Keith Olbermann hits another one out of the park, this time on free speech in America:
Special Comment by Keith Olbermann (via rawstory.com)
Well worth watching, as always!

Posted by: Bea | Dec 1 2006 14:48 utc | 4

Ah Gore

It is inconceivable to me that Bush would read a warning as stark and as clear [voice angry now] as the one he received on August 6th of 2001, and, according to some of the new histories, he turned to the briefer and said, “Well, you’ve covered your ass.” And never called a follow up meeting. Never made an inquiry. Never asked a single question. To this day, I don’t understand it.

snip

[Practically screaming now] But dammit, whatever happened to the concept of accountability for catastrophic failure? This administration has been by far the most incompetent, inept, and with more moral cowardice, and obsequiousness to their wealthy contributors, and obliviousness to the public interest of any administration in modern history, and probably in the entire history of the country!

Posted by: beq | Dec 1 2006 17:33 utc | 6

On 9/11 Clinton and Gore were both Aus.
Bill Clinton went on a surprise trip to Australia, without family, aides, or anyone. The trip was announced on 7 Sept, much to the astonishment of the Aussie Press. He was to be a consultant to the Madison Press (huh?), speak there to about 30 people.
Gore went to an Internet conference in Austria:
A. GORE: Vienna, Austria. There were some young Internet whizzes from Europe there who patched up a connection through the Internet that enabled us to communicate, and Tipper assured me that everybody was all right. I knew right away it was Osama bin Laden. Anybody in…

KING: Bill Clinton, on this show, a couple weeks ago — he was in Australia — said as soon as he saw it, he said, Bin Laden.
A. GORE: Absolutely.
KING: You said it too?

A. GORE: Said it to the people there with me. No question about it.
cnn
From raw story, Nov. 2006: “It is inconceivable to me” Gore continued,” that Bush would read a warning as stark and as clear [voice angry now] as the one he received on August 6th of 2001 …etc.” (See beq above.)
Well, Gore didn’t ask any questions either, did he, post facto?
He made up his mind right away, as he is at pains to point out, so blatantly that even Larry King cuts him off, and feels he has to add forcefully no question?
Gore said and did nothing until it became politically acceptable to blame Bush for lack of foresight or proper planning, always easy with hindsight, but more importantly, a trivial criticism that is unanswerable and directs attention to the ‘before’ (intelligence failures, etc. the incompetence spiel) away from the ‘after’ which accepts the scenario of muslim fanatics, etc. which Gore upheld immediately.

Posted by: Noirette | Dec 1 2006 18:56 utc | 8

more info about the vid game mercenaries 2: venezuela in flames & bono
Reality Check: “Mercenaries 2”

As you may know, Bono of U2 recently formed an investment firm called Elevation Partners, named after a famous U2 song, “Elevation”. Elevation Partners invested $300 million in Pandemic Studios. They also recently bought a major interest in Forbes, again for $300 million. Investment in potentially lucrative business ventures seems like a good business move.
For Bono, “Time Person of the Year” for his humanitarian, anti-poverty, pro-peace efforts, such investments may be somewhat more problematic.
On November 18, William Langley of the Telegraph, when describing Bono’s recent actions, including the moving of his corporate home from Dublin to the Netherlands to evade taxes, wrote, “This debacle was followed by news that Bono was buying a large chunk of Forbes, the American business magazine, founded by the eccentric, Right-wing publisher Malcolm Forbes, which styles itself “The Capitalist Tool”. The stake, costing a reported $250 million, was acquired through Elevation Partners (named after a U2 song), a sophisticated private equity vehicle co-owned by Bono and a group of wealthy California-based investors.
While all this may be no more than astute financial management for a super-rich, middle-aged man with three homes, including a £15 million, three-storey New York penthouse, it somehow fails to cast a warming glow of affinity around Bono’s heavily publicised forays into the world of the starving and wretched.” (“Profile Bono“, Telegraph.co.uk, 2006).
It is clear that Bono’s hypocrisy, when it comes to producing a videogame that seemingly contradicts all of the principles he professes to defend, is a pattern and not unique to “Mercenaries 2”. Therefore, one concludes that this is further evidence that Bono is nothing more than a well-packaged and well-paid frontman for significant corporate interests.
This helps to put “Mercenaries 2” into perspective. With the backing of Bono and his partners at Elevation, the goal is to produce a piece of propaganda that helps to further corporate interests in Latin America, and make a little money in the lucrative videogame market along the way.
…
Pandemic’s current project, set for release in 2007, is called “Mercenaries 2: World in Flames”. However, it is not really about the vaguely labeled “world”.
…
This so-called game depicts the invasion and total destruction of Venezuela. The objectives of the game are to assassinate the President, described as a “power hungry tyrant”, and take over the oil industry. The level of destruction that takes place in the game draws comparisons to what happened when the United States bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki. If you have reviewed the game website, you will have seen that Caracas is reduced to ashes. It is presumed that the same death and destruction extends to all regions of the country.
…
Venezuelans viewing the game will instantly recognize their neighborhoods, famous landmarks, and will also recognize that the purpose of the game is to slaughter thousands, if not millions, of innocent people in order to turn the oil industry in Venezuela over to corporate interests.

Posted by: b real | Dec 1 2006 20:39 utc | 10

In the navy
Yes, you can sail the seven seas
In the navy
Yes, you can put your mind at ease
In the navy
Come on now, people, make a stand
In the navy, in the navy
Can’t you see we need a hand
In the navy
Come on, protect the motherland
— the village people
secrecynews: http://www.fas.org/blog/secrecy/2006/12/navy_mind_control.html

U.S. Navy research on “mind control techniques” cannot be performed on human subjects without the authorization of the Under Secretary of the Navy, according to a new Navy Instruction (pdf).
“The Under Secretary of the Navy (UNSECNAV) is the Approval Authority for research involving … severe or unusual intrusions, either physical or psychological, on human subjects (such as consciousness-altering drugs or mind-control techniques).”
The nature and scope of any such Navy research could not be immediately discovered.
See “Human Research Protection Program,” Secretary of the Navy Instruction 3900.39D, November 6, 2006 [at section 7(a)(2), page 9].

Mind Control: a Navy school for assassins
By Harry V. Martin and David Caul

A U.S. Navy psychologist, who claims that the Office of Naval Intelligence had taken convicted murderers from military prisons, used behavior modification techniques on them, and then relocated them in American embassies throughout the world. Just prior to that time, the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee had censured the CIA for its global political assassination plots, including plots against Fidel Castro. The Navy psychologist was Lt. Commander Thomas Narut of the U.S. Regional Medical Center in Naples, Italy. The information was divulged at an Oslo NATO conference of 120 psychologists from the eleven nation alliance. According to Dr. Narut, the U.S. Navy was an excellent place for a researcher to find “captive personnel” whom they could could use as guinea pigs in experiments. The Navy provided all the funding necessary, according to Narut.
Dr. Narut, in a question and answer session with reporters from many nations, revealed how the Navy was secretly programming large numbers of assassins. He said that the men he had worked with for the Navy were being prepared for commando-type operations, as well as covert operations in U.S. embassies worldwide. He described the men who went through his program as “hit men and assassins” who could kill on command.

gitmo is a naval base, am i right?

Posted by: b real | Dec 1 2006 22:27 utc | 12

Continuing on my theme from above…
Six Questions on the American “Gulag” for Historian Kate Brown
And
1 In 32 American Adults In Jail, On Probation Or Parole At The End Of Last Year…

A record 7 million people — or one in every 32 American adults — were behind bars, on probation or on parole by the end of last year, according to the Justice Department. Of those, 2.2 million were in prison or jail, an increase of 2.7 percent over the previous year, according to a report released Wednesday.
More than 4.1 million people were on probation and 784,208 were on parole at the end of 2005. Prison releases are increasing, but admissions are increasing more.

Note: America has the highest percentage of its population in jail of any industrialized nation on the planet. As a percentage of population we make more people criminals than China, Vietnam, Russia, or Cuba combined.. however, that is not my point, my point is the unseen structural device parameters of the panopticon-like intracacies of the system which is beyond the scope of the offically incarcerated or those in legal hot water, i.e. the rest of us.
More to come…

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 1 2006 23:11 utc | 14

foreign policy in focus: No Clear Victory for Left in Nicaragua

FPIF Commentary
No Clear Victory for Left in Nicaragua
Alejandro Bendaña | November 29, 2006
Editor: Emily Schwartz Greco, IPS
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Comment on this article
Foreign Policy In Focus
http://www.fpif.org
Does Daniel Ortega’s presidential win in Nicaragua mark yet another victory for the Latin American Left? Not quite. One might first ask what is the Left, what does it mean to be Left in 2006, and what does it mean to be Left in 2006 in Nicaragua. This is not to fall into a post-modernist relativist trap, because indeed there are permanent “indicators,” as it were, that throw light on the social and historical significance of the return of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) to power.
…
The bizarre question however is whether both the U.S. government and the Sandinista voters are both making a big mistake in believing that the present FSLN under the leadership (and control) of Daniel Ortega can or wishes to break with the neoliberal economic model. This indeed may be the acid test of what is really the Left (and what is not Leftist at all or is simply sort of Leftist). Such a distinction needs to be made particularly among those, principally outside of Nicaragua, that annoyingly are either welcoming or warning against the spread of elected “Left” governments in Latin America.

Posted by: b real | Dec 1 2006 23:40 utc | 16

A very, very good article about Iraq by Azmi Bishara:

A selective memory
(snip)
The identity crisis in the eastern Arab world is a modern phenomenon, not the extension of a condition with deep historical roots. Nor are nationalism and state- and nation-building concepts that conflict with the existence of tribal and sectarian affiliations; they are answers to the challenges of building a modern society. The problem in Iraq, today, is that the country’s tribal and sectarian structure is being forced on Iraqis as a mold for political affiliation. People aren’t born as a nation; nations are built. And in order to build a nation you don’t go delving into history, when there was no state or nation and when all that existed were tribes and sects, as some Orientalists do.
(snip)
Today’s Iraqi occupation ideologues have concocted three super-simplistic myths to which they have reduced contemporary Iraq history: a Sunni- based Baathist regime ruled over the Shia, the oppressed Shia appealed to the US and Britain for help, and the resistance to the occupation is really a sectarian war between the Sunni and Shia. Their need to invent a fiction in order to cover up their failure and to suggest that Iraq either has to go the way they say or else, is not all that different from the fiction of weapons of mass destruction, the major difference being that they are now producing a real weapon of mass destruction aimed at Iraq and the eastern Arab world.
(snip)
Iraqi governments have clamped down brutally on all opposition and everyone whose allegiance was suspect. The victims of repression are legion, and of all sects. Mohamed Ayish, Adnan Hussein, General Mohamed Mazloum Al-Dulaimi, Shaker Faza and Raji Al-Takriti were all Sunni.
The first religious figure to have died as the result of torture was Sheikh Abdul-Aziz Al-Badri Al-Samaraai, a Sunni. Mohamed Baqir Al-Sadr was executed ten years later. Moreover, for those who care to remember, the Sunni and Shia fundamentalist offensive was directed against the “secularist regime” in Iraq and the Iranian media constantly reminded its public that the two assassinations were connected and proof of the Baathist regime’s war against Islam, both Sunni and Shia. But does anybody in the Iranian media mention Al-Badri today? Similarly forgotten are the armed confrontations against the government in Falluja in the 1970s (The so-called “Dervish Uprising”) and the Ramadi uprising during the funeral of Mohamed Mazloum.
Evidently, the rule of political sectarianism and the preparation of the Arab world for the latest colonialist weapon, requires partial collective memory alongside partial collective amnesia.

(Found via the Lebanese blog Remarkz.

Posted by: Alamet | Dec 2 2006 0:28 utc | 18

@annie #13 and b real’s #12
Just saw your post, yeah, aninmals in a zoo is about right, animals whom do tricks with DARPA sponsorship and manipulation of cognitive processes and Pavlovian conditioning on the masses. I have spoken before about the Delphi Technique, where the general public are more likely to support these idea’s because they are hoodwinked into believing that they are involved in the process and are part of the power structure. A false notion of controland oversite. However, they are not. Most are not even aware of the stratification.
Further, Lieutenant Colonel Grossman describes how modern armies, using Pavlovian and operant conditioning, have developed ways to overcome humans’ natural aversion to killing people .
He argues this conditioning is responsible for the increase in post-traumatic stress syndrome, public anhedonia, population and community apathy. He further asserts that contemorary society, especially the media, has replicated the army’s conditioning techniques, leading to a more violent society and rising (controlled?) murder rates.

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 2 2006 3:02 utc | 20

Some cars used in Iraq bombings hail from Texas Imagine that…/snark
I posted about this a while back, however this is the first a msm has reported on it. Sectarian violence built Ford tough.(tm)?
Also see, Robert Fisk: Seen through a Syrian lens, ‘unknown Americans’ are provoking civil war in Iraq and SAS men get £100,000 to bribe Iraqi fighters
Go ahead and connect the dots…

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 2 2006 3:48 utc | 22

from uncle’s link on stolen cars from texas winding up in car bombings in iraq

Inspector John E. Lewis, deputy assistant director of the FBI for counterterrorism, told the Globe that the investigation hasn’t yielded any evidence that the vehicles were stolen specifically for car bombings. But there is evidence, he said, that the cars were smuggled from the United States as part of a widespread criminal network that includes terrorists and insurgents.

heh. maybe. but a more plausible explanation may point to the global shadow economy, those informal exchange networks that operate outside of formally-acknowleged markets (& only a fraction of which necessarily involve illegal commodities or nefarious characters). the anthropologist carolyn nordstrom has been writing on her discoveries made in field work in war zones for awhile now. from her last book, 2004’s shadows of war: violence, power, and international profiteering in the twenty-first century, nordstrom writes that

While arms and luxury black-market items such as drugs and precious resources are the classic examples of extra-state exchanges, it’s important to keep in mind that traders carrying rice or cigarettes outside of state-licensed channels are as basic to, and can be as lucrative as, shadow enterprises like battle-ready solar-generated laptop computers or chemical weapons.
The example of businesspeople commandeering aid flights and setting international currency exchange rates … shows how basic goods and luxury items like gems link within larger international exchange networks ranging from armaments through high-tech computers and industrial equipment to core energy sources. The lines between state and extra-state power can easily blur here. Smugglers comandeering INGO (international NGO) relief planes may carry sanctioned telecommunications equipment, VCRs, and stolen cars, yet by day these marketeers are often upstanding members and officials of the country. In fact, the returns on such “enterprises” can supply the wealth, industrial base, and influence to gain political office.

nordstrom was refering to an earlier explanation she received from an ex-military pilot working as cargo pilot flying USAID, UN, INGO, etc relief supplies in some war-torn country in africa on why the planes somedays were not available

A group of businessmen requisitioned the plane for this day. They do business, big business. Big enough to be able to take this relief plane, cancel five or six emergency relief runs, and use the plane for their own purposes. This time, they are flying goods into the interior.
It may seem like the towns have been bombed and attacked to a standstill, that the entire population has been reduced to hungry refugees without the means to buy even food. But big businessmen, big not just along the lines of this province and this country, but big along international lines, they live and work and run businesses all over the country.
…
Business goods, telecommunications equipment, war-related supplies, [stolen] motor vehicles, VCRs, luxury items, precious resources, food, cigarettes, liquor, petrol, you name it. They provide the latest movie releases not even available on video in the regular stores yet, and they provide the sets to play them, the generators to run them, the petrol to fuel them, and the jobs to get the money to pay for all this. You can get a beautiful Mercendes Benz, or perhaps you prefer a Land Rover, here in the middle of the bush in the middle of this war. You can order the parts you need to repair it when it hits a land mine.

the shadow economy has always been around, though the networks are now more globally interconnected, ala castells’ network enterprise, than ever. nordstrom’s next book, global outlaws: crime, money, and power in the contemporary world, due out in june, looks to continue her advances on the topic. amongst all the pillaging, no-bid reconstruction contracts, entrepreneurialism, and egregious profiteering taking place around iraq since the occupation, surely there’s a better explanation for stolen cars arriving in iraq than “insurgents” having the time/luxury to scheme up a smuggling ring for stealing american cars from american cities – “Terrorism specialists think Iraqi insurgents prefer American stolen cars because they tend to be larger, blend in more easily with the convoys of US government and private contractors, and are harder to identify as stolen”. why not steal the ones they’re already using in iraq? big savings on the freight. more dough for IEDs, mortars, and all those other items whitefellas are no doubt also trying to sell them.
so, when the MSM stenographers try to sell you lines like

US law enforcement and intelligence agencies are increasingly finding links between violent Islamic extremists groups and vast criminal enterprises such as drug trafficking, weapons smuggling, and car theft.

and

James G. Conway, Jr., legal attache at the US Embassy in Mexico City, told the Globe that ”where you find terrorists you often find some kind of criminal activity.”

take it w/ a huge frickin’ line of blow

Posted by: b real | Dec 2 2006 6:04 utc | 24

GSA Chief Seeks to Cut Budget For Audits

The new chief of the U.S. General Services Administration is trying to limit the ability of the agency’s inspector general to audit contracts for fraud or waste and has said oversight efforts are intimidating the workforce, according to government documents and interviews.
GSA Administrator Lurita Alexis Doan, a Bush political appointee and former government contractor, has proposed cutting $5 million in spending on audits and shifting some responsibility for contract reviews to small, private audit contractors.
…
The GSA is responsible for managing about $56 billion worth of contracts each year for the departments of Defense and Homeland Security and other agencies.
Doan compared Miller and his staff to terrorists, according to a copy of the notes obtained by The Washington Post.
“There are two kinds of terrorism in the US: the external kind; and, internally, the IGs have terrorized the Regional Administrators,” Doan said, according to the notes.
…
Before joining the GSA in August 2005, Miller served as a federal prosecutor and worked on the government’s case against al-Qaeda terrorist Zacarias Moussaoui.

Sourcewatch:

According to the April 6, 2006, White House news release, “Ms. Doan most recently served as President and Chief Executive Officer of New Technology Management, Inc., a surveillance technology company that she founded in 1990.”
…
“Lurita Doan founded her small IT company by walking into a Kinko’s store with $25 to print business cards and stationery. That was 13 years ago. Today [2005], her company provides turnkey solutions including design, installation and maintenance of all secure surveillance technology currently being deployed at over 85% of all the Land Border Ports of Entry on the US-Canadian and US-Mexican borders. In 2004, Lurita’s company, New Technology Management, Inc. (NTMI), will perform on government contracts valued at $214 million.”

Smells like a bigger story is behind this …

Posted by: b | Dec 2 2006 6:56 utc | 26

b real :
A simpler explanation of the US cars used as bombs in Iraq is that the CIA shipped ’em to their operatives there.
From $cam’s link :

WASHINGTON — The FBI’s counterterrorism unit has launched a broad investigation of US-based theft rings after discovering that some of the vehicles used in deadly car bombings in Iraq, including attacks that killed US troops and Iraqi civilians, were probably stolen in the United States, according to senior government officials.
Investigators believe the cars were stolen by local car thieves in US cities, then smuggled to waiting ships at ports in Los Angeles, Seattle, and Houston, among other cities.

Who can cut red tape at the port, such as “Hey, this car’s stolen!”, better than the CIA?

Cracking the car theft rings and tracing the cars could help identify the leaders of insurgent forces in Iraq and shut down at least one of the means they use to attack the US-led coalition and the Iraqi government, the officials said.

So you can bet that it will never happen.

Terrorism specialists think Iraqi insurgents prefer American stolen cars because they tend to be larger, blend in more easily with the convoys of US government and private contractors, and are harder to identify as stolen.

Yes they are harder to identify, and readily available to an outfit like the CIA.

”As you go back to the chop shop guy, he may not know the end user is some terrorist, but who are his contacts?”

Someone who pays cash and has no trouble with law enforcement types.
Like the alternative explanations for the ease with which the mass murder of 9/11 took place, incompetence vs benign neglect, we can never know the answers to these questions without rigorous, impartial investigation.
And there will be no investigation as long as folks like GSA Administrator Lurita Alexis Doan are there to crush them before they start.
The auditors are terrorists. Can this not be the final, absurd end of that particular tack?

Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 2 2006 7:36 utc | 28

regarding “b real” @ #10
Actually, Bono’s Elevation Partners snagged developer BioWare (best known for the their Baldar’s Gate/Forgotten Realms games) and Pandemic, then consolidated them both into one game developing goliath. Reading the information from your link regarding their forthcoming Mercenaries 2 centering around the invasion and total destruction of Venezuela makes me downright sick.
Here I was thinking the videogamers in my age demographic — who will eventually be the largest voting bloc in America in just few short years — would soon question everything they’ve been brainwashed to believe by our sorry corporate media like “Why should I be pissed at The Dixie Chicks, Hugo Chavez, etc. ?!?” but it looks like Bono’s band of game developers want to use the plot of Mercenaries 2 as an engine to completely destroy any pretense of original and independent thought.

Posted by: Sizemore | Dec 2 2006 9:22 utc | 30

@ b real re #24 & jfl #28 et al…
excellent points, all, and thanks b real for the anthro info. I have a bias for anthropological research. It seems looking through the anthro lense gets us closer to the truth with it’s methods and theories than
most pedagogy imo.
Completely off topic?, and just a arrant thought, but, what ever happened to porter goss’s buddy, “Dusty” Fargo third from top CIA investigation? hmmmm?

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 2 2006 10:00 utc | 32

Bill Moyers speech at West Point on “The Meaning of Freedom.” I repeat: These are not palatable topics for soldiers about to go to war; I would like to speak of sweeter things. But freedom means we must face reality: “You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free.” Free enough, surely, to think for yourselves about these breaches of contract that crudely undercut the traditions of an army of free men and women who have bound themselves voluntarily to serve the nation even unto death.
I have spoken before, I’d love to see him run for president, not because I think he has a chance in hell of winning, because he doesn’t , however, I think he would bring the level of debate up several notches beyond the pepsi and coke game.

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 2 2006 10:27 utc | 34

The world is a funny farm right now.
hahahaha, funny farm indeed,
New GSA chief wants to cut audit funds, reduce oversight; calls Inspector General, staff terrorists

Administrator Lurita Alexis Doan is trying to cut wasteful spending at the General Services Administration, according to a spokesman. (By Sarah L. Voisin — The Washington Post)
The new chief of the U.S. General Services Administration is trying to limit the ability of the agency’s inspector general to audit contracts for fraud or waste and has said oversight efforts are intimidating the workforce, according to government documents and interviews.
GSA Administrator Lurita Alexis Doan, a Bush political appointee and former government contractor, has proposed cutting $5 million in spending on audits and shifting some responsibility for contract reviews to small, private audit contractors.
Doan also has chided Inspector General Brian D. Miller for not going along with her attempts to streamline the agency’s contracting efforts. In a private staff meeting Aug. 18, Doan said Miller’s effort to examine contracts had “gone too far and is eroding the health of the organization,” according to notes of the meeting written by an unidentified participant from the Office of Inspector General (OIG).
The GSA is responsible for managing about $56 billion worth of contracts each year for the departments of Defense and Homeland Security and other agencies.
Doan compared Miller and his staff to terrorists, according to a copy of the notes obtained by The Washington Post….

another first class Bush appointee…/snark
All this on the heels of Antonia Juhasz’s report of corruption of audits, oversite etc..

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 2 2006 11:34 utc | 36

The US may stop trying to reach out to Sunni Arab guerrillas…

The US may stop trying to reach out to Sunni Arab guerrillas, and just throw whole-hearted support to the Shiites and the Kurds, according to UPI. On the other hand, the US could be threatening the Sunni Arabs with this in order to make them better dialogue partners. Who knows? The Arab press is convinced that the Arab powers have forestalled an American outreach to Iran and Syria.

They’ve managed to confuse Juan Cole as well as this mere mortal. Perhaps that is their design?

Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 2 2006 14:04 utc | 38

@JFL – it’s smoke an mirrors, though I think not even deliberate.
The white house knows the issue is lost and various parties inside the white house are fighting over hopeless strategies of how to avaoid recognizing this with daily changing positions.

Posted by: b | Dec 2 2006 20:12 utc | 40

Maliki’s Monopoly of Power

The UN Security Council voted unanimously to extend the mandate of the occupation force in Iraq on November 28th. The Council acted in response to a request from Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki in a letter he sent to the UN earlier this month. The US and the UK rushed the vote through the Council far in advance of the December 31 expiration of the mandate of the so-called “Multinational Force.” The vote took place just one day after consultations were held, and the matter was not inscribed in the work program of the Council for this month.
According to Parliamentarian Dr. Jabir Habib (An Iraqi Shia close to the al-Sadr group), the Iraqi Assembly was scheduled to vote on this issue next week. “We spent the last months discussing the conditions we wanted to add to the mandate, and the majority of the Parliament decided on three major conditions,” said Dr. Habib. “These conditions included pulling the coalition forces out of the cities and transferring responsibility for security to the Iraqi government, giving Iraqis the right to recruit, train, equip, and command the Iraqi security forces, and requiring that the UN mandate expire and be reviewed every 6 months instead of every 12 months.” None of these conditions were included in the final document the UN unanimously voted on yesterday.

No wonder Bush likes the guy. He’s an unapologetic traitor to his own people.
As for the UN. Cowards. Traitors to all the world’s people.

Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 3 2006 2:06 utc | 42

Frank Rich: Has He Started Talking to the Walls? (liberated version

When news organizations, politicians and bloggers had their own civil war about the proper usage of that designation last week, it was highly instructive — but about America, not Iraq. The intensity of the squabble showed the corrosive effect the president’s subversion of language has had on our larger culture. Iraq arguably passed beyond civil war months ago into what might more accurately be termed ethnic cleansing or chaos. That we were fighting over “civil war” at this late date was a reminder that wittingly or not, we have all taken to following Mr. Bush’s lead in retreating from English as we once knew it.
It’s been a familiar pattern for the news media, politicians and the public alike in the Bush era. It took us far too long to acknowledge that the “abuses” at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere might be more accurately called torture. And that the “manipulation” of prewar intelligence might be more accurately called lying. Next up is “pullback,” the Iraq Study Group’s reported euphemism to stave off the word “retreat” (if not retreat itself).

Posted by: b | Dec 3 2006 7:14 utc | 44

hahahahahaha…the the grand betrayal begins…
“We’re not going to do anything to limit funding or cut off funds,” says Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid, D-Nev.
You know, the dims are the problem right? They support things like the 21st Century crime-fighters… /snark

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 3 2006 8:33 utc | 46

Shout outs to Uncle, anna missed, John Francis Lee, fauxreal, annie, and as always Bernhard and my other faves jj and b real and Hannah. Hello to new poster alamet.
Sizemore, that is a valuable thread — the youth, the media and what is being sent.
Let’s keep in touch here, good to hear your point of view.
FYI Canada’s Liberal Party just nominated Stephane Dion, a brilliant Quebeq scion as their party leader. He will be leader of the opposition and potentially our next Prime Minister.
Sigh of relief here, Michael Ignatieff (gmac said he was called Ingathief) didn’t succesfully parachute in.
Dion is known as having deep thoughts about Canada and economics and our local politics, as well as a reputation for expressing his opinion despite its unpopularity.
He was active in the last Liberal government. Hope he hates war like I do.
Thanks Uncle.

Posted by: jonku | Dec 3 2006 9:46 utc | 48

uncle, its just you and me baby

Posted by: annie | Dec 3 2006 10:42 utc | 50

jonku, huge shout out to you too! super congrats to canada.Stephane Dion, a brilliant Quebeq scion as their party leader. if you say so. go celebrate. damn. i love canada.
ok, i am posting way to much here. yada yada. forgive me my tresspasses..

Posted by: annie | Dec 3 2006 10:49 utc | 52

Zakaria: A Troubled ‘Afghan Model’ – Having confronted Islamic extremists on many issues, Musharraf seems to believe he need not thwart them on the goal of Afghan jihad.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai and his counterpart in Pakistan, Pervez Musharraf, have openly quarreled about the cause of the Taliban’s re-emergence. Musharraf blames Karzai’s incompetence and weakness. Karzai argues that Pakistan has been tacitly—and often actively—supporting the Taliban along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, and in Pakistan itself. Having spoken to a number of senior Western officials and independent observers in both countries, I think it’s clear that, in the words of a senior U.S. administration official who wished to remain anonymous because of the sensitivity of the subject, “the weight of the evidence supports President Karzai.”
…
At the dinner that Bush threw for both presidents in September, Karzai was extremely blunt, according to those familiar with the discussions (who wish to remain anonymous because of the private nature of the event). Karzai warned that if the United States was forced to leave Afghanistan, Kabul would ally far more closely with India and Russia, which would not be in Pakistan’s interests. He also urged Musharraf to recognize that in supporting the Taliban and its doctrine of ethnic Pashtun nationalism, Musharraf was creating a problem for himself since there are millions of dissatisfied Pashtuns within Pakistan.

Posted by: b | Dec 3 2006 16:01 utc | 54

Even before the newly-elected Democrat-led congress has convened, it’s become apparent that business in Washington is going to be nothing if not usual. Unfortunately, “usual” has become synonymous with “so hideously bestial and mind-numbingly surreal that it simply staggers the imagination”.
For instance, Joe Biden is demanding a “confrontation” with Vladimir Putin on the grounds that:

“Russia is moving more and more toward an oligarchy here. Putin is consolidating power,” Biden said, adding that the United States had failed to challenge Putin for several years.
“I think that Russia is sliding further away from genuine democracy and a free-market system and more toward a command economy and the control of a single man,” he said, adding that he is “not a big fan of Putin’s.”
“I think we should have a direct confrontation with Putin politically about the need for him to change his course of action,” Biden said.

I just want you, gentle reader, to re-read that a moment and marvel that a Senator of the government of the United States of America, with an apparently straight face, made those comments about any other nation on the face of the planet Earth. We can fully expect to hear the US chiding Russia next about how they bungled their occupation of Afghanistan, get in a few shots to China about their growing obesity problem and maybe even slam England for speaking English.
Some have noted that, as far as Iraq is concerned, there seems to be a deliberate plan (outlined and leaked by no less a personage than the embittered D. Rumsfeld) to lower American expectations, by redefining victory, to avoid the appearance of losing. As we can see from the above, however, the “dumbing down” initiative (or Operation Here’s Your Ass, Here’s Your Elbow) might not be strictly limited to the prettying-up of any specific quagmire. As Senator Biden has demonstrated, anything can be made to look better by comparison… so in that spirit, I am going to laugh about the worthlessness of the Chilean peso and grumble about Saudi Arabia’s blatant human rights violations.

Posted by: Monolycus | Dec 4 2006 5:00 utc | 56

An NYT editorial about Putin includes this sentence

Government critics have been branded “enemies of Russia” on lists that circulate openly in government circles.

Are they trying to be funny?

Posted by: b | Dec 4 2006 7:07 utc | 58

There’s been a steady stream of interesting articles on Russia from Asia Times Online over the past summer and fall :

THE HUNGRY BEAR
PART 1: Promises that can’t be kept
THE HUNGRY BEAR
PART 2: Corporate gigantism
THE HUNGRY BEAR
PART 3: No more Mr Nice Guy
THE HUNGRY BEAR
PART 4: The West’s thorny crown
THE HUNGRY BEAR
PART 5: Russia, China ‘cooking something up’
Russia spins global energy spider’s web
Russian energy model challenges OPEC
Russia and Iran lead the new energy game
US outflanked in Eurasia energy politics

Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 4 2006 9:38 utc | 60

this week at Mr Chavez’s bidding to lay plans for a sweeping constitutional “architecture” that would strengthen the legal standing of presidential decrees, such as the transfer of ownership stakes in businesses and factories to worker co-operatives.
nice

Posted by: Anonymous | Dec 4 2006 14:18 utc | 62

@ bea #55
i swear to god it’s chris f channelling chris b

Posted by: Dismal Science | Dec 4 2006 14:23 utc | 64

monolycus,your rummy link @ #56.. this reminds me of bea’s israel branding survey link, they are going to solve the issue of perception w/pr. it’s not the war were fighting, its the war we think we’re fighting. all smoke and mirrors

Posted by: Anonymous | Dec 4 2006 14:39 utc | 66

anyone else hear that bolton just resigned?? and lieberman is being floated as a possible replacement. damn, does that mean they can appoint a republican senator to replace lieberman?

Posted by: conchita | Dec 4 2006 15:32 utc | 68

@conchita (#68)
Bush accepts Bolton’s U.N. resignation

President Bush, in a statement, said he was “deeply disappointed that a handful of United States senators prevented Ambassador Bolton from receiving the up or down vote he deserved in the Senate.”
“They chose to obstruct his confirmation, even though he enjoys majority support in the Senate, and even though their tactics will disrupt our diplomatic work at a sensitive and important time,” Bush said. “This stubborn obstructionism ill serves our country, and discourages men and women of talent from serving their nation.”

Damage Done. Mission Accomplished.

Posted by: Monolycus | Dec 4 2006 16:19 utc | 70

(dec. 3rd) Bolivia’s Morales signs into law contracts nationalizing natural gas

President Evo Morales signed into law Sunday contracts giving the government control over foreign energy companies’ operations, completing a process begun May 1 with the nationalization of Bolivia’s petroleum industry.
The deals, signed by the companies last month, also grant Morales’ government a majority share of the foreign companies’ revenues generated in Bolivia. Companies that signed contracts include Brazilian state energy giant Petrobras, Spanish-Argentine Repsol YPF, France’s Total SA, and British Gas, a unit of BG Group PLC.
Morales also announced Sunday that Royal Dutch Shell had agreed to transfer to his government majority control of its Bolivian subsidiary Transredes, which operates the country’s largest network of gas pipelines.
Bolivia’s natural gas reserves are South America’s largest after Venezuela’s.

(dec. 2) Plan for South American Pipeline Has Ambitions Beyond Gas

President Hugo Chávez is not modest about his energy plans. He wants to build a 5,000-mile natural gas pipeline that stretches from this remote northern tip of South America to the bottom end of the continent.
Erecting possibly the longest pipeline in the world is the centerpiece of a broader effort by Mr. Chávez to strengthen ties among Latin America’s economies and shrink their dependence on the United States.
But from the outset, the $20 billion “great gas pipeline of the south,” planned to be more than twice as long as the United States border with Mexico, has generated political and environmental controversy at home and abroad.
Mr. Chávez, who deeply distrusts the United States and has raised the prospect that it may invade Venezuela to seize its oil, is seeking to diversify his country’s energy exports away from its biggest client and toward countries as far away as China and as close as Brazil.

(nov. 29) Ecuador to refine oil in Venezuela: Correa

Ecuador’s leftist Rafael Correa, who won Sunday’s presidential run-off vote, will start sending Ecuadorean oil to refine in Venezuela, he told a local newspaper in an interview published on Wednesday.
…
Ecuador, South America’s No. 5 oil producer, has very limited refining capacity, which forces it to sell only crude overseas and import finished products such as gasoline.
“From January 16 we will send oil to Venezuela to refine,” Correa told El Comercio newspaper. “Enough of throwing money out of the window to export crude and import products.”
Correa, who spooked Wall Street with talk of debt renegotiation, has also promised to review foreign oil contracts to ensure the state receives a larger share of volume from production.

Posted by: b real | Dec 4 2006 16:28 utc | 72

@Monolycus #69
I could not agree more.
Have you seen this on the front page of today’s NYT?

Posted by: Bea | Dec 4 2006 18:12 utc | 74

& thanks bea for the friedman/floyd

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Dec 4 2006 20:29 utc | 76

so do i, b – some would say – in a slaughterhouse what difference does it make – who are the spokesmen of such sadism – & i would normally agree but in these two instance you have people who clearly did not want to go & who held office to the very last second of the last hour & you have an immediate embittered response fromp the coward-in-chief himself
& their anger today gives me new breath
& congratulations again to el commandante chavez

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Dec 4 2006 21:04 utc | 78

bea #74 what’s w/those goggles?? does the solitary confinement mean he never sees light? wtf.
mono, maybe he converted to for post mortem fame knowing his story was going to be incorporated into a spy thriller.

Posted by: Anonymous | Dec 4 2006 21:48 utc | 80

In my humble opinion, the goggles are so the guards don’t have to see his eyes… which would make him all too human. But what do I know.
I found that piece terrifying, particularly in light of the knowledge that Bush, his sanity as fragile as it has now been reported to be, has the power to put each and every one of us into those exact circumstances forever.
If this is not a new Dark Ages, then I don’t know what is.

Posted by: Bea | Dec 4 2006 23:04 utc | 82

Monolycus@69
Yes, you are not alone. I feel your outrage too.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Dec 4 2006 23:17 utc | 84

Bernhard,
all I can say is Thank you. You are truly special. And yes you are a warrior.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Dec 4 2006 23:32 utc | 86

Bea #74 — the humiliation and psychic destruction of Padilla highlighted by the NY Times seems more of a warning or a threat, much like the entire US prison-industrial complex.
The story says the broken man is unable to assist in his own defence, and is uncertain if his lawyer isn’t part of the plot, cowering when asked questions similar to those of his interrogation under duress. Like “a piece of furniture.”

Posted by: jonku | Dec 4 2006 23:48 utc | 88

The photo of Padilla shackled, blinded, and deafened reveals the unfathomable depths of cowering fear in the minds and souls of his captors.
“while the builders of the cages
sleep with bullets, bars, and stone…
hold on
you may disappear, you’re not forgotten here
and I will say to you, I will do what I can do
and I will do what I can do
and I will do what I can do”
-Peter Gabriel, “Wallflower”

Posted by: catlady | Dec 5 2006 0:59 utc | 90

Oops – that sentence I quoted (and forgot to close the quotes on) was from today’s NYT piece.

Posted by: Bea | Dec 5 2006 1:25 utc | 92

did you catch the DoD photos of shackling padilla at cryptome? looks like someone is doing a mindfuck on everyone involved as well, including those responsible for transporting him. c’mon. who they guarding? a broken human being, right? what’s he going to do? spit on someone?

Posted by: b real | Dec 5 2006 3:30 utc | 94

just now reading threads and links. the padilla story. my heart is sick. to paraphase elizabeth de la vega – are we a nation of kitty genovese’s neighbors? how can decent human beings allow this to happen? and yet, could the tide be turning? patrick leahy states at a vermont democratic victory party that bush should be terrified at the prospect of leahy as judiciary chair. let leahy prove how fierce he can be.

Posted by: conchita | Dec 5 2006 6:11 utc | 96

@Monolycus, #69:

On the front page of AOL (yes, for anyone who hasn’t noticed my address at the end of my posts, I use AOL), there is a non-scientific survey regarding the US government’s treatment of José Padilla.

A majority of Americans may or may not approve of the government’s treatment of José Padilla — it never pays to be optimistic about American political sensibilities — but I doubt the real numbers have anything to do with this poll. AOL is the online equivalent of USA Today or Fox News; it’s proverbial among computer geeks for being a major source of stupidity. You are, after all, talking about people who by and large responded to direct mail solicitations to get onto the service. (And these days, it isn’t even the case that it’s cheaper or easier than doing it yourself, except in rare circumstances.)

Posted by: The Truth Gets Vicious When You Corner It | Dec 5 2006 6:27 utc | 98

@Vicious Truth (#98)
I’m aware. That’s why I caveated the survey (“It’s AOL and it’s ‘non-scientific'”) they way I did. Even so, from a statistical standpoint, 67% approval for the story (which was copied directly from the NYT version that Bea provided) goes beyond mere dumbassery and indicates to my satisfaction a general direction of attitudes.
And anyway, at the end of the day, maybe you can explain to me how it’s a comfort that people support torture out of stupidity rather than mean-spiritedness.

Posted by: Monolycus | Dec 5 2006 10:02 utc | 100