Maui Artists For Peace Livin up the Fourth of July Parade

I rarely wake up at 6 am on a Sunday. This day was no different. I made it to the Independence Day Parade in Makawao by 9 am, meaning I missed the entrance time to actually be in the parade.

Nonetheless, it gave me great pride to sit back with a latte from Cloud Nine with my friend and find that the most entertaining and engaging group in the parade was the Maui Artists for Peace. Just 5 days previously they had closed the War and Peace Art Show, and now they represented the flavor of Maui.

From the Maui News:

Maui Artists for Peace created a large float, with a team of dancers and sign wavers speaking out against the Iraq war. David Coennen, a member of the organization, donned a mask in the likeness of President Bush and waved a sign reading “I resign.”

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Karl Rove the Genius

Every newscast seems to agree (check out Jon Stewart) that Karl Rove was a genius. I like this more, he was ruthless.

I was an avid observer of Al Gore's 2000 campaign. I even helped out a bit with web page maintenance during the 2000 Democratic Convention in Los Angeles. Rove and the full weight of corporate America and Jeb Bush and Ralph Nader threw everything they had at Gore. Gore won. He beat them all. I really respected him for that. In the end, after Gore had won in Florida, after the Florida Supreme court ruled the votes had to be recounted, then the five Republican members of the US Supreme Court actually intervened and shut the vote count down, and made Bush president. And everyone thought Rove was a genius.

I remember on September 10, 2001, NEWSWEEK ran a headline that read, "The Secret Vote That Made George W. Bush President." Bush's public approval rating was at 42 percent and falling. I forget what the article was about. The next day Osama bin Laden flew two commercial airliners filled with passengers into the World Trade Towers in Lower Manhattan, another into the Pentagon and a fourth into a field in Pennsylvania. Once the smoke had cleared, Bush cautiously returned to Washington, and suddenly he was a hero. And everyone thought Rove was a genius.

For the full read on truthout.org read: ruthless