So Sen. Pat Roberts has comeout and backed the idiot Bush's divine right to conduct domestic spying. Well ain't that a doozie.

WASHINGTON - National Intelligence Director John Negroponte told Congress on Thursday that Iran probably does not yet have nuclear weapons, nor has it obtained the material central to producing them.

Still, Negroponte called Iran's nuclear program a matter of "highest concern." In prepared testimony to the Senate Intelligence Committee, he said that Iran and

North Korea are both major threats to U.S. security.

What are we to make of the "furore" surrounding the publishing of anti-Islam cartoons by Dutch and French daily papers? The intent seems clear enough - to portray Islam, and therefore all Muslims as fanatic terrorists, and to provoke Muslim groups to confirm for the world that this portrayal is accurate - which is exactly what has happened. Flag and effigy burning has already ensued in Pakistan, Indonesia, and the Palestine territories. In Iran, hundreds of thousands of worshipers staged a protest demonstration against the insulting cartoons, shouting "Death to America," "Death to Israel" and "this insult will not remain unanswered."

Lately, I find myself in a bit of a funk. It all started with Patrick Fitzgerald riding in on his white horse and dishing out indictments left and right - at least, that's what everyone thought he would do. But that's not what happened.

There has also been a lot of talk lately about impeaching Bush and the rest of the corrupt gang in Washington. Given the rate at which things are progressing in the US at the moment, however, I suspect that in the not too distant future, I may be concluding my thoughts on the impeachment idea with another "But that's not what happened".

The question I keep turning over in my head is this: is it that not enough Americans can see what is going on in the US of A, or is it that enough Americans see, but aren't doing enough?

It is easy to see how the former could well be true. American society has always been one of ideals and saviors. The reality of the situation never mattered as much as the fact that one was working toward that ideal job or ideal moral plateau. Nowhere is this more evident than in the extreme religion that the Bush gang uses to garner support in its battle against a different "extreme" religion. Indeed, we might notice that "extremism" is the word of the decade. While many Americans seek saviors to preserve their way of life, the Bush gang warns of "dangerous extremists" - you know: "the Devil himself is at work here!" It's the black and white view that is so loved by the psychopaths in power, and it is one that has unfortunately been adopted by the masses. As long as the people believe they have a little slice of heaven, they won't want to rock the boat too much. It's all or nothing. While many citizens are pleasantly distracted by this little game, the government gets away with whatever it wants. Americans are on a "need to know" basis, and the Bush gang has decided America doesn't need to know a thing.

Today, Oil company Royal Dutch Shell reported a record annual profit for a UK-listed company of $22.94bn. This comes on top of similarly outrageous profits previously posted by other major oil exploration companies. Exxon Mobil for example made a staggering $36.1 billion in 2005. Where do these vast sums of money come from? Check your bank balance, that might give you a clue.

White House staff members, who are trying to prevent Iran from developing its own nuclear energy capacity and who refuse to take military action against Iran "off the table," have conveniently forgotten that the United States was the midwife to the Iranian nuclear program 30 years ago.

Every aspect of Iran's current nuclear development was approved and encouraged by Washington in the 1970s. President Gerald Ford offered Iran a full nuclear cycle in 1976. Moreover, the only Iranian reactor currently about to become operative, the reactor in Bushire (also known as Bushehr), was started before the Iranian revolution with U.S. approval, and cannot produce weapons-grade plutonium.

President Bush declared on June 25 that "we will not tolerate" a nuclear armed Iran. His words are empty. The physical evidence for a nuclear weapons program in Iran simply does not exist.

Oprah calls out a liar on corporate TV. Could it be her flames were meant for someone else?

The headlines of the corporate media in the US have been full of stories of another liar in recent days. The man's name is James Frey and his lies were contained in a book that he claimed was based on his life. Oprah Winfrey gave the book a recommendation, and that's when things went south. It came out that Mr. Frey had stretched the truth a bit in recounting some of the events in his past. He'd lied.

Well, poor Oprah went ballistic, and she called Mr. Frey back onto her show to give him a piece of her mind. She felt duped, and she had he courage to call out Mr. Frey on her show, an act so courageous that the pundits made certain it became headline material...for some book that will be forgotten in a year. Simply because he made her look bad. Poor Oprah's ego couldn't take it, and she had to set the record straight.

While browsing the news websites recently, I noticed an advertisement for an upcoming movie about Flight 93 that 'crashed' in the Pennsylvania countryside on September 11th 2001.

Here's the ad:

©Unknown

Gold closed at 558.90 dollars an ounce on Friday, up 0.9% from $553.80 at the previous week's close. The dollar closed at 0.8269 euros on Friday, up 0.3% from 0.8241 euros the week before. The euro, then, closed at 1.2094 dollars, compared to 1.2134 at the previous Friday's close. Gold in euros, then, would be 462.13 euros an ounce, up 1.3% from 456.40 the week before. Oil closed at 67.76 dollars a barrel, down 1.1% from $68.48 a barrel the Friday before. Oil in euros would be 56.03 down 0.7% from 56.44 euros a barrel the week before. The gold/oil ratio closed at 8.25 barrels of oil per ounce of gold, up 2.0% from 8.09 at the previous week's end. In the U.S. stock market, the Dow closed at 10,907.21 on Friday, up 2.2% from 10,667.39 the week before. The NASDAQ closed at 2,304.23 for the week, up 1.5% from 2,247.70. The yield on the ten-year U.S. Treasury note ended at 4.51%, up 16 basis points from 4.35 at the close of the previous week.

Gold continued its rise last week and the U.S. stock market rallied on Friday, regaining much of what it lost the previous Friday. Oil eased a bit as well.