Let us not buy into the establishment's diversionary smear tactics Duwayne so ably describes here. Let us help refresh the memories of the goldfish brained populace regarding the atrocities that Chelsea exposed, detailed at a website devoted to her cause : http://www.bradleymanning.o...
...and the fact that the star perpetrators are still walking around, rich and beloved as "patriots".

"There is an official policy to ignore torture in Iraq.

"The “Iraq War Logs” published by WikiLeaks revealed that thousands of reports of prisoner abuse and torture had been filed against the Iraqi Security Forces. Medical evidence detailed how prisoners had been whipped with heavy cables across the feet, hung from ceiling hooks, suffered holes being bored into their legs with electric drills, urinated upon, and sexually assaulted. These logs also revealed the existence of “Frago 242,” an order implemented in 2004 not to investigate allegations of abuse against the Iraqi government. This order is a direct violation of the UN Convention Against Torture, which was ratified by the United States in 1994. The Convention prohibits the Armed Forces from transferring a detainee to other countries “where there are substantial grounds for believing that he would be in danger of being subjected to torture.” According to the State Department’s own reports, the U.S. government was already aware that the Iraqi Security Forces engaged in torture (1).

"U.S. officials were told to cover up evidence of child abuse by contractors in Afghanistan.

"U.S. defense contractors were brought under much tighter supervision after leaked diplomatic cables revealed that they had been complicit in child trafficking activities. DynCorp — a powerful defense contracting firm that claims almost $2 billion per year in revenue from U.S. tax dollars — threw a party for Afghan security recruits featuring boys purchased from child traffickers for entertainment. DynCorp had already faced human trafficking charges before this incident took place. According to the cables, Afghan Interior minister Hanif Atmar urged the assistant US ambassador to “quash” the story. These revelations have been a driving factor behind recent calls for the removal of all U.S. defense contractors from Afghanistan (2)."
...and there is much more at the site, and from other readily available sources. THIS is what Manning is imprisoned for. Somebody on another site mentioned that the Nazi war criminal Speer only got 20 years for his tireless war work for the Reich.

Manning exposed tens of thousands of documents detailing the deliberate criminal actions and policies of the sacred homeland for past decades. She is a hero of the people, and the traitors are the ones who have locked her away. The truth she exposed should be re-broadcast by everyone of conscience.

Yes if Manning wants to be Chelsea then -RESPECT-. Now, I don't know the conditions or the propaganda going on there, so I have no problem with Cals post (no thought crimes with me). But the best we can possibly do is respect the person based on their stated wishes.

Yes focus on the leaks. Ugh, but it's so much more cognitive effort to read the type of stuff above than say "hey didya hear, Manning's a woman now?!" Yea, well Manning got a 35 year sentence to get us this information. The link above has more interesting stuff than just the Iraq and Afghan stuff. Those might be the worst, but that war crimes went on in Iraq is really not surprising, we had the photos of Abu Ghriab, how could one not know what a horror that whole war was (and war is hell anyway). P.S. I hear the U.S. needs to get more involved in Syria for humanitarian reasons: "prisoners had been whipped with heavy cables across the feet, hung from ceiling hooks, suffered holes being bored into their legs with electric drills...."

But actually some of the other parts of that article are more interesting, the Haitian minimum wage (it's the corporate state), the DNA (it's the surveilence state monitoring all) - I think they give a less expected illustration to how things work.

And for all our bothering to try to figure out how our government really works (going in and out of different ideologies, news articles, commentary, books), I get the feeling we're only going to find out how powerless we really are about it all anyway. It's obviously not a Constitutional republic, it's probably not a democracy (as in really having any real democratic accountability) - even if everyone in the country voted 3rd party - do we really trust the voting machines not to switch our vote (it would be pretty darn obvious then - it's like everyone I talk to voted 3rd party - what's going on?, but they don't always mind masks coming off). So at the end of it all we'll probably just come to: politics is a @#$# waste of time, which is what every apathetic person who doesn't follow the news one tiny bit already knows! "We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time"

Still honestly I don't think all resistence is futile, but help me if I don't think the more one follows politics the more rigged everything seems. Sigh ...

Resistance is never futile, it just takes time. Lifetimes, in most cases (look at Ireland). But keeping the truth alive and out in the public sphere is sometimes all we can do, and if that's the case, that's what we must do. Too many people already have forgotten what was uncovered. We can't let them bury it again. That's all I'm getting at. And that's beyond politics, and lives in the heart of human existence. THAT is what they are trying to destroy here, our humanity. We can't let them do that, and even if we only reach a few people, it's worth the effort.

As ever, Chris Floyd said it best, for me at least, when he wrote, "But there's nothing else for it. We must keep sounding the alarm, even in the face of almost certain defeat. What else is our humanity worth if we don't do that? And if, in the end, all that we've accomplished is to keep the smallest spark of light alive, to help smuggle it through an age of darkness to some better, brighter time ahead, is that not worth the full measure of struggle? "

I recommend the essay:
http://www.chris-floyd.com/...

I recommend you read Eric Arthur Blair's "1984". If you HAVE read it, then realize that it is NO LONGER a novel about dystopia, it is an instruction manual. And, given the revelations about the NSA's snooping, they understood every word, and have at their disposal, instruments that not even George Orwell imagined. It is now obvious that "the people" are the enemy of the state, because their evil machinations are brought to light by such patriots as Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden and the powers that be don't like that.

Thanks

This is another sensitive situation like Obama's race where people are easily accused of being biased. Cal raises a good point. Manning is being tarred and feathered as a traitor without being formally charged with treason. The sexual orientation and desire to be transgender serves what purpose? How controversial is this issue? Like abortion it serves to spark fires in Conservatives with reach beyond color lines. Do you know how much homophobic nonsense I hear from Black folks everyday? How could you? I am talking about church-going or Bible believing Black folks many of whom believe that Manning and Snowden are attempts to berate Obama!

It is one of those subjects where Black Christians and Muslims can find common cause with the cults of Bob Jones or disciples of Jerry Falwell.
It also reaches into the Hispanic population.

It does not matter how many Gays, Lesbians, Bisexuals and Transgenders are in these ethnic sectors or even in their families it is condemned even by many who are struggling with it within themselves due to the religious bias of sexual extremes promoted by Judeo-Christianity and Islam which has infected every single American whether they believe, attend or even have never read the Bible or Quran.

Proof?

Why is Christmas a national holiday if the First Amendment bars the Establishment of Religion?

What does Manning's sexual orientation issues have to do with what he's done to expose the criminal hypocrisy of the US and the current Clinton-Obama Administration?

To go into such detail about whether he is a she wannabee serves the same purpose of the media attention to Trayvon Martin's use of marijuana.

To a very big number of Americans, the transgender aspect of homosexuality (since its usually lumped together) means a person is CONFUSED. The medical-psychiatric culture to which determines or facilitates gender reassignment diagnoses Homosexuality and Gender-Identity issues as scientific euphemisms for CONFUSION.

Manning is being cast as a sexual deviant, a Sodomite who is confused about being a man or a woman.
Look at the timing. The Homosexual non-issue issue in the military and marriage. Do you know many states in the USA have Sodomy laws and that being a Sodomite is felony. Sodomite is not synonymous with being Gay, it can deal with a man who dresses as a woman and plays her role in having sexual relations with other men or it can be a man having anal sex with a woman even if she's his wife.

Look at this Math. MARTIAL/MARITAL is almost the same word with the same letters and the current distraction of Homosexuals in the military and Homosexual marriage factors into this character assassination of Manning.

All of this serves to paint Manning as Confused (Confusion = Babylon the symbol of wickedness for Christian fundamentalists) and demonize him as a Sodomite. Do not underestimate the effect of this character assassination on a nation where millions believe the Earth is 6000 years old. Now here we see one has to tiptoe over political correctness even when there is a good point to be made and we are suppose to believe what we are seeing and hearing on TV?

If Manning's lawyer did this then he is in on it or just bad lawyering. What possible reason could there be to appeal to a small almost powerless segment of the population who might feel this is important? Ask the question in the context of the political movement. This invokes the ban of Homosexuals from being worthy of Security Clearances and can be a countermeasure for those still powerful forces within the Military-Intelligence culture who are against the ending of DADT as well as Same-Sex equal rights on a wide-range of fronts.

Manning was not executed as a traitor in the literal sense but he is being treated to a full spectrum of character assassination to where his life is endangered either in prison or upon his release as a Fag-Traitor.

And like criticisms of Obama that would bring charges of racist to whites and race-traitor to blacks now we risk political correction when we question why the media is making an issue of Manning's sexual identity crisis?

Lets go back to another political scandal that should have been a media frenzy but wasn't. The AWOL of Gov.Mark Sanford of South Carolina for an Argentinean woman he met while in Brasil. There was almost no media interest in who this woman is and what she has to be able to get a sitting US Governor abandon his office and family for a week. Where is her 15 minutes of fame ala Fanne Foxe? When the actor Hugh Grant got caught with a hooker Divine Brown the media made her a meteorite.

Brasil and Argentina are noted for their very gorgeous Shemales (yes, Shemales but my use of that term rather than transsexual goes beyond the point I am making as such are adjectives relating to a process not nouns referring to people) some of whom could be Victoria Secret models or Vegas Showgirls in proliferation. Why was there no intense media interest in what kind of woman in Argentina has the power to get such a man with Sanford's office and responsibility to go AWOL? We can learn about Argentinean stripper Fanne Foxe and her scandal with Congressman Wilbur Mills. We can even study the biography of Divine Brown so why the media disinterest in this Argentinean woman Sanford fell in love with? Why wasn't the media challenged for their lack of interest? Why not challenge that maybe this 'woman' was not a 'woman' but one of those legendary Argentinean or Brasilian shemales some of whom have global fame? See its safer for a US politician to seek such pleasures in Brasil or Argentina rather than risk getting caught in Vegas or some other US city. South Carolina well within the Bible Belt does not offer easy association with people considered to be open Sodomites practicing Sodomy which are serious crimes in the Old Confederacy and certain political death.

So the media can choose to ignore a government scandal's intimate detail. There was no quest to destroy Sanford's personal life beyond the fact he went AWOL because he fell in love. This Argentinean woman did not get her 15 minutes or do the talk show circuit.

Consider that of all the 'outed' Republicans its always been man to man but never man to shemale (or transsexual to the PCers) so the question becomes what does Argentina and Brasil have that could be totally unacceptable back home? Male and Lesbian homosexuality is being begrudgingly accepted but not transgender sex. How come the Media did not question Sanford along those lines or even show an interest in who this Argentinean woman is? But now comes Chelsea Manning? Remember, homosexuality just recently made a person a national security risk unless you were J Edgar Hoover and someone he was hot for.

But now we get Manning's desire to be a woman and we cannot question whether this is an Intel measure to demonize him?
Do we really want to get into the overly complex world of sexual-identity labeling for people not involved in the Byzantine terminology of what is considered the Homosexual lexicon and protocols?

I mean consider the differences between a transvestite and a transsexual? Or those men who love to suck cock but consider themselves to be heterosexual men who are just cock-suckers? Or those men who use transgender to attract heterosexual males or those who consider themselves to be. Just because this world is ignored does not mean it does not exist but again what has this to do with what Manning showed us about our tax-dollars at work? WTF does Manning's gender issues have to do with video footage of US troops taking target practice on an Iraqi family?

And just because this was taken to TV by Manning's defense attorney does not mean it served his best interests.

What kind of security does the military have to provide Manning? Remember, his is not just a traitor he is a fag-traitor.

How is he different from all the other military prisoners?

And when he is released, if he survives, and I doubt he does 35 years, what kind of security will he require against vigilantes with an agenda to kill the Fag-traitor? Given this reality it may be in his best interest to become feminine so as to not be recognized by self-appointed court-martial assassins if so why go public?

It all goes back to distracting from the reality of US criminality in what he exposed to exposing him as a deviant for the vast population who could care less about whats on wikilinks or have any empathy for Sexual Orientation issues and rights.

Like Trayvon Martin's character issues in high school attempts to justify being murdered by Zimmerman all this does is demonize Manning as a Sodomite and so what if you are enlightened on sexual orientation issues then this action is not directed at you but at that Silent Majority which was created during the Nixon Administration as a countermeasure to the counterculture of the 60's and the changes it brought about which relates to the current Gay-Lesbian-Transgender issue.

Manning's desire to be a woman, if true is actually a misogynist act on a man's part to consider that all one has to do to change from being a man to a woman is dress up and castrate themselves then take estrogenic agents. Because a woman's genitalia is internal there is a tendency to believe all one needs is a hole between the legs. Or that a woman is a sort of man without a penis and balls. Where is the functioning Ovaries, Fallopian tubes, Uterus and all the other organs which makes a woman different from a man? Does sexual reassignment surgery implant Ovaries, Tubes and a Uterus? If not then what is transgendered is a eunuch not a woman and it then serves as another male insult on the Feminine while all the political correctness must respect the man in his delusion. One day, there will be this possibility of turning a man into full functioning woman but that day has not come. Again, that is a different topic and only important as a diversion just like Gay marriage and Abortion distracts from the looting of the treasury and rights of US citizens. A diversion like baseball players taking steroids because hand in hand with the childish religious beliefs of vast numbers of Americans comes the ignorance of sex and drugs which it fosters. This does not apply to the biological reality of Inter-sexuals which Judeo-Christian narrow-mindedness has always denied but again that is another subject as the greater society recognizes only two genders, male and female with noting in-between. It has nothing to do with what Manning gave to wiki-links and the importance of what that should be to Americans who believe they have rights. I don't give a damn what my next door neighbors are doing to each other in their bedrooms and certainly don't care if Manning prefers looking like a woman so he can better be able to suck alleged heterosexual men's dicks. I dont care if Trayvon Martin was a habitual marijuana smoker or that Obama's Blackness exempts him from the same ridicule and scorn I wrote on Bush and Cheney. Thats not the issue at hand.

Manning exposed the criminal, dysfunctional and incompetent US government especially its state and defense departments. Now as Manning exposed the Entity the sexual orientation issues now arising are a part of the Entity's countermeasure of exposing him as well as give the lesson as to why such people were always security risks and formerly disqualified from receiving security clearances.

That was a powerful piece; thank you. Tony

wouldn't want to give the poor sods the idea that there's life outside the sexually bewildered beltway now would we?

Meanwhile, and of course, the news is cycling away toward the newest, already determined war in Syria because of their governments alleged use of, guess what, weapons of mass destruction. By siding with the insurgency, we will find ourselves allied to Al-Queda, among other people, which proves once again that politics surely makes strange bedfellows.

Despite the deployments, the folks on the ground express doubts as to the chemical weapons :

"CBS News reports that the U.S. is finalizing plans for war against Syria – and positioning ships to launch cruise missiles against the Syrian government – based on the claim that the Syrian government used chemical weapons against its people.

"Haaretz reports:

"Western experts on chemical warfare who have examined at least part of the footage are skeptical that weapons-grade chemical substances were used, although they all emphasize that serious conclusions cannot be reached without thorough on-site examination.

"Dan Kaszeta, a former officer of the U.S. Army’s Chemical Corps and a leading private consultant, pointed out a number of details absent from the footage so far: “None of the people treating the casualties or photographing them are wearing any sort of chemical-warfare protective gear,” he says, “and despite that, none of them seem to be harmed.” This would seem to rule out most types of military-grade chemical weapons, including the vast majority of nerve gases, since these substances would not evaporate immediately, especially if they were used in sufficient quantities to kill hundreds of people, but rather leave a level of contamination on clothes and bodies which would harm anyone coming in unprotected contact with them in the hours after an attack. In addition, he says that “there are none of the other signs you would expect to see in the aftermath of a chemical attack....”

"Steve Johnson, a leading researcher on the effects of hazardous material exposure at England’s Cranfield University who has worked with Britain’s Ministry of Defense on chemical warfare issues, agrees that “from the details we have seen so far, a large number of casualties over a wide area would mean quite a pervasive dispersal. With that level of chemical agent, you would expect to see a lot of contamination on the casualties coming in, and it would affect those treating them who are not properly protected. We are not seeing that here.”

Additional questions also remain unanswered, especially regarding the timing of the attack, being that it occurred on the exact same day that a team of UN inspectors was in Damascus to investigate earlier claims of chemical weapons use.

http://www.washingtonsblog....

EXACTLY!

Bingo. Syria and Egypt, the former United Arab Republic, are the last 2 secular Arabian republics left standing. And the US Theoist alliance with Wahhabis Jihadists is not as strange as it seems since the former helped finance and train the latter.

Consider who the so-called 'Champion of Democracy' is allied with. The absolute monarchies of Pseudo-Arabia, Catarrah, Kut-wait, Useless Arab Imitations and Bah-Rain. Not only are these Fake Kingdoms absolute monarchies ruled by family franchised Pimps but they are infamous for their Misogyny and Slave-markets. Yes, Slave-Markets which still features kidnapped 'Black' Africans and 'White' Women. See the term 'White slavery' is much about the lust of Circassian women sold to powerful Sheikhs throughout the Islamic world.
And yes, Arab raiders still ride down on Black Africans, especially the remnant of those still considered 'Pagan' for sale. The European slave trade ended in the mid 19th Century but not much is known about the Arab slave trade which used the Indian Ocean as its waterways. The city of Dar-es-Salaam and Zanzibar were major centers of the Arab-Islamic slave trade of Africans.

The reality of the Arab slave trade is hidden behind the wall of Euro-American renown hatred of history, especially of those not recognized as their European ancestors.

So why does the USA side with such Cretins? Maybe it sees itself in them, hypocrites. These families owe their 'royal' position to being agents to the British Crown when the Empire was focused on securing the shipping lanes and ports that supported its worldwide possessions and trade. These Fakers claiming direct descent from Muhammad were just the families the British favored with the latest weapons to serve their interests and have been passed over to the USA as the Empire well-armed Rottweiler.

Note the brutish ignorance of Jihadists and the rigidity of Sharia when they have the power to establish it and get an understanding of why the secular Arab states were so brutal in their methods of keeping them in check. Iraq's Hussein, Syria's Assad, Libya's Qaddhafi and the Nasserites of Egypt were students of Ataturk's reformation of Turkey after the fall of the Ottoman Empire and the only chance these nations had for being modern and approaching whatever democracy is. They were brutal against Jihadists because thats what it took. And in each of these secular nations, non-Muslims, especially Jews and Christians were safe. Thats not true anymore in Iraq and it will not be true if these Wahhabis overthrow Assad in Syria.

Isnt it also interesting that the so-called Christian and Democracy loving USA foreign policy is helping Wahhabis takeover the lands where Christianity really started and where its oldest congregations are located? Syria is the real home of Christianity not what is now Israel and some of the Syrian and Assyrian-Chaldean Christian congregations of Iraq are the oldest in the world. If Jesus Christ was ever a historical person then the ancestors of these congregations along with those of Palestine were the ones who may have known him but the USA does not care. One could make the case that the USA is under the control of Sharia and expanding a more fundamentally rigid form of Islam with looking at how its acted since 911.

Gotta Go but again Grandma Sheila right on target.

I wonder how many silkworm anti-ship missiles Iran has aimed at the US carrier strike force that supposedly makes an American lake of the Persian Gulf. I wonder what Iran will do when the US starts raining cruise missiles down on Assad.

but real evidence is so ungenteel with obsessive maniacs, isn't it?

i'm waiting to see those highly touted s-300 missiles blast some incoming imperial ordnance out of the sky.

and i'm also waiting to see Kerry and his ilk dragged off kicking and screaming to the electric chair.

I say let's refer to Manning only as "Manning". Let's drop all use of titles such as Mr. or Mrs. Let's forget gender-designating pronouns such as him, her, he, she, etc. Let the stupids worry about all the gender-based bullshit issues and let's talk only about what whistleblower Manning did or does in relation to journalism, civil liberties, government, secrecy, etc. That way we can stay focused on what matters and let the disposition and shape of Manning's private parts remain private.

What else is being 'exposed' is the absolute garbage of what corporate main-stream media is. IT, meaning NY TIMES newspaper residue and the alphabet TV networks are going to spend more time on Chelsea then what Manning revealed. Its already probably exceeded the airtime minutes dedicated to US criminality given to wikilinks. Remember now, the attempt to cast Assange as a rapist in Sweden of all places the birthland of free sex and liberal sexual attitudes. Sex sells? OK then why the disinterest in the Argentinean woman Gov. Sanford went AWOL for?

Remember this is the Eunuch nation that was so sex obsessed and suppressed that a presidential impeachment turned on perjury over a blowjob rather than an in-depth investigation of White-Water. An entire nation in gridlock over Monica Lewinsky's blowjobs on Bill Clinton!

ABC, CBS, CNN, FOX, NBC and all of its derivatives are total garbage. You learn more by watching their sitcoms then by any delusion of being informed by what It considers to be serious news. Whenever the TV News came on I made a point of looking at whatever sitcom rerun was on the alternate non-news station. The only reason to watch these privatized propagandists is to hear the way the BS is blowing.

Since we sort of function as a community gathered around Chris lets see how soon Manning disappears from media attention. Notice how Trayvon Martin and Zimmerman have vanished? Or course that did not have the significance of a breech in national security. Heck the only reason Assange is mentioned was due to Snowden and now the Manning trial. The NFL season starts in 2 weeks OK? The NCAA football season too. Then we will get back into what is really serious while the cyber gadflies, meaning us, chirp on about the encroaching fascism.
But then I am at the eve of my curmudgeon years, I get my relief from the little pleasure of dismissing institutions like HARVARD as the Grandfather of this entire Artificial Life-Form or hurling my words against over-rated Ken Dolls like Barack Obama and Mitt Romney.

The 'news' is going to spend more time with Chelsea much to the frustration of Chelsea Clinton then It ever spent on the videos of US military and state department criminality because after all the corporate mainstream media is only interested in all the propaganda and dis-information it can present.

Since a lot of people have a hateful fake morality, Gay and transsexual hate will always work plenty good for the EElite ( the 1st E is for Evil ) to demonise Manning. Exposing and exploiting this to the media will automatically get 10's or hundred's of millions more hate mongers to give more support to the establishments side of torturing, support for false imprisonment and vilification of Manning. If belief by the people of Manning being a traitor because of whistle blowing is not a strong enough belief of criminality than the EElite would like, they'll use the gay/transsexual hate card. It works so well. This tactic has worked countless times and the sheeple love to prove their cowardly sheeple-ness.

Yes Tom
, and forgotten by too many or never known by a significant number of USers are the many states where Sodomy is a felony and a Sodomite is a felon. Oh it just happens to be those states that originated Right to Work, seceded from the US and considers Itself to be the Bible-Belt. Sodomy and Sodomite are words seldom spoken or heard these days unless from the condemnation of fire and brimstone demagogues but it becomes a stratagem which is why I refuse to buy into it even if Manning's defense lawyer introduced it or there was this public declaration of 'I am Chelsea Manning.' How do I know this is not a framing? I never heard of Manning before the wiki-leaks issue and dont know him now but I am aware of the lengths the Entity will go to assassinate a dissident's character if It has not decided to murder them outright. We are dealing with an Artificial Lifeform capable of doing everything the NAZIS are accused of to have a pretext for war. The attack on the USS Maine, the sinking of the SS Lusitania, attack on Pearl Harbor, Gulf of Tonkin and 911 are all suspect of an Entity which needed the pretext of American deaths as a reason for military action with the support of the people.
With the exception being the Israeli sinking of the USS Liberty.

In looking over the definitions of Natural Law as well as the focus on worship of exclusively male deities Americans are becoming tolerant of male to male homosexuality. Lesbianism was never the issue as a violation of Biblical or natural law which focused on men having sex with men or animals or women having sex with animals. There was never the coded violation of women having sex with women which is why Lesbian scenes were always entertainment for powerful men as well as included in all early heterosexual pornography. As these acts have become more acceptable the transgender aspect gets thrown under the bus. But these are diversionary issues like abortion shields patriarchal control over women. As I am close to these issues I note the mainstream media works to hide any outing of a man and shemale. For example the mysterious death of David Carradine in Bangkok. Or refusing to address the issue of Sanford's Argentinean woman.

The Sodomite extremist becomes the transvestite male who intends to attract heterosexual males into a sexual encounter since a male homosexual would be attracted to men. Thats the worst of the Biblical fundamentalist condemnation as man to man sex ala the Greek hoplite methods of Sparta and Thebes becomes acceptable. The Lesbian issue had more to do with the suppression of all women rather than any Sapphic preferences.

And I maintain that this defense lawyer is doing Manning a disservice because such a sex change might be needed once he is released as a means to protect him against vigilantes. I am sure if he survives Leavenworth there will be an early release so that a Chelsea Manning might have a better chance of surviving an assassin then Bradley. That should have been the wise counsel, not to make a public declaration for the bigger purpose of personal protection.

And the issue of homosexuality is bigger than the case of an individual in that the military-intelligence complex only recently dropped this as a reason for being a security risk. The hypocrisy is lush when you consider the life and practices of J Edgar Hoover but then some of the loudest voices against homosexuality have proven to be closeted men who are really in conflict with themselves and their Judeo-Christian indoctrination but again, what does this have to do with the exposure of US war crimes? Nothing.

I challenge MSNBC to give ex-Gov. Sanford's Argentinean woman her 15 minutes of fame knowing that by now some genetic woman has been found who will claim to be the one. I accuse the very same media now obsessing over Chelsea to ask whether Sanford got hooked up in an orgy with Argentinean-Brasilian shemales and lost track of time then came up with the 'falling in love with a woman' alibi of deliberately covering over the facts to protect a Conservative Republican's sodomy which I am sure is a felony in South Carolina. That is if Chelsea is such a big deal lets take a full media exposure of the widespread world of the Pre-op transsexual/shemale. Or else shut the hell up on Chelsea and focus on the war crimes funded by US taxpayers in the name of We the People. Lying corporate Mother-fuckers.

About Manning's lawyer announcing Manning wanting to be identified as Chelsea - I'm too ignorant with such things, but my instinct and one possible explanation ( without knowing how to think about it myself ), was Manning's lawyer relayed faithfully, orders from Manning to publicly announce his desired change to Chelsea. I first thought that the timing of this change was important - just after conviction and sentencing for being a hero, was seen by me ( in one part ) as psychological protection from the torture horrors that soon awaits Manning in prison. More so than possible protection after prison even if Manning ever gets out, even though that's important too.

I agree that ' The Entity ' will, and do anything as your examples above show, to get what they want. Framing Manning included.

OK. I am up to speed on the issue now so its all about another 'man believing he's a female' or a 'woman trapped in a man's body' which takes us completely away from what this entire episode is about. Its a hay-maker for sure because handled rightly it will force a total redefinition of what a 'female' and a 'woman' is. There is no real legal definition and science can even be called in to defend Manning on the fact that males have an X-chromosome? Or is a woman more than that?

I would agree that the rigid extremes of male and female with nothing in-between has to be challenged on the scientific front to put an end to the sexual dysfunction caused by extreme asexual-misogynist wings of Judeo-Christianity and Islam.

Another problem is that Manning and others like him dont believe in an In-Between either. They believe since they do not consider themselves to be men then they must be women which is not necessarily the case except in the rigidity of what we have inherited from these Asexuals in the Vatican and a limited and ignorant interpretation of what religion is. Other civilizations have recognized the In-Betweens and even revered them. I am not speaking of castrated eunuchs.

Once again this is a male issue that puts the burden on the feminine. I mean this is the easy part for a man to have these delusions without having the pay the price of what really makes a woman more than a hole and breasts. Maybe it takes more men standing in a birthing room to understand that there are organs hidden up there beyond the vulva and vagina which goes through menses and gestation with hours of labor and childbirth. Its more to being a woman than castrating the testicles and penis then invaginating the skin to form a vagina which has no muscle.

My position is not politically correct but I am on safe ground that the vast majority of Americans do not give this much thought if any unless they are contemplating such a move, have done it or are those medical and pharmaceutical professionals who can make it happen.

Despite the fact of inter-sexuals and hermaphrodites the US medical profession becomes very Vatican-like in addressing the issue as real biology, there is virtually no challenge to the public belief that there are only 2 genders.
Its the same with sports medicine, in the demonization of athletes for taking steroids and Human Growth Hormone the media listens only to ignorant false moralizing fans who couldn't speak for 30 seconds with any sign of knowledge as to what these substances are. Sports medicine physicians are silent and not sought.

Its really the same topic, the human endocrine system and its manipulation by extrinsic dosages, in the case of sex-reassignment its the dosing of estrogen instead of the testosterone for the athlete.

So now we have come to the possibility of defining what a female or a woman is to determine where to house Manning or as a part of his defense? This is why this is BS because its going to takeaway the pressure for why Manning is news in the first place. Lost will be what was disclosed and any possibility of war crimes or high crimes and misdemeanors of US political and military officials. Now this is where the US corporate media, legal community and civil liberties groups will spend its time in the sensationalism of Chelsea rather than US troops firing on Iraqi families for target practice and all the other crimes.

The narrow understanding of what religion is in America is frustrating because even those who claim to be Atheists or anti-religious exhibit Christian and Islamic traits as if just because they reject Judeo-Christianity or Islam they believe these are the total definition and etymology of the word or the listing of religions in the Brittanica.

There are or were religions which facilitated a man's call to the feminine without going so far as to establish that he was a woman. There were even priestess hoods made up of these called men. But Christians, while accepting that men are called to the ministry cannot accept that there are men called to the Feminine Divine because they have denied or rejected such except in the asexualized ideal of the Virgin Mary. This is because we have people who worship a book not knowing that to do so is to have a fetish. Even the transgendered society trying to validate itself has become aware of the various native American nations institution or acceptance of Two-Persons, which the French called Berdache.
These were considered to be Shaman and treated with respect but were men living as women. Such is condemned as Sodomy by Christians.

OK, here's my deal and I am not being hostile, but if a man takes all the Estrogen he can get and wears the cosmetics and fashions of women, he will not grow a functioning pair of ovaries, fallopian tubes or uterus. He may develop his mammary glands to produce milk. And while I defend the right of individuals to make choices that suit them I do know that even the psychiatric sector which specializes in gender identity issues also promote the Either-Or of male-female and not the Neither-Nor because Shamanism does not exist in our culture and there is no recognition of the In-Betweeners who are anatomically and physiological a sort of mixture of the genders and would qualify for surgical intervention the same way as someone with a cleft palate.

As I feel strong on this issue let me add that the Entity is happy for these events if indeed these are the wishes of Manning because now the focus is on transgender rights as well as what is a woman. When we were young boys and saw our first naked girl what did we notice, a hole. We did not know what was inside that hole and too many men still dont know so its time to state the case that a Femme is more than that unless you are ready to say eunuchs who dress like women are women too.

The PENTAGON only recently accepted Homosexuality as qualified for Security Clearance. You can bet there is serious movement to say 'I told you so.' So the Entity keeps on lying, stealing and mass-murdering without any consequence of legal action to where they are facing time in Leavenworth as the nation turns on a gender identity issue. Either way the NFL and NCAA is soon to start and Manning, either Bradley or Chelsea will fade from view.

Did anyone consider the blowback on Lesbians, Gays and Transgenders who may now be treated as Proxy targets in place of Manning? Think the Hate-Crime law will stop such vigilante action? Its a very deep situation but I felt the need to offer a minority view based on my work with religions that are sex based and the acceptance that there is more to humanity than a rigid two gender division. With all the emphasis on male deities men have nowhere to go in search of a heterosexual relationship with the divine. Who thinks of that? Well there use to be Feminine Divine Ideas ministered by Femme and Phallic-Femme Priestesses throughout the pre-Christian-Islamic world, why you can still see their temples and no the Pagans did not worship statues but interacted in real time with Mediums who were human representatives of the ideal. Or if that is too much to fathom just the realization that humans need sex in both procreative and recreative needs and should not be limited to marriage sanctioned by male entities which themselves are celibate.

As for the science, well to start, all men do have a X-chromosome and each of us produce estrogen and testosterone in our steroidal glands. Some more of that and a little bit of this makes the difference in appearances until you get into the gonads.

I just hope there is still some pressure on what got Manning in trouble in the first place, the exposure of a criminal government Entity and the eventual legal reckoning of its main operatives before they get old and senile or die leaving future generations to charge them posthumously without any real consequence.

If I offended some I did not mean to but this distraction on sexual identity issue is BS no matter what its origin. This impacts more than just Manning

Thanks Duwayne. Agree with all above . It's like being taken to school every time you post.

Did anyone, when read about Manning's desire to become female, wonder if this was partially done to discredit him? Not that he/she wasn't conflicted in this way before, but that perhaps some Army jailer, after the psychological trauma, encouraged this approach? He gets a plank for his psyche to stand, and the vast majority of Americans snort and see, not at Manning the unveiler of crimes, but rather Manning the gender-confused.

FYI if someone transitions you're not supposed to refer to them with the wrong pronoun. And it seems you must be clueless to think someone would so easily be pressed into considering themselves the opposite gender. Could the government convince someone that they were gay? Manning has expressed thoughts before that she considered herself a different gender: "the CPU is not made for this motherboard".

I don't think the government will allow hormone replacement therapy, but I need to check that, but honestly that's another form of torture: not treating a dehabilitating condition. Gender dysphoria can be hell, or so I've been taught, with 41% (in the USA) of transgender people attempting suicide

Well, technically, Chelsea Manning is not a female yet, but Ok, I suppose it was careless. I don't know the etiquette. And as I said, it was not "pressed", but encouraged. I know that Manning had already dealt with the issue for years. I'm just asking: Why make this arrangement now, after a lighter penalty is issued. Maybe I'm too much of a conspiracy theorist.

And no, it'll be a fight to allow the hormonal therapy for Manning, as its debated whether that is or ought to be covered under military prison healthcare.

Clearly Washington's criminal wars need less and less fool-proof PR lies as justification for staring a War. All the War PR bullshit, which is more pathetic each passing year, is a demonstration of just how careless, thoughtless and war loving most the public are for mass murder. Washington doesnt really have to try too much anymore with a convincing war narrative because the public will go along with it, or not really care. Need proof ? Ask anyone about Libya.

Also, I'm sick of poll's saying a certain percentage is against this or that war. That group is vastly non committed, will switch sides after the war starts, will not do or say anything meaningful against a war. It's the individual PR lies they tell themselves without the principles or responsibility.

Because it's the Empire we're talking about, the Empire is a compulsive invader of countries. I still can't believe that some were thinking that Syria wasn't next on the list.

Did anyone else notice that the person who killed American soldiers was sentenced to death, whereas the person who killed Afghani civilians was give an life sentence. Both are terrible crimes, but there does seem to be a discrepancy - doubtless for which there are comparable and consistent explanations.

Just take care of each other, our heart & thoughts are with you and all the family. We're here.