While the barkeeper is out, there is still a lot to be talked about.
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August 15, 2004
Billmon: All at Sea
Comments
We chose, in this millennium´s first test,
Between two lesser heirs, who, at their best,
If they´d be born as sons of other pops,
Might hope to be elected sheriff, tops.
…
Posted by: b | Aug 15 2004 7:39 utc | 1
Hope this is an OT. Well, here is some tin-hat material. Amazing how even sex-scandals somehow seem to point to Israel.
An Israeli / Rove Connection? The McGreevey Scandal
And then there is this article from Haaretz:
Afraid of its own shadow The US today as seen through the eyes of an Israeli.
Posted by: Fran | Aug 15 2004 14:54 utc | 2
This makes you long for the Italy of ‘Don Camillo e Pepone’.
Blair’s Italian fiasco
Posted by: Fran | Aug 15 2004 15:08 utc | 3
Fran, interesting article re Blair and the freebee Italian holiday.
Hope the fucker get’s food poisoning, dives into an empty swimming pool and takes 10 hours to die.
Posted by: Cloned Poster | Aug 15 2004 15:31 utc | 5
CP, I don’t know much about Vanunu – except that he was a wistleblower, who informed about Israel’s nuclear industries and weapons. Hope that is correct?
Impressive pictures from Najaf. I sure hope it is not going to explode.
Posted by: Fran | Aug 15 2004 16:04 utc | 7
CP, I don’t know much about Vanunu – except that he was a wistleblower, who informed about Israel’s nuclear industries and weapons. Hope that is correct?
Impressive pictures from Najaf. I sure hope it is not going to explode.
Posted by: Fran | Aug 15 2004 16:06 utc | 8
Vanunu was “honeytraped” in Rome by a Mossad “prostitute”.
Well the Allawi has booted all the media out of Najaf……….
Posted by: Cloned Poster | Aug 15 2004 16:12 utc | 10
Those Najaf photos supposedly represent some of the thousands of Iraqis who are streaming in to act as human shields. Juan Cole’s also reporting that Sunnis in Falluja are sending aid to the shiites in Najaf.
meanwhile, as CP notes, “Journalists urged to leave Najaf”. I guess they don’t want any witnesses.
Die you ragheads, meanwhile hurricane in Florida…. and the main event the Corporate Games.
Posted by: Cloned Poster | Aug 15 2004 16:58 utc | 12
Thanks CP! Wow, that Vanunu stuff is usually stuff I expect to find in fiction. But I guess this is one more example of reality out-doing fiction.
Posted by: Fran | Aug 15 2004 17:07 utc | 13
Philip Marchand takes an interesting look at American eloquence. I do agree with him mostly. However since reading the comments on this site and at the Annex I must say that this theory does not necessarily fit all Americans. But still, as a trend it is clearly visible.
Baseball, apple pie and speaking like an idiot – Lack of eloquence a U.S. tradition
Posted by: Fran | Aug 15 2004 17:35 utc | 14
@CP and dirtgirl….
Re: Najaf Pix:
Remember Rumskull’s swaggering statements about how we had nothing to fear from the docile Arab Street back when he first started his blitzkrieg murder?
Maybe he could stop by for a photo-op right now?
Posted by: RossK | Aug 15 2004 17:45 utc | 15
Russian scientists claim discovery of alien spaceship wreckage in Siberia
No prizes for guessing why ‘they’ haven’t been bothered to come back….
Posted by: Nemo | Aug 15 2004 17:48 utc | 16
WHEN troopers of the US 101st Airborne Division first entered the Iraqi city of Najaf 17 months ago, they were greeted by huge and welcoming crowds chanting “Die Saddam, die”.
Now?
http://news.scotsman.com/politics.cfm?id=941632004
Posted by: Cloned Poster | Aug 15 2004 18:23 utc | 17
Way OT but…..
Josh Marshall’s latest forced me to go looking at polls.
Here’s a capsule from Zogby’s latest that is pretty damned positive, especially that last part in bold…
“….Pollster John Zogby: “Kerry leads in the Blue States by 17 (54%-37%) while Bush leads in the Red States by 6 (47%-41%). Good news for the President: he is back to attracting 86% of Republicans, while Kerry gets 79% of the Democrats. However, Kerry leads 49% to 31% among Independents.”
In other words, the all important Swing has the butt of John Kerry solidly on its seat.
Posted by: RossK | Aug 15 2004 18:25 utc | 18
During a rehearsal of the opening ceremonies, the half-full stadium booed the United States.
Gosh, I for the life of me can’t figure out why they would do that…
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Aug 15 2004 19:44 utc | 19
Just an ordinary Sunday – US 1st Cavalry Division, Baghdad, August 15th
Wadi al-Salam (Valley of Peace) cemetery, Najaf, August 15th
1st Cavalry Division troops dealing with a terrorist suspect, Baghdad, August 15th
Out and about winning hearts and minds, Baghdad, August 15th
A Najaf market scene, August 15th
Part of the crowd at the ‘democratic’ Iraqi ‘national’ conference, Baghdad, August 15th
Meal break, Najaf, August 15th
Waiting, Najaf, August 15th
Neighborhood watch, Sadr City, Baghdad, August 15th
Out and about winning hearts and minds II, Shred-in, Seoul, South Korea, August 15th
Checkpoint, Sadr City, Baghdad, August 15th
‘Dove of Peace’ and companions, near Imam Ali Shrine, Najaf, August 15th
US troops reacting to aerial bombing of Najaf cemetery, August 15th
Tidying up the home after visit by US warplanes, Samarra, August 14th
Out and about winning hearts and minds III – 1st Cavalry Division troops stop a family trying to take a critically wounded relative by truck to hospital, Sadr City, August 14th. The man died.
How very unlike life on Walton’s Mountain it all is…
Posted by: Nemo | Aug 15 2004 19:56 utc | 20
Lots of ambulances from the surrounding area, all journalists evacuated and banned from the city, the tanks have been stationed around the city centre again… Waiting for the bloodbath.
Who will win the battle? That’s pretty clear.
Who will lose the war? See above.
Posted by: teuton | Aug 15 2004 21:06 utc | 21
Interesting collection Nemo. Where is your link to the Abu Ghraib movies?
And this is what the foreign policy elite has to say:
Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi should crush a rebellion in Najaf and other cities to avert an erosion in the credibility of his interim government, Republican and Democratic U.S. lawmakers said.
Iraq Faces Credibility Threat in Najaf, U.S. Lawmakers Say
What will these guys crush while the US experiences an erosion in the credibility of its government?
Posted by: b | Aug 15 2004 21:17 utc | 22
Exodus
Iraqi Christians leave their country en masse after deadly church attacks – August 15th
Incidentally, the ‘crowd scene’ picture from the ‘democratic’ Iraqi ‘national’ conference above seems to have been deleted from the original source. It was of a solitary woman in a burkah, with rows and rows and rows of empty seats stretching away into the distance behind her all the way to a small knot of men at the back of the hall. I wonder why such an historic scene might have been deleted? And how come no ‘jubilant Iraqis’ were brought in to fill all those empty seats? Someone must have looted the psy-ops budget…. I have my own copy of the picture, which I shall now treasure for its rarity and the fact that it was so swiftly removed from public view must indicate that it is highly sought after, eh?
Posted by: Nemo | Aug 15 2004 21:45 utc | 23
Nemo, Here is a link to comments by Riverbend on the above.
Posted by: beq | Aug 15 2004 22:24 utc | 24
Dispute Over Najaf Disrupts Iraqi Political Conference
After the letter was drafted, a four-person delegation from the conference met with Allawi. When the meeting was over, the government announced that its moves to use force to expel Sadr from the shrine were on hold. In a reversal from its position a day earlier, Allawi’s cabinet pledged to refrain from military action against Sadr’s militiamen and keep an “open door” to a negotiated settlement.
Now what will Lugar/Biden say to “sovereign” Allawi?
Posted by: b | Aug 15 2004 22:33 utc | 25
b, I’m having fun trying to read Chandrasekaran’s article. It seems (1.) that the conference has stayed Allawi’s hand, and (2.) that the conference is run by Ibrahim Nawar and Ashraf Jehangir Qazi–two U.N. people, one of them a Pakistani. We know (3.) that the U.N. is where Negroponte just came from, leading me (4.) to infer that Negroponte (and Blackwill, if he’s still in Baghdad) are moving rather quickly to cool off the fighting in Najaf. But if so, then who sent the USMC into the cemeteries last week, and why?
Posted by: alabama | Aug 15 2004 23:44 utc | 26
The inevitable – but who is going to recognize it, and when?
Homage to a Government
Next year we are to bring all the soldiers home
For lack of money, and it is all right.
Places they guarded, or kept orderly,
We want the money for ourselves at home
Instead of working. And this is all right.
It’s hard to say who wanted it to happen,
But now it’s been decided nobody minds.
The places are a long way off, not here,
Which is all right, and from what we hear
The soldiers there only made trouble happen.
Next year we shall be easier in our minds.
Next year we shall be living in a country
That brought its soldiers home for lack of money.
The statues will be standing in the same
Tree-muffled squares, and look nearly the same.
Our children will not know it’s a different country.
All we can hope to leave them now is money.
Philip Larkin
From High Windows (1971)
Posted by: Nemo | Aug 15 2004 23:50 utc | 27
Thank you beq, she is a very perceptive and gifted young woman with a huge and caring heart.
Posted by: Nemo | Aug 15 2004 23:52 utc | 28
…The places are a long way off, not here,
Which is all right, and from what we hear
The soldiers there only made trouble happen….
Iraqis say soldiers rob them
An army of thugs
Posted by: Nemo | Aug 16 2004 0:00 utc | 29
Common ailments of our times – difficulty swallowing
”…Away from the fury of battle, the Western powers were calmly assessing the likely outcome of a struggle for the soul of Iraq. A German diplomat probed his British counterpart on the significance of the absence of all four grand ayatollahs from Najaf at the same time. There was no senior religious figure in the city who could stop the conflict with a single call to negotiate. “It’s entirely a coincidence,” said one Western envoy….”
The Ayatollah and the Firebrand
Posted by: Nemo | Aug 16 2004 0:32 utc | 30
Déjà vu
Offensive resumes in Najaf, prompting desertions of Iraqi troops
You just can’t get the Benedict Arnold types these days….
Posted by: Nemo | Aug 16 2004 0:41 utc | 31
@NEMO 8:00PM:
Enlist or go to juvie or the pen’ is a time-honored tradition. U.S. court system and service recruiters are equally complicit. It’s been going on for a very long time. The % cited in the one link is probably correct.
It is evident that the raids should be supervised better, but given the track record of this administration’s ability to plan anything, Re:Iraq, it’s all sadly predictable.
Wish I could say it wasn’t so.
Newsday article is a compelling read.
Posted by: FlashHarry | Aug 16 2004 0:58 utc | 32
b: to follow up on 7:44 PM, Newsweek (August 23) reports that Allawi summoned the Marines to attack in Najaf. How does Allawi summon Marines? On whose advice? On what terms (think of Conway striking his separate truce at Fallujah)? Did the Marines agree to comb through the cemeteries, and refuse to advance any further? If so, then the goings-on in the conference look pretty hollow….
Posted by: alabama | Aug 16 2004 5:16 utc | 33
b: I don’t know when the conference was scheduled. Two months ago? Two weeks ago? One week ago? I entertain the possibility that Negroponte and Blackwill, having decided to support Allawi, saw that they’d have to (1.) let him summon the Marines and that they’d then need (2.) an “Iraqi” occasion to stay his hand, and so they (3.) set up the conference to do precisely that (through the offices of Ibrahim Nawar and Ashraf Jehangir Qazi). But if so, why didn’t Chandrasekaran simply report it that way? Well, he’s a good reporter, but things on the ground may be too chaotic to follow, and if so, there’s no way the American Embassy is going to help him track this stuff.
Posted by: alabama | Aug 16 2004 5:41 utc | 34
Good piece on Iraq, though it starts out with Hurrican Charley and the 7 Florida minutes.
The imperfect media storm or George Bush and the Temple of Doom
Posted by: Fran | Aug 16 2004 5:49 utc | 35
b: thereby conserving the Marines, the Mosque, and the figment of Iraqi government–something out of the “Commedia dell’Arte”.
Posted by: alabama | Aug 16 2004 5:50 utc | 36
An excellent link, Fran. Thanks for this one! It takes us through each and every step, and in detail, leading up to this weekend’s opera buffo. The link to Pfaff is also extraordinary, but then Pfaff is always extraordinary.
Posted by: alabama | Aug 16 2004 6:09 utc | 37
Riverbend on Sistani:
… he has come down with some bug or other and had to be shipped off to London for check-ups. That way, he can remain silent about the situation. Shi’a everywhere are disappointed at this silence. They are waiting for some sort of a fatwa or denouncement- it will not come while Sistani is being coddled by English nurses.
Yeah right… and he hasn’t left Najaf prior to this in 40 years.
Just wondering out loud here… but don’t people worry more about dying the older they get?
Risk-takers and firebrands are almost always young.
That’s always seemed a bit of a paradox to me given that the young have the most to lose and the aged the least.
Arguably the best time to jump out of airplanes is when you are 80.
At any rate–is Sistani’s passivity the wisdom of a veteran or the docility of an old man?
Obviously, al-Sadr has settled this question in his own mind.
A few more questions:
Does history tell us anything about young and brash leaders who are willing to die against invaders?
Do they fade? Or do they inspire?
I tend to believe they inspire.
If so, this is yet another lose-lose-lose-lose move by our wonderfull inept leaders.
Holy Moe…we got some real stooges running our country.
Posted by: koreyel | Aug 16 2004 6:21 utc | 38
And now the WaPo has just posted a report from Karl Vick that the Marines are fighting in the streets of Najav. Who gave the orders? How many marines? how far into the city?
Posted by: alabama | Aug 16 2004 6:49 utc | 39
Must confess, the thing about the Tom Dispatch piece that struck me, and I hate to go here, but, we enter Najaf then pull back, we” squeeze” Najaf, then let in fresh relief, we assult once more, then withdrawl for a little talk, then punch back in, and on and on and on. I’m sorry, but after Abu-Graieb, just what in the hell is going on here……….. is the US military trying to fuck this place to death?
What masterful vision could have led the (once) good name of the USA into such a dispicable morass of the profane and the squalid, a pornographic killing field on the steps of religious piety. Now thats the surgery to win over hearts and minds.
The forest pygmies in africa describe a person that is ill as being “dead”, a person very ill as “really dead”, gravely ill as “really really dead”, and finally the deceased as “really really and finally dead”.
The US occupation dreams in Iraq must now be really really and finally dead.
Posted by: anna missed | Aug 16 2004 8:33 utc | 40
where is billmon? away for a month now. would appreciate if someone would update his status indicating is healthy. we need all the help in the next 45-50 odd days, and his perspective is fairly good.
Posted by: harry xing | Sep 16 2004 21:26 utc | 42
BIIIIIILLLLLLLLLLMMMMMMMMOOOOOOOOONNNNNNNNNNNNN! Where are you?
Posted by: Anonymous | Sep 21 2004 22:03 utc | 43
yeah, while I really, really miss billmon’s blog, I’d just like to know whether or not he’s A-ok or not….
Posted by: patrick | Sep 22 2004 14:32 utc | 44
Yes, does anyone know if Billmon is okay, and if he is, does he plan to return? Has anyone heard from him, been in touch with him? An update post would be great — I still check his blog a couple times a week and miss his writing.
Posted by: Anita | Sep 26 2004 3:07 utc | 45
It appears that he’s still alive, but has decided to stop blogging for the indeterminate future. He, or someone using his name, has a September 26 article about the commercialization of blogging posted at the Los Angeles Times website. He talks about his own blog, in passing.
@Geoduck:
And it was a very good piece of writing there.
Imagine: The ABC,NBC,CBS,CNN, etc. of blogging.
Would make any self-respecting denizen of the blogosphere want to puke.
Posted by: FlashHarry | Sep 27 2004 0:18 utc | 47
Mute the Bartender may be, but he just posted a very eloquent image at The Whiskey Bar….
Posted by: alabama | Sep 27 2004 1:07 utc | 48
Interesting thesis….not sure I agree with the curmudgeon though.
Hell, this is no ‘A’ list joint and the folks here are doing just fine as they furiously do their best to dig their way out from under the trivia dungpile.
I think perhaps Billmon is mourning the passing of his, the first line, generation of the blogosphere while the second (or maybe even third) is already out there giving as good as it gets.
Posted by: RossK | Sep 27 2004 6:13 utc | 50