Don´t shoot the messenger …
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April 3, 2006
OT 06-29
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The subtitle to the article says: Contractor Will Try to Finish 20 of 142 Sites. The article says something different.
U.S. Plan to Build Iraq Clinics Falters
A reconstruction contract for the building of 142 primary health centers across Iraq is running out of money, after two years and roughly $200 million, with no more than 20 clinics now expected to be completed, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers says.
…
Early in the occupation, U.S. officials mapped out the construction of 300 primary-care clinics, said Gasseer, the WHO official. In addition to spreading basic health care beyond the major cities into small towns, the clinics were meant to provide training for Iraq’s medical professionals. “Overall, they were considered vital,” she said.
…
In 2005, plans were scaled back to build 142 primary clinics by December of that year, an extended deadline. By December, however, only four had been completed, reconstruction officials said. Two more were finished weeks later. With the money almost all gone, the Corps of Engineers and Parsons reached what both sides described as a negotiated settlement under which Parsons would try to finish 14 more clinics by early April and then leave the project.
So it’s 20 out of 300. But don´t worry, the contracter will be payed in full.
Guardian: Revealed: victims of UK’s cold war torture camp
Photographs of victims of a secret torture programme operated by British authorities during the early days of the cold war are published for the first time today after being concealed for almost 60 years.
The pictures show men who had suffered months of starvation, sleep deprivation, beatings and extreme cold at one of a number of interrogation centres run by the War Office in postwar Germany.
A few were starved or beaten to death, while British soldiers are alleged to have tortured some victims with thumb screws and shin screws recovered from a gestapo prison. The men in the photographs are not Nazis, however, but suspected communists, arrested in 1946 because they were thought to support the Soviet Union, an ally 18 months earlier.
…
Predictably, the latest defector in the US led ouster of PM Jaafari is another US friendly SCIRI member. Coordinated with the suprise (and stony) visit of Jack Straw and Condi Rice, no doubt to break the news to PM elect Jaafari that his days are numbered — Shiite cleric and UIA representative Jalal al-Din Saghir is the latest to break ranks with Shiite solidarity and call for Jaafari to step down. Like Kassim Daoud, a former Allawi Advisor, Saghir has shown a willingness to work with the Americans. Ambitious and anti-Sunni (resistance), and reportadly “close” to Sistani, Saghir was the insturmental voice in the Allawi governments efforts to shut down the Baghdad bureau of AlJazeera in 2004. That both the defectors have ties to Allawi should come as no suprise, not only to preserve continued direct US influence in political and particularly economic reforms — but, to at the same time cut off Muqtata Sadr as king-maker in the process. Both defectors carry the Allawi era anti-Sadr bad blood mentality and have both been manipulated into a position of fracturing the UIA alliance, to the favor of US interests. Sadr, through his representative has said he will break with the UIA if Jaafari is ousted as PM, so the showdown materalizes — because if the UIA is split into three competing interests DAWA, SCIRI, Medhi, the troubles will be further fragmented. Which I suppose looks like a last ditch divide and conquer to the administration, givin that they could wait out the 10 or 12 years it would take for the divide part (civil war) to play out. At 6-8 billion a month, I doubt it.
Posted by: anna missed | Apr 3 2006 10:05 utc | 3
“on 28th March 2006, a claim was made in a scholarly magazine at the University in the city of Kragujevac, Serbia, that in fact there is and has always been quite enough evidence to accuse the British establishment, the regime, of the assassination of Percy Bysshe Shelley.
From the workhouse and the prison
Where pale as corpses newly risen,
Women, children, young and old
Groan for pain, and weep for cold –
From the haunts of daily life
Where is waged the daily strife
With common wants and common cares
Which sows the human heart with tares –
Lastly from the palaces
Where the murmur of distress
Echoes, like the distant sound
Of a wind alive around
Those prison halls of wealth and fashion
Where some few feel such compassion
For those who groan, and toil, and wail
As must make their brethren pale –
Ye who suffer woes untold,
Or to feel, or to be behold
Your lost country bought and sold
With a price of blood and gold –
Let a vast assembly be,
And with great solemnity
Declare with measured words that ye
Are, as God has made ye, free –
And these words shall then become
Like Oppression’s thunder doom
Ringing through each heart and brain,
Heard again – again – again
Rise like Lions after slumber
In unvanquishable number –
Shake your chains to earth like dew
Which in sleep had fallen on you –
Ye are many – they are few.
Posted by: annie | Apr 3 2006 16:03 utc | 4
my avuncular contribution for today:
secrecy news: Radio Frequency Bioeffects Viewed for Non-Lethal Weapons
The effects of radio frequency (RF) microwave (MW) radiation on the human nervous system and their potential for use in non-lethal weaponry were discussed in a new summary report (pdf) prepared for the Air Force Office of Scientific Research.
“Although the Department of Defense is one of the world’s largest developers and users of RF/MW-emitting systems for radar, communication and anti-electronic weaponry purposes, the use of RF/MW radiation as a non-lethal weapon per se has not yet been realized,” according to the authors.
“Most likely this is because the effects of exposure of biological systems to RF/MW fields at levels that do not produce thermal effects are largely unknown,” the unclassified report states.
“The overall objective of the research funded by this grant was to begin laying the foundation upon which RF/WM technology can be developed that would have an application for non-lethal weaponry uses, such as stunning/immobilizing the enemy.”
See “Interdisciplinary Research Project to Explore the Potential for Developing Non-Lethal Weapons Based on Radiofrequency/Microwave Bioeffects” by Gale L. Craviso and Indira Chatterjee, University of Nevada, January 31, 2006 (1.3 MB PDF).
See, relatedly, “Air Force Plan: Hack Your Nervous System”
http://www.defensetech.org/archives/002152.html
“Moscow’s Remote-Controlled Heart Attacks”
http://www.defensetech.org/archives/002169.html
Posted by: b real | Apr 3 2006 17:22 utc | 5
annie,
ín America we just let our poets die of neglect or starve to death…
Posted by: ralphieboy | Apr 3 2006 18:19 utc | 7
ralphieboy, you think. who do you think the fifth columns are? the one’s they are preparing internment camps for. actually i don’t think they killed him because he was a poet, it was the Political provocation that sunk him.
“It is impossible to know how far the higher members of the Government are involved in the guilt of their infernal agents. But this much is known, that so soon as the whole nation lifted up its voice for parliamentary reform, spies went forth. These were selected from the most worthless and infamous of mankind, and dispersed among the multitude of famished and illiterate labourers. It was their business to find victims, no matter whether right or wrong.”
bloggers beware. nah, i’m probably overreacting.
Posted by: annie | Apr 3 2006 18:49 utc | 9
Mime the malicious greedy dwarf goads Siegfried into slaying the dragon. Fafner the giant, has become a dragon in order to protect his hoard, enormous amount of gold. Besides he has the ring fashioned from that gold that will allow anyone holding it to govern and possess the world. Siegfried does not know what is fear and after a short fight slays the dragon. The dragon Fafner wonders while he is dying, why Siegfried should have attacked him. But Mime now is prepared to kill Siegfried by offering him a poisoned “refreshing draught” However Siegfried having tasted from the blood of the dragon understands the singing of a bird that warns him about Mimes’s designs. Mime hypocritically tries to convince Siegfried that he has always loved him but at the same time declares his intentions. Eventually Siegfried slays him. This is just a fable .
Posted by: jlcg | Apr 3 2006 19:16 utc | 10
The other option for paradise now is a 700mb rip available via bittorrent.
Posted by: slothrop | Apr 3 2006 19:49 utc | 11
some other really fine documentaries available via bt:
in the year of the pig and century of self.
Posted by: slothrop | Apr 3 2006 20:58 utc | 12
been away for a while – and back on the road tomorrow but wanted to share with all of you this link in case you have not seen it:
Oxford Research Org briefing on outcomes of a war with Iran
Consider sending it to your political critters and asking them to consider the findings before they approve or fund any attack on Iran. Te author, Paul Rogers, wrote a similar study before we invaded Iraq and his description was extremely prescient.
waving to RGiap and all … I’m back at Speakeasy as I am able, come visit!
Posted by: siun | Apr 4 2006 3:33 utc | 13
Anti-Iran propaganda: NYT: Iran Joins the Space Club, but to What End?
The question now asked in Washington and other capitals is whether Iran’s efforts are simply part of its drive to expand its technical prowess or an attempt to add another building block to its nuclear program. In that sense, it is the newest piece of the Iranian atomic puzzle.
To some government analysts and other experts in the West, Iran’s space debut is potentially worrisome. While world attention has focused on whether Iran is clandestinely seeking nuclear arms, these analysts say the launchings mark a new stage in its growing efforts to master a range of sophisticated technologies, including rockets and satellites. The concern is that Tehran could one day turn such advances to atomic ends.
At the end of the article we learn that this is much bullshit but the casual reader or the first ten graphs gets scared. Is Judy Miller back?
Anti-Chavez propaganda: NYT: Chávez, Seeking Foreign Allies, Spends Billsions
President Hugo Chávez is spending billions of dollars of his country’s oil windfall on pet projects abroad, aimed at setting up his leftist government as a political counterpoint to the conservative Bush administration in the region.
…
The Center of Economic Investigations, an economic consulting firm in Caracas, issued a study recently that said Mr. Chávez had spent more than $25 billion abroad since taking office in 1999, about $3.6 billion a year, while First Justice, a leading opposition party, put the figure at $16 billion, based on Mr. Chávez’s own declarations.
Look how bad he is, spending so much money to buy influence. But later we find:
His government has purchased $2.5 billion in Argentine debt, the Venezuelan finance minister, Nelson Merentes, recently said, and was selling oil at cut-rate prices to 13 Caribbean countries and buying a big stake in Uruguayan gas stations. Some projects are as ambitious as the planned $3 billion purchase of 36 Brazilian oil tankers. Others are as modest as the $3.8 million in aid Venezuela has provided to four African countries
Since when is buying foreign debt, foreign gas stations and tankers regarded as “pet projects”? I would charcaterize that as investments.
what John Robb at Global Guerrillaswould call 5th generation guerilla warfare, and what I would call “the poison pill option”. Either way, what is happening that differentiates the current situation in Iraq from the Maoist, and later Vietnam type of warfare, is that the insurgent forces have become so decentralized as a force that they have become incompacitated from asserting a coherent alternative governance. In this case, the resistant forces are to weak to confront the occupation forces militarily, even in the traditional incrimental guerrilla progression, so opt instead to allow the host country to descend into a toxicity that renders goals of the occupier country moot. I’m beginning to see this progression as a game of one-up manship where the occupier seeks a controlled divide and conquer strategy that is answered by the occupied, with a strategy of controlled divide and conquer of its own. In Iraq, the occupier can reasonably be seen to have unwittingly played into and informed the hand of the occupied through its own overzellous implimentation, post invasion CPA policy. In spite of these romantic notions of “creating chaos” as a means to divide and conquer it is important to remember that the “chaos” must be controled by the occupier in order to reap the benifits of the occupation. I’d be the first to admit that this has been the intent all along, from the CPA economic directives — to the current efforts to prevent a coherent government to emerge. And by the same token, could it be possible that the Iraqis themselves, have also noticed that these policies have also prevented the US from achieving its own stated goals — of a privitized economy, of a fully functioning sectarian democratic government, or secure and legal production sharing agreements of the oil resources and its infrastructure. What I’m saying here is that the Iraqis have developed a harmonic relationship to the occupation, which they cannot defeat militarily, but that they can prevent from becoming
successful — in large part by observing the effects of the policies on their own culture — and then allowing them to become amplified to the extent that they defeat the original intention of occupation policy — by, in effect poisioning their own well with a higher level of chaos. Consider these entries in todays news:
……………………..
from reuters:
“Teachers have informed us that a high percentage of students aren’t attending class, especially primary schools students,” said senior ministry official Sarah Obeid. “The main reason for this is their families’ fears due to the increase of sectarian violence.”
According to Obeid, at least 30 percent of Iraqi students are not attending school, with the situation much worse in districts of the capital, Baghdad, where violence has been most in evidence. “The violence between Sunnis and Shi’ites is affecting innocent children,” Obeid added.
…………………………………………………………..
When the “black shirts” come back, the Sunni Arab men of the middle-class Baghdad neighbourhood of Arasat say they will be ready.
They have posted plainclothes spies on the corners to look out for suspicious strangers, keeping their cellphones close at hand and waiting for the ring that will call them to arms. When it comes, the men will pour out from surrounding homes, guns blazing.
Faced with the growth of Shia militias such as the black-shirted Mahdi army – the militia of the prominent cleric Moqtada al-Sadr – and alleged abuses by the Shia-dominated police forces, Sunni in mixed-sect neighbourhoods and cities throughout Iraq are stashing guns in their mosques and knitting themselves into militias of their own.
In recent weeks, US troops have clashed with Shia militias and American officials have expressed concern about their growing power. On the other side of Iraq’s sectarian divide, the emergence of armed bands of Sunni, often from middle-class backgrounds and distinct from the insurgent groups that have been fighting the US-led coalition since 2003, presents a disturbing indication of how close Iraq is to full
……………………………………………………………
Ali Allawi, Iraq’s finance minister, estimated that insurgents reap 40 percent to 50 percent of all oil-smuggling profits in the country. Offering an example of how illicit oil products are kept flowing on the black market, he said that the insurgency had infiltrated senior management positions at the major northern refinery in Baiji and routinely terrorized truck drivers there. This allows the insurgents and their confederates to tap the pipeline, empty the trucks and sell the oil or gas themselves. “It’s gone beyond Nigeria levels now where it really threatens national security,” Mr. Allawi said of the oil industry. “The insurgents are involved at all levels.”
……………………………………………………………
Gunmen have kidnapped 16 employees of an Iraqi trading company, interior ministry officials say.
The staff were seized from the headquarters of the Saeed import and export firm in the exclusive Mansour neighbourhood of Baghdad.
The kidnappers appeared to rifle through papers and computers before taking the staff, Lt Col Falah al-Mohammadawi told the AP news agency.
The motive for the kidnapping was not immediately known, he added.
Earlier this month, up to 50 people were seized from the offices of Iraqi security firm al-Rawafed in the Zayouna distract of Baghdad by people wearing police uniforms.
……………………………………………………………
I’m not saying they are doing it on purpose, but saying that they are doing it by not doing what is expected, and it would appear to be working.
Posted by: anna missed | Apr 4 2006 9:39 utc | 16
Hey, it is just another cakewalk!!Operation silence mullahs
While Condoleezza Rice said this was not the time to try and come to a conclusion about what the next step on Iran`s nuclear defiance might be, those who assured us Operation Iraqi Freedom would be a walk in the park are now telling us Operation Silence Mullahs would be casualty-free — at least for the good guys.
A prominent ‘neocon,’ still in good odor at the White House and OSD (Office of the Secretary of Defense), speaking privately, assured us that by the time president Bush leaves office in January 2009, Iran`s nuclear weapons ambitions would be history.
Assuming tough sanctions — draconian or otherwise — don`t bring Iran`s mullahs to heel, we inquired, trying not to sound too wimpish, what would be Mr. Bush`s next step?
‘B-2s,’ this prominent armchair strategist replied. ‘Two of them could do the job in a single strike against multiple targets.’ With a crew of two per bomber, only four American lives would be at risk, an all-time record in the history of warfare.
…
Such movements have strong loyality codes.
Sinn Fein British agent shot dead
Former senior Sinn Fein member Denis Donaldson has been found shot dead in the Irish Republic.
Mr Donaldson is believed to have been living in County Donegal since December when he admitted he had been a paid British agent for 20 years.
Determined to attack Iran
ANALYST SAYS SOME SENIOR U.S. OFFICIALS DETERMINED TO STRIKE IRAN (scroll down to Under The Radar)
“For months, I have told interviewers that no senior political or military official was seriously considering a military attack on Iran,” Joseph Cirincione, director for non-proliferation at the Carnegie Endowment, writes in Foreign Policy magazine. “In the last few weeks, I have changed my view.” Cirincione says his shift was partly triggered by “colleagues with close ties to the Pentagon and the executive branch who have convinced me that some senior officials have already made up their minds: They want to hit Iran.”
If you are interested in recent Iran weapon show, Noah at DefenseTech has the goods.
robert parry: Condi, War Crimes & the Press
During the three years of carnage in Iraq, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has shifted away from her now-discredited warning about a “mushroom cloud” to assert a strategic rationale for the invasion that puts her squarely in violation of the Nuremberg principle against aggressive war.
Posted by: b real | Apr 4 2006 18:42 utc | 22
b,
Chavez is turning out to be a Fidel Castro except that he has his own built-in Soviet Union to finance him.
Posted by: ralphieboy | Apr 4 2006 19:27 utc | 23
Chavez is turning out to be a Fidel Castro
How that? Last time I looked he was an elected leader with a socialdemocratic agenda who has to fight against a fiercy local opposition media.
None of those three things appear to fit to Castro. So how do you back your judgement?
Perhap’s ralphieboy’s resentment toward Chavez and his dubious claims about Chavez’s similarity to Castro, stems from the simple fact that Chavez like Castro is encouraging other Latin American regimes to consider their own populations’ interests ahead of the US population’s.
After all that is the issue that the US really has with Castro. It can’t possibly be the political system since the US has a well documented history of supporting Latin American regimes where an individual’s political power is far less significant and/or governed by the rule of law than it is in Cuba. Of course those countries bend over and don’t even expect KY when the US deigns to bugger them. That will get your nation’s best sadists access to a Master’s in Torture at the School of the Americas.
The advantage of making the parallel with Castro is that the fifty years of lies, propaganda and jingoism that have been firmly embedded in most US person’s consciousness comes into play.
Then the brainwashed don’t even have to think about what/who/why Chavez and his supporters intend for Venezuala, they can just do a ‘modular bigotry swap’ or the ‘forklift solution’.
One set of beliefs about a foreign country no longer meeting corporate america’s needs? Why then let’s simply send in the philosophical forklift to pick up the Venezualan ‘convenient commonly held beliefs server’ and replace it with a clone from the Cuban server. A simple inexpensive solution to ensuring the US people share the requisite beliefs to maximise profit in a fast changing environment.
Posted by: Anonymous | Apr 4 2006 22:16 utc | 25
If we are doing ralpie-interpretations I would guess at:
Chavez is [to the US] turning out to be a Fidel Castro [to the US, in the sense that he is not going away] except that he has his own built-in Soviet Union to finance him.
And it is fun to note that the value of his built-in SU has been increased a lot by the US policies in the Middle East.
Posted by: a swedish kind of death | Apr 4 2006 23:36 utc | 26
anon 6:16:35, you’re on a roll. the “forklift swap” — perfect.
I’m thinking of late: if I had a free and uncoerced choice whether to live in Cuba or the US right now — supposing for a moment that I could be sure the US will not invade, bomb, or otherwise destroy Cuba in a fit of pique during my remaining lifespan — which would I choose?
I find that Castro’s Cuba seems less scary to me than BushCo’s America. the most scary thing about living in Cuba ain’t Castro, it’s the Miami Cuban Mafia and their nutjob terrorist stunts, and the everpresent threat of US invasion. apart from that, the food’s good, the climate’s great, people friendly, health care is free, every possible flat surface is not covered with advertising, and they lead the world in topics I’d really like to study, like permaculture and organic ag.
waving Castro around like a bloody shirt to people living with the Gitmo project, Abu Ghraib, Scalia, PATRIOT 1 and 2, sabre rattling at Iran etc… well the scare value just isn’t all that high from where I sit. now, if I hadda choose between the US and Uzbekistan (where the premier is such a very good “friend of ours”), that would make the US look really, really, really good.
Posted by: DeAnander | Apr 5 2006 0:22 utc | 27
the cuban people, their leadership & fidel ought to be honoured – their brave experiment has made a moral pygmy of its north american neighbour
& it seems some people cannot tell latin or central americans apart fidel is allende is ortega is morales is chavez
reductive in a way the poster cannot imagine
there is as eduardo galeano points out – a real heart to to movement of resistance in the americas
a heart so absent elsewhere
me i’d live in cuba in a southern second
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Apr 5 2006 0:31 utc | 28
Little Brown Brothers Should Be More Thankful and Respectful
Posted by: Groucho | Apr 5 2006 0:38 utc | 29
interesting groucho, once we establish how ungrateful they are we can move up to demonizing them.
Posted by: annie | Apr 5 2006 1:27 utc | 30
Groucho’s link,
A: The ingratitude of the Iraqis for the extraordinary favor we gave them — to release them from the bondage of Saddam Hussein’s tyranny. They have rapidly interpreted it as something they did and that we were incidental to it. They’ve more or less written us out of the picture.
Haha. Exactly. Writen out of the picture.
Posted by: anna missed | Apr 5 2006 1:53 utc | 31
Was reading the posts from bottom up and read anna’s quote before reading Groucho’s link. Pipes was the first that came to mind as source of the quote, and sure enough..
Posted by: ww | Apr 5 2006 5:12 utc | 32
Iraqi politicians should be told that they have until May 15 to put together an effective unity government or we will immediately withdraw our military. If Iraqis aren’t willing to build a unity government in the five months since the election, they’re probably not willing to build one at all. The civil war will only get worse, and we will have no choice anyway but to leave.
If Iraq’s leaders succeed in putting together a government, then we must agree on another deadline: a schedule for withdrawing American combat forces by year’s end. Doing so will empower the new Iraqi leadership, put Iraqis in the position of running their own country and undermine support for the insurgency, which is fueled in large measure by the majority of Iraqis who want us to leave their country. Only troops essential to finishing the job of training Iraqi forces should remain.
From the parallel universe jukebox Bush Was Right.
Posted by: anna missed | Apr 5 2006 10:24 utc | 34
Thought everyone might like to have a bit of fun with this one:
Yes, It’s Anti-Semitic
Might even drag Alabama away from his absinthe and escargot.
Posted by: Groucho | Apr 5 2006 12:40 utc | 35
@Grouche – saw that this morning.
It is a rant against the recent John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt study about “The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy” .
The rant is written by Eliot Cohan. He calls the study and the authors anti-semitic.
Cohen is
Cohen is the Director of the Strategic Studies department at SAIS and has specialized in strategic studies, the Middle East, Persian Gulf, Iraq, arms control, and NATO. He is a member of the Project for the New American Century and was called “the most influential neoconservative in academe” by energy economist Ahmad Faruqui.
…
He has been a member of the Defense Policy Board Advisory Committee, a committee of civilians and retired military officers that the U.S. Secretary of Defense may call upon for advice, since the beginning of the administration of President George W. Bush. He was put on the board after acquaintance Richard Perle put forward his name.[2] In the run-up to the 2003 Invasion of Iraq, he was a member of Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, a group of prominent persons who pressed for an invasion.
I’d say just by this guy lauching his rant in that WaPo OpEd he is kind of proving their conclusion.
Doyle, of Silver Spring, Md., had a sexually explicit conversation with what he believed was a 14-year-old girl whose profile he saw on the Internet on March 14, the Polk County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement
snip
During other online conversations, Doyle revealed his name, that he worked for the Homeland Security Department and offered his office and government issued cell phone numbers, the sheriff’s office said.
dummy
Posted by: beq | Apr 5 2006 14:00 utc | 37
Some Gallows Humor and Belly Laughs for the Groundlings
Posted by: Groucho | Apr 5 2006 14:31 utc | 38
an aside.. yesterday i opened a paper copy of the nyt following the front page delay story. on the opposite side was a full page ad from the AJC w/a huge ME map, iran in black, bulls eyed w/extending rings around it, can be view at ajc website. bold heading “can anyone within range of iran’s missles feel safe?” then, “suppose iran one day gives nuclear devices to terrorists. could anyone anywhere feel safe?”
just boils my blood. full page ad.
israel elections
Given the above, it is little wonder that Palestinians and discerning observers around the world were not fooled by the media spin about Israel’s elections bringing us any closer to peace based on the minimal requirements of justice. Perhaps no one sums up this election better than Gideon Levy, who writes [7]:
“Contrary to appearances, the elections this week are important, because they will expose the true face of Israeli society and its hidden ambitions. More than 100 elected candidates will be sent to the Knesset on the basis of one ticket – the racism ticket. [] An absolute majority of MKs in the next Knesset do not believe in peace, nor do they even want it – just like their voters – and worse than that, don’t regard Palestinians as equal human beings. Racism has never had so many open supporters.”
The Israeli majority has chosen apartheid. And since Western governments have welcomed the result as a breakthrough for peace, Israel’s Wall and colonies can only be expected to grow more aggressively under the pretence of “consolidation” and “separation,” condemning the entire region to endless bloody conflict. It is time for the international civil society to fulfill its moral obligation by opting for sanctions and boycotts — similar to those that brought down South Africa’s apartheid — for the sake of equality, justice, real peace and security for all. Nothing else has worked.
Posted by: annie | Apr 5 2006 17:08 utc | 39
skod,
yes, Chavez is antother Castro in the sense that he is a real thorn in America’s side and will continue to undermine America’s attempts to sell its version of free market capitalism to Central and South America for some time to come.
As for Mr or Ms Vertical Slash, you have stuffed a read lot of things into my posting that aren’t there.
Posted by: ralphieboy | Apr 5 2006 18:03 utc | 40
Uncle, don’t think yr. absence has gone unnoticed…Hope you’re feeling better….and pls. hurry back…
Posted by: jj | Apr 5 2006 19:02 utc | 41
i’ll second that jj, in a big way. also, i recall malooga mentioning in an emali he was having computer problems and needed a new one. wonder if that has anything to do w/ his absence.
Posted by: annie | Apr 5 2006 20:35 utc | 42
@beq – on the Homeland security paedophile guy
I wonder about sting operations. They are not legal in my country if there is not very serious suspicion on aperson before the operation takes place.
It is just much too easy to sting anyone into anything with the right action.
So I can not blame the guy accept for being a bit dumb maybe. But that is what you said 🙂
It is just much too easy to sting anyone into anything with the right action.
really? do you think you could be enticed into seducing a 14 yr old girl to perform sexual acts over the internet?
this will never be a right left issue. incest, pedophilia, these topics were never addressed when i was a kid, unheard of. because it didn’t happen , no. because is was hush hush. some people find children sexy. old guys have been screwing 14 yr old girls since the beginning of time. daughters have been getting devirginized by their fathers since forever.
this incredible carpenter doing finish work on my house in the 80’s didn’t show up for work one day(maybe it was 79). i ask, what gives? turns out he is the subject of a 3 piece pacific sun article about a step father abusing his 8 yr old stepson for years. it was him, my carpenter, a quiet unassuming talented man. i was aghast. this was the opening of the news in my area, before that, nothing. then i found out one of my best friend had been abused by her father, a deacon in the church since she was 6. her parents divorced over it, after 6 or 7 years of denial.
they are out there. its not accepted. how i feel about it is beside the point. here’s the breakdown as i see it. the people who will support no tolerance are… parents and adults who have been abused(assuming they haven’t become predators) vs offenders and ‘reasonable ‘ people such as yourself that think the law shouldn’t entrap people. and maybe they shouldn’t b. but that is not going to fly in todays society. do you have children? imagine, just imagine.
there is no way you can watch a video of a child having sex without a victim. even if the child is ‘going along’.
i’m just sayin,limits?
many children who are abused, abuse. others become lifelong victims. children are very impressionable. even ones who reach out and want acknowledgement of their sexuality.
puberty is a stunning experience, it shouldn’t be exploited.
Posted by: annie | Apr 6 2006 2:53 utc | 44
@Annie,
Entrapment is a very, very dangerous concept, and should not be an internet or any other kind of fishing expedition. There should be reasonable cause presented before a magistrate or judge before these type of activities should be allowed to be used upon any IDENTIFIED individual.
I imagine ACLU has a position on this. Check out their thoughts, if you do not agree with B or me.
When we are all protected against everything in life, I imagine most all of us will be behind bars.
Posted by: Groucho | Apr 6 2006 3:23 utc | 45
i didn’t mean to imply i didn’t agree w/the concept you and b present about entrapment.
how i feel about it is beside the point. here’s the breakdown as i see it. the people who will support no tolerance are… parents
i do disagree w/b’s statement i highlighted in my previous post. but that’s really beside the point.
Posted by: annie | Apr 6 2006 4:15 utc | 46
It is just much too easy to sting anyone into anything with the right action.
Yeah Annie, wasn’t phrased the best.
Bet we could sting B good with a good-looking sheep under the age of consent.
Posted by: Groucho | Apr 6 2006 4:57 utc | 47
Bet we could sting B good with a good-looking sheep under the age of consent.
Only if it’s an Armenian sheep named Daisy.
It is just much too easy to sting anyone into anything with the right action.
Ok – much too generalized. But you did get the idea. Sting operations induce people to something they probably never would have thought of in the first place. Bad idea …
Sting operations induce people to something they probably never would have thought of in the first place.
strongly disagree. I mean what are we saying here, that the guy would never ever have approached any *real* 14 year old girl on a chat room, but was magically induced to do so because there was a fake 14 y o girl in the chat room? and I suppose rapists who are suckered into attacking disguised policewomen in public parks are somehow mysteriously attracted specifically to policewomen in disguise, but would never under any circs have assaulted a civilian woman in the same locale?
ahem.
next we’ll be saying that the 14 y o girls behave in a “provocative” manner and that induces men to do things that they would never have thought of doing, blah blah…
face it, if a guy does something that he damn well knows is wrong, because he thinks he can get away with it, he deserves to get caught.
I have a great idea — we should ban the display of merchandise in shop windows and the wearing of jewellery in public, because it’s just an enticement to thieves who would never have thought of stealing anything if it weren’t deliberately dangled in front of them with CCTV cameras monitoring the scene, to trick them into smashing the window or mugging the passerby 🙂
where’s all that libertarian personal responsibility rhetoric? all of a sudden it’s “poor little perp, someone *made* him do it”?
Posted by: DeAnander | Apr 6 2006 7:32 utc | 50
@DeA – you do cite the right cases that argue for sting operations.
But there are others where people get suckered into doing things they never would have done without the stinging. The chances for abuse are just too big. Police officers et al. need to make a certain “quota” to justify their existance. With sting operations you give them the tool to do so.
Win at all costs is a series by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette about the problem. From Part 2
Millions already had been spent on Operation Lightning Strike, including enormous bills for luxury hotel suites, gourmet meals, deep-sea fishing trips and booze-filled nights at Houston strip clubs. Federal agents needed something to show for their effort. So they went to work trying to lure minor space agency players into doing something illegal. Brown would be one of these consolation prizes.
It was a scenario similar to dozens of other failed government stings that the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette uncovered in a two-year investigation of federal law enforcement officers’ misconduct.
Brown, now 38, eventually was charged with 21 counts of mail fraud and one count of bribery. After a jury deadlocked, all charges were dismissed, but the price of fighting for his innocence proved costly. Brown lost his business, his savings, his fiancee, his health and his belief in the American dream.
…
Brown was in good company.
The other 14 targets in Operation Lightning Strike were also college graduates. Most had families. Only one had previously been the target of a criminal investigation.
In 1994, two years into the government sting, federal prosecutors charged each with violating federal laws. Several of the cases started with the lithotripter. The government contended that Brown knew the device was phony, and thus every act he performed in trying to win a NASA contract for it constituted a crime, but that argument eventually self-destructed in court.
…
Francis cajoled other sting targets into situations that would bring criminal charges, even though several said they couldn’t imagine that what they were doing might be construed as a crime.
…
The physical and psychological toll of “Operation Lightning Strike” was great. Seven small companies employing more than 100 people went bust. Three of those arrested had nervous breakdowns. One attempted suicide. Others experienced health problems that ranged from heart attacks to strokes.
“The government agents intentionally and methodically drove our companies and personal bank accounts to zero and drove our reputation to ruin,” Brown said.
Court documents show the misconduct in this case originated with the government, not the people the government had charged, nor was Operation Lightning Strike an isolated case of a sting gone bad.
Time and again, the Post-Gazette found poorly executed government stings that followed a similar pattern: …
Do sting operations get some criminals into jail? Sure they do. But how many others are just “collateral damage”? How would you feel to be one? You could not be? Read part 2 linked above and think again.
Sting operations as political tools.
NYT today: A.C.L.U. Says Ethnic Bias Steered Georgia Drug Sting
The American Civil Liberties Union is accusing federal prosecutors of ethnic bias in a sting last summer in which South Asian owners of convenience stores in Georgia were charged with selling household ingredients that could be used to make methamphetamine, a highly addictive drug.
In a legal filing, the A.C.L.U. said yesterday that prosecutors ignored extensive evidence that white-owned stores were selling the same items to methamphetamine makers and focused instead on South Asians to take advantage of language barriers.
…
Documents filed by the A.C.L.U. yesterday include a sworn statement from an informant in the sting, saying that federal investigators sent informants only to Indian-owned stores, “because the Indians’ English wasn’t good.” The informant said investigators ignored the informant’s questions about why so many South-Asian-owned stores were visited in the sting.
Other filings said prosecutors had several tips that more than a dozen white-owned stores were selling the same ingredients, but failed to follow up on them. According to a sworn statement from a witness, law enforcement officials tipped off a white store owner about the investigation and recommended ways to avoid scrutiny.
NBC has been accused of a similar “sting” operation involving sending guys with beards and turbans to Nascar events and filming any signs of “racist” reactions to them from the fans.
A very nasty case of the media making news instead of reporting it. Besides, we all know that guys with beards and turbans don’t go to Nascar events, they only attend public beheadings…
Posted by: ralphieboy | Apr 6 2006 21:12 utc | 53
“two-year-old child being raped”
Asked about privacy concerns, DeGette said, “Someone who’s raping a child has no right to privacy. And somebody who possesses materials that show that kind of crime also has no right to privacy.”
This week’s congressional hearings have cast a spotlight on what’s estimated to be a $20 billion per year industry, with an estimated 4.4 million illegal images floating around the Internet and in the possession of about 1.4 million people.
“We were all aware that internet kiddie porn was going on,” DeGette said. “We had no idea how it was just exploding and how the offenses are just getting more and more serious”
so, if the guy was baited, and never would have sent the tape had he not been ask for it, and maybe never would have raped the 2 yr old had he not had a customer to buy the tape…
i don’t understand the in’s and out’s of entrapment. peoples reasoning skills don’t work as efficiently when something pushes their emotional triggers past a certain capacity. people selling equipment for other people to make drugs to ingest or sell for others to ingest is not as a comparatively emotionally charged issue. i know this is a dead thread, sorry, also its very interesting about the position of comcast in this story.
Posted by: annie | Apr 6 2006 22:33 utc | 54
@Annie:
I would much prefer to have professional investigators investigate cases, and “sting” after they have probable cause.
Not a bunch of local yokels playing 13 year old girl on the internet, with a federal grant, and little supervision.
I read the link.
I question that Wyoming needs a Wyoming task force on Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC).
Great waste of taxpayers’ money and subject to great abuse.
Posted by: Groucho | Apr 6 2006 22:58 utc | 55