News & views …
Back to Main
December 16, 2006
Weekend OT
Comments
Testimony Helps Detail CIA’s Post-9/11 Reach
In the early stages, the CIA had prepared even more ambitious plans, according to the depositions from the Italian intelligence officials, who testified last summer during a criminal investigation into a CIA-sponsored kidnapping of a radical Islamic cleric in Milan.
For example, Pignero said in his deposition that the CIA’s Rome station chief had offered in 2002 to abduct a fugitive leader of the Red Brigades — a Marxist network blamed for dozens of assassinations in Italy — who had found refuge in South America. “The Americans would capture him and turn him over to us, and we in return would have to ‘extradite’ him to Italy without any legal proceedings,” Pignero said.
In exchange, the CIA wanted help in abducting Islamic radicals living in the Italian cities of Turin, Vercelli and Naples, Pignero said. Italian intelligence officials rejected the offer, he added, because it was “contrary to international laws.”
…
European investigators are still examining other mysterious cases of missing or detained people. Among them is the disappearance a few weeks before Nasr’s kidnapping of another Egyptian-born Islamic fundamentalist.
Gamal al-Menshawi, a physician and occasional mosque preacher who knew Nasr personally, had left his home in Graz, Austria, bound for the Islamic holy city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia. His wife was waiting for him there, but he never arrived, according to Egyptian exiles in Austria and Italy who know him.
…
“The Arab secret services, they give names to the CIA of people who they want, people who are on the outside, such as Europe,” said Hissini, an Egyptian native known locally as Abu Imad. “They give the names to the CIA, because the CIA can go to work in these countries.”
There is also little doubt about Menshawi’s fate among those who knew him in Austria’s Islamic community.
…
“The Americans look around in Europe for who is being loud, who is speaking out, and then those people are kidnapped,” he added. “He was very vocal; he was too loud for them. He talked openly about Egypt’s government, about the U.S. government, about the Islamic community in Austria.”
…
Texts are the gist of the Mesopotamian troubles. Texts are the epitaphs of cultures and certain ideas or hopes are engraved in them. Faith is an activity of the will and we come to believe whatever we want and most of our beliefs are derived from texts and texts then are given as reasons for some action. But the reality is precisely the opposite. Action wants to validate the texts. When Millenialists push for the catastrophe that will assure many years of peace and justice they are acting to validate their biblical text. When the Jews act to extend Israel from the Great River to the Euphrates they are acting to validate their Scriptures. It does not matter whether these are right or wrong beliefs, who can determine that? But if through some activity some text is validated then the activity of generations, the beliefs of millions, are validated. I suppose that Muslims are in the same bind. They must create some kind of society that validates their Scriptures, otherwise they would appear as fools. Catholics on the other hand know that the Sacred Texts were put together by the Church so that the texts obtain their validity by the actions of the Church and though the attitude of the Roman church would seem to be contrary to the Protestant notion that only Scripture is validating at the end everyone validates texts by its own personal activity. Even the evolutionists perform the most daring convolutions to validate the idea that what they believe is what Darwin taught. At lower levels there are those that follow Voltaire or d’Holbach and when the bloggers base their expressed opinions on texts culled from publications and they quote them as authority they are participating in a massora.So many people that feel themselves freed from superstition are in reality victims of the textual superstition.
Posted by: jlcg | Dec 16 2006 12:45 utc | 2
Gaza, although I think the Daily Telegraph headline is wrong here. It will not be a civil war, Hamas could crush Fatah like a bug any moment it chooses such is the overwhelming level of support Hamas now commands.
Palestinians now living under North Korean conditions for lack of freedom of movement (capital, goods, labor) (bringing cash over the border from Egypt is because the international banking system has been closed down since March 2006). Plus poverty at levels similar to that in Afghanistan, Sierra Leone.
Tell me you wouldn’t pick up a gun if it was you and yours.
Posted by: Dismal Science | Dec 16 2006 12:57 utc | 3
White House Forbids Publication Of Op-Ed On Iran By Former CIA Official (Think Progress)
Former CIA Middle East analyst Flynt Leverett, now a fellow at the New America Foundation, revealed today that the White House has been blocking the publication of an op-ed he wrote for the New York Times. The column is critical of the administration’s refusal to engage Iran.
Leverett’s op-ed has already been cleared by the CIA. Leverett explained, “I’ve been doing this for three and a half years since leaving government, and I’ve never had to go to the White House to get clearance for something that I was publishing as long as the CIA said, ‘Yeah, you’re not putting classified information.’”
According to Leverett the op-ed was “all based on stuff that Secretary Powell, Secretary Rice, Deputy Secretary Armitage have talked about publicly. It’s been extensively reported in the media.” Leverett says the incident shows “just how low people like Elliot Abrams at the NSC will stoop to try and limit the dissemination of arguments critical of the administration’s policy.”
p.s. Is eveyone else still having to do the typepad verification random letter thing? This has really slowed down my enthusiasm for posting…
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 16 2006 14:34 utc | 4
@uncle p.s. Is eveyone else still having to do the typepad verification random letter thing? This has really slowed down my enthusiasm for posting…
Uncle – I am fighting with the typepad guys daily to get away with that. Please keep em coming …
—
@jlcg – on religious texts to timely recent pieces:
Guardian on “Virgin” Mary: Face to faith
In Luke the virginal conception was announced to a girl on the point of marrying Joseph. Mary was baffled. How could she become a mother before they had come together? One may wonder whether her astonishment resulted from the knowledge that, not having reached the age of puberty, she was not yet ready for motherhood, for virgin in Jewish parlance could designate a girl too physically immature to conceive. The angel, in his answer, seems to argue that God could allow the pre-pubertal Mary to conceive just as he had caused the post-menopausal Elizabeth to become pregnant. Again in Jewish parlance, a married woman past child-bearing age was a virgin for a second time.
Hmm – maybe Joseph liked the young …
Haaretz on Hannukkah (which commemorates the successful fight against “brutal” Antiochus IV Epiphanes, a Helenistic emporer, by the Maccabees family,the later kings of the Hasmonean dynasty, and their guerillias: Antiochus’ decrees – a figment of Hasmonean propaganda
In a recent essay in the Journal of Biblical Literature Weitzman says these explanations are based an unfounded speculations. He suggests checking what purpose the story about Antiochus’ edicts was meant to achieve, and how it served the interests of those who wrote it – the supporters of the Hasmonean kings.
“The Maccabees have been considered heroes for so long, that it is hard to imagine that in their time, their rule was extremely controversial. They and their descendants, the Hasmonean dynasty, presented themselves as high priests, but did not belong to a family that held that position for a long time. Neither did they belong to the House of David dynasty, which was supposed to produce kings. Therefore many Jews did not recognize the Hasmoneans as legitimate rulers.”
“The story of Antiochus’ edicts is part of the effort to justify the Maccabee’s rule. This is why they described themselves as protectors of the Jewish tradition, a tactic which many rulers and conquerors in the ancient East used to justify usurping power,” he says.
The gangsters who won the fight later wrote the history that made their side look good and the loser side bad … hasn’t changed much today …
Craigh Murry, former British ambassador on the vanishing “mist on a Plane” terror scare: The War on Shampoo
But have they found stuff that is exclusively concerned with causing explosions, like detonators, explosives or those famous liquid chemicals? No, they haven’t found any.
Wycombe Woods, like the sands of Iraq, have failed to yield up the advertised WMD.
The other “evidence” that the police announced they had found consisted of wills (with the implication they were made by suicide bombers) and a map of Afghanistan. It turns out that the wills were made in the early 90s by volunteers going off to fight the Serbs in Bosnia – they had been left with the now deceased uncle of one of those arrested. The map of Afghanistan had been copied out by an eleven year old boy. All of which is well known to the UK media, but none of which has been reported for fear of prejudicing the trial.
…
While the arrest of 26 people in connection with the plot was also massively publicised, the gradual release of many of them has again gone virtually unreported. For example on 31 October a judge released two brothers from Chingford commenting that the police had produced no credible evidence against them. Charges against others have been downgraded, so that those now accused of plotting to commit explosions are less than the ten planes the police claimed they planned to blow up in suicide attacks.
@ uncle p.s. –
Yes. Sometimes several lines of scrambled figures, probably because my eyes aren’t great and mistake the symbols. Typepad’s rumpled background can make it hard to distinguish “g” from “q” e.g.
Posted by: small coke | Dec 16 2006 16:58 utc | 7
@ uncle-
p.s. Short comments seem to bypass the typepad censor.
Posted by: small coke | Dec 16 2006 17:00 utc | 8
I find it somewhat baffling, but interesting nonetheless, that issues that start off in the blogsphere as chatter slowly surface to the top (see Washington Post story below). I have been seeing and hearing more and more about bio-terrorism in the last few weeks in my net travels. Wonder if somethings up?
1918 Flu Epidemic Teaching Valuable Lessons
Of course what they don’t say here, is the recent reengineering of the Spanish flu by the US Army. Dr. Jonathan King, Professor of Molecular Biology at M.I.T. and a founder of the Council for Responsible Genetics, said the government’s “growing bioterror programs represent a significant emerging danger to our own population.”
In inflation-adjusted dollars the US spends more on them today than it did on the Manhattan Project to develop the atomic bomb in World War II.
Also see, Judy Miller on mobile labs
and
My recent post: Anthrax attack on US Congress made by scientists and covered up by FBI, expert says
Finally, Recreating the Spanish flu?
Note: as a commenter recently said, “why is it called the Spanish flu despite not having originated in Spain but,in Fort Riley, Kansas?
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 16 2006 17:12 utc | 9
Abbas Calls for Early Elections
Variety of views:
Laila’s Blog (Gazan Mother)
Report from Ramallah
The Hamas-led government said Abbas’s actions were “a coup d’etat against the will of the Palestinian people.”
Hamas official Ismail Raduan said “we reject the call by president Abbas to hold early elections, as this contradicts Palestinian basic law.”
The Palestinian Basic Law, the effective constitution, does not address the issue of early elections.
Hamas says the absence of such a provision prohibits holding early polls, while the Abbas entourage says such an election can be held since there is no passage specifically prohibiting it.
The current Palestinian parliament was elected in January and is due to remain in office until the end of 2010.
Blair, in Turkey, Calls on World to Support Abbas – Says “coming Days and Weeks” Pivotal in Middle East
I will post more links in a moment — my computer is not cooperating today.
Posted by: Bea | Dec 16 2006 17:30 utc | 10
uncle
not being a staknovite & unleashing a zhukov-like assault of links – i quite like the code thing-a-ma-jig, it gives me the time to make less typographic & spelling errors – but i think for you my friend the keyboard is more a glock than a typewriter – you know, as usual i & others are extremely greatful for yr industry
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Dec 16 2006 17:52 utc | 11
Rice Plans to Request Millions from Congress for Abbas for Security Forces, promises guarantees that funds won’t reach Hamas
And I am wondering, how, pray tell, are they planning to fix the outcome of these elections so Hamas doesn’t win an even bigger victory this time??? Perhaps the funds have something to do with that as well.
Posted by: Bea | Dec 16 2006 17:57 utc | 12
Photostory: Retracing the Route of Bus No. 23
Powerful piece by a girl who grew up in the West Bank and returns to discover what has happened in her old neighborhood. If you can’t read the whole piece, do at least scroll down and look at the photos. They powerfully convey what it is like to live in the Walled-in West Bank today.
Truly, it is unfathomable.
Posted by: Bea | Dec 16 2006 18:07 utc | 13
Last one…
On the Brink of Civil War? Nigel Parry Reports from Palestine for Electronic Intifada.
Very good photos of the events of the past few days in this piece.
Posted by: Bea | Dec 16 2006 18:14 utc | 14
OK not the last one… Two more pieces that vividly illustrate what life is like these days for Palestinians under Israeli rule:
Gideon Levy in Haaretz: Palestinian boy, 14, shot dead for throwing a stone
First-Hand Account of an Israeli Undercover Operation in Downtown Ramallah
And finally, Virginia Tilley speaks truth to power:
But if you [Israel] actually reap the chaos you are crafting for the Palestinians, you will find that no one else is responsible for these five million civilians except you.
OK, I will stop blog-hogging now…
Posted by: Bea | Dec 16 2006 18:28 utc | 15
I will stop blog-hogging now…
what are you, nuts? don’t even consider it.
Posted by: annie | Dec 16 2006 19:40 utc | 17
hahaha my friend R’giap, if it will encourge you to post more and at a quality of your comfort level, then by all means lets keep it in place as I enjoy your posts so.
It is with added sorrow that I will not be able to attend the Moon bash in hamburg, further, as you sir are the one with whom I would have most liked to meet. However, as for the rest of you, I hope you all rot in hel.., er, opps, (just kidding) HAVE A WONDERFUL TIME… *without me* ;-p
You guys/gals are great!
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 16 2006 20:07 utc | 18
there is also force in your labour uncle & i am a beneficiary
reminded today that there has been yet another forestalling of the criminal process in america against agent orange – for the eniéme time -& this is over 30 years since the us armed forces carried out that criminal policy against civilian populations
& now there is the third generation of people who are victims of that policy. the results of that policy are as always, horrific – so some standartenfûhrer in washington could feel o k the people of vietnam have had to continue sufferring & there will be no recompense
the very companies who benefited from selling agent orange – dow chemical, westinghouse & others putting gladly their snouts in the public trough to reap the benefits of their applied cruelty & today when there are tens of thousand & perhaps more victims – they cower & crawl – to evade their responsibilities
whatever happened in fallujah & tal afar & all the other towns of iraq where we know defoliants of one kind or another, white phosphore etc – the u s will never ever recompense the people for the evil that they do
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Dec 16 2006 22:46 utc | 19
HAVE A WONDERFUL TIME… *without me* ;-p
boo 🙁 , this makes me very sad indeed. i always say where there is a will there is a way. i will gladly contribute to your trip, but cannot swing the entire fare. it’s not too late.. maybe it can happen uncle. have you even investigated the airfare?
Posted by: annie | Dec 16 2006 23:12 utc | 20
I’ve been on and off in terms of staying up to date but has Billmon gone somewhere? His site has been blank for weeks now. If someone has already answered, my apologies but I missed it. Thanks
Posted by: Elie | Dec 17 2006 0:44 utc | 21
elie, sometimes billmon takes time off. he has done this before. usually w/out warning tho the times he mentions he won’t be posting he posts. who knows how long this will last? hopefully not too long.
b’s really been posting up a storm thank goodness.
Posted by: annie | Dec 17 2006 0:59 utc | 22
bea:
And I am wondering, how, pray tell, are they planning to fix the outcome of these elections so Hamas doesn’t win an even bigger victory this time???
A cursory search shows accounts of $2 million prior to the January election and $42 million prior to this “election”. That’s up-front admitted, AP wire story money.
Someone, yourself?, had a post from Russian sources outlining CIA arms to al Fatah as well.
Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 17 2006 1:46 utc | 23
youtube: a classic from 1986, zappa takes on the freaks on crossfire
Posted by: b real | Dec 17 2006 2:56 utc | 24
The Hal Turner News Show – anyone know this one? – reports that China is about to sell off $1 trillion in US reserves which would likely trigger a worldwide sell off and collapse of the dollar on Monday morning. China cites the following as reasons for the sell off:
1) The Federal Reserve Bank ceased publishing “M3” data in March, making it nearly impossible for anyone to know how much cash is being printed. China said this act made it impossible to tell how much a Dollar is worth.
2) The U.S. Dollar has lost upwards of thirty percent (30%) of its value against other foreign currencies in the recent past, meaning China has lost almost $300 Billion simply by holding U.S. Dollars in its reserves.
3) The U.S. has no plans whatsoever to reduce deficit spending or ability pay down any of its existing debt without printing money to pay it off.
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, Secretary of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez, Labor Secretary Elaine Chao, Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt, Energy Secretary Sam Bodman, and U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab are said to have been in Beijing the 14th and 15th for a straegic economic dialogue from which Bernanke emerged “pale and in a cold sweat”. However, OPEC may have come to the rescue: making it “clear that they too would be severely harmed if the U.S. Dollar collapsed, and hinted they ‘would not be inclined to sell oil to any particular nation that intentionally caused such a collapse.'”
Has anyone else heard this, have any idea how much credibility the Hal Turner News Show has?
Posted by: conchita | Dec 17 2006 3:04 utc | 25
my apologies for the link above. the guy is a nutcase racist. hard to imagine he has any kind of credible source. my guess is that he is blowing the u.s. chinese trade issues out of proportion.
Posted by: conchita | Dec 17 2006 3:15 utc | 26
Hey folks – We’re all on the cover of TIME…!
But look at 2006 through a different lens and you’ll see another story, one that isn’t about conflict or great men. It’s a story about community and collaboration on a scale never seen before. It’s about the cosmic compendium of knowledge Wikipedia and the million-channel people’s network YouTube and the online metropolis MySpace. It’s about the many wresting power from the few and helping one another for nothing and how that will not only change the world, but also change the way the world changes.
The tool that makes this possible is the World Wide Web….
And we are so ready for it. We’re ready to balance our diet of predigested news with raw feeds from Baghdad and Boston and Beijing. You can learn more about how Americans live just by looking at the backgrounds of YouTube videos—those rumpled bedrooms and toy-strewn basement rec rooms—than you could from 1,000 hours of network television.
And we didn’t just watch, we also worked. Like crazy….
We’re looking at an explosion of productivity and innovation, and it’s just getting started, as millions of minds that would otherwise have drowned in obscurity get backhauled into the global intellectual economy.
Who are these people? Seriously, who actually sits down after a long day at work and says, I’m not going to watch Lost tonight. I’m going to turn on my computer and make a movie starring my pet iguana? I’m going to mash up 50 Cent’s vocals with Queen’s instrumentals? I’m going to blog about my state of mind or the state of the nation or the steak-frites at the new bistro down the street? Who has that time and that energy and that passion?
The answer is, you do. And for seizing the reins of the global media, for founding and framing the new digital democracy, for working for nothing and beating the pros at their own game, TIME’s Person of the Year for 2006 is you.
Posted by: Bea | Dec 17 2006 3:58 utc | 27
Even for experienced prosecutors, identifying strong cases among the mass of detainees is difficult given the quality of the evidence. Capt. Matt McCall, who focuses on men like Mr. Abdulla who have been detained in the volatile Anbar Province in western Iraq, said he had to sift through the files of 50 detainees to find 2 that he thought could be convicted. The rest were left in detention either because the soldiers who captured them were not readily available as witnesses or because the evidence was too weak, he said.
haha – what a copout. in time‘s online poll for person of the year, the voting tally was:
Hugo Chavez 35%
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad 21%
Nancy Pelosi 12%
The YouTube Guys 11%
George W. Bush & Al Gore tied w/ 8%
Condoleezza Rice 5%
Kim Jong Il 2%
they didn’t want to give the cover to chavez so they patronized their internet audience! fuckers.
Posted by: b real | Dec 17 2006 4:21 utc | 29
conchita:
The website may be that of a “nutcase”, but the points you list as 1,2, and 3 are mere statements of fact.
It must be that those for whom the “nutcase” serves as mouthpiece have decided to get the word out on US vulnerabilities to Chinese financial power. The reference to OPEC is then meant to be “reassuring”.
The fact that this regime has put us in the financial situation we are in is gong to become the news just as soon as it can no longer be avoided. Soon.
Just as Richard Perle and the other Neocons are bailing on the regime, blaming poor George for all their manipulations, so too are those responsible for the impending financial collapse of the US now bailing, blaming the Chinese for the huge deficits they themselves created with their race to the bottom.
Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 17 2006 5:27 utc | 30
GI Special Volume : 4L Issue : 13
Soldier Says This War Can’t Be Won
December 04, 2006, Letters To The Editor, The Oregonian
To the Editor:
I have a son in Iraq: the 1st Armored Division of the Army, stationed at a remote outpost near the hotbed Ramadi.
Last week his platoon lost two to injuries — one a result of shrapnel to the testicles, the other a leg wound from small arms fire.
They’re down to 15 in the platoon. Nearly every day they’re out on patrol, generally by foot. Every day, they’re vulnerable, their lives held open to the potential of death or injury.
Two weeks ago he called by satellite phone, awakening Amy and me in the dead of the night. Machine gun fire was all around him, the sound of war filling our ears and hearts with grief and fear of loss.
He wanted to tell us that he loves us, that he was on a dangerous patrol and that if anything happened to his life, he would take his love for us to his death and beyond.
He made it through that day and night. As this is written, he is still here with us. His tour was to end the first week in November but he was extended until next February.
He said that the morale of the platoon was at an all-time low.
He said that the war is creating more insurgency, rather than less.
He says that he cannot trust anyone in an Iraqi military uniform.
He said that most of the Iraq people do not want us there.
He says that this war cannot be won!
He has no faith in the politicians who sent him there.
Question, America: Whom would you listen to, the soldier in the field or the padded politician in office in reference to how this war is really going?
LARRY TURNER, Malin
Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 17 2006 5:42 utc | 31
jfl, actually, he hates jews. what i didn’t include was that the piece concludes with:
Arabs and OPEC will want something in return for saving the U.S. from economic collapse and it is already widely speculated what they want will be a complete change in U.S. backing of Israel in the Middle East.
If such demands are made by the oil-rich Arabs, the U.S. would be left with little choice but to virtually abandon the jewish state to preserve itself.
i don’t disagree with points 1,2,3 either. this came to me in an email from someone who tends to send good stuff and 1,2,3 gave it credibility so i posted it. however, this taught me a good lesson not to post without checking out the source. hal turner’s site says “for whites only” at the bottom. i really felt like i should go wash my hands after looking at it. there is some pretty scarey stuff there.
Posted by: conchita | Dec 17 2006 5:44 utc | 32
conchita :
He may or may not hate Jews. He’s pitching the ISG line plus the crash of the dollar is China’s fault.
The audience he’s pitching to may hate Jews. He sounds like he’s pitching to NASCAR dads.
Forgive me if I don’t go to his website.
I have a few friends who seem always to be forwarding mail to me. I don’t bother to open it anymore. It’s a substitute for conversation while trying to stay in touch.
I’d be happier with just a “Hi”.
No problem if it’s addressed to me and fifty other people 🙂
Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 17 2006 6:03 utc | 33
annie, uncle, I’ve got $800 roundtrip for Hamburg from where I am. Which isn’t horrible, but some of us are unemployed. Of course, if we were employed, it would be harder to get time off. So let’s go with “some of us aren’t independently wealthy.” Most of us aren’t, I’m guessing.
Posted by: Rowan | Dec 17 2006 8:23 utc | 34
rowan, its so much cheaper to fly for those of us who live in transportation hubs. from seattle its 540 including all taxes. i bought my ticket back in oct when i had the extra cash. anyway, i have a couple hundred+ i can part with w/out excessive stress. if there is someone who wants to go and that amount might make or break the difference for them, email me but make it soon because the cheapfares and flight options available narrow radically near the holidays.
Posted by: annie | Dec 17 2006 11:55 utc | 35
@ Uncle $cam — #4
I hate to say this … but I’m getting sick and tired of feeling sorry for people like Flynt Leverett who whine and kvetch that the corporate, tax-break collecting, alledgedly free MSM won’t publish his Op-Ed because they’re too busy shaving their legs and rolling on the leaderhozen at the Decider’s behest.
I’ll publish Mr. Leverett’s Op-Ed on my blog the moment I recieve it, and I’m sure that sentiment is shared by many other bloggers here on “the internets”. All that I ask is for the brownshirted bastards within our Government to be kind enough to order Judith Miller to my “Enemy Combatant” detainment cell for a few hours or days ahead of time to keep my fucking cot warm and perhaps have the CIA give it a waterboarding test-run.
CHRISTMAS EVE BONFIRE IN BEDFORD FALLS
Let us begin by imagining that the movie “It’s a Wonderful Life”
does not end at the Christmas tree, with George Bailey holding
his daughter Zuzu in his arms, with his wife Mary by his side.
Rather, the scene continues with Potter’s personal attendant
(the man who pushes his wheelchair) bursting into the party.
The mood, which had been festive (just a moment before,
we saw the arrest warrant being torn apart and thrown on
the pile of contributions from “so many friends”) changes
immediately, as the tale of Potter’s purloining of the missing
bank deposit is told. At first incredulous, the people become
increasingly angry as the depth of depravity of the twisted,
misanthropic millionaire becomes clear.
Next we see the crowd carrying torches as they approach
Potter’s mansion. It is the evil twin of the house that George,
Mary, and their kids have filled with love – equally large,
but almost all in darkness, and without any sort of holiday
decoration, neither Christmas tree, menorah, or solstice
wreath. Ernie drives up in his cab, and siphons some
gasoline from the tank into a large metal can. We see him
and Potter’s former personal attendant splashing the gasoline
at the entrances of the house, including the wheelchair ramp.
Uncle Billy ignites the flammable liquid by throwing his
torch into it, and the rest of the crowd follows suit. The
Bedford Falls volunteer fire department arrives, but Burt
the cop keeps them from coming up the long drive.
Through the windows, we see Potter desperately going
from room to room, trying to escape, but it is useless.
Uncle Billy watches with grim satisfaction, and we see
the flames of the house reflected in his glasses as he
mutters “So long, you old so and so.” We recognize other
members of the crowd – the same men we saw in the
“Pottersville bar” scene – there are no women present.
Clarence the angel, no longer in civilian clothes, but rather
in his magnificent new robe and wings, watches sadly from
treetop level. The camera pulls back and we see the house
beginning to collapse as the flames leap higher. The final
image pans upward from the remains of the burning house to
the starry sky, and we see in Gothic letters on the screen:
I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing:
therefore choose life — Deuteronomy 30:19
When we imagine the film ending in this way, it is no longer
a children’s fable. On a metaphorical level, in Buddhist
philosophy, the “house on fire” represents the aging and
inevitably mortal human body. Potter, who has devoted
himself to the pursuit of material wealth at the expense
of others, finds himself cut off from the rest of humanity,
helpless and alone in the face of doom. There is a satisfying
parallelism and contrast between the life-threatening events
at the beginning and end of the film. Harry Bailey, encircled
by cold water, is saved by his brother George, organizing
the other boys, at the beginning of the film. At the end,
Potter, encircled by fire, is destroyed by a spontaneously
organized social action prompted by the harm he did to
the same George Bailey.
And in the middle, we have the turning point, in which George,
about to do away with himself by jumping in the river, instead
instinctively chooses life when his guardian angel jumps in
[which Clarence did in order to save George –
from the sin of self-destruction]. The subsequent scenes show
us the hypothetical result of George’s wish for non-existence
(in other words, to reverse the birth process, which disappearing
into the river stands for, using Jungian archetypal reasoning).
We visit Pottersville and witness George’s change of heart,
when he consciously chooses life – “I want to live again”,
in accordance with the scriptural injunction “therefore choose life.”
The struggle for all of us is to continue to choose life, even though
we know we live in Pottersville, not Bedford Falls.
May the Creative Forces of the Universe be with us all.
Posted by: mistah charley | Dec 17 2006 14:09 utc | 37
hown an empire/came into being – lesson xxxv
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Dec 17 2006 16:00 utc | 38
Awwwww, I just feel so bad for them…/snark
Scraping by on $150,000 a year
Meanwhile…
Reuters AlertNet – More Americans hungry, homeless in 2006- mayors
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 17 2006 18:24 utc | 39
Air Force looks to outsource casket duty
The Air Force is looking for a private contractor to fly caskets out of Dover Air Force Base, Del.
Earlier this year, Congress mandated that as of Jan. 1, the Air Force will be responsible for transporting caskets and human remains from Dover to funeral locations. Dover is the air hub where most troops who die overseas are brought before being returned to their families.
The military was using commercial airlines to transport caskets as part of their cargo. However, some grieving families and lawmakers thought the practice didn’t respect the service members’ sacrifices. The law now mandates the military handle the mission.
According to the request issued in late November, Air Mobility Command is looking for a firm that can provide crews and four aircraft able to carry two caskets each and their military escorts. The planes could make up to 110 flights a month.
The initial contract would last until the end of January; however, it could be extended for up to six mont
I was listening to the Thom Hartmann show the other day, and he was talking about a plan to outsource legal aid attorneys, Public defender’s etc, to India.
I say fuck it, lets go a few steps further, we can outsource congress and the motherfucking Whitehouse.
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 17 2006 18:47 utc | 40
I was listening to the Thom Hartmann show the other day, and he was talking about a plan to outsource legal aid attorneys, Public defender’s etc, to India.
I say fuck it, lets go a few steps further, we can outsource congress and the motherfucking Whitehouse.
🙂
Posted by: DM | Dec 17 2006 19:04 utc | 41
Don’t know who Thom Hartmann is, or whose plan, but shit, yes, I can see them pulling this one off in due course. (Don’t worry, the Indian legal team will be responsible to a US qualified and resident attorney)
Posted by: DM | Dec 17 2006 19:09 utc | 42
The Capital Awaits a Masterstroke on Iraq
SOMEONE in Vice President Dick Cheney’s office has gotten everybody on this city’s holiday party circuit talking, simply by floating an unlikely Iraq proposal that is worthy of a certain mid-19th century British naturalist with a fascination for natural selection.
We shall call it the Darwin Principle.
The Darwin Principle, Beltway version, basically says that Washington should stop trying to get Sunnis and Shiites to get along and instead just back the Shiites, since there are more of them anyway and they’re likely to win in a fight to the death. After all, the proposal goes, Iraq is 65 percent Shiite and only 20 percent Sunni.
…
Darwin? Try Machiavelli. An even more far-fetched offshoot of the Darwin Principle is floating around, which some hawks have tossed out in meetings, although not seriously, one administration official said. It holds that America could actually hurt Iran by backing Iraq’s Shiites; that could deepen the Shiite-Sunni split and eventually lead to a regional Shiite-Sunni war. And in that, the Shiites — and Iran — lose because, while there are more Shiites than Sunnis in Iraq and Iran, there are more Sunnis than Shiites almost everywhere else.
Expect them to go for the worst, which is Machiavelli, though not the smart one …
Justin Raimondo discusses the Iraqi options seemingly under debate within the ruling block: surge v. jobs or, in other words, guns v. butter. The ultimate choice will probably be both.
Translation: The uniformed military are against the “surge” concept, but the civilians in the Pentagon and over at Neocon Central now have a retired general on their side. . . .
Chiarelli’s approach is one perfectly suited to a Democratic Congress. . . As an alternative to withdrawal, launching a War on Poverty in Iraq may win plaudits in Congress, and even in The Nation, but it is just another form of imperialism – one that is doomed to fail, but in the meantime will cost American taxpayers a pretty penny.
. . . Two styles of imperialism, competing visions of what an American empire could and must be: there is no real dissent, however, except around the margins, when it comes to whether we can or should be an empire. It’s too late for that, say the Washington policy wonks. . .
There is no “smart” way to run an empire: in the end, it runs you. And then it ruins you. The smart thing to do is to refrain from acquiring an empire, and, if one seems about to acquire you, then the really smart strategy is to run, not walk, away from it.
. . . the political dynamics here in America give life to the empire-building impulse, in spite of the growing national distaste for foreign wars. In a democracy, a small but determined minority can easily subvert the will of the majority by intensive lobbying and generous subsidies to the compliant.
. . . the news that two-thirds of the American people reject interventionism does little to alleviate my essential pessimism. Perhaps it is a matter of personal temperament, but I just don’t see how we can break through the political blockade of special interests and the two-party monopoly without some fundamental political reforms. Our entire system is biased in favor of meddling in the affairs of other nations, and so are the interests of the political class.
Posted by: small coke | Dec 17 2006 19:59 utc | 44
THAT #43 LINK IS PREPOSTEROUS!
how on earth can you have survival of the fitest when you have the world superpower backing one side?
and it eleiminates iraqis ever having a chance to work anything out on their own. the only thing it guarentees is a virtual blackmail to solve it w/the vicky sunnis.
really, i can’t believe we are considering exterminating a sect. my god.
Posted by: annie | Dec 17 2006 21:30 utc | 45
@DM #42:
(Don’t worry, the Indian legal team will be responsible to a US qualified and resident attorney)
Lonel Hutz, Attourney at Law, at your service!
Posted by: Dr. Wellington Yueh | Dec 17 2006 22:21 utc | 46
@Uncle $cam, Re: #9:
That article on the Spanish Influenza is awful. The author seems to be unable to think clearly, and seems to have very little understanding of the subject matter.
The article attempts to portray the recreation of the virus as sinister, but admits that the motivation was actually curiosity. The virus is said to have a 2.5% mortality rate amongst the infected, which in terms of plague mortality rates is strictly kid’s stuff, but is then described as “one of most deadliest [sic] viruses known to humankind”. Consider smallpox (10%+ mortality rates depending on population studied, ranging up to 90%), ebola (50%+), Marburg virus (25%+), SARS (10%)…
Then there’s the mechanics of the thing: the 1918 flu was deadly because it replicated quickly. (In both senses: the fast reproduction allowed it to spread quickly from person to person, but also, according to modern analysis, was what made it have an unusually high mortality rate for flu; an infected person’s respiratory system would effectively choke on the immune response.) In influenza, fast replication = lots of mutation throughout the genome. In biological weapons, lots of mutation throughout the genome = bad weapon. Not only would a high mutation rate render any prepared defenses useless quickly (because vaccines would not protect against mutated forms of the virus), thus making it a weapon likely to backfire, but it would also make it likely that the virus would turn out to be a dud — the parts that make the virus deadly might mutate, and since the deadly form would kill its hosts, the nonlethal form could displace the lethal form.
I’m not saying that recreating the virus was a good thing — it wasn’t, it was tremendously foolhardy, particularly given the U.S. government’s track record on containment of biohazards in labs — but this article has laughable take on the issue.
Oh, and by the way: it’s called the Spanish influenza because Spain had high mortality early on; even at the time, it was understood that the disease did not originate there.
Posted by: The Truth Gets Vicious When You Corner It | Dec 18 2006 1:49 utc | 47
b:
These Mayberry Machievells are trying to run around to the front of the parade and to “lead it”.
The Shia are the majority in Iraq. The Sunni bear the stain of Saddam and of their present unholy alliance with US Death Squads. They are going to suffer, have suffered, losses in the “new Iraq”. They may prefer the death of Iraq to their losing control of it, they are not in the majority.
The Neocons, rather than admit that they are impotent, are trying to associate themselves with the Shia takeover. “We planned it all along.”
Sadr builds alliances with Sunni and Kurd nationalists behind the scenes while his straight man Maliki waltzes the US around the room, smiling, ignoring the fact that the US keeps stepping on his toes.
When Sadr has his ducks all in a row the US will be forced to leave Iraq and the fight between the nationalists and the various US-UK, Saudi-Sunni rejectionists begins.
May it be as brief as possible.
Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 18 2006 1:56 utc | 48
Off all topics: I’m enjoying a “family visit” with my daughter in New York City,
and have also enjoyed a bit of tourism here (with the Cloisters and Ft. Tyron park
being favorite “attractions”). I am, however, aghast at the rat-infested New York
Subway system, where I had the chance to observe an active family of rats at the
39-th street station this afternoon. I know the city has anti-rat infestation squads,
I know that eradication of the rodents is extremely difficult and indeed impossible in practice, and I know that “real New Yorkers” don’t even think twice about seeing rats running between the subway tracks, but I remain aghast at the fact that a city that prides itself on being caput mundi, the ne plus ultra of sophistication and modernity, has subway sanitary conditions that are unworthy of a medieval backwater at the time of the black plague. Why doesn’t the city put some of that myriad of “security personel” to work eradicating rats? Or is rat borne disease not in fact a more real and present danger to the populace than intelligence agency puppets and the terrorist boogey man du jour ?
Posted by: Hannah K. O’Luthon | Dec 18 2006 3:18 utc | 49
Some sound writing of Austin Cline at the General’s site. Though I don’t think it is restricted to Americans, it is quite pronounced with some: Welcoming the Ugly Americans Abroad: Why Don’t Americans Understand Why They are Resented in Other Nations?
The principal issue is probably much more tragic: Americans tend to operate from a naive premise of ethical purity, assuming that since their intentions are always good, they will always be welcomed.
This leads to shock when Americans or American actions are resented or opposed in any fashion, and consequently produces significant arrogance towards those they wanted to help: they are ungrateful, unworthy of help, and perhaps unworthy of the gifts of democracy and liberty which we want to bestow upon them. The problem can’t be us, after all, since we are good and what we bring is good. If there is resistance, then there must be something wrong with the recipients.
Right?
…
Hannah :
I can’t point you to an authoritative link, but there are definitely communities of human beings as well as rats living in New York’s subways. Googling the subject brings up references to a recent book on the subject.
Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 18 2006 3:45 utc | 51
A U.S. mercinary in Iraq blows the whistle to the FBI about his companies weapon smuggling. The US military catches him, tortures and interogates him for some month before letting him go.
Former U.S. Detainee in Iraq Recalls Torment
He said that the company, which was protecting American reconstruction organizations, had hired guards from a sheik in Basra and that many of them turned out to be members of militias whom the clients did not want around.
Mr. Vance said the company had a growing cache of weapons it was selling to suspicious customers, including a steady flow of officials from the Iraqi Interior Ministry. The ministry had ties to violent militias and death squads. He said he had also witnessed another employee giving American soldiers liquor in exchange for bullets and weapon repairs.
b:
On the Austin Cline… yeah, but com’on now. This might have been the case… in the 1950’s. Rather this might have been an excuse in the 1950’s, but since Viet Nam it’s hard to describe such a mindset as any thing less than willful self-delusion.
Which is not to say the mindset he describes doesn’t exist. Perhaps Ausin Cline is a bit of a missionary himself, and the missionaries of whom he speaks are the flock he seeks to lead, gently, to awaken to the bad news.
I had a co-worker in TX “level” with me about what she thought was the “real cause” of 9/11, just before I left for Thailand in 2002 :
“It’s just like in High School. Some of the kids are jealous of the rich kids. They don’t have nice cars and good things themselves and they’re jealous.”
I paraphrase, but that was the gist of it. Some verbatim. I think the “sotto voce” delivery was due to an unspoken “understanding between us” that, of course, it’s completely understandable.
And wealth of course is its own justification. A testimony to itself. Worthiness personified. Wealthiness is next to godliness.
It buys a lot of soap.
Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 18 2006 4:06 utc | 53
Allegedly dangerous detainees often not held prisoner after U.S. releases them to home countries
Clive Stafford Smith, a British-American attorney representing detainees, said the AP’s findings indicate that innocent men were jailed and that the term “continued detention” is part of “a politically motivated farce.”
”The Bush administration wants to be able to say that these are dangerous terrorists who are going to be confined upon their release … although there is no evidence against many of them,” he said.
When four Britons were sent home from Guantanamo in January 2005, Britain said it would detain and investigate them — then released them after only 18 hours. Five Britons repatriated earlier were also rapidly released with no charges.
Murat Kurnaz, a German-born Turkish citizen, was also quickly freed when he was flown to Germany in August, bound hand and foot, after more than four years at Guantanamo.
U.S. officials maintained he was a member of al-Qaida, based on what they said was secret evidence. But his New Jersey-based lawyer, Baher Azmy, said he was shown the classified evidence and was shocked to find how unpersuasive it was.
”It contains five or six statements exonerating him,” Azmy said.
In October, German prosecutors said they found no evidence that Kurnaz had links to Islamic radicals in Pakistan or Afghanistan and formally dropped their investigation.
The United States insists that the fact so many of the former detainees have been freed by other countries doesn’t mean they weren’t dangerous.
Wait a second… they are being released due to lack of evidence when they are not being held by US authorities? You mean, in compliance with legal strictures that aren’t made up as you go? Damn it. Now I’m starting to hate the rest of the world for their freedom!
Posted by: Monolycus | Dec 18 2006 4:43 utc | 54
:
From your NYTimes :
But when American soldiers raided the company at his urging, Mr. Vance and another American who worked there were detained as suspects by the military, which was unaware that Mr. Vance was an informer, according to officials and military documents.
Who but the NYTimes would “believe” that?
She said officials did not reach Mr. Vance’s contact at the F.B.I. until he had been in custody for three weeks. Even so, she said, officials determined that he “posed a threat” and decided to continue holding him. He was released two months later, Lieutenant Fracasso said, based on a “subsequent re-examination of his case,” and his stated plans to leave Iraq.
When they “reached” that contact they realized just how great a “threat he posed”. I wonder why they didn’t kill him in custody? I guess they weren’t paid enough by the “security contractor” he blew the whistle on?
Or perhaps the FBI investigation has already been brought to a “successful conclusion”. And they believe that they have taught this man a “lesson” that he won’t forget? And that the NYTimes is printing this story not as an expose of abuses but as a warning to others… “This is the new reality.” Would Vance have blown the whistle if he knew what was in store?
On his way out, Mr. Vance said: “They asked me if I was intending to write a book, would I talk to the press, would I be thinking of getting an attorney. I took it as, ‘Shut up, don’t talk about this place,’ and I kept saying, ‘No sir, I want to go home.’ ”
I hope he reconsiders. I hope he’s contacted by legal representation that will open a case against these bastards.
Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 18 2006 4:54 utc | 55
I don’t know if someone referred to this post previously and I missed it. For those who don’t regularly read Prof. Juan Cole – I thought this was one of his better posts. It covers a lot of past history, and explains just why the US will lose in Iraq unless it turns to genocidal methods.
How the Republicans are Stealing the November Elections
Or, Bushes and Bonapartes
Posted by: Owl | Dec 18 2006 5:56 utc | 56
Posted by: jj | Dec 18 2006 7:45 utc | 57
It’s the moonie times so maybe a fak: Saudis report Shi’ite ‘state’ inside of Iraq
Iran has effectively created a Shi’ite “state within a state” in neighboring Iraq, defying both Iraqi Sunnis and neighboring Sunni nations, according to a Saudi security report.
Iranian military forces are providing Shi’ite militias with weapons and training, Iranian charities are pouring funds into schools and hospitals, and Tehran is actively supporting pro-Iranian Iraqi politicians, the report said.
“Where the Americans have failed, the Iranians have stepped in,” said the report by the Saudi National Security Assessment Project, a Riyadh-based consultancy commissioned by the Saudi government to provide security and intelligence assessments.
The report, submitted to the Saudi government in March, has not been publicly distributed.
Citing interviews with intelligence and military officials in Iraq and surrounding region, the report states that the Sunni insurgency numbers about 77,000, while the Shi’ite militia forces total about 35,000.
…
The Saudi security report was directed by Nawaf Obaid — who recently was fired for writing an article in The Washington Post warning that Saudi Arabia would not stand idly by and allow Iraq’s Shi’ites to destroy its Sunni population.
…
Analysts say some Saudi citizens are raising funds for Sunni insurgents.
“I have heard them say it is not hard to line up a couple hundred thousand dollars and send it to the insurgents across the border,” said Isobel Coleman, a senior fellow at the Council for Foreign Relations.
…
The Saudi study says the Badr Organization is still about 25,000-strong, and the party has roughly 3 million supporters. Anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr’s militia, the Mahdi Army, is thought to number just under 10,000, while his party has the support of about 1.5 million Shi’ites.
…The study also provides details on the Sunni insurgency. It cites Iraqi tribal leaders as saying that the insurgency is run mainly by former commanders and high-level military officers of the Ba’athist regime. Only a smaller group is religiously inspired and includes foreign fighters.
Of the 77,000 active members of the insurgency, the “jihadis” number about 17,000, of which some 5,000 are from North Africa, Sudan, Yemen, Egypt and Saudi Arabia.
The remaining 60,000 are members of the former military or Saddam’s paramilitary Fedayeen forces. The officer corps of the insurgency has “command and control facilities in Syria as well as bases in strategic locations, where Sunnis constitute the majority of the urban population.”
Given the centuries-old tribal, familial and religious ties between Iraq’s Sunnis and Saudi Arabia, the assessment concludes that “Saudi Arabia has a special responsibility to ensure the continued welfare and security of Sunnis in Iraq.”
Its recommendations to the Saudi government included a comprehensive strategy that would include overt and covert components to deal with the worst-case scenario of full-blown civil war.
@jj – nice fake story and fake picture – though Putin is getting bald, he still does have more hair than the man in the picture …
Not remotely surprised, but I posted it ‘cuz for me it raises the issue of how easy it is to manufacture crap out of thing air on anyone they want to discredit. Reputations are tricky things in mass society.
Anyway, Pat Lang noted in a comment on his Stalingrad on the Tigris thread, linked previously, that he’s going to team up w/Ray McGovern to take on the immorality of Bu$hCon’s proposed Iraqi actions. Should be interesting.
Posted by: jj | Dec 18 2006 8:17 utc | 60
U.S. SEEKS TO REIN IN ITS MILITARY SPY TEAMS
U.S. Special Forces teams sent overseas on secret spying missions have clashed with the CIA and carried out operations in countries that are staunch U.S. allies, prompting a new effort by the agency and the Pentagon to tighten the rules for military units engaged in espionage, according to senior U.S. intelligence and military officials.
…
But the initiative has also led to several embarrassing incidents for the United States, including a shootout in Paraguay and the exposure of a sensitive intelligence operation in East Africa, according to current and former officials familiar with the matter. And to date, the effort has not led to the capture of a significant terrorism suspect.
Some intelligence officials have complained that Special Forces teams have sometimes launched missions without informing the CIA, duplicating or even jeopardizing existing operations. And they questioned deploying military teams in friendly nations — including in Europe — at a time when combat units are in short supply in war zones.
…
Officials said this led to the secret deployment of small teams of Special Forces troops, known as military liaison elements, or MLEs, to American embassies to serve as intelligence operatives. Members of the teams undergo special training in espionage at Ft. Bragg and other facilities, according to officials familiar with the program.
The troops typically work in civilian clothes and function much like CIA case officers, cultivating sources in other governments or Islamic organizations. One objective, officials said, is to generate information that could be used to plan clandestine operations such as capturing or killing terrorism suspects.
…
In 2004, members of an MLE team operating in Paraguay shot and killed an armed assailant who tried to rob them outside a bar, said former intelligence officials familiar with the incident. U.S. officials removed the members of the team from the country, the officials said.
In another incident, members of a team in East Africa were arrested by the local government after their espionage activity was discovered.
…
On at least one occasion, a team tracked an Islamic militant in Europe. “They were trying to acquire certain information about a certain individual,” said a former high-ranking U.S. intelligence official who spoke on condition of anonymity. The official declined to name the country, but said it was a NATO ally and that the host government was unaware of the mission.
b:
Which makes me wonder if our rogue gevernment will ever be reigned in again. The “opposition party” has just won a resounding majority in the House and is at least at parity in the Senate and… nothing’s going to happen.
No talk of
- repeal of the MCA, Sherrod Brown, for instance, has “other priorities”; or
- repeal of the PATRIOT Act; or
- repeal of the Republicrat tax cuts for the monstrously rich; or
- defunding the Iraq War; or
- defunding the Palestine War; or
- defunding the MIC and closing down some (most) of the 725 military bases abroad.
None of those measures cost money. They all save money. More importantly they reverse some of the worst excesses of the past 6 years.
How many will even be mentioned, let alone acted upon, in the next Congress?
Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 18 2006 9:19 utc | 62
Or, was it one of his high ranking lieutenants? Why is it that lynch mobs never get the right man?
Posted by: anna missed | Dec 18 2006 9:51 utc | 64
12/10/06 by Vic Walter and Krista Kjellman, ABC News
Cell phone users, beware. The FBI can listen to everything you say, even when the cell phone is turned off.
A recent court ruling in a case against the Genovese crime family revealed that the FBI has the ability from a remote location to activate a cell phone and turn its microphone into a listening device that transmits to an FBI listening post, a method known as a “roving bug.”
Experts say the only way to defeat it is to remove the cell phone battery.
“The FBI can access cell phones and modify them remotely without ever having to physically handle them,” James Atkinson, a counterintelligence security consultant, told ABC News. “Any recently manufactured cell phone has a built-in tracking device, which can allow eavesdroppers to pinpoint someone’s location to within just a few feet,” he added.
According to the recent court ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Lewis Kaplan, “The device functioned whether the phone was powered on or off, intercepting conversations within its range wherever it happened to be.”
Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 18 2006 11:20 utc | 65