Open Thread …
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January 21, 2007
Sunday’s News
Comments
Frank Rich: Lying Like It’s 2003
In reality we’re learning piece by piece that it is the White House that has no plan. Ms. Rice has now downsized the surge/escalation into an “augmentation,” inadvertently divulging how the Pentagon is improvising, juggling small deployments in fits and starts. No one can plausibly explain how a parallel chain of command sending American and Iraqi troops into urban street combat side by side will work with Iraqis in the lead (it will report to a “committee” led by Mr. Maliki!). Or how $1 billion in new American reconstruction spending will accomplish what the $30 billion thrown down the drain in previous reconstruction spending did not.
All of this replays 2003, when the White House refused to consider any plan, including existing ones in the Pentagon and State Department bureaucracies, for coping with a broken post-Saddam Iraq. Then, as at every stage of the war since, the only administration plan was for a propaganda campaign to bamboozle American voters into believing “victory” was just around the corner.
The ‘surge’ is a red herring to disguise what they really want to do.
Assuming that we are still dealing with rational people. If we are not (as I suspect), then it is imperative to get Congress to stop the military buildup as soon as possible.
Marching won’t do it. No one pays attention to the marchers. It has to come from the entire Senate so contact your representatives now!
Posted by: hopping madbunny | Jan 21 2007 11:54 utc | 2
How to Bury a Secret: Turn It Into Paperwork
So where are all those millions of newly declassified documents?
On 12/31/06, some 700 million pages of secret documents became declassified and public. This would seem a victory for freedom of information, but it is not so simple. Declassification is not the same as release.You still can’t rush down to the Nat’l Archives to check them out. In fact, it could be years before these public documents can be viewed.
Some of the most damning are already available.
Did you, for instance, like the Machurian Candidate? Request CIA MORI ID 140401, and 17748
A few links, and links to links to… Some are blogs. none are mine. I intend no spam. ymmv…etc.etc.etc..
CIA Releases Mind Control Documents
CIA’s MKULTRA
MKULTRA is one of the most disturbing instances of intelligence community abuse on record.
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Jan 21 2007 14:28 utc | 3
I will write about something very alien to the Mesopotamian misadventure but topical of the cultural and historical moment that we live. My wife was invited yesterday to a birthday party offered by a couple of Mexican immigrants. My wife had helped the mother of this child throughout the pregnacy by translating since these people speak no English and understand very little. It is a program organized by our diocese and it is very successful in helping distressed mothers. The distress may be the pregnacy itself or the social conditions within which the pregnancy occurs. The parents of this child feel very obliged towards my wife so they invited her to a dinner in a restaurant that serves food from the state of Oaxaca. The participants at the gathering were all from the state of Oaxaca all of them Indians of the purest kind and they were mostly relatives or people born in villages adjacent to the village of the hosts. They ate Mexican style and sang Mexican style. Because these people cannot be understood by the locals they might be called Barbarians since the original meaning of the word is that of unintelligible gibberish. Whole families have come and whole families live in close social relations and the relation with the main society is external. That makes me remember the Goths and the Alans and the Franks and the Vandals. The Barbarians invaded the Empire as whole nations not just individuals. It took the whole Middle Ages to bring them into a semblance, only a semblance, of Latinitas. Thus on one side we see this demographic pressure on the USA and on the other side the feeling of the aborigines that their social and cultural systems are subverted. But History doesn’t care about opinion. She has her own program.
Posted by: jlcg | Jan 21 2007 14:55 utc | 5
Some updates on how the Iraqi oil law is progressing:
NYT: Draft Law Keeps Central Control Over Oil in Iraq
BAGHDAD, Jan. 19 — After months of tense bargaining, a cabinet-level committee has produced a draft law governing Iraq’s vast oil fields that would distribute all revenues through the federal government and grant Baghdad wide powers in exploration, development and awarding major international contracts.
The draft, described Friday by several members of the committee, could still change and must be approved by the Iraqi cabinet and Parliament before it becomes law. Negotiations have veered off track in the past, and members of the political and sectarian groups with interest in the law could still object as they read it more closely.
But if approved in anything close to its present form, the law would appear to settle a longstanding debate over whether the oil industry and its revenues should be overseen by the central government or the regions dominated by Kurds in the north and Shiite Arabs in the south, where the richest oil fields are located.
And the article ends with this:
“The international companies keep contacting me — every week, without exception,” Mr. Shahristani said. “They are all very, very keen.”
Stratfor: The Problems with Iraq’s New Oil Law
This new draft oil law is not just not the final word; it could more accurately be described of as part of the preamble. Once the al-Maliki government steps down, we will see another new energy law. Another will come after the United States and Iran hold a meeting of the minds. There will be another once the Shiite factions decide how to split the southern oil field revenues. And finally, yet another will appear after the Americans, Turks and Kurds find a solution to the problem of Kurdistan.
In essence, no one should get too hopeful about Iraq substantially expanding its oil output. This will happen — but not for a very long time.
There are also a number of links to earlier related articles on the Stratfor site at the end of the article.
Posted by: Bea | Jan 21 2007 15:12 utc | 6
Annie, this is for you — an in-depth analysis of the exact language used by Ahmadinejad in his supposed “wipe Israel off the map” comment, and an analysis of how the comment came to be distorted. (You will be surprised.)
Posted by: Bea | Jan 21 2007 16:01 utc | 7
Meanwhile, in Gaza and the West Bank…
Three new reports offer some perspective on where things stand there.
(1) Israeli historian Ilan Pappe writes that Israel is Conducting Genocide in Gaza and Ethnic Cleansing in the West Bank
This chilling article is very important to read in full. I cannot adequately represent it with just an excerpt.
(2) A local Israeli non-profit organization has released a report that concludes that despite its claim of having withdrawn from the territory, Israel still controls all aspects of life in Gaza, effectively still occupying it for all intents and purposes. From the press release:
Wed., Jan. 17, 2007: Israel never “disengaged” from control over Gaza and therefore cannot escape responsibility for the well-being of its residents, according to a position paper published today by Gisha: Legal Center for Freedom of Movement. The paper, titled, “Disengaged Occupiers: The Legal Status of Gaza,” counters a claim made by Israel that it no longer occupies Gaza and therefore owes no obligations to Gaza residents under international law.
The position paper argues that despite the removal of settlements and permanent army bases from Gaza, Israel continues to control life in Gaza through an “invisible hand”: control over borders, air space, territorial waters, population registry, taxation system, supply of goods, and control over the ability of the Palestinian Authority to function. The paper challenges an assumption held by Israelis and even some international policy-makers that Israel’s “disengagement” plan ended the occupation of Gaza.
According to the paper: “Gaza residents know that their ability to use electric lights, to buy milk, or to have the garbage collected depends on decisions made by Israel. At times, soldiers operate in the streets of Gaza, but even after they leave, Israeli control over the lives of Gaza residents remains constant.”
Gisha uses public and internal military documents, interviews with EU monitors, and narratives from Gaza residents to argue that tightened Israeli closure policies, implemented since its disengagement plan, have helped plunge Gaza into an economic and humanitarian crisis unprecedented in the 38 years of occupation that preceded the removal of permanent military installations. The paper includes interviews with Gaza residents who are trapped in Gaza and officially “do not exist” – because Israel won’t recognize them as residents of Gaza. The paper analyzes the international law of occupation and concludes that it still applies to Israeli actions vis à vis Gaza residents.
“A Gaza university cannot receive visits from a foreign lecturer unless Israel issues a visitor’s permit; A Gaza mother cannot register her child in the Palestinian population registry without Israeli approval; A Gaza fisherman cannot fish off the coast of Gaza without permission from Israel …”
(3) A report from John Pilger includes this information:
When I was last in Gaza, Dr Khalid Dahlan, a psychiatrist, showed me the results of a remarkable survey. “The statistic I personally find unbearable,” he said, “is that 99.4 per cent of the children we studied suffer trauma. Once you look at the rates of exposure to trauma you see why: 99.2 per cent of their homes were bombarded; 97.5 per cent were exposed to tear gas; 96.6 per cent witnessed shootings; 95.8 per cent witnessed bombardment and funerals; almost a quarter saw family members injured or killed.” Dahlan invited me to sit in on one of his clinics. There were 30 children, all of them traumatised. He gave each a pencil and paper and asked them to draw. They drew pictures of grotesque acts of terror and of women streaming tears.
Posted by: Bea | Jan 21 2007 16:23 utc | 8
ya know Bea, the Iranians need to get themselves a first class PR firm. That was a pretty stupid mistake they made. I wonder if they have ever considered it. it would be money well spent. I bet they could even get the Lincoln Group if they asked.
Posted by: dan of steele | Jan 21 2007 21:09 utc | 10
IDF source admits: 44 ‘removed’ barriers didn’t exist
The Israel Defense Forces admitted yesterday that the 44 dirt obstacles it said had been removed from around West Bank villages did not actually exist.
Last Tuesday, the IDF announced that it had removed 44 dirt obstacles that blocked access roads to West Bank villages, to fulfill promises made by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas during their meeting a month ago. Olmert had pledged measures to ease the lives of Palestinian civilians.
Report exposes police collusion with paramilitary killers
Devastating evidence that loyalist paramilitary informers were allowed to get away with a series of murders in Northern Ireland will be revealed today.
Police Ombudsman Nuala O’Loan is to publish damning findings from a three-year inquiry into alleged collusion between police Special Branch handlers and an Ulster Volunteer Force gang based in north Belfast.
It’s not really new or unexpected, but this link from Sibel Edmonds’ site to Luke Ryland’s wotisitgood4 gives some worthwhile comments on the World Bank’s recent “analysis” of the Afghan drug trade. Probably Wolfie didn’t even have to tell his analysts what to omit. There are also a few worthwhile comments to the main posting. These matters are, by now, well known at least in their broad scope to those relatively few who are paying attention. Moreover, they are, of course, regularly and quite rightly liquidated as unsubtantiated rumors, since any legally valid substantiation would mean, at the minimun, resignations, disgrace, and jail terms for the criminal politicians and corrupt officials running the “gravy train”.
Posted by: Hannah K. O’Luthon | Jan 22 2007 14:16 utc | 13
According to a summary released by the U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command, the HAA can watch over a circle of countryside 600 miles in diameter. That’s everything between Toledo and New York City. And they want to build 11. With high-res cameras, that could mean constant surveillance of every square inch of American soil.
How paranoid is too paranoid? I’ve hit it. This Lockheed-Martin project was uncovered after an accidental fire in an Akron, OH warehouse and all I can think is that there was no “accident” involved.
I said once in a 2005 rant that Abu Ghraib, Gitmo, et al were open secrets which were calculated to keep the amygdalae of voters (some of whom might otherwise be tempted to become dissenters… and Kissinger made clear his opinion about those folks!) on overdrive since no reasonable case can be made that torture produces actionable intelligence. It ain’t about the “terrorists”… people suffer or are surveilled to keep folk like me and you in line.
Stories like the above may or may not be accurate, but there was nothing “accidental” about them being revealed.
Full stop.
Posted by: Monolycus | Jan 22 2007 14:39 utc | 14
Monolycus (post 14):
“Behave”
Stories about this constant troublemaker here or here.
Posted by: Rick | Jan 22 2007 15:04 utc | 15
Gulf of Tonkin Part I?
The U.S. military helicopter that crashed outside Baghdad, killing all 12 on board, was shot down by a shoulder-fired missile, CNN reported on Monday.
The Black Hawk was most likely brought down on Saturday by hostile fire, according to unidentified U.S. officials cited by CNN. The crash was still under investigation but debris recovered on the ground indicate a missile was involved, CNN said.
“We have not released anything from here on the cause of the crash … The cause of the crash is still under investigation,” said Lt. Col. Josslyn Aberle in Baghdad.
Twenty-five U.S. troops were killed on Saturday in one of the deadliest days for the American military in Iraq, according to the latest U.S. tally.
Posted by: Cloned Poster | Jan 22 2007 15:50 utc | 16
Actually, this is kind of the previous Sunday’s news, but housing market in the UK finally cooling, it looks like, especially for yuppie flats, of which there is somewhat of a glut, even in London:
The UK’s army of buy-to-let investors, meanwhile, has seen a dramatic increase in the gap between borrowing costs and net rental yields. A new landlord should expect to receive a net annual yield of just 3.5 per cent a year from a property, compared with borrowing costs of more than 5 per cent – even before this week’s rate rise.
Posted by: Dismal Science | Jan 22 2007 18:25 utc | 17
This article in Congressional Quarterly paints an abysmal portrait of the CIA’s “humint” capabilities in Iraq. It rings true to me, but I certainly can’t know for sure.
h/t AMERICAblog
Posted by: Bea | Jan 22 2007 19:35 utc | 18
bit of a soundtrack: Lupe Fiasco – American Terrorist. “Can’t burn his cross cause he can’t afford the gasoline”
Posted by: Rowan | Jan 22 2007 21:02 utc | 19
Palestinians seem to be resisting the US attempts to foment civil war between Hamas and Fatah. Important, if incremental, progress in this regard is reported in Haaretz today.
Posted by: Bea | Jan 22 2007 22:28 utc | 20
Shulamit Aloni, former Education Minister of Israel, writes a that Jimmy Carter’s book told the truth:
~Snip:
The US Jewish Establishment’s onslaught on former president Jimmy Carter is based on his daring to tell the truth which is known to all: through its army, the government of Israel practices a brutal form of Apartheid in the territory it occupies. Its army has turned every Palestinian village and town into a fenced-in, or blocked-in, detention camp. All this is done in order to keep an eye on the population’s movements and to make its life difficult. Israel even imposes a total curfew whenever the settlers, who have illegally usurped the Palestinians’ land, celebrate their holidays or conduct their parades.
If that were not enough, the generals commanding the region frequently issue further orders, regulations, instructions and rules (let us not forget: they are the lords of the land). By now they have requisitioned further lands for the purpose of constructing “Jewish only” roads. Wonderful roads, wide roads, well-paved roads, brightly lit at night — all that on stolen land. When a Palestinian drives on such a road, his vehicle is confiscated and he is sent on his way.
On one occasion, I witnessed such an encounter between a driver and a soldier who was taking down the details before confiscating the vehicle and sending its owner away. “Why?” I asked the soldier. “It’s an order — this is a Jews-only road”, he replied. I inquired as to where was the sign indicating this fact and instructing (other) drivers not to use it. His answer was nothing short of amazing. “It is his responsibility to know it, and besides, what do you want us to do, put up a sign here and let some anti-Semitic reporter or journalist take a photo so that he can show the world that Apartheid exists here?”
Indeed, Apartheid does exist here. And our army is not “the most moral army in the world” as we are told by its commanders, sufficient to mention that every town and every village has turned into a detention centre and that every entry and every exit has been closed, cutting it off from arterial traffic. If it were not enough that Palestinians are not allowed to travel on the roads paved “for Jews only”, on their land, the current GOC found it necessary to land an additional blow on the natives in their own land with an “ingenious proposal”.
Humanitarian activists cannot transport Palestinians either.Major-General Naveh, renowned for his superior patriotism, has issued a new order. It came into affect on January 19. The order prohibits the conveyance of Palestinians without a permit. It determines that Israelis are not allowed to transport Palestinians in an Israeli vehicle (one registered in Israel regardless of what kind of number plate it carries) unless they have received explicit permission to do so. The permit relates to both the driver and the Palestinian passenger. Of course none of this applies to those whose labour serves the settlers. They and their employers will naturally receive the required permits so they can continue to serve the lords of the land, the settlers.
Did man of peace president Carter truly err in concluding that Israel is creating Apartheid? Did he exaggerate? Don’t the US Jewish community leaders recognise the International Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Racial Discrimination of March 7 1966, to which Israel is a signatory? Are the US Jews who launched the loud and abusive campaign against Carter for supposedly maligning Israel’s character and its democratic and humanist nature unfamiliar with the International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid of November 30 1973?
Apartheid is defined therein as an international crime that among other things includes using different legal instruments to rule over different racial groups, thus depriving people of their human rights. Isn’t freedom of travel one of these rights?
Read the whole thing.
Posted by: Bea | Jan 22 2007 22:41 utc | 21
American presidential candidates and government officials fall all over themselves to beat the war drums with Israel in Herziliyya and Tel Aviv.
Posted by: Bea | Jan 22 2007 23:36 utc | 22
don’t know that these things mean much, but it is interesting to note that the last i checked, the mnbc poll today on impeachment had 87% in favor. maybe not scientific, but potentially indicative of mainstream public opinion, no? check it out.
Posted by: conchita | Jan 23 2007 2:45 utc | 23
I think I remember some murmurs here about people going to DC this weekend for a walk in the sun/protest. If anyone is driving from chicago, I might be interested and might have a place to stay.
Posted by: Rowan | Jan 23 2007 2:48 utc | 24
Released IDF documents reveal ethnic cleansing effort in South Lebanon
Posted by: annie | Jan 23 2007 4:43 utc | 26
Liberated Krugman…
Surging and Purging ?
“In case you’re wondering, such a wholesale firing of prosecutors midway through an administration isn’t normal. U.S. attorneys, The Wall Street Journal recently pointed out, “typically are appointed at the beginning of a new president’s term, and serve throughout that term.” Why, then, are prosecutors that the Bush administration itself appointed suddenly being pushed out?
The likely answer is that for the first time the administration is really worried about where corruption investigations might lead.” — Paul Krugman
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Jan 23 2007 5:11 utc | 27
Hillary may be inevitable, but not if another, more remarkable woman Cindy Sheehan can prevent it. Cindy and all her activities will surely be consigned “by her betters” to the memory hole, but I will not forget her ability to cut through the bullshit and bear witness to her truth. (Link found at
Mike Rivero’s whatreallyhappened site.)
Posted by: Hannah K. O’Luthon | Jan 23 2007 6:25 utc | 28
just came in my email from an interview with darell anderson, an iraq vet against the war:
Pen: What has it been like since coming home?
Darrell: I just got home in October. I shut myself inside my house and didn’t want to come out. I took a bus from Georgia and came here. After this I’m going to move to Portland Oregon. The people in Kentucky don’t relate. They’re too conservative. Even the anti-war crowd doesn’t understand what’s going on in Iraq.
Pen: That brings me to the main question I wanted to ask. You said, “It’s not even real enough to the anti-war crowd. People are dying in Iraq today and we’re just sitting here talking about it.” Yesterday, several panelists asked “What can WE do?” I have to be frank, there wasn’t really any very satisfying answers. We were told the U.N. is useless. The international courts are impotent. It’s up to us. Yet both times, the answer what to do was dodged. No one asked any of the veterans this question however. So I’d like to ask it. “What can WE do?”
Darrell: (Nodding emphatically)We’re all just talking politics. That won’t stop the war. The Democrats won’t stop the war. The courts won’t stop the war. Only the soldiers can stop this war. If the soldiers refuse to fight, then there’ll be no more war. If you say you’re anti-war, but you don’t know any soldiers who are resisting or support the resistance, then you aren’t doing anything. We gather in hundreds of thousands for protest marches, but when a soldier makes a stand we don’t show up to support them. It is their leadership that inspires others to refuse to accept this illegal war. They need your support.
Pen: Given the wealth and power of the American military machine, do you think common Americans can stop this war?
Darrell: The whole military-industrial-complex is funded off taxpayers money. It goes straight to Iraq and then Halliburton gets it. Halliburton puts zero in and gets 100% out. It’s the best business move Bush ever made. If we stop paying taxes they can’t pay for the war.
Pen: Do you intend to remain in America?
Darrell: I spoke to a Canadian soldier when I was AWOL who was going to America. I asked him why would he leave Canada and go there? He said that America is where you have to go to make a change in the world. I want to make a change.
Posted by: conchita | Jan 23 2007 7:06 utc | 29
It probably won’t do much good to complain, still less to be shocked,
but, for the record, one should at least be aware of two matters placed
in evidence at the Federation of American Scientists Project on Government Secrecy
site:
It is undoubtedly childish to hope that the true perpetrator anthrax letters will ever be brought to justice, despite the fact that this is patently an area in which there are so few technically proficient suspects to investigate that the even the most sluggish FBI investigation ought by now to have produced indictments.
Posted by: Hannah K. O’Luthon | Jan 23 2007 7:34 utc | 30
cache this it won’t be around for long @ you tube
guard at abu ghraib
….girl, she was probably like 15 years old. Yeah, she was hot dude. The body on that girl, yeah, really tight. You know, hadn’t been touched yet. She was fucking prime. So….
***
One of the guys started pimping her out for 50 bucks a shot. I think at the end of the day he’d made like 500 bucks before she hung herself.
Really?
Yeah. (laugh)
She hung herself? How’s come she hung herself?
I don’t know. She wasn’t happy. (laugh)
***
In their culture, it’s really shunned upon if you get raped. I guess she would have been stoned to death by her people. It’s fucked up.
She was fucked anyway, I guess. In more ways than one.
(more laughing)
***
You didn’t get shit from the CO, did you?
No, not until those fucking pictures came out. After then the biggest rule was no fucking cameras.
posted by Christian Sunni at
12:24 PM
Posted by: annie | Jan 23 2007 10:01 utc | 31
sorry about the format b, i am so blown out i wasn’t thinking.
Posted by: annie | Jan 23 2007 11:24 utc | 32
A good one by William Pfaff: Military Misjudgment in Africa
The influential New York Times columnist Nicholas D. Kristof has proposed American, French or NATO air strikes on the “Arab” janjawid mercenary horsemen, who are financed and armed by the Khartoum government and carry out attacks on the Darfur refugees.
While bombing is a characteristic American response to troubles in Africa and Asia, it is not usually a constructive one, as events in Iraq might suggest.
The comparison with Iraq is jutified by the facts that the tragedy in Darfur also involves Moslems (on both sides), terrorism, and “Arabs” as villainous terrorists (although the janjawid are not in fact Arab but North African). It is simple enough to conclude that Darfur is another front in George Bush’s global war on terror.
What it actually provides is an occasion for one of the biggest mistakes Washington could make in dealing with today’s Africa: to confuse humanitarian crises with its war on terror. Darfur may have “Arabs,” Moslems, and terrorism, but it doesn’t have Osama bin Ladin or al Qaeda, and it has nothing to do with any threat to the United States or its allies.
What Darfur does have to do with is an evolving natural phenomenon, or indeed natural disaster, spreading across the Sahel, which is the semi-arid geographic and climactic zone that stretches across Africa just south of the North African deserts from Senegal and Mauritania all the way to Somalia.
…
This is an immense tragedy for hundreds of thousands of people, destabilizing societies and destroying ways of life, as well as forcing conflict and migrations. It is certainly a situation nourishing extremism, but not one that foreign intervention – least of all foreign military intervention – can resolve.
The Pentagon has taken note of the destabilization, and the U.S. Army now wants a new regional command with assigned forces to intervene in the region. This is based on a profound misunderstanding of what is going on. Military interventions can only contribute to a social and political disorder bad enough as it already is.
This is based on a profound misunderstanding of what is going on.
this is based on a profound misunderstanding of what is going on. 😉
Posted by: b real | Jan 23 2007 16:18 utc | 35
omg
i know. i cannot seem to move past these thoughts. even in my brief sleep
Posted by: annie | Jan 23 2007 16:35 utc | 36
mr pfaff does underestimates the profondeur of their misunderstanding
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 23 2007 16:46 utc | 37
annie
even if this is ‘staged’ or a mock ‘piece’ is still underlies a concrete reality – that actions like this & worse are happening every day in iraq – even what this criminal & immoral administration permits to put before their crooked courts – haditha et al – reveals just a small measure of what evil is being practiced.
this obscenity is both reflection on a dying culture & it’s complete inability to comprehend a culture that gave birth to baghdad’s palace of reason in the 9th century
in each instance a power, especially a military power is faced with its impotence (as was the case of the invading german armies in russia) – their derangement multiplies & i expect with this new ‘living amongst iraquis’ policy of the war criminal bush to lead to exactions of this & other kinds
rape – because it is either the exercise of an impotent nation or a vengeful one – is completely characteristic. the avenging armies of the soviet union practiced it on a wide scale in taking east prussia & the americans formalised the rape of vietnamese into a system
so this ‘clip’ doesnt surprise me, not in the least – whether in this instance the facts ar ‘real’ – the facts speak for themselves – that haditha is happening all over iraq, again & again & will happen until the invader leaves
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jan 23 2007 17:09 utc | 38
Meanwhile Opposition protesters paralyze Lebanon:
Hezbollah-led protesters paralyzed Lebanon Tuesday, clashing with government supporters and burning tires and cars on roads in and around the capital to enforce a general strike aimed at toppling U.S.-backed Prime Minister Fuad Saniora.
…
Hezbollah chief Sheik Hassan Nasrallah and other opposition leaders called the strike, which was backed by labor unions. The Hezbollah-led opposition is demanding a new coalition government giving them more power, which Saniora has rejected.
Saniora and his supporters urged citizens to ignore the strike call, a move endorsed by banking associations and business leaders.
…
The unrest comes two days before a crucial conference of donor nations in Paris aimed at gathering some $5 billion in aid and loans for Lebanon to rebuild after the devastating summer war between Israel and Hezbollah. The money would be a boost for the embattled Saniora — but the political chaos raises questions of whether his government can distribute funds and lead reconstruction without a deal with Hezbollah.
“What we are not interested in is another war in the region,” Mohammed al-Naqbi, who heads the Gulf Negotiations Center, told Burns. “Iraq is your problem, not the problem of the Arabs. You destroyed a country that had institutions. You handed that country to Iran. Now you are crying to Europe and the Arabs to help you out of this mess.”
@annie 31,
Has America come to that? such overt symbolism. such obvious disgustingness. I really want to believe it’s a fake, but of course, can’t.
Posted by: Rowan | Jan 23 2007 17:32 utc | 41
Hmm – Cheney has a problem: Someone blogging MSNBC coverage: (Fitzmas!) MSNBC: Cheney first to leak Plame to Scooter Libby
David Shuster is on MSNBC right now…:
SOTU false claim re: uranium in Niger: VP Cheney asked Tenet to take complete responsibility for the mistake, and make clear that Cheney & Bush didn’t know that it was a false claim.
Cheney wrote note suggesting how Libby should handle FBI interview on leak; note destroyed right before Libby testified to FBI for the first time. This destruction is new and damning as far as the Obstruction of Justice charge is concerned.
David Addington (VP aide) also provided info to Libby.
i can’t stop crying. am such a baby. yesterday i just read the testimony of darrel anderson (sorry, in no mind to link), about how they would enter homes and just round up people for no reason sometimes. and i couldn’t help but wonder if her crime wasn’t being beautiful. if she was plucked from her families arms because of her usefulness. whether the horror she felt before she killed herself wasn’t more for her fear of the future, the past, or the present.
sometimes the culmination of the horrors just break me down, render me hopeless.
a whole country gone, tell me it isn’t so. is it theirs that brings me to this place, or mine? tears just keep flowing. thank you for being here for me now, i feel so alone.
Posted by: annie | Jan 23 2007 17:41 utc | 43
thanks, b, was just reading that diary on dkos. damn, this could be the moment we have all been waiting for. didn’t bush once say he would fire anyone obstructing the investigation? i scanned through the comments on this diary and the speculations are wide-ranging about the implications – resignation? impeachment? or will they have some way to rove past this one as well?
Posted by: conchita | Jan 23 2007 17:45 utc | 44
“The moving finger writes and having writ, moves on. Nor all thy piety nor wit can lure it back to cancel half a line, nor all thy tears wash out a word of it…”
I used to love the Rubaiyat and memorized so much of it. I was lying awake this morning because I had to get up at 4 so, couldn’t sleep at all and this popped into my mind out of nowhere.
Dreadful, annie.
Posted by: beq | Jan 23 2007 17:51 utc | 45
Possible mustard gas poisoning of former Chilean president
Former Chilean president Eduardo Frei Montalvo who died in 1982 could have been poisoned with mustard gas, according to a report from the Belgian University of Gant which is currently in the hands of the Chilean judge who has the case.
The report apparently states that three tissue samples from the former Christian democrat president show traces of the chemical weapon first used during the First World War One.
However the report is not conclusive that mustard gas was the direct cause of the death of the former leader, but Chilean Justice now must investigate how it could have influenced his health situation or aggravated his condition leading to his death.
Former elected president Frei, who ruled from 1964 to 1970 died in a Santiago clinic January 22, 1980 following two operations to address gastric regurgitation.
According to the official version of the time, Mr. Frei then the leader of an incipient opposition to the General Pinochet dictatorship died of septicemia but his family always suspected that his death was more linked to the action of agents from the state secret police or military intelligence.
The presence of mustard gas in tissue samples was discarded by the FBI in 2005. However the family and the judge were not convinced with the findings uncovered in United States and criticized the fact that not even the methodology employed for the analysis by the FBI was disclosed.
imagine that…
Posted by: b real | Jan 23 2007 19:35 utc | 47
Not sure if anyone has posted this link before, but just in case not:
The Truth About the Iraqi Superbug — The Spread of a Killer Bacteria and the US Military’s Role in Spreading it
Posted by: Bea | Jan 23 2007 20:40 utc | 48
With US sentiment turning against the war in Iraq, and anti-Islamic sentiment on the rise, and fascism on the rise, can a US version of Reichskristallnacht against Muslims be very far behind?
I’d ask the authorities on such a thing, but they seem to have their hands full at the moment.
Posted by: Monolycus | Jan 23 2007 23:21 utc | 49
annie,
…just read your post about the Iraqi girl. One can only hope it is not true, but after all the other tragedies revealed, why should this not be true? I know conchita and others are probably correct that we should call our representatives – U.S. Senators and those in the U.S. Legislature – to try and stop this continued madness. I haven’t. Surely our representatives know, just as sure as we do, about what has transpired and continues to transpire because of the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq. I’m sorry, but my disgust is so great it is almost crippling. I feel degraded in even approaching my U.S. representatives. Add to this a belief that such an action is futile, and the crippling and degradation becomes complete. I believe it would be as useless as contacting someone in the Klu Klux Klan and asking them nicely to quit abusing/torturing/killing blacks. Where has been the outrage concerning the U.S. occupation of Iraq? A few outspoken exceptions come to mind, namely Lynn Woolsey, Ron Paul, and Barbara Lee. That so few representatives come to my mind is just plain pathetic. Some here may include a handful of other members, perhaps some of the Black Caucus, perhaps D. Kucinich, or even Sen. Kennedy speaking out after Abu Ghraib; but really, how passionate have any of these leaders been in attempting to tell Americans the truth? Even James Webb in his Democratic Party Rebuttal Speech tonight, caught himself on live television:– “… Americans no longer support this [stutter].. no longer support the way this war is being fought.” – Jim Webb The guy couldn’t even say that Americans no longer support the Iraq War.
As of today, Patrick Fitzgerald has made it very clear to all America, beyond a shadow of a doubt, the lies and tricks played by Vice-President Cheney, the very same deceit that led this country to war. Patrick Fitzgerald has done his part – it is now up to the American people to force the issue of impeachment. The dates for mass protests calling for the impeachment of Bush and Cheney are coming soon. I will be participating. Perhaps I may muster a change in perspective and make a few phone calls.
Posted by: Rick | Jan 24 2007 3:29 utc | 50
daily nation (nairobi): Oil, Not Terrorists, the Reason for US Attack On Somalia
Just why is Somalia so important to the US, and by extension the big boys of Europe and some Gulf states?
A UN Somalia Monitoring Group report released in November 2005 reveals that a dozen countries, namely Yemen, Djibouti, Libya, Egypt, Kazakhstan, Ethiopia, Iran, Syria, Eritrea, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and Uganda were all poking their noses into the Somalia pie.
What the UN Somalia Monitoring Group didn’t reveal, however, is that these were not the only countries which were interested in the country.
The little known yet well-heeled contact group, consisting of Norway, the US, UK, France and Tanzania (just an appendage) are also deeply enmeshed in Somalia.
While the terrorism theory holds some water, the reality of the factors contributing to the mess in Somalia is pegged on natural resources. Oil and gas are Somalia’s Achilles heel. It is an open secret that four US oil giants are sitting pretty on money-spinning concessions expecting to reap huge windfalls from massive resources of both oil and gas in Somalia.
The story of Somalia and oil goes back to the colonial period. British and Italian geologists first identified oil deposits during that period of imperialism.
The first oil wells historically referred to as the Daga Shabell series were dug in the 1960s. Tiny gas discoveries adjacent to Socotra were also noted..
The race for these precious natural resources took a new turn in 1988, when the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the World Bank, with the support of the governments of Britain, France and Canada and backed by several Western oil companies financed a regional hydrocarbon study of the countries bordering the Red Sea and the Gulf of Eden.
The countries were Somalia, Ethiopia and Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia was later dropped, but not before it had been established that within the study area, massive deposits of oil and gas existed.
…
The study was intended to encourage private investment in the petroleum potential of eight African nations. The conclusions of their findings are quite telling as the geologists put Somalia and Sudan at the top of the list of prospective commercial oil producers.
While presenting their results during the conference, two geologists involved in the study (an American and an Egyptian) reported that the investigation of nine exploratory wells dug in Somalia pointed out that the region was “situated within the oil window, and thus (is) highly prospective for gas and oil.”
…
Four US oil companies, namely Conoco, Chevron, Amoco and Philips have concessions in nearly two thirds of Somalia. This quartet of oil conglomerates was granted these contracts in the final days of Somalia’s deposed dictator, Siad Barre.
Posted by: b real | Jan 24 2007 3:53 utc | 51
I thought Webb came across particularily strong. There was an intensity that came, not from inflated rhetoric, but from deliberate unambiguious clarity and precision. By far the most coherent Dem rebuttal in years, and years. Maybe the makings of a Democratic “anti-Reagan”, as an x-soldier, as an x-Republican.
Posted by: anna missed | Jan 24 2007 4:00 utc | 52
interview w/ the u.s. ambassador to kenya, michael ranneburger, on his country’s intentions toward somalia
On the issue of stability in Somalia, does it mean that US will be involved in Somalia militarily?
What it means is that the United States is going to be involved for very long time. This is not something where we are going in very quickly and will then leave. We are coming in to stay.
Posted by: b real | Jan 24 2007 4:08 utc | 53
my disgust is so great it is almost crippling
aside from the ‘almost’ in your sentence..my sentiments
thnx rick
Posted by: annie | Jan 24 2007 5:14 utc | 54
yeah, straight up crippled. when I read that I had some personal/political annoyances and sullenness. Since, I’m straight-up depressed. CNN managing to print a massive “We’re so fucked” article certainly doesn’t help.
I’d ask the barkeep for a double, but I recall that perhaps the biggest turning point in his blog was Abu Ghraib stealing America’s soul. All too appropriate.
Posted by: Rowan | Jan 24 2007 5:45 utc | 55
rowan, for his rejection of the kyoto protocols and cheney’s energy “summit” alone he/they should be impeached.
Posted by: conchita | Jan 24 2007 5:59 utc | 56
@Rowan:
I’m waiting to see that report. I’ve been depressed over global warming already, so I’m not sure whether this is anything new to panic about or not. Quite frankly, given that a lot of people in the U.S. don’t believe global warming exists, there is the distinct possibility that the report is no worse than what was already basically known (vide Lovelock). If you think everything’s fine, the existince of something like this makes things bleak no matter what.
Posted by: The Truth Gets Vicious When You Corner It | Jan 24 2007 7:18 utc | 57
Truth,
I was pointing it out because of the language used by the “official” media. Terms like “smoking gun of global warming” which is deliberately loaded language. Another interesting thing I’ve noticed is a commercial from Phillips for lightbulbs which will stop global warming. It starts with a baby floating through a collapsing iceberg, then switches to it being carried by its parents, happily, through a beautifully-lit city. The female narrator solemnly intones that the antarctic ice sheet is shrinking, due in large part to electricity consumption. But Phillips lightbulbs use less electricity.
I’d try to find it on the internet, but scouring the internet for advertisements doesn’t seem the best thing to do at work.
conchita,
with so many impeachable offenses, it would tremendously ironic if the Plame Affair was what brought many in the administration down. Where I come from, outing a CIA agent should be celebrated. But we’re still playing by the Americanist party rules.
Posted by: Rowan | Jan 24 2007 15:41 utc | 58
Sunday’s News
This was also in last Sunday’s news:
81 year old’s ‘letter to the editor’ brings the Secret Service to his door!
Posted by: Rick | Jan 25 2007 2:10 utc | 59