What a Diff’rence a Day Makes

December 5, 2006

Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said Tuesday that Iraq will call for a regional conference on ending the rampant violence in his country …
Al-Maliki says Iraq will call for regional conference on stabilizing country

Only yesterday Maliki and other Iraqi pols sounded quite different. Over night somebody taught them a new tune:

My yesterday was blue, dear
Today I’m part of you, dear
My lonely nights are through, dear
Since you said you were mine

Any guess what kind of teaching method was used to get Maliki into tune here? Carrots? Sticks? Money? A bullet shown to him? Or was it his own ambition?

Yesterday’s quotes are below the fold:

Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki also rejected Annan’s suggestion that an international conference could help the country resolve its sectarian divides and deadly insurgency.

"His call for an international conference on Iraq is a denial of the will of the Iraqi people," al-Maliki’s office said in a statement.
Premier rejects Iraq conference

—

Iraqi politicians appeared divided on Sunday over a suggestion for an international conference on Iraq, with the president joining a powerful Shia politician in rejecting it and a former prime minister welcoming it.

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, rejected the proposal.

[…]
Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari also questioned the aim of the suggestion by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan

[…]
Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, one of Iraq’s top Shia politicians, also rejected the conference Saturday in Amman, Jordan, saying it would be “unrealistic” to debate Iraq’s future outside the country and Iraq’s government was the only party qualified to find a solution to Iraq’s conflict.

But former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, a secular Shia with close Washington links, disagreed, saying Iraq could not solve its problems alone.
Iraqi politicians divided over int’l conference on Iraq

—

Mr. Hakim, for his part, flatly rejected one of the recommendations that the bipartisan Iraq Study Group is expected to make this week: a call for an international conference or regional peace initiative.

“We believe that the Iraqi issue should be solved by the Iraqis with the help of friends everywhere,” Mr. Hakim said, speaking through an interpreter. “But we reject any attempts to have a regional or international role in solving the Iraqi issue. We cannot bypass the political process.”
Bush Meets With Rival of Iraqi Leader

Posted by b on December 5, 2006 at 17:43 UTC | Permalink

Comments

It seems to me that the underlying reason all these changes we see is that the U.S. is determined to prevent any one political entity, or political direction from developing — that would circumvent the overall project of turning Iraq into a U.S. client state.
On the one hand we can see that aan issue like say de-Baathification, was insturmental in destroying the previous govermental infrastructure, which allowed the Shiite politicians the liberty to consolidate and realize their own infrastructure. We’ve come to associate this move with the right zionists wing of U.S.foreign policy. Subsequently, U.S. policy has reversed course, and set about on re-Baathification and political “reconcilliation” of Baathists and former insurgents, seen as a resurgence of right arabists or realists thinking. I think this is one (good) way to follow these events, but can I think, be misunderstood to mean one policy directive has failed and the other has gained, when such a change of course has occured. When in fact, all the players in this game are one side or the other of the U.S. government — which finds its end projection of policy in the president (‘s behavior).
What struck me about the recent meeting in Amman was just how duplicitous the public face of policy (in Bush) has become. Between the Hadley memo, the Rumsfeld memo, the reported overtures to other countries, the ISG recomendations, and the presidents own press conference reveals that U.S. policy in Iraq has become (and probably always was) in fact, totally amorphus to the extent that any changes in course can be considered “normal” within the context of the whole project. Both the Hadley memo and the Rumsfeld memos might indicate that the overall project of establishing a client state in Iraq is basically on course, but perhaps a little to messy, with regards to public perception.This would imply that all the infamous mistakes, reversals, and contradictions have in effect — BEEN NECESSARY — for the neo-colonial/small force/new way divide and conquer model to work its magic. That what we are witnessing in the political dynamic is in effect a kind of “hearding” of the Iraqi body politic into an acceptable medium ground client status, that the Iraqi politicians can accomodate and still serve U.S. interests.
The “noise” then that we hear, such as an al-Mutlak claiming the U.S. ambassador is pushing for partition, while at the same time the president is saying he’s against it, is simply the friction that comes from blackmaleing al-Mutlak to move a little closer to U.S. interests. Same with b’s example of Maliki, above.
Of course the essential problem with this strategy is that the falling dominoes of this new way of divide and conquer small footprint neo-colonialism, is is that the U.S. has lost control of the how they fall — that the dominoes falling on the ground, have rendered those of “managed” falling in the green zone irrelevant. That the manipulation and “hearding” of Iraqi politics has reached the point of no return in the red zone. Where events in the green zone have no substantial effect one way or another on the population, no matter what they do, or how many changes of course they go through. Its the point where time, is decidedly, no longer on your side. And the mantra of “staying the course” has reached a terminal dead end.

Posted by: anna missed | Dec 5 2006 19:45 utc | 1

@ anna missed – ack.
—
Interesting read on neocon idiocity like in what I excerpt: Vanity Fair: Neo Culpa

Frum admits that the optimistic vision he and Perle set out in their book will not now come to pass. “One of the things that we were talking about in that last chapter was the hope that fairly easily this world governed by law, the world of the North Atlantic, can be extended to include the Arab and Muslim Middle East,” he says. “I think, coming away from Iraq, people are going to say that’s not true, and that the world governed by law will be only a portion of the world. The aftermath of Iraq is that walls are going to go up, and the belief that this is a deep cultural divide is going to deepen.” This is already happening in Europe, he adds, citing the British government’s campaign against the wearing of veils by women and the Pope’s recent critical comments about Islam. As neoconservative optimism withers, Frum fears, the only winner of the debate over Iraq will be Samuel Huntington, whose 1996 book famously forecast a “clash of civilizations” between the West and Islam.

Posted by: b | Dec 5 2006 19:59 utc | 2

None of which, I might add, might necessarily compel bush to either acknowledge or act upon the disconnect between what happens in the red zone as compaired to the green zone. The evaluative discourse for bush must remain exclusively within the confines of U.S. interests with regards to Iraqi politics to accomidate them, Which means that within the green zone he can indefinitly continue to tweak and nip at any imerging power block within that context, because here he can control events toward whatever imagined status of resolution he may entertain at that particular moment, or prevent a contrary set of circumstances from developing. Because bush is still in command the only thing that would force bush into a capitulation would be de-funding by the congress or a significant military setback, neither of which is likely at this point. So it looks like he will continue to fiddle, while rome burns, for at least for 2 more years. And try this and try that.

Posted by: anna missed | Dec 5 2006 20:17 utc | 3

anna missed
not only is it not suffice to massacre a country – they internalise their own imperial melodrama on the living souls of iraq
evidently, they want a client state – but all they are capable of bringing to the world is different brands of the same butchershop
even their own aims are beyond their grasp – the world is turning from them & it will turn still

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Dec 5 2006 20:50 utc | 4

this concurs much of what anna missed says (the pdf is not linking to me so this is the source site)CENTER FOR STRATEGIC INTERNATIONAL STUDIES: BRIEFING ON IRAQ

Posted by: annie | Dec 5 2006 21:48 utc | 5

one big question is what the US is willing to concede in order to extricate itself from the Iraq mess.
its still not clear but soon enough it will reveal. And the sooner the better.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Dec 5 2006 21:56 utc | 6

the US isn’t willing to extricate from iraq. it’s just better pr to say you’re on your way out, than on your way in.

Posted by: Anonymous | Dec 5 2006 22:11 utc | 7

b, that ‘tune’ link isn’t working

Posted by: annie | Dec 5 2006 22:15 utc | 8

the US public wants some form of extrication. And it will remain a top issue thru 2008.
GWB & Baker may be able to string this phase (non-extrication) out for a while (assuming this is what they want to do) but it could cost the Repubs big in 2008.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Dec 5 2006 22:35 utc | 9

From the Daily Show last night, the guy with the glasses explains that Bush’s strategy is that “leaving Iraq means losing the war” — or “staying in Iraq means winning.”
And when can we leave Iraq? “When we win.”
So we can’t leave Iraq until we win, but winning is defined as not leaving.
So I guess we are staying.
p.s. they were funny, but the analysis is spot-on.

Posted by: jonku | Dec 5 2006 23:33 utc | 10

oh my god the tune is funny. b you crack me up.
that was me @7 btw.
jonku, sounds about right

Posted by: annie | Dec 6 2006 0:25 utc | 11

Saudi-Iran tension fuels wider conflict
By Kaveh L Afrasiabi

According to a Tehran University political scientist, “If the Saudis had been gassed by Iraq and lost a million people to Saddam’s butchery, then they would not be surprised that Iran is angry at their lobbying for Saddam’s pardon.” Iran has openly wondered why the US is not pressuring Saudi Arabia to stem the tide of its nationals infiltrating Iraq on a daily basis to fight a sectarian war. “And why hasn’t Saudi Arabia bothered to respond to Iran’s call for a collective security arrangement in the Persian Gulf?” the same professor asked in a recent conversation with the author.
It should not be forgotten that, in the post-September 11, 2001, context, Iran and Saudi Arabia share economic, energy, religious and political concerns, including the Arab-Israeli conflict and terrorism. The countries also play a leading role in both the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC).
A major indicator of warming relations is their cooperation on security affairs, including regional security. As the largest and the richest Persian Gulf countries, Iran and Saudi Arabia have the capabilities to affect the pace of events in their region. Thus their cooperation is a necessity for ensuring security in the region, which contains more than 60% of the world’s proven oil reserves, in addition to a phenomenal amount of gas (Iran and Qatar have the world’s second- and the third-largest gas deposits, respectively).
Should the Lebanese crisis be resolved amicably with the reapportionment of cabinet posts more proportional to the balance of political forces in the country, as favored by not just Hezbollah but also by certain Christian leaders, then the Saudis will be forgiven for their one-sided, blistering criticisms of Iran. Tehran will have shown that it can influence events there in the direction of non-violent resolution of political differences.
On the other hand, the nightmare scenario of Lebanon spiraling into civil war will certainly sharpen Shi’ite-Sunni hostilities pervading the region, no matter what steps Tehran takes to ensure that Iraq does not drown in sectarian conflict. In this respect, pro-Iran Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, head of the Shi’ite Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, is in Washington for a meeting with President George W Bush. Clearly, Hakim’s visit will be regarded in the Persian Gulf as an indirect US dialogue with Iran. Their common fear of (pro-Israel) Turkey’s intervention in Iraq is yet another glue that binds Tehran and Riyadh, a relatively neglected issue so far.
Equally important, in removing the walls of distrust between Iran and Saudi Arabia, is an explicit sign from Riyadh that it is not simply concerned with “Sunni” interests in Iraq, in light of a recent pro-Saudi article in the Washington Post by a key Saudi expert, but that rather its concerns are all-inclusive, covering the embattled Shi’ites as well. To that effect, the kingdom’s own Shi’ites must be better respected in their civic rights.
Measures to improve Iran-Saudi relations

Several measures could put an immediate halt to the visible deterioration of relations between the two countries, including the following: An all-inclusive Persian Gulf conference on Iraq, including Iran and Iraq, hosted by the Gulf Cooperation Council. This would be instrumental in closing the cognitive gaps on both sides on the nature of security threats and what to do about them.

A sub-OIC Iraq group inclusive of Iran and Saudi Arabia to be formed to hammer out differences and to explore workable solutions for Iraq, perhaps by fathoming an OIC peacekeeping force for Iraq. Enhanced Iran-Saudi cooperation on Iraq within the OIC framework will help Iran to be perceived as an Islamist rather than a purely Shi’ite power, keen on the welfare of all Muslims irrespective of their sects. (See A role for the OIC in Iraq, Asia Times Online, April 17, 2004.)

A joint Iran-Saudi-Iraq council should meet periodically to discuss security matters and to offer ideas.

In the absence of such initiatives, the likelihood of more sharpened hostile relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia is almost a guarantee.

Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 6 2006 0:36 utc | 12

[And when can we leave Iraq? “When we win.”
So we can’t leave Iraq until we win, but winning is defined as not leaving.
So I guess we are staying.]
………………………………….
And thats what we’ll do, stay for the sake of staying. Until people realize thats the only reason left that we are staying for, so we dont have to admit that we lost. At hundreds of thousands dead, and hundreds of billions of dollars, thats a pretty expensive state of denial.

Posted by: Anonymous | Dec 6 2006 1:38 utc | 13

Anna Missed wrote:
It seems to me that the underlying reason all these changes we see is that the U.S. is determined to prevent any one political entity, or political direction from developing — that would circumvent the overall project of turning Iraq into a U.S. client state.
Okay, but it can be put more clearly. From Zbig’s “Grand Chessboard” we learn that the First Principal of Empire is to never allow any Regional Powers to emerge. Iraq presents a challenge to this because it’s only ME state w/BOTH abundant Oil & Water. So, to Empire Managers the Overarching issue is how to weaken it – permanently.
First solution wasa to pit Iran against Iraq, so they could bleed each others resources. Then after that war, there was fear that Iraq, which was just damn broke, would flood the market w/oil to pay rebuild. This would drive down prices at a time when Western Oil Cos. had just laid out a pile for offshore drilling facilities. Hence they had Kuwait slant drill into Iraq stealing their oil, to set up pretext for war – ie. Operation Wreck Iraq I. That worked til market needed Iraqi Oil.
Thus, Operation Wreck Iraq II. Question now is how to get Iraqi Oil to market, controlled by Western Oil Cos., while insuring country never becomes major power w/out turning Iran into Agressive Ambitious Hegemon now that they’ve eliminated both of their natural enemies – Iraq & Taliban. Second purpose is to Destroy Iraq & steal absolutely everything as object lesson to other ME states to force them to piratize their state owned oil cos. & sign Pirates Agreements governing the remainder of their economies…lest they too be wrecked…

Posted by: jj | Dec 6 2006 2:22 utc | 14

“And thats what we’ll do, stay for the sake of staying. Until people realize thats the only reason left that we are staying for, so we dont have to admit that we lost. At hundreds of thousands dead, and hundreds of billions of dollars, thats a pretty expensive state of denial.”
yes, except the numbers will be higher – much higher.
sadly

Posted by: Susan | Dec 6 2006 2:52 utc | 15

The last person in my family has finally left Iraq so I can finally comment without concern for their safety. I wonder what Izmertzis think as their town is flooded with people they expelled 3 to 4 generations ago…Once again my family is desperately trying to find a new home.
Those of you who read the Iraqi blogs know that the latest concern is once again Academics, threatened specifically: DO NOT SHOW UP TO WORK! Students are warned with the same. There is no more Iraq so I am not even sad just concerned for those who remain. Though anyone still there is just crazy or very poor.

Posted by: Amurra | Dec 6 2006 2:56 utc | 16

Excuse me, but whats up with the major focus on Saudi that we have seen of late. The Saudis are certainly a factor – they are the custodians of the Holy Land, they are a leading Sunni nation plus they have stupendous amounts of money.
But if money was so key to armed or political conflict, the Iraqi insurgency would have been wiped out a long ime ago.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Dec 6 2006 3:28 utc | 17

b_cool :
See jj at #14
It’s not just about the Saudis but about the region figuring out that while the US is able to wreck huge destruction it is not only unwilling but also unable to put Humpty Dumpty together again.
As far as picking up the pieces after the shocking, awful US devastation goes… they’re the only ones home.
And after reflecting on that for awhile the next thing that occurs is that the potential benefits to themselves of taking their own region in hand are truly, truly huge.

Posted by: John Francis Lee | Dec 6 2006 3:55 utc | 18

At hundreds of thousands dead, and hundreds of billions of dollars, thats a pretty expensive state of denial.

Posted by: vbo | Dec 6 2006 3:59 utc | 19

Those of you who read the Iraqi blogs know that the latest concern is once again Academics, threatened specifically: DO NOT SHOW UP TO WORK!
Threatening Leaflets distributed in Baghdad

Civil war in Iraq has reached its peak. Everyday a new aspect of life dies. People are killed continuously in massacres that harvest more than 500 lives in one week.
Out of this civil war, education has its share. Schools are barely functioning to educate the new generations of Iraq.
After the U.S.-led occupation to Iraq, education deteriorated form its steady situation where students and professors were able to exchange knowledge despite the oppression of the former regime and the U.S.-U.N. sanctions against the Iraqi people.
Last November, Gunmen in military-style uniforms abducted scores of staff and visitors from a Higher Education Ministry institution in Baghdad. The attackers stormed the ministry’s research department, locked women in a room and took the men away. As a reaction to this, the Higher education minister ordered all universities to be closed fearing a new wave of abductions reach the university campuses.
The minister’s fears were right. However, the new fighting-education campaign took another style. The militant’s aim seems to be not to kill professors rather than kill education itself. They started new techniques in destroying the long-term good education in the country.
Last week, a friend of mine told me that the former chair of the English Department in my university in Baghdad fled to northern Iraq. She told me he became miserable after armed men kidnapped his son, beheaded him and sent his head in a box.
Today, my sister called me from Baghdad. She said most of the students are either unable to go to the universities or unwilling to due to the kidnappings and bombings. In the latest incident, she said, armed men distributed leaflets in the University of Technology, the major engineering university in allover Iraq, threatening students and professors to be killed if they come to school. She added that the whole university has been shut down since last week.
In today’s edition, Azzaman newspaper reported that an “unknown group distributed leaflets to university students in Adhamiya and Yarmouk neighborhoods banning them from going to schools.” The paper added that the same group “excluded the elementary and high school students” from this campaign and “promised not to hurt them.”
Residents of Adhamiya told the paper that yesterday’s leaflets caused a huge panic among the residents and the students who stopped going to their schools after these threats.
A university professor who spoke to Azzaman on condition of anonymity said he was shocked when he saw one of the leaflets at the footstep of his house. He said fear haunted him and made him decide not to go to school fearing these groups’ threats.
In Abu Ghraib, an area in south western Baghdad, another unknown group distributed same leaflets threatening students from going to the Agriculture college of Baghdad university which is located in that restive part of the city.
People in Azzafaraniya, an eastern Baghdad neighborhood, said that armed groups threatened students of the Technical Institute to be killed if they come to school.
The Higher education ministry sources did not comment on most of these incidents, Azzaman said. The source didn’t say much but told the paper that the “government promised to increase the security measures in the universities and institutes.”…….

baghdad treasure, one of my (very) favorite iraqi bloggers

Posted by: annie | Dec 6 2006 4:23 utc | 20

There is no more Iraq so I am not even sad just concerned for those who remain. Though anyone still there is just crazy or very poor.

Posted by: vbo | Dec 6 2006 4:24 utc | 21

in case you didn’t know
Within just a few years, Iraq was providing social services that were unprecedented among Middle Eastern countries. Saddam established and controlled the “National Campaign for the Eradication of Illiteracy” and the campaign for “Compulsory Free Education in Iraq,” and largely under his auspices, the government established universal free schooling up to the highest education levels; hundreds of thousands learned to read in the years following the initiation of the program.
an then the US showed up and built them schools

Posted by: annie | Dec 6 2006 4:31 utc | 22

They cry for us , we cry for them.
i’m sorry vbo

Posted by: annie | Dec 6 2006 4:34 utc | 23

The last person in my family has finally left Iraq so I can finally comment without concern for their safety
what can i say, what can any of us say

Posted by: annie | Dec 6 2006 4:37 utc | 24

ADS — The Newest Weapon From Our Overlords

The crowd is getting ugly. Soldiers roll up in a Hummer. Suddenly, the whole right half of your body is screaming in agony. You feel like you’ve been dipped in molten lava. You almost faint from shock and pain, but instead you stumble backwards — and then start running. To your surprise, everyone else is running too. In a few seconds, the street is completely empty.
Sounds interesting.
You’ve just been hit with a new nonlethal weapon that has been certified for use in Iraq — even though critics argue there may be unforeseen effects.
Uh oh.
The ADS shoots a beam of millimeters waves, which are longer in wavelength than x-rays but shorter than microwaves — 94 GHz (= 3 mm wavelength) compared to 2.45 GHz (= 12 cm wavelength) in a standard microwave oven.
Now we will know how a frozen pizza feels.
The longer waves are thought to limit the effects of the radiation. If used properly, ADS will produce no lasting adverse affects, the military argues.
Aaaaahhhh, there’s the key phrase, “If used properly. . .”
The ADS technology is ready to deploy, and the Army requested ADS-armed Strykers for Iraq last year. But the military is well aware that any adverse publicity could finish the program, and it does not want to risk distressed victims wailing about evil new weapons on CNN.
All you bloggers out there please do a fellow Iraqi a favor and do what you do best, create adverse publicity NOW!

Posted by: annie | Dec 6 2006 5:39 utc | 25

Annie, your post 22, sums up my feelings about this whole mess. Ironically, as the U.S. has been destroying Iraq for as long as I can remember, if only the U.S. education system functioned, a properly educated U.S. populace perhaps could have prevented U.S. attempts at empire building and allowed Iraq to become a modern secular force for progress in the mid-east – this would have been without our sanctions and interference with two wars. Not much good to focus on “could have, would have” type thoughts now, but the sad state of U.S. Corporate media is also to blame. War crimes tribunals are needed desperately. Include in the tribunals enablers from all branches of U.S. (and U.K) government. What a pleasant dream!
Sorry for random ranting here at MOA this morning – I’m just so upset with the loss of a civilization. Oops! – I should correctly say the loss of two civilizations.

Posted by: Rick Happ | Dec 6 2006 9:59 utc | 26

Just heard rpt. on radio – quickie network news tidbit – that suggests Bush consigliere’s rpt. could be declaration of war on us. It says something to the effect that the xUS Elite is at war & “we” must be united…..

Posted by: jj | Dec 6 2006 10:28 utc | 27

Ladies and gentlemen, Baker-Hamilton

About a year ago, senior Pentagon officials announced a plan that captured the main headlines for a day, maybe even two. By the end of 2006, they said, meaning in less than a month from today, the size of the American force in Iraq will drop to less than 100,000 soldiers. That much. They also explained how this would happen: The Americans would train the Iraqis, the Iraqis would take the reins into their own hands, and the Americans would pull back to training and aid missions.
…
The Baker-Hamilton performance is a huge Hollywood-style production, as is the name of the commission. And in any case, its conclusions have already been trickling out: Train the Iraqis, hand over the reins and start thinning the presence and size of the forces. If it were that simple, it would already have happened a long time ago.

Posted by: b | Dec 6 2006 13:22 utc | 28

Neo-Cons Move to Preempt Baker Report

WASHINGTON, Dec 5 (IPS) – To have read the neo-conservative press here over the past month, one would think that former Secretary of State James Baker poses the biggest threat to the United States and Israel since Saddam Hussein.

Things got even more personal with columns by Frank Gaffney, president of the neo-conservative Centre for Security Policy, and Mark Steyn in the Washington Times suggesting that Baker’s thinking was motivated as much by anti-Semitism as by realism.
“Jim Baker’s hostility towards the Jews is a matter of record and has endeared him to Israel’s foes in the region,” wrote Gaffney, suggesting that the ISG — which, in another column published Tuesday, he called the “Iraq Surrender Group” — would recommend a regional approach similar to Madrid that would “throw free Iraq to the wolves” and “allow the Mideast’s only bona fide democracy, the Jewish State, to be snuffed in due course.”

For sheer consistency, however, the Weekly Standard, which in this week’s edition featured no less than three articles denouncing the ISG — including one that described the Commission’s membership as “deeply reactionary” and the “K-Mart version of the Congress of Vienna — has led the field.
In successive lead editorials by chief editor William Kristol and Robert Kagan, the magazine first assailed the notion that Washington should engage Syria and Iran as “capitulation,” and then, reassured by Bush’s declaration last week that he was not prepared to follow the ISG’s advice on talking with either Damascus or Tehran, accused Baker of having “quite deliberately created… the disastrous impression… that the United States is about to withdraw from Iraq.”
“At home and broad, people have been led to believe that Jim Baker and not the president was going to call the shots in Iraq from now on. Happily, that is not the case,” according to Kagan and Kristol, who recently called Bush “the last neocon in power”.

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 6 2006 14:59 utc | 29

The Badr Brigade is affiliated with the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), which is led by Abdul Aziz al-Hakim. The Badr Brigade has long-standing ties with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps. Many Badr members have become integrated into the Iraqi police, and others play policing roles in southern Iraqi cities. While wearing the uniform of the security services, Badr fighters have targeted Sunni Arab civilians. Badr fighters have also clashed with the Mahdi Army, particularly in southern Iraq.

Baker/Hamilton Report (pdf)
Add a link to a recent photo of Bush and Hakim …

Posted by: b | Dec 6 2006 16:36 utc | 30

and then, reassured by Bush’s declaration last week that he was not prepared to follow the ISG’s advice on talking with either Damascus or Tehran, accused Baker of having “quite deliberately created… the disastrous impression… that the United States is about to withdraw from Iraq.
if the force behind Iraq policy comes down to James Baker vs. the neocons, I’m betting my chips on JB.
its not on the front pages as yet but it seems the Republican party is a somewhat lower priority for the neo-cons.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Dec 6 2006 17:21 utc | 31

fwiw- The head of the Iraq National Library and Archives closed the library on Nov. 22 and will not re-open it until the situation stabilizes. This information comes from an email he sent to an archivist’s listserv.

Posted by: fauxreal | Dec 6 2006 18:19 utc | 32

rick 26 a properly educated U.S. populace perhaps could have prevented U.S. attempts at empire building
part of the dumbing down process uncle reminds us of. i viewed an interview w/richard dryfuss (of all people) who has decided to change professions in real life to one of a civics teacher. civics is no longer a regular course in US high schools and he says people should be trained how to run a country!

Posted by: annie | Dec 6 2006 20:22 utc | 33

Youtube baby…Richard Dreyfuss Sr. Advisor Oxford University on Democracy (part 1) Civics There are more, I susgest watching them all.
I remember civics in school, though at the time I hated it, it bored me to death and I knew at least in one instance that
it was my teachers slant of civics, one whom did not tolerate questions. But I recall enough that stayed with me to question basic things that do not even occur to the generation below me. I think my generation was the last to be taught civics, before they did away with it in public schools.
Thanks annie, that was timely…

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Dec 6 2006 20:51 utc | 34

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