U.S. Forces Battle Iraqi Guerrillas in Intense Firefight
By ALEX BERENSON and SUSAN SACHS
Published: October 31, 2003
ABU GHRAIB, Iraq, Oct. 31 — Guerrillas and American troops battled for hours here today in an intense firefight after a demonstration in support of Saddam Hussein turned violent. Meanwhile, rumors of terrorist attacks this weekend roiled Baghdad.
The daylong battle in Abu Ghraib, a western suburb of Baghdad that has been a center of hostility to the American-led occupation, and the anxiety in the capital underscored the deteriorating security situation here at the end of a week which began when four simultaneous car bombs killed 34 people and wounded more than 200.
In addition, an American soldier was killed in an attack west of the capital today. At least 33 United States troops have died from hostile fire in attacks in October, compared with 16 in September, and the pace has increased in recent days.
The soldier, from the 82nd Airborne Division, was killed by a roadside bomb at 8:30 a.m. local time near Khaldiya, about 45 miles west of Baghdad, the military reported. Four other soldiers were wounded. The area west and north of the capital has been a center of resistance to the American occupation.
The death brought to 118 the number of American troops killed in action since Washington declared an end to major combat operations in Iraq on May 1. Since the Iraq war began on March 19, 350 soldiers have been died in combat or of other causes, and 2,160 more wounded, according to Maj. Linda Haseloff, an American military spokeswoman in Tampa, Fla.
Daylong battle? Come on, this is insane. These folks can fight day long battles? This isn't a bunch of secret policemen doing this. That's infantry, trained infantry. These folks shot it out all day with the Americans and didn't lose any ground. That's a bad sign. Which general said he had no threat for any of his companies? Odierno? Sanchez? Well, that's now officially bullshit.
Any enemy who can tie you down for the better part of the day is a threat to your command. Especially when they're blowing up trains, using anti-tank missiles and now holding off US armor and infantry in cities.
The Times said 1,000 people took to the streets with guns and for extra measure, Sunni clerics called for jihad during services.
What is clear is that this is NOT Vietnam. Even in 1975 there wasn't the sense of loss of control. This seems close to a real explosion . We have been very lucky that the Shia have kept their peace. When they decide to break it, we're in deep trouble.
Americans are in a deep dilemma. The more we police Iraq, the worse the resistance grows. Yet, without order, we have to do more intrusive policing.Either way, we're screwed.
I'm sitting in SIBL, the New York Public Library's Science and Technoiogy branch. They have nice, fat Ethernet connections and docking stations, It ain't Starbucks, but it's free and its on my computer.
The docking stations are in the rear of the basement, if you ever come to New York and need to get onlne during the day. The library is open from 10-6 Tuesday-Saturday. It's on the corner of 34th and Madison. It is an underutilized place, with maybe 10 laptop users at the moment.
One of the library's features is a bank of TV's on the lower level. As I was coming back from the bathroom, I saw Jessica Lynch on my TV. Now, I personally have nothing against her. But then, I'm not in an infantry squad in Tikrit either.
Sunday night, this heinous movie about her "rescue", which will be as accurate as Signal magazine will air. I think the Smart story, another piece of clever fiction, will be on around the same time.
In two months, demonstrably false versions of events have made on to TV. First, there was DC 9/11, a fictional recounting of the heroism of GeorgeW. Bush. After all, any movie with Bush ordering Dick Cheney around is as real as a Jenna Jameson porno. No worse, since she really IS blonde and her first name really IS Jenna. DC 9/11 doesn't even have that level of credibility.
But what's even worse is that while Lynch is getting 80 percent disability, Shoshana Johnson, who was also wounded in he 507th fiasco is getting 30 percent and she's got PTSD, a common occurance in POW's. The Army was caught short when Jesse Jackson accused them of racism. I think it was politics. Fifth Corps had to prevent them from awarding her the Silver Star. If you think people are pissed that she got the Bronze Star.....
I think Lynch got special treatment and everyone else is getting jacked around. Warehousing wounded and injured GI's like refugees and ignoring their wounds. Digusting on every level.
Now, stories of serious PTSD problems and the use of denigrating terms for the Iraqis is just a sign things ae getting worse.
Angry Iraqis have attacked the mayor's office in the flashpoint town of Falluja, setting the building on fire.
Residents told Reuters news agency the violence flared after police shot dead a local man nearby.
There have also been clashes in western Baghdad between US troops and Iraqis.
AFP news agency reported that four Iraqis were killed and two US soldiers injured, but this could not be confirmed.
Falluja, a Sunni Muslim town about 65 kilometres (40 miles) west of Baghdad, is a stronghold of supporters of ousted president Saddam Hussein.
On Tuesday, a suicide car bomb attack killed at least four other people near the town's police station.
Near Falluja on Thursday, a makeshift bomb set fire to a train which was carrying goods to US soldiers.
In the latest violence in Falluja, several men, many wearing traditional robes, opened fire at about 1345 (1045 GMT) using assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades, AFP news agency reported.
There hasn't been a morning since April 9th where I I haven't been greeted by some horror from Iraq. Now this.
So how did Al Qaeda get those traditional robes? Buy them?
Jesus, people think this is like Northern Ireland or Lebanon are wrong. This is like the opening stages of the Congo. There's still the shell of a society, but if this keeps up, civil war is the only outcome possible.
Now, they're blowing up supply trains? Man, this is really turning into the Great Patriotic War.
Recently, I asked if someone had a laptop they were no longer using. This was early on a Saturday.
I am now the owner of a G3 Kanga, thanks to the generousity of one of the readers here. Since he made the offer privately, I won't use his name, but he knows that I am grateful.
Other people have made generous offers as well and I appreciate those as well.
My laptop needs are modest and this machine is more than adequate. As long as I can type and go online, I'm cool. This does that and more.
Once upon a time, people said that no one would pay for content on the internet. That is not true. People can and will pay when the people doing the work take it seriously and do it dilligently. Not just my needs for a laptop, which is a nice convience, but in more serious matters, paying for Josh Marshall's trip to New Hampshire, Atrios's new laptop and offers of serious legal help. I'm sure that there are many more kindnesses that have happened without much notice.
While a bitter hack like Camille Paglia can whine about the quality of blogs, you can see their growing influence daily. They're forcing the media to cover stories they would have ignored. The Guardian is publishing in America because their stories are circulated daily on blogs, building their audience.
It is a two way street. We do our work because it needs to be done. But without your generous support of this site and many others, it would be no more than pissing in the wind.
Robert Fisk describes the resistance in an interview with Pacifica's Amy Goodman.
AMY GOODMAN: It's good to have you with us. Well, the killings in Iraq continue. We hear about one side. We hear about the continual killings of U.S. service men and women. We hear about the bombings of the Red Cross, the bombings of the police stations in Baghdad and Fallujah. You've spent a lot of time in Iraq. Can you explain?
ROBERT FISK: Well, I think, you know, part of the explanation needs to include a kind of a cultural comment. We were just listening to your reading of the news where we were hearing you quoting American statesmen as saying that-- talking about the number of foreign fighters in Iraq. Well, I can tell you there are at least 200,000 foreign fighters in Iraq and 146,000 of them are wearing American uniform. You know, Americans in Iraq did not grow up in Tikrit eating dates for breakfast. The largest number of foreign fighters in Iraq, a thousand times over anything Al Qaeda can do, are western soldiers. And we need to realize that we're maintaining an occupation there.
Are there foreign Arab fighters, which is really what your question is about. I think there are probably a few, though we don't know how many and we don't know how many of them actually entered Iraq. Not as friends of Al Qaeda, but in heeding the call of Saddam Hussein to defend Iraq before the American invasion. But, you know, at the end of the day, this is what we call a canard. It's a game. It's a lie. The resistance to the American presence, and these ferocious, brutal, cruel attacks on Iraqis themselves are being carried out largely by Iraqis. The Americans claimed, after the bombings, oh, they managed to get one of the suicide bombers who didn't kill himself and he had a Syrian passport. I noticed we've not been given his passport number or his nationality, date of birth or, indeed, his name. Well, he may be real. He may be real.
But the vast majority of the, quote, resistance, unquote, are Iraqis and my own investigations, particularly around the city of Fallujah, which is where so many Americans have been killed, American servicemen, is that these people were originally Iraqis with a growing interest in the politics of Islam, who, under Saddam Hussein, were permitted, because Saddam knew when to let the top off the kettle and let it not boil over. Were permitted to form an organization called the committee, or the organization, of the faithful. They weren't pro-Saddam; in many cases they, like the people of Fallujah, were arrested and very cruelly treated by Saddam's henchmen. But they were allowed to form individual groups who could discuss religion, providing they didn't talk about politics.
When the regime fell, when the Americans entered Baghdad on the ninth of April this year, these groups became the only focused resistance against American rule. And they did decide, individually and then in coordination, that they would become the Iraqi resistance. I wrote about this actually on April 9. But, these people did begin to believe that they could be the new nationalists, aided, of course, with the weapons of Saddam, the former henchmen of Saddam, and, to some considerable extent, by a population which felt that the American occupiers were behaving brutally.
One man, a tribal leader around Fallujah, whose village I went to and, indeed, I had lunch with him a few weeks ago said to me, you know, originally when the Americans came here, we shouted our greetings to them. But when we staged a protest against their presence, they shot 14 of us dead. There were indeed 14 Iraqis shot dead in Fallujah. After that, he said, it became a question of tribal honor. We had to take our revenge against the Americans, and as they shot back, it became a question of resistance. So, what you found is that the way in which the Americans behave, the way in which the Iraqis behaved, plus this cellular system of groups of the faithful, which were permitted to exist under Saddam, though not with much enthusiasm from the previous regime, turned a war of resistance-- or, rather, turned a war of revenge into a war of resistance. And the people who are killing Americans, at the moment, and killing fellow Iraqis, are largely Iraqis. Mr. Rumsfeld and Mr. Wolfowitz and Mr. Bush can go on talking till cows come home about foreign fighters. These are not, for the most part, people who were born outside Iraq, which most Americans were. They are people who are called Iraqis. This is a resistance movement, whether we like it or not.
AMY GOODMAN: Robert Fisk, you described your experience simply at Baghdad Airport, who was there, the rocket attacks that were coming in as you were trying to leave, what the soldiers there were saying, what the perimeter is there.
ROBERT FISK: Yeah. Well, it was -- As I said in the piece which you quote, a crazy mixture of Walt Disney and Vietnam-- you know? They didn't even have any-- the only international flyer or airline operating out of Baghdad Airport, we can't call it Saddam Airport anymore, and who would want to, is Royal Jordanian, which is a comparatively small Middle Eastern airline company. Heaven knows who insures them for this trip.
But they -- When I was flying out, they had a flight on the ground. There were supposed to be two planes of Royal Jordanian, one of which was a small executive jet, the other which was to be an Airbus and they kept changing the times, there were no seat numbers, etc. But as I was waiting hour after hour for the planes to take off, mortars started landing at the airport. Five in all. And I was actually chatting to a group of special forces, Americans, with their black webbing with lots and lots of radios and telephones and weapons. And they were actually-- as special forces tend to-being quite appreciative of their enemy. They were saying: Not bad. They're getting better. They're getting better. In other words, they were aiming their mortars to land closer to the actual runway of the airport. Each mortar landing would be succeeded by a large kind of smoke ring that would go up in the sky about 20, 30 feet wide. And then an Apache helicopter took off to try and rocket the attackers.
After reading about the assclown libel threat letter, people, not just me, are guessing why he would do this. Most people think it's to invade Atrios's privacy.
I've never written anything I didn't stand behind, so anonymity was never a problem. But the use of the law to strip anonymity from publishers is a dangerous one. Me, I've worked as a writer for almost 20 years, so I like the publicity. But if I taught kids or was a businessman, I'd think I might use the protection of anonymity.
It keeps me honest. Since my name is attached to everything I write, my full legal name, it makes me think before I put something online.
But for people who don't have that luxury and it is a luxury, they need a way to express themselves and not get hassled for their opinions. People DO get fired for their opinions. They are ostracized by their friends. Any critic wants to strip anonymity as a breaching of your basic defense. Then they can go after your personal life.
Luckily, anonymity online has been generally protected, as has the right to publish comments, as long as you don't edit them. A free and open forum is just that.
As a general rule, it is best to ignore what is writen about you unless it is so outrageous that it causes you real harm. If someone said I was a drunken bum, I'd be pissed. If someone said I was a convicted pedophile, I'd sue. But if you're going to run a blog, and attack a popular columnist on a regular basis, it is best to develop a very thick skin.
You know, people here are civil. No one calls me an asshole or evil. But if they weren't, the last thing I'd want to do is sue anyone. Once you do that, it becomes a matter of public record. Atrios could investigate his sex life to prove he was a stalker, question any and all lovers and aquaintances. It's like exposing your entire personal life for public inspection. Because truth is an absolute defense.
Billmon worries if bloggers are going to sue each other. Neighbors do it all the time. Not everyone has the same level of judgement. One could put up a blog called "Samantha Jones is a bisexual slut" and include pictures. If that blog is doctored and the pictures faked, Ms. Jones should be able to sue. Or if someone is falsely accused of a crime. But for mere insult? It's as silly as a property line dispute. The assclown called himself a stalker. Come on, any decent, non-friend lawyer would laugh at this.
Hell, if Atrios was mean, he could sue the assclown for harassment and abuse of the legal system.
A lot of people like to use libel actions as cudgles, to scare people. And if you don't know the law, it works. But for a smart client, it's about the worst legal action you can file. You rarely win and the defense is as broad as permitted by law. Because it has several hurdles to meet. Blumenthal v Drudge, who committed a textbook case of libel in claiming he had court records that Blumenthal had beat his wife and he didn't. If you want libel, that's about good as you get, a malicious lie. Even so, Blumenthal and Drudge settled. If that case settled, then few cases will ever reach court. I think 48 went to trial in 2000.
As a writer, the assclown should know libel is hard to win and Atrios has no responsibilty for comments placed on his sight.
Sometimes with progress comes hostility, as evidenced by two recent events. Black Rose, a Washington, D.C.-based s/m organization, planned to hold its annual national conference (which attracts thousands) at the Princess Royale hotel in Ocean City, Maryland (in previous years, it has been held elsewhere in the state). The contract had been signed; all the rooms in the hotel were booked. A few weeks ago, when details were leaked to the local media, there was a flood of public opposition as residents claimed the event would tarnish Ocean City's family-oriented image.
Opponents worked every angle to try to run Black Rose out of town. Finally the liquor commission informed the hotel, city officials, and the papers that local laws could be violated during the event, especially those that prohibit erotic touching over clothes in a place with a liquor license, even when no booze is sold or consumed. Faced with pressure from police and local religious organizers ready to picket, Black Rose canceled.
Less than a week later, police chief Nick Congemi of Kenner, Louisiana, wrote a letter to 15 area motels urging them to decline requests to host Fetish in the Fall, a new s/m event scheduled to run in conjunction with N'awlins in November (neworleansinnovember.com), an annual swingers conference. Although he refused to meet with organizers, Congemi called the event "borderline illegal and demeaning to women." The organizers hadn't yet secured a signed contract with their host hotel, and decided to cancel in order to focus on the larger swingers event (first letting the media know their side of the story).
Congemi's personal opinion, which he chose to turn into policy, reflects a fundamental yet typical misunderstanding of s/m. "It is virtually impossible to bind, denigrate, beat and inflict pain on humans in sexual acts, yet honor and respect them in everyday situations," wrote one woman in an editorial about Black Rose in Delaware County's Daily Times; she also likened s/m practitioners to the serial rapist and murderer Ted Bundy. AP reported that Black Rose offered classes on "everything from torture to the various techniques associated with pain-induced sex." What the hell is pain-induced sex? Sadomasochism is a consensual practice that may incorporate power play, bondage, and heavy sensation play but is not equivalent to violence and abuse; while it is often sensual, it may or may not include genital-focused sex. Because there may be pain, punishment, or submission involved, people automatically assume that no one would willingly be subjected to such things. These same ignorant people cannot imagine erotic exchanges outside their comfy norm.
OK, you may not be into S&M, but the fearmongering about it is silly. While it's not my personal taste, anyone who does even cursory research on the subject, they would S&M is very different than people think.
BDSM, in it's mildest form, is simply being restrained, in it's most extreme, may involve body modification, like piercing. But it is clearly consensual. It can only be engaged in with consent. If it isn't, it's a crime.
What bothers me is that people, without doing any investigation, are making assumptions about private sexual behavior. BDSM requires an insane level of trust between two partners. Any time you use any sort of physical punishment, you have to trust your partner without reservation. If someone has you restrained and hanging from a hook, you have to know that person will be in control.
BDSM is the easiest sexual practice to denigrate and depict as perverse, when in reality, it requires the most intimacy and trust possible. Anyone who plays the role of a submissive is doing so willingly. They aren't being degraded or forced.
But what drives me nuts is that local officials are now banning legal activity by consenting adults based on misinformation or their personal biases. You want sexual degeneracy? Don't go to a leather convention. Go to your local bar. On any given night, you can see girls strip, take off their bras and start making out with each other. I can see degenerate sexual behavior in any bar filled with 20-somethings in New York. I've seen things people would not believe. I've seen public sex, all kinds of stuff, things no organized people would tolerate in public, as these conventions are.
If people had ignored this, no one asked for their public support, they would have spent the money generated from these affairs and walk away. Judging them is pointless, especially when their actions were legal. It's nice to judge people from a distance, but that's not how one should make their laws. If people want to swing or have group sex, that's a private matter. Banning them from doing what is legal, because you don't like it, is obnoxious at best and criminal at worse. You don't like BDSM events, stay home. You weren't invited anyway.
Our friend Atrios has been threatened with legal action because he called some yahoo at the National Review a stalker of Paul Krugman.
While I'm not a lawyer, I know a few and this reeks of a buddy favor. That's when your lawyer buddy friend sends off a cease and decist letter to clear up a hassle.
Except, when you do that, you don't always get people ready to cave. Some are ready to fight to the last round. That's the lesson the MPAA found when they sued Emmanel Goldstein, publisher of 2600. Now, if you know anything about computing, suing 2600's proprietor is about as smart as robbing a bank in Fayetteville, NC. You're gonna get a fight and you don't know who's coming to the party. Well, in 2600's case, Goldstein (nee Eric Corley) wound up with Maritn Garbus, Hollywood's top First Amendment lawyer defending him. They thought he qould quiver in fear over the power of the MPAA. He runs 2600, the MPAA is small beer compared to the NSA. But they didn't know that.
Atrios is already flooded with offers of legal help and cash. Which isn't surprising. People don't like bullies and they really don't like conservative bullies. There is a lot of quiet support for liberal bloggers. Josh Marshall raised 5K in a couple of days. Clearly, the internet has matured and people will support and defend those who share their views.
The lawyer whined about messages posed on his site as well, but that's not going very far:
Court decision protects bloggers from libel suits
JULIANA BARBASSA
Associated Press
SAN FRANCISCO - A federal appeals court has extended the First Amendment protections of do-it-yourself online publishers.
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, the nation's largest appeals court, said that online publishers can post material generated by others without liability for its content - unlike traditional news media, which are held responsible for such information.
"It clarifies the existing law," said Eric Brown, who represented the defendant in the suit. "It expands it in the sense that no court had really addressed bloggers, list serve operators and those people yet, certainly not on the level of the 9th Circuit Court."
Blogs, short for Weblogs, are online diaries updated frequently by tech-savvy writers who use the medium to comment on current events and everyday life.
Online publishers and free speech advocates lauded the court's decision.
"The decision is a real victory for free speech," said Jeralyn Merritt, a lawyer and blogger who manages talkleft.com, a Web site about crime-related news and politics. "Now we can publish information we receive from someone else without fear of getting sued."
Merritt said it would be impossible to monitor the nearly 200 messages posted on her site every day.
"I can't be responsible for the content of those comments," she said.
The decision recently was the most discussed topic according to Daypop.com, a current events search engine that crawls the Web and reflects its collective conscience, identifying the topics that are generating the most interest in the blogging world.
The decision last week was based on the 1996 Communications Decency Act, Brown said.
Other cases have said commercial service providers on the Internet are not responsible for information posted by a third party. And this decision says noncommercial Web site hosts are only liable when they post information that a reasonable person would have known wasn't meant to be published.
Besides, if you sue for libel, if not only has to be false, but malicious as well. You have to know it's a lie and it's not merely opinion.
Winning a libel suit is pretty rare.
Iraqis Are Only Option for Security
By Thomas E. Ricks and Peter Slevin
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, October 29, 2003; Page A18
Three days of rocket attacks and car bombings in and around Baghdad, the bloodiest anti-U.S. assaults since the conventional war ended in April, have not changed the Bush administration's strategy for winning the peace in Iraq.
Rather, the attacks intensified the officials' determination to pursue the two-part "Iraqification" approach they have emphasized since midsummer: Rely increasingly on Iraqi police and soldiers to provide security; and move U.S. troops more to the background, where they can be poised to conduct raids and other concentrated attacks on resistance fighters.
"The strategy remains the same," President Bush told reporters yesterday.
What the president did not say is that this is really the only approach open to the U.S.-led coalition right now. The two major alternatives to this plan essentially have been considered and rejected.
One would be to deploy thousands of U.S. troops on top of the 130,000 already there. But there really are not many available, because most active-duty divisions in the Army have completed tours of combat duty in Afghanistan or Iraq over the past two years.
The other would be to persuade more foreign nations to contribute forces, but few have been willing to send more than a token contribution. The big battalions of Pakistani or Moroccan troops that could ease pressure on U.S. forces by taking up some guard duty work, or by conducting patrols with troops who can speak Arabic with locals, have not been forthcoming.
That means the U.S. exit strategy rests squarely on getting Iraqis to provide security. In meetings over the past two days, the only notable difference from earlier discussions is that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and other top administration officials have sought to figure out how to accelerate the training of Iraqi police.
The stance now, one top general said at the Pentagon yesterday, is "stay the course, faster."
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"I believe we're looking at the beginning of a sustained insurgency. I don't think this is the mopping-up the administration cast it as a couple of months ago," said Steven Metz, a professor at the U.S. Army War College. He sees the potential for the violence to go "on and on and on, with a shooting here and a bombing there . . . somewhere between the Palestinian intifada and Northern Ireland."
Yet Metz, an insurgency specialist, does not think the militants can stop the Bush administration from building an Iraqi government or restarting the economy. Nor, he said, does he think "they can kill enough Americans that it would lead to a collapse of the American will."
It's not the will of the Americans in Washington which is the problem. But the will of GI's on the ground. The insurgents only need one big strike, a major explosion at a US site, to collapse US morale, which is already low.
There are two real issues, if we can prevent a national uprising and keep US morale up. There is no support for anything like an intifada or Ulster. If that's what's being faced, the US will flee. What foreign policy experts forget is that the American public's appetite for foreign adventures are limited. Years in Iraq is not fiscally or poitically possible. Americans, at the end of the day, would be perfectly content to leave Iraq a larger Lebanon. Anyone forgetting that will be reminded of that next November.
BAGHDAD, Oct. 28 -- The warnings came from his mother, sister, four brothers, and friends -- and from people who called late at night and threatened harm.
Stop working with the Americans.
Faris Abdul Razzaq Assam, one of Baghdad's three deputy mayors, heard the messages but listened to his heart, family members said. He continued to work on water projects and set up neighborhood councils. He supervised thousands of employees as the head of city technical services.
When Assam returned Sunday from an international donors' conference in Madrid, he excitedly told his family that he had secured billions of dollars in pledges. "I'm going to turn Baghdad into heaven," he said.
Hours later, witnesses said, two gunmen walked into an outdoor cafe where Assam was playing dominoes and shot him in the head at point-blank range. The assailants slipped into the night and remain at large.
Assam's unsolved slaying is the latest in a string of assassinations of Iraqis who work with U.S. forces. Last month, a member of Iraq's U.S.-appointed Governing Council was gunned down as she left her home; earlier, a member of a Baghdad neighborhood council was killed by a car bomb.
Police in Mosul, about 220 miles north of Baghdad, said Ahmed Shawkat, a newspaper editor, was shot and killed Tuesday on the roof of his paper's building. His daughter, Roaa Shawkat, told the Associated Press that some people disagreed with her father's writings because they were about democracy, "and our people don't understand the meaning of democracy."
Assam's family, speaking on the second day of a three-day mourning period, said they did not learn until after his killing that he had received death threats. As friends and relatives gathered under large, colorful tents to pay their respects, the family members said they assumed the Americans would protect him but did not know if Assam had told them he might be in danger.
They reserved the brunt of their anger and blame for the killers, who they said they believe are steadfast followers of the ousted president, Saddam Hussein.
"Iraq doesn't deserve people like him," a distraught Mayada Assam, 33, dressed in traditional black mourning clothes, said of her brother. "That's why he's gone. They deserve Saddam only."
These folks are serious. Cooperation with the CPA is enough to get you killed. Some are Baathist, but a lot aren't. Everyone is armed, but they didn't move to stop the killers.
Billmon has a quote from Trent Lott about getting more aggressive.
Reality check time.
Saddam had 600,000 Army and police and restricted the use of assault rifles to the military. He still paid millions in bribes and had several uprisings.
We have 150,000 troops who don't speak the language. Who are doing dual duty as police and soldiers. Who stick out. Who don't have the intel they need. The armories were opened and every family has an AK. Some, several.
What exactly could we do? Shoot more civilians? Loot more homes? Dig up more palm trees? Hire fewer Iraqis?
In the real world, short of public hangings and burning homes, we don't have many cards left. Our current trigger happy aggression has made more guerrillas than we can count.
Any more aggression and we could create the national uprising we desperately need to avoid.
Mr. President, if I may take you back to May 1st when you stood on the USS Lincoln under a huge banner that said, "Mission Accomplished." At that time you declared major combat operations were over, but since that time there have been over 1,000 wounded, many of them amputees who are recovering at Walter Reed, 217 killed in action since that date. Will you acknowledge now that you were premature in making those remarks?
THE PRESIDENT: Nora, I think you ought to look at my speech. I said, Iraq is a dangerous place and we've still got hard work to do, there's still more to be done. And we had just come off a very successful military operation. I was there to thank the troops.
The "Mission Accomplished" sign, of course, was put up by the members of the USS Abraham Lincoln, saying that their mission was accomplished. I know it was attributed some how to some ingenious advance man from my staff -- they weren't that ingenious, by the way. But my statement was a clear statement, basically recognizing that this phase of the war for Iraq was over and there was a lot of dangerous work.
Kos has a bunch of quotes proving this is a lie, but I just wanted to say how this is a typical alcoholic's lie. Instead of accepting responsibility, he shifts blame to the crew of the Lincoln, who have previously shown no evidence of using mylar banners to celebrate other events.
Especially, given the dangers of the flight deck, that large banners pose a real risk to the flight deck crew. If they were going to use a banner, they would not do so on a live flight deck, where strong winds could rip it off and cause it to be sucked into an exhaust, foul a helicopter rotor or drag a crewman off the deck and into the briny deep. Of course, since this is a specialized kind of printing, one not commonly needed on a carrier, and one the president uses frequently, well, it's obvious that the story is a lie.
But why lie? Because he's a dry drunk and he lies about anything when pressed. His life is a series of lies. He cannot accept responsibility for anything. Any problem is someone else's fault. Never his. So instead of accepting that he did something which didn't work, he'll blame the innocent and expect them to remain silent. Which I seriously doubt will happen in this case. Lies are lies and with Bush, they keep mounting up.
According to The New York Times, President Bush was genuinely surprised to learn from moderate Islamic leaders that they had become deeply distrustful of American intentions. The report on the "perception gap" suggests that the leader of the war on terror has no idea how badly that war — which must, ultimately, be a war for hearts and minds — is going.
Mr. Bush's ignorance may reflect his lack of curiosity: "The best way to get the news," he says, "is from objective sources. And the most objective sources I have are people on my staff." Two words: emperor, clothes.
But there's something broader going on: a sort of willful ignorance, supposedly driven by moral concerns but actually reflecting domestic politics. Surely it's important to understand how others see us, but a new, post 9/11 version of political correctness has made it difficult even to discuss their points of view. Any American who tries to go beyond "America good, terrorists evil," who tries to understand — not condone — the growing world backlash against the United States, faces furious attacks delivered in a tone of high moral indignation. The attackers claim to be standing up for moral clarity, and some of them may even believe it. But they are really being used in a domestic political struggle.
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Muslims are completely wrong to think that the U.S. is engaged in a war against Islam. But that misperception flourishes in part because the domestic political strategy of the Bush administration — no longer able to claim the Iraq war was a triumph, and with little but red ink to show for its economic plans — looks more and more like a crusade. "Election Boils Down to a Culture War" was the title of Mr. Fineman's column. But the analysis was all about abortion and euthanasia, and now we hear that opposition to gay marriage will be a major campaign theme. This isn't a culture war — it's a religious war.
Which brings me back to my starting point: we'll lose the fight against terror if we don't make an effort to understand how others think. Yet because of a domestic political struggle that seems ever more centered on religion, such attempts at understanding are shouted down.
I was watching Crossfire when Tucker Carlson said that Krugman was accusing his enemies of a vast conspiracy. I should have known better than to take him seriously.
The right hates Krugman for one simple reason: he's right. Consistantly and clearly on both economics and politics. And they cannot stand it. More importantly, they cannot touch him. He is a tenured professor at Princeton and perpetually short-listed for a Nobel Prize. They can't get him fired, because, quite frankly, he doesn't need to work for the Times. He has a job and is quite good at it.
So he has unlimited freedom to say what he wants. The odds are good that he could win both a Nobel and Pulitzer in one calendar year. Compared to the ignorant hacks on the right, Krugman actually knows how to use facts coherently. He is a politician's worst nightmare, an opponent you cannot harm. If he were to lose his column, he could syndicate. If they forced him from Princeton, he'd have a job in a day. So all they can do is discredit him and they're failing badly at that.
It also helps that he's in the mainstream of his profession. More of his peers agree with him than disagree. So they can't even dispute his qualifications. The fact that he's quite modest and calm also helps. His only distinctive feature is that he is an excellent writer. He writes clearly and cleanly and doesn't hide behind jargon.
When we look back at the Bush era, Krugman will get a lot of credit for his writing on Bush.
THE PRESIDENT: Good morning. After the 26,000-mile journey last week, I hope the members of the traveling press had a restful weekend. I have a brief statement; then I'll be glad to take questions.
On my trip to Asia, I had a series of very productive meetings with some of America's closest allies in the war on terror. Nations such as Australia, Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines are fighting terrorism in their own region. Their leaders understand the importance of our continuing work in Afghanistan and Iraq. Liberating the people of those nations from dictatorial regimes was an essential step in the war on terror. And the world is safer today because Saddam Hussein and the Taliban are gone. We're now working with many nations to make sure Afghanistan and Iraq are never again a source of terror and danger for the rest of the world.
Where I spent a total of eight hours in each country because they hate me
Our coalition against terror has been strengthened in recent days by U.N. Security Council Resolution 1511. This endorses a multinational force in Iraq under U.S. command, encourages other nations to come to the aid of the Iraqi people.
You mean like the Turks, who took our eight billion and are going to stay home. Just like the Portuguese and Bangladeshis.
Last week a donor conference in Madrid brought together more than 70 nations to discuss future contributions to Iraqi reconstruction. America appreciates the recent announcements of financial commitments to Iraq offered by many of the donors at the conference. After decades of oppression and brutality in Iraq and Afghanistan, reconstruction is difficult, and freedom still has its enemies in both of those countries. These terrorists are targeting the very success and freedom we're providing to the Iraqi people. Their desperate attacks on innocent civilians will not intimidate us, or the brave Iraqis and Afghans who are joining in their own defense and who are moving toward self-government.
Which raised $33 B, well shy of the $55B needed, most in loans.
Coalition forces aided by Afghan and Iraqi police and military are striking the enemy with force and precision. Our coalition is growing in members and growing in strength. Our purpose is clear and certain: Iraq and Afghanistan will be stable, independent nations and their people will live in freedom.
Just because the Taliban now run southern Afghanistan doesn't mean we aren't winning.
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. I also asked Congress to move forward on elements of my agenda for growth and jobs. After the shocks of the stock market decline, recession, terrorist attack, and corporate scandals, our economy is showing signs abroad and gathering strength. America is starting to add new jobs. Retail sales are strong, business profits are increasing, the stock market has been advancing, housing construction is surging, and manufacturing production is rising. All of this can -- all of us can be optimistic about the future of the economy, but we cannot be complacent. I will not be satisfied until every American who is looking for work can find a job.
Well, you're down 3m, Hoover, Jr.
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Finally, the United States Senate must step up to serious constitutional responsibilities. I've nominated many distinguished and highly-qualified Americans to fill vacancies on the federal, district and circuit courts. Because of a small group of senators is willfully obstructing the process, some of these nominees have been denied up or down votes for months, even years. More than one-third of my nominees for the circuit courts are still awaiting a vote. The needless delays in the system are harming the administration of justice and they are deeply unfair to the nominees, themselves. The Senate Judiciary Committee should give a prompt and fair hearing to every single nominee, and send every nomination to the Senate floor for an up or down vote.
You send up wackos who are barely qualified and you're shocked Senators did their job? Sorry.
Finally, of course, we are monitoring the fires in California. FEMA Director Brown is in the state. I express my deep concerns and sympathies for those whose lives have been hurt badly by these fires. The federal government is working closely with the state government to provide resources necessary to help the brave firefighters do their duty.
Not that I will visit.
With that, I'll be glad to answer some questions, starting with Terry Hunt.
Q Thank you, Mr. President. Mr. President, you just spoke about the suicide bombers in Iraq as being desperate. But as yesterday's attack show, they're also increasingly successful and seem to be trying to send a warning to institutions like the police and the Red Cross not to cooperate with the United States. Has the United States been able to identify who's behind this surge of attacks, where they come from, and how to stop them?
THE PRESIDENT: Yes. I think it's a very interesting point you make in your question, "they're trying to send a warning." Basically, what they're trying to do is cause people to run. They want to kill and create chaos. That's the nature of a terrorist, that's what terrorists do. They commit suicide acts against innocent people and then expect people to say, well, gosh, we better -- better not try to fight you anymore.
No, they're causing people to run. Almost all the NGO's are fleeing. And they don't flee.
We're trying to determine the nature of who these people were. But I will tell you, I would assume that they're either, or, and probably both Baathists and foreign terrorists. The Baathists try to create chaos and fear because they realize that a free Iraq will deny them the excessive privileges they had under Saddam Hussein. The foreign terrorists are trying to create conditions of fear and retreat because they fear a free and peaceful state in the midst of the part of the world where terror has found recruits, that freedom is exactly what terrorists fear the most.
Right. The killing of innocent Iraqis have nothing to do with this, right? It's all terrorists.
And so, as I said yesterday, we will not be -- I said today again, they're not going to intimidate America and they're not going to intimidate the brave Iraqis who are actively participating in securing the freedom of their country.
You mean the collaborators who are being targeted and killed?
Steve.
Q Mr. President, if there are foreign terrorists involved, why aren't Syria and Iran being held accountable?
THE PRESIDENT: Yes. Well, we're working closely with those countries to let them know that we expect them to enforce borders, prevent people from coming across borders, if, in fact, we catch them doing that. The coalition forces have stepped up border patrol efforts. There are now more Iraqis patrolling the border. We are mindful of the fact that some might want to come into Iraq to attack and to create conditions of fear and chaos, and that's why General Abizaid, in his briefing to me yesterday, talked about the additional troops we have on the borders. And that is why it is important that we step up training for Iraqis, border patrol agents, so they can enforce their own borders.
Because Syria isn't the only player. What about Saudi Arabia? Nice open border there.
John.
Q Mr. President, thank you. As you know, the Chairman of the commission investigating the September 11th attacks wants documents from the White House, and said this week that he might have to use subpoena power. You have said there's some national security concerns about turning over some of those documents to people outside of the Executive Branch. Will you turn them over, or can you at least outline for the American people what you think is a reasonable compromise so that the commission learns what it needs to know, and you protect national security, if you think it's that important?
THE PRESIDENT: Yes. It is important for me to protect national security. You're talking about the presidential daily brief. It's important for the writers of the presidential daily brief to feel comfortable that the documents will never be politicized and/or unnecessarily exposed for public purview. I -- and so, therefore, the kind of the first statements out of this administration were very protective of the presidential prerogatives of the past and to protect the right for other presidents, future presidents, to have a good presidential daily brief.
Now, having said that, I am -- we want to work with Chairman Kean and Vice-Chairman Hamilton. And I believe we can reach a proper accord to protect the integrity of the daily brief process and, at the same time, allow them a chance to take a look and see what was in the -- certain -- the daily briefs that they would like to see.
And stonewall them.
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Nora.
Q Mr. President, if I may take you back to May 1st when you stood on the USS Lincoln under a huge banner that said, "Mission Accomplished." At that time you declared major combat operations were over, but since that time there have been over 1,000 wounded, many of them amputees who are recovering at Walter Reed, 217 killed in action since that date. Will you acknowledge now that you were premature in making those remarks?
THE PRESIDENT: Nora, I think you ought to look at my speech. I said, Iraq is a dangerous place and we've still got hard work to do, there's still more to be done. And we had just come off a very successful military operation. I was there to thank the troops.
The "Mission Accomplished" sign, of course, was put up by the members of the USS Abraham Lincoln, saying that their mission was accomplished. I know it was attributed some how to some ingenious advance man from my staff -- they weren't that ingenious, by the way. But my statement was a clear statement, basically recognizing that this phase of the war for Iraq was over and there was a lot of dangerous work. And it's proved to be right, it is dangerous in Iraq. It's dangerous in Iraq because there are people who can't stand the thought of a free and peaceful Iraq. It is dangerous in Iraq because there are some who believe that we're soft, that the will of the United States can be shaken by suiciders -- and suiciders who are willing to drive up to a Red Cross center, a center of international help and aid and comfort, and just kill.
It's the same mentality, by the way, that attacked us on September the 11th, 2001: we'll just destroy innocent life and watch the great United States and their friends and allies crater in the face of hardship. It's the exact same mentality. And Iraq is a part of the war on terror. I said it's a central front, a new front in the war on terror, and that's exactly what it is. And that's why it's important for us to be tough and strong and diligent.
Our strategy in Iraq is to have strike forces ready and capable to move quickly as we gather actionable intelligence. That's how you deal with terrorists. Remember, these are people that are willing to hide in societies and kill randomly. And therefore, the best way to deal with them is to harden targets, harden assets as best as you can. That means blockades and inspection spots. And, as you notice, yesterday, one fellow tried to -- was done in as a he tried to conduct a suicide mission. In other words, an Iraqi policemen did their job.
But, as well, that we've got to make sure that not only do we harden targets, but that we get actionable intelligence to intercept the missions before they begin. That means more Iraqis involved in the intelligence-gathering systems in their country so that they are active participants in securing the country from further harm.
Remember, the action in Iraq was -- to get rid of Saddam Hussein was widely supported by the Iraqi people. And the action -- the actions that we're taking to improve their country are supported by the Iraqi people. And it's going to be very important for the Iraqi people to play an active role in fighting off the few who are trying to destroy the hopes of the many. You've heard me say that before. That's just kind of the motto of the terrorists. It's the way they operate.
Link the two. Link 9/11 and Iraq as much as you can. You can't do anything else.
Plante.
Q Mr. President, thank you. In recent weeks, you and your White House team have made a concerted effort to put a positive spin on progress in Iraq. At the same time, there's been a much more somber assessment in private, as with Secretary Rumsfeld's memo. And there are people out there who don't believe that the administration is leveling with them about the difficulty and scope of the problem in Iraq.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, I can't put it any more plainly, Iraq is a dangerous place. That's leveling. It is a dangerous place. What I was saying is there's more than just terrorist attacks that are taking place in Iraq. There's schools opening, there are hospitals opening. The electricity -- the capacity to deliver electricity to the Iraqi people is back up to pre-war levels. We're nearly two million barrels a day being produced for the Iraqi people. I was just saying we've got to look at the whole picture, that what the terrorists would like is for people to focus only on the conditions which create fear, and that is the death and the toll being taken.
No, Iraq is a dangerous place, Bill. And I can't put it any more bluntly than that. I know it's a dangerous place. And I also know our strategy to rout them out -- which is to encourage better intelligence and get more Iraqis involved, and have our strike teams ready to move -- is the right strategy. People are constantly taking a look at the enemy.
In other words, one of the hallmarks of this operation in Iraq, as well as Afghanistan, was the flexibility we've given our commanders. You might remember the "stuck in the desert" scenario that -- during the dust storms, that we're advancing to Baghdad and all of a sudden we got stuck. But, remember, at that period of time it also became apparent that Tommy Franks had the flexibility necessary to adjust based upon, in this case, weather conditions and what he found.
And that's exactly what's taking place on a regular basis inside of Iraq. The strategy remains the same. The tactics to respond to more suiciders driving cars will alter on the ground; more checkpoints, whatever they decide, how to harden targets will change. And so we're constantly looking at the enemy and adjusting. And Iraq is dangerous, and it's dangerous because terrorists want us to leave. And we're not leaving.
What about the non-suicidal guerrillas launching mortars and laying ambushes?
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Q Thank you, Mr. President. You recently put Condoleezza Rice, your National Security Advisor, in charge of the management of the administration's Iraq policy. What has effectively changed since she's been in charge? And the second question, can you promise a year from now that you will have reduced the number of troops in Iraq?
THE PRESIDENT: The second question is a trick question, so I won't answer it. The first question was Condoleezza Rice. Her job is to coordinate interagency. She's doing a fine job of coordinating interagency. She's doing -- the role of the National Security Advisor is to not only provide good advice to the President, which she does on a regular basis -- I value her judgment and her intelligence -- but her job is also to deal interagency and to help unstick things that may get stuck, is the best way to put it. She's an unsticker. And -- is she listening? Okay, well, she's doing a fine job.
Unsticker? Is he kidding? Didn't he go to YALE?
Dana.
Thank you, Mr. President. You have said that you are eager to find out whether somebody in the White House leaked the identity of an undercover CIA agent. Many experts in such investigations say you can find if there was a leaker in the White House within hours if you asked all staff members to sign affidavits denying involvement. Why not take that step?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, the best person to that, Dana, so that the -- or the best group of people to do that so that you believe the answer is the professionals at the Justice Department. And they're moving forward with the investigation. It's a criminal investigation. It is an important investigation. I'd like to know if somebody in my White House did leak sensitive information. As you know, I've been outspoken on leaks. And whether they happened in the White House, or happened in the administration, or happened on Capitol Hill, it is a -- they can be very damaging.
And so this investigation is ongoing and -- by professionals who do this for a living, and I hope they -- I'd like to know.
Look, I don't give a damn about that spy bitch and her loudmouth husband. Stop asking me about them, OK.
Judy.
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Let's see. Mark Smith, a radio man.
Q Thank you very much, sir, for including our radio folks here.
THE PRESIDENT: A face for radio. (Laughter.)
Q I wish I could say that was the first time you told me that, sir. (Laughter.)
THE PRESIDENT: The first time I did it to a national audience, though. (Laughter.)
Q Actually -- my wife the last time. (Laughter.)
Your package of reconstruction aid, sir, that the Congress, as you point out, is considering -- that's an emergency package, meaning it's not budgeted for. Put another way, that means the American taxpayer and future generations of American taxpayers are saddled with that. Why should they be saddled with that? I know you don't want the Iraqis to be saddled with large amounts of debt, but should future generations of Americans have that --
THE PRESIDENT: Well, first of all, it's a one-time expenditure, as you know. And, secondly, because a secure, a peaceful and free Iraq is essential to the security, the future security of America.
Why?
The first step was to remove Saddam Hussein because he was a threat, a gathering threat, as I think I put it. And, secondly, is to make sure that, in the aftermath of removing Saddam Hussein, that we have a free and peaceful country in the midst of a very troubled region. It's an historic opportunity. And I will continue to make that case to the American people. It's a chance to secure -- have a more secure future for our children. It's essential we get it right.
You know, I was struck by the fact when I was in Japan recently that my relations with Prime Minister Koizumi are very close and personal. And I was thinking about what would happen if, in a post-World War II era, we hadn't won the peace, as well as the war. I mean, would I have had the same relationship with Mr. Koizumi? Would I be able to work closely on crucial relations? I doubt it. I doubt it.
In other words, we've got very close alliances now as a result of not only winning a war, but doing the right things in the postwar period. And I believe a free and peaceful Iraq will help effect change in that neighborhood. And that's why I've asked the American people to foot the tab for $20 billion of reconstruction. Others are stepping up, as well: $13 billion out of the Madrid conference, which may be just only a beginning.
And, by the way, in the Madrid conference, most of the money came from the World Bank and the IMF, which are lending institutions, as you know. The Iraqi oil revenues, excess Iraqi oil revenues, coupled with private investment, should make up the difference to fund the estimates of what the World Bank thought was necessary to help that country.
Q Another radio? Another radio, Mr. President?
THE PRESIDENT: Excuse me -- particularly, since you interrupted me, no.
Jeez. How petty can you be?
And that's what the World Bank estimated it would cost, and it looks like we'll be able to help the Iraqis get on their feet and have a viable marketplace.
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Bill.
Q Thank you, Mr. President. After more than a year of being accused by your critics of waging war for oil, is it frustrating to now hear some of those same critics demand that you, essentially, take that oil in the form of loans instead of grants for reconstruction?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, that's exactly the point I made to the members of Congress who have come here to the White House to talk about loans or grants. I said, let's don't burden Iraq with loans. The only thing they'll be able to repay their loans with is oil. And, hopefully, we'll get a good solution out of the Congress on this issue. We're making progress. We're working hard with the members to make the case that it's very important for us not to saddle Iraq with a bunch of debt early in its -- in the emergence of a market-oriented economy, an economy that has been wrecked by Mr. Saddam Hussein. I mean, he just destroyed their economy and destroyed their infrastructure, destroyed their education system, destroyed their medical system, all to keep himself in power. He was the ultimate --
Q -- on the part of your critics?
THE PRESIDENT: No, that's my answer there.
Hillman.
Q Thank you, Mr. President. You have repeatedly urged Americans to have patience when they view postwar operations in Iraq. But isn't there a limit to American patience, particularly in an election year, when your foreign policies --
THE PRESIDENT: Interesting question.
Q -- will be the center of debate?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, I think the American people are patient during an election year, because they tend to be able to differentiate between politics and reality. As a matter of fact, the American people are -- the electorate is a heck of a lot smarter than most politicians.
And the only thing I know to do is just keep telling people what I think is right for the country and stand my -- stand on what I believe, and that's what I'm going to do. And there's no question politics can -- will create -- get a lot of noise and a lot of balloon drops and a lot of hot air. I'll probably be right in the mix of it, by the way. But I will defend my record at the appropriate time, and look forward to it. I'll say that the world is more peaceful and more free under my leadership, and America is more secure. And that will be the -- that will be how I'll begin describing our foreign policy.
Is he kidding? He has to be kidding. We are fighting two wars and losing both. Terrorists attacks have not abaited. He's as out of touch as can be. The Red Cross is fleeing Iraq. Oxfam is fleeing. Doctors without Borders. In short, people who have worked in Ethiopia, Chechyna, Somalia are running from Iraq. Homeland Defense is a joke. Please run on this record. Please. Ed, and then Bob, and then I'm going to go eat lunch.
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Q Sir, David Kay's interim report cited substantial evidence of a secretive weapons program. But the absence of any substantial stores of chemical or biological weapons there have caused some people, even who supported the war, to feel somehow betrayed. Can you explain to those Americans, sir, whether you were surprised those weapons haven't turned up, why they haven't turned up, and whether you feel that your administration's credibility has been affected in any way by that?
THE PRESIDENT: David Kay's report said that Saddam Hussein was in material breach of 1441, which would have been casus belli. In other words, he had a weapons program, he's disguised a weapons program, he had ambitions. And I felt the report was a very interesting first report -- because he's still looking for -- to find the truth.
The American people know that Saddam Hussein was a gathering danger, as I said. And he was a gathering danger, and the world is safer as a result for us removing him from power -- "us" being more than the United States, Great Britain and other countries who are willing to participate -- Poland, Australia -- all willing to join up to remove this danger.
And the intelligence that said he had a weapons system was intelligence that had been used by a multinational agency, the U.N., to pass resolutions; it had been used by my predecessor to conduct bombing raids. It was intelligence gathered from a variety of sources that clearly said Saddam Hussein was a threat.
And given the attacks of September the 11th, it was -- we needed to enforce U.N. resolution for the security of the world. And we did. We took action based upon good, solid intelligence. It was the right thing to do to make America more secure and the world more peaceful.
And David Kay continues to ferret out the truth. This is a man -- Saddam Hussein is a man who hid programs and weapons for years. He's a master at hiding things. And so David Kay will continue his search. But one of the things that he first found was that there is clear violation of the U.N. Security Council Resolution 1441. Material breach, they call it in the diplomatic circles. Casus belli, it means a -- that would have been a cause for a war. In other words, he said, it's dangerous.
And we were right to enforce U.N. resolutions, as well. It's important for the U.N. to be a credible organization. You're not credible if you issue resolutions and then nothing happens. Credibility comes when you say something is going to happen and then it does happen. And in order to keep the peace, it's important for there to be credibility in this world, credibility on the side of freedom and hope.
Thank you all very much.
Yes he does, if the truth is that Saddam didn't have a nuclear program or any meaningful WMD development.
Simon Jeffery and agencies
Tuesday October 28, 2003
Four civilians and a suspected suicide bomber were today reported killed in Iraq as aid agencies and non-governmental organisations considered their future in the country.
The five died when a small car driven by one man - thought to be the bomber - exploded 100 metres from the main police station in the town of Falluja, 40 miles west of Baghdad, the Reuters news agency reported.
The attack comes one day after a strike on the Iraqi headquarters of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and three Baghdad police stations that killed 35 people and wounded 244 others within an hour, in the city's bloodiest day since it fell to US forces in April.
It brings the death toll from bomb attacks since yesterday morning to 40 people. The dead include eight Iraqi policemen, at least 30 Iraqi civilians and a US soldier.
The bomb attacks have again highlighted the lack of security in parts of Iraq and heightened concern that the forces ranged against the occupation are prepared to attack targets that may otherwise be considered neutral.
It's really simple: by attacking the NGO's, they place an even greater burden on the CPA. The NGO's are going to have to withdraw because the US cannot support or protect them. It's that simple. The enemy is dictacting the offensive tempo, forcing the US to react. All those partisan sweeps are useless. They are not preventing attacks and the idea that people are doing this for money is wearing thin.
This is not some random strategy, but a coordinated attack on the NGO structure. By collapsing the NGO's, it makes administering Iraq impossible. NGO's are a critical support factor in every government on earth. Imagine if Catholic Charities, the United Way and the Red Cross folded up shop? People would die, right here in the US. They're even more critical in a war-torn country like Iraq. Without NGO's, the CPA would be unable to feed millions of people, provide health care or education support. NGO's are a lot like tendons, critical to keeping a society funcitioning, but invisible until they stop working.
The resistance is picking their targets carefully. They're working on the NGO's and anyone working with the CPA, seeking to collapse support. It's not one group, it couldn't be. Its networks of small groups, meeting, coordinating attacks, working in concert with criminal gangs. They also take their time. They let the effects of their attacks sink in. They also move preemptively. They hit the Jordanians, then the UN, then the Turkish embassy when talks of bringing in Turkish troops start. They have waged a steady war on the northern pipelines. No sooner the line is fixed, the line is attacked. And it's not just some kid with semtex. The oil engineers are directing the sabotage campaign. By day, they fix the line, by night they pick the part of the line to blow. Hey, the French railroad workers did the same thing in WWII.
Every single act of industrial sabotage is being done by the people who formerly ran those systems. Someone is telling the resistance how to destroy the targets with a minimum of force and for maximum effect. None of this is an accident or a campaign by outsiders.
Some people call for the US to be pulled from the cities, but all that would do is blind them even further. Iraq is a country of cities. If you don't control the cities, and we're talking cities the size of Miami and Boston, you don't control the country. We have to realize that the Iraqi resistance has good, reliable intelligence assisted by our dependence on translators and other low-level Iraqi functionaries.
Every time the US talks about Saddam's feyadeen or Al Qaeda being at the root of the resistance, they are delusional. It is Iraqis who are doing this, Iraqis who hate Americans, use the internet for information, as well as a network of spies at every level of the CPA and NGO's and with American contractors. Until we face that reality, a reality which may force us to begin withdrawal, things can only get worse.
Sending a letter may soon require more than a 37-cent stamp. It might also require a valid photo ID.
A small change in labeling requirements for bulk mailings announced Oct. 21 requires bulk mailers to identify themselves on the outside of the envelope with a valid address. This marks the first step in the Postal Service's desire to create "intelligent mail."
The Postal Service issued the proposal in response to recommendations in a July report (PDF) written by the President's Commission on the United States Postal Service.
The outside commission urged the Postal Service to become more like a private business and to take steps to improve security in the wake of the anthrax letter attacks of 2001 that killed five people and contaminated postal facilities and Senate offices.
"The Postal Service, in coordination with the Department of Homeland Security, should explore the use of sender identification for every piece of mail," said the Commission's report.
That frightens civil liberty advocates, such as Chris Hoofnagle, deputy counsel at the Electronic Privacy Information Center.
"People should be able to send an anonymous letter to the editor or an anonymous love letter," said Hoofnagle. "That shouldn't be lost for questionable gains in security."
The President's Commission report, subtitled "Making Tough Choices to Preserve Universal Mail Service," dismissed such concerns, saying that most people wouldn't mind sacrificing anonymity for national security.
Last week a suspected Syrian national was arrested trying to target a US military building in the Baghdad suburb of Ad Doura. Gen Hertling said yesterday that suicide attacks were not typical of former members of Saddam's Ba'ath party. "There are indicators that certainly these attacks have a mode of operation of foreign fighters," he said.
"The possible foreign links among the attackers are being investigated." The attacks were coordinated but not sophisticated. "They are amateurish acts," he said. It did not take professionals to agree "to set off their bombs between 8am and 10am".
Bullshit. How can foriegn fighters operate in Iraq without massive help from the locals. Even if a division of the Syrian Army was in Baghdad, how would they know how to rocket the Al-Rashid on the side where Wolfowitz was staying? Osmosis?
Four of those bombs went off and the fifth guy called the cops a collaborator, hardly a phrase a Syrian would use.
It's the locals. Foriegners may be around, but it's the locals. Always has been and I'd say the majority hate Saddam AND the Americans.
I freely admit that Stanley Crouch is far from my favorite writer. But when I read this, I was stunned by it's utter stupidity and racism. No, floored, to be honest. It was just the stupidest fucking thing I've read in some time.
In our present war, we are up to our necks in this problem, primarily because any criticism of Muslims can be interpreted as bigotry toward all its believers. The upshot is that we seem to continue pussyfooting around our troubles and not making it clear to the public what is going on and how we have to handle it.
I have been writing for a while in this space that I believe we should have a moratorium on immigration from anywhere in the Islamic world because the nature of destructive technology is such that even very small numbers of immigrants - 19, for instance - can kill large numbers of people if that is their mission. War always shuts down borders, and we are, ladies and gentlemen, in a war.
This has always been responded to as a bigoted idea when, according to critics, we can easily see that Islam is a religion of peace and the great majority of Muslims are not terrorists. I'm not concerned about the great majority of Muslims outside America, but I am sure that within that great majority are thousands of believers who would gleefully bring off any version of Sept. 11 if they could.
So it seems to me that we have no choice. Circumstances are such that we should not be manipulated by arguments that do not obtain in our present situation. We have to move with resolve, with good sense and a sensitivity to the dangerous potential for hysteria that can result from focusing on any group.
We also need to understand that the American Muslim community has been of virtually no help at all in our war against urban terrorism. Perhaps they fear, as other minority groups have so often, that if they turn in, even anonymously, some suspicious person or group, hell will come down on all who share belief in the same religion. I think the response would be the reverse.
A staggeringly stupid and blind comment. Completely idiotic.
Why? OK, there are 1.2 billion Muslims. The largest number of Muslims reside in .....India. Would he propose closing down Silicon Valley and half of America's hospitals? So how many Filipinos would he like to exclude. Ten percent of France is Muslim, will they be excluded. What about South Africans? Ban them too? Nigerians? Albanians? Please let me know which Muslims you mean, because there are many to choose from.
Remember Timothy McVeigh? He was a Christian fundamentalist and he killed people. Are we going to ban Christians from America?
Crouch has an amazingly racist series of conclusions based on complete ignorance of Islam. First of all, it's a religion which has adherents on all seven continents. One can be Australian, British, South African, French or German and be a Muslim. One can have blonde hair and blue eyes and be a Muslim, a point the TV show 24 made abundantly clear last season. In fact, his proposal would force us to exclude Turks, Albanians, Indians and people who have no tie to any form of fundamentalist religion. We would have to segregate Indians, Nigerians and Filipinos on the basis of religion and exclude Pakistanis and Bangladeshis.
The reality is that the terrorists who attacked on 9/11 were visitors, not residents and they came from our allies Saudi Arabia and Egypt. As have hundred of thousands of law abiding citizens.
Are there target groups we have to watch? Sure. Young, single men need to be scrutinized closely because they are the prime targets and actors of terrorism. But they don't come from across the muslim world, but a few countries, Yemen, Saudi Arabia and Egypt. And a decent examination would weed out most killers.
Tom Friedman may be wrong about a lot of stuff, but he is dead solid on one thing, most Muslims do not mean the US harm. To treat them as if we are waging war on Islam and not a few lunatics, means we will only make more enemies. The problem is not Islam, but terrorists who hide behind Islam. It's a shame Crouch hides behind a moronic racism which is easily refuted.
Car bombers attacked the international Red Cross headquarters and four police stations across Baghdad today, killing around 40 people.
A suicide bomber drove an ambulance packed with explosives into security barriers outside the Red Cross at around 8.30am local time (0530 GMT), killing 12 people, the aid agency said.
Then in police station bombings through the morning, 27 people, mostly Iraqis and one US solider, were killed, Iraqi police said.
The capital has now seen the worst two day of violence since the war was declared over in April and the sound of sirens reverberated through the streets this morning as emergency vehicles criss-crossed the city.
The bombings came during a morning of apparently choreographed attacks by Iraqi resistance guerrillas that appears to have been timed to coincide with the first day of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan.
Witnesses of the Red Cross bombing said the vehicle stopped some 20 metres (60 feet) in front of the headquarters. One Red Cross worker said: "The ambulance stopped in front of the line of barrels we have had in front to protect the building and then it exploded."
Despite the protection of the barrels, oil drums filled with sand, the blast blew down a 40-foot (12-metre) section of the front wall in front of the three-storey building. It also demolished a dozen cars parked nearby and appeared to break a water main, flooding the streets.
"We feel helpless when see this," a distraught Iraqi doctor said at the devastated offices
You have to wonder what the hell Wolfowitz was thinking by showing up just before Ramadan. He's running around, having dodged three assassination attempts in as many days and then watching any claims of security turn into a cruel, bitter joke. We now have a bombing offensive which makes a clear statement-collaboration, at any level means death. UN, Red Cross, police, if you cooperate with the coalition, we'll target you.
They killed 40 people in one day successfully completing four out of five bombings. The last one failed, and as they drag the guy away, he's screaming "Death to the Iraqi Police, you're all collaborators".
Now you tell me, how does this happen without excellent intelligence? A roadside bomb waiting for Wolfowitz, a helicopter ambush, rocketing the hotel with a home made rocket launcher. This isn't the last gasp of anything. This is the start of a serious offensive to undermine the CPA.
The Pentagon then has to lie and say Wolfowitz wasn't the target. Bullshit. He was nearly killed by the rocket attack. He's the Iraqi version of Reinhardt Heydrich and the Iraqis will spare no expense in killing him. That should be self-evident. No matter the level of US security, it can be and is penetrated. Juan Cole suggests he can come back secretly, but I doubt that. If he's in the country, the Iraqis will find out and seek to kill him. He's a marked man in Iraq, no matter what crap flies from his mouth. More importantly, Bremer isn't much safer.
There is no reconstruction in Iraq, just a guerrilla war.
It was an elite fighting unit in Vietnam - small, mobile, trained to kill.
Known as Tiger Force, the platoon was created by a U.S. Army engaged in a new kind of war - one defined by ambushes, booby traps, and a nearly invisible enemy.
Promising victory to an anxious American public, military leaders in 1967 sent a task force - including Tiger Force - to fight the enemy in one of the most highly contested areas of South Vietnam: the Central Highlands.
But the platoon's mission did not go as planned, with some soldiers breaking the rules of war.
Women and children were intentionally blown up in underground bunkers. Elderly farmers were shot as they toiled in the fields. Prisoners were tortured and executed - their ears and scalps severed for souvenirs. One soldier kicked out the teeth of executed civilians for their gold fillings.
Two soldiers tried to stop the killings, but their pleas were ignored by commanders. The Army launched an investigation in 1971 that lasted 41/2 years - the longest-known war-crime investigation of the Vietnam conflict.
The case reached the highest levels of the Pentagon and the Nixon White House.
Investigators concluded that 18 soldiers committed war crimes ranging from murder and assault to dereliction of duty. But no one was charged.
Since the war ended, the American public has been fed a dose of movies fictionalizing the excesses of U.S. units in Vietnam, such as Apocalypse Now and Platoon. But in reality, most war-crime cases focused on a single event, like the My Lai massacre.
The Tiger Force case is different. The atrocities took place over seven months, leaving an untold number dead - possibly several hundred civilians, former soldiers and villagers now say.
One medic said he counted 120 unarmed villagers killed in one month.
For decades, the case has remained buried in the archives of the government - not even known to America's most recognized historians of the war
How things don't change. Americans don't want to ask what happens to civilians in Iraq today and they didn't 30 years ago.
The worst problem facing US forces in Iraq may not be armed resistance but a crisis of morale. Robert Fisk reports on a near-epidemic of indiscipline, suicides and loose talk
By Robert Fisk
Oct 24, 2003: (The Independent) I was in the police station in the town of Fallujah when I realised the extent of the schizophrenia. Captain Christopher Cirino of the 82nd Airborne was trying to explain to me the nature of the attacks so regularly carried out against American forces in the Sunni Muslim Iraqi town. His men were billeted in a former presidential rest home down the road - "Dreamland", the Americans call it - but this was not the extent of his soldiers' disorientation. "The men we are being attacked by," he said, "are Syrian-trained terrorists and local freedom fighters." Come again? "Freedom fighters." But that's what Captain Cirino called them - and rightly so.
Here's the reason. All American soldiers are supposed to believe - indeed have to believe, along with their President and his Defence Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld - that Osama bin Laden's "al-Qa'ida" guerrillas, pouring over Iraq's borders from Syria, Iran, Saudi Arabia (note how those close allies and neighbours of Iraq, Kuwait and Turkey are always left out of the equation), are assaulting United States forces as part of the "war on terror". Special forces soldiers are now being told by their officers that the "war on terror" has been transferred from America to Iraq, as if in some miraculous way, 11 September 2001 is now Iraq 2003. Note too how the Americans always leave the Iraqis out of the culpability bracket - unless they can be described as "Baath party remnants", "diehards" or "deadenders" by the US proconsul, Paul Bremer.
Captain Cirino's problem, of course, is that he knows part of the truth. Ordinary Iraqis - many of them long-term enemies of Saddam Hussein - are attacking the American occupation army 35 times a day in the Baghdad area alone. And Captain Cirino works in Fallujah's local police station, where America's newly hired Iraqi policemen are the brothers and uncles and - no doubt - fathers of some of those now waging guerrilla war against American soldiers in Fallujah. Some of them, I suspect, are indeed themselves the "terrorists". So if he calls the bad guys "terrorists", the local cops - his first line of defence - would be very angry indeed.
No wonder morale is low. No wonder the American soldiers I meet on the streets of Baghdad and other Iraqi cities don't mince their words about their own government. US troops have been given orders not to bad-mouth their President or Secretary of Defence in front of Iraqis or reporters (who have about the same status in the eyes of the occupation authorities). But when I suggested to a group of US military police near Abu Ghurayb they would be voting Republican at the next election, they fell about laughing. "We shouldn't be here and we should never have been sent here," one of them told me with astonishing candour. "And maybe you can tell me: why were we sent here?"
Things are going to get a lot worse before they get better. A lot worse.
The pace of combat in Iraq is growing and the level of sophistication of the attacks are hardly that of a "dying" regime. Anyone who can make a Stalin's Organ from parts and not kill themselves is hardly part of a doomed movement. The people who built that weapon can and will build others and they're clever in doing so.
This isn't just terrorism. Most terrorists couldn't find Paris if they were standing on the banks of the Seine. They're half-assed ideologists who are lucky if they can blow up an empty building. These folks are professionals. They have good, reliable intelligence which they can act on. The have a time lag of a couple of hours, but they can and do go after US officials. It's not organized or well directed, yet, but time is on their side.
It's clear that most Iraqis want peace and stability. Most don't trust the resistance groups. But there is enough support for them so that they can operate with impunity. Someone sets up a freaking rocket launcher in a public park and no one sees this?
The US has overestimated the support its had in Iraq since the very beginning. The ridiculous idea that the Shia were our allies when they really wanted us to hand them power without much fuss. As was the idea that Saddam and his sons could direct a resistance movement from hiding. He wasn't exactly Charles De Gaulle, you know.
The reaity is that the Iraqis are at best tepid in their support and with each day, the resistance gains support. It's absolutely critical to understand that the resistance would be unable to stay alive without massive support from the locals. The Iraiqs, shpuld be getting decimated every time they go out to shoot it up with the US. Instead, they hit, run and take relatively few casualities. Which should be of massive concern.
One of the things not mentioned widely in the US media, but should be, is that most of our technical means of surveilliance don't work. In a report for the Army, the equipment can pick up special ops in the field, but they can't let you know who's a guerrilla and who isn't. The US, to this day, is unsure of who exactly the enemy is. There's always the fog of war, but this is ridiculous. How do you fight an enemy in the dark?
The US thinks they can defeat the Sunni guerrillas, a feat Saddam never completely managed, given the number of uprisings which occured and the bribes paid, before Sadr and the Sunnis get their act together. The problem is that the resistance has been and remains nationwide, and I suspect, fueled by occasional smugging and extortion. So money is not really a problem for them. Also, given the tribal nature of Iraq, few people would betray their kin to the Americans, especially when the Americans cannot protect them.
The fact is that the resistance, which is probably more widespread and popular than the Americans can imagine, is getting closer and closer to pulling off an assassination of note. The UN Bombing was an attempt to kill Bremer, but the timing was wrong. They fired rockets at Rumsfeld's plane but missed. Now, they rocket the main HQ of the US in Baghdad. These are not accidents or coincidences. They are well planned and organized assassination attempts lacking last minute data. They cut down that gap, and when cell phones start working in Iraq on a large scale, they will, and people are going be hit hard.
It's really time to ask how we get out of Iraq before we lose Iraq. We can't impose our will and the clock is running. We can't get things working fast enough and the CPA is a massive circle jerk society. talking to each other and living behind fortress walls. The Bush Administration has burdened us with a mess of a scale of which we still cannot imagine.
Imagine every urban renewal project attempted and why they failed. Then ramp up the scale to include an entire country. That is the reconstruction of Iraq. Billions being stolen while the locals stew. Except in this case, they have enough weapons for 400,000 men plus 200,000 reserves.
MIKE CHIN'S eureka moment came in an Ikea store, on a spring day in 2002.
Mr. Chin, a technology writer in Vancouver, British Columbia, had just gotten a tiny motherboard from a Taiwanese chip maker, and he had been growling that he could not find a similarly small case so that he could build the computer he had promised to a friend's daughter.
Then his eyes fell on a blue plastic Ikea breadbox - the "perfect marriage of cheap modern art, chintziness and utility," he said.
The fully functional breadbox PC that he then built and described on the Web was among the first to spring from an idea that has become a raging obsession in a far-flung community of electronic do-it-yourselfers: the stealth computer.
Across Europe, the United States and the Far East, hobbyists have been stuffing the works of personal computers into toasters, humidors, biscuit tins, lampshades, even a plush E. T. doll.
"It's tiny, it's wonderful, it's all integrated, it's extremely low power, and it fits almost anywhere," said Mr. Chin of the mini-ITX motherboard at the heart of his breadbox computer, which measures about 10 inches by 14 inches by 6 inches.
But the mini-ITX is not just an object of obsession. The stealth builders are the extreme flank of an assault against the status quo by the originator of the mini-ITX boards, Via Technologies. Via, which is based in Taiwan, wants to make the little computer the next big thing.
"We were surprised it was the enthusiasts who were interested," Richard Brown, the vice president for marketing at Via, said when the company introduced the tiny motherboard idea in early 2002. Today, the concept has already spread beyond hobbyists; a few stylish new PC's using Via's tiny boards have reached the consumer market.
The mini-ITX, which often includes the central processing unit, or C.P.U., as well as audio and graphics circuitry and other built-in components, measures less than seven inches on each side, about half the size of a typical board. The Via boards include relatively slow C.P.U.'s, which in terms of raw computing power are "a long way behind the Pentium 4 and top-of-the-line Athlon," Mr. Brown said.
But with sales of personal computers lagging, Via and others in the industry have been pushing the idea of the "second PC" - an inexpensive, quiet device that can take the pressure off the family computer, perhaps even breaking out of the home office and moving into the living room.
This is a perfect mothferboard for low end laptops. They can run Windows or Linux, add in a screen and chassis and you could have a cheap, viable laptop like the old Apple eBook, but running hundreds less. These stunt machines are cute, but they have a business use without the compromises Transmeta had. Talk about a disappointing company. They had so much hype, and some nice machines, but kind of stalled out. VIA could make the same kind of machines with these mobos and charge $4-500 for them. Sure, Battlefield 1942 might be out of reach, but for the surfing/writing most people do on the road, these machines would be perfect. People still use Powerbook 1400's, so a faster, smaller box which was mobile would definitely fill a niche.
If anyone has seen the kinds of machines Transmeta sold in Japan, they would understand what I'm talking about, small machines fast enough to play DVD's, not draw too much power, but have more capabitlites than a PDA and cheaper than a tablet PC.
What people don't get about computers is that there is still a market for people who want to go online but still can't afford it. This caught my eye because there's a lot of potential here.
I was talking about the Kobe Bryant case with my mother this morning and while she claimed the alleged victim was looking for a payday, a common consensus in the black community as far as I can tell, the story seemed all too familiar. It came up when people were talking about his marketability if he's not convicted. I think if he's innocent, his image will encourage people to let it all slide.
I don't know, honestly, if he's guilty of rape, but if the prosecution can't claim she said no and the judge says the case is weak, a conviction is unlikely.
But that isn't what bothers me about this. Because it seems like an all too familiar story. College age girl sleeps with guy and he disposes of her like garbage. MTV's Fraternity Life had an episode where a guy pretty much dumped a girl who she thought he was dating seriously. She went a little psycho, following him around, trying to get into his room, and playing out some drama. Finally, the kid has her banned from the house.
Girls and women are constantly being defined by the ability to get and keep men in their lives. So much so, it's now common for women to forget sex partners over time. It's now commonly understood that single women have more sex than single men. In the movie Clerks, Dante, the store clerk is astonished when his girlfriend says she's only had three sex partners, but given 37 blowjobs. To Dante and his partner, that number went from 3 to 37 in lightning speed. Monica Lewinsky described her asignations with Bill Clinton in the same way. Few men agreed with that. Even in junior high school, when Dr. Phil asked the boys about the girls who were blowing them at parties, they uniformly called them sluts and hoes. One said "I could never introduce her to my mother. She's just someone you hook up with at parties."
Among adult females, you often hear excuses like "oh we went out for a while" or "we were friends". Men are not stupid. We know you fucked these guys. And in most cases, we don't care. After all, men have their secrets, but they rarely have to do with women. It's the non-women activities we'd like to forget, public urination, drunken escapades. Women seem to deal well with men who have multiple girlfriends, they deal less well with men who have exposed their ass in Yankee Stadium.
The alleged victim seems to fit a type you see in college a lot. A former cheerleader, she goes off to college and then is hit with fact that she's merely one pretty girl among many, and no matter how cute she is, it isn't going to be enough to get her over the hump. She's going to have to develop a personality and skills other than shopping at the Gap and batting her eyes. Now, this doesn't make her a bad person, evil or stupid. She's just taken to heart a bunch of messages about sex which we tell girls. Be pretty, be available to men, but not too available. Be attractive to women, have sex with them, but don't take that too seriously or you'll be a dyke. You always have to orgasm and if not, something is wrong with you. You don't need men, but you better be able to get them.
Even educated, intelligent women get hit with these messages and sometimes come ourt scrambled. Teenage girls are bait for boys who have a much simplier goal. Just get laid. As my mysoginist friend said about his buudy's latest girlfriend, "what relationship? She's just another semen recepticle.". He tnen told her to perform a certain sex act as a joke, which she did. The irony, of course, is that he's faithful and repsectful to his girlfriend. But the point is that men can be incredibly cold towards women once ardor wanes or she starts making demands on his time.
I do not know what the alleged victim was thinking when she chased a married man. Maybe she wanted an adventure, or had dreams of being his mistress and living in luxury or she found him attractive and thought he would treat her better than the local boys did. Whatever she thought, her experience with Bryant was bad. Whether he raped her, and the judge, and I suspect the prosecutor, think the evidence is weak , or not, this is a girl who's having a series of bad relationships with men. When you go for a rape test and another man's semen is in your panties, you've just created reasonable doubt.
It is really easy to call her a money grubbing whore who entrapped him, and people are doing so all over the black community. You hear it on radio all the time. But I don't think it's that simple or pat. I think she feels violated. Her claims could be spiteful, but I doubt it. I think it's about perception. She feels used and violated and he treated her the way many men, especially rich, famous men treat women, as disposable. So even if legally, especially when the prosecution can't claim she said no or acted to get away, he might not have raped her, she was violated. She did something that she regrets and now can't really make right. This happens on college campuses all the time. The guys want to get laid, the girls think something else is going on, and at the end of the day, the girl is used and disposed of like a condom.
We create these contrary sexual expectations: you must have a partner, and be sexually available, and then wonder why things go wrong and why so many people are unhappy. Men benefit from this, getting to pick and choose committment while still having sex, yet the magazines and the talk shows why women don't get married. Well, if you tell people that they need to both have lots of sex and find a soulmate, weird things happen. It's as if perfection is a duopoly of sexual license and sexual committment and nobody's perfect.
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - The Baghdad hotel at which U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz was staying has been evacuated after a series of blasts, according to a journalist staying at the hotel.
.................
At least three people were wounded .........
The blasts occurred at about 6 a.m. local time.
That was no accident. They knew where he was and they were trying to kill him. Only problem is we don't know who was the bomber.
TIKRIT, Iraq (AP) — Guerrillas fired small arms and rocket-propelled grenades at a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter after it came down Saturday in a field near Tikrit, wounding one soldier and causing the craft to explode in flames and spew a column of black smoke, the U.S. military said.
Also, near the flashpoint city of Fallujah, three civilians were killed and two wounded when their convoy came under fire. An American engineer and an Iraqi security guard said U.S. troops shot at their vehicles, but the military denied that.
Amid the ongoing violence, U.S military officials prepared for the holy fasting month of Ramadan, which begins in Iraq on Monday. For weeks, chaplains have been training troops to be sensitive to Muslim religious traditions.
..................
In the incident near Fallujah, three SUVs of the European Landmine Solutions, a British-based private contractor, were hit by gunfire, according to an American engineer with the firm, David Rasmussen, who was hospitalized with wounds.
Asked where the shots came from, Rasmussen replied: "from the USA."
Centcom is trying to spin the fact that an RPG shot down another helicopter. Which is what happened. It didn't just "come down". By what? A faulty engine? Please. Try grenade. Then they pulled an ambush on the downed chopper.
Think about it: the helicopter just landed and then an ambush just miraculously exploded around it? Please. They ran into the simple version of a flak trap, and then when they came down, they were fighting for their lives. Which is no more an accident than the assassination attempt on Wolfowitz.
US intel is fatally compromised by the legions of translators and police who are quietly working for the resistance. We cannot move without intel going to the enemy. Hell, given the pausity of Arabic language skills, they could use the CPA phones with no problems.
But no one will put this together until all hell breaks loose. There are no coinicidences when it comes to bombings and high officials. They were waiting for him. A master stroke like assassinating Wolfowitz or Rumsfeld would send the war effort into a tailspin. Remember, the enemy gets a vote. The enemy always gets a vote. Sometimes, the deciding vote.
There may be no better words in the English language than Yankees lose, well, there are a couple "yes, I want to sleep with you", "the beer is free", "the EPT was wrong". But excluding those phrases, Yankees lose brings a spring to my step and a song to my heart. There are few things in life I take as much pleasure in than to see the Yankees lose at home in the World Series. As a lifelong Mets fan, few things are better to watch than to see the Yankees lose in a complete game, five hit shut out.
I've been waiting a few weeks to write this piece. I knew the Twins didn't have much of a chance, but the Red Sox were so close, so close and they couldn't close the deal. Which was among the great disappointments in a lifetime of watching baseball.
No one wanted this series, except for Yankee fans. Everyone wanted the Cubs vs Red Sox, but that was not to be. Instead we got this series and most people expected the Yankees to roll over them. Boy were we surprised. Pleasantly surprised. The Marlins came to play, not lose and play they did. They didn't care about the Yankee payroll or mystique, they wanted to be champions and they became champions.
You may be wondering, why, as a New Yorker, I take such joy in a Yankee humilation. Well, that's simple. I'm not a Yankees fan. I hate the Yankees. I have hated the Yankees since I was a kid. I hated them as a child, as a teenager and as an adult. I grew up in a household of Brooklyn Dodgers fans and that means a lifetime of disdain for the Yankees. Watching them lose and seeing all those forlorn faces in the dugout was a joyous, rapturous experience.
Hating the Yankees is both fun and easy. I hate the Yankees because they are the worst in sport. Greedy, venal, corrupt. A legacy of thuggish ownership and dishonesty from day one. They've always treated their players like chattel after buying them. The Yankees are so greedy, they started their own network and charge extra for it. Only the Yankees could get away with such naked greed.
Ben Affleck summed it up, the Yankees are nothing more than well-heeled mercenaries. There is success, but no heart, no spirit. Anything quirky or weird is soon banished from Yankeeland.
If you've ever been to a Yankees game and a Mets game, the difference is pretty stark. They may both take place in New York, but that's about it. A Yankees game is usually filled with people who expect to win. The Mets game is filled with people who want to win. The difference is that while Yankee fans may cheer, Mets fans believe. I've felt Shea rocking from the pounding of feet and cheering in a way you'd never feel in Yankee Stadium.
During interleague play, the usual arrest counts hover around 300 per game. It doesn't take much for a fistfight to start. When I was a teenager, I went to a doubleheader with the Cubs with my father. Some kid got a Yankees jersey and crossed out the Yankees, something I have to do one day, and he got free beers until he puked. Now, punches would definitely fly if you did that.
Here's an example of how the Yankees suck: in the games after 9/11, the Yankees had some kind of ceremony. The Mets wore Police, Fire and Port Authority hats for the rest of the season. Why? Because John Franco, the Mets team captain, thought it was a good idea. Every game he pitched, he wore a Saintation department T-shirt as a tribute to his father. That's never, ever gonna happen to the Yankees. The Yankees are always bigger than anyone or anything else. Some call it tradition, I'd call it self-indulgence. The Yankees have been trying to get money for a new Stadium for years, despite the fact everyone likes the old one. Greed, avarice, that's the Yankees tradition.
Someone said that rooting for the Yankees was like rooting for Microsoft to buy another company. Which I think is an apt analogy.
Ah, it's always a good day when the Yankees lose. This is a really good day. The bigger the loss, the better the day.
Oh yeah, fuck the Yankees. The Yankees fucking suck.
Wal-Mart uses more than 100 third-party contractors to perform cleaning services in more than 700 stores, Williams said, and those contractors are required to use only legal workers.
The arrests stem from a November 1998 investigation done with the Pennsylvania attorney general's office. That inquiry also targeted store-cleaning contractors and subcontractors used by Wal-Mart.
The cleaning crews did not receive health insurance and were paid below the minimum wage, sometimes as little as $2 a day, a federal official said.
The workers arrested Thursday were released if they had no criminal records, but they must appear later before immigration judges.
Arrests were made in Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia and West Virginia, ICE officials said.
This has to be a typo, because two dollars a day is ridiculous. What do they do? Hand you a 10 and send you on your way? You can make more collecting cans. It's probably $2 an hour, but that's still a crime in the US.
Ok, I have a bunch of them, but reading about Bill "Whiny Little Bitch" O'Reilly, just sets me off. They run his weekly column in the Daily News and he was whining about Terry Gross and Al Franken again and how people don't like him. Well, there's a reason: he's an asshole. People don't like him.
O'Reilly thinks people don't like his politics and a lot of people don't. But he seems not to get that people don't like "him". Him, not what comes out of his mouth, but how he says it. He's a thug and a bully and a whiny little bitch.
I don't agree with Tucker Carlson one bit, but that's it. I don't agree with him. I wouldn't ignore him, refuse to shake his hand or think he's a particularly bad person. Nor do a lot of people. He has every right to his politics, as wrong as they are. But the difference between him and O'Reilly is simple and I think we call it a happy childhood.
Carlson sat there with Janeane Garofalo for a week and Al Franken for two days. People who couldn't disagree with him more if he was a Spanish Communist and they were anarchists. But he did it with grace and style. Can anyone imagine O'Reilly doing the same? Carlson can lose an argument, even if plays fast and loose with the facts. He knows perfectly well that he can't be more entertaining than comedians. O'Reilly has to not only win, but protect the "innocent" masses from the evil liberal world. And when he's attacked for his views, it's an attack on him, personally. It's not about O'Reilly the hack, but O'Reilly the man. He takes things more personally than most black people, and that's something. There are no neutral comments in his world.
And unbelievably, he thinks the liberals are out to get him. Of course, Terry Gross was nicer to Al Franken than him. He's a prick and she doesn't like him. She doesn't have to. He bullies the weak. Franken attacks the strong. Hell, even Ann Coulter attacks people who can attack back. Sure, she can call Molly Ivins a traitor and Evan Thomas, the son of Norman Thomas, even though his name is Evan Thomas, Jr. But they can respond in kind and ask about her adams apple and the fact that there was no child named Ann Coulter born in Connecticut in 1962-63. But O'Reilly, he likes to pick on the innocent and weak like a vulture. He doesn't like to battle equals.
I am so sick of his millionaire victim act. He's a thug and a loser and by the grace of God he's not rampaging through central Brooklyn with a badge like his thuggish grandpa. He's always got his nose up Howard Stern's ass, as if Stern agreed with his wacky views. At least he doesn't have contempt for him like he does for the pill popping racist pig Rush "rehab" Limbaugh.
O'Reilly so needs therapy it isn't funny. He needs to talk out all his repressed childhood anger with a professional before he drops dead. I hardly want to turn to Fox News and see a foaming, twitching red faced O'Reilly.
The most irritating thing about him is that he relies on this fantasy childhood he uses as the underpinning of his philosophy. He's altered a brutal, sad childhood in with an alcoholic dad and enabling mom into some kind of Father Knows Best world which never existed. Instead of confronting what must have been an unusually tough childhood, he's fictionalized it. Now, he uses that fiction to guide himself in the real world, and the results is a verbally brutal, physically cowardly man unable to accept any challenge from anyone. He has to be in control and when he isn't, everyone and everything else is to blame. He pushes close to libel with Franken, he maligns Terry Gross and in the process, he looks like a jerk. He doesn't even see how bad he looks. And he wonders why people revile him.
GOP to put challengers in black voting precincts Critics call strategy intimidation
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By SHELDON S. SHAFER
sshafer@courier-journal.com
The Courier-Journal
Jefferson County Republicans intend to place Election Day challengers at 59 voting precincts in predominantly black neighborhoods, a move that NAACP leaders yesterday called blatant intimidation.
The GOP election workers, most of whom live outside the targeted precincts in western and central Louisville, Portland and Newburg, will be on hand to challenge voters who they suspect aren't eligible.
Jefferson County GOP Chairman Jack Richardson IV said the precincts were chosen at random or because the Republican Party has had trouble finding registered voters in those areas to serve as election workers. The challengers, who will receive the same training as precinct workers, could fill in if needed.
Richardson said the precincts weren't chosen because of their racial makeup or voting patterns. Using challengers is a "legal, proper and permissible" way to ensure that voters are bona fide, he said.
"It is in the best interest of everybody and the responsibility of both parties to protect the ballot integrity," Richardson said. "That is the bottom line."
Hmmm, yet another case of nigger vote suppression.
It didn't work in 1965, it won't work now. But the Dems should pick the richest, whitest counties in the state and do the same. See how quickly this plans dies.
In the real world, most of these people are long time, regular voters and know the people at the polling stations. This is just legal intimidation.
Under pressure from both Berlin and the Hague, Dutch coffee shop culture is under threat, writes Andrew Osborn
Friday October 24, 2003
A thick pall of sweet-smelling hashish has hung over the Netherlands since the first "coffee shop" opened its doors in 1972.
Since then, the country's famously relaxed drug laws have attracted droves of weed lovers from across the globe and earned the country a sometimes controversial reputation for unparalleled liberality.
At its peak in 1997 the country's network of coffee shops ran to almost 1,200 cafes where anyone over 18 could exercise their legal right to buy up to five grams (a sixth of an ounce) of marijuana at a time. But thirty years later, the novelty appears to have worn off and the increasingly conservative Dutch authorities are drawing up plans to turn back the clock.
With the conservative Christian Democrat party holding sway in the latest three-party coalition and the Labour party consigned to opposition, the country's traditionally liberal approach towards drugs are up for review.
This week the Dutch public got a foretaste of exactly how the government is planning to sweep aside decades of tolerance, when justice minister Piet Hein Donner publicly outlined plans to allow only Dutch citizens to visit coffee shops.
In a move designed to tackle the perceived scourge of drug tourists, he said that coffee shop customers should be asked to show their passport and prove that they live locally before being served.
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Angered by such liberality on its doorstep, Berlin wants nothing less than a total ban on soft drugs in the Netherlands.The Dutch authorities seem unlikely to go that far but they do mean business. A treaty allowing the German and Dutch police to cooperate in border regions is likely to be signed soon and the Dutch government is reportedly close to drawing up new narcotics legislation.
The Dutch government may, however, find the going uphill. It wants local councils and coffee shops themselves to stop foreigners from buying pot, but neither seem keen to comply. Both the councils and the cafes say they believe that the move would merely push the entire drugs trade underground and force people to buy off street dealers and criminals.
There is also the small matter of money. In 1999, the latest year for which figures are available, Dutch coffee shops turned over €300m (£210m) - money which is all subject to government tax.
The Dutch government is therefore faced with a stark choice: to keep taking the money or to appease the Germans.
You're asking the Dutch to choose between money and keeping Germans happy? Why not ask the British to choose beer over keeping the Irish happy or the Italians to choose between food and keeping the Austrians happy? The odds are about the same of it never happening. The Dutch are not and never have been liberal in the sense Americans think. Dutch social policy has always seemed conservative to me: they don't ask what you do behind closed doors and you don't make a point of announcing it. As long as you show up to work and do your job, your life is your business. As long as you show up and do your job. Americans have always assumed it was some hippie wonderland because they didn't poke their nose in your business. But that was always a mistake. The Dutch always seemed buttoned down, but relaxed to me. Just because you can smoke weed and they don't hide their hookers never meant that you could roll into work in shorts and a Quicksilver T.
The Dutch government knows localities are not going to start quizzing people about their nationality when money is involved. They're just going to tell people to chill and sell them dope anyway.
Americans have always misunderstood Dutch drug policy anyway. It was never a free for all. The Dutch allowed cannibis and hash to be sold, ignored ecxtasy, but prosecuted the hell out of coke and heroin dealers and always have. Along with needle distribution and generous treatment programs, they controlled hard drug use. They controlled selling weed which limited crime, brought in taxes and kept people within the legal economy. And people who would be tempted to sell all kinds of drugs went into the legal drug system and only sold weed. This way, they keep kids out of it, they minimize the drug culture, it's more touristy than a staple in the heavy drinking Dutch culture, and they get taxes.
Now, the Germans are tired off all the cross-border dope dealing coming from the EU's open borders, but they really can't expect the Dutch to impose German moral standards. The Dutch, quite logically, prefer their system, which seems to work for them.
Jonathan Watts in Xiongqiao village, Henan province, the ground zero of an epidemic threatening millions
This is Xiongqiao village in Henan province, the ground zero of arguably the world's worst HIV/Aids epidemic, with up to a million people infected in this single province through a vast, largely unregulated blood-selling operation.
The situation is already a catastrophe, but the risks are growing. The medical treatment is inadequate and the authorities are trying to cover up the truth with a lethal mix of censorship and police intimidation.
The Guardian has gained rare access to the village and has spoken to HIV-positive villagers who have been arrested and beaten for trying to draw attention to their plight; to health officials who have been harassed, sued and kept under surveillance for speaking out; and to local newspaper reporters who have been fired for trying to publish the truth.
It has also heard from Aids experts, charity organisations and foreign diplomats who have either been refused access to Henan or only allowed to enter under heavy restrictions.
Outside journalists fare little better: two cameramen from China's state-run television channel, CCTV, were kicked out this week.
The problem and response are side-effects of modern China's peculiar blend of profit-at-all-costs capitalism and hide-and-control communism. Even more than the Sars scare this year, the HIV crisis in Henan underlines the growing gulf between the urban rich and rural poor and the state's overarching emphasis on social stability at the expense of individual rights and free speech.
China refused to accept that it had a major HIV problem until 2002. Then in a single day, it pushed up its estimate for infected people from 30,000 to 1 million. Aids activists believe the real number could be more than twice as high
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· Last month, Human Rights Watch issued a report condemning China's policy on HIV/Aids. Few Chinese people saw it because the government blocked the group's website
· In international forums and English language media, Chinese officials acknowledge that the country could have 10m HIV cases by 2010. In the domestic Chinese language media, however, officials cite infection figures as low as 40,000
· Asked why the cover-up is necessary, an official in Henan told doctors: "Who will invest in our province if they believe we have a huge number of HIV cases"
China's restrictive policies are not just a problem for China. With illegal immigration and tourism, China's penchant for lying makes it a potential ground zero for a host of diseases. China's record in confronting public health issues ranges from miserable to horrible and as long as they lie, they place millions of people around the world at risk.
Become a Selective Service System Local Board Member
The Selective Service System wants to hear from men and women in the community who might be willing to serve as members of a local draft board.
Prospective Board Members must be citizens of the United States , at least 18 years old, and registered with the Selective Service (if male). Prospective Board Members may not be an employee of any law enforcement occupation, not be an active or retired member of the Armed Forces, and not have been convicted of any criminal offense.
Once identified as qualified candidates for appointment, prospective Board Members are recommended by the Governor and appointed by the Director of Selective Service, who acts on behalf of the President in making appointments. Each new member receives 12 hours of initial training after appointment, followed by 4 hours of annual training for as long as he or she remains in the position. They may serve as Board Members for up to 20 years, if desired.
Local Board Members are uncompensated volunteers who play an important community role closely connected with our Nation's defense. If a military draft becomes necessary, approximately 2,000 Local and Appeal Boards throughout America would decide which young men, who submit a claim, receive deferments, postponements or exemptions from military service, based on Federal guidelines.
Positions are available in many communities across the Nation. If you believe you meet the standards for Selective Service Board Membership, and wish to be considered for appointment please visit our web site at: http://www.sss.gov/fslocal.htm
What's up with this? Are they looking to set the groundwork for a draft? I think people need to be a bit concerned about this. Although, if they try this, Bush should start moving now. A draft would be the perfect thing to ensure a Democratic government for years to come.
Rumsfeld Draws Republicans' Ire
By DOUGLAS JEHL and DAVID FIRESTONE
Published: October 24, 2003
WASHINGTON, Oct. 23 — Last Friday, the Republican chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee and his top Democratic colleague sent a private letter to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld that questioned the propriety of comments made by a top Pentagon general, William G. Boykin.
Mr. Rumsfeld not only did not respond, but on Tuesday, after the chairman, Senator John W. Warner of Virginia, made the letter public, the defense secretary said he knew nothing about it. "It may be somewhere around the building," Mr. Rumsfeld told reporters on Capitol Hill, "but I am not aware of it."
The episode was described this week by senior Republican Congressional officials as emblematic of what some now openly call the high-handedness and lack of respect shown by Mr. Rumsfeld, whose steps and missteps in the past month have drawn increasing Republican ire.
On issues that include General Boykin (who has likened the war against Islamic militants to a battle against Satan) and his own views about the war on terrorism (and the gap between Mr. Rumsfeld's glossy public assessments and the more roughly hewn private views that leaked out this week), senior Republicans have joined Democrats in openly complaining that the Pentagon has left them in the dark and vulnerable on critical and sensitive political issues
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A Republican who is close to the White House said the view there had been that Mr. Rumsfeld "went off the deep end" in his reaction earlier this month to Mr. Bush's decision to designate Ms. Rice as the overall coordinator of Iraq policy. "The worst thing that can happen in Washington is if you're a cabinet member, you think you're bigger than the president," the Republican said.
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Republican officials, though reluctant to criticize Mr. Rumsfeld publicly, said he and his staff, including Paul D. Wolfowitz, the deputy defense secretary, have been no less dismissive of their needs than they are toward Democratic lawmakers.
"The Pentagon is not exactly Capitol Hill's favorite department anymore," said one prominent Republican staff member. "Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz just give off this sense that they know better than thou, and that they don't have to answer our questions
Rummy let all the asskisssing which went on earlier go to his already inflated head. Now, when people demand hard answers, he doesn't have them.
Bush should have put a stop to his freelancing in February. Now, he's got this arrogant monster running loose and he's now embarassed by him. Does anyone really think Rummy has more than nominal respect for Bush, if that much?
But I think the skids are being greased to fire him. Too many negaitive stories are popping up for him to remained employed for long and that is a shame. He belongs in the dock at the Hague, at a minimum, but he certainly shouldn't be allowed to walk away from the mess he's worked a decade to create.
Bear in mind also that just increasing the number of jobs isn't good enough. If we want to improve the dismal prospects of job seekers — currently, 75 percent of those who lose jobs still haven't found new jobs when their unemployment benefits run out — the number of jobs must grow faster than the number of people who want to work. Indeed, because the working-age population of the United States is steadily growing, the economy must add about 130,000 jobs each month just to prevent the labor market from deteriorating.
Mr. Snow thinks the economy will, finally, start to do better than that — but it's not happening yet. In September, employment rose for the first time since January, but the increase was only 57,000 jobs. And to have kept up with the population growth since Mr. Bush took office, the economy would have to add not two million, but seven million jobs by next November.
Mr. Bush's employment policies would truly have been a success if he had left the job market no worse than he found it. In fact, even his own Treasury secretary thinks he'll fall five million or so jobs short of that mark.
I know, I know, the usual suspects will roll out the usual explanations. It is, of course, Bill Clinton's fault. (Just for the record, the average rate of job creation during the whole of the Clinton administration was about 225,000 jobs a month. Mr. Clinton presided over the creation of 11 million jobs during each of his two terms.) Or maybe Osama bin Laden did it.
But surely there must be a statute of limitations on these excuses. By the time of the election, Mr. Bush will have had almost four years to deal with the legacy of the technology bubble, and more than three years to deal with the economic fallout from 9/11.
This number, along with the casualty rate in Iraq are the numbers by which Bush's fate hangs. We're talking not only long term unemployed, but massive underemployment as well. There's a mythology in America that any job is a good job, well, economically, that's simply not true.
It is a tremendous waste of resources to have a, let's say University of Virginia trained economics major selling hardware at Home Depot. The state has invested millions in that person's education, and having them spend a year or two in retail has two negative effects. One, it reduces the taxable income of that person and two, it has a downward effect on employment. Every college graduate underemployed in a service job takes a job a high school graduate cannot get, thus lowering their income.
The current unemployment is not just sector-based, but across the board. Technology employment is being shifted overseas to countries who's ultimate political aims may well pose a challenge to the US. Shifting so much technology development to India, has had a pernicious effect on not only our economy, but on our security. What day do we find out Indian companies are not only stealing our technology, but funnelling it and the information held in call centers to Indian intelligence. When does a Los Alamos scientist get brought to a meeting with his medical records waved in his face by an Indian intelligence officer? When is software stolen by an Indian company and sold, knowing that decades of litigation await any claimant?
The problem is not just unemployment, but a net loss of jobs which are not coming back. This despite the fact that the US is only partially wired. There is still a massive need for technological development in schools, health care, government, and we're making it impossible for Americans to complete that revolution. If you keep shipping the tech work to India, who's going to build America's technological infrastructure?
If it was just unemployment, that would be understandable. But it's not. It's permanent job loss and little real chance of replacing them. Which is why Wal-Mart can hire illegals and abuse their workers. If you lose a job at Wal-Mart, the next stop is welfare.
Notably missing from this trip were the big crowds that have almost always turned out for a glimpse of the world's most powerful leader. To some extent, that was planned:Thailand, where Mr. Bush stayed the longest for the annual Asian economic forum, gave workers a holiday and made it clear that protests would not be tolerated.
In Indonesia, the Secret Service would not let the president get more than a mile off the grounds of the airport in Bali - the overwhelmingly Hindu island of the world's largest Islamic nation. The result was that only ordinary Indonesians to see the first American president to visit their country in more that a decade were selling oke from a stand outside the airport fence.
Similarly, in Australia Mr. Bush visited only this trim-and-proper capital, where few Australians without government business ever step. (Hu Jintao, the Chinese president, was beginning to take a much more extensive tour of the country as Mr. Bush was leaving.)
All this is in sharp contrast to the last presidential tour of the region, when President Bill Clinton visited Vietnam at the end of 2000, talking to mayors about housing and health care, touring ancient temples and new factories, his car weaving through streets packed five- and six-deep with Vietnamese who said America, once an enemy, was now the path to prosperity.
That, of course, was a different time, and Mr. Bush's aides say Mr. Clinton viewed Southeast Asia through the cheery
glasses of economic globalization, while Mr. Bush is forcing governments that would rather turn the other way to face the threats brewing in their own villages.
It is an unpleasant message, and the risk facing Mr. Bush is that important parts of it get lost in translation. In Indonesia and the Philippines, one American official with long experience in Asia noted during the president's tour, "people are tired of hearing that they are the front line of terrorism, and over time they come to blame the messenger."
UPDATE 2-U.S. arrests 300 workers at 60 Wal-Mart stores
Reuters, 10.23.03, 3:09 PM ET
By James Vicini
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Authorities arrested about 300 workers at 60 Wal-Mart Stores Inc. locations across the country on immigration charges in an investigation into contractor cleaning crews, and some company executives knew about the scheme, U.S. officials said Thursday.
They said the investigation, known as "Operation Rollback," involved allegations the contractor had recruited illegal immigrants, mainly Eastern European nationals, to work on cleaning crews at the stores for the world's largest retailer.
Federal law enforcement officials said some Wal-Mart executives had direct knowledge of the scheme, based on recorded conversations, surveillance and monitoring.
One official said federal agents conducted searches at the Bentonville, Arkansas, headquarters of Wal-Mart, the largest U.S. private sector employer, with about 1.1 million workers in the United States and 1.4 million worldwide.
Another official said federal grand jury subpoenas have been issued for the Wal-Mart executives to testify. The executives were not identified.
An official said the U.S. believes Wal-Mart has shown a "reckless disregard" for U.S. immigration laws, exploiting workers, and has continued to hire some contractors who were already convicted of felony violations.
A Wal-Mart spokesman said the company was "committed to cooperating" with federal officials, who he said came to company headquarters with specific requests for information.
"These are third-party contractors," spokesman Tom Williams said. "We require that the contractors use legal workers."
"We don't know at this point if the current investigation includes one or more outside contractors. We use hundreds of them," he said, adding that about 1,000 of Wal-Mart's U.S. stores have outside cleaning services.
Wal-Mart already faces dozens of lawsuits alleging discrimination and violations of wage-and-hour rules. The company has drawn fire from labor groups, who say the company has an anti-union stance.
No unions, now, illegal aliens. Wal-Mart is a perfect example of the worst corporate practices in America. Anyone who believes Wal-Mart didn't knowingly hire companies filled with the brim with illegals is out of their mind. They aren't anti-union for no reason. They don't say "use illegals", but they make sure the lowest bidder gets the contract.
Most companies would be ashamed to be caught out like this, not Wal-Mart. They will make their profits no matter the cost to workers or the public.
Maybe some prosecutions might change matters there, but I doubt it. Hard jail time is the only cure for corporate law breaking.
President George Bush was jeered and heckled yesterday during an address to the Australian parliament, in which he thanked the nation for its support in the war against Iraq.
President Bush defended the American-led military action, claiming it was vindicated by the discovery in Iraq of secret biological laboratories and design work on prohibited long-range missiles.
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The people, though, were unable to hear him deliver those compliments unless they switched on their television sets. As part of a massive security operation to protect Mr Bush, they were shut out of Parliament House for the first time in the country's history.
With the public gallery closed, the job of expressing the anti-war sentiments of a substantial minority of Australians fell to two maverick senators, Bob Brown and Kerry Nettle. The pair, both members of the Green Party, were ejected from the chamber. Interrupted by them for the second time, Mr Bush said, smiling between gritted teeth: "I love free speech."
Three hours in Bali, 20 in Australia, wow, what a vacation. The clap is more popular than George W. Bush in most countries.
By Vernon Loeb
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, October 22, 2003; Page A01
BAGHDAD -- Lt. Denny Vigil points the barrel of his M-4 carbine out the driver's side door of a Humvee. His eyes scan the storefronts and the rooftops. He and his men used to stop and walk through the busy markets of Sadr City, Baghdad's vast Shiite Muslim slum. But now they stay buttoned up in their vehicles with mounted machine guns and go out on patrol only with M1-A1 Abrams tanks leading the way.
"The older people were giving me that look, 'What's the need for all this?' " Vigil said on the move one day last week. "They know something is going on."
Everything changed for the Army's 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment 13 days ago, when a U.S. patrol was ambushed by hundreds of armed men presumed to be followers of Moqtada Sadr, the young Shiite cleric who has denounced the U.S. occupation of Iraq and called for creation of a Shiite state.
Despite the Oct. 9 encounter, which killed two Americans and two Iraqis, the regiment's commanders say they believe they are still winning a war against Sadr for the hearts and minds of 2 million residents packed into a garbage-strewn quarter of Baghdad named for Sadr's father, a revered cleric assassinated in 1999, allegedly by Saddam Hussein's government. But there is little question that the climate in Sadr City is different than it was during the regiment's first six postwar months here, which passed without a combat fatality.
"We used to walk around, talk to the kids, drink [tea] with the old guys. Not no more," said Sgt. Gary Frisbee.
In important ways, the tenuous state of affairs in Sadr City has become a microcosm of the Bush administration's efforts throughout Iraq. The ambush, and the car bombing of an Iraqi police station on the same day, have overshadowed six months of civic works and what military officials regarded as slow but steady progress. The situation here also highlights the fine line the military must walk in all parts of Iraq between aggressive deterrence against myriad adversaries and excessive force that angers the Iraqi people.
"We remind the commanders all the time that this is a thinking man's war," said Maj. George Sarabia, executive officer of the regiment's 2nd Squadron. "The center of gravity is the attitude of the Shia population. What the enemy is trying to do is get us to overreact."
Like U.S. military forces across much of Iraq, Sarabia's squadron is spread thin, trying to secure Sadr City, an area measuring 3-by-41/3 miles, with 800 troops supported by a 160-soldier military police company. The squadron employs 60 Iraqi interpreters who accompany every patrol and has two Iraqi Americans who work for the Pentagon and have government clearance to translate sensitive documents and interpret during interrogations.
"If you have 2 million people, and 1 percent is against you, that's 20,000 people," Sarabia said. "If only one-tenth of 1 percent is against you, that's 2,000 -- they still outnumber us."
SACRAMENTO, CA—Political observers are struggling to understand exactly how, on Oct. 7, Arnold Schwarzenegger, an Austrian-born, movie-star muscleman with no political experience, was elected to govern the state of California, the world's fifth-largest economic region.
"We're a bit baffled as to exactly how this happened," said David Gergen, director of the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. "Poll results show that the strongman received 1.3 million more votes than the next candidate—that much is clear. We just can't determine precisely why people believed that the bodybuilder was qualified to lead the socially and economically complex state of California."
According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, California is an economic region with an annual gross domestic product of $1.36 trillion—an amount equal to one-sixth of the U.S.'s total gross national product. Considered internationally, California's GDP ranks fifth in the world, behind the U.S., Japan, Germany, and the United Kingdom.
"Apparently, this man has appeared in numerous popular films," Gergen said. "And I guess he was awarded a Mr. Universe title. But I don't understand how that would make him a competent gubernatorial candidate."
"There were, in fact, figures from the pornography industry on the ballot who were better equipped to lead than the muscleman," Gergen added. "A major adult-magazine publisher who could claim not only leadership and business experience, but also a working knowledge of First Amendment law, was in the running. The fact that the pornographer received only 15,454 votes is confusing, in light of the muscleman's victory."
Michael Howard in Baghdad
Wednesday October 22, 2003
The Guardian
Coalition and Iraqi officials are preparing an arrest warrant for the firebrand Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr over his alleged involvement with the brutal murder of a rival cleric last spring, sources close to the Iraqi governing council told the Guardian yesterday.
The warrant, which has yet to be finalised, cites Mr Sadr for instigating a deadly attack on Abdel Majid al-Khoei, who was stabbed to death by a mob in the Shia holy city of Najaf on April 10.
It is said to be signed by Tahir Jalil Habboush - a senior mukhabarat officer under the former regime who now works with the coalition authorities - and is based on the confessions of 23 men who were involved in the killing.
"The belief of the coalition is that al-Sadr is not containable," the council source said. "They believe there is enough evidence that Muqtada was involved in the Khoei assassination and want to act to clip his wings before he can cause any more damage."
Since his swift rise to prominence in the days following regime change in Iraq, Mr Sadr, 30, has been a constant thorn in the side of the US-led administration in Iraq. He has been the most vocal opponent of occupation, while his well-organised followers have been involved in armed confrontations with US soldiers. Last week he declared a rival government to the US-appointed authority and urged his supporters on to the streets.
But with tension running high between US forces and Mr Sadr's supporters, Iraqi police fear an explosion of anger in the disaffected areas of Baghdad and Najaf and Karbala if Mr Sadr is seized.
First, they have to actually seize him, and I don't think that's possible. No matter how they do it, tanks, Delta/SAS, armored raid. It's like a roach trap. Getting in is easy, getting out......once people find out the Americans have seized him, East Baghdad is going to explode. They had 10,000 people outside the CPA HQ for minor clerics. If they grab Sadr, 100,000 armed people may well show up.
I think we have Black Hawk Down II if we try. Except there are 2 million people in Sadr City. I just don't see, with all the young, unemployed, armed, men around that the country wouldn't erupt in anarchy afterwards. The US is three months behind the times. Any attempt to grab him will get ugly fast and turn into a full-scale Mog within an hour, with mobs and guns everywhere. And the difference between Iraq and Somalia is simple, there was a real Army in Iraq with trained soldiers. So they won't just be running around in a fire drill. They will know where to shoot and how to handle their weapons.
Of course this is stupid and poorly thought out. It is inviting a full-scale Shia rebellion. And coming just before Ramadan, you really have to wonder why the CPA is picking yet another play from the playbook of the German occupation of Russia to emulate. Kill the local leaders. Yes, makes perfect sense. Amazing. Simply amazing. Why not stage a few public hangings next? Seems to work wonders.
JESSE J. HOLLAND, Associated Press Writer Friday, October 17, 2003
(10-17) 13:13 PDT WASHINGTON (AP) --
The Congressional Black Caucus denounced White House judicial nominee Janice Rogers Brown of California on Friday, with one member saying she was "cut from the same cloth as Clarence Thomas" and should be kept off a federal appellate court.
"This Bush nominee has such an atrocious civil rights record she makes Clarence Thomas look like Thurgood Marshall," said Rep. Diane Watson, D-Calif.
But Republican senators immediately defended Brown. "If critics don't like Justice Brown's decisions, they should change the law, rather than attack her for partisan political gain," said Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
President Bush has nominated Brown, a California state justice, for a seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. She is expected to appear next Wednesday before the Senate Judiciary Committee for a confirmation hearing.
The 12-member appeals court decides important government cases involving separation of powers, the role of the federal government, the responsibilities of federal officials and the authority of federal agencies. It now has five Republican and four Democratic appointees.
The black Democrats said Brown's conservative credentials make her unfit for the D.C. judgeship. Brown, who is black, is considered among the California high court's most conservative justices
They dig up the craziest black jurist they can find and say "we're inclusive". Well, no, they're not. I saw her confirmation hearing on the Newshour tonight and the Democratic senators were aghast at her views. Instead of venue shopping, the Bush Administration is now negro hunting. They failed with the crazed, right-wing hispanic Estrada, now, they hunt for a crazed right wing black jurist. What's the point? She's going to get fillibustered like all the other wackos they've pushed on the court, and Brown is singularly unqualifed because she's had no legal experience in Washington.
The racism of the GOP is so transparent. This woman's views are completely out of sync with even the other justices on her own court. Yet, they expect a free pass because she's black. Well, no. I think the Senators are not going to be fooled by this trick. She's being judged by the content of her character and rulings, not her race. As the above article shows, her views are widely rejected by the black community for their severity and social conservatism. Why in God's name should black politicians support judges adamantly opposed to their ideas? Just because she's black? What kind of racial double standard is that? We disagree with your politics, but because you're black, we'd duty-bound to support you?
Then, of course, we're all supposed to feel sorry for her because she was a single mom who made it through law school. Well, no. Other people from hard backgrounds don't feel they have the right to shut the door behind them. Brown's rulings have done everything to restrict the rights of others to achieve what she did. She opposes the affirmative action which not only got her into college, but law school. So why should a black politician support a judicial nominee who is for closing off access to their constitutients.
She's getting the exact same consideration that a white jurist with her hard right views would get, as well as the same expected filibuster. The token conservative negroes will use her to say the Democrats are racist, which will have most black people laughing hard and long.
Clarence Thomas played the race card and pulled it off, only to become the most reviled figure in black America. Let Justice Brown stay in California and limit her harm to the rest of the country. Her failure will be because people took a look at the content of her character and found it lacking. The fact that she was black was irrelevant to that, as it should be.
WASHINGTON — My old buddies the Kurds, a long-mistreated people we freed from Saddam, are now looking a gift horse in the mouth. I hope somebody explains that American expression about shortsighted suspicion to a key leader, Massoud Barzani.
The U.S.-British coalition can use a fresh force of experienced troops to patrol Iraq's porous border with Syria and help us cause die-hard terrorists to die hard. Turkey's leaders, eager to re-establish warm relations with Washington and to take part in creating a nearby democratic trading partner, offered a division of well-trained troops.
This would do much to Muslimize and localize the war on Saddam's last-ditch fighters. Turkey's generous offer — duration, one year — would send a message to the world: pitch in and help now, while Iraq is not yet able to police and rebuild itself.
The overwhelming vote in Turkey's Parliament added momentum to the effort by the U.S. and Britain in the Security Council to get U.N. backing last week for continued firm coalition control of helping Iraqis build a democratic, free-enterprise government
But here come Iraqi Arabs, using the Kurdish leader Barzani as their wedge to evoke faded memories of the Ottoman Empire and to look the Turkish gift horse in the mouth.
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Kurdish leaders reached by cellphone are well aware of the danger of letting their traditional suspicion of Turks poison their well with Americans.
Says one, thinking short-term: "Our pesh merga cannot police the Sunni triangle. If you could work out a way to transport and supply the Turks by ship, without passing through Kurdish lands. . . ." Another, thinking ahead about an alliance with the superpower, goes to the heart of the matter: "If it takes Turkish troops to save American lives, we Kurds should be for it."
It's real simple. We call it genocide. The Kurds are afraid of genocide.
Here's a more rational explaination of why the Iraqis want no part of the Turks
There are all sorts of reasons why people don't like the idea of Turkish troops in the region. First, there's a lot of animosity between the Kurds and Turks; thousands of Kurds faced constant persecution while on Turkish territory- many of them were driven into Iraq. Ever since the beginning of the war, there have been several clashes between Kurdish militias and Turkish troops in northern Iraq.
Second, everyone knows that Turkey has certain interests in the region- namely, Kirkuk and Mosul. Turkey has been overly eager to send in troops ever since the 'end' of the war in April.
Third, Shi'a are adamant about not allowing Turkish troops into Iraq because Turks are predominantly Sunni and the thought of an aggressive Sunni army makes the majority of Shi'a nervous.
One faction of Christian society in Iraq, Armenian-Iraqis, are dead set against having Turkish troops in Iraq. They speak of Turkish occupation, bloodshed, executions and being driven into Iraq. Armenian-Iraqis are horrified with the thought of having Turkish troops inside of Iraq.
Then there are all of the historical reasons. For almost 400 years, Iraq was ruled by the Ottoman Empire.... The Ottoman Rule in Iraq ended in 1918, with the start of the British occupation. Iraqis haven't forgotten that during World War I, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis were forced to fight and die for the Ottoman Empire.
Then there's the little issue of all the problems between Iraq and Turkey. Iraqis still haven't forgotten the infamous Ataturk Dam on the Furat (Euphrates), the fourth largest dam in the world. We had to watch the Euphrates diminish in front of our very eyes year after year, until in many areas, it seemed like nothing more than a stream. In a country that is largely composed of desert land, ebbing the flow of a river that many people depend on for survival is an atrocity.
A memo leaked to USA Today from Donald Rumsfeld gives a completely different picture of our current wars than the one he gives to the steongraphers in his daily briefings. Here it is with annotated comments..
Rumsfeld's war-on-terror memo
Below is the full text of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's memo on the war on terror:
October 16, 2003
TO: Gen. Dick Myers
Paul Wolfowitz
Gen. Pete Pace
Doug Feith
FROM: Donald Rumsfeld
SUBJECT: Global War on Terrorism
The questions I posed to combatant commanders this week were: Are we winning or losing the Global War on Terror? Is DoD changing fast enough to deal with the new 21st century security environment? Can a big institution change fast enough? Is the USG changing fast enough?
DoD has been organized, trained and equipped to fight big armies, navies and air forces. It is not possible to change DoD fast enough to successfully fight the global war on terror; an alternative might be to try to fashion a new institution, either within DoD or elsewhere — one that seamlessly focuses the capabilities of several departments and agencies on this key problem.
Our current forces can't do the job, so now we need to create a new organization to do the job instead of making elementary reforms in everything from weapons training to aquisition.
With respect to global terrorism, the record since Septermber 11th seems to be:
We are having mixed results with Al Qaida, although we have put considerable pressure on them — nonetheless, a great many remain at large.
Because we invaded Iraq instead of manning Afghanistan with two divisions as we should have. The Taliban would have been hard pressed to survive prolonged contact with the three brigades of the 10th Mountain and 101 Airborne. Instead, we deploy brigades and that gives them a nearly 1-1 advantage in manning, despite the differences in training.
USG has made reasonable progress in capturing or killing the top 55 Iraqis.
Who are now completely irrelevant to the worsening political situation in Iraq.
USG has made somewhat slower progress tracking down the Taliban — Omar, Hekmatyar, etc.
Hekamatyar is NOT a Taliban/AQ member, but an independent actor who has close ties to Iranian hardliners. It was him, not Bin Laden, who got the largess of CIA support and training, despite warnings of his true intentions. His name should not be mentioned with Taliban/AQ and they should know that. In fact, his main area of Operations abuts the Iranian border, not Pakistan.
With respect to the Ansar Al-Islam, we are just getting started.
Please. A minor group in Kurdistan with little real pull or power. Considering we've been after them for a year, this is pretty bad
Have we fashioned the right mix of rewards, amnesty, protection and confidence in the US?
Is he on crack? No, seriously. Arabs have newspapers and they can read all about Jerry Boykin and women being disrespected while carrying the Quran. There is only hate for the US in the Arab world.
Does DoD need to think through new ways to organize, train, equip and focus to deal with the global war on terror?
Let's start with our trigger happy infantry and their lack of armored vests.
Are the changes we have and are making too modest and incremental? My impression is that we have not yet made truly bold moves, although we have have made many sensible, logical moves in the right direction, but are they enough?
Bold moves? Try getting water to the troops with decent food. Our logistics system is broken. Let's try fixing that. Let's fix the basics first.
Today, we lack metrics to know if we are winning or losing the global war on terror. Are we capturing, killing or deterring and dissuading more terrorists every day than the madrassas and the radical clerics are recruiting, training and deploying against us?
This is not a numbers battle. America is hated in the Muslim world and is considered to be conducting a war against Islam. Until that changes, recruits will abound.
Does the US need to fashion a broad, integrated plan to stop the next generation of terrorists? The US is putting relatively little effort into a long-range plan, but we are putting a great deal of effort into trying to stop terrorists. The cost-benefit ratio is against us! Our cost is billions against the terrorists' costs of millions.
No shit? Really? NOW you realize this?
Do we need a new organization?
What? A new JSOC? A new CIA? No thanks. We've seen how your Plan B works.
How do we stop those who are financing the radical madrassa schools?
Place a call to our Saudi friends.
Is our current situation such that "the harder we work, the behinder we get"?
We aren't working hard. We're making things worse.
It is pretty clear that the coalition can win in Afghanistan and Iraq in one way or another, but it will be a long, hard slog.
Really? We could win how? We're in a war and we don't know what victory is?
Does CIA need a new finding?
No. It needs an administration which listens to its analysts
Should we create a private foundation to entice radical madradssas to a more moderate course?
Why? They're funded by rich Saudis. Until Pakistan offers free public education, madrassas will provide the only education for most poor people there. Madrassas are not the issue, education is.
What else should we be considering?
Leaving Iraq while we still have an Army.
Please be prepared to discuss this at our meeting on Saturday or Monday.
An attack on a US convoy Sunday highlights concern over Iraq's 50 unsecured arms depots.
By Dan Murphy | Special to The Christian Science Monitor
KARBALA, IRAQ – A roadside attack on US military convoy Sunday in Fallujah, Iraq left an American armored car and munitions truck burning wrecks. No one was reported killed, but some Iraqis nearby were cheering.
The Fallujah attack typifies one of an emerging series of threats apparent since September due to the wide availability of guns and military ordnance here. The result has been a steady supply of explosives to use against coalition soldiers, more Iraqi vigilante justice, and a rise in local militia groups.
One coalition official says that up to 50 major weapons sites across Iraq with bombs, ammunition, and rifles in them are improperly secured and have probably served as a source for the home-made bombs - improvised explosive devices (IEDs) in military parlance - that have become the single biggest security threat to the coalition.
New militias are also being spawned across the country and are increasingly coming into conflict either with the coalition or with other Iraqis.
The most visible militias in recent weeks have been ones aligned to extremist Shiite clerics. Shiite Muslims make up about 60 percent of Iraq's people, and were literally second-class citizens in Saddam Hussein's Iraq. At least seven coalition soldiers - 5 of them Americans - have been killed in clashes with these militias this month.
The availability of weapons to ordinary Iraqis, not just militias, is also a concern. In May, Paul Bremer, the top coalition official here, decided to allow Iraqis to keep AK-47s, with the stipulation that they confine them to their home. But that provision has proven almost impossible to enforce, and gun-toting toughs are now a regular feature on the streets of most of Iraq's cities.
"In my opinion, we'd be a lot better off if we didn't let people keep AK-47s in their homes,'' says Gen. Kadhem Abdul Khalik, the chief of police for Al-Risafa district, which encompasses about half of Baghdad. "Under the old regime, there were a lot fewer guns in private hands, and that made our job easier and safer."
What happened to Maj. Don Tyler was one of the most bizarre things I have reported in my 40 years as a journalist. And the perpetrator was not the terrorist enemy, but the U.S Army.
It was such a shocker, in fact, that even though the man telling me the story was an Air Force special ops navigator who had managed to survive a plane crash 10,000 feet up in Afghanistan’s Hindu Kush mountains that effectively destroyed his left shoulder, I had a hard time believing it. You would, too. Here’s the short version:
Landstuhl Regional Medical Center, the U.S. Army’s premier hospital in Germany is the place where all the high-profile American casualties are taken for treatment on their way home. On Feb. 15, 2002, Landstuhl officials tossed this seriously-injured navigator out of the hospital in the middle of the night, into the rain, wearing nothing but a hospital gown and paper flip-flops, telling him to check into billeting.
His left shoulder had been destroyed in the crash of Ditka 03, his MC-130P, while on a special ops mission refueling MH-47E Chinook helicopters. Every muscle and tendon from front to back had been ripped apart. He was in excruciating pain that was barely controllable by the drugs he’d been given. As anyone who’s ever torn a rotator cuff knows, his ability to do the simplest of tasks – try zipping your fly one-handed – was gone. Yet he told me that Landstuhl, which was oh-so-public about its ministrations to ersatz hero Jessica Lynch, tossed him out on his keester.
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Was it conceivable that the drugs Don Tyler had been given for pain had permanently addled his brain? It was preposterous to think that a hospital whose very name is synonymous with the best medical care the U.S. military can offer would toss a combat injured, hurting, drugged, virtually naked Air Force navigator out into the street on a cold winter night. Or was it?
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Even more shocking than the treatment Tyler didn’t receive at the hands of the vaunted Landstuhl medical team is the fact that Dr. Burlingame wasn’t shocked to hear of it.
“It’s a serious indictment of Landstuhl, and we’ve complained about it. I didn’t realize how bad it was until after I got home and talked to guys that went through Landstuhl. And some guys said, ‘Oh, I got great care there,’ but then you hear about other guys that maybe weren’t ICU – sick as shit – that had this exact same thing happen to them. And to me it was very distressing.
“We see our patients, but we don’t know how they do once they leave us. Interestingly enough, we get zero follow-up from Landstuhl. They won’t return our phone calls. I mean, we’re down at the front lines, making an effort to call back or e-mail back, and they couldn’t give us the time of day. The only time that we’d ever hear anything about our patients is when we’d call back, we’d e-mail back to Walter Reed. Our buddies are back at Reed, and they tell us what was going on with the guys. And that’s only a fraction of all the folks that went out.
“Let me tell you, scary enough, he (Tyler) is one of several that I know of that’s happened to.”
Tyler’s problems weren’t just with the medical treatment at Landstuhl. Once he’d been discharged from the hospital, he had to fight for help arranging his transportation back to Fort Walton Beach, Fla., and his unit at Eglin AFB. He didn’t even have clothes to wear on a civilian flight home; a buddy had to scrounge some donated jeans and a shirt, then lend him a pair of tennis shoes that were one size too small. Tyler had to make his own arrangements to have civilian travel orders faxed from his home unit, he had to ride a van for an extremely painful ninety minutes to the Frankfurt airport, and he had to endure being profiled as a terrorist at both Frankfurt and Atlanta (one way, last-minute ticket; no baggage; dressed poorly, unshaven, obviously on drugs and not communicating well).
Several weeks after Tyler made it back home, he underwent surgery to repair the damage in his left shoulder. More than a year of physical therapy followed, but he has yet to regain the mobility that allowed him to play tennis and golf. Tyler, who was caught on “stop loss” when his plane crashed into the mountains, was medically discharged from the Air Force, with one final insult: neither he nor the other seriously injured crewmen aboard their aircraft were awarded the Purple Heart. The recommendation for the medal was rejected at higher headquarters, because their injuries were “not the direct result of enemy action.”
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Maybe if he’d been in a convoy that had taken a wrong turn – and been a whole lot cuter – Don Tyler would have a Purple Heart to go with his permanently mangled shoulder
We are in the waining days of the current conservative movement. After 30 years, 1973-2003, of conservative economic dogma, American are poorer, less stable, and facing a hostile world.
Bush and the neo-cons are the Black Panthers of conservative theory. They're trying to enact radical schemes which have very little support outside their ranks. Just as conservatism rose during the 1960's as a rejection of extreme liberal radical dogma, with it's praise of Mao and Che and other avowed enemies of the US, the conservative era ends with the US's extreme isolation and ideology rejected by our closest allies.
The conservative mismanagement of the economy has led from a situation where long term growth and expansion was possible to a decline in basic living standards. Full-time employment is now elusive for millions of trained, educated Americans, while a class of paper-rich royalty flaunt their wealth to obscene standards. Not a day passes without a story about one of these people and their antics. Corporate abuse, not of the environment or workers, but of their basic fiduciary duty, leaving loyal employees penniless after decades of work, has undermined the basic support they had among the public.
The military, after years of quiet support for Republicans, find they are living their worst nightmare, fighting an unpopular war with an understength army in a completely hostile environment. The Army watches half it's strength frittered away as policemen, while it is forced to essentially draft thousands of National Guardsmen for prolonged combat duty, losing them the minute their enlistments are up. Instead of the support they thought the GOP would bring, they are watching the army they carefully honed and trained being destroyed before their eyes. The intelligence community, who believed that a Bush Administration would be an ally, finds the White House to be a dangerous, careless enemy, who would risk their most cherished secrets for political points.
The conservative movement's spokesmen are revealed to be promiscious, drug abusing, bullies, ripe for satire and abuse. All their moralizing rings hollow as their foibiles are exposed. The worst sorts of rumors about Bush and his family are confirmed. Nazis, drug using, going AWOL, all depressing, all true.
The one thing that conservatives were supposed to do was protect the US. Instead, Homeland Security is run more like Maxwell Smart was in charge than Tom Ridge. They use the Patriot Act, a misnamed bill if there ever was one, to bludgeon confessions. It's so odious that even the right is sick of its provisions. There has not been one trial of a Al Qaeda cell, while several hundred people sit in our very own gulag in Cuba. The hunt for Osama Bin Laden is now a punchline in jokes. If we could have fought the war in a worst way to get Bin Laden, it is hard to imagine how. Let's invade the one country where Al Qaeda doesn't operate openly and take it over so they know where they can kill our troops. This ridiculous notion is actually being paraded around the US as a reason for the insane war we're fighting in Iraq.
People may bathe in cynicism and worry about rigged elections and public apathy, but the reality is that Bush is the conservatives Carter. The final, ineffective gasp of an increasingly bankrupt and unpopular ideology. Conservativism has delivered nothing its proponents promised, not jobs, not security, not personal freedom. Instead, they have left poverty, insecruity and a hostile world. George Bush has proven to be the worst president possible for these times. When generousity of spirit and creative thinking are most needed, he is the most doctrinare and rigid man we could have chosen for the job. Driven by both a desperate need to be seen as a leader and the complete inability to function as one, Bush cannot create the alliances we need to win or prevent more attacks on us. Given the sympathy we had on 9/12, the present mistrust and hatred of the US is the direct and total creation of Bush's policies and attitudes. Bush's exclusionary and narrow view of the world may fit well in Houston, but it is a total failure for a statesman.
In every way possible, conservative dogma has betrayed the country. Our citizens are less healthy, our nation insecure, our relations strained.
The non-binding vote against Iraq aid is a sign of things to come. The GOP control House, led by Republican luminaries like Dana Rohrbacher, voted to turn all of the Iraq money into a loan, forcing Bush to either sign or veto it, as he threatened. Even Republicans know giving Iraq $20B while people scream about hiked property taxes is no way to keep your seat. Helpful commercials from the DNC remind them of this fact. That money was as popular as a turd in a punch bowl and is a harbinger of a sea change. They may say "we support the president" but they act like he's going down.
As we watch conservatives twitch, spin and turn to avoid their coming collapse, things will get ugly. Anyone who deviates becomes the enemy, any act justified. Which is the true sign of the coming of the end. And the end of the conservative era is coming faster than most of us can see.
Atrios brings up the Elizabeth Smart case because they're making some bullshit TV movie about it and it's one of the most dishonest spectacles I've seen in some time.
Everyone wants to pretend she was kidnapped, held for months and then was "rescued".
Which is about as close to the truth as Santa Claus delivering gifts on Easter.
First, Smart wasn't kidnapped. The police and parents want to say this because it makes sense, even though it doesn't. The kidnapper had to have navigated around a dark house with men, not make any noise, take a teenage girl and risk getting shot. Now, maybe it's me, but the only people I know who would take that risk are meth freaks or SAS/Delta troopers. The schmo who took her didn't look like he'd been at Ft. Bragg lately. Normal people couldn't do it without help. And he had it, from her.
Second, this was about sex. She was 14 and this guy wanted a young bride. The whole relationship could only exist sexually. He didn't have a weapon, he didn't fill her with drugs, he called her his "wife". It's not the most appealing picture, but come on, she lived in the woods, she wore disguises, she begged for money in public. She was a cute 14 year old living in a stiffling household. The idea that she "remained pure", as her father said, is comical. She ran off with this guy. Now, I'm not saying that she was prepared for a sexual relationship with an adult, nor that he was sane, but when the trial starts, they're going to be quite shocked at the level of complicity of Smart in her "kidnapping".
"Good girls" as Smart was defined, are often the most likely to take a risk. See, if you've been around a little, you know how guys are. If your parents keep you locked up like veal, you have no idea that some men are going to play you.
The parents, of course, want to see her as a victim. Our poor little girl, kidnapped by some awful man who did god knows what. Well, in the real world, 14 year old girls have sex. They choose lovers and perform oral sex and some times same sex partners. No one wants their child hurt, but the reality is she was of the age to make that choice, no matter how her parents felt. I think that she was making a choice, a hellaciously bad one, but a choice all the same. TV has an institutional interest in the same image. The idea of a 14 year old making a sexually conscious choice is one which scares the hell out of adults. But that doesn't mean they don't make them.
The Smart case is going to be different than we think. We've been told it's about a kidnapping. But even a cursory examination of the facts makes that ridiculous. It's about something far less pleasant, a 14 year old girl being seduced and led away by a much older man, who then used her sexually, with her complicity on some level. No one, not the parents, not the Mormon establishment or the general public are eager to face that. The reality is about sex, not kidnapping.
Few of More Than 30 Absent Troops Offer Explanation
By Steve Vogel
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, October 21, 2003; Page A20
More than 30 soldiers who came home from Iraq for two weeks of leave have failed to show up for their flights back to the combat zone, military officials said yesterday.
The soldiers, among more than 1,300 troops so far in the first large-scale home leave program since Vietnam, have yet to be declared absent without leave -- a violation of military law, said Army Col. Paris Mack, the Pentagon official overseeing the program.
A week after return flights began, 28 soldiers had not made it to Baltimore-Washington International Airport for the journey back to Iraq, said Air Force Maj. Mike Escudie, a spokesman for the U.S. Central Command in Tampa. Six others did not make yesterday evening's flight out of BWI for unknown reasons, said Lt. Col. Robert Hagen, an Army spokesman.
Escudie said "a small number" have been granted emergency extensions by military commanders because of extenuating circumstances, including deaths in the family. Military officials could not say how many presented valid reasons or how many others had failed to contact authorities.
"Many of them are understandable due to illnesses or canceled airline flights," Escudie said. One soldier was unable to board his flight to BWI because he lost his wallet, while another had a sick baby, Hagen said.
But a military advocacy group cited two cases in which service members called to say they do not want to return to the long and difficult mission in Iraq.
"Ultimately, every one of these cases will be looked into and there will be a determination if there are any mitigating circumstances," said Marine Maj. Pete Mitchell, a Central Command spokesman.
If it was good enough for Bush, it's good enough for regular soldiers. I guess some folks just had enough of Iraq and daily killing. See, in Vietnam, only married men got to go to Hawaii. Everyone else was kept in the Far East and they still had desertions.
Tuesday, October 21, 2003 Posted: 9:23 AM EDT (1323 GMT)
TALLAHASSEE, Florida (CNN) -- The Florida House late Monday intervened to save the life of a severely brain damaged woman whose feeding tube was removed last week under court order at her husband's request. The lawmakers authorized Gov. Jeb Bush to order that the tube be reinserted.
By a vote of 68-23, the GOP-controlled House approved a bill giving Bush authority to issue a one-time order to reinsert the feeding tube that has nourished Terry Schiavo, 39, since she fell into what doctors call a persistent vegetative state after suffering heart failure in 1990.
The Republican-dominated Senate will take up the measure Tuesday, and Bush has indicated that he will quickly sign the bill if it passes. He would have 15 days to act.
The feeding tube, which supplies Schiavo with nutrition and hydration, was removed last Wednesday, after a lengthy and contentious court battle pitting her husband and legal guardian, Michael, against her parents, Bob and Mary Schindler.
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Michael Schiavo asked that the tube be removed because his wife made it clear before her collapse that she did not want to live on life support and because she has no meaningful hope of recovery. Her parents dispute that contention, insisting that despite her medical condition, she still responds to them and could improve with rehabilitative care.
The Schindlers accuse Michael Schiavo, who collected more than $1 million in malpractice settlements stemming from his wife's collapse, of trying to remove the tube so that he can keep the money and pursue a new relationship. He denies the charge, countering that his in-laws are angry because they didn't receive any of the money
A typically ugly family dispute turned in to constitutional crisis. Jeb, looking to score points with the right-to-lifers, is using this family to make his points. Florida law and the courts have already ruled that the husband can decide on the care his wife gets. This isn't two weeks, but 13 years and it is cruel, if nothing else, to force him to keep her alive. An ex post facto decision to allow Bush to intervene is even more cruel and will only be turned down by the court.
The woman is a vegetable. She has no chance to function in anything like a normal manner. But the parents want to control her life and Jeb Bush is more than willing to use him. This is a decision in which government has already been too deeply involved. More government involvement won't make this any better.
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It's worth reading the rest of last week's speech, beyond the offensive 28 words. Most of it is criticism directed at other Muslims, clerics in particular. Mr. Mahathir castigates "interpreters of Islam who taught that acquisition of knowledge by Muslims meant only the study of Islamic theology." Thanks to these interpreters, "the study of science, medicine, etc. was discouraged. Intellectually the Muslims began to regress." A lot of the speech sounds as if it had been written by Bernard Lewis, author of "What Went Wrong," the best-selling book about the Islamic decline.
So what's with the anti-Semitism? Almost surely it's part of Mr. Mahathir's domestic balancing act, something I learned about the last time he talked like this, during the Asian financial crisis of 1997-98.
At that time, rather than accept the austerity programs recommended by the U.S. government and the I.M.F., he loudly blamed machinations by Western speculators, and imposed temporary controls on the outflow of capital — a step denounced by all but a handful of Western economists. As it turned out, his economic strategy was right: Malaysia suffered a shallower slump and achieved a quicker recovery than its neighbors
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And that's what he was doing last week. Not long ago Washington was talking about Malaysia as an important partner in the war on terror. Now Mr. Mahathir thinks that to cover his domestic flank, he must insert hateful words into a speech mainly about Muslim reform. That tells you, more accurately than any poll, just how strong the rising tide of anti-Americanism and anti-Semitism among Muslims in Southeast Asia has become. Thanks to its war in Iraq and its unconditional support for Ariel Sharon, Washington has squandered post-9/11 sympathy and brought relations with the Muslim world to a new low
I guess the Times has a quota for village idiots and since Andrew Sullivan is too busy pining for gay marriage, David Brooks has been slated to take his place. Brooks, the proto-typical yuppie scum snob, embarasses himself in his new Times column. I've generally ignored his condescending racism and overall comic stupidity but when I read this, I was, well, not stunned, but amused leaning towards irritation. While not as bad as his misunderstanding of baseball or Puerto Ricans in Chicago, this is pretty bad. Spy used to edescrive Abe Rosenthal as "writing as bad as a I can". I hereby nominate David Brooks for the new recipient of that title.
Brooks is such an idiot, Paul Krugman spanked him, hard, in a recent column.
John Edwards has the most persuasive theory. He argues that most voters do not place candidates on a neat left-right continuum. But they are really good at sensing who shares their values. They are really good at knowing who respects them and who doesn't. Edwards's theory is that the Democrats' besetting sin over the past few decades has been snobbery.
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His campaign is based on the argument that the Democrats need to nominate a person from Middle America, not from the coastal educated class. "My campaign is a different Democratic campaign," Edwards said in his announcement speech. "Not only will I run for the real America, I will run in the real America. . . . Democrats too often act like rural America is just someplace to fly over between a fund-raiser in Manhattan and a fund-raiser in Beverly Hills."
Edwards draws an implicit contrast between himself and Howard Dean and John Kerry by pointing out that he worked for everything he has. He loaded trucks to pay for college. "It didn't hurt me at all," he says.
He draws an explicit contrast with George Bush, arguing that the Bush administration rewards wealth and punishes work. This is not about economics, he says; it's about values. The Bush administration disrespects working Americans. It lowers taxes for people who sit around the pool and collect capital gains, while shifting the burden to people who wake up early, work hard and hope to get rich.
Obviously Edwards's campaign has not caught fire. (Although it is far too early to count him out. One thing I learned last week in Iowa is that voters are far more interested in Gephardt, Kerry and Edwards than we in the national media.) But that doesn't mean Edwards's theory is wrong, or that Democratic primary voters accurately understand their plight. When I interviewed people during the 2000 campaign I found many voters preferred Democratic policies to Republican ones. But they didn't trust Al Gore because they thought he looked down on them. They felt Bush could come to their barbershop and fit right in.
OK, let's get back to reality. Edwards has a very small public record compared to Al Sharpton, forget Howard Dean. Second, he's one of the richest trial lawyers in America. He may have worked his way through college, but so did Bill Clinton. It's not exactly a virtue. Snobbery? Hell, it's question mark if he'd be reelected in his own home state, forget running for President.
Edwards is only spewing this bullshit because his campaign is stalled like a rusted Chevy. He can't raise money in New York or California. This coastal stuff is bullshit demographically, if Brooks had bothered to check. If you look at a demographic map, the bulk of the US population lies in two major belts, along the northeast coast from Maine to Virginia and in California, home of one out of every eight Americans. Snobery my ass. Any campaign which cannot raise money along the coasts isn't much of a campaign.
Bush pretends to be affable, but as David "Axis of Evil" Frum wrote, the real Bush is an aloof, hostile man not given to pleasantries or introspection. Petty, mean, vengful, are all adjectives which can be used to describe Bush, and that's just from his public acts.
The Republicans don't just look down on people, they advocate policies which suggest they think they're really peasants. The idea, ever so carefully implanted by Republican-dominated media, especially talk radio, is that the Dems are not really there to protect you, but the darkies, fags, illegal alien scum and everyone who doesn't live in your pleasant subdivision. That they'll take some uneducated jungle bunny and give them your job, send their uncontrollable kids to your schools and have them fuck your daughters. That's what we're talking about. Not snobbery.
Of course, reality, and David Brooks, hopping from latte to bistro to apple martini has little grasp of it, is quite different. The GOP's policies are, of course, creating a new royal class of corporate CEO's and their children. You do understand that the children of todays CEO's are of course going to live lives of unparalleled luxury off of your dad's retirement money. Ken Lay's grandkids will have nothing denied them, while your dad, who froze his ass off in Korea, worked as a gas line repairman for 30 years and then had his money stolen, will be fueling their latest binge. So while some CEO's spawn is snorting coke and slamming Dutch hookers, you can meditate on the snobbery of the Democratic party.
So while your son is playing dodge the RPG in his Humvee in Iraq, because his only way to college was through Baghdad, you can read about Jenna and Babs buying $250 bottles of Absolute in a bottle club and how the Secret Service has to ignore their "escapades." So remember, it's the Democratic Party, with all those union members and working people, who are the real snobs and the GOP represents you, as their kids spend your dad's retirement money on whores and coke.
Richard Sarkis and David Kinsley were juniors at Williams College, surfing the net for a cheap source for their economics textbook, when they discovered a little known economic fact: the very same college textbooks used in the United States sell for half price — or less — in England.
Just like prescription drugs, textbooks cost far less overseas than they do in the United States. The publishing industry defends its pricing policies, saying that foreign sales would be impossible if book prices were not pegged to local market conditions.
But many Americans do not see it that way. The National Association of College Stores has written to all the leading publishers asking them to end a practice they see as an unfair to American students.
"We think it's frightening, and it's wrong, that the same American textbooks our stores buy here for $100 can be shipped in from some other country for $50," said Laura Nakoneczny, a spokeswoman for the association. "It represents price-gouging of the American public generally and college students in particular
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The differences are often significant: "Lehninger Principles of Biochemistry, Third Edition," for example, lists for $146.15 on the American Amazon site, but can be had for $63.48, plus $8.05 shipping, from the British one. And "Linear System Theory and Design, Third Edition" is $110 in the United States, but $41.76, or $49.81 with shipping, in Britain.
Many college bookstores, meanwhile, have taken matters into their own hands, arranging their own overseas purchases.
Drugs, textbooks, yet another example how America's free market system funds benefits for Europeans. There's a bone simple reason books are half the price in Europe as they are in the US, European governments won't buy them if they cost too much. Americans provide the profit on European sales. Since Americans don't know that they're covering those costs, they pay them without question.
But remember, the free market system is the best system. Coming to Iraq, soon.
Tony Blair believes that he may have triggered his heart scare by drinking too much strong continental coffee at the European Union summit in Brussels last week.
Downing Street said Mr Blair started to feel unwell at 9.30am on Sunday, but it is understood that he felt "breathless" on Friday after returning to Chequers, his country retreat, from the two-day summit. He worked normally at Chequers on Saturday and felt fine when he hosted a monthly dinner there, but felt queasy on Sunday morning and a doctor was called.
A Blair aide told The Independent: "He is saying that he drank a lot of coffee at the summit. He obviously felt the need for it to keep him going. It is possible that he had too much strong, continental coffee. Perhaps he should have stuck to herbal tea."
Maybe it was his guilt at driving David Kelly to suicide and his ghost is haunting him. Or maybe it's the ghosts of dead British soldiers coming back for their due. Either way, coffee is the least reason for Blair to feel tense.
Turmoil in court as US sniper suspect conducts own defence
Suzanne Goldenberg in Washington
Tuesday October 21, 2003
The Guardian
The trial of the man charged with last year's sniper shootings in the Washington area was thrown into turmoil yesterday when the accused began conducting his own defence.
With his life in the balance, John Allen Muhammad, 42, delivered a rambling opening statement, with reflections on the meaning of truth and how he once wrongly accused his daughter of raiding a biscuit jar.
The decision to defend himself - approved by the presiding judge after a five-minute courtroom conversation - puts Mr Muhammad's life in peril.
The US attorney general, John Ashcroft, ordered the trial to take place in Virginia, which has carried out the highest number of executions of any state after Texas, and legal experts predicted yesterday that the defendant's decision would threaten his chance of an acquittal.
Mr Muhammad, a Gulf war veteran who prides himself on his ability to maintain outward control, appeared reasonably calm as he launched his defence. However, he was reluctant at first to directly address the fact that he stood accused of murder.
"One of the things we're here for today is to find out what everyone wants to know. What happened?" he said. "There's three truths. The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. I always thought there was just one truth
This is not going to be anything like a fair trial. Muhammad is well, a fucking loon, and him being his own lawyer is so unfair as to begger the mind. None of the US media reported the wacky shit he said in court, which is interesting. Look for the circus to commence.
If I wrote a piece which described all white men as tools of the devil and despoilers of the black race, most of you would be pissed. You'd wonder why you supported my site if I could write something like that. Or you would think I was crazy. Either way, you'd be embarassed for me.
When Gregg Easterbrook wrote a review of Kill Bill, the new Tarantino move, he wrote that Harvey Weinstein and Michael Eisner were "Jewish executives [who] worship money above all else". He was then shocked to find out that ESPN fired him.
Come on. Do you really have to debate that he doesn't much like Jews? He whips out the Shylock canard so fast it would make Julius Streicher's head spin. What's next, an interview with David Irving and Ernst Zundel?
There are a lot of things you can accuse Michael Eisner of being, a control freak who needs to retire, for one. And that Harvey Weinstein has an obsession with Gwyneth Paltrow which is well...interesting. But it never occured to me to call them, in essence, money grubbing Jews for doing their jobs. They're supposed to make money and in fact, they're lucky when they do. Anyone who knows the movie business would know it's not for people who are addicted to cash. That's for WASPs on Wall Street. These guys spend money and if they make it back, well, that's a good day. And to be fair, neither Disney nor Miramax, named after Weinstein's parents, are the worst offenders in churning out schlock. I don't think Toy Story and Lilo and Stitch are examples of greed-based movie making. And given Miramax's risky films, they certainly aren't churning out crap for money.
So he was wrong in his assertions and really wrong to bring up their race. Is Ron Howard a greedy Jew as well?
There are a lot of casual bigots in this world. They hide their bigotry until confronted with it. Suddenly you date someone not of your race and they exclude them from everything. Or they make a snide comment when you say something. You never know with people.
It's really sad to all these people, especially at The New Republic, leaping to their pet's defense.
We have known Easterbrook for many years, and we wish to say without doubt or hesitation that he is not an anti-Semite. Indeed, he is a person of high integrity. He has written prolifically and thoughtfully and with great erudition on many subjects, including science, the environment, politics, and religion; and the moral sensibility that appears in his writings is that of tolerance and open-mindedness. The many editors and writers who have worked with him over the decades of his career--at Time, Newsweek, The New Yorker, The Atlantic Monthly, and The Washington Monthly, to name but a few--can all attest not only to his talent, but to his character
Please. They're just embarassed to think he had contempt for Jews all the years they've known him and then revealed what was really in his heart. No person who wasn't an anti-semite would even think in those terms. I simply can't imagine writing those words, unless we were talking about faith. And he wasn't. Of course they're defending him. They don't have any choice. They would look absolutely foolish if they didn't. They wouldn't knowingly hire someone who thinks of Jews differently than other people. But the evidence is there in black and white.
"But he seems like such a nice guy" is the quote everyone uses to describe someone accused of a heinous act. People still call Jesse Jackson an anti-semite for using the term "hymie town" to describe New York. Yet, when Easterbrook calls two executives Jews who worship money, there is all manner of spin to deal with what he said. He didn't stutter, he didn't stammer, he wrote what he wrote.
Let's make it simple: what he wrote was bigotted, factually wrong and deservedly got him fired. You can spin it left or right, up or down, but it's an nakedly anti-semitic statement and all the apologies afterward won't change that fact.
With 6,000 dead, wounded and injured in six months, Operation Iraqi Freedom is turning into one of the bloodiest campaigns in US history. People have compared the war to Vietnam, and they would be right. Total casualities from Vietnam averaged about 1042 per month, but given the pace of war, this was clearly higher from 1965 to 1971. But considering that the war lasted 14 years, this averages the deaths for each year.
Korea was a much bloodier affair, with 4300 killed, wounded and injured per month. World War II created 2200 wounded, killed and injured per month.
What is clear that with each war, the number of wounded to killed has increased over the last 100 years. In World War I, the ratio was 1.7 soldiers were wounded for every one killed. Add in the Spanish Flu, and more died of disease than in the months of combat the US faced.
In World War II, three soldiers were wounded for every two killed from all causes. This includes loading dock accidents as well as sniper attacks. Why the increase? Better medicine, better transportation, doctors working close to or even on the battlefield, better equipment.
In Korea, for every three soldiers wounded, one was killed. The introduction of mobile hospitals, blood plasma, helicopter transport and most importantly, protective vests, limited the number of dead.
The ratio is the same for Vietnam, which had improvements on personal protection and transport, but an enemy which relied on mines and booby traps as offensive weapons, as well as ambushes. Korea was much more intensive combat over a shorter time.
Now, the ratio is about 6:1 wounded to killed. Even better transport, medicine and protective gear has limited casualities from Iraqi attacks, which is the good news. The bad news, Iraq and the Iraqis have inflicted a level of casuality fast approaching the average in Vietnam, if I had to guess, close to 1966 levels.
This is bad news for a number of reasons:
One, the enemy is dispsersed and not organized. There is no NVA or KNPA with sanctuaries and outside support and professional infantry. It is small band of guerrillas without heavy artillery or any armor, organized in small groups. They have repeatedly shown an ability to adapt and change to meet the military requirements of the situation.
Two, US forces are simply unable to adapt to the environment and face a growing, not receeding threat. As the enemy gets more organized and draws from disgruntled former Iraqi Army members, their proficiency can only grow.
Three, the lack of a government makes building local forces to support the Americans both difficult and unlikely. Even as we form the units, their loyalty is likely to remain with the local opposition, especially given the poor raport between US soldiers and Iraqi police.
While the Administration wants to claim things are getting better, there is every reason to believe that Iraq, given a full year of occupation, could exceed Vietnam era monthly averages for wounded and killed. No matter how we define it or argue about it, the scale of casualities and combat, Iraq is not an occupied country, but a country at war.
WASHINGTON - The Bush administration believes it is on track to collect a satisfactory amount of international aid for Iraq (news - web sites)'s reconstruction through 2007, the Pentagon (news - web sites)'s top financial officer said Monday.
Dov Zakheim, who is heading the Pentagon delegation to this week's Iraq donors' conference in Madrid, Spain, cited Japan's promise of multi-year contributions, starting with $1.5 billion in 2004.
"If the pattern that has been started by the Japanese and others is maintained and is replicated over these next few years, we'll be in good shape," Zakheim said in an interview in his Pentagon office.
The administration is projecting total overall needs for Iraq of $55 billion through 2007, of which $20 billion will be U.S. funds. It expects Iraq's oil revenues to contribute between $15 billion and $18 billion, leaving $17 billion to $20 billion to come from other countries.
Remember, Bush and his team thought the occupation would last three months and Chalabi would be popular.
Howard Stern is in his glory mocking Rush Limbaugh's little hillbilly heroin problem. The racist pig pill popper's stint in rehab is of much satisafaction to Stern, as it is to millions of other Americans, tired of his sanctimony and judgments.
But it occured to me, that he's probably never had Big Fun.
I think the term comes from Hunter Thompson, who has definitely had his share of Big Fun.
What is Big Fun?
Well, if you've had it, you know what I mean. It's sitting at a bar with a jack and coke in your hand, beer chaser on the bar and someone in a skimpy dress on your lap. Or you're at the craps table, making points (and money) while your friends are as well. Or when you stagger into a cab, come home, strip your clothes off, hit the bed and pull the blinds. By the time you wake up, you're eating eggs while the second inning starts and Tim McCarver is talking about how scary Bob Gibson was. Or you roll over and you aren't quite sure if her name is Amber, Heather or Linda, but you know her friend's name is Diane and she's staring at herself in your mirror.
That's Big Fun.
Can you imagine Rush having Big Fun? Playing penis tag with a couple of hookers and a bottle of Cristal? Or lying around, not completely sure if he's going to hell for having sex with twins?
Please. Ted Kennedy, Bill Clinton, they've had Big Fun. Strom Thurmond dedicated his life to Big Fun. Ben Affleck had so much Big Fun he had to go into rehab. Frank Sinatra defined Big Fun. Rush Limbaugh wouldn't know Big Fun if it hit him in the ass and called him Charlie.
That's what so funny. Rush developed a drug habit and he had no fun. He was reduced to feeling up his average-looking, married housekeeper. His wife, clearly happy to spend his money, seemed less than concerned. I mean, if you had his millions, wouldn't you have a hot young housekeeper in skimpy clothes? But the fact was he was a shlub. He always way and always will be. He doesn't do coke, he does prescription drugs and plays golf. He molests his housekeeper and bullies her for dope. He's the kind of guy who watches Showgirls and wonders why they wear so much makeup. It's so pathetic it's funny.
Then you have Bill Bennett, slots man. My mother plays slots. She's a retiree. Bennett is a millionaire. So what does he do? Play the sucker's bet. Slots are designed to suck money down like Rush taking Oxy Contin. Only old ladies and people who don't like gambling play slots. I can imagine poor Bill Bennett, escaping his harridan wife, having waitresses fawn all over him, giving him booze, slinking back and forth between his room and the high value slots.
Is that Big Fun? At a Vegas casino? I can play slots on my computer.
If Bill Bennett was a real man, he'd be betting the hard way at the craps table and if his huevos were especially hard boiled, he'd sit down at the Texas Hold 'Em table and play a few hands. If you don't have a TV, Texas Hold 'Em is all the rage. You get two cards and the table gets five. Whoever has the best hand wins. It's all about the cards and bluffing. A real hard core gambling game. It is Big Fun.
Bennett did not have Big Fun. He sat like a zombie pulling a lever in a game weighted to make the house money. His isolation, his sort of robotic quest is not Big Fun. Then, of course, he made the ridiculous claim he'd won money playing slots. Which sent gamblers into fits of laughter. You do not win at slots. You merely get lucky. Bill Bennett had $8m of unlucky.
What is amusing is to see these tortured defenses. Arnie may be a mysoginist pig, but the man had Big Fun. People will always defend Big Fun, even if they minimize it. But in this case, these guys were shlubs who didn't even enjoy themselves. They spent their days being scolds and telling people how to live. So when they "cut loose" it was a spectacle worthy of humor. Rush demanding more "cabbage", Bennett sitting huddled over a slot in the dead of night.
Yeesh. If you're going to sin, you might as well go all the way. Now if Bennett had topped off his Vegas trips with a trip to the Bunny Ranch, you could at least respect his debauchery. But the slots? Come on. Why not just go to AC on the Greyhound?
You would think Bush had Big Fun, but what started out as Big Fun would get mean and dark. Bush on a bender was probably both sad and mean. Sure, he might have had some Mexican whores on tap and coke, but he wasn't having fun, he was escaping. You know, Dean Martin went home and was a devoted father. Frank loved his kids. Sure, he had Big Fun, but it had its time and place. Bush, well, he was always sloppy, drunk and mean. He needed to be drunk. Big Fun is only fun when you limit it. When all you do is have Big Fun, you usually turn into a degenerate. The reigning king of Big Fun, Hugh Hefner, worked for years, hard. He runs a business based on Big Fun, but it is a business. Bush never enjoyed his Big Fun, it was just so he could stick out from dad.
All you can say about Rush and Bill is that they are small men who hide from the world. They have no fun. Big or small.
AUSTIN -- The chairwoman of the Texas Republican Party, who once said some low-income families should pay for their own children's health insurance, was named Friday as the director of a state foundation created to meet the needs of the less fortunate in Texas.
Gov. Rick Perry named Susan Weddington, chairwoman of the Republican Party of Texas, as the first director of the OneStar Foundation.
"I know this, when we give of ourselves to help others, it brings a satisfaction to the spirit like nothing else can," Weddington said. "And government must reorganize and encourage the vital role of volunteerism in meeting people's needs and fostering a culture of caring."
The creation of the foundation is in line with the governor's goal, as outlined in his inaugural speech, to have Texans step forward and volunteer to help Texans in need.
"That's what the OneStar Foundation is really about, bringing people who have needs together with people who have time, who have their resources, who want to help but may not know where to go," Perry said.
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Last April, Weddington defended proposed state budget cuts that, at the time, would have removed 250,000 low-income children from the Children's Health Insurance Program. The proposal would have tightened eligibility for the program to 150 percent of the federal poverty level, which last year would have been an annual income of $27,150 for a family of four.
"If you're used to getting a government subsidy, you don't like it when you don't get it," Weddington told Republican leaders in a conference call at the time. "But it doesn't mean you're going to be harmed. It doesn't mean you're going to be without any other options."
She said families whose children are removed from the program would have to purchase their own insurance and "maybe have a little less disposable income or a little less inheritance from Mom and Dad."
Inheritance? What, a rusted Chevy and a shotgun? Jesus, this is kinda like reading Tom Metzger has been made a board member of the Museum of Tolerance. My God, what world does this woman live in? Inheretance. Yeah, right. I'm sure all those poor folks in North Dallas and in El Paso and the Fifth Ward of Houston plan to pass down their worldly goods and have extra money for health insurance. Yep. That's what crossed my mind. Amazing
The Army culture is like other cultures, with its own values and expectations. When judging the comments of former generals and colonels on Clark, you have to understand that he stood out. As a golden boy, first at his class at West Point, and a Rhodes Scholar, he stood apart from the hardscrabble world of the combat arms.
To understand the social phenomenon of the US Army, you need to understand one thing about most officers, they come from the working and lower middle classes. There is a "good 'ol boy" culture where modesty and humility are expected. The most respected officers are those who do the hardest jobs in combat and make a point of being retiring. While Patton is admired for his skill, it is Bradley admired for his modesty and lack of pretention. MacArthur, while clearly both brave and brilliant, was detested by his peers, absolutely loathed for his dramatic tendencies.
The easiest way to understand the Army's values is a book, Once an Eagle by Anton Meyer. Originally published in 1968, this is the story of two officers, Sam Damon and Courtney Massengale. Damon is promoted from the ranks and becomes a general. Along the way, he's given a bunch of hard, demanding jobs, earning the respect and love of his men. Massengale proves to be a selfish, indifferent officer who uses connections to get ahead. The Army's leaders so prized this book, out of print copies were husbanded by career officers. Demand for the book, spurred oddly by the Marines reading list, caused the book to be reissued. When Army officers want to suggest a lack of character among their peers, he's quickly dubbed a Massengale, and everyone knows what you mean.
That is clearly the way some people feel about Clark, especially those who served mostly in combat units in their careers.
In an institution filled with ambitious men, some viewed Clark as over the top, someone who would do or say anything to get ahead -- and get his way. Notably, the Army hierarchy did not officially recommend Clark for some of his most prestigious posts: the 1996 Southern Command, overseeing Latin America and the Caribbean, and his appointment as supreme allied commander, Europe, overseeing NATO forces. The recommendations came over the Army's objections from Gen. John M. Shalikashvili, then chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and from senior Pentagon civilians.
"You have to look at a whole leadership picture," said retired Army Chief of Staff Dennis J. Reimer, who was among those who recommended others over Clark. "Subordinates and peers have considered him ambitious to a fault. It's not to say ambition is a not good trait, but in the Army we look for officers who have a balance of selfless service and ambition."
"All of his gifts are undercut by his relentless need to be front and center, to always make it all about him winning -- rather than the mission," said one former government official who was at odds with Clark during the Kosovo war.
Some allies attribute Clark's problems to simple jealousies. Clark was an unusual breed of soldier, they said, an extraordinary intellect in a good ol' boy culture. "Wes was just a bit too smart and too pretty for Army infantry," retired Gen. Barry R. McCaffrey said.
McCaffrey and others track Clark's internal problems to early glowing publicly -- an Esquire article in the late '70s that called him "probably the most brilliant junior officer now on active duty," a 1981 Washington Post magazine piece that declared the young officer "the best the Army has to offer."
"He committed the sin of fame," said Jack Wheeler, a West Point classmate and friend. But Wheeler added, "It's hard for Wes to admit a mistake. He is so confident in his ability that sometimes he rushes to judgment. He doesn't understand why he is not perceived as someone who is just trying to do the right thing."
Clark's tenure at NATO may be the most illustrative case. He became the first allied commander to run and win a war -- and still lose his command.
Joe Conason heard a report on NPR about Clark's career and attacked the people who made the charges. I wrote Conason and told him it wasn't as simple as that. Wes Clark has no monopoly on courage in combat or a distinguished career. All of his peers deserve the same respect he gets for his service. Hugh Shelton was running a Special Forces A Team while Clark was drinking beer at the Oxford Student Union.
What I think it comes down to is that the peers who like him, really like him. They see his gifts and they trust him. But those that don't.. think he's a squirrely ass-kisser who will do anything to get ahead. And this isn't just an opinion among generals, but from civilians and senior enlisted men. Some think he's the greatest man they served with, some wouldn't trust him to burn leaves. I would not jump to any conclusion about him based on the opinions of his peers alone. Some like the guy, some don't trust him. But it doesn't mean either side is completely right.
Reduction in U.S. Troops Eyed for '04 Gradual Exit Strategy Tied to Iraq's Stability
By Thomas E. Ricks
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, October 19, 2003; Page A01
U.S. military commanders have developed a plan to steadily cut back troop levels in Iraq next year, several senior Army officers said in recent interviews.
There are now 130,000 U.S. troops in Iraq. The plan to cut that number is well advanced and has been described in broad outline to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld but has not yet been approved by him. It would begin to draw down forces next spring, cutting the number of troops to fewer than 100,000 by next summer and then to 50,000 by mid-2005, officers involved in the planning said.
The plan, which amounts to being the first formal military exit strategy for Iraq, is designed to show how the U.S. presence might be reduced without undercutting the stability of the country. Military officials worry that if they do not begin cutting the size of the U.S. force, they could damage troop morale, leave the armed forces shorthanded if crises emerge in North Korea and elsewhere, and help create a long-term personnel shortage in the service.
At the same time, some of the people involved in the discussions said they consider the force reduction plan optimistic, as much a goal as a guaranteed outcome
Sure, sure.
Look, this is as likely to happen as the full scale, burn and run withdrawal of US forces from Iraq.
First, it is vital to call up the Iraqi Army and the national police force, at least up to mid-officer level. The coalition's early decision to abolish the army and police was well intended, but it unfortunately resulted in a security vacuum that let criminals, die-hards of the former regime and international terrorists flourish. And the coalition's plan to build a 20,000-member lightly armed force mostly responsible for security and border control would make poor use of a valuable resource: the 300,000 Iraqi soldiers who simply went home with their weapons in the face of the American-led invasion.
Most of these soldiers are Iraqi patriots who chose not to fight for Saddam Hussein. Americans should not confuse the Iraqi Army with the hated Republican Guard, which Saddam Hussein created precisely because he distrusted the legitimate military. In one simple process, the coalition authority can support the governing council to call the army back to its barracks for retraining and, ultimately, for redeployment. Most soldiers and their officers will proudly return to their units and contribute to their country's future.
The coalition and the Iraqi Interior Ministry can vet officers to remove those who committed crimes under the old regime, and then rapidly redeploy the most capable units to work with, and progressively relieve, American troops of security duties. Iraqi Army units have an established chain of command and esprit de corps. Not only can they be recalled to barracks immediately, but it would be much easier and quicker to retrain and re-equip them within their existing organizational structure than to start from scratch.
By supporting the recall of army units, the United States would not only speed the process of relieving the burden on its troops, it would also gain substantial good will in Iraq. In contrast, any American-led military presence, even if complemented by the United Nations, will never have the credibility and legitimacy that the Iraqi Army has among the people.
In addition, the Iraqi national police must also be recalled. Most Iraqi policemen — as opposed to Saddam Hussein's feared intelligence and security organs — are dedicated to law and order. The United States does not have the time or money to create a police force from the ground up, nor is it necessary, because we have a large, organized force that is ready and willing to serve.
Makes too much sense to happen. He doesn't get it. Chalabi and the exiles wanted the Army and police out of the way so they could seize power without organized opposition. Then they would rebuild the Army to serve them. Didn't count on the Sadr and Hakim families, did he. Now that they're embarked on emasculating Iraq, they're not going to turn back. They want an Iraqi police to repress Iraqis, not protect them.
Who knew, that beneath her skirts, Barbara Bush had the heart of the Great Santini. Yeesh. If Georgie Anne Geyer won't play psychoanalyst, here's a psychoanalyst who will.
So George, how do you feel about your mom and dad?
Psychologist Oliver James analyses the behaviour of the American president
Tuesday September 2, 2003
The Guardian
As the alcoholic George Bush approached his 40th birthday in 1986, he had achieved nothing he could call his own. He was all too aware that none of his educational and professional accomplishments would have occured without his father. He felt so low that he did not care if he lived or died. Taking a friend out for a flight in a Cessna aeroplane, it only became apparent he had not flown one before when they nearly crashed on take-off. Narrowly avoiding stalling a few times, they crash-landed and the friend breathed a sigh of relief - only for Bush to rev up the engine and take off again.
Not long afterwards, staring at his vomit-spattered face in the mirror, this dangerously self-destructive man fell to his knees and implored God to help him and became a teetotalling, fundamentalist Christian. David Frum, his speechwriter, described the change: "Sigmund Freud imported the Latin pronoun id to describe the impulsive, carnal, unruly elements of the human personality. [In his youth] Bush's id seems to have been every bit as powerful and destructive as Clinton's id. But sometime in Bush's middle years, his id was captured, shackled and manacled, and locked away."
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A direct and loutish challenge to his father's posh sensibility came aged 25, after he had drunkenly crashed a car. "I hear you're looking for me," he sneered at his father, "do you want to go mano a mano, right here?"
As he grew older, the fury towards his father was increasingly directed against himself in depressive drinking. But it was not all his father's fault. There was also his insensitive and domineering mother.
Barbara Bush is described by her closest intimates as prone to "withering stares" and "sharply crystalline" retorts. She is also extremely tough. When he was seven, Bush's younger sister, Robin, died of leukaemia and several independent witnesses say he was very upset by this loss. Barbara claims its effect was exaggerated but nobody could accuse her of overreacting: the day after the funeral, she and her husband were on the golf course.
She was the main authority-figure in the home. Jeb describes it as having been, "A kind of matriarchy... when we were growing up, dad wasn't at home. Mom was the one to hand out the goodies and the discipline." A childhood friend recalls that,"She was the one who instilled fear", while Bush put it like this: "Every mother has her own style. Mine was a little like an army drill sergeant's... my mother's always been a very outspoken person who vents very well - she'll just let rip if she's got something on her mind." According to his uncle, the "letting rip" often included slaps and hits. Countless studies show that boys with such mothers are at much higher risk of becoming wild, alcoholic or antisocial.
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The outcome of this childhood was what psychologists call an authoritarian personality. Authoritarianism was identified shortly after the second world war as part of research to discover the causes of fascism. As the name suggests, authoritarians impose the strictest possible discipline on themselves and others - the sort of regime found in today's White House, where prayers precede daily business, appointments are scheduled in five-minute blocks, women's skirts must be below the knee and Bush rises at 5.45am, invariably fitting in a 21-minute, three-mile jog before lunch.
Authoritarian personalities are organised around rabid hostility to "legitimate" targets, often ones nominated by their parents' prejudices. Intensely moralistic, they direct it towards despised social groups. As people, they avoid introspection or loving displays, preferring toughness and cynicism. They regard others with suspicion, attributing ulterior motives to the most innocent behaviour. They are liable to be superstitious. All these traits have been described in Bush many times, by friends or colleagues.
The problem for Bush is that this kind of world view leads to failure and disaster as surely as anything. By being so rigid, he is unable to adapt and trust. So when failure comes, it comes quickly and without mercy. By being unable to accept error, criticism or dissent, he is unable to make adjustments in his plans. That kind of weakness becomes a target for his enemies, who give him rigid targets and then sweep across in flexible feats of ledgedemain. Does anyone think Bush could survive a debate with Saddam Hussein, forget Howard Dean or Wesley Clark, men who can recall facts from the top of their heads? Bill Clinton would gut him like a catfish before a church social.
As long as Bush is kept in a tightly regulated world, he can function. Once that world is disrupted, he becomes disoriented and prone to bullying and wildly inappropriate behavior, like trying to bully senators. Polticially, some politicians, FDR, even more so Harry Truman, become stronger in office. As they gain confidence and knowledge, they take more calculated risks. Bush grows weaker, more beset by dissention and opposition. Unable to understand, much less comphrend other world views, he can only react with anger. Which is why he personalized the conflict with the French. It wasn't about legitimate concerns, but people thwarting his will and his plans. Bush takes the greatest risk for the most minimal gain. Massive tax cuts for small possible job gains, invading a country peripheral to both the war on terror and middle east conflict, who's resolution will not bring great change.
Bush has failed his entire life. His anger and resentment comes from a lack of truly independent success. I would watch for a serious, public explosion around November 7th. As his father, in that quiet, WASP way, undermines his son in the most public way possible, by honoring a man who called him a liar once and will do so again while praising his father. Bush has felt humiliated by his father his entire life, now, this is the crowing insult to a lifetime of perceived slights and insults, which exist nowhere but in his head. If the Iraqi resistance reads the Guardian, and they do, they will be planning a major attack for that time, counting on an angry, disoriented Bush to do something completely counterproductive.
Turkey to give up Iraq deployment plan if troops not welcome: PM (18/10/2003)
ANKARA (AFP) Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan conceded for the first time that Ankara would abandon plans to send troops to Iraq if they are not wanted in the war-ravaged country, following harsh objections from Iraq's interim readership.
His remarks -- on the sidelines of a gathering of Mediterranean leaders in Mallorca, Spain -- also followed media reports that Washington was hesitating on whether to insist on a Turkish military involvement after the vocal opposition in Baghdad.
"If we are wanted we will go, if we are not wanted we will not. We have not made a 'must' decision," Anatolia news agency quoted Erdogan as saying.
"Iraq is our neighbor and will continue to be so in the future. We will not undertake anything that may lead to problems. The demands of the Iraqi people are very important for us," Erdogan said.
Before making its final decision Ankara will wait to see developments following the adoption Thursday of a UN Security Council resolution which authorizes the establishment of an international security force in Iraq, he said.
"Let me say that we are not that enthusiastic on sending soldiers to Iraq. There has been a request from the United States and we have considered it.
"But if the Iraqi people say 'we do not want anybody,' then there is nothing left that we can do," Erdogan said.
Let's get real. The Turks know if their units cross the border in force, they'll get sniped and bombed from day one. Marsoud Barzani has already threatened to quit th IGC if the Turks come and you can bet he won't be sitting in Mosul wringing his hands. The rest of the Iraqis are screaming "stay the hell out". Most Turks want nothing to do with this either.
Then, of course, Al Qaeda sends a car bomb to the Turkish Embassy. Hinting that they might be able to send one to Ankara as well. So this is looking to be a very expensive $8B loan and after the US is gone from Iraq, Turkey has to live with the results.
The only people who want Turks in Iraq is the US and they're not going to stay. More importantly, they aren't going to lift a finger to help with the PKK, who will finally be embraced by their Iraqi brothers in their united struggle against the Turks. So the end result for Turkey is: civil disorder at home, civil war in Iraq, renewed terrorism and a united Kurdish enemy looking for revenge. Yes, occupation really makes sense for them. It seems like they may well pass on this one. Oh yeah, given how Europe feels about this adventure and the need for them to be part of the EU, well, a sea of dead Kurds might well prevent that. And if they go to Iraq, there will be killing.
Kos has a story about another claim that Wes Clark is a republican.
So what?
If I was Clark, I'd dig out an old party registration card, rip it in pieces and say "yeah, I was a Republican. I liked Reagan, I liked Bush, Sr. But when this latest crew took over, I had to change parties. I don't know who or what they represent, but it certainly isn't me or the principles I fought for since I was 21. You bet I changed parties, and you should too."
See, that would make sense. I don't care if he had been on the GOP National Committee. We're not Bolsheviks, for God's sake. He looked around, saw what the GOP was up to and decided he was a Democrat. That's a good thing. Not some betrayal of party loyalty. He looked around and the current GOP scared the bejesus out of him and people want to use this against him. Hell, he should drag a few more people like Susan Collins and Lincoln Chaffee with him. I think it's an asset. I think people will look at him and think: wow, if a general hates the GOP, and runs as a democrat, what do they have to offer to me? Maybe I ought to support the Dems.
Now that kind of logical thinking may not work with some people, but for me it's a freaking asset in a country which doesn't like politics and is sick of parties. It doesn't matter what Clark was last year, or last month, but what he is today.
FORT STEWART, Ga., Oct. 17 (UPI) -- Hundreds of sick and wounded U.S. soldiers including many who served in the Iraq war are languishing in hot cement barracks here while they wait -- sometimes for months -- to see doctors.
The National Guard and Army Reserve soldiers' living conditions are so substandard, and the medical care so poor, that many of them believe the Army is trying push them out with reduced benefits for their ailments. One document shown to UPI states that no more doctor appointments are available from Oct. 14 through Nov. 11 -- Veterans Day.
"I have loved the Army. I have served the Army faithfully and I have done everything the Army has asked me to do," said Sgt. 1st Class Willie Buckels, a truck master with the 296th Transportation Company. Buckels served in the Army Reserves for 27 years, including Operation Iraqi Freedom and the first Gulf War. "Now my whole idea about the U.S. Army has changed. I am treated like a third-class citizen."
Since getting back from Iraq in May, Buckels, 52, has been trying to get doctors to find out why he has intense pain in the side of his abdomen since doubling over in pain there.
After waiting since May for a diagnosis, Buckels has accepted 20 percent of his benefits for bad knees and is going home to his family in Mississippi. "They have not found out what my side is doing yet, but they are still trying," Buckels said.
One month after President Bush greeted soldiers at Fort Stewart -- home of the famed Third Infantry Division -- as heroes on their return from Iraq, approximately 600 sick or injured members of the Army Reserves and National Guard are warehoused in rows of spare, steamy and dark cement barracks in a sandy field, waiting for doctors to treat their wounds or illnesses.
The Reserve and National Guard soldiers are on what the Army calls "medical hold," while the Army decides how sick or disabled they are and what benefits -- if any -- they should get as a result.
Some of the soldiers said they have waited six hours a day for an appointment without seeing a doctor. Others described waiting weeks or months without getting a diagnosis or proper treatment.
Wait until they get to the VA.
We are destroying the Guard and reserve by second class treatment. From the field to medical treatment, reservists are getting the short end of the stick. People need to write their Congressmen about this and demand the Army take action. The Army is scared of Congress and always has been.
Bush Sr.'s 'message' to Bush Jr.
By Georgie Anne Geyer, 10/18/2003
WASHINGTON -- IT'S NOT AS THOUGH Osama bin Laden gave a Jihad Award to Ariel Sharon, or Donald Rumsfeld gave his Good Pal Award to Condoleezza Rice. It's not even as though Dick Cheney gave his Favorite Foreigners Citation to the French.
But the news from College Station, Texas, this week -- that the First Father, former President George H.W. Bush, has given his own most treasured award to Senator Edward Kennedy -- is nearly as astonishing.
When it was announced (with amazingly little fanfare) that the pugnaciously anti-Iraq war Democrat Kennedy had been awarded the 2003 George Bush Award for Excellence in Public Service, so many jaws dropped all over Washington that usually voluble politicians were only heard swallowing their real thoughts.
Since the current President Bush veered away from the real war against terrorism in Afghanistan and went a'venturing in Iraq, much to his father's dismay, just about everybody close to Washington politics has known of the policy schism between father and son.
It was politically and philosophically obvious. But people around Father Bush, a coterie of traditional internationalist conservatives who protect him like a wolf mother does her cubs, would heatedly deny any family rift -- and nobody spoke publicly about it.
Now it's all out. Father Bush has done it in his own preferred nuanced way -- the way Establishment gentlemen operate -- but he has revealed the depth of his disagreement with his impetuously uninformed son.
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The son seems to have made posturing against his father's accomplishments and beliefs his life's work.
W has given way to a radical right that abhors international coalitions and manners; he mocks the world and denies any need for its help. He has led the Middle East to the nadir of its hope and possibilities, and he has led the United States to a moment in history in which we face asymmetric warfare from one end of the globe to another.
And above all, he has replaced his father's courtesy and good graces with an almost proud rudeness and scorn for others.
It's simple. He's always envied his father. Always. He's never measured up, from Andover to oil, he's failed to be his father's son his entire life and he is desperate to show he's his own man.
Recent fighting between different Shia factions and Coalition troops is the harbinger of very bad news. Representing six out of 10 Iraqis, the Shia are the determining factor in the future of Iraq. The US's inability to prevent clashes between their forces and radical Shia is very serious and very under reported. The Sunnis could fight the US for next 20 years and not win. A Shia rebellion changes that very quickly.
The most dangerous man in Iraq is no longer Saddam. Whatever he's doing, he's part of the past. It's not even young Sadr. It's Grand Ayatollah Sistani. He's desperately trying to avoid a new war, but events are moving past him. Sistani apparently still believes that the US will eventually hand them power, but Sadr and his fan base in East Baghdad think otherwise. Normally, his age and inexperience would leave him an outsider in Iraqi politics, but because he has so many demobilized young men supporting him, he's got a shake and bake army ready to go.
The US has been slowly and surely pushed out of East Baghdad, reduced to setting up checkpoints and doing the odd raid, fearing that any move against Sadr, could send hundreds of thousands into the streets. The arrest of minor clerics send 10,000 to protest outside CPA HQ.
Why is Sistani so dangerous, despite his moderation? Because, first of all it's a tactical moderation. He wants the same theocracy Sadr does, but in a different way. If he decides there should be a war to evict the US, all the Shia factions and much of the population would fall in line.
But the US has failed to realize that if they move against Sadr, they risk forcing Sistani's hand. He can't remain silent if Sadr is arrested or killed in a gunfight. No older Shias want a war, but the Us is giving them few options. Turkish occupation, US incompetence, massive violence and the unelected IGC, all make keeping the peace hard for Sistani and his followers. Blowing Hakim into tiny little bits didn't help matters either. Even if people didn't like him or trust the SCIRI, his murder was unacceptable and played right into the hands of the Sadrists.
Of course, the US had to compund the mess by accusing of every crime in Iraq short of the Lindburgh kidnapping. The clumsy frame-up attempt was as stupid as it was shortsighted. One can only hope they don't try to arrest him. However, hope is a very lonely thing in Iraq policy.
Many of you must be wondering why I don't have an Amazon or Paypal sticker to beg for cash up. Honestly, not because my work is free, but because I'm waiting for the right time. You'll know when that time comes and the begging will commence in detail. However, doing this site is not a cost free enterprise. I defray as much of this as I can with my work, such that it is, and since Blogger is free, there's no point in begging for money. That will not always be the case, but that is a request for another day.
Nor have I put up an Amazon wish list. I don't need books, I have five I haven't read or personal stuff. That's a bit unseemly. Buy me stuff because you like my work. Well, that's why I work and have a social life. The only thing I'll ask for (later) is money to keep the blog going, pay bills, and do upgrades. I will never ask you to contribute to any cause or campaign, with one or two exceptions, But that's also in the future.
What I am looking for at the moment is a used laptop. At least a PII running 2000, but more honestly, a Celeron or PIII or G3 pre-whitebook Mac. Something lying around your house or about to be tossed by your company. Why? Because I'll need one over the holidays to keep posting. I don't want anyone to buy a machine or steal one and I need it to work without any major repairs. Now, I can do them, but a working machine would be so much easier to deal with.
I've placed what cash I've had into my desktop, which makes sense, since it is my primary platform and workspace. But a laptop would be nice because I could actually do more research and get away from the desk. So instead of selling that old machine on eBay, especially when it's a tax-deductable work expense, sending it my way could do me a favor and make my life easier.
You guys have been extremely supportive, not just to me, but to Kos, Atrios, Billmon and other bloggers providing news and commentary you can't buy elsewhere. And I'll survive without the laptop, but if there's one out there gathering dust, especially if you can write it off on your taxes and it works, I sure could use the extra machine.
Also, you can be assured this machine will be used exclusively for writing and some MP3 listening.
OK, let me list my requirements:
Mimimum PII 400
Prefered: Celeron over 600, P III or Mac G3 iBook or PowerBook (I really do like Macs)
OS: Has to be able to run 2000 at a minimum. I can install it, so that's not a problem. It just has to run it. Or OS9.
Memory: 64MB, 128 MB Better
Hard Drive: 6GB good, 10 MB better
Applications: If it's a Mac, Word would be nice. Otherwise, the drive can be almost bare.
* A wireless card would be great.
Anyone who can help me with getting this machine will be blessed a thousand times and thanked profusely.
Keep in mind, I'm asking for a spare machine. If you were going to give it to orphans or a charter school, go ahead. I want what people can spare, not a sacrifice.
Uzbekistan, home of US special ops in Central Asia. Home to Islam Karimov, who boils political opponents like other Uzbeks boil tea. And protected by the US government, despite a deplorable human rights record.
According to the Guardian, the British Ambassador there seemed to object to the wanton torture of the locals and such.
this country last month on temporary sick leave, was the victim of threats from Downing Street related to his outspoken views on US foreign policy in the run-up to the Iraq invasion.
Inquiries by the Guardian have discovered that Craig Murray, one of Britain's youngest ambassadors, was subsequently called back from his Uzbekistan post, threatened with the loss of his job, and accused of a miscellaneous string of diplomatic shortcomings in what his friends say is a wholly unfair way.
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A senior source said the former ambassador had been put under pressure to stop his repeated criticisms of the brutal Karimov regime, accused among other things of boiling prisoners to death. The source said the pressure was partly "exercised on the orders of No 10", which found his outspokenness about the compromises Washington was prepared to make in its "war on terror" increasingly embarrassing in the lead up to the Iraq war.
"He was told that the next time he stepped away from the Ameri can line, he would lose his post," said the source. During a visit earlier this year at the height of the political tensions prior to the Iraq invasion, the former development secretary, Clare Short, is reported to have said to him: "I love the job you are doing down here, but you know, don't you, that if I go, you go." She eventually resigned over the Iraq war.
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Uzbekistan, a post-Soviet police state on the strategically important border with Afghanistan, was another potential political minefield. Uzbek security services use "torture as a routine investigation technique", according to the US State Department. But Washington's wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have led them to finance much of the regime's security apparatus. In exchange the US gets a military base in Khanabad as a centre for operations in Afghanistan. Last year Washington gave the government $500m (£298m) in aid, $79m of which was specifically for the same "law enforcement and security services" they accused of routine torture.
Mr Murray upset the regime of President Islam Karimov with his blunt remarks on torture.
But let us make this point: no government has the right to use the war against terrorism as an excuse for the persecution of those with a deep personal commitment to the Islamic religion, and who pursue their views by peaceful means. Sadly the large majority of those wrongly imprisoned in Uzbekistan fall into this category.
But it is not only Muslims who suffer; the British Embassy yesterday observed the trial of a Jehovah's Witness, being prosecuted for pursuing his beliefs. It should not be a crime to practice your religion, nor to tell others about it. And a number of those imprisoned are ethnic Russian human rights defenders, colleagues of some of my audience. I would like to say at this point how deeply I admire you on a personal level. I am very conscious that I stand here in a very privileged position, in the literal sense. You on the other hand daily risk persecution to stand up for the rights of your fellow citizens. You have my deepest respect and one day your countrymen will be in a position to show you their gratitude.
Uzbekistan is to be congratulated on a good record of ratifying key UN Conventions on human rights; unfortunately there appears to be a gap between obligation and practice.
World attention has recently been focussed on the prevalence of torture in Uzbek prisons. The terrible case of Avazoz and Alimov apparently tortured to death by boiling water, has evoked great international concern. But all of us know that this is not an isolated incident. Brutality is inherent in a system where convictions habitually rely on signed confessions rather than on forensic or material evidence. In the Uzbek criminal justice system the conviction rate is almost 100%. It is difficult not to conclude that once accused by the Prokurator there is no effective possibility of fair trial in the sense we understand it.
Another chilling reminder of the former Soviet Union is the use of commitment to lunatic asylums to stifle dissidents. We are still seeing examples of this in 2002.
Nor does the situation appear to be getting any better. I have been told by people who should know that there are significantly more political and religious detainees now than there were this time last year. From my own meetings with human rights groups from across the country there appears to be a broad picture of a reduction in the rate of arrests in the first half of this year, but a very substantial increase around August. Just last week saw another highly suspicious death in police custody in Tashkent. There is little sign of genuine positive change in Human Rights. And that is what we want to see; genuine change. By that I mean change which actually increases the liberty of Uzbek citizens in their daily lives. Uzbekistan's international obligations require genuine respect for Human Rights. For example officially censorship has recently been abolished. But you would not tell this by watching, listening to or reading the media which is patently under strict control and contains no significant volume of critical comment or analysis of central government policy.
Let me give you an example. In August the government embarked upon a series of closures of major bazaars in Tashkent, and subsequently across Uzbekistan. I witnessed it happen in Namangan, for example. This is not the forum to address the motive for those closures or the rights and wrongs of this action. But it was a radical action, effected with some degree of physical and moral resistance, and closed off the retail outlets through which the majority of manufactured goods are sold in this country. It directly affected the livelihood of an estimated 50,000 people. Furthermore I have in the last two weeks visited a number of factories in Uzbekistan which have halted production and laid off their workers because their distributors have been put out of business by the bazaar closures.
As I say, I make no comment on the rights and wrongs of this, though I note that the IMF have recommended that these issues be reversed, not least because of the resulting increase in inflation. But everyone in this room knows this has been a burning political issue in the last two months. Yet one could have watched Uzbek television or listened to Uzbek radio solidly throughout this period, and read the newspaper every day, but still have gathered almost nothing of the flavour of what I have just told you. There is little reporting of basic facts and almost no free debate. I trust that the proceedings of this event will be fully and fairly reported
Fixing Iraqi Health Care Comes at
Expense of U.S. Needs, Critics Say
By Ceci Connolly
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, October 17, 2003; Page A25
President Bush and first lady Laura Bush have a vision for health care in Iraq in which all mothers-to-be receive prenatal care, childhood mortality rates plummet and every person has access to virtually free treatment and medicine through an extensive network of 1,400 renovated hospitals and clinics.
It is a vision that will cost U.S. taxpayers almost $2 billion in the first 18 months -- an amount some lawmakers say is too steep, especially when a growing number of Americans cannot afford medical care.
"I certainly understand the need for health care in Iraq," said Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.), who tried unsuccessfully Tuesday to shift $5 billion from Iraqi assistance to domestic education, health and construction projects.
"This administration has a sense of urgency in Iraq that I don't see here at home. We see hospitals closing and the number of uninsured going up, and yet we don't see any sense of urgency from this administration."
The effort to revitalize Iraq's health care system is a source of pride for the Bush administration in a postwar reconstruction program that has often been hampered by violence, international squabbling and logistical problems. Laura Bush has taken a personal interest, lobbying for construction of a state-of-the-art children's hospital in Basra that would one day draw patients and physicians from all over the Middle East.
The Bush administration and many humanitarian relief groups say the United States has a moral and legal obligation to rebuild Iraq.
"There is no doubt that the one responsible for this is, according to the Geneva Conventions, the occupying power, and that is the U.S.-led coalition," Morten Rostrup, international council president of the aid group Doctors Without Borders, said recently.
A state of the art hospital in Iraq with free medical care. I know I'd like to see that in oh, central Brooklyn, Appalachia, central Texas. Somehow I think someone will mention this next year in the election. Just call it a feeling.
Kobe Bryant, regardless of the charges against him, provides an object lesson on the power of friendship. Tina Brown compared him to Gray Davis, friendless in his hour of need.
Beyond the media circus of his rape trial, what one discovers quickly is that Kobe is a cool, remote figure, not prone to spend time with teammates or other athletes. People admire his skills, but do not know the man. And given his estrangement from his parents, he faces a long time in jail, very much alone.
Can anyone imagine the testimonials Shaq would have gained in similar trouble? How people from Newark to Orlando to LA would have attested to his character? But of course, genial family man Shaq wouldn't be in this kind of trouble. But there's a larger point here, and it's one which is highly relevant to politics. People instictively mistrust those unable to make friends. It was what sunk Gray Davis, the minute someone who was more appealing was found. Bryant is a mystery to his teammates, despite his popularity with the press. The one consitituancy he desperately needs to vouch for his character can only attest they don't think he could do it.
Maria Shriver saved her husband's campaign by her support of him. Her defense of her family, more than her husband, gave him credibility. Bryant's wife remains ever so silent.
It also explains Bush's continued popularity, such that it is. People think he's someone who is friendly, even though reality is quite different. Bush is a man very much alone in his own way, disrespected by those closest to him, surrounded by incompetents. Bryant decided, at the age when most men make their lifelong friendships, at school or in the military, that he would generally isolate himself from his peers. That his skills meant that the team should follow his lead. The reality was that he wasn't leading, but showing up, playing a role, but remaining aloof and distant from the people he needed support from the most. Teamwork is a much abused phrase in the business world, but it is critical.
Skills do not make leaders. Never have, never will. There has to be an element of sacrifice. By missing college, Bryant missed the idea that he needed to make sacrifices, in time, in desire, to be accepted. Leadership is like friendship in that you do not always do what you want when you want. Because Bryant was able to create a cocoon of people who served his needs, without him ever giving anything back.
Take Tiger Woods. No matter how good he is, or how talented he is, his relationship with his peers is vastly different. He has to play with these guys for decades, not years. He'll be playing against Sergio Garcia 30 years from now. He has to be one of the boys. He has to play cards with them when it rains, be nice to their kids, say hello to their wives, attend their charity events, even if all he wants to do is watch the Bucs play the Niners. He cannot afford to be aloof to his peers, to create the big money cocoon that a basketball star can, if he chooses. He has to be part of the gang to survive being on tour. Bryant can be on a team, but he never seemed to get the idea of teamwork being more than showing up and playing. To be a high school star is to have a distorted view of the world. He was so much better than his peers that they merely helped him play. When he got to the NBA, he thought the same rules applied and they didn't . Surely he was talented, but he was not singularly talented. No one can be in a team sport.
Now, facing an ordeal where he should be able to call on legions of defenders to attest to his character, there is only silence. He doesn't even get the palid defense Gray Davis got.
Coalition seeks to downplay role of Ankara's troops
Ewen MacAskill, diplomatic editor
Friday October 17, 2003
The Guardian
The US-British coalition in Iraq is running into problems over its attempt to bolster its forces with Turkish troops.
Washington and London have been forced to rethink by the level of hostility generated in Iraq by the prospect of troops from Turkey, a neighbour and detested former colonial power.
The crisis has also sparked a fresh round of in-fighting in Washington between the Pentagon and the state department.
Several options are being considered to try to minimise Iraqi anger.
One being floated is for Turkish troops to serve in Iraq but not in uniform, a proposal that is unlikely to go down well with the Turkish high command. Another is for the Turkish troops to be given tasks that would not involve highly visible frontline policing of the kind being carried out by US and British troops. Instead, they would be used to train the Iraqi army or as border guards.
Yet another is to halve the proposed number of Turkish troops, from the estimated 10,000 being suggested at present.
The Turkish parliament voted last week to send the troops, a move gratefully seized on by the US and British governments, who have had little success in obtaining troops from other countries for duties in Iraq. But the Iraqi governing council voted by 24 to 0 against the move.
It is understood that Paul Bremer, the US envoy to Iraq and head of the coalition in Baghdad, is sympathetic to the Iraqi governing council and favours minimising the role of Turkish forces.
Mr Bremer is from the state department, though until now has enjoyed the backing of the Pentagon. But Paul Wolfowitz, the deputy US defence secretary, favours maximum involvement of Turkish troops
Well, no one will be sending car bombs to kill Mr. Wolfowitz, now will they?
Has Apple turned a corner? Steve Jobs leads Microsoft users to the promised land
The iTunes music store is open for business on Windows. Let the rejoicing begin.
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By Farhad Manjoo
Oct. 17, 2003 | SAN FRANCISCO -- Long before most tech CEOs, Steve Jobs grasped that the personal computer was becoming what he called the "digital hub" of your home -- the place to bring together your photos, your music, your movies. And Macs, Jobs has always argued, were the best machines to work with digital media.
So, to that end, Apple, after Steve Jobs' return to the company he co-founded, produced a new line of Mac-only photo, music and movie software; it created iPod, the top-selling portable MP3 player, which worked best with Macs; it launched a landmark online music store, also available only for Macs; and it even opened a national chain of retail stores to show off the Mac's multimedia prowess. All of these things, Jobs said, would bring the masses to the Mac -- a thought that you could either call optimistic or borderline delusional. Jobs seemed to think that the billions of people around the world who currently use Windows computers would happily go to the Mac once they saw how terrific it was at categorizing their digital photos.
On Thursday Steve Jobs finally abandoned that plan. In San Francisco, at one of his famously theatrical product presentations, Jobs unveiled a new version of Apple's iTunes music store -- and this time, in a huge departure for the firm, the program works on Windows, too. The words "Hell Froze Over" flashed on the screen behind him as Jobs described what he called "the best Windows app ever written." Steve Jobs, finally, has seen the light.
In his heart, Jobs probably still believes that Macs are better at media. But by releasing the iTunes software for Windows (fulfilling a promise he made in April), Jobs is using his head. The new iTunes brings the same simple, legal, digital music-buying service that Mac users have enjoyed for the past six months to the people who need it most -- the more than 95 percent of computer users who, due to the exigencies of the workaday world (the lack of money, compliance with office tech rules, the crush of a global software monopoly), can't switch to Macs but still desperately want digital music in their lives.
Best Window app ever? Nah. That's still Eudora. But as I write this, I'm listening to my music collection via iTunes for Windows. Radiohead, actually.
This could be a seminal moment for Apple. Macs, as a rule, look cute on TV, but for 97 percent of the public, they don't exist. Even school kids want PC's so they can play Halo or Madden 2004 or Half Life 2. Apple has needed to make its software available to the public for years. ITunes is clearly less kludgy and sounds better than any of its competitors. It's less bug prone than Real Media, more stable than Winamp 3, which is a truly mediocre product, and less complicated than Musicmatch Jukebox and yes, I have all three on my machine.
It's not so much about buying music from the iTunes store, which may well be sued out of business by the Beatles (trademark infringement), but having one of Apple's best apps work with Windows seemlessly. The one issue I have is that if you're used to Winamp's playlisting, which I think is pretty clever, you'll have to import the playlists. Winamp's one advantage is the ease of playlist creation by drag and drop. However, iTunes can track the music that you play, the times you play it and create playlists based on that. Which simplifies matters a great deal. Although I haven't done it, burning to disc is supposed to be easy with iTunes as well.
Why are the Beatles suing Apple? Well, in 1982, Apple Corps, the holding company for the Beatles, entered into an agreement with Apple Corp. that as long as one stuck to music and the other computers, everything would be fine. Seems Steve Jobs decided to ignore that agreement and could be on the hook for millions more than the $26m which settled the agreement.
What the Salon article points out and what I think makes sense is that Apple is realizing that it's best asset is its software. People don't want their machines, they want the software. The hardware is less relevant by the day. As PC prices plunge and power increases, few people want any part of the cost of Apple hardware, except for the most specialized of tasks. Home built PC's provide as much style as the stuff from Apple labs as new case form factors are made.
Jobs thought that people would buy his overpriced machines to get the apps, but the world doesn't work that way. No one goes to the Four Seasons for appetizers, no matter how good they are. The core user functions of the Mac are no different than the PC and you get the less flexibility. Macs may be slightly more reliable, but when they stop working, there is ONE trusted repair shop in NY you can take your machine to, and if you've ever dealt with the good folks at Tekserve, you know the racket they have running. You can fix a PC yourself, down to ripping out the motherboard and drives. Which is no small difference in cost savings over time. In the end owning a Mac is like owning an Italian sports car, nice to look at and drive, a pain in the ass to maintain and keep running.
However, people like Apple software and applications. The problem is that Apple is addicted to the high profits of hardware sales. They make all their money on hardware. But in the end, like Atari and Sega, they may face the simple fact that the reason people dealt with their hardware is their software. Given Jobs's enormous ego, that may be a hard pill to swallow, but after years of a slowed economy, Apple as independent hardware maker may be coming to an end. In a world of $500 computers and declining incomes, Apple is increasingly out of reach for schools, young families and small businesses. With 3 percent of worldwide PC sales, a new strategy needs to be developed. Both the iMac and iPod failed to increase marketshare. So did the new apps. Now, either Jobs thinks he can pull in new customers by letting them use iTunes or he's going to adapt to the realities of the marketplace and sell to Windows users en masse.
O'Reilly's ingrained sense that he's come a long way has less to do with overcoming financial hardship than familial hardship. Even though he calls the concept a "cliché," he clearly lugs around some pretty heavy emotional baggage. "There was plenty of tension in my house," he recalls. "Along with a lot of yelling and martial arts." At the center of the maelstrom was O'Reilly's dad, an ornery and occasionally abusive figure. "There were times when I hated my father. I admit it. He knew it. The punishment that descended upon me was mostly uncalled-for and born of the frustration of his life." And his paternal grandfather wasn't exactly a role model, either. O'Reilly describes him as a crusty Brooklyn beat cop who practiced "a kind of low-grade vigilantism."
For armchair psychologists, this is pure gold. It's not too tough to imagine how a kid who grew up with an unsupportive father and a thuggish grandfather went on to host a show like the "Factor." The apple didn't fall too far from the tree. However, O'Reilly clearly wants to be a better man than his forebears. Hence his desire to be a crusader, albeit a pretty thin-skinned one. Just last week, he stormed off National Public Radio's "Fresh Air," accusing host Terry Gross of doing "a hatchet job on me." What triggered the congenital O'Reilly temper to flare? Gross had started to read an unflattering People magazine review of "Who's Looking Out for You?"
Despite his conflicted feelings about his father and grandfather, O'Reilly is loath to condemn them. His dad wasn't a great parent, but O'Reilly insists that didn't make him a bad person. Sure, he was a "suspicious guy" who "trusted almost no one" and "set a terrible example by inflicting unnecessary pain on his children." But, O'Reilly explains: "He did not do this on purpose. He simply could not control himself." Likewise, Grandpa O'Reilly's strong-arm approach to law enforcement didn't make him a criminal. "He was a good man, but some of his cohorts were not," says O'Reilly. Like his son, his downfall was that he didn't have a "support system," a phrase that sounds alarmingly touchy-feely for a guy who cringes at the idea of emotional baggage
So O'Reilly's father was a bitter paranoid and abuser and his grandfather beat the shit out of people as a cop. Why am I not surprised. His grandfather wasn't a criminal? Let me guess who he smacked around, Irish or blacks. In the bad old days, both were suitible targets for the occasional assbeating.
Didn't have a support system? Shit. He was an asshole. And his son, who desperately needs psychotherapy to deal with this legacy, is one too.
The overrepresentation of minorities in the Army is often cited as proof of the continuing struggle for people of color in the mainstream economy. The Army needs to target ethnic groups, says Kendall Martin, account supervisor at Muse Cordero Chen, because it needs to "mirror" the country. "The Army wants to make sure it improves on representing all groups," he says. "The Army wants to look like America."
But the Army doesn't really look like America, and with a volunteer service, it never will. And considering that one of the Army's main draws is money for college, it's definitely not economically diverse; kids who don't need those incentives aren't as enticed to enlist.
"If you're a middle-class black kid, you're not enlisting, any more than any middle-class white kid is enlisting," Werner says. "The Army has nothing to do with the general profile of American culture. It's lower middle class, disproportionately black and brown, and disproportionately Southern and rural."
Nickerson says he doesn't have any information on the socioeconomic demographics of the Army's enlisted men. "We don't focus on economic backgrounds," he says. "If you qualify to join the Army, I don't care what your economic or social status is."
Since the campaigns tailored to minorities were launched only this past year, it's too soon to measure their impact. But the Army has hit its quota of enlistees -- before deadline -- three years in a row.
"I think you underestimate the commitment of young Americans," Nickerson says, when I ask how the Army can possibly hit its numbers given the combative state of global affairs. (After all, you've got to wonder if the flashy ad campaigns and free headbands will keep recruitment numbers up as the body count in Iraq continues to rise.) "We've got the best recruiting force in the world. We've got a soft economy, and we've got opportunities that resonate with young Americans."
This is a dishonest campaign. Here's the deal, if you're male and fit, you're going to be shunted into a few MOS's, think combat infantry, engineer, airborne, MP's. Why? Who's getting killed in Iraq? The Army knows that minorities, as a rule, opt for service and supply jobs to maximize their employment chances outside the service. They also know they're running short of trained infantry. Any campaign centering around recruiting is going to shove the men into the combat arms.
Even if you don't go into the combat arms, supply units can come under fire. With half the Army in Iraq, anyone who joins can expect a combat tour. If people think the Army isn't about killing, they better watch the news. Not only infantry get to conduct patrols in Iraq. So do tankers and artillerymen. They hand you a rifle and point you towards the town and say walk. No promise the Army makes is valid, all promises you make are. Now, military service is a noble thing and a good thing. But the false expectations recruiters create mislead kids. Anyone joining the Army today should expect to see combat in the combat arms. They may not see it, but if they're men, the odds are good that they will.
They should also consider that conditions in Iraq are so bad that many soldiers, previously happy in their assignments, are leaving the service at the first opportunity. Iraq is not a game. You drive a hummer in Iraq, it may blow up around you.
William Arkin, defense reporter for the LA Times researched Gen. Jerry Boykin's career and beliefs and came to the following conclusions:
All Americans, including those in uniform, are entitled to their views. But when Boykin publicly spews this intolerant message while wearing the uniform of the U.S. Army, he strongly suggests that this is an official and sanctioned view — and that the U.S. Army is indeed a Christian army.
But that's only part of the problem. Boykin is also in a senior Pentagon policymaking position, and it's a serious mistake to allow a man who believes in a Christian "jihad" to hold such a job.
For one thing, Boykin has made it clear that he takes his orders not from his Army superiors but from God — which is a worrisome line of command. For another, it is both imprudent and dangerous to have a senior officer guiding the war on terrorism in Iraq and Afghanistan who believes that Islam is an idolatrous, sacrilegious religion against which we are waging a holy war.
And judging by his words, that is what he believes.
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Since 9/11, the war against terrorism has become almost exclusively a special operations war, melding military and CIA paramilitary and covert activities with finer and finer grained integrated intelligence information. Hence, the creation of Boykin's new job as deputy undersecretary of Defense for intelligence.
The task facing Boykin, Rumsfeld insiders say, is to break down the wall between different intelligence collectors and agencies and quickly get the best information and analysis for American forces in the field.
But even as he begins his new duties, Boykin is still publicly preaching.
As late as Sept. 27, he was in Vero Beach, Fla., speaking on behalf of Visitation House Ministries.
In describing the war against terrorism, President Bush frequently says it "is not a war against Islam." In his National Security Strategy, Bush declared that "the war on terrorism is not a clash of civilizations." Yet many in the Islamic world see the U.S. as waging a cultural and religious war against them. In fact, the White House's own Advisory Group on Public Diplomacy for the Arab and Muslim World reported this month that since 9/11, "hostility toward America has reached shocking levels."
"Arabs and Muslims respond in anger to what they perceive as U.S. denigration of their societies and cultures," the report stated.
The task for the U.S., the report said, is to wage "a major struggle to expand the zone of tolerance and marginalize extremists."
Appointing Jerry Boykin, with his visions of holy war in the Islamic world, to a top position in the United States military is no way to marginalize extremism..
What Arkin doesn't say and should have, is this is one of the results of the purge of the Army. Boykin obviously impressed the secretary's deputies with his wacko beliefs, and they didn't consider how his pronounced beliefs would be received by the Islamic world. He doesn't make his speeches in suits, but in his uniform. He speaks as a decorated soldier. His views, despite his experience, should have disqualified him from being selected for this post. How can he deal with the Muslim world when announcing his open bigotry. Which is what it is.
Boykin is obviously a political appointee chosen because he said the right things. However, they didn't realize he spoke about his faith while in uniform, which is pretty unusual for an active duty general.
OLYMPIA — State Democrats have blistered Republican U.S. Rep. George Nethercutt for saying Iraq's reconstruction is "a better and more important story than losing a couple of soldiers every day."
Democratic state Chairman Paul Berendt said Nethercutt has turned into "an administration shill who insults the service of the men and women brave enough to serve their country."
Nethercutt replied that his remarks had been mischaracterized. He said he knows firsthand the sacrifice of American soldiers and deplores the continuing violence in Iraq.
The Spokane congressman, best known for knocking off the sitting speaker of the U.S. House, Tom Foley, in 1994, told a University of Washington forum Monday that "the story of what we've done in the postwar period is remarkable," better than the news media are portraying.
"It is a better and more important story than losing a couple of soldiers every day," he told his audience, while adding he did not want any more soldiers to die.
But two key indicators - troops and money - show that the Americans in particular, and the British to a lesser extent, are carrying the load and will go on doing so, in the hope that by this time next year things will have improved.
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Even Turkey's offer to send a force to central Iraq (that is, outside the Kurdish areas in the North) has not been well received by the Iraqi Governing Council itself.
So do not expect a flood of foreign forces into Iraq.
Nor is there is going to be a flood of money from around the world. The main burden will be born by the US taxpayers who are being asked to stump up $20 billion for reconstruction. The UK Government is pledging £550 million.
Sitting on its hands
The rest of the European Union, at a meeting of its foreign ministers in Luxembourg this week, sat on its hands, apart from the European Commission which offered the sum of $200m.
Germany said it was doing enough elsewhere (Afghanistan) and that it had no more money. Sweden said the conditions were not right and France said nothing at all, according to diplomats present.
The mood was that, as one diplomat put it: "Those who broke Iraq are going to have to put it back together."
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One problem the US and UK have had is their failure to explain their plans. The problems of security and safety have dominated headlines and are themselves hindering the reconstruction process.
Morale in Iraq I've run a bunch of letters from Stars and Stripes over the last month or so talking about conditions in Iraq. Most of the letters from in country say two of three things: I hate this place and want to go home, I hate this place and will leave the Army or it sucks but I'll tolerate it because I'm a soldier. You get a few from Marines who wonder why people are whining or the Air Force who say things aren't that bad, but by far the Army letters, especially the National Guardsmen and Reservists unload tons of bitterness in their letters.
So the editors of Stars and Stripes, to their credit, decided to actually look at the situation and sent a team of reporters to Iraq. They're running a seven part series on the subject to get at the ground truth there.
Troops were asked about their morale and their unit’s morale. They were asked about their living conditions and whether they thought their commanders were doing anything to improve those conditions. They were asked about their unit’s mission and if they felt going to war in Iraq was worthwhile for America.
Of those surveyed:
¶ Many Reserve and National Guard respondents said they were unhappy with a number of things, just as letter writers from those units had said in letters to the newspaper. They said they often felt like second-class soldiers who don’t receive the same equipment, support and treatment as their active-duty counterparts.
¶ When asked how worthwhile they thought the war in Iraq was for the United States, the split among all those responding was 67 percent saying it was “worthwhile,” “probably worthwhile” or “very worthwhile,” with 31 percent saying it was of “little value” or of “no value at all.”
¶ Asked about their personal morale, 34 percent overall rated it as “low” or “very low,” 27 percent said it was “high” or “very high,” and virtually all the rest called it “average.” Perceptions of their unit’s morale ranked heavier on the “low” side. This question of personal morale elicited widely different responses among the services. Reservists ranked their morale as the lowest by far. Marine and Air Force respondents tended to rate their own morale on the high side, while Army respondents were fairly evenly divided between high and low morale, with most falling in the middle, or “average.”
¶ Of all troops surveyed, 72 percent rated living conditions “average” or better. But disparities existed throughout the region. One Army unit could have three hot meals a day and another unit with the same mission subsisted on MREs and rationed bottles of water. Some units, although they had been in Iraq for months, still hadn’t had a day off or access to a hot shower. Other troops had been in Iraq a few weeks and were already being allowed to leave on morale trips.
The numbers show that sometimes camp conditions and morale are not always connected. Some Marines surveyed in southern Iraq live in austere conditions but still had overall high morale.
¶ There is a sharp divide between the Air Force and Army. The Army and Air Force share several bases in Iraq, but the Air Force has separate — and superior — living conditions. The Air Force at Tallil Air Base, for example, brought in a Pizza Hut concession but the Army is barred from using it. The Air Force does deploy differently based on its mission, but soldiers, after seeing the contrast, said the division, which at times is a fence topped with barbed wire, undercuts morale and teamwork. The Air Force has its own gyms, morale tents and mess halls.
¶ Noncommissioned officers predict problems in re-enlistment, although military leaders say enlistment rates historically drop after conflicts. Nearly half of the troops surveyed said they do not plan to re-enlist. No re-enlistment figures from Iraq are available at this point, while generally the overall military re-enlistment rates appear to be satisfactory or better.
¶ While from all indications troops in Iraq are doing what needs to be done, slightly more than one-third of those responding to the questionnaire said their mission was for the most part “not clearly defined” or “not at all defined.” Sixty-three percent said it was. Again, reservists mostly said that the mission was unclear. Marine and Air Force respondents tended to say that the mission was “mostly clear” or “very clear.” As in other questions, Army respondents, the largest group surveyed, were almost evenly split on the question. At the same time, many respondents — mainly from the Reserves and Army — said that what they were doing was not closely related to what they were trained to do. Air Force and Marine respondents mainly tended to see their current mission and their training as more closely aligned. Reporters in the field found that the transition from war-fighting to occupation had led to different tasks. Soldiers in transportation companies were operating equipment they were not trained to drive, for instance. Marines were asked to perform peacekeeping duties they said they had been rarely been asked to do before. In interviews or written responses to the questionnaire, some troops described what they were doing as “busy work.”
¶ While supply problems have not crippled operations, they have stymied some units. Troops had plenty of bullets, grenades, weapons and fuel, but they said they did not have enough of the plates that make flak vests impervious to bullets. Units also complained that they were sent into combat without enough medical supplies, and transportation companies resorted to building their own “gun trucks” because there were not enough to provide security for convoys. More than 60 percent of the troops surveyed rated their chain of command’s ability to get them supplies as “average” or better. Sixty-three percent of Reserve troops rated that ability as “not good” or “poor,” and 27 percent of the Army rated that “not good” or “poor.”
¶ In interviews, written comments on questionnaires and letters to the editor, a number of troops complained about having to spend more time in Iraq than they thought necessary or were told they would spend. Most of these were reservists.
BAGHDAD, Iraq — The Pentagon’s top commander in Iraq said complaints about morale are “expected,” but troops are focused and they understand and support the mission.
“Are you going to find soldiers on any given day who are down on morale? Of course,” said Lt. Gen Ricardo Sanchez, commander of all U.S. forces in Iraq. “There are days when I wake up and don’t feel very good and I’d probably bite your head off. I walk around and talk to all sorts of soldiers also, and I honestly believe our soldiers are doing very, very well. There is no morale problem.”
Complaints about morale, living conditions and other issues surfaced in a Stars and Stripes survey of nearly 2,000 troops in Iraq.
Sanchez said complaints are “an Army’s normal posture. What would be the difference if we were back in [Europe] or Fort Hood or wherever?”
When asked directly about morale, their opnions varied:
Stars and Stripes sent a team of reporters to Iraq to try to ascertain the states of both conditions and morale. Troops were asked about morale, among many other issues, in a 17-point questionnaire, which was filled out and returned by nearly 2,000 persons.
The results varied, sometimes dramatically:
¶ Among the largest group surveyed, Army troops, the results looked much like a bell curve. Twenty-seven percent said their personal morale was “high” or “very high.” Thirty-three percent said it was “low” or “very low.” The largest percentage fell in the middle, saying it was “average.”
¶ Among the second largest group, reservists and National Guard members, the differences were much starker. Only 15 percent said their own morale was “high” or “very high,” while 48 percent said it was “low” or “very low.”
¶ Among Marines, the next largest group, 44 percent said their morale was “high” or “very high,” and only 14 percent said it was “low” or “very low.”
¶ Among airmen, the smallest of the four major groups surveyed because fewer questionnaires were allowed to be circulated to them, the results were also very positive. Thirty-nine percent said their morale was “high” or “very high,” and only 6 percent said it was “low” or “very low.”
¶ Very few Navy servicemembers could be found to question in Iraq.
The questionnaire findings can’t be projected to all the servicemembers in Iraq. Still, the reporting of “lows” among the two largest groups surveyed, Army and Reserve/National Guard, seemed significant. The views of these troops, at least, appeared to contrast sharply with those of the visiting VIPs.
Respondents to the survey were not given a definition of morale. They responded according to what they interpreted the word to mean. Some believe morale reflects the degree of well-being felt by the servicemember. On the other hand, commanders say that in measuring morale, they want to know if the servicemember is following orders and getting the job done.
Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, the top U.S. officer in Iraq, said that low morale isn’t an issue because troops are fulfilling the mission.
“Morale is … not necessarily giving them Baskin-Robbins,” he said in a Stars and Stripes interview. “Sometimes it’s being able to train them hard and keep them focused in a combat environment so they can survive
Bush's attempt to assert himself extends beyond the executive branch. Late Tuesday, in a brief, brusque arm-twisting session with nine senators, the President made it clear that he was not there to answer questions or debate the merits of his $87 billion Iraq and Afghanistan aid package. He demanded that the aid to Iraq be in the form of grants, not loans, as some of the senators have urged.
Present at the session in the Roosevelt Room of the White House were Republicans Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania; Olympia J. Snowe and Susan Collins, both of Maine; Saxby Chambliss of Georgia; Sam Brownback of Kansas; Lindsey Graham of South Carolina; and John McCain of Arizona. Democrats Maria Cantwell of Washington and Mary L. Landrieu of Louisiana also attended.
At one point, as he discussed the question of providing some of the money as a loan, Bush slammed his hand down on the table and said: "This is bad policy."
When Collins tried to ask a question, the President replied: "I'm not here to debate it."
One participant told The Inquirer that some of the senators, particularly those who have never been on the opposing side of an issue with Bush, were "surprised by his directness." It was clear he was not there to engage in any give-and-take, the participant said.
Nevertheless, Bush failed to sway any of the pro-loan Republicans.
That failure was in sharp contrast to the President's lobbying of House members last week. Zach Wamp, a Tennessee Republican who had pushed a loan plan, backed away after meeting with Bush. "If his eyes had been lasers, mine would have burned out," Wamp said then.
"What's most revealing is the extent of frustration taking hold," said historian Robert Dallek of Boston University, a biographer of Presidents Lyndon B. Johnson and John F. Kennedy. "It's really reminiscent of Johnson and Vietnam. Members of the Senate... and the media were giving him grief. It sounds like Bush is falling into that pattern. He's blaming the media, much like Johnson did."
Yesterday, Bush sent Vice President Cheney and Powell to the Capitol to attend a Republican senatorial lunch, but they made no apparent converts. After the lunch, a dozen GOP senators were still discussing how the reconstruction money could be turned into a loan or partial loan.
Bush doesn't get it. They approve a $20B grant for Iraq, some of them will lose their seats. Simple as that. It's a hammer to use against them by their opponents. He can pound his fist all he wants, but he pulled that stunt with people not likely to tell him to pound salt. Dick Lugar and Chuck Hegel would not have been so polite. They cannot justify that as a grant in their states. They just can't. Bush doesn't even seem to realize that getting this money will be it as well. He cannot come back for another $20 or 30B in six months. The opposition to the money is pretty strong. If they split the bill, Iraq would get between $5 and 7B at most.
It's just too much money and too much corruption in the process for that to sit well with most people. It will be a very close vote between loan and grant and loan will win. Wolfie ran around saying Iraq is a rich country, well, let them pay is the attitude. The fact that oil production will take years to get back online was neglected. Now, it's biting them in the ass. Bush thinks lies have no consequence. well, they do. The Bushies have been lucky that people haven't figured out that Iraq will get five times more than Israel in direct aid while they kill Americans on a daily basis. When people connect those dots, things could get real ugly, real fast.
Clearly, the Bush Administration has little clue about what is really going on in Iraq. Another Congressman or GOP puppet, escorted by once and future Delta troopers, passes through some safe area, looks at a few schools and talks about "good news". The delusion of this can be seen if you read the translated reports of Nazi visitors to the East or the reports from Rand about Vietnam. How can anyone assume the occupied would tell the occupiers the truth about anything? What can a GOP Congressman do for an Iraqi that is going to liberate him from the Americans?
Congress, in it's own way, is just as guilty as the White House for delusional thinking. Europe is not going to bail us out. The Turkish offer of help, which cost $8B, is a trojan horse and may be the trick that unites Baathist and Islamic fundamentalist, Kurd, Sunni and Shia in a united front to oppose the CPA. Turks are deeply unpopular in Iraq and their motives are dark. Many in Congress, in both parties, believe if we can adjust the policy, support will come flooding along. That isn't the case. There's no popular support for doing anything but getting Americans out of Iraq. No European politician wants to say this to their American allies, but their citizens hope we fail in the most spectacular way possible. Years of high handed exceptionalism has made us enemies. A chastened US, driven from Iraq, its plans in tatters, Bush and Rumsfeld facing charges, is a dream among our allies. Privately, quietly, they want Iraq to change us into team players. It's not just the French, but the Germans, the Russians, everyone. They want the US to stop tossing its weight around on minor issues. It's time to play footie, just like everyone else does and get on the pitch.
Iraq is speeding towards civil war. When the US says things have improved, you need to know what matters and what doesn't.
First, schools and water and light are what sane people call basics. They should have existed without interruption. The scandal is that it took Saddam weeks and the US months to do the same thing.
Second, as long as security is a joke and the US plan to only support 1/10th of the size of the former Iraqi Army, it will remain a joke, nothing else can happen. It's only a matter of time, given the near open hatred between the US soldiers, who long to be anywhere else, and the Iraqi police, start to turn on each other. One night, the Iraqis will fade away and a police precinct will be blown sky high with only Americans inside.
Third, unemployment is rampant. Without jobs, the only employment for young men is guerrilla or criminal or both. Until people can work, they're gonna blow things up and steal.
Real improvement is work, security and 24 hour services. Anything less is a joke.
Bush's pathological inability to admit error means we will wake up one day and find Bremer either dead like Chinese Gordon, as his bodyguards lay crumpled beside him or surrounded by 100,000 Shia men, armed to the teeth.
Why?
What are the triggers to the civil war?
I think there are three:
1) The Turks move south.
The Kurds, fearing genocide like the residents of Haifa would seeing the 2nd SS Das Reich Division land on their beach, mine the roads, and start killing Turks as they cross through Kurdistan. Some small skirmishes, other large ones, but there's fighting and Turks are dying and then react in their usual subtle village burning and peasant raping ways. This draws the SCIRI (Hakim's boys) into the fight with the Kurds and the Sunnis join in as well. So you have the Turks facing a real fight and endangered supply lines and they react with force. So instead of the mythical Sunni triangle, you have all of Iraq, north of Baghdad resisting the Turks.
Once that happens, the US has to decide which ally to protect. If they protect the Turks, all Iraq turns on them. If they leave the Turks to hang, they violate the NATO treaty. And you never know how the Greeks, Russians or Iranians will play their hands.
The fighting expands across the country as an uprising against the CPA. Shia are not going to let more genocide happen to them and if the US can't prevent it, they will
2) The US arrests Sadr
If the US moves to arrest or kill Sadr as a "terrorist", East Baghdad erupts in rage. They flood out of East Baghdad and everyone goes for their guns. Sunnis fear a Shia takeover, Kurds go after the Turkmen for their final solution and everyone is at everyone. Sistani, sitting in Najaf, has to protect Sadr, so does Hakim. So they declare a fatwa, say that the IGC are tools of the infidels and everyone is off to the races. The mass, 1979-style protests start, flooding the streets with everyone and US troopers freak and kill everyone they see and then everyone finds their guns and the war is on for real.
3)Sadr decides to move
This is the riskiest of the scenarios. Sadr thinks he has the bodies and figures he'll present a fait accompli to Sistani and Bremer. So he and his 100,000-200,000 fans show up outside CPA HQ and decide to conduct an eviction. They say it's time to go and if you get stupid about it, we'll block all access to the building. The resulting stanoff freaks everyone out and power struggles erupt all over the country. The US troopers shoot, instant martyrs and you have a wave of human bombs going after checkpoints. All pretense of neutrality ends and Sistani says the US has to go.
The degree of control and violence is different, but all three mean the end of US control of Iraq. There are too many guns and RPG's and too few employed people for the US to survive any mass uprising without killing thousands of Iraqis in street massacres. There is no center, no Iraqi figure with enough respect to aid the US and those that are respected want the US gone.
Someone said unless there is a miracle in Iraq, Bush is in trouble. The real issue will be how great will the coming disaster be. Will we run like the Chosin Reservoir, walk away like Suez or have some kind of mad collapse like Vietnam. We won't be in Iraq for years. We haven't got enough troops to enforce our will. The only reason we're still there is the patience of the Shia and that will end, oh, starting next with with the start of Ramadan.
New babies are being named Saddam by their parents in this oil refinery town 160 miles north of Baghdad, such is the hostility to the US occupation, an official at the local births and deaths registration office said.
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But in Baiji, "Long live Saddam" slogans are scrawled everywhere. The mayor's office and a building which housed a pro-American opposition party are burned out, having been set on fire by demonstrators who brandished pictures of the former Iraqi leader.
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A Swedish journalist witnessed US soldiers beat an elderly religious man, Maad Ibrahim, almost to death. Mustapha Can, a correspondent for the Swedish evening newspaper Aftonbladet, was with a US patrol, which was hit by two mortar rounds.
He told The Independent: "Suddenly I saw the soldiers kick in a door and drag out an old man who screamed, 'Me no shoot! please, please mister.' The soldiers shouted, 'Shut the fuck up! Shut the fuck up!'
"They tied his hands behind his back and then, as he lay on the ground, one said: 'Keep his head still.' He slammed him on the head with his rifle butt again and again. Then the others kicked him. There was blood everywhere." US officers later admitted they were probably wrong about the old man, but said "these things happen in the heat of the action".
Iraqi leaders in the area say that while Paul Bremer, the head of the US civil administration in Baghdad, claims the guerrillas are an isolated remnant of the old regime, the soldiers assume the opposite. They assume all Iraqis are hostile and support the resistance.
NBC News military analyst Bill Arkin, who's been investigating Boykin for the Los Angeles Times, says the general casts the war on terror as a religious war: "I think that it is not only at odds with what the president believes, but it is a dangerous, extreme and pernicious view that really has no place."
During a January church speech in Daytona, Fla., Boykin recalled a Muslim fighter in Somalia who bragged on television the Americans would never get him because his God, Allah, would protect him: 'Well, you know what I knew, that my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God, and his was an idol."
The Somali was captured, and Boykin said he told the man: 'Mr. Atto, you underestimated our God."
In a phone conversation, Boykin tells NBC he respects Muslims and believes the radicals who attack America are 'not true followers of Islam."
Boykin also routinely tells audiences that God, not the voters, chose President Bush: "Why is this man in the White House? The majority of Americans did not vote for him. Why is he there? And I tell you this morning that he's in the White House because God put him there for a time such as this."
Boykin tells NBC News that, given his new assignment, he is curtailing such speeches in the future. He says, "I don't want - to be misconstrued. I don't want to come across as a right-wing radical."
Jesus freaks are not unknown in the military, but stuff like this, in our media age, makes its way to the Arab world and thus is repeated. Atrios pointed this particular bit o wackiness out and while I'm not surprised, I'll be betting the good general will soon retire to the sunbelt.
Hundreds of Iraqis have taken to the streets in support of the parallel government that Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr has announced for the country.
A day after al-Sadr announced the formation of his "Iraqi government" in defiance of the US-led occupation, a large crowd gathered in the city of Najaf, pledging their whole-hearted support.
"We are ready to sacrifice our souls for you, Sadr," chanted the demonstrators as they roamed the streets of the city.
A firebrand cleric, al-Sadr had announced the formation of the government during his weekly sermon in the town of Kufa.
Announcement
"I have decided and I have formed a government made up of several ministries, including ministries of justice, finance, information, interior, foreign affairs, endowments and the promotion of virtue and prevention of vice," the young cleric had said.
"If you agree, I ask you to demonstrate peacefully in order to express you support," al-Sadr had exhorted
Riverbend pointed this out on her blog. She asks a question I have a pretty clear answer to: what happens when the locals decide that Sadr, and not the IGC or CPA are the law? I'd say violent civil war personally.
On October 1, members of the Iraqi Governing Council confronted L. Paul Bremer, head of the Coalition Provisional Authority and the man who had appointed them. They were protesting his decision to spend $1.2 billion training a new Iraqi police force—in Jordan. Bremer claimed that the facilities required did not exist in Iraq. The council demurred, insisting that their country not only had the facilities but could provide them more cheaply. "If we had voted, a majority would have rejected it," one council member said to The New York Times. "He told us what he did. He did not ask us."
The money for Jordan came out of a $60 billion funding package for Iraq, conjured by Congress in April at the president's request. In the next few weeks, they will probably approve another $87 billion, of which $70 billion is tabbed for Baghdad. That's the easy part. What's more complicated is how it will be spent, both at home and abroad. And as subcontracts awarded to Saudi conglomerates or Kuwaiti telecoms make clear, there will be a broad impact to these taxpayer billions suddenly flowing to the Persian Gulf.
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So is a certain amount of campaign cash, cycled back from those who profit in the reconstruction. Against the backdrop of a treasury-draining scheme to remake the world, a few million dollars in corporate contributions to a sitting president may seem insignificant, but one can be sure they matter to Bush—and to his political opponents. For Democrats, the spectacle of a Republican administration larding out contracts to close allies is a political disaster.
"A hundred-fifty billion dollars is a large amount of money with no incumbent claimant," observed John Pike, of globalsecurity.org, a nonpartisan think tank for defense. "It's new money, up for grabs, and the campaign effects are a given. Such a large sum serves to consolidate the existing distribution of power in Washington, where one party is in control, and there's an uncompetitive electoral system in Congress. So this will further undermine the pretense that we live in a functional democracy—meaning, you can look forward to another round of redistricting after the next election!"
Toward that end, the administration is already putting its own people in place, gatekeepers who will manage that potentially lucrative union between American investment and Iraqi resources. Like Thomas Foley, an old business-school friend of the president's, and also one of his 2000 Connecticut campaign bosses. Foley will decide which of Iraq's roughly 200 state-owned enterprises are fit to survive.
Iraq is being set up for auction, and in Washington and Baghdad, the administration is lining up bidders. Lawyers and lobbyists, many with deep ties to the Republican electoral machine, are corralling investors ready to join in the enormous gamble. "If you go to the Four Seasons and shout out 'Who's working on a deal in Iraq?' everybody there will raise their hand," said Ed Rogers, one of the GOP's top lobbyists in Washington, according to The Hill. With non-American companies frozen out, and the UN withdrawing its mission, U.S. firms will be on their own, just the way the administration wants it.
I'm shocked. Just shocked. Bush farming out deals to his supporters? Never. An outrageous charge.
I love Ed Levine's writing on NY food, as a rule. His hamburger discussion last winter was the talk of New York. Unlike the Hot Dog debate, which basically centers around if you like the thin Papaya King dogs over the thick Nathan's dogs, the hamburger debate had many partisans. I still lean towards Corner Bistro, but really, any place which gets fresh ground chuck can make a good, non-mealy burger. The ground beef from Fairway does a great job for hamburgers. But Paul's also gets a big vote, although the fries from the Belgian place are a LOT better.
Anyway, I have to add some comments here to Levine's assertions.
Published: October 15, 2003
WE are a city of heroes. The rest of the country may clamor for po' boys and hoagies, grinders, subs, wedges or torpedoes, but New York knows what really constitutes a gigantic sandwich, and what raises the hero above those pretenders; what makes it gastronomic royalty.
Let there be no misunderstanding by those who have never ventured to New York, or by those who have come lately, or by those who diet. The hero is a sandwich of cured Italian meats. These are layered into a forearm's length of fresh crusty bread, often with a few slices of Italian cheese and a condiment or two atop them — pepperoncini, yes; roasted peppers, yes; mayonnaise, an emphatic no. Also, perhaps, a splash of vinegar, certainly a drizzle of olive oil. Some ground pepper, a sprinkle of salt. But no more. No sun-dried tomatoes sully the interior of a true hero, no pesto, no Brie, no fancy pants ingredients at all.
This, is, of course correct. Mayo can be included, but it's like adding a layer of fat to the fatty meat. You really need that vinegar/olive oil mix with herbs to get it correct. Paul Newman's original dressing is a great substitute if you're too lazy to make your own. You can make your own with a simple mix of oregano, basil, rosemary, salt, pepper and red pepper flakes with good olive oil and good vinegar, more on this later.
THERE are a number of things the discerning eater should look for in a cold hero. The flavors of the sandwich should be complementary, as should the textures. Meat should marry fat, crunch should dance with cream, tangy should balance the sweet, the salty, the plain. The sandwich should be beautiful. And, as is true of virtually every great dish, a great hero should be made of only the finest ingredients.
Everything begins with the bread. It should be crisp and crusty, not soft and doughy, with a pronounced yeasty flavor...............
If you're not from New York, you might want a softer roll, but that's insane. This is not Subway. You want the crunch of the roll, the snap of the bread, the sturdiness of it. Soft rolls aren't bad, but well.....they're not the same. If the bread doesn't have a crust, it's not really a decent sandwich. These meats need a firm base, sturdiness.
If the place has good bread, it's time to look closely at the cold-cut case. Look for salumi from high-quality, high-cost purveyors: Volpi or Oldani salami from St. Louis, dried sausage and soppressata from Alps Provisions in Queens, prosciutto di Parma, imported mortadella studded with pistachio nuts. Beware of prosciutto imported from Canada, not Italy; it might as well have come from Akron on the late bus. And save the Boar's Head for a ham and cheese sandwich — what you want in a hero is the taste of home-cured meats.
......................
Then, construct your hero as you might order a drink at the bar of the Four Seasons, ignoring the well brands and calling for top-shelf bottles. A sandwich made with prosciutto di Parma or house-made soppressata may cost a dollar or two more, but it's more than worth it
Personally, I think prosciutto di Parma is way too salty and dry to enjoy in a hero. I would always, always choose cappicola and prosciutto Cotto, which is both sweet and very hamlike. Fresh baked ham is also a good substitute. I've had parma on heroes and it's saltiness and dryness always disappoints. It's like bacon, some, modified with other ingredients, is great. A lot, on it's own, is too much. Prosciutto, to me, is always best on it's own, like a single malt scotch, or with fruit or cheese, maybe a cracker. It's too independent a flavor to work well in the pepper/salt combo of salami. If I want that flavor, I want to have that rich saltiness on it's own. Not drowned out by other, less subtle flavors. If I wanted a prosciutto sandwich, the bread would have to be thin with a single slice of mild provelone, not mozzarella.
Cheese? When it comes to mozzarella in heroes, you should get it only if it's made on the premises, or in the neighborhood and delivered daily. Ask about this, as commercial mozzarella adds a rubbery texture and no flavor to a hero. Mr. Capezza at Corona Heights Pork Store makes his wonderful creamy mozzarella in the back, and when he cuts into it to make a hero, it's so fresh it spurts milk. (Mr. Capezza, by the by, has a superb hero pedigree; his in-laws owned the legendary Carl's Dairy in Astoria, which closed in 1984, but was known to be among the best hero spots in New York practically from its opening in 1925.)
There are all kinds of provolones to put on a hero: domestic, imported, aged, fresh.
Fresh mozz is easy to get. Most good cheese stores have it in abundance. So do the best delis. But there's a caveat here: mozz is best with single meats or meats which are not salty. For this kind of hero, the best mix is a mild provelone with a slice of something sharp. Sharp provelone is, well, sharp. Mild provelone melts well in the mix of salty meats. But, if you want a killer simple sandwich, roast beef and smoked mozzerella is as good as it gets, maybe with a little gravy or roasted peppers. The mildness of the roast beef works well with the salty cheese.
Dressings deserve a few words as well. The presence of oil and vinegar in a hero often leaves the customer with soggy bread, and too often the vinegar is so cheap it lends the sandwich an unwanted astringent, sour note. I stand for just a drizzle of olive oil across the top of the sandwich, or a light coating of the transcendent caper vinaigrette Mr. Gualandi makes at Melampo
It depends. If the place has a good mix, with a good wine vinegar and decent olive oil, then you can trust them. Olive oil alone can be a bit cloying. The vinegar is a bit sharp and cuts through the other flavors. Sometimes, you can just use a good brown mustard which gives a nice kick. I know it's heresy, but people eat fried pig innards and fluffernutter sandwiches. However, in a good Italian deli, which one of three you'll find in the NY area (Jewish and German are the others), you should be able to get a sandwich with a light coating of dressing.
A quick note about German delis. They're not nearly as common, but they've basically turned into the basic ham and cheese palace. They're the people who've developed potato salad and the love of mayonnaise. Jewish delis sell your basic beef (corned beef, roast beef, pastrami) hot on rye. Italian delis are a wonderful world of complex meats and cheeses and breads. Levine's only mistake was to not visit Hoboken, which has some amazing sandwiches from their small delis.
One final point: Levine is talking about a specific kind of hero. Any kind of meat served on a hero roll in NY is technically a hero. If you're wondering what this stuff taste like, Subway's Italian and Blimpie's #1 are good hints of what you can expect. Put them on a hard long roll, and you'll get a taste of what a real Italian hero tastes like. Any good deli will have these meats in quality as well.
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Coalition officials say a radical young cleric named Muqtada al Sadr is behind a recent spate of suicide bombings and political assassinations that he's using to try to gain power over Iraq's Shiite Muslim majority. But they haven't yet decided how to deal with him for fear of touching off even worse violence.
Coalition officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, say they now think that a car bombing Sunday at the Baghdad Hotel was a Sadr-inspired assassination attempt against Moffowak al Rubaie, a moderate Shiite physician who sits on Iraq's U.S.-appointed Governing Council. Al Rubaie, who was in the hotel, was slightly wounded. Six Iraqis, mostly paramilitary police, were killed and at least 36 were injured.
Coalition officials think that attack was coordinated with a roadside bomb that struck the car of Sheik Saed Hussain al Shiami, Iraq's newly appointed deputy secretary of religious affairs, as he was on his way to work. Shiami, another prominent Shiite moderate, also was slightly wounded.
The allegations about Sadr come as the struggle for primacy among Shiites, who make up 60 percent of Iraq's population, intensifies.
Overnight Tuesday, about 40 to 50 armed Sadr gunmen battled with about 200 gunmen claiming allegiance to Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, Iraq's top Shiite leader, after Sadr's men took control of two mosques in the sacred city of Karbala, about 50 miles southwest of Baghdad. At least six people were killed and an unknown number were wounded, said 1st Lt. Hashim Adami, a Karbala police officer.
The incident, the first major clash between Shiite groups since the U.S.-British invasion last spring, reflects the deep divisions between Sistani, who is said to favor strict separation between religion and politics, and Sadr, who favors a theocracy like Iran
Juan Cole pointed this out on his blog today, and almost every word in this article from the CPA is bullshit.
First, there is no evidence that young Sadr has the skills to make car bombs. The targets hit by car bombs are far more likely to have Al Qaeda or Baathist links, like the Al-Hakim assassination and the recent car bombing in East Baghdad. Sadr could not survive being linked to such attacks. Unless he's getting help from Hizbollah, car bombs would not be his main tool.
Second, Sadr has the allegiance of 2m people in East Baghdad, plus some in Basra. He doesn't need car bombs. He can send 100,000 people in the streets any Friday he chooses.
Third, Sadr's struggle for power has little to do with the CPA. He has Shia rivals to deal with, mainly SCIRI, the Hakim organization and the defacto support they give Sistani, the country's leading object of emulation, or main Shia cleric.
Fourth, Sistani wants a theocracy just like Sadr, the only difference is the degree of the influence the clergy has in daily life.
The US desperately wants Sadr out of the way. If someone goes after him, fine. If he's neutralized, fine. Only problem is that Sadr survived Saddam, who killed his father in plain sight. The Americans, Cole argues and I agree, have nothing to terrorize him with. If they try to arrest him, they may well trigger a civil war by that one act, and if they don't, they look weak.
It's a very risky gambit using such unsubtle disinformation against Sadr. If it doesn't work, it could make a lot of people very angry. If it does, another cleric will just take his place.
Andrew Clark, transport correspondent
Wednesday October 15, 2003
The Guardian
Train travellers will be forced to call Bangalore to find out the time of their next connection at Crewe or Clapham Junction, under a secret plan to save up to £10m by shifting Britain's national rail enquiries service to India.
According to documents leaked to the Guardian, train operators intend to educate Indian call centre workers in the eccentricities of Britain's railways. The move could put 1,700 jobs at risk at the existing call centres in Cardiff, Derby, Newcastle and Plymouth.
Indian staff will need to cope with queries about anything from the availability of smoking carriages on South West Trains to disabled access on the Fort William sleeper and weekend engineering works on the Settle-Carlisle line.
They will have to know every fare and promotion on the network, including the difference between a saver, a supersaver, an off-peak saver and a weekender.
An internal memo to the board of the Association of Train Operating Companies (Atoc) reveals that the chief executive of National Rail Enquiries, Chris Scoggins, visited eight call centres in three Indian cities earlier this year.
Mr Scoggins found that they delivered an "excellent quality" service: "In two operations the agents had virtually no Indian accent."
His memo requests approval to set up a pilot operation in Bangalore, saying the "business case is strong" but warns: "There may well be trade union agitation and negative media coverage regarding jobs."
What won't they farm out to India? One day, incorrect procedures given over the phone in India will cost a western company millions in legal settlements.
The first story they tell you in Reporting 101 goes like this:
A cub reporter goes to a city council meeting and a fire breaks out in City Hall. The reporter calls the desk and tells the editor that there's no story, He asks why. Because a fire has broken out in City Hall and they cancelled the meeting. The reporter is then told that the story is not the meeting, but the fire. The point is that if you don't see the fire as a story, you need to find a different line of work.
THe Bush Administation has the idiots in the Washington press corps debating whether there is any good news in Iraq. It's a stupid argument whe car bombs go off every other day. What are they supposed to report? New school built in Basra? That is not important to the families of the 130,000 men and women in Iraq. We're supposed to believe that sending Iraqi six year olds to learn their Arabic ABC's is more important than a car bomb attack on the Turkish Embassy?
No one cares.
The Bushies and their little fantasy of empire may need us to care, but Americans care about Iraq in only one context, if their friends and neighbors will come back alive, in a box or missing a few pieces. Maybe if they can get a little oil in the bargain. There was no agreement to build Iraq, no appetite for it and no desire for an $87B downpayment. So running around talking about school construction in Iraq while GI's learn the value of walking with artificial limbs is both insulting and stupid. One of the Presidential candidates will call this PR campaign the insult to the intelligence that it is.
They don't send letters saying " we got you son killed, but Abdel Nasser Primary School opened" . We are at war and while the education of the Iraqi people is nice, it isn't a priority in Ohio, OK. If the President was an honest man, he would tell the American people things suck, may continue to suck and we're looking for a way out. These idiots, sitting on the brink of a civil war, which could be triggered by anyone, Sadr, Hakim, the Baathists, the resistance, the Kurds, and they want to pretend school construstion is the key to peace.
The intervention of the Turks will go down as well as Chinese occupation troops in Vietnam. The Kurds are seeing visions of genocide in their heads, burned villages, raped women and looted homes. And that's the start. Other Iraqis have similar memories. In an America where history is entertainment, Turkey's history with the Arabs and Kurds is a quant tale from the past. Not in Iraq, where it's like the SS coming over the Golan Heights and down towards Tel Aviv. The Turks show up, fighting will start, even if the leaders try to prevent it and they aren't that eager. Even if there wasn't such bad blood, all the occupiers get attacked. But with the Turks, its all personal. The US may well be stuck between allies, Kurds and Turks, who want to kill each other on sight.
The problem in Iraq isn't the speed of school construction or negative media. It's the facts.
Josh Marshall dug this up off of MPR's Marketplace today
Okay, can I have five minutes of your time?
You've gotta hear this.
If you click on this link you can hear a short segment from NPR's 'Marketplace' about one of the American businessmen, Tompie Hall, trying to get a piece of the Iraqi reconstruction action.
Believe me, you've gotta hear this
Hall is speaking to the second richest Iraq and his business "consultant", Joe.
Hall: There's no initation fee, if you come in by January 1st, and a $7500 participation fee every month.
Joe: You mean we have to pay to be in the consortium?
Hall: Everybody does
Joe: You should pay us to be in the consortium
Hall: I'm going to pay you to be my customer? What is that?....... Iraqi thinking?
Hall had come to Iraq looking to make eight clients for a consortium of companies which would then have the inside track to bid on projects given to American companies. Joe's client runs Iraq's largest construction company.
After the meeting, Hall says that if the Iraqis don't play ball, they just get the labor from outside the country. That the Iraqis have to change their ways.
Which is delusional, considering how effective sniper's rifles and car bombs are.
Needless to say, Hall got NO clients. I think they were offended by having to pay a kickback to a guy who would then farm out work to the occupiers and give them the crumbs. Saddam and the clerics won't be the only supporters of the resistance if this is how these people think they will rebuild Iraq.
I've been listening to The Who lately. Normally, I avoid classic rock like the plague, but some Who songs seem to be particularly resonant. They just seem to scream Iraq in a very pointed way.
Won't Get Fooled Again
We'll be fighting in the streets
With our children at our feet
And the morals that they worship will be gone
And the men who spurred us on
Sit in judgement of all wrong
They decide and the shotgun sings the song
I'll tip my hat to the new constitution
Take a bow for the new revolution
Smile and grin at the change all around
Pick up my guitar and play
Just like yesterday
Then I'll get on my knees and pray
We don't get fooled again
The change, it had to come
We knew it all along
We were liberated from the fold, that's all
And the world looks just the same
And history ain't changed
'Cause the banners, they are flown in the next war
A friend of mine sent me the following diatribe which ran on a BBS:
I am the father of 4 kids. My wife stays home to take care of them and the house. It is her JOB. If I come home from work to a messy house, am I not supposed to complain? She can't seem to stay on top of things like the dishes, laundry, she lets things pile up on the table, she is a slob. She is teaching my children to be slobs. We can not sit down to eat dinner until she clears the table, sometimes she does dishes before even making dinner, why not do them during the day?
What does she do all day that makes it impossible for her to be neat and organized? I am concerned about the effect on the children. She gets to school late sometimes, so that they aren't prepared for the day adequately. If they tell her they have no homework she BELIEVES them!
Even if it is not true. She tries all these stupid charts to get the kids into a routine, and do chores and stuff, why can't she just tell them to do it? Why do they have to be told every day to do the same things? I go to work every day to provide for my family, is it to much to expect that when I get home I be able to sit down and relax in front of the tv without having to deal with the mess or homework or chores? I go to work and do my job, if I didn't my boss would fire me.]
WHY can she not do her job with no ramifications. If I was her boss, I would fire her! She claims I have unrealistic expectations, I am getting tired of hearing that. I expect a clean house, dinner on the table, my kids to be neat and organized, and I expect her to do it. It is her JOB. How do I get her to see that?
Joe
Then, upon being told that he was, well wrong, he replied thusly
First of all I thought this was a DAD's zone, for DAD's to "worry and complain".
Second of all you all are missing the point. I WORK all day, sometimes more than 8 hours, I have even had to work weekends at times. I commute 45 minutes to work, deal with bosses and co-workers, I work in a stressful IT job. Is it too much to expect to come home and be able to relax?
I provide a pay check for HER, so she can STAY HOME with our children. I don't think it is unreasonable to expect that she deal with the children and the house. Why should I have to come home from work and do her job? I am NOT going to come home and spend hours making the kids do homework or clean their rooms, that is not MY job. It is her's. I have already had to hire a cleaning lady to come in every other week, that is money out of my pocket!
Why? Because my wife refuses to do it. She has all day to take care of the house, if she appreciated or valued the work I put in to provide for her she would DO IT! When I walk in the door and see the kids shoes, toys and backpacks piled by the door, it pisses me off. They don't value what I do for them if they treat their belongings that way. She is not teaching my children to value what they have if she allows them to throw them around. Why can't they be taught to put things away? If they aren't going to do it than at least she should do it for them. How else will they learn to appreciate what they have?
I do not have to justify my behavior, I was asking about my wife. She is a stay at home mom because I WORK for her to be able to stay home. If she isn't holding up her end of the deal than she should get a job and bring in some income.
Joe
Now, this is a man who has never been trapped with ONE child, much less four. When I was in high school into college, my mother was a home daycare provider. We routinely had three-four 2 year olds in the house. There is nothing closer to anarchy than having four small kids to deal with. They have to be watched constantly and fed, and taken care of. This is not an easy job. I would rather work in an office any day of the week, even an IT office, over caring for small kids.
See, this guy thinks he has a hard job. Well, when I was caring for my niece and nephew, who were four and five at the time, my day would start around 7, I'd wake up, feed them, turn on Sesame Street or Reading Rainbow and relax. Then we'd go out, I'd feed them again, they'd do some more work in their workbooks, eat a snack, then I'd fix dinner. By 9, I was half dead and they were in bed. I'd never worked as hard in my life. And these were not infants. And they weren't mine.
Only an idiot could think his wife has time to care for four kids and keep the house clean. He's lucky she's not depressed ansd suicidal. Yes, kids are great and fun and a wonderful expression of the human capacity to love. But they are also a pain in the ass. Nothing like a crying four year old screaming because there are onions on her cheeseburger. Or waking you up so they can eat? Or asking for no onions at White Castle. Or looking at a fridge full of food and figuring out how to make pigs in a blanket with canned biscuits and hot dogs. Or explaining why your nephew needs to spend time with other boys to your niece.
This man thinks his house is supposed to run by osmosis. Four kids are a pain in the ass. Until they are almost teeangers, you just have to deal, not expect some Father Knows Best bullshit. Why is his house a mess? He has four kids. My sister has two and her house is in constant upheaval from Barbies and PS 2 games and Pokemon/ Yu-Gi-Oh cards and random toys and Legos.
Of course the guy works in IT. He would have to. I don't know where the idea that moms sat around all day and hung out watching TV got started, but man, I'd like to meet any that do. Because I sure didn't get a chance to when I was caring for kids.
A suicide bomber has died during an attempted attack on the Turkish embassy in central Baghdad, the US military says.
The car bomb, which exploded at about 1440 (1140 GMT) close to the building, wounded a couple of people, but killed no-one else, the US military says.
US Colonel Peter Mansoor said they had received a warning of "increased danger" to the embassy three days ago through informants - and this had prompted stricter security.
The warning came after Turkey's decision to send peacekeeping troops to Iraq.
........................
Controversial move
The suicide attack in Baghdad comes a week after the Turkish parliament approved plans to send peacekeeping troops into Iraq - the first mainly Muslim country to do so.
That decision was welcomed by Washington but bitterly rejected by many in Iraq, especially Kurds in the north of the country, says the BBC's Jill McGivering in Baghdad
You have a room full of suspects here. Everyone but Sadr and the Hakims, basically. This is only the start of attacking the Turks. NO ONE wants them there. This is a clear message: stay home. How quickly will it take the Kurds to come out shooting when the Turks move south? An hour? Sure, you could lay it at the feet of your Islamic nationalists, but realistically, it could be anyone with a grudge against the Turks. Which would be most Iraqis excluding the Turkmen. Hell, it could even be the PKK, Turkey's own Kurdish party.
And in other news, the Sadrists and Hakims went at it when Sadr's boys pulled a jack move and tried to take over the Imam Ali mosque. A bit hasty, one would think. But he's got the people and his boys speak Arabic and not Farsi. I wonder if the US even noticed that at the funeral in East Baghdad, people were walking around with G3 rifles. Guess which Army uses the G3. Not the Iraqis. Not the Americans. Not the Syrians. That would leave.....Iran. Is Sadr getting help from the Iranians, or are Iranian arms being smuggled across the border. The G3 is a Heckler&Koch rifle first used by the German Army in 1959 and exported where the AK, FN/FAL or M-14/16 didn't get shipped. This, not the AK-47 and varients, are the descendents of the SG-44 Assault Rifle used at the end of WWII by the Nazis.
WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court cleared the way Tuesday for state laws allowing ill patients to smoke marijuana if a doctor recommends it.
Justices turned down the Bush administration's request to consider whether the federal government can punish doctors for recommending or perhaps just talking about the benefits of the drug to sick patients. An appeals court said the government cannot.
Nine states have laws legalizing marijuana for people with physician recommendations or prescriptions: Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Nevada, Oregon and Washington. And 35 states have passed legislation recognizing marijuana's medicinal value.
But federal law bans the use of pot under any circumstances.
The case gave the court an opportunity to review its second medical marijuana case in two years. The last one involved cannabis clubs.
This one presented a more difficult issue, pitting free-speech rights of doctors against government power to keep physicians from encouraging illegal drug use. A ruling for the Bush administration would have made the state medical marijuana laws unusable
The feds drug law paranoia has been so deep and so silly for so long, this is a breath of fresh air. Now, I like my drugs in brown bottles made in breweries, but the war against pot is so pointless that it lost its sense of humor long ago. The fact that Tommy Chong is facing jail time for selling bongs is ridiculous. The fact the John Walters is drug czar is even more ridiculous. Most adults smoke weed at some point in their lives, some like it, some don't. I know people who smoke every day, I'd rather have a beer myself. But the point is, none are selling their asses or bullying housekeepers or ceasing to function.
Washington needs to end their drug war paranoia when it comes to weed and let people smoke, for whatever reason, once they hit adulthood. The easiest thing in the world for a teenager to get is a bag of weed. Because there is only the law to stop sales. A liquor license costs money to keep. You can build a business around it. Weed? Sell to anyone and make your money back. You sell booze to minors you might lose your business.
and Rick Pearson, Tribune staff reporters
Published October 12, 2003
If Republican U.S. Senate candidate Chirinjeev Kathuria makes it to the March primary ballot, the one vote he may not be able to count on is his own.
The 38-year-old Oak Brook business promoter isn't registered to vote. According to election officials in DuPage County, where he grew up and still lives with his parents, he never has been.
That is only one of the striking inconsistencies surrounding Kathuria, whose campaign is built on highly embellished claims of success as an international business tycoon.
A firm he until recently touted as a groundbreaking Internet site for health information is on life support, $3 million in debt, and has been sued by suppliers. Some major corporations he lists as backers say they have no financial involvement with him. Some firms he says he launched were actually started by others, exist largely on paper, or are shrouded in what he said are confidentiality agreements.
Now Kathuria, who has never worked in a campaign or made a political contribution, is asking voters to make him the first Sikh in the Senate and has pledged to spend $6 million of his own money to get there.
Kathuria is packaging a dazzling resume and the novelty of someone of his ethnic background running for high office into a strategy that has gained outsized attention for a political novice from the media and conservative activists. He recently told the online edition of Newsweek that he was "getting an unfair advantage because everyone remembers me because of the beard and turban."
Kathuria, who holds an Ivy League medical degree but has never practiced, portrays himself as an innovative entrepreneur who has made a fortune launching cutting-edge technology firms that he says "impact world economies and shift business models."
I found this little gem on corrente amnd it reminded me of the bad old days covering dot scam companies. A whole bunch of these guys made money, puffed up their resumes, and then say they did shit they couldn't possibly have done. What is charming about this is this guy is suing the Chicago Tribune for a lack of "fair and balanced reporting" which is bullshit. They are under no obligation to be fair, just honest.
It is a newspaper's job to check into the background of people running for public office. Not just to take their word for it.
This guy is a perfect example of resume blindness. People see his dazzling resume and they assume he's a star, when the reality is a lot more sober.
Oct. 13, 2003 | WASHINGTON (AP) -- Nearly one-quarter of the 130,000 U.S. troops in Iraq still have not been issued a new type of ceramic body armor strong enough to stop bullets fired from assault rifles.
Delays in funding, production and shipping mean it will be December before all troops in Iraq will have the vests, which were introduced four years ago, military officials say.
Congress approved $310 million in April to buy 300,000 more of the bulletproof vests, with 30,000 destined to complete outfitting of the troops in Iraq. Of that money, however, only about $75 million has reached the Army office responsible for overseeing the vests' manufacture and distribution, said David Nelson, an official in that office.
Angry members of Congress have denounced the Pentagon. They say up to 44,000 troops lack the best vests because of the sluggish supply chain, significantly more than the Pentagon figure. Relatives of some soldiers have resorted to buying body armor in the United States and shipping it to their troops, congressional critics say.
"I got a letter from a young soldier in Baghdad saying that the men in his group were concerned that they had cheap armor that was incapable of stopping bullets. And they wondered why they could not have the best protection possible under the circumstances," said Rep. Ted Strickland, D-Ohio.
Ooops. My bad. We didn't expect the most nationalistic people in the middle east to resist with bullets. Sorry about that.
Juan Cole, a professor at UofM and an actual expect on the Middle East (he even speaks Arabic) has written an interesting article for the Boston Review. Prof. Cole is one of the best bloggers on the region, since, uh, he makes his living at it. You should read his blog daily if you want to be truly informed about what Arabs are saying about Iraq. They aren't talking about new schools.
The Iraqi Shiites
On the history of America’s would-be allies
Juan Cole
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And unlike Saudi Arabia, Paul Wolfowitz thought, Iraq did not have holy cities such as Mecca and Medina that would make the stationing of U.S. troops there objectionable: Iraqis, he said, “don’t bring the sensitivity of having the holy cities of Islam being on their territory.” (He apparently did not then know about the Shiite shrine cities of Najaf and Karbala). The hawks were aware that a democratic Iraq would have a Shiite majority, but their client, Ahmad Chalabi (head of the expatriate Iraqi National Congress), convinced them that Iraqi Shiites were largely secular in mindset and uninterested in a Khomeinist theocracy. In the short term, they thought, Chalabi and his Iraqi National Congress would run Iraq in at least a semi-democratic fashion.
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The Iraqi Shiites
Shiites in Iraq were radicalized and brutalized by two major events: the Baath crackdown on Shiite political activity in the late 1970s and 1980s, and the crushing of the 1991 uprising and subsequent persecution of and even genocide against Shiites in the South. As a result of the cruel 1990s, Khomeinist ideas gained far more purchase with the poverty-stricken and desperate younger generation than a secular middle-class expatriate like Chalabi could have dreamed. Indeed, Chalabi left Iraq in 1958 and the beginnings of organized Shiite politics coincide more or less exactly with the time of his departure.
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In the meantime, inside Iraq, Saddam’s government appeared determined to wipe out Iraqi Shiism. It tried to draw Shiites away to secular Baathism and launched cruel attacks on recalcitrant villages in the south. Some 500,000 marsh Arabs of the Madan tribes—fishermen, farmers and smugglers—employed their swamps to hide from the Baathist troops and to conduct hit-and-run guerrilla operations against them. They were organized by the Iraqi Hezbollah, or Party of God, and received some Iranian help. They also sometimes coordinated with SCIRI’s Badr Corps, which infiltrated the swamps from Iran. In response Baath engineers built dams and irrigation works that drained the swamps. By the early 21st century only 10 percent of the swamps survived; the rest had turned to dust. The marsh Arabs were scattered, some to nearby villages and towns as dirt-poor laborers, others to exile in Iran.
Many Shiites with a village-tribal background had also settled in East Baghdad’s al-Thawrah township, which had been founded by military dictator al-Qasim in 1962. Dwelling in grinding poverty and largely deprived of the benefits of Iraq’s petroleum bonanza, they often rioted against the Baath, with particular force in 1977 and 1991. In each case they met vicious repression. By the 1990s their population had swelled to some two million, nearly 10 percent of the country. They retained some tribal ties and organization in their new urban environment and began turning away from folk Shiism to a more scholastic urban religious outlook.
In scholastic Shiism each believer must choose a prominent clergyman and follow his rulings on the minutiae of religious law, such as “Since perfume has alcohol in it, and alcohol is forbidden, may a Shiite wear perfume?” The most popular and authoritative such clergyman, or Object of Emulation, had usually been the foremost scholar in the shrine and seminary city of Najaf. In the 1960s it was Muhsin al-Hakim, and then the torch passed to Abu al-Qasim al-Khoei.
After al-Khoei’s death in 1992, however, a generation gap developed. Older Shiites tended to follow al-Khoei’s disciple, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, who was originally from Iran. A quietist, he rejected involvement in politics and rejected Khomeini’s theory of clerical rule. The new generation, however, was attracted to a younger, activist scholar named Muhammad Sadiq al-Sadr. A cousin of the martyred theorist of Islamic government in Iraq, Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr, Sadiq emerged as a political organizer of some genius. He established networks of believers loyal to him in Basra, East Baghdad, Kufa, and the shrine cities of Najaf and Karbala. Although he did not have Sistani’s seniority, he also lacked the elder man’s timidity. In the 1990s Sadr II, as he became known, repeatedly defied Saddam.
Saddam had attempted to outlaw Friday prayers among the Shiites. Sadr II insisted on leading them, and established a network of mosques in the slums of East Baghdad where congregants furtively gathered on Friday afternoons. Sadr II compared Saddam to a tyrannical medieval caliph who persecuted the Shiites of his day. He organized informal Shiite religious courts throughout the country and tried to convince tribal Shiites to come under the sway of formal jurisprudence. He denounced women, including Christians, who dared go out unveiled. He lambasted his followers if they wore clothing with Western labels. He preached against Israel. He accepted Khomeini’s theory of the rule of the jurisprudent, and may have had his eye on the position for himself in Iraq.
Sadr II gained some two million followers for his militant, Khomeini-style Shiism. Then, after warning him to fall silent, Saddam’s secret police assassinated him and two of his sons in February of 1999. The South erupted in riots, which were, predictably, put down by the jackboot.
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The Shiites Under Occupation
Sadr II’s young son, Muqtada al-Sadr, was heir to a family tradition of martyrdom. Married to the orphaned daughter of Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr (Sadr I), he went underground in Kufa and East Baghdad, continuing his father’s networking and organizing among young Shiite slum dwellers. The American invasion of Iraq in the spring of 2003 proved to be a windfall for him. Even before the Baath fell on April 9, his followers had expelled the party from East Baghdad, which they renamed Sadr City. Muqtada’s young clerical devotees reopened mosques and other Shiite institutions, established neighborhood militias, captured arms and ammunitions from Baath depots, took over hospitals, and asserted local authority in East Baghdad, Kufa, and some neighborhoods of Najaf, Karbala, and Basra. They engaged in crowd politics, calling for frequent demonstrations against the Anglo-American occupation in Baghdad, Basra, and Najaf, sometimes managing to get out crowds of 5,000 to 10,000.
In the meantime, the al-Da`wa Party reemerged in Nasiriya, Basra, and elsewhere, though not nearly on the scale of the Sadr II bloc. The London-based branch of al-Da`wa, which had been willing to cooperate with the Americans, emerged as the most prominent, hooking back up with cell members in Nasiriya and Basra. Many figures associated with the Iranian branch remained in Tehran, unwilling to return to an Iraq under American dominance. The attempt of the heir to the al-Khoei name, Abd al-Majid al-Khoei, to come back and assert authority in Najaf (probably with U.S. backing) failed when he was cut down by a Sadrist mob in April. SCIRI leaders returned to Iraq in April and May, and their Badr Corps fighters slipped back into the country from Iran, establishing themselves in eastern cities, such as Baquba and Kut, near the Iranian border. They failed to get much purchase in East Baghdad or other Sadrist areas, however. Although SCIRI proved willing to work with the Americans, the Badr Corps often clashed with U.S. troops in Baquba and elsewhere.
Both the Sadr II bloc and SCIRI sought a clerically dominated Islamic republic in Iraq, though with different announced strategies. Muqtada was plain-spoken about the goal and refused to cooperate with the United States in attaining it. SCIRI, in contrast, thought in terms of a two-step process. Badr Corps commander Abdul Aziz al-Hakim articulated the process in a television interview, saying that Iraqis would first choose a pluralistic government, but in the long term the Shiite majority would opt for an Islamic republic. This plan resembled the machinations of Communist parties in the early 20th century who collaborated with the national bourgeoisie to establish postcolonial states but aimed for ultimate Communist dictatorship.
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Conclusion
In removing the Baath regime and eliminating constraints on Iraqi Islamism, the United States has unleashed a new political force in the Gulf: not the upsurge of civic organization and democratic sentiment fantasized by American neoconservatives, but the aspirations of Iraqi Shiites to build an Islamic republic. That result was an entirely predictable consequence of the past 30 years of political conflict between the Shiites and the Baathist regime, and American policy analysts have expected a different result only by ignoring that history.
Note:I've been nursing a sore foot for a couple of days, which means lots of bed rest and little doing of anything else. It's almost better, but it's not much fun limping around.
The Bush Administration seems not to understand how effective the idea of the car bomb is. Car bombs work, because they scare the shit out of every one. You're having a drink or going shopping and a Fiat turns into a missle, well, that's going to ruin your day. Whether triggered by a human or remotely, they are very effective weapons. Especially against standing targets. The Iraqi method of terror seems to br based on randomness. The more random the attack, the more effective it is.
The US, six months in, still doesn't know who they're fighting. Nor did it bother to secure the millions of tons of munitions lying around in massive depots. The Iraqis dismantle the weapons, there are thousands of former armorers with no jobs around, turn the big explosvies into little explosives and then watch the fun begin.
Every time the US launches a raid or kills a kid, they lose more people to the enemy. Well, more accurately, more people decide the Americans have to leave. You can't murder someone's son and then expect them to help you. Some of these "accidental" shootings are really "be safe shooitings". You see someone on a roof, you kill them.
The Shia are losing patience with the inept American Administration because they expected both security and power and have gotten neither. It doesn't take much to create disorder and even less to maintain it. Any idiot with a rifle can undermine security. In this case, there's more than idiots with rifles. Some of these attacks were planned in great detail. But then, the US has placed such inviting targets in downtown Baghdad and then alienated the police by killing them. The naivety here is both amazing and fatal to American soldiers.
Iraqis have a right to expect less than 500 murders a month in Baghdad. In one year, that would be 6,000 dead. New York was crime city when there was 1,000 dead and both cities are officially have about 8 million people.
Until the Americans realize that terror is not some random choice, but the sister of guerrilla war, bombs in the city, ambushes in the country, they will be handicapped. Stupid pronouncements like "we'll find the bombers" is a joke. Placing the Iraqi police in charge of the investigation is an even bigger joke. They know damn well you won't find them. They can be working in the CPA by day and plotting attacks at night and since you don't speak Arabic, you will have no clue. So that's hardly a boast which frightens them.
All we can do is dig up their trees, cinduct anti-partisan sweeps and check out rumors of Saddam. Actually establishing order is beyond our means or the ability of the people in the White House.
WASHINGTON - It's just a 12-letter name - Valerie Plame - but the leak by Bush administration officials of that CIA officer's identity may have damaged U.S. national security to a much greater extent than generally realized, current and former agency officials say.
Plame, the wife of former ambassador and Bush critic Joseph Wilson, was a member of a small elite-within-an-elite, a CIA employee operating under "nonofficial cover," in her case as an energy analyst, with little or no protection from the U.S. government if she got caught.
Training agents such as Plame, 40, costs millions of dollars and requires the time-consuming establishment of elaborate fictions, called "legends," including in this case the creation of a CIA front company that helped lend plausibility to her trips overseas.
Compounding the damage, the front company, Brewster-Jennings & Associates, whose name has been reported previously, apparently also was used by other CIA officers whose work now could be at risk, according to Vince Cannistraro, formerly the agency's chief of counterterrorism operations and analysis.
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Bush partisans tend to downplay the leak's damage, saying Plame's true job was widely known in Washington, if unspoken. And, they say, she had moved from the DO, the CIA's covert arm, to an analysis job.
But intelligence professionals, infuriated over the breach and what they see as the Bush administration's misuse of intelligence on Iraq, vehemently disagree.
Larry Johnson - a former CIA and State Department official who was a 1985 classmate of Plame's in the CIA's case officer-training program at Camp Peary, Va., known as "the Farm" - predicted that when the CIA's internal damage assessment is finished, "at the end of the day, (the harm) will be huge and some people potentially may have lost their lives."
But it wasn't a big deal, was it?
Millions of dollars pissed away, her career ruined. No big deal.
Here's a hint, NOC's are doing the most sensitive, dangerous espionage work possible. When they get jammed up, more often than not, you have to send in a SEAL or Delta Force team to extract them. Some have had to commit suicide to avoid capture. It's not just drama for TV shows and movies. You really cannot overestimate the danger involved or the risk. Most American spies have a get out of jail free card, called a diplomatic passport. She didn't. This is an unprecidented revelation. Unlike the Welch case, where he was the station chief and working with diplomatic cover, until now, no NOC had ever been revealed. It's like opening a door. Once you know her, you can look around and see what she did and who she did it with. She's far from the only one hurt.
Howard F. Ahmanson Jr does not like publicity. The fiftysomething multimillionaire, who lives in Newport Beach, California, is something of a recluse.
Calls to Ahmanson's multitude of companies and foundations requesting an interview go unreturned. Organisations which enjoy his largesse decline to talk about their benefactor.
What is known is that in the 1990s Ahmanson, whose family made a fortune in banking, subsidised a number of controversial right-wing causes. These include a magazine called the Chalcedon Report , which carried an article calling for gays to be stoned; a think-tank called the Claremont Institute which promoted a video in which Charlton Heston praises 'the God-fearing Caucasian middle class'; and a scientific body which rejects the theory of evolution.
Now Ahmanson has a new crusade, whose repercussions will be felt far beyond the United States. He is using his cash to stir up the most divisive row facing the Anglican Church, one that threatens to rip it apart when its leaders meet in London this week.
At its heart is the Church's stance on homosexuality, an issue that divides liberal and conservative. Somewhere in the middle is the Anglican Communion's spiritual leader, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams. Initial estimates suggest that the Communion's leaders are split down the middle, with some 20 of the 38 opposing two separate events that have occurred in North America.
These are among the most crazy of the wingnut crowd. He deserves to have the British press after him.
US soldiers bulldoze farmers' crops Americans accused of brutal 'punishment' tactics against villagers, while British are condemned as too soft
By Patrick Cockburn in Dhuluaya
12 October 2003
US soldiers driving bulldozers, with jazz blaring from loudspeakers, have uprooted ancient groves of date palms as well as orange and lemon trees in central Iraq as part of a new policy of collective punishment of farmers who do not give information about guerrillas attacking US troops.
The stumps of palm trees, some 70 years old, protrude from the brown earth scoured by the bulldozers beside the road at Dhuluaya, a small town 50 miles north of Baghdad. Local women were yesterday busily bundling together the branches of the uprooted orange and lemon trees and carrying then back to their homes for firewood.
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The children of one woman who owned some fruit trees lay down in front of a bulldozer but were dragged away, according to eyewitnesses who did not want to give their names. They said that one American soldier broke down and cried during the operation. When a reporter from the newspaper Iraq Today attempted to take a photograph of the bulldozers at work a soldier grabbed his camera and tried to smash it. The same paper quotes Lt Col Springman, a US commander in the region, as saying: "We asked the farmers several times to stop the attacks, or to tell us who was responsible, but the farmers didn't tell us."
Informing US troops about the identity of their attackers would be extremely dangerous in Iraqi villages, where most people are related and everyone knows each other. The farmers who lost their fruit trees all belong to the Khazraji tribe and are unlikely to give information about fellow tribesmen if they are, in fact, attacking US troops.
Asked how much his lost orchard was worth, Nusayef Jassim said in a distraught voice: "It is as if someone cut off my hands and you asked me how much my hands were worth
Is he kidding? Why should they help the US? So they can be hunted down and killed? They won't be protected. Every Iraqi now knows what happens to informers. Your family may be asked to execute you. This is a war crime and the colonel should know that. Collective punishment is wrong and stupid. Besides, now every family in that region is an enemy of the US. Help you? You'll be lucky you're not ambushed in that village.
I can imagine the frustration. Your men are getting wounded and killed and the locals aren't saying a word. But you don't try to starve them into cooperation. Maybe 10 percent of that area was active resistance. Now, you can bet it's 90 percent. What is the point of this? To replicate the German occupation of the Ukraine? Maybe we can hang some guerrillas next. Burn down a village or two to send an even stronger message. Toss in a couple of rapes as well. I mean, if you're going to act like Nazis, don't stop with collective punishment. Go the whole way.
Let's say you're the singer for this hugely internationally famous pop band about to win a major award in front of millions, and you'd like to make the occasion special by saying a very naughty word that means what people do for fun and procreation -- right there on live broadcast TV.
Well, go right ahead. U2 singer Bono got away with it at the Golden Globe Awards back in January. The Parents Television Council and other organizations that make it their business to monitor what your kids hear complained to the Federal Communications Commission, which ruled without fanfare Friday that it's OK to use that word (for which we will substitute "feep") as long as you're not being literal. Follow the logical bouncing ball: You can say "feep" or "feeping" if you don't really mean "to feep."
All of which Bob Peters finds distressing. Peters is president of the National Obscenity Law Center, which is a project of Morality in Media, in Washington.
According to the ruling, quoting from the FCC's Indecency Policy Statement, indecent material "must describe or depict sexual or excretory organs or activities."
"The word . . . may be crude and offensive, but, in the context presented here, did not describe sexual or excretory activities," FCC enforcement bureau chief David Solomon wrote in the ruling. "Rather, the performer used the word . . . as an adjective or expletive to emphasize an exclamation."
By this logic, Peters notes, Howard Stern could go on his radio show and call someone a cornshucker 68 times -- so long as he meant it as an insult and not as a description of a what a person might actually do.
Wow, you can say fuck on TV.
Well, fuckety, fuck fuck. Glad that fucking barrier is down.
I saw a cartoon with Condi Rice holding a gigantic smiley face over rubble. The perfect metaphor for this war and the way it's been conducted. In a series of speeches, administration officials are trying to basically turn lead into gold. Their political alchemy "the press has it wrong, things are going well in Iraq" is the hallmark of the utter dishonesty of the Bush White House. Things are not going well, because if they were, the UN would be moving full steam ahead, young Sadr would be regarded as a crank and Al-Hakim would be alive.
Instead, it's dead and wounded Americans, daily guerrilla attacks, a permanently shut Baghdad Airport and 500 dead a month in the streets of Baghdad.
I know they think we're stupid, but come on, things are spinning out of control, not getting better. Toss in the Turks and you're setting the stage for all out civil war. The trouble with the Shia is the breaking straw. A lot of people may not agree with Sadr and his band of fundies, but they aren't going to let Americans kill or disrespect Shia leaders. If the US moves to arrest Sadr, the people who try won't be coming out healthy. The last place you want him is in jail during Ramadan. Shia theology centers around martyrdom and you'd be making one, big time with him locked up.
Why? Because no matter how much Sistani views him as a pimple on the ass of his life, he could not tolerate the US throwing the son of a revered cleric in to Abu Gharib. Nor could the Hakim people, because they'd be next on the list. Bremer has made life hard for them from day one, raiding their offices, pretending to disarm SCIRI. So if Sadr is locked up, the US is going to come for them next. In that way, the US is doing two stupid things, strengthening young Sadr's hand by going after him, and forcing other Shias to defend him to protect their own hides.
If the Bush Adminsitration wasn't run by Stalinists, forever lying in the service of ideology, they would admit this and start treating Iraqis with common sense and not as lab rats. The Shia were neutral because they thought the US wou
