If you don’t comment, I’ll end up with painted toenails …
And now we’ll switch back to serious News and Views …
Back to Main
January 2, 2007
OT 07-01
Comments
Can’t even look at archives, the wayback machine only goes to May 31, 2006. Does anyone have his postings copied?
Posted by: doug r | Jan 2 2007 2:01 utc | 3
Power Balance Shift in Israel-Palestine
An interesting analysis from Rami Khouri:
Seven events during the last half of 2006 suggest a new power shift resulting from Israeli conflicts in Gaza and Lebanon. The hope is that from these developments wiser and more humane – peaceful and negotiated – actions and agreements will come in the New Year, says Rami Khouri.
Posted by: Bea | Jan 2 2007 2:16 utc | 4
there is no way he can stay away forever. leopards can’t change their spots nor tigers their stripes, agitated lions roar… eventually.
Hi doug r
someone who wants to stay anonymous (though not Billmon) handed me a complete archive of Billmon’s site. I have to reformate it a bit to post here and I currently am busy with interacting with live, physical present, commentators at my place here.
So please give me a week or for preparing the things but then you may download from here a quite complete copy of Billmon’s works.
humble host b, I know it is much to ask, however, I’d be willing to pay to have it done, but would it also, be possible to burn a copy of our MOA archives and put it on cd/dvd, and perhaps mail it to me? Again, I’d pay for it.
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Jan 2 2007 2:42 utc | 7
Speaking on behalf of MoA lurkers, we request pictures from the New Year’s celebration. Painted toenails and all.
Please. 🙂
Posted by: byteb | Jan 2 2007 2:43 utc | 8
bea, thanks for khouri’s latest. as i have mentioned before his sister is a close personal friend of mine. they are palestinian. i consider him a moderate although i don’t consider him careful. lets hope this is very telling. at my home computer his editorial’s outlet is on my toolbar.
Oh how I wish I was in Europe with you all!! Very quiet here in Seattle. I will toast you with a nice glass of Syrah and sing a song sending some sound out into atmosphere. Who knows, if you listen, you might hear my little harmony. Or you’ll hear me trying to learn a blues scale. Either way, love, peace and joy to you and yours. Maybe next year I can get myself over the pond. Did spend New Year at the Hoffbrau Haus, Munich circa 1986. I don’t have Annie’s stamina ’cause I still to this day do not remember how I got back to the hostel. Somewhere in space, the film is still being played. Maybe I’ll check out the rerun and see how the night ended.
Posted by: SME in Seattle | Jan 2 2007 2:53 utc | 10
http://www.aljazeera.com/me.asp?service_ID=12538
Israel controls water resources in the occupied West Bank and the Gaza Strip, and seeks to take over water reserves in the Golan Heights and southern Lebanon, according to an Arab League report released on Sunday.
The study, carried out by the Arab Water Studies and Water Security Center, concluded that Israel was the main cause of water problems in the Middle East.
It said the average amount of water used by Israel is estimated at about two billion cubic meters, of which 65% comes from the West Bank, Gaza, southern Lebanon and the Syrian Golan Heights, occupied by Israel since 1967.
Posted by: mattes | Jan 2 2007 3:10 utc | 11
Matt Stoller puts up an invigorating piece on how people in teh States might want to discuss universal healthcare.
Summary quote:
So anyway, to recap, we already have universal health care, it’s just run by psychos.
Posted by: citizen | Jan 2 2007 7:26 utc | 13
@Uncle – but would it also, be possible to burn a copy of our MOA archives and put it on cd/dvd, and perhaps mail it to me?
That is part of the plans, but will take a few days to be done – I’m kind of busy protecting my toenails right now …
safely back at work, a special heartfelt thanks to b for his hospitality and making it possible to meet so many interesting people at the same time at the same place.
I have not yet got official approval for my proposed meeting place for the next bash but do not foresee any problems getting same.
btw, fauxreal’s victory in backgammon was quite amazing. It was looking like at least a gammon against her and maybe even a backgammon and then she hit one of my pieces that I carelessly exposed. I suspect Annie blowing on the dice may have had some affect on the outcome but I was unable to detect nor understand how she did it.
Posted by: dan of steele | Jan 2 2007 9:11 utc | 15
@Oscar – a write-up on Billmon in the Philadelphia Inquirer: Poured Out
The southpaw stopped pouring Dec. 28th. Now the saloon’s closed. You try to call up his site, and an error message bars the door. For many readers, including this one, it was the most satisfying watering hole on the strip.
…
I put in a call to Billmon’s home in suburban Philadelphia. A woman there said he wasn’t available. And he didn’t get back to me. Last spring we talked for about 45 minutes for a profile.
He was slowing down, questioning the worth of what he’d written, complaining about burn-out, wondering if he should just write blog on the history of travel. I published that, and Billmon proceeded to go on a vicious tear, writing with more energy and passion than he’d summoned for months.
I’d happily be made to look foolish again if it meant he returned to form. But I wouldn’t count on it.
…
In lue of JFL on the lamb…
Bangkok on alert after bombings
Bangkok’s governor and several foreign embassies have been encouraging people to stay at home and avoid moving about, especially in areas where there will be large crowds.
Have you ever been to Bangkok? Do you know how silly that sounds?…lol geez..
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Jan 2 2007 9:57 utc | 17
US President George W Bush intends to reveal a new Iraq strategy within days, the BBC has learnt. The BBC was told by a senior administration source that the speech setting out changes in Mr Bush’s Iraq policy is likely to come in the middle of next week.
Its central theme will be sacrifice.
Posted by: the Ghost of Saddam Hussein | Jan 2 2007 10:09 utc | 18
Bernhard said that the needs of his other job might require he shut it down or hand it over to someone else later this year
say it isn’t so b! please
Posted by: dan of steele | Jan 2 2007 10:11 utc | 19
dan of…back game babeeee…actually i did get lucky after annie blew on my dice. (get your mind out of the gutter uncle $cam.) she and i will be up for the next round sometime later this week. she’ll probably keep her lucky breath to herself.
n/a – i meant to thank you earlier for the wonderful links to music on ny’s eve. I didn’t have auld lang syne in my batch of cds. viele dank. if you are in the neighborhood, btw… tango awaits.
catlady is in frankfurt and will arrive soon. we expect accordion music and song. reeperbahn, perhaps. i guess she didn’t try to fit an accordion into her carry-on, tho.
luckily for her, we’re all sleep deprived still, so she’ll have some company for her jet lag.
waiting for askod to arrive for a bit of shopping for cigarettes, embroidery scissors and lettuce.
thanks for posting links, y’allll. it is hard to keep up with what is going on in the world when i have to fight with annie and beq to get to the computer. did see a little spongebob squarepants in german tho.
Posted by: fauxreal 2007 | Jan 2 2007 10:53 utc | 20
Spongebob Schwammkopf? I liked the French version better: Bob L’Eponge.
Posted by: ralphieboy | Jan 2 2007 13:07 utc | 21
Its central theme will be sacrifice.
Brilliant line, Ghost. I guess you’re not down and out after all.
Posted by: Bea | Jan 2 2007 13:51 utc | 22
Speaking of Gilad Atzmon, here he is, writing on The Spectacle of the Noose.
Posted by: Bea | Jan 2 2007 13:56 utc | 23
the catlady has landed. i repeat. the catlady has landed. one small step for catlady, one giant leap for moonkind.
Posted by: fauxreal 2007 | Jan 2 2007 14:34 utc | 24
I’m so glad that the sundry branches of the US government have their priorities straight. We already know about the unitary executive branch. Let’s hear from the increasingly superfluous other two branches for a moment.
The new Democrat majority in the legislation branch is apparently pissed off because they might have to show up for work in January instead of going on PAC-fueled benders in the Riviera.
The January junket to warmer climates — a postholiday tradition of sorts for some members of Congress — could be headed to the wayside.
An accelerated work schedule set up by the new Democratic leadership has put a halt on many January excursions funded by lobbyists. Given that Democrats are taking over the House and Senate in part because of GOP ethics scandals, some lawmakers are fearful of the voters’ wrath anyway if they go on the trips.
Put those tissues away, folks… we haven’t checked in with the solidly conservative judicial branch yet! Let’s see… according to Chief Justice of the SCOTUS, John Roberts, it’s more than just a “crying shame” that rubberstamping fascist seatwarmers are only payed six-digit salaries, it’s a bona fide “constitutional crisis” (I shit you negative!):
Federal district court judges are paid $165,200 annually; appeals court judges make $175,100; associate justices of the Supreme Court earn $203,000; the chief justice gets $212,100.
Thirty-eight judges have left the federal bench in the past six years and 17 in the past two years.
The issue of pay, says Roberts, “has now reached the level of a constitutional crisis.”
“Inadequate compensation directly threatens the viability of life tenure, and if tenure in office is made uncertain, the strength and independence judges need to uphold the rule of law — even when it is unpopular to do so — will be seriously eroded,” Roberts wrote.
…Over the past 16 years, Congress has provided the judiciary occasional cost-of-living adjustments, but Roberts said the absence of salary increases is “grievously unfair.”
“Grievously unfair”, hm? As unfair, as, say, letting an American citizen moulder in a brig for four years with no formal charges ever being filed against him? That kind of unfair? Or living in an entirely different country and having your family and friends killed or tortured because a pretender in the US White House’s daddy had a tiff with your leader a few decades back? That kind of unfair? Or are you talking about the kind of unfair where sanctions are placed against your country, even though more than 90% of the people are starving and human rights workers have described the food shortages as “critical”? Surely, you don’t mean that kind of unfair, do you?Um, shall I throw out some average salaries earned by productive members of your own society like, oh, say, teachers or construction workers, Your “Honor”, or are you through whining to us yet? Apparently not.
[Patrick]Leahy [D-VT]pledged “to do what I can to convince Congress to fairly evaluate this issue and the chief’s arguments so that we can see what solutions may be possible.”
It is the first time in the two-decade history of year-end reports by Roberts and his predecessor, the late William Rehnquist, that the chief justice’s message has focused entirely on a single subject.
There are “very good judges” in both of those categories, said Roberts, but a judiciary drawn more and more from only those categories “would not be the sort of judiciary on which we have historically depended to protect the rule of law in this country.”
“It changes the nature of the federal judiciary when judges are no longer drawn primarily from among the best lawyers in the practicing bar,” Roberts wrote.
Yeah, thanks, Pat. Somewhere in the billions continually approved by the US Congress to be misappropriated by Halliburton and the like, there must be some chump change left over to throw at Chief Justice Crybaby here. After all, we wouldn’t want to “change the nature of the federal judiciary” by attracting anything less than the most avaricious lawyers in the practicing bar.
I’m sure the founders of the nation of the United States would be appalled that people are required to show up for work and are not paid enough to buy their own learjets. Hell, I’ll take taxation without representation as long as I get an unlimited number of vacation days and a salary that looks like the GDP of Luxembourg. Hell, where’s Upton Sinclair when you need him to protest this barbarity? I’d write about it myself, but I’d be working pro bono and, as an American, I’m worth way too much to expend that kind of effort without some ridiculous level of compensation.
Posted by: Monolycus | Jan 2 2007 15:16 utc | 25
journalists, bah! that inquirer column b links to in #16 states
Russ Wellen, writing in OpEdNews, called Billmon “the man who may have done more to brng respectability to blogging than anybody.” But he noted that Billmon had worried in his posts that dedicated blogging came at a high price, robbing time from work and family. Billmon had posted a picture of his wife with the words, “You have to choose — the blog or us.”
but wellen wrote
Billmon periodically disappears from the Web for agonizing stretches — like for the last month. “Is this the end?” his readers wonder. One pictures his wife: “You have to choose — the blog or us.”
still, nice to see MoA get its props!
Posted by: b real | Jan 2 2007 15:35 utc | 26
yeah, i made it, and b picked me up at the airport, and annie poured me a glass of fine chianti the moment i walked in the door, and we haven’t stopped talking since and any moment now i’m going to succumb to sleep deprivation, but not yet. finding the letters on diese deutsches clavier will keep me awake for a little while (forget upper case, i’m with ya, slothrop. but where’s the verdammte Y????)
thanks, B for the catch on the Blinq article. I mis-read the phrase “One pictures his wife” to refer to a now-deleted Billmon post, not a reader imagining. have snipped the faulty ref — Dan
Posted by: daniel rubin | Jan 2 2007 16:01 utc | 28
Greetings comrades – love the live updates!
Monolycus – great rant. Totally agree on all points. Plus, the Supreme Court only works 9 months a year! I guess it is hard for them to enjoy their annual 3 month holiday on such a paltry salary. Sniff sniff.
Posted by: Maxcrat | Jan 2 2007 16:05 utc | 29
Novakula does a little investigating:
I checked with prominent Republicans around the country and found them confused and disturbed about the surge. … Why, they ask, is the president casting aside the commission’s recommendations and calling for more troops?
Maybe these guys should read the Asia Times Online to find out what the plan is:
… Now, the US and Britain are faced with the insurmountable problem of finding a way, at this extremely late date, to restore a rough balance of power to the region by attempting to reconstruct something similar to the mechanisms they eliminated and failed to replace in 2003. And they now have but one last chance, and they must be successful before the sectarian tinderbox they helped create is set aflame by only one of many impending sparks. All the odds are entirely against them.
The two powers realize they cannot literally reconstruct a dominant Sunni regime in Iraq to face down the Shi’ites and Iran in a bid to revive power-balancing mechanisms. Those former mechanisms are gone and they cannot be revived. Those are no longer workable strategies and policies, anyway.
But if Iran and the region’s Shi’ite factions are to be faced down and counterbalanced, only the Sunnis can hope to accomplish the task and hold it in place on a strategic basis, because the US, already severely over-stretched and bogged down in Iraq, cannot genuinely accomplish the feat by itself.
…
Now the US and Britain wish to exploit those very rivalries to push back the steadily advancing Shi’ite axis. That will almost inevitably accelerate the region’s already unstable sectarian hotspots into a series of full-blown explosions, from Saudi Arabia all the way to Iraq and Iran. At every vortex across the region where the forces of Shi’ite-Sunni rivalry are swirled into close contact with each other both factions will come to the full realization of the impending endgame and will spare no effort, energy and risk to come out the winner.
Or they could simply read their local WaPo’s Eugene Robinson:
Since history is written by those who rule, the annals of the U.S.-supported Iraqi government record that the deposed dictator Saddam Hussein was given a fair trial, sentenced to death for the mass murder of innocent Shiite civilians and duly executed by hanging on Dec. 30, 2006, in accordance with Iraqi law. A tragic era was brought to an end, according to the official history, opening the way for a brighter tomorrow.
But the dark, remorseless, unflinching cellphone video of the execution that quickly surfaced on the Internet tells an alternate history, one that is neither tidy nor hopeful — and that demonstrates, not just by its content but by its very existence, that forces other than the current beleaguered government intend to be the final authors of Iraqi history. That’s because they intend to be the ones in charge.
…
…the anonymous videographer wanted to show Sunni insurgents — and the rest of the Muslim world, in which Sunnis far outnumber Shiites — just how much is at stake in the civil war, and why Sunnis view the insurgency as a matter of survival. His message might have been this: If they can hang the fearsome Saddam Hussein like a dog, they can do the same to any of us.
OK, Bush and Repubs: please tell me what the mission of our troop “surge” is going to be.
Posted by: Hamburger | Jan 2 2007 16:08 utc | 30
it is very clear from me – that tho i might very irregularly write a post elsewhere (to five thanks to al jazeera, for example) it is to you b & our community & this site that my on line energies are devoted
& for good reason, the synthesis of this community & that of le speakeasy are an uncommon alchemy
to be cherishe, to be honoured, to be aided
to be frank – i think the public murder of saddam hussein has brought in dark tidings of the empire s& this year will require our energy, strength & contact
(just a petit aside – on french tv on the news there has been this implicity racist rendering of the assistange germany is giving to mothers having babies in 2007 – making a bug deal of it being a person of african origin & making big of the fact – that she held all in until the hour of the new year passed)
i am tired beyond belief of the fear that they furrow, of the security they insist on, of the implicit racist insults that pass for general knowledge – france has had the best of public television – so when even they reproduce the vulgarity & the venality of cnnfoxbbc – the rareness of a kind of ‘clarity’ in information cannot be understated
Posted by: r’giap | Jan 2 2007 19:00 utc | 33
at least france the public are treated as citizens. here, they are only consumers to be constantly exploited.
DHS To Seize Eyeballs At U.S. Airports
The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) is ringing in the New Year with a plan to address the arguably unbearable time it takes for airline passengers to traverse their way through screening checkpoints, The Peacock Report has discovered. TSA will achieve this heightened scale of efficiency by joining hands with another hallowed U.S. institution: the advertising industry.
According to a presolicitation notice that TPR located via a routine search of the FedBizOpps contracting database, TSA and the Dept. of Homeland Security (DHS) soon will launch a pilot project that seeks to turn airport checkpoints into bombardment centers of commercial offerings. TSA’s stated short-term goal for the one-year experiment is an assessment of “industry interest in advertising on available spaces within Passenger Screening Checkpoints,” the Dec. 21 document says.
The agency’s unstated, implicit goal is to generate additional revenue for the federal government, a task it will accomplish by seizing a captive audience of eyeballs, 24/7, “in select airports throughout the [U.S.] and its territories.”
Posted by: b real | Jan 2 2007 19:43 utc | 34
someone who wants to stay anonymous (though not Billmon) handed me a complete archive of Billmon’s site. I have to reformate it a bit to post here and I currently am busy with interacting with live, physical present, commentators at my place here.
So please give me a week or for preparing the things but then you may download from here a quite complete copy of Billmon’s works.
Posted by: b | Jan 1, 2007 9:20:31 PM | 6
I have an app that might be useful with that I’m wickedly pressed for time at present but … – drop a comment (won’t be published) on my site Gorillas Guides telling me how to get in touch and I’ll do so.
Posted by: markfromireland | Jan 2 2007 19:53 utc | 35
upps – comment 32 was by me, b, not by catlady. She had used this machine before me and I didn’t change the name she put in – sorry.
b #36
It gets so we recognize the different voices all coming out of the same machine and scrambling the tags. Even more fun for those of us only commenting tangentially. We almost hear rooms full of lively, intertwining discussions, spirited jet lag, and toenail polishing.
Posted by: small coke | Jan 2 2007 20:57 utc | 37
We almost hear rooms full of lively, intertwining discussions, spirited jet lag, and toenail polishing.
You’ve got better hearing than I.
-GFO
Posted by: GuyFromOhio | Jan 2 2007 21:47 utc | 38
A belated shout-out to the MoA’ers, in both cyber and meat-space, and thanks for the thought-food and reality doses throughout the year.
It’s so funny for me to imagine the meeting in Europe, like certain characters from Shakespeare’s many plays all getting together around a table and interacting in real time. Thanks for sharing that, and I’m sending you hugs and hugs.
For better or worse I make my living processing information (reading trends, valuing alternative outcomes, allocating capital in the markets) and so the “truthiness” of my sources is of more than academic interest. But more valuable by far to me personally is the honest questioning and debate at the Moon, and the spirit of cooperatively searching for a wider truth that we can somehow all share.
I look back at many special situations in my life, often only recognising them as such after the fact; but now some of them last long enough for me to realise their magic and beauty while they are still going on. Moon is one of those very special (and new) situations, and it is happening RIGHT NOW.
Thanks, and all the best for 2007.
Posted by: PeeDee | Jan 2 2007 21:53 utc | 39
Footage of Saddam’s Execution was a US Plan to “Foment Sedition”
Al-Jazeera TV, 1 January 2007. Interview with Iraqi writer Dr Walid al-Zubaydi.
Commenting on the possible “ramifications” of executing Saddam Husayn, Al-Zubaydi says: “Undoubtedly, the US occupation in Iraq wanted the last moment of the execution to drag the Iraqis into what is worse after the failure to carry out the most dangerous conspiracy against the Iraqi people; namely, sectarian sedition.”
He adds that the last footage of the execution was leaked to the media “according to a US plan that depends on the effects of the psychological war and propaganda that aim at achieving a clearly known objective.”
Al-Zubaydi says: “Obviously, the last footage was taken wilfully and carefully. In order to avert any legal responsibility concerning the media, they fabricated things to show that the footage was taken stealthily. Everybody knows that the Americans surround the chamber [of execution ], and cameras cannot be allowed in. So they invented the idea of using mobile phones although no violations can take place. However, this is a play designed to foment sedition. They prepared some people to arouse a certain sect to show that the execution was implemented on sectarian grounds.
He continues to say: “I believe that this is the last attempt by the administration of the occupation to penetrate the Iraqi society.”
And from the Iraqi news agency VOI:
Two officials filmed Saddam’s hanging
Baghdad, Jan 2, (VOI) – Two officials, one of them a senior government official, filmed the execution of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein with their mobile phones, Monqez al-Feraun al-Fatlawi, the assistant prosecutor in the trial of former president Saddam Hussein and one of those who attended the hanging of Saddam, said on Tuesday.
(snip)
All those who were transferred to the execution location “were thoroughly searched by the U.S. forces which banned any person regardless of his position from taking a mobile phone, even those without cameras, into the room,” Fatlawi said.
The two people who filmed the execution “were also searched …and I don’t know how and where from they brought the equipment they filmed the process with,” he added.
Posted by: Alamet | Jan 3 2007 1:19 utc | 40
david brooks on ford’s funeral:
“tapped into deep american norman rockwell values”
booyahhh!
Posted by: slothrop | Jan 3 2007 1:27 utc | 41
everything is more or less about distracting — away from saving Baby Bush’s legacy & the Repub party.
Posted by: jony_b_cool | Jan 3 2007 1:42 utc | 42
ooh, PeeDee, can I be Beatrice?
I should be really jetlagged by now, but somehow the combination of the marginal rest I achieved on the red-eye flight and the amazing energy converging in Hamburg has kept me in wide-awake zone.
Fauxreal made amazing vegetable soup for dinner, accompanied by plates of good bread, cheese, sausage and that wonderful Chianti. We followed dinner with a double feature of high-end kung fu films, battling the DVD player for language control, and taking assorted naps as needed when the plot was less important than sleep. (I won’t say who snores.)
Highlight for this evening was an excursion to Blaues Haus for wonderful froufrou drinks (the kind with lots of fruit juice) and and preview of the Cafe Buenos Aires.
Blaues Haus is blue on the outside, with a red light by the door, dark and quirky on the inside, with a _great_ drink menu. Rick Happ had Sex on the Beach and took off for a tour of the Reeperbahn before catching his train….
(TMI warning) Blaues Haus has the greatest loos–the ladies’ has cute little recessed lighting units–little black-lit disco balls hanging from chains in tiny alcoves behind the plumbing–and then you realize it’s the pull-chain for the flush, how chic is that? We’ll have a more complete experience at Cafe Buenos Aires tomorrow night, but the beer preview is positive (coming from a Pacific Northwest beer snob) They have a piano, so I may be a menace tomorrow. Tonight two young musicians, late late in the evening, agreed to share some music, and Beq, b and I were chastized by one of their friends for talking instead of listening and supporting. Ah…they had sweet and true voices, but I’ve played too many gigs to semi-attentive audiences to take the admonition too seriously.
More adventures tomorrow…’tis time to catch up on sleep.
OT- on a private note –
I was wondering why this girl said she loves green and said she always wears green and I currently see only brown cloth on her (well, except those gloves of course)
definitly no judgement – just wondering …
2007 is going to be a decider in so many, many ways
the sino-soviet split appears to have healed at last, and putin’s approval rating w/in russia is put at 80%+ by recent poll there (compare and contrast you know who), but there is a very long way to go
plus how to avoid planetary suicide by suv? (2006 = warmest recorded year in uk since record-keeping began 350 years ago)
a lot of work to be sure for moonkind(tm), but what the hell, count me in
Posted by: Dismal Science | Jan 3 2007 3:01 utc | 47
it is with heavily lidded eyes that this amazonette has returned from a raucous new year’s celebration in hamburg. seems somehow strange that i will not awake to the sound of laughter coming from bernhard’s infamous kitchen (in addition to hosting moa bernhard is a formidable chef and gracious entertainer). it is small comfort that i will wake in my own bed and eat a new york bagel rather than the customary slice of bread and gouda.
i don’t know that i have words to express the gratitude that i feel for the camradery and sharing of the past several days. that i have now looked into the eyes of so many mooners and conducted open thread discussions into the wee hours of 2007 seems simultaneously amazing and yet altogether natural to me. we may not have solved the problems of the world (yet), but the soul of this commentator has been touched. i am even nostalgic for the haze of cigarette smoke that shared bernhard’s kitchen with the best set of hearts and minds i have known in a long time.
thank you, bernhard, annie, beq, fauxreal, askod, hamburger, danofsteele, and rick happ for an unforgettable weekend, and cheers to those who remain chez bernhard to carry on with tomorrow night’s gathering and the sojourn to berlin. until the next one – tschuss!
Posted by: conchita | Jan 3 2007 3:04 utc | 48
The hanging of Saddam (as noted above) was allowed to turn into a sectarian lynching, there’s really no other explanation for it. The U.S. controlled all aspects of the post trial period, and were in a position to control all aspects of the execution timing, personal present, etc. The execution was either tacitly allowed or made to play out in the manner that it did. I can see several reasons that this might work for the occupation playbook, givin that the steep price for allowing the execution to devolve into a lynching must entail (for the U.S. image). Allowing the Sadrist personal (with cameras no less) into the (un-policed) execution chamber was a guarentee that things would get out of control fast. This in turn a) allows the Sadrists to indulge their worst sectarian impulses, to picture themselves (literally, on camera) as “extremists”, and b) shows that the Maliki government is either unable or unwilling to reel in these “extremists” and shows itself to be generally incompetent. The other big thing to hasppen is that Saddam has, against all odds, has been set up in a perfect martyrdom scenario — that will reverberate throughout the Sunni arab world, against the rising tide of Shiaism/Iranian influence. By all appearances this was a set up, in a bait and switch scheme — the switch part to come at a later date.
Posted by: anna missed | Jan 3 2007 3:20 utc | 49
maybe soon we’ll look back on 2006 as being one of the coldest years in memory
it’s gettin’ hot in here…
World faces hottest year ever, as El Niño combines with global warming
A combination of global warming and the El Niño weather system is set to make 2007 the warmest year on record with far-reaching consequences for the planet, one of Britain’s leading climate experts has warned.
…
Professor Jones said: “El Niño makes the world warmer and we already have a warming trend that is increasing global temperatures by one to two tenths of a degrees celsius per decade. Together, they should make 2007 warmer than last year and it may even make the next 12 months the warmest year on record.”
The warning of the escalating impact of global warming was echoed by Jim Hansen, the American scientist who, in 1988, was one of the first to warn of climate change.
In an interview with The Independent, Dr Hansen predicted that global warming would run out of control and change the planet for ever [sic] unless rapid action is taken to reverse the rise in carbon emissions.
Posted by: b real | Jan 3 2007 3:39 utc | 50
Anna Missed: You should read Imperial Life in the Emerald City. Picture a US colonial administration lead by the equivalents of 100 Heckuva Job Brownies, a bunch of 20 year old young republicans with the skill sets of bananna slugs, Bernie Kerik, and a large number of beltway bandits homing in on the cash. There is nothing about the execution of Saddam that cannot be explained by the sheer stupidity and ignorance of this team, under the gentle guidance of the Mehdi Army. It’s typified by people who go to Iraq to make policy and don’t begin to comprehend that a total ignorance of middle eastern and iraqi history, culture, and language could be a problem. I have never had anything but a low opinion of the Bush regime, but this book was a shocker. Years ago I used to argue with libertarians for sport, and it’s exactly the same kind of shallowness, smug self-regard, and total naivete at work. These people are chumps, not masterminds. They must attract a swarm of 3-card-monte dealers wherever they go and sit by the mailbox hoping for that check from Nigeria.
Posted by: citizen k | Jan 3 2007 3:44 utc | 51
conchita and danof – we already miss you both. it was odd not to see hamburger and bun last night, too. annie and I hit the wall and missed cocktail hour. I have no idea what happened to askod…assume the trip back to h and b’s was fine.
I missed the goodbyes to rick. smooches! 🙂
btw, danof, tell gianni ciao and great tractor.
and, continuing the tradition of annie’s first post from here…obviously a catlady is no dog!
at catlady’s request, as per the beef stew recipe earlier in moa history, and for those of you eating along at home..
chervil soup (not exactly what we had here but close, and how I usually make it and in u.s. measurements…)
2 T butter (butter is imp., not fake stuff)in a large pot to saute (can’t find my accent aigue here)
2 large leeks (with as much green as possible included)
1 large onion, or two
(saute these for a bit in the butter while you peel and cut up…)
3 large potatoes
this is the basic. you can add, as we did, celery and carrots.
fill pot with water and boil all until soft.
dissolve 3 knorr-ish vegetable boullion cubes too.
when veggies have cooked, use your mouli blender to puree the veggies in the cooking pot. if you don’t have one of those, you can puree in batches in a blender and return to the pot. the soup should be totally blended…smooth, no chunks of veggies.
add at least one third cup of minced chervil and mix it throughout. add pepper to taste.
let the soup sit for 8 hours or so if possible.
reheat so that it’s very hot before serving. serve with a baquette. a typical euro-soup.
very easy.
here’s a salad that we also did last night-
wash and tear butterhead lettuce into pieces, shake or spin out water. put into a bowl and toss with a good mayonnaise… enough to glaze the lettuce, at least…really should be a bit more than that.
in another serving bowl, mix-
1 part (1-3 cup?) first press olive oil to 2 parts balsamic or white or combo thereof vinegar. add fresh coarsely ground pepper and a t. or so of dijon mustard. whisk until blended.
add chopped tomato and sliced cucumber (and onion, if you like.) stir it up, little darling.
serve the tom-cukes on top of the lettuce. again, easy.
nothing to compare with the beautiful and tasty spread from our ny eve feast.
oh, after dinner and before cocktails, serve House of Flying Daggers and Hero (jet li version) with b’s dark chocolate-covered marzipan pralines.
add naps.
Posted by: fauxreal 2007 | Jan 3 2007 6:59 utc | 52
Elliott Abrams currently quietly at work on Iran as noted here: link
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elliott_Abrams
Posted by: missingbill | Jan 3 2007 7:00 utc | 53
citizen k,
For sure, stupidity is always a prime candidate in explaining what this gang does, either intentionally or not. But THIS, recently floated and got me thinking that maybe there was/is a plan behind this seeming major fuck up. Just that there may be way more implications behind it. And anything that smacks of divide and conquer makes my wheels spin.
Posted by: anna missed | Jan 3 2007 7:34 utc | 54
above link works but, second piece down; “Bush Maliki Plan off to Shakey Start”
Posted by: anna missed | Jan 3 2007 7:36 utc | 55
Citizen k – Imperial Life in the Emerald City by WaPo Chandrasekaran discloses that Elizabeth Cheney, the vice president’s daughter, did important hiring for the Green Zone.
p195 l32
“Garner asked Rumsfeld for the “best minds in the nation “ to draw up a political transition plan for Iraq. Rumsfeld passed the request to Liz Cheney, the vice president’s daughter, who was an assistant secretary at State. She dispatched…”
Liz Cheney is also working quietly.
“Elizabeth Cheney, the vice president’s daughter, who was the former deputy assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern Affairs, served as cochairwoman before she took a maternity leave earlier this year.”
link
Posted by: missingbill | Jan 3 2007 7:45 utc | 56
So why was it necessary for the Bush Administration to execute Sadam?
He could argue that he never resigned as President and become President again. That is what happened with Chavez.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venezuelan_coup_attempt_of_2002
Posted by: missingbill | Jan 3 2007 8:03 utc | 57
@anna @49 –
The “Sadr” calls at the Saddam hanging look to me as a set up to enrange Sunni against al-Sadr, the most nationalistic force today in Iraq. The folks at the hanging were planned to be there and to do what they did. It served a purpose …
FBI details possible detainee abuse
FBI agents documented more than two dozen incidents of possible mistreatment at the Guantanamo Bay military base, including one detainee whose head was wrapped in duct tape for chanting the Quran and another who pulled out his hair after hours in a sweltering room.
Documents released Tuesday by the FBI offered new details about the harsh interrogation practices used by military officials and contractors when questioning so-called enemy combatants.
The reports describe a female guard who detainees said handled their genitals and wiped menstrual blood on their face. Another interrogator reportedly bragged to an FBI agent about dressing as a Catholic priest and “baptizing” a prisoner.
Some military officials and contractors told FBI agents that the interrogation techniques had been approved by the Defense Department, including directly by former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld.
yes b,
and its also interesting how this event is also quite a blow to the Maliki government — the government Bush was praising just a couple weeks ago, so much for that (aka Donald Rumsfeld).
Also I have a little trouble with the missing links “plan” idea that Maliki would allow the Sadrists in on the execution as some kind of favor to them. Any fool could anticipate the Sadrists would howl with vengence, being allowed too, not to mention the Sunni reaction to it all. And its also counterintuitive to think such a “plan” would do anything but inflame the civil war, which certainly is NOT in the interest of the Maliki government. The U.S. government however, does stand to gain from hyping the civil war as cover for dissolving the elected Iraqi government. That Iraqi government of “national salvation” may be just around the corner.
Posted by: anna missed | Jan 3 2007 9:12 utc | 60
@anna missed et al…
They’ll do it better next time….promise..
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Jan 3 2007 13:30 utc | 61
Malaki “would prefer to leave the job before his term ends”.
Be careful what you wish for …
Posted by: Hamburger | Jan 3 2007 14:26 utc | 62
Jerome has deconstructed a Bush message to the new Democratic Congress, taken from WSJ. It is worth reading, although he has written it on Kos and not on Euro Trib.
LINK
Posted by: ww | Jan 3 2007 14:31 utc | 63
updates from Hamburg contingent:
Steamed kale for breakfast (not b’s fault, blame Annie) started us off with fortitude. Took the train, verbally blogging all the way (everything but the links) to meet Rick Happ and ASKOD downtown–hopefully Rick will post about his adventures last night on the Reeperbahn. I won’t spill the beans, but after hearing the tale, I was impressed by his continued verticality this morning.
Toured a small section of the harbour, including the giant automobile elevators of the Alter Elbtunnel, then the beautiful Rathaus, and finally the Museum der Kunst und Gewerbe (arts and crafts) with its lovely Art Nouveau collection, old keyboard instruments (proto-pianofortes), new fashion design, photographs, maps, antiquities…a place to return to sometime in the future, far too much to see all in one afternoon. Late lunch at Max und Consort and a walk in the rain back to the subway.
Resting up for tonight’s party at Cafe Buenos Aires, with a special musical surprise or two.
Tomorrow, we take Berlin (Manhattan has to wait).
this just sounds like a great opp for disseminating lies & misinfo, etc…
secrecynews: Wikileaks and Untraceable Document Disclosure
A new internet initiative called Wikileaks seeks to promote good government and democratization by enabling anonymous disclosure and publication of confidential government records.
“WikiLeaks is developing an uncensorable version of WikiPedia for untraceable mass document leaking and analysis,” according to the project web site.
“Our primary targets are highly oppressive regimes in China, Russia, central eurasia, the middle east and sub-saharan Africa, but we also expect to be of assistance to those in the west who wish to reveal unethical behavior in their own governments and corporations.”
…
Wikileaks invited Secrecy News to serve on its advisory board. We explained that we do not favor automated or indiscriminate publication of confidential records.
In the absence of accountable editorial oversight, publication can more easily become an act of aggression or an incitement to violence, not to mention an invasion of privacy or an offense against good taste.
and then some…
Posted by: b real | Jan 3 2007 20:39 utc | 66
breal@66:
Thanks for finding that one. I am always interested in what those Jeffersonian democrats are up to.
Posted by: Anonymous | Jan 3 2007 22:27 utc | 67
Daddy Bush Attacks JFK “Conspiracy Theorists”
Former President triumphs Warren Commission at Ford’s funeral; Are the Bush’s breaking down?
The only man in America who does not remember where he was on 11-22-63.
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Jan 3 2007 23:03 utc | 68
i’m probably on the wrong thread. jesus, i am for sure the least capable person (talented writer etc)to describe what has been the most awesome everything european, moon/wine/tweek light/JANA/CATLADY experience.
y’know those times when all the stars are in your favor…b is way too cool. just walked him home and tucked him in. going back to the bar to reel in the others cuz we’re catchin the bus to berlin in the AM.
damn what a night to remember..really. no words of mine can do it justice. i’ll get the gang in shortly(w/luck) catlady did us proud.PROUD. very hard act to follow because jana live is out of this friggin world. ok, late night drunk blather from annie, but i couldn’ head out in the cold w/out checkin in.
oh, i gave a little speech for the mooners.
i’ll make sure faux,hamburger,beQ,askod(to cool for school)rick(got ta see to believe),ok ok gotta go or i’neverr get gone..
another night in hamburger
annie “drunk blather” blogging – almost like pictures! or video!
Speech?
Posted by: small coke | Jan 4 2007 0:32 utc | 71
I cannot do justice either. know the word “gezellig?” (hope I spelled that right through the argentinian vino… )
allez- mijn eurospanto – annie arranged for jana to play at the Buenos Aires cafe this evening long before we arrived.
zo, we came to the cafe and jana played her accordion and songs. then catlady took the stage with the piano and played “moon of alabama” –and we all sang along, as much as was possible, a dozen or so bottles of argentinian wine into the night… and b ordered shots of whiskey all around to toast billmon and all at moon of alabama…and I don’t even drink whiskey… but did tonight.
and catlady did a fine, fine version of tom waits’s Reeperbahn, to which we also sang along, tho beq was the only one who knew all the words…
and annie walked b back the two blocks to his place and returned and jana played some more.
earlier b had sent jana the link to moa when he posted her music. she remembered everything everyone had written about her music. b had made a poster for her performance tonight and had used a catlady quote saying…if brecht and piaf had a love child…which jana thought was far too pretentious, considering the esteem with which germans held those two. jana is also playing for a theatre production of T. Williams’ Glass Menagerie here, and many, many of her compadres showed up to cheer her on as she played music from the show.
I explained the term “break a leg” to one of the other members of the theater group… hopefully she didn’t think I was a strange american..or at least not because of that.
I left annie dancing at the piano as the bar owner played. I had danced the merengue with catlady and beq for a bit, and we only hit one sweet blind lady in the head…no joke. bad catlady, bad, bad. 🙂
ensemble we were: b, annie, catlady, beq, askod, hamburger and hunnie bun, rickhapp, et moi. if I forgot someone/something, het spite mij.
no pictures are possible now because b doesn’t have the software/cables to upload photogs. all for the better, imo… I told hamburger the “create your own cleavage” photogs were verboten.
no cherie blairs in the crowd, btw. and anyway, I left my strap-on tool at home, so none of us can take advantage of b. (bad cloned poster, bad, bad)
guten abend schatzes. of iets dirkelijks. so saith fauxreal in euroengsperanto. is it terrible to find comfort in the friendship of others around the world, in the face of such suffering?
is it not a good thing to bring something good to life?
as catlady said, which I will hopelessly mangle, sans doubt, this is what peace is about. regular, everyday people who can sit together and share a meal and a drink and music and laughter…and the power players of the world be damned. the people can come together, as arundhati roy has noted, to resist the call to hatred, to refuse to be a pawn in their games.
namaste.
Posted by: fauxreal 2007 | Jan 4 2007 0:46 utc | 72
rowan, small coke: i think you will wait a long, long time before we see photos on moa, but if you send email addresses to me, annie, etc., you might receive some photos – with clearances, of course. i have a small cache from the first few days of this event and will send on those that are approved by the subject/s and photographer/s. (a little reciprocity might also go a long way.)
Posted by: conchita | Jan 4 2007 0:49 utc | 73
just read fauxreal 2007’s post and damn, wish i’d stay another coupla days. what was i thinking???
Posted by: conchita | Jan 4 2007 0:55 utc | 74
CP: we’ve watched the video of Cherie a dozen times, and we think it means nothing, but we’ll have to watch it some more to see if we can find the occult meaning.
conchita: many kisses, and you are here in our hearts.
(sorry, all the orgies y’all are imagining are in your heads, but we won’t say which head…..)
Posted by: fauxreal 2007, beq, annie, catlady | Jan 4 2007 1:01 utc | 75
sorry, all the orgies y’all are imagining are in your heads,
i can’t keep track of who saya what around here but i will not sit by as someone tells untruths about the deeds we are up to.
its for us to know and you to find out
drunk in hamburg
Posted by: massive amend via annie (plus the amazons) | Jan 4 2007 1:14 utc | 76
As others have said, nothing can describe the great time tonight had by all. The music and friendship was the best. Some friends and I were going to continue the partying but decided not to, since any other place or further partying tonight would be a letdown after such joy.
Bernhard can truly be proud. And as annie said, catlady playing Reeperbaum at the piano was terrific and jana’s soul was enthralling. Conchita, you were in my thoughts knowning you had to leave early and missed this – you would have loved it. Thanks to Bernhard and to the amazon brigade for bringing us together. I feel we are all more than friends, more like a family. I hope that doesn’t sound too corny but it is hard to describe the great feeling. We are all different but yet so much the same. Time for a quick nap and then early in the morning back home across the pond.
Posted by: Rick | Jan 4 2007 1:34 utc | 77
not me. not me. and I do not take credit for the last two amazon posts. but need to add that catlady and jana played reeperbahn together, after catlady showed jana the chord changes. jana didn’t know the song but she’s adding it to her repertoire. music is the universal language, isn’t it? fr2007
Posted by: the piano has been drinking | Jan 4 2007 2:04 utc | 78
b/c typepad is a fuckin’ piece of shit w/ it’s dumbass spam filter, i bring you a short post (w/ multiple links) in two parts.
=========
ladies, have i got a makeover for you
…or so went the pitch
reuters: Infamous Guatemalan army unit confronts new foes
A picture of a fierce-looking gorilla emblazoned with the words “Welcome to Hell” once hung over the entrance of Central America’s toughest military training center, the notorious “Kaibil” school in Guatemala.
Now, visitors to the base in the Peten jungle are greeted by a cheery painting of a soldier holding hands with a blonde-haired girl. It says, “The Guatemalan Kaibils, respected by their adversaries, loved by the people. Have a nice trip!”
The red-bereted fighters, who once ate dog guts as training, want to leave behind a sordid past of human rights crimes and project a new image as international peacekeepers and a front against rampant drug gangs.
Created in the 1970s to fight a counter-insurgency campaign against Guatemala’s leftist guerrillas during a 36-year civil war that left over 200,000 dead, the Kaibils were infamous as one of the most brutal special forces units in Latin America.
of course, the two reporters that crafted this pitch omit the historical fact that the founder of the kaibiles, pablo nuila hub, was a graduate of the united states’ SOA, or of the long record of u.s. support that went beyond financial & weapon assistance to counterinsurgency forces in guatemala throughout the cold war period, or that human rights watch reported ” parachute and jungle-survival training by U.S. Special Forces for Guatemala’s elite Kaibil counterinsurgency troops in the Petén in November 1988″, and into the 90’s “Green Berets openly trained the Kaibil massacre force”, etc etc. just pointing out the influence to help fill in some details, ya know.
Posted by: b real | Jan 4 2007 5:16 utc | 81
When the war ended in 1996, the army’s budget was slashed, its ranks depleted, and the highly trained combat force was left looking for a new enemy.
At about the same time, drug trafficking exploded along the porous border with Mexico, from where sophisticated and well-equipped gangs ship cocaine to the United States.
But the Kaibils cannot legally fight the dealers.
“They laugh at us,” said Kaibil commander Colonel Eduardo Morales Alvarez, as soldiers on the base were setting up a beauty pageant for teens from the nearby town of Poptun. “They drive past in their cars full of weapons and there’s nothing I can do, because I am not authorized,” he said.
The U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency estimates some 75 percent of cocaine shipped from Colombia to the United States passes through Central America, much of that via smuggler-built landing strips and roads in the lawless jungle region around Poptun.
The drug gangs are so well armed and trained that even the Kaibils, held responsible for savage rapes and mutilations of villagers in the civil war, are worried.
“To be honest, I’m scared,” said Morales. “These people are psychopaths, they kill each other like they kill cockroaches.”
can you say projection? now times have indeed changed since that jesusfreakgenocidaire rios montt unleashed the kaibile on the children & women of dos erres the day after reagan visited him, complaining “to the press that his Central American counterpart, an evangelical Christian with strong ties to the fundamentalist movement in the United States, was getting a ‘bad deal’ from his critics … assur[ing] reporters that Rios Montt was ‘totally committed to democracy'”[1]. but to hear the much-hated/feared kaibile claim to be “scared” of drug gangs? stop pissing on my leg & then trying to tell me it’s raining. both the u.s. green beret’s and the kaibile’s were training the mexican army last i heard. they were involved in attacking the zapatista’s over a decade ago. and they’ve recently been on a “peacekeeping” mission in the congo, where six kaibile soldiers were “ambushed” & exterminated earlier last yr. i’d imagine that the buildup in worries about drug gangs in mexico might have something to do w/ the revolutionary tensions ongoing in that country right now.
1. from greg grandin’s empire’s workshop: latin america, the united states, and the rise of the new imperialism
btw, didja know that illinois rep jerry weller is married to montt’s daughter?
Posted by: b real | Jan 4 2007 5:17 utc | 82
Pentagon Redefines ‘Emergency’
“It’s a feeding frenzy,” says an army official involved in budget planning. “Using the supplemental budget, we’re now buying the military we wish we had,” he says, referring to former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s 2004 quote about inadequate equipment for troops.
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Jan 4 2007 5:45 utc | 83
Just for the record billmon’s wife seems just as puzzled about why he quit but confirms the bar is gone for good. She predicts that he won’t be able to stay quite for long, he needs the intellectual stimulation and the audience, but doesn’t know what he might do next. She says she didn’t mind the blogging, at least she knew where he was and what he was doing, but worried about his lack of sleep.
Posted by: phoenix | Jan 4 2007 16:41 utc | 84
I second that, thanks phoenix.
So I am up and about, can someone from the rest of the brigade check their email…
Posted by: a swedish kind of death | Jan 7 2007 13:23 utc | 86