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April 24, 2006
OT 06-36
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This makes me sick.
Time: Stolen Away
The man on the phone with the 14-year-old Iraqi girl called himself Sa’ad. He was calling long distance from Dubai and telling her wonderful things about the place. He was also about to buy her. Safah, the teenager, was well aware of the impending transaction. In the weeks after she was kidnapped and imprisoned in a dark house in Baghdad’s middle-class Karada district, Safah heard her captors haggling with Sa’ad over her price. It was finally settled at $10,000.
…
The Organization for Women’s Freedom in Iraq, based in Baghdad, estimates from anecdotal evidence that more than 2,000 Iraqi women have gone missing in that period. A Western official in Baghdad who monitors the status of women in Iraq thinks that figure may be inflated but admits that sex trafficking, virtually nonexistent under Saddam, has become a serious issue.
…
Two other girls, Asmah, 14, and Shadah, 15, were taken all the way to the United Arab Emirates before they could escape their kidnappers and report them to a Dubai police station. The sisters were then sent back to Iraq but, like many other girls who have escaped their kidnappers and buyers, were sent to prison because they carried fake passports.
Next – How contracters are involved…
Roach calls for some new architecture:
The IMF, World Bank, WTO, and OECD should be merged and radically streamlined. They have become bureaucratic fiefdoms, ripe for turf wars, which work at cross-purposes and dilute the message.
Though his solution is not convincing. He wants one world institution that could set a “policy”. How would that world financial policy be decided on?
Under the same link (scroll down) in a different piece there is this:
We think that crude prices (WTI/Brent) are likely to range between $70 and $80/bl for the reminder of this year; we raise our 2006 annual average forecast from $61 to $73/bl (+19%);
– We believe that markets will remain tight next year, as new refinery capacity is coming slower than we had thought; We raise our 2007 annual average forecast from $48 to $68/bl (+43%);
– We continue to believe that price signals matter and that slower demand and stronger supply will ease tensions in the markets at some point. With the information we have in hand, we do not see that happening before 2008.
– In the short term, markets will remain highly sensitive to the mismatch between marginal demand and marginal supply, to possible supply-side shocks, political (Iran, Nigeria) or natural (Hurricane season)
All part of the Bushites mad push to liberate women.
We continue to believe that price signals matter and that slower demand and stronger supply will ease tensions in the markets at some point. With the information we have in hand, we do not see that happening before 2008.
Timed for maximum profits before the election, how convenient.
Posted by: Malooga | Apr 24 2006 19:35 utc | 3
HAs anyone seen any pictures of our “Big FootPrint” $600,000,000 Imperial Headquarters in Iraq? I heard this was “top secret” but it seems all the Iraqis know where it is. Frankly, it is just one more bush Boondoggle to me. It’s been contracted to a Kuwait company from what I hear and about 1/3 finished. This sickens me.
Posted by: Diogenes | Apr 24 2006 23:27 utc | 5
diogenes, here’s the only picture i’ve seem of our city within the city. i thought b posted it but after an unsuccessful search i found it @fdl
Posted by: annie | Apr 25 2006 2:31 utc | 6
From Vancouver BC’s Metro Magazine:
“I’ve just returned from Kandahar.
Let me tell you what it’s like.
Imagine Penticton 100 years ago,
only mudbrick instead of frame,
and 250,000 townies instead of
2,500 farmers and orchardists.
Drive east down a narrow two-lane
highway about twenty clicks, and
then turn right off onto a dusty
trail winding through concrete
tank traps, to the first sentry.
Welcome to Kandahar Air Base.
It’s 45*’s outside, but you laugh,
it’s a dry heat. Everyone offers
you bottled water to stay hydrated.
You pass the second sentry check,
and then turn over your passport
for an ID tag. You’re on base now,
base being just a cluster of newly
plywood shacks and air-conditioned
tents. Gear is stashed everywhere.
The Commander greets you and then
invites you into the messhall, a
tiny cafeteria with a juice machine,
an ice cream machine, a salad bar,
and your standard fast-food fare.
He laughs, “Hey, there’s nothing for
us to do here, except go on patrol,
and eat.” He’s not joking, either.
Kandahar Air Base is in the middle
of nowhere, by a town in the middle
of nowhere, deep in a country in the
middle of nowhere. Nowhere’s-ville.
If you want to change that for our
kids in arms, contact Supreme Allied
Commander NATO, General James Jones,
at: public.services@shape.nato.int
Ask him where’s the $20B promised for
reconstruction aid, and ask him when
he’s going to start with rebuilding.
The Afghan people are getting peeved,
and the bounty for a kill is $2500.
Contact Prime Minister Martin too!
Otherwise it will be May this time
next year, and we’ll still be having
this same conversation. That is all.”
Posted by: Peristroika Shalom | Apr 25 2006 3:13 utc | 7
RAY MCGOVERN: We’re not talking about petty crimes or misdemeanors; we’re talking about war crimes. She was cognizant of war crimes. She needed to do something about that, from a moral and a legal perspective. And she chose this way to do it, because the other ways were blocked for her.
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/fedagencies/jan-june06/leaks_4-24.html
F–king With Charlie
You know, we can wring our titties over Bush,
but he’s still going to be in power in 2008,
when gasoline is over $5 a gallon and the US
economy is on NotGeld life-support, and John
McCain is giving his victory speech. For right
now, we should focus on ending this G-D war.
IED’s are killing our kids with used scavenged
ordinance. We can’t do anything about salvage.
The IED’s are triggered by cell phones and/or garage door openers. We can do a lot about that.
We can f–k with Charlie.
1. Random delay in ring-through – Contact all
the cellular providers in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Ask them to insert a simple code in their system that causes a random delay of 1 to 3 seconds in the ring-through on a cell phone call. From that point on, cells will be useless as IED triggers, the bombers won’t be able to time the explosion.
2. Automated roll-over call database – The
same as a bank video rolls over endlessly,
get the cellular providers to link all calls information to a constant roll-over database. The moment an IED goes off, freeze the archive. Then start calling every cell phone that was making a call at the moment of the explosion. Find the cell phone that never answers, and you have the number of the caller, and their name. Put that in your system, then hunt them down.
The math for this double-elimination is precise,
you can actually predict how long it will take
to find the silenced (exploded) cell phone and from that, the caller. Assemble a strike team.
3. As the coup-de-grace, closing the noose, get the cellular providers to provide a list of all the cell phone numbers in the country. Build an automated dialing system that rings each one of those numbers every fifteen minutes, just once, just long enough to blow up the IED’s and the bombers, but not cost a penny in ring-through.
Ditto re garage door openers. There are only a
finite number of four-digit codes. Roll through them all every fifteen minutes, and randomly.
Within a week all the bombers will be DOA. Total cost to the US taxpayer, nothing. Ask the phone companies to donate the software and hardware.
And while we’re at it, let’s talk real blowback.
You remember the audio technicians who proved
from the audio tapes that there were assassins on the grassy knoll when Kennedy was killed?
Same-same. A mortar makes a whump. An RPG makes a big whoosh. A bank of microphones ringing the Green Zone would easily pick up those whumps and whooshes. A couple of XP Pentium 4’s rigged to analyze composite audio could almost instantly give the coordinates of the originating sounds.
Helicopter gunships would take care of that noise.
If the US military wasn’t so brain-dead, and so in thrall to US defense contractors who have no intent or interest to end the war, this would’ve been solved by mid-2003. Shame on DoD! Shame!! Instead now they’re trying to bilk us for space weapons and a Mission to Mars,while our kids are still fighting and dying! G-d damn MF’ing shame.
Hey, if you like these FWC ideas, call your CGM.
Posted by: tante aime | Apr 25 2006 3:55 utc | 9
@tante aime:
If the US military wasn’t so brain-dead, and so in thrall to US defense contractors who have no intent or interest to end the war, this would’ve been solved by mid-2003.
Yes, because we all know that killing more people will solve our problems. We also know that those darn brown people are too stupid to figure out that we’re playing with the phone system within a day or so and find a new way to trigger bombs. They aren’t smart, like our US military.
Posted by: The Truth Gets Vicious When You Corner It | Apr 25 2006 5:04 utc | 11
@Tante – don´t know where you picked that up, but those are old ideas –
1. Troops Get New Jammers
Back in April, Copley News Service notes, Lt. Gen. James Mattis told Congress that “the Marines are sending 1,066 of the new devices to Iraq and plan to buy another 2,500. The Army is purchasing 3,000.” In August, the Joint IED Defeat Task Force shifted “$48 million to buy 6,246 [ICE] kits,” according to Inside the Army.
The resistence then started to use other means to lauch IEDs, like classic pressure switches.
2. Lightweight Counter-Mortar Radar (LCMR)
The Lightweight Counter-Mortar Radar (LCMR) detects and locates mortar firing positions automatically by detecting and tracking the mortar shell and then backtracking to the weapon position.
Pat Lang on Sunday posted a piece (he has deleted it after a bit of discussion he didn´t like) where he demanded counterfire to mortar launches at the green zone in Bagdad.
I called him bullshit on it because:
a. Resistance will put the mortar on a pickup truck and fire from next to hospital/school/mosque and then scoot off.
b. Counterfire will destroy hospital/school/mosque.
c. Aljazeerah and Reuters will distribute video of destroyed hospital/school/mosque. Major win for the resistance moral position.
Pat then said “But we are losing and need to do something.” I said “You are losing because the basic moral position of the US in Iraq is wrong”. That resulted in an ad hominem attack by Pat at me, me being banned form commenting at his site and then him deleting his post and all comments on it.
Maybe it’s too hard for him to recognize that the war is indeed lost.
Thing is: It’s not even my idea, it is Boyd’s who was one of the U.S. best 4GW strategy thinkers.
In Boyd’s world, both personal and abstract, morality plays a central role. Failure to understand that brings ruin in the long run. Neither individuals nor societies can ignore, discount, or overlook moral considerations in the long run. Moral values provide a set of higher goals and standards that enable us to confront mistrust, uncertainty and menacing circumstances with confidence and courage. Without them, we are likely to be overcome by fear, anxiety and alienation and defeated in our endeavors. Something more than quantitative or even qualitative superiority on the battlefield is necessary to win in the larger context of things. And without a concern for the moral as well as the mental and physical aspects of conflict, we deceive ourselves and never really “win.”
@b
That’s interesting. I hadn’t visited Pat’s site in a while and I had an inkling to go there the other day. But I missed your interchange. Still, from lurking around, I came to the conclusion that he is more of a “cover-your-ass realist” than a doubter of empire. I still like him a lot, but as with every Margherita, they taste better when you first dip the rim in salt.
Posted by: Malooga | Apr 25 2006 6:08 utc | 13
@Malooga – I like some of Pat Lang’s stuff too, but he can not get out of that lifelong framework of imperialism.
—
Rice Says Progress In Iraq Might Aid Efforts on Turkey
Rice also said the creation of a permanent government would allow the United States to “redouble our efforts” to battle a resurgence of attacks against Turkey by the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), operating from a base in northern Iraq. The group fought a separatist insurgency in which more than 30,000 people were killed between 1984 and 1999, when a cease-fire was declared. Hardened elements of the group have resumed attacks in the past two years, and some Turks have blamed the United States. They say the Iraq invasion gave the PKK a sanctuary in Iraq’s largely autonomous north, which is run by two Kurdish parties with closes links to the United States.
“redouble the efforts”: 2 x 0 = 0 I am sure the turks will notice this.
Interesting: George Monbiot comes out for natural gas usage.
He now prefers conversion of natural gas to hydrogen to be distributed to inhouse fuel cells.
All my instincts rebel against this prospect, but there don’t seem to be any other answers. Cutting the carbon our homes produce use means using hydrogen, and hydrogen means natural gas. I appear to have become a supporter of the fossil fuel industry.
Congress tries to keep smaller parties down
On Feb. 1, congressional Democrats led by Rep. David Obey of Wisconsin introduced a bill that, if approved, would end viable third-party competition in races for the U.S. House of Representatives.
The Constitution does not mandate a two-party system, and indeed the nation was founded on the premise of multiple parties all with equal opportunity to run candidates for office. But over the years, possibly to contain the number of candidates that must be bribed in order to bypass the result of any election, the nation has evolved to a two-party system to which many special advantages are already given.
Chief among these are the primary elections, which by law automatically carry the candidates from the Republicans and Democrats, while other parties must go through a lengthy and costly petition process to get their names onto the ballot, in the process using up their already inferior financial resources.
I like the idea of shutting off large private contributions (especially from lobbying groups operating for a foreign government), but if public funds are to be made available to candidates, they should be equally available to ALL candidates.
In other words, Coke or Pepsi!
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 25 2006 8:09 utc | 16
Also, couldn’t get to this till now, and it makes me utterly sick.
Shades of Theresienstadt? : Amy Goodman “run” out of [New Orleans] FEMA park
Theresienstadt.
During the war, small bits of information about the extreme and horrific episodes perpetrated under the Third Reich reached an unbelieving world. The Nazis needed to answer the world’s growing concern and yet they wanted to continue implementing their “solution” to the Jewish Question. The Nazis decided to use Theresienstadt to solve the growing outside pressure. Through deceit and subterfuge, the Nazis transformed Theresienstadt into a “model ghetto.”
Also see, the Potemkin village and even the Potemkin President
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 25 2006 8:14 utc | 17
Fleck says The housing bubble has popped but the big downturn in housing is still to come.
The natural gas thing should work out well. The US has about 3% or world reserves (looks like all the rest is in Russia, Iran, the ME).
Posted by: DM | Apr 25 2006 13:12 utc | 19
President: Women can watch football in stadiums
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad here Monday said that Iranian women can watch national and important matches in stadiums.
In his directive, Ahmadinejad urged Physical Education Organization (PEO) Head Mohammad Aliabadi to outline an appropriate plan and give women the best stands of the stadiums where national and important games are played.
“Contrary to propaganda, experience has proven that the massive presence of women and families in public sites has created an ethical atmosphere,” read the letter.
The president ordered the PEO to do the job in association with Interior Ministry.
Small steps? That’s soccer btw.
wow, b. the fact that lang completely blew away even the thread says a lot. good for you. i hope he lost some sleep over it.
Posted by: b real | Apr 25 2006 15:48 utc | 21
What did you use there B, a verbal shaped charge?
I was busy in my shop all weekend turning some things, so missed it.
Anyone know precisely when Task Force Slothrop passes by here again?
Posted by: Marshal Grouche | Apr 25 2006 16:22 utc | 22
secrecy news: House Poised to Grant Arrest Powers to CIA, NSA
The House version of the 2007 intelligence authorization bill would grant CIA and NSA security personnel the authority to make arrests for “any felony” committed in their presence, no matter how remote from the foreign intelligence mission it might be, the Baltimore Sun reported today.
Section 423 of H.R. 5020 “appears…to grant to CIA security personnel powers that have little to do with the primary mission of ‘executive protection,’ and potentially creates a pretext for use or abuse of these powers for the purposes of general domestic law enforcement — something no element of the CIA has ever been empowered to perform,” wrote Danielle Brian of the Project on Government Oversight in a letter to members of the House Intelligence Committee opposing the provision.
Section 432 of the bill grants similar authority to NSA security personnel.
The bill also includes measures intended to increase penalties for unauthorized disclosures of classified information.
See “Congress cracking down on U.S. leaks” by Siobhan Gorman, Baltimore Sun, April 25.
any felony? or just selective felonies…
Posted by: b real | Apr 25 2006 17:01 utc | 23
Can’t help myself. markfromireland left this over at LeSpeakeasy. Turn up the sound and rock and roll.
Posted by: beq | Apr 25 2006 17:11 utc | 24
paul craig roberts debunks the notion that the u.s. is a superpower
Posted by: b real | Apr 25 2006 17:24 utc | 25
What did you use there B, a verbal shaped charge?
No – I didn´t use any hard words or anything attacking him. The exchange went something like this.
His post said mortars on the greenzone should be answered with counter-mortar fire.
I argued it would not work because it would be a success for the resistance. That was picked up and agreed by other commentators.
Pat said something like “we are losing the war if he don´t hit back”
I responded that the Iraq war had no moral base and therby is lost just like Vietnam was lost and Afghanistan will be lost. Maybe calling the Vietnam war unmoral was a bit to much for him.
He hit back after that, but not with an argument on the issue but a personal attack and a ban from the comments.
I changed my IP number (hihi) and commented questioning his need to use ad-hominem attacks instead of arguments.
Some ten minutes later the post and the comments were gone from that site.
So nothing sharp, but he doesn´t like any pushbacks. At least not from lower ranks 🙂
DM is wrong on his oil info. In interview I heard w/Greg Palast, he saw internal xUSgov documents saying that Venezuela has 5x reserves of Saudi Arabia. Here’s what he says on BBC segment:
The US DoE report shows that at today’s prices Venezuela’s oil reserves are bigger than those of the entire Middle East including Saudi Arabia, the Gulf states, Iran and Iraq. The US DoE also identifies Canada as another future oil superpower. Venezuela’s deposits alone could extend the oil age for another 100 years.
The US DoE estimates that Chavez controls 1.3 trillion barrels of oil – more than the entire declared oil reserves of the rest of the planet. Hugo Chavez told Newsnight’s Greg Palast that “Venezuela has the largest oil reserves in the world. In the future Venezuela won’t have any more oil – but that’s in the 22nd century. Venezuela has oil for 200 years.” Chavez will ask the OPEC meeting in June to formally accept that Venezuela’s reserves are now bigger than Saudi Arabia’s.
Which is why they’re hard at work trying to overthrow Chavez. Can’t let an actual democracy control significant amounts of oil, as it might be used to actually enhance the welfare of the population, rather than consolidate the power of elites. THE NEW WORLD OIL ORDER: HUGO CHAVEZ TELLS BBC, WE HAVE MORE OIL THAN SAUDI ARABIA
Posted by: jj | Apr 25 2006 17:34 utc | 27
More should be quoted from Roberts art. linked above on the Civil War xUS elites have declared on the rest of us:
Because of jobs offshoring and illegal immigration, US consumers create jobs for foreigners, not for Americans. Bureau of Labor Statistics jobs reports document the loss of manufacturing jobs and the inability of the US economy to create jobs in categories other than domestic “hands on” services. According to a March 2006 report from the Center for Immigration Studies, most of these jobs are going to immigrants: “Between March 2000 and March 2005 only 9 percent of the net increase in jobs for adults (18 to 64) went to natives. This is striking because natives accounted for 61 percent of the net increase in the overall size of the 18 to 64 year old population.”
A country that cannot create jobs for its native born population is not a superpower.
In an interview in the April 17 Manufacturing & Technology News, former TCI and Global Crossing CEO Leo Hindery said that the incentives of globalization have disconnected US corporations from US interests. “No economy,” Hindery said, “can survive the offshoring of both manufacturing and services concurrently. In fact, no society can even take excessive offshoring of manufacturing alone.” According to Hindery, offshoring serves the short-term interests of shareholders and executive pay at the long-term expense of US economic strength.
Hindery notes that in 1981 the Business Roundtable defined its constituency as employees, shareholders, community, customers, and the nation.” Today the constituency is quarterly earnings. A country whose business class has no sense of the nation is not a superpower.
Posted by: jj | Apr 25 2006 17:42 utc | 28
For good laugh, though less sexy than beq’s “rock and roll”, read this:
Terrorist Al-Zarqawi Appears in Rare Video
In a rare video posted Tuesday on the Internet, al-Qaida in
Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi accused the West and the United States of waging a “crusader” war against Islam but said Muslim holy warriors were standing firm.
He also said the recent formation of a new government in Baghdad was an attempt to help the United States get out of what he called the dilemma it now faces in Iraq.
…
In the past, al-Zarqawi has made statements only through audiotapes posted on the Web, although photos of him obtained by the U.S. government have been widely circulated.
It was not possible to confirm the authenticity of the video, but it was posted on a Web site that al-Zarqawi’s group and other groups have often used to post Internet messages.
…
In the video, al-Zarqawi, who wears a beard and mustache, sat dressed in black, with an ammunition vest. An automatic rifle was propped against the wall to his right.
Oh yeah, sure AP, good headline.
As General Kimmit concluded
“The Zarqawi PSYOP program is the most successful information campaign to date.”
Speaking of the housing bubble, several months ago, someone posted a link to a site that had a map of, in effect, how artificially high the price of housing was — as I recall it used blue for places where the price was too high, and the deeper the blue the more out-of-whack the prices were, with red used for the equivalent artificially-low places. (Although I may be confusing the color scheme with the maps of the last election.) Does anyone have a link to a current map? Or even the same one?
Posted by: The Truth Gets Vicious When You Corner It | Apr 25 2006 20:13 utc | 30
@b
Someday, if we survive long enough, these videos will become collectors items, like old films of elvis, the beatles, or even good old zapruder’s strip of celluloid.
“I wish my life was a non-stop Hollywood movie show
A fantasy world of celluloid villains and heroes
Because celluloid heroes never feel any pain
And celluloid heroes never really die”
The Kinks
Posted by: Malooga | Apr 25 2006 20:54 utc | 31
@JJ
“DM is wrong on his oil info. In interview I heard w/Greg Palast, he saw internal xUSgov documents saying that Venezuela has 5x reserves of Saudi Arabia.”
I think DM was referring to the distribution of natural gas, rather than oil – they don’t necessarily go together.
In Venezuela’s case, as I understood Palast in that interview, the V. oil is “heavy crude” which only becomes viable to extract and process at $50/barrel, thus adding to the total oil available as well as giving Venezuela the largest reserves at that price or above. Also, second after V. in “heavy” crude is Canada (but I cannot recall where I heard this).
Posted by: PeeDee | Apr 25 2006 22:42 utc | 32
Ooops…sorry, DM…guess oil’s leaked onto my brain 🙁
Thanks for correcting me, PeeDee.
b-, thanks for sharing yr. exchange w/Pat. That’s astonishing. Guess military guys don’t change their fundamental authoritarian spots. But why did you change yr. IP number? Is that going from work->home, or is there a reason he should feel uncomfortable w/that?
Posted by: jj | Apr 26 2006 1:38 utc | 33
@JJ:
“fundamental authoritarian” in re: Pat Lang
Hardly.
First visited there 8 months ago, when B pointed the site out here.
Pat probably has as good a take on ME reality as Juan Cole or anyone else out there.
Just a divergence of opinion about Viet Nam , I think.
Will use my “good offices”, if requested, to iron things out.
Nothing to see here. Please move on.
Posted by: Marshal Grouche | Apr 26 2006 2:57 utc | 34
lifted from chris-floyd.com ..
What a Great Nation Would Do PDF Print E-mail
Tuesday, 25 April 2006
A great nation is like a great man:
When he makes a mistake, he realizes it.
Having realized it, he admits it.
Having admitted it, he corrects it.
He considers those who point out his faults
as his most benevolent teachers.
He thinks of his enemy
as the shadow he himself casts.
— Lao-Tzu, Tao Te Ching,
Stephen Mitchell, trans.
They say America was a great nation once.
Posted by: Anonymous | Apr 26 2006 4:47 utc | 35
(me above – crumbled cookies)
.. and what a great opening sentence for the next Great American Novel :-
They say America was a great nation once …
Posted by: DM | Apr 26 2006 4:59 utc | 36
Hmm …
The RAND thinktank comes out against War on Iran:
Time To Talk With Iran
While preventing Iran from becoming a nuclear power is a bipartisan goal shared by just about everyone, the risks and perils of a war with Iran are little discussed in public by government leaders and are barely mentioned by the media. Americans continue to uselessly dissect the motives for invading Iraq — when it is too late to do anything about it — while failing to debate the far more fateful consequences of conflict with Iran when it might still be prevented.
…
U.S.-Iran talks should focus on the salient issues. For America these include a moratorium on the production of materials that could be used for nuclear weapons and the opening of Iran to “at will” inspections of power-generating nuclear facilities by the International Atomic Energy Agency. In addition regional security necessitates that Iranians stop supporting terrorists, in particular Hezbollah.
Like every other country that has moved down the path to nuclear weapons, Iran must surely be motivated first and foremost by concerns for its own security, making that a key topic for talks with America. In addition to the presence of U.S. troops in Iraq, the U.S. Fifth Fleet offshore, and the American ambition for “regime change” in Iran, the Iranians are worried about unfriendly neighbors surrounding them, including nuclear-armed Pakistan.
As loathsome as Americans find Iran’s hatred of the West, calls for the destruction of Israel, and absurd denials of the Holocaust by its president, Iran’s legitimate security concerns have to be on any serious agenda for talks.
The RAND thinktank comes out against War on Iran:
b, it sounds like the good cop bad cop ploy to me…
Like something out of the Tavistock Institute.
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 26 2006 7:50 utc | 38
Al Jazeera : Fox host to take White House press job
The Washington Post said Snow decided to accept the job after top officials assured him that he would not be just a spokesman but an active participant in administration policy debates.
Well I suppose adding Faux News’ direct input to the administration policy debates will fix things right up.
Is this embedded “journalism” or embedded “government”?
Posted by: John Francis Lee | Apr 26 2006 8:47 utc | 39
A question on John Snow.
Was he the White House operative working at Faux News, or is he the Faux News operative working at the White House?
Laura Rozen has the Nelson Report discussing Iran
The leaders of Iran have amused themselves, if few others, in the past 24 hours by deliberately crossing over the Bush Administration’s declared “red line” for both Iran and North Korea…that is, threatening to proliferate nuclear and missile technology to rogue states like Sudan.
This, following a week of statements from senior Iranian officials…not just the increasingly over-the-top President Ahmadinejad…saying Iran has no intention of complying with Friday’s “deadline” (April 28) to provide the IAEA with answers for its report to the United Nations Security Council.
…
The “counting coup” tactic has a strategic goal, of course…”splitting the Five”…the US, the EU-3, and Russia. As with the stalled (failed?) US policy on N. Korea, it is the existence of the “Five” which, itself, as a practical matter, constitutes US policy toward Iran, just as the US must cling to the fiction that the 6 Party Talks amount to a real policy toward N. Korea.
“Maintaining the solidarity of The Five is all the policy we have,” our analyst friend laments. “All the rest is BS.”
That less-than-polite remark referred, among other things, to the latest series of Administration leaks via the always-willing New York Times..see today’s story with alleged details of what IAEA inspectors “suspect” in terms of Iranian plutonium production capabilities.
remembering jane jacobs, who died yesterday
The Rich Life of Jane Jacobs, by robin philpot
and the transcript from dan ellsberg’s segment on democracynow this morning
Pentagon Papers Whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg to Government Insiders: Risk Prison to Leak Information Exposing Illegal Government Actions
Jack Anderson, in a little known expose which is in one of his memoirs, also revealed that President Carter was making nuclear threats over a possible intervention by Russia into Iran in 1980. I’ll bet even you don’t know about that, Amy. It’s really very little known, but there’s a good deal in print about it now, nobody remarks. Carter was threatening to use nuclear weapons in connection with a possible second raid, amounting to an invasion into Iran, which is part of a very long pattern of U.S. making nuclear threats over Iran, as it is doing this week.
Posted by: b real | Apr 26 2006 17:45 utc | 42
Interesting piece on gas pricing:
How the refiners are profiting from your pain
Throughout the 1990s and into this decade, the major oil companies have continually reduced their working inventory levels for gasoline – even while the demand for gasoline has risen. In 1990 the supply level was about 30 days. In 2000 it fell to 23.8 days and more recently to about 22.7 days. This is precariously close to the 20 days of supply considered a bare minimum. Much of this inventory isn’t even available to meet demand, but is needed to keep gasoline flowing through the refinery into the wholesale and retail system to the consumer: it’s line fill in pipelines, tank bottoms, in-transit flow, etc. The companies explain that their inventory reduction improves efficiency and lowers costs. No doubt this is true, but even assuming all of these cost savings are passed through to the consumer, is the consumer better off?
…
excerpt from an interview w/ fidel castro that elaborates on chavez & the 2002 coup d’état in caracas
Posted by: b real | Apr 26 2006 18:32 utc | 44
Bush Calls Cabinet Meeting To Get Story Straight
WASHINGTON, DC—With his administration dogged by criminal allegations, President Bush called a special Cabinet meeting Tuesday to ensure that his staff’s complex web of alibis is consistent at every level, an anonymous source reported. “Okay, team, let’s make sure we’re all on the same completely fabricated page here,” Bush reportedly said while aides distributed thick binders containing the administration’s latest official side of things. “The e-mail server crashed during Katrina, the dog chewed up our files on the Plame leak, and no one ever told me that the illegal wiretapping was illegal. Right, boys?” Added Bush: “Remember, we’re all really on a picnic at Camp David right now.” Bush has held 17 Cabinet meetings to get the story straight since 2001, surpassing the previous record, held by the Reagan administration.
The Onion of course – where the truth masquerades as satire.
Posted by: PeeDee | Apr 26 2006 21:28 utc | 45
American Samizdat
Raw Story is in danger!
Your right to read news stories and writing that disrupt the government/Big Media symbiosis is under attack. And you probably don’t even know it.
The Orwellian “Communications Opportunity, Promotion, and Enhancement Act of 2006,” sponsored by Congressman Joe Barton (R, Texas), will, if it becomes law, allow your Internet provider to charge you extra to read this column. It will allow your provider to block this column entirely.
Also see, Congress readies broad new digital copyright bill
For the last few years, a coalition of technology companies, academics and computer programmers has been trying to persuade Congress to scale back the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
Now Congress is preparing to do precisely the opposite. A proposed copyright law seen by CNET News.com would expand the DMCA’s restrictions on software that can bypass copy protections and grant federal police more wiretapping and enforcement powers.
10 years in jail if you try to download a movie… This legislation is a front for something bigger, bigger brother that is. FBI being pawns for corporations and more wiretapping.
” Gonzales said, adding that proceeds from the illicit businesses are used, “quite frankly, to fund terrorism activities.”
Eat [Bush’s] dick Gonzales, you lying asshat.
The 24-page bill is a far-reaching medley of different proposals cobbled together. One would, for instance, create a new federal crime of just trying to commit copyright infringement. Such willful attempts at piracy, even if they fail, could be punished by up to 10 years in prison.
“A man will be imprisoned in a room with a door that’s unlocked and opens inwards; as long as it does not occur to him to pull rather than push.”
-Ludwig Wittgenstein
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 26 2006 21:49 utc | 46
the guardian: Senate Shifts Iraq Funds to Border Patrols
The Senate voted Wednesday to divert some of the money President Bush requested for the war in Iraq to instead increase security on the nation’s borders and provide the Coast Guard with new boats and helicopters.
…
On border security, the Senate voted 59-39 for a plan to cut Bush’s Iraq request by $1.9 billion to pay for new aircraft, patrol boats and other vehicles, as well as border checkpoints and a fence along the Mexico border crossing near San Diego.
While the border security funds had broad support, Democrats and Republicans argued over whether the cuts to Pentagon war spending would harm troops in Iraq. The cuts, offered by Judd Gregg, R-N.H., would trim Bush’s request for the war by almost 3 percent but don’t specify how.
…
Gregg chairs the Appropriations Homeland Security subcommittee. His border security plan focuses on the capital needs of the Border Patrol and the Coast Guard, including new planes, helicopters, ships and communications equipment.
Gregg said his plan would “give the people who are defending us on our borders, the border security agents, the Custom agents, the Coast Guard, the tools they need to do their job right – the unmanned vehicles, the cars, the helicopters which are a critical part of our fight in the war on terrorism. It has to be done now.”
Reactionary concepts plus revolutionary emotion result in Fascist mentality.
– wilhelm reich
Posted by: b real | Apr 27 2006 3:06 utc | 48
The first solid indication that the United States received concerning the accident was from an official Soviet statement on Monday, April 28.
Once alerted to the disaster, the intelligence community responded by turning its full set of resources on the Kiev area. A VORTEX signals intelligence satellite sucked up all military and relevant civilian communications within several hundred miles of Chernobyl. …the U.S. space imagery capability consisted of a lone KH-11, 5506. It was reprogrammed to obtain photography of the nuclear reactor at the first opportunity. … The following morning, the distance was still too great to produce a good photo, but be evening the KH-11 had approached close enough to return the first good imagery of the accident site. The picture was reported to be “good and overhead.” [NPIC Director Robert] Huffstutler recalled the imagery as being “right down the core,” showing the concrete cap blasted right out and helicopters and firemen trying to deal with the consequences of the accident.
With the photos in hand, analysts as NPIC began assessing the situation. The photos revealed that the roof of the reactor had been blown off and the walls were pushed out, “like a barn collapsing in a high wind,” said one source. Inside what was left of the building, there was an incandescent mass of graphite. Some tendrils of smoke and the blackened roof of the adjoined building indicated that at some point the fire had been more active. The graphite settled down into a glowing mass, while radioactive material from a pile that had contained 100 tons of uranium was still being vented through the open roof and into the atmosphere.
The photos revealed activity in the surrounding areas, activity that was quite remarkable given the perilous situation at Chernobly: A barge was sailing peacefully down the Pripyat River, and men were playing soccer inside the plant fence less than a mile from the burned-out reactor. The photos of the town of Pripyat showed that there had been no evacuation.
– The Wizards of Langley: Inside the CIA’s Directorate of Science and Technology, Jeffrey Richelson
greenpeace:Chernobyl death toll grossly underestimated
A new Greenpeace report has revealed that the full consequences of the Chernobyl disaster could top a quarter of a million cancers cases and nearly 100,000 fatal cancers.
Our report involved 52 respected scientists and includes information never before published in English. It challenges the UN International Atomic Energy Agency Chernobyl Forum report, which predicted 4,000 additional deaths attributable to the accident as a gross simplification of the real breadth of human suffering.
The new data, based on Belarus national cancer statistics, predicts approximately 270,000 cancers and 93,000 fatal cancer cases caused by Chernobyl. The report also concludes that on the basis of demographic data, during the last 15 years, 60,000 people have additionally died in Russia because of the Chernobyl accident, and estimates of the total death toll for the Ukraine and Belarus could reach another 140,000.
U.S. Nuclear Industry Fires Up Public Relations Campaign
The nuclear industry launched a new campaign on Monday to generate support for increased nuclear power, spearheaded by Greenpeace cofounder Patrick Moore and former U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Christine Todd Whitman.
Nuclear power advocates are hoping that Moore and Whitman can sell the American public on the benefits of nuclear power and help spark the resurgence of an industry that has not constructed a new plant in some 30 years.
Posted by: b real | Apr 27 2006 3:50 utc | 49
The Guardian would be well advised to be spending it’s time less worrying about new toys for photo ops for xUS’s boy emperor, than about the fact that Britain is on the verge of becoming de jure a Dictatorship, under Rupie Murdoch’s chosen guy, Tony Blair.
Freedom dies quietly
by John Pilger
People ask: can this be happening in Britain? Surely not. A centuries-old democratic constitution cannot be swept away. Basic human rights cannot be made abstract. Those who once comforted themselves that a Labour government would never commit such an epic crime in Iraq might now abandon a last delusion, that their freedom is inviolable. If they knew.
The dying of freedom in Britain is not news. The pirouettes of the Prime Minister and his political twin, the Chancellor, are news, though of minimal public interest. Looking back to the 1930s, when social democracies were distracted and powerful cliques imposed their totalitarian ways by stealth and silence, the warning is clear. The Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill has already passed its second parliamentary reading without interest to most Labour MPs and court journalists; yet it is utterly totalitarian in scope.
It is presented by the government as a simple measure for streamlining deregulation, or “getting rid of red tape”, yet the only red tape it will actually remove is that of parliamentary scrutiny of government legislation, including this remarkable bill. It will mean that the government can secretly change the Parliament Act, and the constitution and laws can be struck down by decree from Downing Street. Blair has demonstrated his taste for absolute power with his abuse of the royal prerogative, which he has used to bypass parliament in going to war and in dismissing landmark high court judgments, such as that which declared illegal the expulsion of the entire population of the Chagos Islands, now the site of an American military base. The new bill marks the end of true parliamentary democracy; in its effect, it is as significant as the US Congress last year abandoning the Bill of Rights.
Those who fail to hear these steps on the road to dictatorship should look at the government’s plans for ID cards, described in its manifesto as “voluntary”. They will be compulsory and worse. An ID card will be different from a driving licence or passport. It will be connected to a database called the NIR (National Identity Register), where your personal details will be stored. These will include your fingerprints, a scan of your iris, your residence status and unlimited other details about your life. If you fail to keep an appointment to be photographed and fingerprinted, you can be fined up to £2,500.
Every place that sells alcohol or cigarettes, every post office, every pharmacy and every bank will have an NIR terminal where you can be asked to “prove who you are”.
link
Does anyone know what the “Parliament Act” is that Dictator Tony can secretly change?
Or the story of the gutting of the Guardian? Why the hell are we reading about this via this crazy back channel, rather than daily headlines in the Guardian? Remember when the Guardian was a daily must read? Now …
Posted by: jj | Apr 27 2006 4:23 utc | 50
@b real
Thanks for that. The US military-industrial complex is currently downplaying the long-term biological and ecological impact of the depleted uranium projectiles that they are aerosolizing all over Iraq (and elsewhere) as well.
This is a pattern of collective head-burying.
If combatting global warming would prove to be costly (or, in the words of the Decider “would cripple the US economy), they simply produce a group of dubiously qualified “experts” to deny it exists and to muddy the debate. A minority of people telling an addict what they want to hear has the effect of negating any facts to the contrary, even if a quorum of scientists say it is a genuine problem and has the potential drown more US cities. As we have seen, though, “relief efforts” don’t hurt the US economy very much at all.
The same process of using selective evidence is involved in the circus of evolution vs. creationism, although the effect of people remaining willfully ignorant is probably of a different scale than the effect of the willfully avaricious physically poisoning themselves and everyone around them. The methodology in both cases is identical.
If they weren’t so damned obnoxious and off-putting, I would like to see the snotty teenagers at Truth.com tackle an issue like internal combustion emissions instead of trying to turn tobacco users into social pariahs, but attack ads against the US military-industrial complex probably wouldn’t be received so passively. As addictive as nicotine is, it can not hold a candle to heating one’s home in the winter or getting from point A to point B. Or even murdering poor people at home and abroad. Now there’s an addiction that should be faced up to!
Posted by: Monolycus | Apr 27 2006 4:25 utc | 51
Gee, I missed this one from Chris Floyd ..
Knight Rider: Murder and Plunder Mean Honors for Armitage
Written by Chris Floyd
Monday, 24 April 2006
Richard Armitage: First in war, first in subversion, first in the hearts of someone else’s countrymen.
For his outstanding service in leading America and Britain into an illegal war of aggression that has murdered hundreds of thousands of innocent people in Iraq, as well as his heroic role in running guns and money to the dope-dealing terrorist bands that sought to overthrow the legitimate government of Nicaragua, Richard Armitage has been secretly knighted by Queen Elizabeth Deuce, as the Guardian reports today:
“Honoured with a KCMG [Knight Commander of St. Michael and St. George, second highest rank of British knighthood] is Richard Armitage, deputy secretary of state under Colin Powell between 2001 and 2005 and a leading player in rallying diplomatic support for the Iraq invasion. Mr Armitage’s role in the Iran-contra arms smuggling scandal was controversial enough to prevent him becoming army secretary in 1989. He worked alongside Oliver North to trade arms to Iran illegally and siphon profits to the Nicaraguan contra rebels.”
“[Armitage] is one of 100 non-UK citizens honoured since last May who are named in a list released by the Foreign Office after a parliamentary question from the Liberal Democrat MP Norman Baker. Unlike honours to UK citizens, those for foreigners are not generally announced…”
If Armitage gets this kind of gilded wheeze for mere minioning in some of the most murderous operations of the past half-century, then great googily-moogily, what’s George W. going to get, when he retires, for actually being the trigger-man for the world-convulsing killing spree in Iraq? Not to mention his relentless and ruthless gutting of the U.S. Constitution? What honor would suffice for this sterling service? No mere knighthood or baronage will do; Lizzie will have to adopt him into the royal family or something, name him heir to the throne.
After all, his whole life’s work has been aimed at overthrowing the American Revolution and restoring feudal rule by aristocrats, warlords, religious cranks and simpering courtiers. Why not just bring the whole thing full circle back to Buckingham Palace? .
Posted by: DM | Apr 27 2006 9:11 utc | 52
Anyone who predicted what shape the world would be in now six years ago when the last emperor was coronated would have been dragged off to the looney bin. I remember the sinking feeling I had in the pit of my stomach those days, but I never…..Three more years — if we make it that long.
Posted by: Malooga | Apr 27 2006 11:47 utc | 53
Patterns anyone?
Group: Congressional Chairmen on intelligence won’t hear out NSA whistleblower
and
Scapegoats
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 27 2006 13:10 utc | 54
Outstanding interview with both Daniel Ellsberg and John Dean on Democracy Now today…
I’ll repost when the’re website is updated…
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 27 2006 13:44 utc | 55
Philippine Daily Inquirer : Critics plan offensive as IMF-World Bank crisis deepens
Ngaire Woods, an Oxford University specialist on the IMF and World Bank, revealed that the IMF projects that payments of charges and interest to the organization would more than halve from 3.19 billion dollars in 2005 to 1.39 billion dollars in 2006 and halve again to 635 million dollars in 2009, creating what she described “a huge squeeze on the budget of the organization.”
Problems at the Bank
While it does not have the aura of controversy and failure that surrounds the IMF, the World Bank is also in crisis, say informed observers. A budget crisis is also overtaking the Bank, according to Woods: Income from borrowers’ fees and charges dropped from 8.1 billion dollars in 2001 to 4.4 billion dollars in 2004, while income from the Bank’s investments went from 1.5 billion dollars in 2001 to 304 million dollars in 2004. China, Indonesia Mexico, Brazil and many of the more advanced developing countries are going elsewhere for their loans.
With the deepening crisis of the two institutions, the critics sense an opportunity for putting in place a more radical strategy. “We’ve united around a strategy of disempowering the Bank and the Fund,” Lidy Nacpil of Jubilee South, a global coalition demanding debt cancellation, at the conclusion of the two-day meeting. Instead of attaching conditions to IMF and Bank operations in order to reduce their negative impacts, the new approach would identify the most vulnerable operations or divisions of the two institutions and wage global campaigns to shut them down with the strategic goal of eventually rendering the two institutions with radically reduced power and influence.
“It’s like cutting off the tentacles of an octopus,” Dossani said. “You start with the most vulnerable parts, then move on.”
Posted by: John Francis Lee | Apr 27 2006 14:37 utc | 56
I guess they squeezed all the juice they could out of the southern orange and now all of our professional squeezers are otherwise occupied.
Posted by: Malooga | Apr 27 2006 14:44 utc | 57
Sex in the City:
Federal prosecutors are investigating whether two contractors implicated in the bribery of former Rep. Randall “Duke” Cunningham supplied him with prostitutes and free use of a limousine and hotel suites, pursuing evidence that could broaden their long-running inquiry.
Besides scrutinizing the prostitution scheme for evidence that might implicate contractor Brent Wilkes, investigators are focusing on whether any other members of Congress, or their staffs, may also have used the same free services, though it isn’t clear whether investigators have turned up anything to implicate others.
In a Democracy Now! broadcast exclusive we are joined by two figures who played central roles in the fall of President Richard Nixon and the Watergate scandal of a generation ago, John Dean and Daniel Ellsberg. Dean served as President Nixon’s chief counsel. He exposed the government-sanctioned break-in of the psychiatrist of Daniel Ellsberg, the government analyst who leaked the Pentagon Papers and earned himself a spot on Nixon’s enemy list. Dean and Ellsberg join us in our firehouse studio to discuss Watergate and the abuse of presidential power from Nixon to Bush.
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 27 2006 16:48 utc | 59
Mid March there was company sized resistance attack on a police station in Iraq.
I then wrote
So these were not rag-tag guerillas, or “terrorists” by any means. This was a high disciplined, well lead professional military force. Something we have not yet seen often, at least not in this size. The next level is to coordinate three to four companies as a batallion. That would probably be enough to run over most “new Iraqi army” units.
Reuters: Raids on Iraqi checkpoints kill 11
At least 11 people, including two civilians, were killed when hundreds of insurgents attacked several police checkpoints in Baquba 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad on Thursday, police said.
The afternoon raids, including mortar fire, lasted several hours and the rebels were only repelled when U.S. forces came to the aid of the police.
Police Major-General Ghassan Adnan al-Bawi said four rebels were killed in the fighting and 16 were arrested.
“The attack took place at 2:15 p.m. (1015 GMT) from six directions,” he said. “I estimate there were 400-500 fighters.”
The quote is unconfirmed yet, but 400-500 is batallion size.
“For the first time in many years, I fear death.” She said last night to no one in particular, as we sat around after dinner, sipping tea. We all objected, wishing her a longer life, telling her she had many years ahead of her, God willing. She shook her head at us like we didn’t understand- couldn’t possibly understand. “All people die eventually and I’ve had a longer life than most Iraqis- today children and young people are dying. I only fear death because I was born under a foreign occupation… I never dreamed I would die under one.”
listening to Ms. Faiza al-Arji give the “Bipartisan Congressional Forum on How to Bring the Troops Home from Iraq” an earful, speaking as a mother whose family had to flee iraq after the invasion & as a shia married to a sunni. how can americans sit there, thousands of miles away & claim to make decisions for the iraqis? what is this talk of iraq being divided into shia, sunni & kurdish states when she sees american jingoism everywhere in the homeland – united we stand. why is this not good enough for iraqis?
Posted by: b real | Apr 27 2006 20:59 utc | 62
I was waiting to see if b was going to put up a weekend ot, to post the following stolen comment from over at Jeff Wells heirophant council otherwise know as Rigorous Intuition.
What a news day. Earlier this morning, stories started to break about the hospitality suites run by Duke Cunningham bribers Brent Wilkes and Mitchell Wade. One suite was at the Watergate, then the Westin Grand. Yes, there are prostitutes and limosuines involved. Now, some speculate Porter Goss (and possibly Dusty Foggo) may have been around during some of these parties…
History doesn’t repeat itself, but it does rhyme…
And these are a vile eyry nest of predators as I have ever seen.
Liar, lawyer,
Mirror for ya,
What’s the difference?
Kangaroo be stoned
He’s guilty as the government
~Tool – 10,000 Days Album
A monarch’s neck should always have a noose around it. It keeps him upright.
~Lazarus Long
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 28 2006 4:29 utc | 64
While bringing these fucking kleptocrats down for fucking may be fun & games, it’s the Kleptocractic elements that have me howling at the moon.
To wit:
OMB WATCH – A threat is now building in the House of Representatives: some lawmakers are pushing legislation that would force all federal programs–from Head Start to Even Start; from EPA to OSHA; and from urban development to rural healthcare–to defend themselves before an unelected commission. This one “sunset commission” would make recommendations to kill, consolidate, or “realign” all programs (with rare exception), and would have the power to force its recommendations
through Congress, limiting your representatives’ ability to save important programs from the chopping block.
The threat is real. In the scramble for votes to pass the budget, a handful of lawmakers were able to strike a deal with House leaders: in exchange for their votes, they were promised that a bill for sunset commissions would be put to a vote in the coming months. We expect this
vote as early as June.link
Posted by: jj | Apr 28 2006 5:06 utc | 65
You can listen to the new Neil Young album: “Living with War”
this outta go over like a lead brick
President Bush is expected on Friday to announce his approval of a deal under which a Dubai-owned company would take control of nine plants in the United States that manufacture parts for American military vehicles and aircraft, say two administration officials familiar with the terms of the deal, the NEW YORK TIMES will report Friday.
Posted by: annie | Apr 28 2006 16:06 utc | 67
It seems that the opposition within the military elite
is real and growing. That these are hardly card-carrying
leftists is obvious, but compared, say, to what passes
for the congressional opposition these guys are flaming
radicals.
Posted by: Hannah K. O’Luthon | Apr 28 2006 16:26 utc | 68
Someone somewhere here asked how much oil the US military machine is burning. I finally have found some numbers in a
Reuters piece though these numbers do not include lecticity used.
The U.S. military consumed 144.8 million barrels of fuel in 2004, spending US$6.7 billion, according to the Defense Energy Support Center (DESC).
Last year, it consumed only 128.3 million barrels, but spent US$8.8 billion, as the average price per barrel rose by almost 50 percent to more than US$68.
For 2006, DESC estimates the military will need 130.6 million barrels and pay more than US$10 billion for it, at a price of more than US$77 per barrel.
If these numbers are right, its about No.33 in the list of nations oil consumption. Right next to Pakistan with some 165 million people.
Holy Shit annie!
I read somewhere JR. has a sadeian abnormally obsessive preoccupation with the hidden desire to be punished e.g. he wants to be caught and spanked! I’m begining to think it’s true.
The ways of Sade are not limited to bedroom and scenes of bondage or porno theaters or forbidden books. Any aspect of culture, from the great to the small, insofar as it is engaged in issues of power has therefore Sadean qualities. Furthermore, since life is never perfect, every aspect of culture will know the split of power into torture and suffering, dominance and submission, or sentimentality and cruelty.
~Thomas Moore from Dark Eros: The Imagination of Sadism
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 28 2006 21:31 utc | 70
Interesting article, b. Themilitary is working hard to reduce its fuel consumption. Pre-war numbers are down to 60% of what was burned 10years ago. I can’t find any data about consumption fom the long war itself.
Still, those numbers sound low to me. Total US consumption is some 20 Million Barrels a day. The amount Reuters quotes would amount to a military consumption of around 400,000 bpd, or about 2% of total US consumption. (By the way 400,000 bpd was about the total daily output of the refinery I worked at.) According to Wikipedia, “Approximately 1.8 million personnel are currently on active duty in the military with an additional 860,000 personnel in the seven reserve components,” or almost 1% of the population. That means that they consume only twice the oil flying jet planes, sailing the globe in armadas the size of cities, and driving Abrams A-1 tanks around than the average citizen does. Hardly likely.
Of course this doesn’t take into account the additional oil consumption of the suppliers of military materiel, an industry that employs millions.
By the way, our refinery had the contract for jet fuel for the US navy — a product which I personally produced for about 2 years. That contract totalled some 25K bpd, or more, alone in the ’90’s.
I suspect that that figure is low-balled by a factor of about 2 or more. When you include the entire consumption of the weapons industries too, I would guess that the 400,000 bpd might be multiplyed by a factor of 5 or more, minimum. This would place total military consumption of 2 mbpd, or 10% of total US consumption. This is just a guess on my part, but it seems more in line with the entire chain of production from mining to manufacturing to running the VA hospital system and Arlington cemetary.
That would move the death industries up the ladder to about #12 on the list, about equal to France.
Posted by: Malooga | Apr 28 2006 21:42 utc | 71
i am sorry comrades that i have not posted in these last two weeks – the complications of the diabetes have caused such havoc for a life lived almost without the medical model
but i read all of you every da- i consider this place – another of my homes
tho my days would be better if i thought rove was really in the grinder, that this absurd visit by rumsfield/rice to iraq meant anything, that the new puppet govt in iraq was anything other than the shadows of a saigon of the sixties
b your posts have been especially tough & clear minded these last weeks & billmon seems to be churning them out in white heat
this to say, i am thinking of you, brothers & sisters of struggle
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Apr 28 2006 21:57 utc | 72
sending love to you r’giap. hang in there. big hug thru cyberspace
Posted by: annie | Apr 28 2006 22:20 utc | 73
scratchy-tongued cat kisses, r’giap. feel better soon.
I agree that billmon and b have been blistering. it’s great, and it’s also horrible because I should not be online. not to mention that I spent waaay too much time over at Digby’s on the sex toy thread.
and I don’t even have any sex toys. unless human counts.
Posted by: Anonymous | Apr 28 2006 22:30 utc | 74
that was me. I had to clear cookies and cache to fix something and now I no longer exist anywhere.
sigh
Posted by: fauxreal | Apr 28 2006 22:32 utc | 75
scratchy-tongued cat kisses?
Ewwwww! No, no, sweet puppy dog kisses the kind that make you smile inside.
still steel comrade r’giap.
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 28 2006 22:58 utc | 76
unless human counts
boytoys? of course they count.
i am playing catch up, have been busy, so many great threads, so little time.
b, it’s friday, when are you going to show us another of your photos?
Posted by: annie | Apr 28 2006 23:01 utc | 77
@fauxreal, annie et al…
If it was me fauxreal, I’d say I did have toys even if I didn’t, so as to confuse the profile the hooverish NSA boys are building on us here at da Moon…lol
You know for their datamining of cyber-dissidents..
*smiles, winks, nods and waves at nice G-man types*
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 28 2006 23:19 utc | 78
Returning to the real world:
Was watching Godfather I on cable(AMC)
Nothing else on except Panic Room, and Chris KneePads.
Interesting lead in to GFII.
About immigration or something.
Pictures of children at Ellis Island fade to Whack, Whack, Whack!
They do the work no Americans want to do.
Helluva comedic viewpoint, I guess.
Posted by: Groucho | Apr 29 2006 0:03 utc | 79
Uncle- you, obviously, have not been kissed by a cat. dog kisses are sloppy and slobbery…and sure, they’re sweet, but no technique. 🙂
annie, make that man toy, not boy. and singular. I wanna go out and play, but I have to work still, and I can’t stop procrastinating because I hate the part I have to do now.
whaaaaaaaaaaaaa.
as far as the g-man types, I hope they’re g-spot g-men. from all the weird spam I’ve gotten lately, you’d think that’s what they were, at least.
Posted by: fauxreal | Apr 29 2006 0:08 utc | 80
some dogs know what they’re doing faux, they aren’t all lacking in technique. as long as they aren’t drooling and all sweaty.
ok groucho, now we can go back to the real world.
Posted by: annie | Apr 29 2006 0:51 utc | 81
Since it’s not cat blogging time, I really wonder, in the dog-man equation, which species really domesticated the other. Plenty of googling to be done here.
Personally think mankind got its clock cleaned on this one.
They’ll probably start whimpering, going to whine, if they don’t get steak tartare, every meal.
Posted by: Groucho | Apr 29 2006 1:32 utc | 84
” so as to confuse the profile the hooverish NSA boys are building on us here at da Moon…lol”
I’m doomed. I even include them when I talk on the phone.
Yeah, b. How about some more of your photos?
@ Groucho. Dangerous territory; cats and dogs… Any bond with nature is good, however.
Posted by: beq | Apr 29 2006 1:37 utc | 85
Damn your old fashioned pig headedness, R’Giap. If you stayed the hell out of the Newtonian medical system & found yrself a good Naturopath, you could skip all those complications. I have a Naturopath whose mother got diabetes in her eighties. Even needed insulin. She got her mother even off the insulin w/in 3 yrs. at that age. And no complications ever…
Posted by: jj | Apr 29 2006 1:47 utc | 86
R’Giap, on 2nd thght., my Naturopath’s mother lived almost across america from her daughter, so treatment can be arranged even at a distance. If you’re interested, let me know…
Posted by: jj | Apr 29 2006 1:48 utc | 87
I agree w/Malooga on the unreliable nature of those figures. The ones I heard were that USmil oil usage would rank it #7 on list of countries. However, I don’t know what yr. that is.
But, consider how utterly horseshit their figures are for deaths in war. They list a handful for Operation Wreck Iraq I, whereas ~680,000 are sick & dying. And for O- W- I- II, they list ~2,300. But that only counts those that die on the ground from enemy fire…
Hard to believe that any figures for oil usage would be more reliable, unless perhaps it comes from Stratfor, or is smuggled out by insiders…
Posted by: jj | Apr 29 2006 1:52 utc | 88
Good advice jj. It couldn’t hurt totry comrade buddy.
By the way, I very much enjoyed the discussion on previous thread about owning cars and escapist tourism.
Posted by: Malooga | Apr 29 2006 2:41 utc | 90
R’Giap go HERE for starters. This person has Outstanding people on her show – state of the art stuff in what’s called “complementary medicine”. (Warning – just ‘cuz she lists somebody from Dr. Atkins’ Center does NOT mean she endorses his diet. He did a lot of other exc. work w/complementary medicine.) You can order tapes, or get their books/articles to get a sense of the work that’s going on outside of the garbage traditional medicine is providing you, that’s obviously not solving the problem.
If you want to follow up, let me know.
Posted by: jj | Apr 29 2006 5:56 utc | 91
merci, my comrades
but as in a dream i learnt today that prodi won the position of president for both houses in italy
what was unbelievable or not so – given these dark times – berlusconi had nominated that old mafia hoodlum guileo andreotti for president
it is true, it is getting very hard to swallow
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Apr 29 2006 13:50 utc | 92
& as if my health problems aren’t enough to keep me on my toes -i am also having computer problems -i imagine it is on its last legs -if only computers were like andreotti – on & on & on
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Apr 29 2006 14:06 utc | 93
rgiap, just to add to jj, my naturopath cured herself of terminal cancer. I just started seeing her and she is addressing among many other things my prediabetic condition. Take care and best wishes.
Posted by: liz | Apr 29 2006 14:32 utc | 94
liz
i have a very good acupuncturist who is a colleague & supporter of the work i do here – as all acupuncturists here are doctors – he is conscient of the other interventions which now include a neurologue, a cardialogue etc etc & evidently my form of insulin dependance is relatively rare & i am on an astronomical daily intake of insulin now problematised by a neurological condition
& in the middle of this my old a otherwose faithful old black powerbook is falling apart – as it seems the world is doing
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Apr 29 2006 14:59 utc | 95
Who here would like to make a contribution toward a new computer for rgiap? I don’t know what the mechanics would be of transporting funds across the water, but I for one would love to offer a modest amount as a small token of my appreciation for his being and his words.
Posted by: liz | Apr 29 2006 16:40 utc | 96
Detailed overview of US Military Oil Consumption
Interestingly, the questions put forward here are echoed in the article which concludes with :
“My experience with international oil statistics tell me that the US military oil consumption overseas disappears in world oil demand. Hence, demand is understated at least that much.
Is about 350 000 barrel per day missing oil demand important?”
Posted by: Alamet | Apr 29 2006 18:43 utc | 98
Thanks Alamat – interesting. So they lowballed a lot.
Given how much light fuel they need for their aircraft their is a serious point of weakness to be exploited.
..just one last bad joke…
Groucho- if kitty cat and puppy kisses and sex toys or their human equivalent are not part of the real world according to you…
…well, maybe there’s a reason you chose that pseudonym “Groucho” 🙂
just teasing.
now, something from your namesake:
Hello, I must be going.
I cannot stay,
I came to say
I must be going.
I’m glad I came
but just the same
I must be going.
For my sake you must stay,
for if you go away,
you’ll spoil this party
I am throwing.
I’ll stay a week or two,
I’ll stay the summer through,
but I am telling you,
I must be going.
a bien tôt
otherwise someone will have to make a b-movie called
“Stop Me Before I Post Again!”
–Ida Lupino should direct. Elijah Cook has to have a part as a two bit gangster.
Posted by: fauxreal | Apr 29 2006 19:38 utc | 100