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CORRUPTION UPDATES 131

Posted: November 15, 2007

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1) The Articles linked below were Abstracted from the sources cited. After the abstract there's analysis and commentary, links to related articles, and a link to the database with suggested search terms.

Debate on Cheney Impeachment Averted

 

By JIM ABRAMS

The Associated Press

Tuesday, November 6, 2007; 5:07 PM

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/06/AR2007110601451.html

 

WASHINGTON -- House Democrats on Tuesday narrowly managed to avert a bruising debate on a proposal to impeach Dick Cheney after Republicans, in a surprise maneuver, voted in favor of taking up the measure.

Republicans, changing course midway through a vote, tried to force Democrats into a debate on the resolution sponsored by longshot presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich.

The anti-war Ohio Democrat, in his resolution, accused Cheney of purposely leading the country into war against Iraq and manipulating intelligence about Iraq's ties with al-Qaida.

The GOP tactics reversed what had been expected to be an overwhelming vote to table, or kill, the resolution.

Midway through the vote, with instructions from the GOP leadership, Republicans one by one changed their votes from yes _ to kill the resolution _ to no, trying to force the chamber into a debate and an up-or-down vote on the proposal.

At one point there were 290 votes to table. After the turnaround, the final vote was 251-162 against tabling, with 165 Republicans voting against it.

"We're going to help them out, to explain themselves," said Rep. Pete Sessions, R-Texas. "We're going to give them their day in court."

Democrats countered by offering a motion to refer the proposal to the House Judiciary Committee for further study, effectively preventing a debate on the House floor. That motion passed by a largely party-line vote of 218-194.

Kucinich has long pushed for a vote to impeach Cheney, but has failed to win the backing of the Democratic leadership. After Kucinich introduced the resolution, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., immediately moved to table it.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said "impeachment is off the table"...

The resolution said that Cheney, "in violation of his constitutional oath to faithfully execute the office of vice president," had "purposely manipulated the intelligence process to deceive the citizens and Congress of the United States by fabricating a threat of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction to justify the use of the U.S. Armed Forces against the nation of Iraq in a manner damaging to our national security interests."

The 11-page resolution also charged that Cheney purposely deceived the nation about an alleged relationship between Iraq and al-Qaida and has "openly threatened aggression against the Republic of Iran absent any real threat to the United States."

The bill is H. Res 799.

On the Net:

Congress: http://thomas.loc.gov/

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What's Really Going on Here?

Cheney's crimes were protected when the leadership of the Dems and Repugs joined hands to bury Kusinich's impeachment resolution

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., November, 2007

The republicans, by voting against tableing the impeachment bill along with the renegade dems, almost brought the impeachment resolution to the floor.

This was designed to force pelosi to openly get into bed with cheney on the floor of congress, which she would do. pelosi barely avoided the public humiliation of defending cheney's crimes against Kusinich's impeachment resolution on the floor of the House by moving the resolution to Conyer's judiciary committee, where it will never again see the light of day.

That would have been the vilest form of political pornography imaginable. Instead. pelosi, the political piss-ant, moved to bury a well deserved deep investigation into cheney's lies, deceptions, and manipulation of intelligence that lead up to our catastrophic invasion of Iraq.

An impeachment inquiry would would enevitably expose not only cheney's crimes, but the deep incompentence and lack of oversight that characterizes each party's conduct of Congress that followed this singular crime against humanity.

what this means is that our Constitution has been openly betrayed by both parties. cheney not only lied, he has openly challenged our Constitutional system. pelosi is doing what is necessary to cover these lies to protect the webs of power that fuel her, and cheney's, political lives.

As soon as bush and cheney realized that they could cross the line and defy our most fundamental Constitutional principals and laws without consequences, reprecussions, or resistance from the democraps, they just went hog-wild.

As pelosi the piss-ant, and virtually all of the democraps stood silent, if not acted as active co-conspirators in all of bush's international and domestic crimes, they have shown themselves for what they are: a party willing to betray principal for power.

The democraps lack of ethics, let alone respect for our Constitution, has deprived them of any basis to resist the corporate fascism that bush and cheney represent. The dems share not only the same corporate funding sources with the the repugs, but share the desire to represent, guide, and advance corporate power at the center of American politics.

the democrats political viability is as dependent on the same corporate controlled structure of wealth and power as are the republicans. it should be no surprize to astute observers that the dems have been aiding and abetting bush and cheney's moves to crush the last restraints on our corporate government's ability to unilateraly impose unchecked domestic and international authority.

the democrats are as dependent on the same web of corporate bribes as are the republicans, and neither party is capable of threatening their shared basis of power: control of political and economic power by combining the most powerful alingment of corporate bribes.

That process of combining the greatest alingment of wealth and power under one or the other parties' banner is the dynamic whereby wealth and political power are joined together. This is the actual center where American political power is created, and it is this alingment that has disabled our democracy in favor of empowering and maintaining what can only be called a corporate fascist state.

Bush won the last two elections by cheating, and the democraps not only respected the vile electoral corruption which delivered these tainted victories, but have stood by while his backers in enron looted California as FERC cheerled the rape.

And the democraps have stood silent as bushies have used the stolen elections as a platform from which to steal our most fundamental rights as Americans.

Hell, the democraps in california set the whole repugnant energy rip-off up by privitizing our hydroelectric assets along with california's energy grid.

All in a day's work for the democrat corporate ass-lickers that monopolize political office in california and across the country. Pay those whores, and they will deliver the goods.

in the national auction, pelosi, to avoid the clamity of being forced to defeat a republican-supported motion to impeach cheney, (which this whore would do, if she was forced to it), instantly made a flanking move, and moved to pass and instantly shelve the impeachment resolution by stashing it in a committee where it will never see the light of day as long as pelosi runs congress, or the committee chairman's political life will end.

Kusinich's honorable impeachment resolution will die a dishonorable death in the house injustice committee by the hand of pelosi.

in the meantime, cheney continues to push kidnapping, illegal secret detentions, torture, general searches without warrants, and gitmo, all based on the traitorous notion that the president has the modern police state powers of a middle ages king.

I wonder who Billery will torture if she becomes president? Bill started calling kidnapping "extrodinary renditions," and said nothing about the torture that he delivered his kidnap victims into. but the dems said nothing then, so why expect them to say anything now?

although Bush is disgusting, unconstitutional, and an enemy to all Americans and every person who seeks freedom, at least he is an honest fascist. pelosi can not even claim the cover of honestly while being the whore she is.

pelosi and the democraps are the dog shit on the neo-con's jackboot, and will be scraped off when the stink of their presense is no longer required to cover the corporate destruction of our democratic republic.

in the meantime they offer but thin cover for the complete corporate takeover of political power in the us.

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Also See:

Corruption Updates 84, 10-23-06, Pelosi: Impeachment 'off the table'

House Injustice Committee: John Conyers, D chair

 

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Pelosi

Democrats

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2) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

House to Vote on Eavesdropping Bill

 

By PAMELA HESS

The Associated Press

Thursday, November 15, 2007; 3:01 PM

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/15/AR2007111500261.html

 

 

WASHINGTON -- House Democrats are hoping changes they made to a bill to expand court oversight of government surveillance inside the United States will find enough support to win passage on a second try.

The Senate Judiciary Committee, meanwhile, was working on its own eavesdropping bill. A version of the bill approved by the Senate Intelligence Committee contains a provision that would immunize telecom companies from lawsuits that accuse the companies that they secretly helped the government eavesdrop on American phone calls and e-mails without court permission.

The eavesdropping bill before the House also lacks immunity for telecommunications companies.

The House bill would allow unfettered telephone and e-mail surveillance of foreign intelligence targets, but would require special authorization if the foreign targets are likely to be in contact with people inside the United States _ a provision designed to safeguard Americans' privacy.

The special authorization is called a "blanket warrant," and would let the government obtain a single order authorizing the surveillance of multiple targets.

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What's Really Going on Here?

Pelosi House is Authorizing General Search Warrants, a tool of tyrants that sparked our forefathers to fight, and kill, those that pretended to posess royal authority

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., November , 2007

(Note: The House passed 3773, and the Senate Judiciary Committee approved their version of the Bill.)

No surprize here, as the democraps have condoned, supported, defended and funded all of bush's crimes.

The pertinent question is, what's next? Is there a point where the dems will actually find the criminality that supports their political existance is not worth the ethical costs, and resist?

I ask the same question of the conservatives, many of whom are finding that the costs of imposing their moral world on the rest of us is not worth the loss of their democracy to the corporate powers.

the hope that remains in this nightmare is that the voters, whom both parties have betrayed, will join together to throw off the money power that has killed our democracy, and restore each other's rights.

But first we would all have to be honest about what is really happening to our country, and find the values to confront the ugly truth.

Interesting bits from the Dems traitorius illegal search bill:

Section 2 of the Conyers bill grants 1 year general search warrants that include the capture of domestic communications by Americans, in the US, on domestic communications networks with no burden of proof other than suspicion. (See amendment to sec 105b. (a): "ADDITIONAL AUTHORIZATION OF ACQUISITIONS OF COMMUNICATIONS OF NON-UNITED STATES PERSONS LOCATED OUTSIDE THE UNITED STATES WHO MAY BE COMMUNICATING WITH PERSONS INSIDE THE UNITED STATES," especially (a), (D)(ii)(I,II, and III))

Section 9 of Conyers' bill apparently grants the president unlimited searching powers during time of war. As we all know, bush has proclaimed the beginning of the Orwellian endless war in which the whole world is the battlefield. Now conyers' bill confirms the bush's claims to the same unlimited wartime power he has already claimed and acted upon.

Although most people seem to have missed it, Bush has already declared, and begun, World War III. Bush has described this as an endless, borderless, frontless war on "terror," which authorizes him to act as a military dictator both within the US, and around the world.

Section 10 demands an accounting of all domestic searching programs after 9-11. This inquiry would have the potential to dig up the dirt on Bush's massive domestice survaillence program necessary to remove Bush and Cheney from office, and prosecute them for their crimes against our rights, but the Dems haven't the balls for that.

This is merely a belated genuflection to cover Congress' failure to do their duty, and uphold our rights against this president's seizure of illegal powers. Bush will be out of office, or will fully seize power in a fake emergency, long before the Dems finally discover that bush is a criminal.

Top of Page

Also See:

Congress.org: House and Senate approve general searches without warrants, but omitted telecom immunity

Summary of HR 3773, by Congress.org

Full Text of HR 3773, by Thomas


Corruption Updates 88, December 16, 2005, Bush Authorized Domestic Spying

Corruption Updates 104, NYT, August 17, 2007, Notes Detail Pressure on Ashcroft Over Spying

Illegal searches routine, Nov, 23 2007, CU 132, #1

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Illegal Searches

 

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3) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

Obama-Mining Lobbyist Ties Scrutinized

 

By KATHLEEN HENNESSEY

The Associated Press

Wednesday, November 14, 2007; 5:52 PM

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/14/AR2007111401954.html

 

LAS VEGAS -- Democrat Barack Obama opposes a bill that would change the nation's 135-year-old mining law _ the same stance as mining industry executives who employ a Nevada-based lobbyist advising the presidential candidate.

The General Mining Law of 1872 allows the mining industry to pull gold, silver and other minerals from federal lands without paying royalties. The industry opposes changes to the law and several efforts to reform it have failed.

A House-passed bill would impose a royalty of 4 percent of gross revenue on existing hard-rock mining operations and 8 percent of gross revenue on new mining operations. The reform bill also would put new environmental controls on hard-rock mining, set up a cleanup fund for abandoned mines and permanently ban cheap sales of public lands for mining.

Obama said the legislation, favored by environmentalists, "places a significant burden on the mining industry and could have a significant impact on jobs." He also opposes the proposed fees.

Obama's statements are largely in line with the those of Nevada Sen. Harry Reid, a miner's son who has long fended off significant reform and defended the industry as critical to the rural West. Nevada is the largest gold-producing state in the nation and ranks behind only South Africa, Australia and China internationally.

3b) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

Clinton will take any money, say anything to get elected:

 

Is Clinton campaign too scripted?

A planted question at an Iowa event brings the issue to the front burner.

By Peter Nicholas, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

November 14, 2007

 

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-hillary14nov14,1,3417267.story?coll=la-politics-campaign

 

WASHINGTON -- At a campaign stop in Newton, Iowa, last week, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton peered out at the crowd of 250 people and called on a 19-year-old college student, who posed a friendly question about global warming.

The Clinton campaign insists that the New York senator chose the student at random. If so, it turned out to be a fortuitous pick. Before the event began, a Clinton campaign aide had conferred privately with Grinnell College student Muriel Gallo-Chasanoff, opening a binder and showing her a typewritten list of questions she might pose. The sophomore selected one on global warming, and the aide assured her that Clinton would call on her when she raised her hand, according to an interview Gallo-Chasanoff gave to CNN.

"I find as I travel around Iowa that it's usually young people that ask me about global warming," Clinton said.

The episode followed a Democratic debate in Philadelphia where Clinton was widely faulted for offering ambiguous and perhaps overly calculated answers on Iraq, immigration and Social Security.

Another man describes a similar incident. Geoffrey Mitchell, a 32-year-old minister, said that at a Clinton appearance in Iowa in April a campaign aide suggested in the course of a conversation that he ask the candidate how she was "confronting" President Bush on Iraq.

Mitchell said he was uncomfortable posing that question and refused. In the end, Clinton took no questions, said Mitchell, who said he planned to vote for Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois in the Jan. 3 Democratic caucuses.

"There was no doubt in my mind that they were attempting to get me to ask a specific question that they wanted to talk about," Mitchell said in an interview. "The tradition of the Iowa caucus is to just answer the questions of the people at the event, and it disappointed me that that was not taking place."

Spontaneous questions from the audience can be worrisome for Clinton's campaign, which is bent on minimizing risks. She has had a few brushes with tough questions, some of which made unwelcome news.

In Iowa last month, Clinton sparred with a man about her vote for a resolution proclaiming the Iranian Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization. He said he feared that the resolution would encourage Bush to take military action.

Clinton told him that "somebody obviously sent to you" a mistaken view of her position.

The man bristled and said he had done "my own research."

 

Top of Page

What's Really Going on Here?

Obama is a whore, no different from the rest of the surging rat pack that runs politics. Except Obama and Billery have clawed their way to the top on the bloody back of our democracy:

the biggest rats have revealed themselves

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., November , 2007

billery and obama are playing a fool's game for power: each has given up their own values and moral perspective in an attempt to conform themselves to the space between the demands of their corporate sponsors, and the image of victory that their polls and focus groups project.

The result is that the average voter can be certain of one thing: although we can not be sure about any position either candidate takes, we can be sure that the bribers who provided the richest alingment of campaign funds will be served by the victorious candidate long before either candidate would fulfill the promises to the voters the polls demanded they make for victory.

Top of Page

Also See:


USA Today, Jan 7, 2005, Bush paid Reporter for Biased Coverage

Salon, Feb 10, 2005, Bush did the same thing: Fake news, fake reporter: Jeff Gannon received press creditials

NYT, Oct 4, 2006, Bush Buys Cuban Reporters, no one cares

NYT, Oct 9, 2006, Reporters helped Plan War

Democracy Now, April 25, 2007, Bill Moyers exposes Fake News Conference in which the main corporate Reporters in Washington asked pre-approved questions (scroll down to "Rush Transcript")

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4) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

Buffett Says No Estate Tax Would Be a Gift to the Rich

By BLOOMBERG NEWS

NYT, November 15, 2007

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/15/business/15buffett.html?ref=business

 

Warren E. Buffett urged Congress yesterday to maintain the estate tax, saying that plans to repeal the tax would benefit a handful of the richest American families and widen income disparity in the United States.

Mr. Buffett, the billionaire chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, told the Senate Finance Committee that advocates of repeal were “dead wrong” to call the tax a “death tax.”

It would be more appropriate to call it a “death present,” Mr. Buffett, 77, said. “A meaningful estate tax is needed to prevent our democracy from becoming a dynastic plutocracy.”

Mr. Buffett said that in the last 20 years, tax laws have allowed the “superrich” to become richer.

“Tax law changes have benefited this group, including me, in a huge way,” he said. “During that time the average American went exactly nowhere on the economic scale: he’s been on a treadmill while the superrich have been on a spaceship.”

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What's Really Going on Here?

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., November , 2007

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Also See:

Corruption Updates , th article on the page,

Search the Corruption Database under

 

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5) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

Chinese bank chair urges cut in US$ share of forex reserves

 

Saturday, November 10, 2007

AFP

 

http://www.chinapost.com.tw/business/2007/11/10/130279/Chinese-bank.htm

 

SHANGHAI -- A senior Chinese banker has suggested the government reduce its share of U.S.-dollar assets within US$1.4 trillion of foreign exchange reserves, state press reported Friday.

Tang Shuangning, chairman of state-controlled China Everbright Bank, said China should adjust the structure of its reserves and cut the ratio of dollar assets, according to major business newspapers, including Shanghai Securities News and China Securities Journal.

Tang, a former vice chairman of the China Banking Regulatory Commission, was addressing a forum in Beijing Thursday.

Tang's remarks came one day after Cheng Siwei, vice chairman of China's national parliament, was reported as saying strong currencies ought to be given more weight in the reserves to offset the losses in weak ones.

"For instance, as the euro is rising against the yuan, and the U.S. dollar is falling against the yuan, the two taken together can effectively make up for any losses, " Cheng was quoted as saying Wednesday.


5b) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

China spying 'biggest US threat'

Chinese espionage poses "the single greatest risk" to the security of US technology, a panel has told Congress.

BBC,

 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7097296.stm

 

China is pursuing new technology "aggressively", it says, legitimately through research and business deals and illegally through industrial espionage.

China has also "embraced destructive warfare techniques", the report says, enabling it to carry out cyber attacks on other countries' infrastructure.

A foreign ministry spokesman in Beijing denied any spying activities by China.

"Chinese espionage activities in the United States are so extensive that they comprise the single greatest risk to the security of American technologies," the report said.

It urged Congress to study "military, intelligence and homeland security programmes that protect critical American computer networks and sensitive information, specifically those charged with protecting networks from damage caused by cyber attacks".

The report also identified other grounds for concern, such as the fact that the Chinese are manufacturing "sophisticated weapon platforms" speedily and efficiently.

The unexpected pace of China's military development has fuelled analysts' suspicions that it is being helped by stolen information, the commission said.

 

'Unfair trade'

In addition, the Chinese media - firmly under state control - are being used to create "deep feelings of nationalism", it said.

In an international crisis, the panel warned, that could turn misunderstanding into conflict.

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What's Really Going on Here?

Our Corporate polity has grown its own enemy, China, and is forcing and simultanously funding a global realignment of power that has, and will continue to, cost us more than their irresponsible profits will ever justify

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., November , 2007

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Also See:


china links

Search the Corruption Database under

china


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6) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

Putin backed for ‘national leader’ status

 

By Neil Buckley in Moscow

 

Published: November 7 2007 20:37 | Last updated: November 7 2007 20:37

 

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/032b8382-8d6f-11dc-a398-0000779fd2ac.html

 

Russia’s dominant United Russia party has published a blueprint for formalising the status of President Vladimir Putin as “national leader” after he steps down as president next year.

The proposals have surfaced following rallies in several Russian cities calling either for Mr Putin to remain for a third term as president, despite a constitutional bar, or for his political course to be continued.

Mr Putin announced last month that he would top United Russia’s candidate list in December 2’s parliamentary elections, guaranteeing a sizeable majority for the pro-Kremlin party, though as permitted by Russian election rules he is not expected to take up a parliamentary seat.

He also said he might become prime minister next year, seen as a signal he intends to continue to play a decisive political role.

United Russia’s electoral programme is entitled “Putin’s Plan” and Boris Gryzlov, the party leader, yesterday made the latest in a series of statements suggesting the parliamentary poll had been transformed into a “national referendum on Mr Putin”.

In an article on United Russia’s website, Abdul-Khakim Sultygov, a senior party manager, proposes that after the parliamentary polls and next March’s presidential elections, a “Civic Assembly” be held that would proclaim Mr Putin as the country’s guiding figure.

It was not clear on Wednesday whether United Russia would adopt Mr Sultygov’s proposals. But their publication is a reflection of the intense debate on the president’s future role.

Under Mr Sultygov’s plan, the assembly would adopt a “civil unity pact” that would “formalise the institution of national leader as a foundation of the new configuration of power in the country and a principal condition for implementing Putin’s Plan”.

Such a move would meet the demands of a “growing mass movement of citizens in all regions of the country, with the demand to preserve [Mr] Putin as Russia’s national leader”.

Senior Russian politicians have insisted pro-Putin rallies in cities including Grozny, the Chechen capital, Novosibirsk in Siberia, and Petropavlovsk-Kamchatka in the Russian far east, were “spontaneous”. But opposition politicians have handed to prosecutors telegrams from officials apparently ordering citizens to attend.

Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman for Mr Putin, said the article was a party document and noted that the “constitution does not include the position of national leader”.

6b) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

Putin urged to stay on as leader

A group in Russia has urged President Vladimir Putin to stay on as "national leader" after his term ends next March.

Story from BBC NEWS: 2007/11/15

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/europe/7096377.stm

 

The recently formed For Putin group said it had a petition with 30m signatures supporting such an idea.

It is unclear how the group's proposal can be implemented, as Russia's constitution prevents Mr Putin from seeking a third consecutive term.

'Laws can be changed'

For Putin called on the president to stay on as national leader at the group's first congress in the city of Tver, about 160km (99 miles) north-west of the capital Moscow.

            If the people want him [Mr Putin] to stay on, isn't it democracy?

Andrei Latyshev

For Putin delegate

"The constitution is a law and laws can be changed. It is only laws made by God that can't be changed," group activist Vladimir Voronin told some 700 delegates attending the congress.

A number of speakers in Tver praised Mr Putin's handling of Russia's economy and his political skills, and also wished him good health.

For Putin says it represents the fervent hope of millions of ordinary Russians who want the current president to stay on in power after his second term expires on 2 March.

The group's leadership says it is completely independent of the Kremlin and of any Russian political party.

But it seems extremely unlikely that the group could have grown so fast without at least the tacit support of the Kremlin, the BBC's Rupert Wingfield-Hays in Tver says.

What seems more likely, our correspondent adds, is that it represents the deep anxiety of Russia's power elite, which views the end of the Putin presidency with growing concern.

It is not clear how Mr Putin can stay on as national leader when another man is sitting in the Kremlin as Russia's next president.

Putin lawsuit

But some For Putin delegates hinted that Mr Putin could take any number of jobs - from prime minister, to prosecutor general or head of the Supreme Court.

Mr Putin has repeatedly stated that he wants to remain an influential political player after next March.

Earlier this year, he agreed to head the electoral list of the pro-Kremlin United Russia party, saying he may seek to become prime minister.

Russia's opposition questions the legitimacy of the move - the SPS party has already asked Russia's Supreme Court to remove Mr Putin from the United Party list.

The lawsuit is likely to be symbolic, correspondents say.

SPS leader Nikita Belykh alleges that since Mr Putin has agreed to lead the United Russia list, the "might of the state bureaucratic machine" has fallen on the liberal party.


Top of Page

What's Really Going on Here?

Putin is Manovering to Maintain Supreme Authority in Russia

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., November , 2007

6c) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

Putin Signals He'll Retain Power

By AP/STEVE GUTTERMAN

Time, Tuesday, Nov. 13, 2007

 

http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,1683739,00.html

 

(KRASNOYARSK, Russia) — President Vladimir Putin said Tuesday that a big win for the dominant pro-Kremlin party in December parliamentary elections would give him the "moral right" to maintain influence in Russia after he steps down next year.

Putin's remarks on a campaign-style visit to Siberia were the clearest sign yet that he intends to retain power and keep Russia on the authoritarian, globally assertive course that he has set during eight years as president.

...there have been indications that he would choose an informal path, using an overwhelming electoral victory for United Russia as a mandate to maintain authority as the people's choice for a national leader.

"If the people vote for United Russia, it means that a clear majority ... put their trust in me, and in turn that means I will have the moral right to hold those in the Duma and the Cabinet responsible for the implementation of the tasks that have been set as of today," Putin said.

"In what form I will do this, I cannot yet give a direct answer. But various possibilities exist," he said. "If the result is the one I am counting on, I will have this opportunity."

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What's Really Going on Here?

Putin has made his choice

America stood by, applauding, while Mikhail Khodorkovsky stole Russia's Oil Industry, and tried to leverage his stolen Big Oil money into Political Dominance, Just like his Big Oil pals had done in the United States. The takeover failed, and Kornhead will spend the rest of his life in Russian Prison.

We have exactly the same kind of people as Kornhead here in the US, except their plan to takeover our country in a flood of Corruption and Bribery Succeeded.

Bush, Cheney, and Ken Lay represent what happens when people like Khodorkovsky, the failed Russian Rockefeller, are able to leverage wealth into political power, and ultimately, into control of the whole political system.

The "oligarchs" failed attempt to impose the rule of wealth on Russia, and really pissed-off the Russian People with their efforts. Average Russians cheered wildly when this greedy bastard was jailed, and his fellow cockroaches fled for the West.

The rest of his gang of thieves, such as Boris Berezovsky and Vladimir Gusinsky, fled Russia with as much money as they could steal from the Russian people. They are not welcome in Russia, unless they are willing to put their heads into a noose.

Putin's crushing of Khodorkovsky and his gang of criminals raised his approval rating to 80%, and it has not fallen significantly since.

Khodorkovsky represented American-Style business and political practices in Russia, and these practices were firmly rejected.

Our Support for these thieves squandered the our "political capitol" in Russia, and marked the end of hopes that a Corporate Elite would rise to rule Russia as it Rules the United States.

Our attempts to finance Corporate Politics and Parties in the Ukraine and Georgia are suffering similar fates, and raising the hostility of average Russians towards our interference in their, and their neighbors, domestic politics.

Now, largely due to our misguided interference in Russia's Domestic Politics, Non-Corporate Western Democratic Ideals are as dead in Russia as Corporate Democracy is. And so is the Conventional Arms treaty in Europe.

Our brilliant strategy offers us no room to criticize or pressure Russia from a moral high ground. Putin is Clubbing Dissenters in the streets of St. Petersburg with the approval and blessing of the Russian people, and there is not a thing we can do about it.

Putin will soon hand-pick his replacement as President, and the people will elect his chosen successor, or he will keep the Presidency.

Putin's choice depends on how he perceives the maturity and stability of his political Mafia: If Putin feels his party can maintain its strange balance between Commie-Style Authoritarianism within an economic system of modified open-market capitalism, he will step down.

If Putin believes his departure will allow the Market to Control Politics, or if he believes that post-Putin Authoritarianism will shut down their modified open-market capitalism, he will keep the Presidency.

It's Putin's Choice.

In either case, it's sure that the greed and dishonesty that dominates our government's Corporate Foreign Policy, combined with our military and political aggression along the soft, insecure underbelly of Russia's Southern Frontier, has rekindled the fires of paranoid anti-American nationalism in Russia.

Good work, America; your greed and ego has exceeded our principals, and blown our post-cold war chance to lead Russia, and the rest of the world, into a truly democratic age.

It was a pipe dream at best; how could we lead the world into something that we do not ourselves possess?

(First printed in 52_2)

 

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Today's Headlines

1) Pelosi pushed hard to avoid openly defending cheney's crimes on the floor of congress

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3) Obama support for fee-free Mining on public lands mimics position of mining lobbyist "assisting" campaign

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