MAYA -- may mean "illusion" in some languages, but in this case it means dealing with cold, cruel reality --

Priests to Purify Site After Bush Visit

- - - - - - - - - - - -

By JUAN CARLOS LLORCA Associated Press Writer

March 09,2007 | GUATEMALA CITY -- Mayan priests* will purify** a sacred archaeological site to eliminate "bad spirits" after President Bush visits next week, an official with close ties to the group said Thursday.

"That a person like (Bush), with the persecution of our migrant brothers in the United States, with the wars he has provoked, is going to walk in our sacred lands, is an offense for the Mayan people and their culture," Juan Tiney, the director of a Mayan nongovernmental organization with close ties to Mayan religious and political leaders, said Thursday.

Bush's seven-day tour of Latin America includes a stopover beginning late Sunday in Guatemala. On Monday morning he is scheduled to visit the archaeological site Iximche on the high western plateau in a region of the Central American country populated mostly by Mayans.

-----------------------

* Time and the calendar begin on the equinox of 3/21 -- uh-oh -- and here comes the anti-whatever-you-got stomping on someone else's sacred grounds just before the big days.

----------------------

** Keep their names -- we will definitely need them and a whole passel of others to do a similar exorcism in the White House and the Veep's Residence in January 2009


------------------------