machines, especially those using optical scan technology,
because in other states, notably New Mexico, Bush had won all the
precincts with that voting system in place. Kerry also wanted to examine
92,000 ballots that recorded no vote for president, and 155,000
provisional ballots that were rejected.

But early responses from the counties to Freedom of Information Act
requests for their voting records indicate such an effort may already have
been sabotaged.  Shelby County officials have admitted to discarding key
election data.  One county referred requesters to the software company
that programmed the county's voting machines, saying the company's
permission would be required for access to a recount, as the code is
proprietary.

New reports of voter suppression and fraud corroborated the Supreme Court
filing, which presented a detailed analysis of where votes were
incorrectly counted for Bush instead of Kerry. An election challenge must
prove the wrong presidential candidate was declared the winner. The
challenge lawsuit asks the Ohio Supreme Court to declare Kerry the victor. 
Numerous witnesses offered testimony to support that conclusion.

A second brief was also filed Monday, seeking a temporary restraining
order to block Republican presidential electors from meeting until the
recount was done and the challenge was litigated. It focused on
"overwhelming statistical evidence" that pointed to "statewide fraud
allegedly conducted at the direction of Secretary of State J. Kenneth
Blackwell."

The TRO filing was primarily based on national and statewide exit poll
data, which was the extensive, non-partisan polling done by a consortium
of the nation's major news organizations. Expert affidavits accompanying
the brief said an analysis of exit poll data found that the final vote
tallies in all but the most contested battleground states mirrored the
exit poll's predictions. The experts said it was unlikely the exit polls
could be so accurate in some states while significantly wrong in others.
They said election fraud was the only plausible explanation for the
discrepancy.

The TRO filing identified exactly when they believe the fraud occurred --
at about 12.30 a.m. on Wednesday, Nov. 3. At that time of night, Ohio's
final voting returns were being tabulated at regional and county offices.
It was about this time that the Ohio exit poll data -- posted on websites
such as CNN -- put Bush ahead of Kerry, even though the exit polls
expected Kerry to win with 52.1 percent of the vote.

What experts like Steven Freeman, Ph.D. of the University of Pennsylvania
say happened was at this time the raw poll data, showing Kerry ahead, was
replaced online and on television by "calibrated" data. This adjusted
data was intended to reflect the total vote counts, once the results came
in from late-reporting precincts -- if it didn't match the raw exit
poll results. Ohio's results didn't match, and the likely reason is
because across the state, in a variety of ways, the reported vote totals
were being manipulated. If Bush votes were added to the total, or votes
were taken away from Kerry, this shift was first noticed at about 12:30
a.m., when the networks started to report "calibrated" figures, not
the raw data.

"The media has largely ignored this discrepancy (although the
Blogosphere has been abuzz), suggesting the polls were either flawed,
within normal sampling error, or could otherwise be easily explained
away," Freeman wrote in an article, cited in the TRO filing. Instead, it
simply reported Bush's final tally as 51 percent to Kerry's final
tally of 48.5 percent.

As Rev. Jackson and election attorneys explained to the packed hearing,
the election challenge suit describes how votes were added to Bush's
total, or in many cases, taken away from Kerry -- because they were added
to the totals of other Democratic candidates further down the ballot.

The Democrat whose totals were most likely to have been boosted by this
kind of "vote-shifting" was C. Ellen Connally, an African-American
candidate for Ohio Chief Justice, who was little-known and outspent in the
southern part of the state, the challenge complaint says. Because
Secretary Blackwell has obstructed most efforts to examine ballots and
poll records, it has been almost impossible to investigate and explain
anomalies like Connally's strong showing in the southern part of the
state.

"What are they hiding?" asked Rev. Jackson.  One after the other,
witnesses argued that by making a recount virtually impossible, Blackwell
has offered firm indication that the Republicans have something to hide.

"The secrecy of the ballot has been converted to the secrecy of the vote
count," added Ronnie Dugger, founder of the Alliance for Democracy.  Now
based in Massachusetts, the legendary Dugger is founder of the Texas
Observer.  He said when Texas Republicans heard complaints that voting
machines could be corrupted, "they knew that had found what they were
looking for."  Voting machines, he said, are the "most anti-democratic
technology ever employed."

Dr. Ron Baiman, a statistician from the University of Illinois, Chicago,
confirmed that the odds on vote counts diverting from exit polls as they
did the night of November 2 were on the order of magnitude of millions to
one.  Baiman told freepress.org that the odds of the exit polls being
wrong in the key battleground states of Florida, Pennsylvania and Ohio
alone were "155,000,000 to one."

Dr. Norman Robbins of Cleveland testified that over 10,000 voters in
Cuyahoga County alone were disenfranchised by various means, and that
nearly all were "youth, poor and minorities."

In one Cleveland ward, he said, 51% of the provisional votes cast were
thrown in the trash, virtually all of them from African-Americans.

Eve Roberson, a former election official from Santa Rosa, California,
testified that while working as observer at precinct 354 in Wilberforce,
home of Central State University, she witnessed conscious fraud aimed at a
student body that went 95% for Kerry.  Election officials used an
inconsistent, discriminatory set of demands for Wilberforce students to
register as opposed to those used in white precincts in Greene County.

Roberson and others also testified that after the election they discovered
ballots sitting open, on unguarded tables where manipulation and random
disposal could easily have occurred.  It was, she said "a serious breech"
of election security.

Riveting testimony followed from Clinton Curtis, a Tallahassee-based
computer programmer who told the hearing he had been hired by US Rep Tom
Feeney, then Speaker of the Florida House, to write a program that would
conceal the theft of an election.  Curtis said Feeney was then a lobbyist
for a major computer company as well as Speaker.  Curtis said Feeney
wanted a program that could use voting machines to "flip an election"
without being detected.  Curtis said he wrote a prototype program, then
quit.

Under questioning Curtis said a program could be written that would
protect the security of voting machines, but that it had not been deployed
in Ohio.  He said it would be a simple matter, involving perhaps 100 lines
of code and some simple switches, to turn an entire election.

"One person in a simple tab machine can affect thousands of votes," Curtis
testified.  "There is absolutely no assurance of anything on those
machines."

Given what he had seen, he said, the Ohio election was "probably hacked."

The last hour of the Columbus hearing was filled with testimony from local
voters who were harassed, intimidated and made to stand in long lines to
cast votes that may well have been pitched in the trash.

Similar sworn testimony surfaced Tuesday at a citizens' hearing in Toledo. 
Among other things eye witnesses confirmed that a Diebold programming team
entered the Lucas County (Toledo) Board of Elections to "reprogram" the
opti-scan voting machines on the day the recount began. 

Catherine Buchanan, a Democratic Party observer, testified that one of the
sample precincts chosen as a control for the recount---Sylvania Precinct
3---had the programming card reprogrammed prior to the ballot testing. 
While the observers watched, nearly seven out of fifteen test ballots were
rejected at least three times before the machine would read them.

Janet Albright told hearing officers she had been voting at the same Lucas
County polling place for fourteen years but that the polling place was
changed this year without notification to a station farther away. 
Machines throughout Lucas County malfunctioned in tests through the week
prior to the election, and on election day.  Thousands of
Ohioans---primarily in Democratic precincts--thus lost their right to
vote.

During the Lucas County reprogramming, election observers were shocked
when they were denied the right to look at sheets that had target test
results on them, or the reprogramming of the opti-scan machines used in
the recount.  Diebold-leased machines and software malfunctioned in the
weeks prior to the election.

That echoed similar testimony from Green Party candidate David Cobb in the
Columbus hearing.  Witnesses said an unauthorized programmer from the
Triad Corporation dismantled at least one voting machine in rural Hocking
County.  Conyers referred to the incident as "pretty outrageous" and asked
the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and a county prosecutor, to
investigate "inappropriate and likely illegal election tampering" in
Hocking and perhaps several other Ohio counties.

Brett Rapp, president of Triad, told the New York Times it might be
unusual to do what was done in Hocking County, but that Triad was involved
in voting machines in 41 of Ohio's 88 counties.

The Hocking County investigation was spurred in particular by testimony
Sherole Eaton, the deputy elections director.  Such testimony will be
transcribed and presented at www.freepress.org as it becomes available. 
But in the interim the battle of Ohio rages on, machine by machine and
hearing by hearing.  Because the recount process has been so severely
tainted, the call for a revote is growing.

On January 6, Congress is scheduled to vote on whether or not to approve
the tally of electors, including Ohio's tainted 20 votes.  Conyers and the
other US Representatives present made it clear more public hearings will
be held before then.

In 2001, a host of US Representatives, most from the Black Caucus, asked
that the tainted Bush electors be challenged.  This year at least 14
members of the House of Representatives will demand an immediate
"investigation of the efficacy of the voting machines and new technologies
used in 2004 election, how election officials responded to the
difficulties they encountered, and what we can do in the future to improve
our elections systems and administration."

Their action requires the consent of a single Senator, which did not come
in 2001.  As the battle to save democracy rages in Ohio and elsewhere,
January, 2005, could be very different.

--
Bob Fitrakis, Steve Rosenfeld and Harvey Wasserman are co-authors of the
upcoming OHIO'S STOLEN ELECTION:  VOICES OF THE DISENFRANCHISED, 2004
(http://freepress.org).

The Messianic Era

Dear Friends,

 

I was raised a Jew.  Our rabbi, David Wice, taught that we were entering a messianic era, ushered in by the founding of the state of Israel.  Although the OT prophets foresaw a person, a messiah to save us, Rabbi Wice envisioned, rather, a time of peace and justice, with love and good will marking the

Justice shall flower in His days,
and profound peace, till the moon be no more.
May He rule from sea to sea,
and from the River to the ends of the earth.
Psalm 72: 7-8

http://www.nccbuscc.org/nab/121704.htm

 

Peace and justice are the hallmarks of the era ruled by the Messiah, whether it takes the form of a person or of Christ-consciousness entering all our hearts.

 

Contrast this the Bush administration.  We are treated to the endless war and the setting aside of the most basic codes of justice, such as the Geneva Convention and the Bill of Rights.  It is the opposite of what the prophets envisioned. 

 

This is tremendously important to understand.  The rapture cultists would have us believe that the returning Savior will bring fire and brimstone, and destroy the biosphere.  The elect will be transported to another realm, to live happily ever after.  Their vision, and their actions, are hellish rather than godly.  If we are to save ourselves, the rapture cult must be vigorously challenged.  It is a psychosis, a radical departure from the prophecies of Isaiah, David, Hosea, Micah,- all of whom foresaw that the Messiah would establish an era of peace and justice.

 

In the name of the Prince of Peace, 

 

Carol Wolman

 

When I became a Christian, and