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April 22, 2006
Weekend OT
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Condoleezza Rice accused of leaking info to pro-Israel lobby
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice leaked national defense information to a pro-Israel lobbyist in the same manner that landed a lower-level Pentagon official a 12-year prison sentence, the lobbyist’s lawyer said Friday.
Also,
Let The AIPAC Spy Trial Begin
Shutting down illicit conduits for classified information is not a negative for most Americans. If, at the behest of owners and financial backers, the mainstream press and Middle East think tanks really do spend such a great amount of time scouring the branches of government for agents willing to release classified information of interest to and trafficked to Israel, the behavior should be stopped. Many think tanks, functioning as stealth lobbies, seek an unfair advantage and influence through access to classified information. Taking away the motivation to seek and traffic classified information functions as a kind of policy “regulation FD”, small investors, or in this case, small stakeholders in US policymaking, won’t be so easily outmaneuvered by corrupt “inside traders” like AIPAC.
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 22 2006 6:55 utc | 1
Mind Control iPod Update:iDecider heh heh? hehe….for our Dutch friends
According to a transcript of President Bush’s remarks on the American Competitiveness Initiative at Tuskegee University on April 19th: “The government funded research in microdrive storage, electrochemistry and signal compression. They did so for one reason: It turned out that those were the key ingredients for the development of the Ipod. I tune into the Ipod […]
Beware: possible nest of Belgian agents!
hehe…
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 22 2006 7:20 utc | 2
Rice coming to Rosen’s defense? They both worked at Rand in the early ’80s. Rosen’s attorney says if Rice provided Rosen with info, then we can assume it couldn’t have been damaging to US interests. Oh my.
Steve Rosen. Worst kisser on the planet.
Posted by: Hamburger | Apr 22 2006 13:14 utc | 3
groucho
i wonder how you or your father would interpret
cnn’s defence of the duke lacroose richboys
as if hey were the scottsboro boys
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Apr 22 2006 13:40 utc | 4
Hate to pass on activist “spam,” but this is an issue which I feel very deeply about. Malooga.
Dear media reformer,
Congress Sells Out
After accepting hundreds of thousands of dollars in contributions from big telecom firms, Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas) is sponsoring a bill to hand over the Internet to these same companies. He’s not alone.
Where Does Your Representative Stand?
Act Now: Save the Internet
Congress is about to sell out the Internet by letting big phone and cable companies set up toll booths along the information superhighway.
Companies like AT&T, Verizon and Comcast are spending tens of millions in Washington to kill “network neutrality” — a principle that keeps the Internet open to all.
A bill moving quickly through Congress would let these companies become Internet gatekeepers, deciding which Web sites go fast or slow — and which won’t load at all — based on who pays them more. The rest of us will be detoured to the “slow lane,” clicking furiously and waiting for our favorite sites to download.
Don’t let Congress ruin the Internet:
Tell Congress to Save Net Neutrality Now
Our elected representatives are trading favors for campaign donations from phone and cable companies. They’re being wooed by people like AT&T’s CEO, who says “the Internet can’t be free” and wants to decide what you do, where you go and what you watch online.
The best ideas never come from those with the deepest pockets. If the phone and cable companies get their way, the free and open Internet could soon be fenced in by large corporations. If Congress turns the Internet over to giants like AT&T, everyone who uses the Internet will suffer:
Google users — Another search engine could pay AT&T to guarantee that it opens faster than Google on your computer.
iPod listeners — Comcast could slow access to iTunes, steering you to a higher-priced music service that paid for the privilege.
Work-at-home parents — Connecting to your office could take longer if you don’t purchase your carrier’s preferred applications. Sending family photos and videos could slow to a crawl.
Retirees — Web pages you always use for online banking, access to health care information, planning a trip or communicating with friends and family could fall victim to Verizon’s pay-for-speed schemes.
Bloggers — Costs will skyrocket to post and share video and audio clips — silencing citizen journalists and amplifying the mainstream media.
Online activists — Political organizing could be slowed by the handful of dominant Internet providers who ask advocacy groups to pay a fee to join the “fast lane.”
Small businesses — When AT&T favors their own services, you won’t be able to choose more affordable providers for online video, teleconferencing, and Internet phone calls.
Innovators with the “next big idea” — Startups and entrepreneurs will be muscled out of the marketplace by big corporations that pay for a top spot on the Web.
We can’t let Congress ruin the free and open Internet.
Let Congress Know that You Want Net Neutrality Now
We must act now or lose the Internet as we know it.
Onward,
Robert W. McChesney
President
Free Press
http://www.freepress.net
P.S. Visit SavetheInternet.com to contact your representative, learn more about this issue, and discuss this campaign with other activists.
P.P.S. Tell your friends about this campaign.
Posted by: Malooga | Apr 22 2006 15:50 utc | 5
It seems that one cannot act within today’s global empire without being, at least, an unwitting accomplice
The new Open Source Center (OSC) at CIA headquarters recently stepped up data collection and analysis based on bloggers worldwide and is developing new methods to gauge the reliability of the content, said OSC Director Douglas J. Naquin.
“A lot of blogs now have become very big on the Internet, and we’re getting a lot of rich information on blogs that are telling us a lot about social perspectives and everything from what the general feeling is to … people putting information on there that doesn’t exist anywhere else,” Mr. Naquin told The Washington Times.
I doubt that the loss of internet neutrality will slow down the data miners.
Posted by: Juannie | Apr 22 2006 16:13 utc | 6
Talabani asks Shiite leader Maliki to form Iraqi government
Newly reelected Iraqi President Jalal Talabani has asked Shiite candidate Jawad al-Maliki to form the country’s next government as prime minister.
ADVERTISEMENT
“On this occasion, I call upon our brother Jawad al-Maliki to form the next Iraqi government,” Talabani told lawmakers Saturday, shortly after they had reelected him.
“We think he has all the qualities required to head the government,” Talabani added.
Maliki now has one month to form a cabinet, according to the constitution.
Just another “purple finger moment”.
given the diversity of platforms (dbs, wireless, cable, dsl) it’s hard to see “net neutrality” (I like “end-to-end,” e2e; sounded better, or for purists: common carrier conveys the same meaning)failing as the de facto standard. but, hey, looks like at&t is finally rising like the phoenix from the ashes of the 84 consent decree. let’s just go back to the good old days of regulated “common-carriage” monopoly.
Posted by: slothrop | Apr 22 2006 17:09 utc | 8
here’s a bit more on e2e.net neutrality w/ industry whitepapers.
the venerable professor lessig is right, e2e must be legally required. without this principle, network design (“code”) has moved towards more and more control.
Posted by: slothrop | Apr 22 2006 18:05 utc | 9
Interesting pick in WaPo about the end(?) of the republicans
How the GOP Lost Its Way
The immigration reform debate has highlighted a long-standing fissure in the GOP between the elitist Rockefeller business wing and the party’s conservative populist base. Whether the two groups can continue to coexist and preserve the Republican majority is increasingly doubtful as conservatives begin to consider — and in some cases cheer — the possibility that the GOP may lose control of Congress this fall.
The two camps are deeply divided. The business elites are interested in a large supply of cheap labor and support unfettered immigration and open borders. The populist base supports legal immigration but is concerned about lawlessness on our border, national sovereignty and the real security threat posed by porous borders.
There is nothing new about this division. It is a 40-year-old fight that has its roots in the cultural, economic, regional and ideological differences between the two camps. Still, most conservatives felt that after the victory of Ronald Reagan and the Republican Revolution of 1994 their point was made and the country-clubbers would know their place. They were wrong. The Rockefeller wing is now attempting to reassert its control over the party and is openly hostile toward the Reagan populists who created the Republican majority in the first place.
…
The elites in the GOP have never understood conservatives or Reagan; they’ve found both to be a bit tacky. They have always found the populists’ commitment to values unsettling. To them, adherence to conservative principles was always less important than wealth and power.
Unfortunately, the GOP has lost its motivating ideals. The revolution of 1994 has been killed not by zeal but by a loss of faith in its own principles. The tragedy is not that we are faced with another fight for the soul of the Republican Party but that we have missed an opportunity to bring a new generation of Americans over to our point of view.
…
It was the populists under Reagan, and later under Newt Gingrich, who energized the party, gave voice to a maturing conservative ideology and swept Republicans into power. We would be imprudent and forgetful to disregard this. But it may be too late, because conservatives don’t want to be part of the looming train wreck. They know that this is no longer Ronald Reagan’s party.
And a follow up to that republican split:
Immigration Reform Splits Catholics, GOP
The national immigration debate is muddying Republican relations with Roman Catholics – coveted swing voters who comprise about one-quarter of the electorate.
While Catholic bishops and many Republican politicians share opposition to abortion, they’re often split over the specifics of immigration reform. Church leaders are challenging – and in some cases even vowing to defy – the tougher enforcement proposals by GOP lawmakers.
…
St. Louis Archbishop Raymond Burke, who said in 2004 he would refuse to give Holy Communion to Kerry, was among many church leaders who organized recent rallies in favor of giving undocumented workers a chance at citizenship. Burke noted that American Catholics were immigrants themselves, and that by welcoming migrants, “we obey the command of Our Lord, who tells us that when we welcome the stranger, we welcome Christ Himself.”
Rep. James Sensenbrenner, a Republican from Wisconsin, galvanized Catholic opposition by sponsoring legislation that the House passed in December that would make it a felony to be in the country illegally and making it a crime to help illegal immigrants.
Now if immigration is the republican issue for the 2006 election, they really may be in trouble.
It was the populists under Reagan, and later under Newt Gingrich, who energized the party, gave voice to a maturing conservative ideology and swept Republicans into power. We would be imprudent and forgetful to disregard this. But it may be too late, because conservatives don’t want to be part of the looming train wreck. They know that this is no longer Ronald Reagan’s party.
Wow, historical revisionism as it happens! Just who was that populist base? Why, I believe it was ppl like Pat Robertson and Tom DeLay leading the charge of the confederacy with the “southern strategy” that Nixon began and Reagan perfected.
I believe it was the creationistas, who Reagan empowered by saying that evolution was “just a theory,” tho the poor addled man had no idea what that meant in scientific terms even before his brain started to sag.
Maybe I don’t understand the editorial. When I read this:
The elites in the GOP have never understood conservatives or Reagan; they’ve found both to be a bit tacky. They have always found the populists’ commitment to values unsettling. To them, adherence to conservative principles was always less important than wealth and power.
So this person is saying that because the moderate or fiscal conservatives reasoning is that money and power as they understand it is all that matters, while the Talibornagain wing, embarrasing cousins invited to the table just so the country clubbers can reserve the best table in the house…they’ll just seat the cousins at one end of the table…the Talibornagain values of money and power (oh, wait, values…yeah…to disempower women and deny money to public education cause it won’t teach creation…) are somehow noble? Ideological in a way that wealth concentration is not?
whatevah.
that this commentator sees a coming train wreck with the Bush administration is really the most telling and honest piece of print included…who can take the blame for the horrible mistake of forcing GWB on the American people in 2000.
The “elites” got their corporate welfare and tax breaks, but they also got the unstable world based upon an unwillingness to look at reality, even if it conflicts with their beliefs.
Whose fault is that, again? The entire party. The complicit media. The bought media. The gullible independents. The criminal Diebold corp most of all.
Posted by: fauxreal | Apr 22 2006 19:28 utc | 12
from the sydney morning herald – a mike carlton
SYDNEY, NSW, is a long way from Washington DC but, even at this distance, it is clear that the Bush Administration is falling to pieces.
In recent weeks, scanning the political coverage in the mainstream US media and sampling the blogs has been to watch a flood tide ebbing to reveal a rotting, skeletal hulk. It is the George W. Bush ship of fools, stuck in the mud for the world to see in all its mendacity, its incompetence, its faith-based stupidity.
It is possible, at this late stage, that even Bush himself has begun to realise something is wrong. That oddly simian face is ashen, the eyes leaden. The voice is shrill and its tone defensive.
“I’m the decider and I decide what’s best,” he squawked to reporters in the White House rose garden the other day, as the screws turned tighter on his disastrous Defence Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld. Can you imagine Roosevelt, Eisenhower or Kennedy blurting something like that?
Rummy is looking knackered too, with six retired generals going public to agree that he is “incompetent strategically, operationally and tactically”, to quote one of them.
These men would have been junior officers in Vietnam, veterans of the all-American nightmare they now see replicated in Iraq. They don’t want the mad old warmonger doing it over again in Iran. As former Marine Corps Lieutenant-General Gregory Newbold wrote in Time magazine: “… we must never again stand by quietly while those ignorant of and casual about war lead us into another one and then mismanage the conduct of it”.
But the Middle East quicksands are not all that is killing Bush’s presidency. Domestically, the rot is wide and deep. It is a budget deficit blowing out towards $US700 billion this financial year as Dubya juggles to fund his war while stealing from the American and immigrant poor to bestow tax cuts on the rich.
It is criminal sleaze in Washington, with the Republicans’ favourite influence peddler, Jack Abramoff, headed for jail, and one of Bush’s closest Texan buddies, the disgraced House Majority Leader, Tom DeLay, not far behind him.
It is arrogant, Nixonian trampling of the law to order the wiretapping of American citizens and the leaking of national security secrets. It is the rape of the environment to enrich big business, especially big oil. And resonating with ordinary Americans most of all, it is the loss of the city of New Orleans – not by Hurricane Katrina but by the bottomless incompetence of the feds’ post-apocalypse response.
This is a trash presidency, founded on lies and knavery, fraud and ignorant ideological crackpottery.
KARL ROVE is another faux-Texan wheeler-dealer sometimes described as Bush’s brain, a courtier most often seen superglued to the presidential right ear. Pink and pudgy, he looks like one of Disney’s three little pigs, although infinitely more smug.
Rove was shunted sideways this week in a shuffle of the White House deck chairs which also saw Dubya’s press secretary lose his job. His new assignment will be to divert the Republican Party from the coming train wreck of the Congressional mid-term elections this November.
That will be crucial to the survival of this gang. If the Democrats regain control of Congress, there would be a good chance of them moving to impeach Bush for high crimes and misdemeanours.
The famous Watergate journalist Carl Bernstein raised just that possibility in a recent article in Vanity Fair magazine. “We have never had a presidency in which the single unifying thread that flows through its major decision-making was incompetence stitched together with hubris and mendacity on a Nixonian scale,” he wrote.
Exactly. Compared to this lot, Bill Clinton was John the Baptist.
THE next question is this: what will the Howard Government do when Bush and co decide to bomb Iran?
On past performance, Australia will be the kiddie on the sideline, panting to join the team: “Pick me, pick me.” That, of course, is how we wangled our way into Iraq.
To quote the admirable US Marine Lieutenant-General Newbold again: “My sincere view is that the commitment of our forces to this fight was done with a casualness and swagger that are the special province of those who have never had to execute these missions – or bury the results.”
As we have seen, John Howard and Lord Downer are terrific at casual swagger, although neither has ever heard a bullet go pffwt-pzzz through the rubber trees. Luckily, they have not had results to bury. But next time we might not be so easily conned. After the never-ever GST, children overboard, Iraq, WorkChoices, AWB and now Papua, Howard has lost public trust. The moment we hear him blather that no decision has been made for war, that everyone is working for a peaceful solution to the Iran crisis – that’s when we know the SAS is already there.
When the shoulders go back, the chin goes up and the lower lip juts out, you know the Prime Minister is lying.
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Apr 22 2006 19:45 utc | 13
Amazing piece from Austrialian press, r’giap.
Yesterday the doozy in the UK was all the right-wing press here crowing about the Queen’s 80th birthday, but The Independent instead going with a front-page full-length picture of the King of Nepal in ceremonial dress – he who is about to be king no more! Even the BBC has started describing the revolution in Nepal as a “pro-democracy” movement (earlier on today the Beeb was describing the scenes on the streets in Kathmandu as “ugly”).
Nepal, France, vast migrant workers’ demos in the US – taking it to the streets is back!
Where next?
Posted by: Dismal Science | Apr 22 2006 19:58 utc | 14
@rememberinggiap:
Can you imagine Roosevelt, Eisenhower or Kennedy blurting something like that?
Now, that’s just unfair. Even when Bush’s star was in the ascendant, he never said anything that anyone could reasonably imagine Roosevelt, Eisenhower, or Kennedy saying, since for all their faults those men were all reasonably good public speakers at even the worst of times and Bush has always been a tongue-tied moron. It’s unfair to hold him to a standard of coherency now, when everything is going wrong.
Posted by: The Truth Gets Vicious When You Corner It | Apr 22 2006 20:26 utc | 15
unfortunately, tonigh here in france – the darling of the right who is a filtered le pen -nicolas sarkozy gave an adress to his public that was as ugly as political speech can be
what sarkozy sd tonight le pen could have said
in france we have these two edges – voices sometimes massive voices of resistance & on the other hand an extreme right which has a man very likely to become president
as for the australian article – while posting it i felt it was a little too easy for a country & press which is so far up bush’s ass it is hardly in a position to criticise
as yesterday am a little bemused at cnn & its defence of the new scottsboro boys out there at duke university
& tonight nepal looks as hot as hell & the massive calls for a constituent assembly warming me
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Apr 22 2006 20:34 utc | 16
dismal it was also very interesting to note bbc’s very very lukewarm relationship with prodi & like its brother in arms sky – they eagerly awaited their little god berlusconi – dwarf spawn of andreotti & the dulles brothers
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Apr 22 2006 20:36 utc | 17
reveiwing this 05 article about death squads/ wolf brigade the shister Mowaffak Rubaie a man already experienced at participating in bombing campaigns, undoubtedly working hand in glove with the CIA and the National Security Council in the US.
Further agents (presumably existing intelligence assets for the most part) were recruited from Iraqs main political groups, consisting of SCIRI, the Dawa Party, the two main Kurdish parties, the Iraqi National Congress and the Iraqi National Accord. These agents became the Collection, Management and Analysis Directorate (CMAD), whose principal job was to turn raw intelligence into targets that could be used in operations ( Detroit Free Press ,op. cit. ). Initially, operations were carried out by a paramilitary unit composed of militia from the five main parties, who, under the supervision of US commanders, worked with US special forces to track down insurgents ( Washington Post ). As the new Iraqi state apparatus developed, CMAD was split between the ministries of Defence and Interior, with an elite corps creamed off to form the National Intelligence Service ( Detroit Free Press ,op. cit. ). To oversee all three bodies, the National Intelligence Coordination Committee was established, headed, as National Security Advisor (appointed in April 2004), by Mowaffak Rubaie. This leading Shiite moderate had been a spokesman for the Dawa Party in the 1980s when it was a serious terrorist organisation targeting Iraq, before moving on to help coordinate the Iraqi opposition from London ( Asia Times Online ,op. cit. ). In London he worked with the Khoei Foundation, a pro-US charitable organisation that has distributed money for the CIA and is linked with the National Endowment for Democracy through Prime minister Jaafaris advisor Laith Kuba, another long-term CIA asset ( Village Voice ).
3 hrs ago nyt
“He has a strong, clean bill, if you like,” said Mowaffak al-Rubaie, Iraq’s national security adviser and a friend of Mr. Maliki’s.
there’s been speculation here at moon this past week over maliki’s rise in stature. it give’s me the creeps. all the recent escalation in bloodshed, US got it’s man.
Posted by: annie | Apr 22 2006 20:46 utc | 18
Thats the statement that jumped out at me (too), dont recall anyone putting it quite like that before. Hell, even Reagan or Nixon never said anything quite that stupid — talk about feet of clay, its a blessing not in disguise all these evil fuckwit policies get to be personified by this hapless idiot.
Posted by: anna missed | Apr 22 2006 20:51 utc | 19
well done Annie
it is way cool to read investigative journalism in real time.
Posted by: dan of steele | Apr 22 2006 21:18 utc | 20
“it is one motherfucker of a protest album”
” Living With War may just be the Fahrenheit 9/11 of rock.”
Let’s get one thing out of the way right now: this album rocks. It’s post ’80s electric Neil Young at his grunge best, and of the 10 cuts on Living With War, the first eight are mostly uptempo rockers. In fact, this may be the 60-year-old Young’s most crossover-worthy album yet, since many of the songs should appeal to fans of bands as diverse as Green Day and Pearl Jam and will likely be embraced on campuses across America.
“Living With War,” a good cut that had toes tapping. But the room really came alive with the third cut, “Restless Consumer,” a headbanging indictment of both American consumerism and the manipulation of the public by the corporate media. Young breaks into an almost rap-style rant in the choruses, with the refrain, “We don’t need no more lies!” No, we do not.
The fourth cut, “Shock and Awe,” skewers our botched “liberation” of Iraq due to hubris and deliberately falsified intel. By this point it is clear Young is not pulling any punches. The lyrics are sometimes heart-wrenching, sometimes humorous, sometimes laden with uncomfortable truth.
Cuts 5 and 6, “Families” and “Flags of Freedom” examine the effect of war on us all, and “Flags” stops you dead with this thought-provoking lyric, “Do you think that you believe in yours more than they do theirs somehow?”
But Young kicks out the proverbial jams with the album’s centerpiece, “Let’s Impeach the President.” This song is a blistering, barnstorming indictment of our Commander-in-Thief, and Young borrows a page from Michael Moore here by letting Bush destroy himself with his own words. In the song’s midsection, Bush’s own recorded contradictory statements are juxtaposed against one another to create an incontrovertible pastiche of lies and contradictions while the background singers chant, “Flip… Flop… Flip… Flop…” Incendiary. The CD is worth buying for this one song alone.
Posted by: annie | Apr 22 2006 21:31 utc | 21
@RG:
My take on the Duke Lacrosse case, is remarkably similar to:
THIS
Wouldn’t want to be in the Duke Boys shoes, though. A rape conviction is generally long time in NC.
As my area has few blacks (2%), my father was mostly writing “their” wills, deeds, dealing with divorces and traffic infractions, etc. He was actually the most turned to lawyer, as I remember, by this small community.
Nuance and race relations sure is strange.
Posted by: Groucho | Apr 23 2006 2:24 utc | 23
How the GOP Lost Its Way: So the Rockefeller businessmen will just stroll across the street to the party of Hillary and Joe/Joe. Who cares?
Neil Young’s politics swing faster than David Bowie’s sexuality (not that that is necessarily bad, just an observation).
their little god berlusconi – dwarf spawn of andreotti & the dulles brothers You owe me a new monitor, r-giap! Or at least a bucket of windex and 3 packs of handi-wipes.
Posted by: Malooga | Apr 23 2006 3:10 utc | 25
I haven’t heard much discussion about the neoprohibitionists in Texas yet, but that seems to be the way of things. There wasn’t a lot of debate before they took away the first and fourth amendments of the Constitution, either.
My rule of thumb is getting to be: If there is a lot of debate going on about a topic (gay marriage, immigration, the port deal, Social Security reform, et cetera), then it’s not a very important issue to the powers-that-be. When they really want something, there’s a small story in some obscure newspaper somewhere to let the reader know that it’s a done deal.
Posted by: Monolycus | Apr 23 2006 5:20 utc | 27
rape, from personal experience i know the subsequent bodily searches, cops, grand jury, its all humiliating. very hard to concieve someone would trump up those charges unless they had a serious bone to pick (revenge, jilted lover etc) of course someone could assume , especially where fame and fortune are considered, it may be a chosen path, but realistically, i would assume that would be rare. not impossible but rare. statistics lead to the hypothesis that for every rape reported there are at least 5 that go unreported. it took lots of coaxing for me to report. the longer you wait , the less likely you will be believed.
it is not impossible that the woman fabricated the charges, but i find it highly unlikely. the devastation of the degradation is a primary factor in seeking retribution, tho consideration of future victims of the perp can be the strongest motivating factor. especially if one does not know the rapist. usually rapist who attack strangers are serial. it is a very humiliating process.
understandably, the circumstance of consent can confuse the issue, but in instances of severe physical abuse beyond the act of rape itself, ie bruses etc, i would posit very very few instances of false allegations are the norn rather than the exception.
just sayin. in my case, i have no regrets. my actions resulted in a serial rapist exposed and then some. it was a long haul but worth every moment. somebody had to do it. it mustered more courage than i thought i had in me.
just sayin. and please. do not respond to this comment.
Posted by: annie | Apr 23 2006 7:00 utc | 28
Zbigniew Brzezinski OpEd in LA Times: Been there, done that
IRAN’S ANNOUNCEMENT that it has enriched a minute amount of uranium has unleashed urgent calls for a preventive U.S. airstrike from the same sources that earlier urged war on Iraq. If there is another terrorist attack in the United States, you can bet your bottom dollar that there also will be immediate charges that Iran was responsible in order to generate public hysteria in favor of military action.
But there are four compelling reasons against a preventive air attack on Iranian nuclear facilities:
First, in the absence of an imminent threat (and the Iranians are at least several years away from having a nuclear arsenal), the attack would be a unilateral act of war. …
Second, likely Iranian reactions would significantly compound ongoing U.S. difficulties in Iraq and Afghanistan, perhaps precipitate new violence by Hezbollah in Lebanon and possibly elsewhere, and in all probability bog down the United States in regional violence for a decade or more. …
Third, oil prices would climb steeply, especially if the Iranians were to cut their production or seek to disrupt the flow of oil from the nearby Saudi oil fields. …
Finally, the United States, in the wake of the attack, would become an even more likely target of terrorism while reinforcing global suspicions that U.S. support for Israel is in itself a major cause of the rise of Islamic terrorism. …
…
Military threats also reinforce growing international suspicions that the U.S. might be deliberately encouraging greater Iranian intransigence. Sadly, one has to wonder whether, in fact, such suspicions may not be partly justified. How else to explain the current U.S. “negotiating” stance: refusing to participate in the ongoing negotiations with Iran and insisting on dealing only through proxies.
…
Serious negotiations require not only a patient engagement but also a constructive atmosphere. Artificial deadlines, propounded most often by those who do not wish the U.S. to negotiate in earnest, are counterproductive. Name-calling and saber rattling, as well as a refusal to even consider the other side’s security concerns, can be useful tactics only if the goal is to derail the negotiating process.
…
For now, our choice is either to be stampeded into a reckless adventure profoundly damaging to long-term U.S. national interests or to become serious about giving negotiations with Iran a genuine chance. The mullahs were on the skids several years ago but were given a new burst of life by the intensifying confrontation with the United States. Our strategic goal, pursued by real negotiations and not by posturing, should be to separate Iranian nationalism from religious fundamentalism.
Treating Iran with respect and within a historical perspective would help to advance that objective. American policy should not be swayed by the current contrived atmosphere of urgency ominously reminiscent of what preceded the misguided intervention in Iraq.
Speaking of Net Neutrality
Here’s a video that explains why discrimination on the Internet is a problem and will continue to be as long as net neutrality rules are not enforced
For the backstory see, [How] The Right-wing Seeks to Take Your Internet.
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 23 2006 10:11 utc | 31
As our unglorious leader Bliar moves towards making a unilateral decision for the UK to renew its moribund nukular programme when two-thirds of the population don’t want to increase n-power here, we learn that our existing nukular waste is being handled in a “distinctively non-scientific” way. Fucking brilliant.
And half a world away, a Japanese court orders the closure of a newly-built n-plant over earthquake fears.
20 years since Chernobyl:
Scientists at Newcastle University examined rates of thyroid cancer in children across northern England before and after the Chernobyl cloud passed overhead.
They found slight increases across the region – and an abrupt 12-fold jump in Cumbria, which received most fall-out. Professor Louise Palmer, who led the study, said yesterday that the results were “consistent with a causal association with the Chernobyl accident”.
Posted by: Dismal Science | Apr 23 2006 11:17 utc | 32
There to stay: Stuck in the Hot Zone
With 27,500 landings and takeoffs a month, Balad is second only to London’s Heathrow airport in traffic worldwide, according to Brig. Gen. Frank Gorenc, the base commander and leader of 332nd Air Expeditionary Wing. In an interview with NEWSWEEK, Gorenc said he’s “normalizing” the giant Balad airfield, or gradually rebuilding it to U.S. military specs. The Saddam-era concrete is considered too substandard for the F-16s, C-130s and other aircraft that fly in and out so regularly, they crack the tarmac. .. “It’s safe to say Balad will be here for a long time,” says Gorenc, who feels at home in Iraqi skies, where the Air Force has been having its way since the first gulf war. “One of the issues of sovereignty for any country is the ability to control their own airspace. We will probably be helping the Iraqis with that problem for a very long time.”
…
But the vast base being built up at Balad is also hard evidence that, despite all the political debate in Washington about a quick U.S. pullout, the Pentagon is planning to stay in Iraq for a long time—at least a decade or so, according to military strategists. Sovereignty issues still need to be worked out by mutual, legal agreement. But even as Iraqi politicians settle on a new government after four months of stalemate—on Saturday, they agreed on a new prime minister, Jawad al-Maliki—they also are welcoming the long-term U.S. presence. Sectarian conflict here has worsened in recent months, outstripping the anti-American insurgency in significance, and many Iraqis know there is no alternative to U.S. troops for the foreseeable future. “I think the presence of the American forces can be seen as an insurance policy for the unity of Iraq,” says national-security adviser Mowaffaq al-Rubaie.
[al-Rubaie is a longtime CIA asset – b.]
…
True, most Iraqis don’t like the U.S. occupation today any better than they did a year ago, or two, or three. But with the exception of radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, no major politician is calling for U.S. withdrawal. “Even guys who want Americans to leave, they know it will be civil war if they do,” says Ahmed al-Jobory, an unemployed chemical engineer working at Balad. What is emerging is a sense of psychological dependency. Even the new Iraqi Army, on which Washington is spending billions, is designed to be weak. The Army just received its first armor from the United States: light-skinned Humvees. But the Pentagon won’t be giving up any tanks. “The goal is to have them equipped to fight a counterinsurgency, not to defend against external threats,” says Lt. Col. Michael Negard, public-affairs officer for the Multinational Security Transition Command in Iraq.
…
One big question is whether a reduced but long-term U.S. presence in Iraq can be effective. Counterinsurgency experts say that sectarian conflict and insurgencies simply can’t be fought from the air. And the Air Force officers at Balad say that, at long last, they’re getting that message. .. Since January, says F-16 squadron commander Pete (Guns) Gersten, he has been feeding the info to his Army “brothers” rather than bombing the targets. “The Army said, ‘Every time you blow stuff up, we get it back five times [in reprisals]’,” he says. “So now we just do a lot of surveillance for the Army. They say it’s time to start building. It’s time to quit blowing things up.”
But Gersten adds that, when it comes to preventing all-out civil war, control of the skies is crucial. “When I show up at a firefight, it stops,” he says. “We’re the big brother.” Bristle-headed and lean in his tan flight suit, Gersten looks very much like a character out of “Top Gun.” Is he a tad overconfident? Perhaps. But he fairly well sums up how Washington sees its role in Iraq today—and for a long time to come.
Quite optimistic – I bet that will not happen that way.
This is the way it DID happen:
From a March 3, 1999 letter to Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, the Venezuelan terrorist known as Carlos the Jackal, from Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez, in response to a previous letter from Ramirez, who is serving a life sentence in France for murder. Translated from the Spanish by Paul Reyes. Originally from Harper’s Magazine, October 1999. By Hugo Chavez.
Citizen Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, Distinguished Compatriot,
Swimming in the depths of your letter of solidarity I could hear the pulse of our shared insight that everything has its due time: time to pile up stones or hurl them, to ignite revolution or to ignore it; to pursue dialectically a unity between our warring classes or to stir the conflict between them—a time when you can fight outright for principles and a time when you must choose the proper fight, lying in wait with a keen sense for the moment of truth, in the same way that Ariadne, invested with these same principles, lays the thread that leads her out of the labyrinth.
Our liberator Simon Bolivar, whose theories and example are fundamental to our doctrine of revolution, whispered briefly this question before he passed away: “How will I find the way out of this labyrinth?” We agree with Bolivar that Time delivers miracles only to those who maintain a righteous spirit, to those who understand the true meaning of things. There is no measure of distance or time that can undermine these thoughts of our Caracan hero.
I feel that my spirit’s own strength will always rise to the magnitude of the dangers that threaten it. My doctor has told me that my spirit must nourish itself on danger to preserve my sanity, in the manner that God intended, with this stormy revolution to guide me in my great destiny.
With profound faith in our cause and our mission, now and forever!
Posted by: Malooga | Apr 23 2006 15:22 utc | 34
b
yes, the u s forces & their valets & slaves working day & night for the profit of their masters & themselves – will find the turth otherwise
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Apr 23 2006 17:24 utc | 35
For the records:
Newsweek: Iran: The Intelligence Reports vs. the Hard-Liners
Some neocon activists have urged a sharp increase in U.S. efforts to undermine Tehran and thwart its nuclear ambitions. American Enterprise Institute scholar Michael Ledeen told NEWSWEEK: “The people hate [the regime]. It’s a revolution waiting to happen.” But U.S. intel agencies strongly disagree, according to six sources familiar with official analyses of Iran who asked not to be identified when discussing sensitive material.
…
U.S. or Israeli attempts to bomb Iranian nuclear facilities would only rally popular support for the regime and the nuke program, two of the intel sources said. Finally, several of the sources agreed that intel’s assessment is that if the United States were to bomb Iran or try to oust the mullahs, the regime could turn to anti-American terrorism, using proxies like the Lebanese group Hizbullah or a corps of “martyrs” that Tehran claims to be recruiting. The sources said that intel officials have communicated all these points directly to senior officials, though it is up to policymakers how much heed they pay.
@dan – I didn´t know for sure, so I did kill the URL it posted but left the comment intact. I’ll junk that one now too.
Repugs calling for Moron-in-Chief to dump cheney. Here’s Fred Barnes of weekly standard, via Brit Mudoch paper Swap Cheney for/Condi. LA Times (now owned by Chicago Trib.) ed. page agreesDumping Rumbo Not Enough
Posted by: jj | Apr 23 2006 21:46 utc | 39
Enjoy Zbig’s negotiation of the Fairfax easement. A model for negotiators everywhere.
LINK
Posted by: Groucho | Apr 24 2006 0:16 utc | 40
groucho, i got a real chuckle from your link, but i have to agree w/zbig. i bought a little house in 78 on a cute little street in an area that has become mc mansionland. everything is becoming so overdeveloped. plus, when i bought it jogging wasn’t the rage. sunday afternoons are a carnival of strollers, bicyclists,cell phones, groups of these swift walkers chatting away as they power down the street. and all because this pleasant out of the way lane is ‘scenic’. my home is the last of a dying breed in the area. i get constant offers from developers and real estate people thru mailings to sell my house, knowing they only want the lot to mow it down and build one of their monstrosities. let them eat cake! these poor depraved urban developers. normal people cannot afford these once quiet pretty lanes. if i were him i would do everything in my power to keep it the way i bought it for as long as i could.
another aspect of this is the property taxes on these zillion dollar
estates make the area completely uninhabitable for anyone but the very very rich. local planning commision make it virtually impossible
to do any form of upgrade or remodel w/out licensed architects, engineers, etc, literally 10 grand for just permits and design, because they don’t want remodels, they want you to mow your home and start from scratch and get stuck paying a grand a month in property taxes (the minimum!)
it forces out older people native to the area. i was in wrightsville beach nc at a family reunion , since the last time i was there the place is completely developed w/huge townhouses. why don’t developers find new places to invade? why go to the old neighborhoods and ruin them? rant
Posted by: annie | Apr 24 2006 1:15 utc | 41
The elephant is wearing sunglasses!
Aeons go elephant jokes were popular for a week or two. eg
Q: “Why did the elephant paint his toenails red?”
A: “So he could hide upside down in the strawberry patch.”
OR
Q: “what did Tarzan say when he say the elephants coming over the hill?”
A: “Here come the elephants”
Follow up:
Q: “What did Tarzan say when he saw the elephants coming over the hill wearing sunglasses?”
A: “Nothing, he didn’t recognize them.”
Which explains the dems problem. The elephant is wearing sunglasses. From todays New York Times:
Democrats Hope to Divide G.O.P. Over Stem Cells
COLUMBIA, Mo., April 19 — Democrats are pressing their support for embryonic stem cell research in Congressional races around the country, seeking to move back to center stage an issue they believe resonates with voters and to exploit a division between conservatives who oppose the science and other Republicans more open to it. . . . . . . . “
The dems are struggling to find a point of difference with the repugs. For everyone else bar the dems there is a huge issue that bush has created that the vast majority of the population around the world, including ordinary people in the US abhor. That is the failing attempt to subjugate the people of the Mid East.
The elephant in the room that nobody wants to talk about.
It seems likely that given the dems approach to this issue, their long standing over the top support for Israeli massacres and terror attacks, combined with their aggressive approach towards US hegemony over Latin America, means that less people in the world will die with a rethug administration than a dem one.
The rethugs have had their fingers badly burned with the bushco “If it ain’t nailed down we’ll take it” approach to foreign affairs. In all likelihood if they do manage to scrape back in this year and/or in ’08 they will go back to their isolationism and non-intervention.
Not an ideal situation I admit but given that both parties conception of multi-lateralism is turning up to the UN to heavy other member nations into voting the “correct way”, an isolationist US is less harmful to the rest of us.
Posted by: Anonymous | Apr 24 2006 2:00 utc | 42
an isolationist US is less harmful to the rest of us
Well anon i would be quite content with several years, back to back, of
A LITTLE PEACE.
Would be nice.
Posted by: Groucho | Apr 24 2006 2:11 utc | 43
Apparently nobody in the US is actually buying the story that Iran is an “imminent threat”. Now, I’m the first one to complain about the public’s short attention span, but it’s beginning to look like people might be wising up about this same old formula of scaremongering. According to a recent
op-ed I saw,
“the danger of such a reckless move is real, and rising. The Bush administration claims that negotiations are their first choice. But they have gone to war based on lies before, and there is no reason to believe that they are telling the truth this time.”
If the consequences weren’t so monstrous, I would have chuckled when I remembered that one Bush’s major criticism of Kerry while he was stumping in 2004 was that “the man has a credibility problem.” He was referring to Kerry’s inconsistent voting record, whereas in his own case, he has developed the same problem with his absolutely consistent pattern of lying to the public. I’m surprised that I haven’t seen any political cartoons yet using the “boy who cried ‘wolf'” theme.
But even if this administration’s methods are shallow and transparent (viz.; create a “crisis” and promptly recieve a blank cheque for it), the motivations for them remain murky. Bush is saying now that his legacy would be resolving the artificial Iran crisis… but he also said his legacy would be the “road map to peace” in the middle east after Arafat was out of the way. And before that, he said he was “betting his Presidency” on Iraq. These grand statements indicate a peculiar awareness of posterity for someone who assured us all that history doesn’t matter since we’ll all be dead.
So what the hell are the motivations here? Why create hornet’s nests where they don’t presently exist so that they can be “pre-empted” in defiance of international law? Part of me thinks that Washington’s recent bitch slap of Hu Jintao might have been to provoke a response from a heavyweight military that actually could be a global threat (God, how they miss the USSR on Capitol Hill!), but if creating genuine crises were the order of the day, they have had Kim Jong Il on the menu for a few years but only seem interested in picking at the appetizers.
I have to admit, I’m flummoxed. Bush has already seen how much capital there is to be lost creating wars with middle eastern nations, so this can not by any stretch of the imagination, be a calculated political move. Even a one-trick pony like Bush the Younger, after having been burned playing this identical game before, should be hesitant to stick his hand in the fire again. At this point, it is seriously looking as though he either genuinely wants to stand trial for war crimes or he genuinely wants to take the entire world down with him. I can be as calculated and cynical as anyone, but none of this makes the first bit of sense.
Posted by: Monolycus | Apr 24 2006 3:31 utc | 44
Givin the situation in Iraq, the Iranian “crisis” is most likely a function there of. The choice they have made in Iraq — to allow a controlled democracy to evolve as the agent of US interests — has created a bi-polar containment problem that appears contradictory, but may in fact serve several cross-purposes. One thing the recent Jaafari PM event has revealed is that the real point of contention (from the US perspective) has and still is, who maintains control over the ministries of Defense and Interior (effectivly, the military). The US has obviously exerted major pressure upon the process in order to either break up the UIA alliance or failing that, dump Jaafari, who if nothing else has become the symbol of militia control of the ministries, de-ba’thification, non-partitionism, and alliance with the Sadr trend. All of which amounts to an effort to prevent the full consolidation of Shiite (and nationalistic) power. Tandem to a US push back on the Shia comes an increased sectarian reaction along with the possibility of outright rebellion — either of which would draw into Iraq a proportional Iranian response, which with the importation of military personal and hardware, particularly of the surface to air variety — could spell military defeat on top of the political failure. So it makes sense that at this point Iran should be threatened with an unrelated (to Iraq) and yet still variable set of potential responses — that can set markers down in relation to events in Iraq — should they spin out of control. Going back a couple of years ago Iran, in relation to Iraq, was hardly mentioned, but that was before the spector of Shiite political domination in Iraq had become its current unalterable reality. And now that it has become a reality, demonizing Iran serves a dual purpose in containing Iranian influence in Iraq while simultaniously legitimizing a parallel containment of indegenious Shiite power. Painting Shiite power in Iraq with the brush of Iran also holds the possibility, for the US domestic audience, should a coup be in the works**– as a mode of berating Iran and its evil sectarian influence.
** a coup being the full realization of threats used to influence and “contain” the current governmental process toward US interests.
Posted by: anna missed | Apr 24 2006 6:34 utc | 45
A PLUTOCRACY OF THE MASSES
The Busheviks’ Great Leap Forward
Rugged Individualism Is Strongest When We Obey!
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 24 2006 6:41 utc | 46
The old guard is really coming out against a War On Iran
Arthur Schlesinger: Bush’s Thousand Days
The issue of preventive war as a presidential prerogative is hardly new. In February 1848 Rep. Abraham Lincoln explained his opposition to the Mexican War: “Allow the President to invade a neighboring nation, whenever he shall deem it necessary to repel an invasion and you allow him to do so whenever he may choose to say he deems it necessary for such purpose — and you allow him to make war at pleasure [emphasis added]. . . . If, today, he should choose to say he thinks it necessary to invade Canada to prevent the British from invading us, how could you stop him? You may say to him, ‘I see no probability of the British invading us’; but he will say to you, ‘Be silent; I see it, if you don’t.’ ”
This is precisely how George W. Bush sees his presidential prerogative: Be silent; I see it, if you don’t . However, both Presidents Harry S. Truman and Dwight D. Eisenhower, veterans of the First World War, explicitly ruled out preventive war against Joseph Stalin’s attempt to dominate Europe. And in the Cuban missile crisis of October 1962, President Kennedy, himself a hero of the Second World War, rejected the recommendations of the Joint Chiefs of Staff for a preventive strike against the Soviet Union in Cuba.
…
But our Cold War presidents kept to the Kennan formula of containment plus deterrence, and we won the Cold War without escalating it into a nuclear war. Enter George W. Bush as the great exponent of preventive war. In 2003, owing to the collapse of the Democratic opposition, Bush shifted the base of American foreign policy from containment-deterrence to presidential preventive war: Be silent; I see it, if you don’t. Observers describe Bush as “messianic” in his conviction that he is fulfilling the divine purpose. But, as Lincoln observed in his second inaugural address, “The Almighty has His own purposes.”
There stretch ahead for Bush a thousand days of his own. He might use them to start the third Bush war: the Afghan war (justified), the Iraq war (based on fantasy, deception and self-deception), the Iran war (also fantasy, deception and self-deception). There is no more dangerous thing for a democracy than a foreign policy based on presidential preventive war.
Scholars Call Moussaoui Trial a “Charade”
Doh’…lol!
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Apr 24 2006 9:29 utc | 48
i found this bit of propaganda highly amusing this morning
Chávez says he wants Ortega to win Nicaraguan vote
By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
CARACAS, Venezuela — President Hugo Chávez has endorsed Nicaraguan presidential candidate Daniel Ortega to win his country’s November election.
Both men appeared here Sunday on the weekly television broadcast of President Chávez where Chávez told Ortega, “I hope you win.”
Both are considered authoritarians.
The endorsement comes on the heels of a recommendation from the U.S. State Department last week that Nicaraguans reject not only Ortega, but also former Nicaraguan president Arnoldo Aleman, who is also a presidential candidate. A Department spokesman, Sean McCormack, said that both men are “discredited figures from Nicaragua’s past.”
Ortega led the leftist Sandanista movement against Contra rebels supported by Washington in the 1980s.
A.M. Costa Rica is a small online newspaper, geared toward an english-speaking audience in & interested in costa rica, that regularly pumps out articles that make up for a lack of informed reporting w/ an overcompemensation in conservative political opinion masking as fact. a member of the Inter-American Press Association, an organization w/ longstanding ties to the cia, A.M. Costa Rica visualizes its role in the southern hemisphere as “a training ground for English-speaking university graduates who wish to learn Latin culture and international journalism. In 10 years we hope international reporting from Latin America will have a large contingent of our alumni.”
Posted by: b real | Apr 24 2006 16:33 utc | 49
re that “discrediting” of the nicaraguan ex-president arnoldo aleman, and yet another example of the interference in other countries elections that the u.s. still manages to get away with
Whose democracy is the U.S. supporting in Nicaragua?
On April 5, 2006, [U.S. Ambassador Paul] Trivelli sent a letter to several political parties offering to fund primaries that would result in one presidential candidate in order to increase their chances of defeating Ortega. When this offer was rejected by the parties, all of whom had already declared their separate candidates, Trivelli chose another tactic. In a highly publicized meeting, Trivelli met with the leaders of the Liberal Constitutional Party (PLC), many who have been stripped of their U.S. visas, and close associates of the party leader, former U.S.-supported ex-President Arnoldo Aleman, who has been convicted of embezzling over $100 million from state coffers. Trivelli urged the party to participate in an effort to defeat Ortega, which would include ditching their candidate José Rizo, chosen in internal party elections earlier this year. When the party refused to remove their candidate, Trivelli went back to his rhetoric denouncing the PLC, stating, “A party that is controlled by Mr. Aleman is still not in the category of democratic parties…” He then met with Presidential candidate Eduardo Montealegre, former PLC member who split from the party. In a statement that barely fell short of endorsing Montealegre, Trivelli stated that he is the democratic choice for the presidency.
Trivelli’s recent actions prove that democracy is a fluid concept, one that applies when convenient for the US State Department. He negotiates with the PLC if it could mean the possibility of achieving an alliance to beat Daniel Ortega. When not successful, he reiterates that the PLC is undemocratic, another pressure tactic.
Posted by: b real | Apr 24 2006 17:13 utc | 51