for someone who goes on and on about freedom so fucking much, bush has a funny way of showing it. like wanting to bomb al-jazeera, the only semi-free media in the entire middle east. how back-assward is that? yet, given the types of constraints, manipulation, and gag rules he regularly tries to impose on the u.s. media, it’s hardly surprising. the feds spent $7.2 billion dollars classifying documents to prevent their release last year and uses state-secret priviledge 33 ties more often today than during the cold war. i swear to god, if we get out of the next 3 years of this administration alive, without an accidental or intentional nuclear holocaust, i will consider it a holy miracle. i wish i was being sarcastic there.

waiting on a miracle: the 40 million people living with hiv. it’s nearly world aids day, and with 25 million already gone, people continue to die of this virus at an unconscionable rate. world targets fall by the wayside, infection rates are nearly 1-in-4 in some places. yet the bird flu scare gets more press coverage. what does that say about society? that people who die quietly are forgotten, but people who die of a bizarre and exotic disease make us sit up and take notice. bush has called for $7.1 billion in spending from the u.s. alone, to prevent a disease which may kill an unknown number between 2 and 50 million people. yet current *global* spending on hiv research is a paltry $3 billion. it’s a fucking sin.

and finally, people see the Virgin of guadaloupe in tree bark. I would ridicule it… but in a world so full of craziness, horror and despair, the fact that people still believe in *something* is a miracle unto itself.

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bush, bird flu, hiv, classified documents