Monsters in Congress - "Skin in the Game"
"We've put about $45 billion into Iraq's reconstruction . . . and they have not spent their own resources," said House Democratic Caucus Chairman Rahm Emanuel (Ill.). "They have got to have some skin in the game."
link
So this is a game? Over a million Iraqis dead, 4-5 million refugees? How much skin does Rahm think Iraqis should put up for his war? Does he wish more Iraqi children to die?
According to the United Nations — citing reports from Iraq's southern province of Qadissiyah — 275 children have been struck with leishmaniasis, which is spread by sand flies. Most have a form that causes skin sores, but others have a type that strikes internal organs and can be fatal.
...
Though the disease was first identified in Iraq more than a century ago, outbreaks were rare during Saddam Hussein's regime. But since the conflict began, experts say the destroyed health system has opened the way for diseases lurking in the environment.
Skin disease strikes Iraqi children
Now the U.S. Congress, Democrats and Republicans alike, want Iraqi's to pay for the bullets that kill them.
Sens. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) met yesterday to craft a bipartisan bill to make Iraq take on a greater share of the financial burden. Under their plan, any future U.S. money for reconstruction would take the form of a loan to be repaid, and Baghdad would have to pay for fuel used by U.S. troops and for the training of its own security forces, and make payments to the predominantly Sunni fighters in the Awakening movement taking on al-Qaeda.
...
Even Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.), one of the staunchest war supporters and a key ally of Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, agreed that Bush made a mistake by not making Iraqis repay U.S. costs from the start. "The best thing we can do for the people of Iraq is to make them a stakeholder in their own country," he said.
link
Iraqis have tobe made "stakeholder in their own country"? Then who owns their country right now Mr. Graham?
These people are monsters.
Posted by b on April 10, 2008 at 9:49 UTC | Permalink
this is the first time i have ever commented on a post before i have finished reading it. i am not even really awake yet. the first thing that came into my mind were those lampshades...and i thought about charging people for their own genocide. this is truly mindblowing what he has said. i better have some coffee before i continue reading and say my 'i will not hate' mantra.
Posted by: annie | Apr 10 2008 11:59 utc | 2
So where are the reports on those Iraqi "welfare moms" showing up in a brand-new armored Humvee to collect their cooking oil rations?
I remember James Watt, Secretary of the Interior, commenting on the US Indian reservations as an example of the "failure of socialism". When in fact we were looking at an example of the failure of imperialism, as we are now in Iraq.
Posted by: ralphieboy | Apr 10 2008 12:07 utc | 3
pay for reconstruction costs? like this one?
But then, somehow, two months later, Spicer's company, known as Aegis Defence Services, landed a $293 million Pentagon contract to coordinate security for reconstruction projects, as well as support for other private military companies, in Iraq. This effectively put him in command of the second-largest foreign armed force in the country—behind America's but ahead of Britain's.
i just want to scream
Posted by: annie | Apr 10 2008 12:14 utc | 4
I can’t imagine that these monsters won’t replace Al Capone as the archetype of ruthless psychopathic criminality in the American and probably the world psyche.
Posted by: Juannie | Apr 10 2008 12:49 utc | 5
And of course it will all be done for the benefit of the Iraqi people. It will be enshrined as bringing freedom and democracy to Iraq. It will enjoy widespread support by many Americans that want to create a peaceful and American freindly government in the heart of the ME.
This I can understand becuase it is human nature to cover up one's wrongs because to think otherwise is to support genocide. No fine upstanding citizen would ever support genocide so it must be dressed up in ideals.
What I don't understand is all the Iraqis going along with this. Those Awakening Councils that we want the Iraqis to pay are actually killing other Iraqis. Michael Ware was on CNN this morning with some film showing them arrestting and beating other Iraqis for the US money and promises they recieved. He worries that they will return to shooting Americans if the Iranian influence in government is not reigned in. I don't see how that is possible since the Supreme Council are America's strongest ally in the Iraqi government.
It amazes me how they can be manipulated to kill and toture each other. It was the same in Palestine when they paid Dahlen to kill and torture Hamas. What did the Palestinian people get out of that. Yet it goes on. Their only hope in getting out from under occupation is uniting but they never do. The only time Arabs united was under the 2006 Israeli invasion of Lebanon. They stood united, won worldwide popular support and succeeded in halting hostilities. As soon as it was over they went right back in their corners and resumed fighting amongst each other.
They don't seem to see this either. When you see their commets on message boards regardless of which side they frame the Sabra and Chatilla refuge camps massacre as an Israeli affair. The fact is Israel never killed any of the men in that camp let alone the women and children. Not a single one. That was done by Arabs. Of course they were fine upstanding Christian Arabs, friends of ours that we still support to this day.
Posted by: Sam | Apr 10 2008 13:39 utc | 6
"It amazes me how they can be manipulated to kill and torture each other."
They're absolutely desperate. Sure, there's criminal sadists amongst them but they have been unleashed by America.
Their society has been politically corrupted for decades, leading to 3 wars and ten years of sanctions. America's complete involvement in every stage is as shameful as Vietnam.
Pastor Wright was right,
Posted by: waldo | Apr 10 2008 14:33 utc | 7
The US has more Iraqi "skin in the game" than they about know just yet.
Congress has known about the Leishmaniasis coming home in the bloodstream of thousands of soldiers and contractors. They also know about the Completely Drug Resistant Acinetobacter baumannii genotypes that have been spread from the military evacuation system from Iraq throughout the entire military health system and on to civilian hospitals all across the US. All of the coalition countries as well as any countries with contractors working in Iraq or Afghanistan are effected as well.
By ignoring these issues Congress now has their own constituents unwittingly paying with their lives for the war in Iraq.
Every single member of Congress has been informed.
www.iraqinfections.org, www.leishmaniasis.us/mapping.html
Posted by: Marcie Hascall Clark | Apr 10 2008 14:58 utc | 8
about #8, Marcie
They will do anything to pretend nothing it can't happen here.
I was working in the ER of a VA hospital and was fired when I put up a stink about being in MRSA treatment rooms without being told I couldn't protect myself if I didn't know!
There are few real checks in our domestic system to protect patients and staff from infectious disease.
Posted by: Jake | Apr 10 2008 15:27 utc | 9
Errrr. correction. missing a period.
I was working in the ER of a VA hospital and was fired when I put up a stink about being in MRSA treatment rooms without being told. I couldn't protect myself if I didn't know!
Posted by: Jake | Apr 10 2008 15:29 utc | 10
"They're absolutely desperate. "
'The purpose of this week and the campaign leading up to it will be: 1) To highlight the genocidal agendas of the Islamo-fascist crusade'
crooks and liars
“Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week” kicks off
Posted by: annie | Apr 10 2008 16:14 utc | 11
speaking of genocide, i think it's time we had a Zionofascism awareness week to highlight aipac operatives like House Democratic Caucus Chairman Rahm Emanuel. bringing awareness to new zionofascist policies like
1. Paying for your own genocide!
2.How to create the political environment for genocide!
The principle behind the Interim Governing Council’s composition also sets a troubling precedent. Its members were chosen so as to mirror Iraq’s sectarian and ethnic makeup; for the first time in the country’s history, the guiding assumption is that political representation must be apportioned according to such quotas. This decision reflects how the Council’s creators, not the Iraqi people, view Iraqi society and politics, but it will not be without consequence. Ethnic and religious conflict, for the most part absent from Iraq’s modern history, is likely to be exacerbated as its people increasingly organise along these divisive lines.
3.Elliot abrams: peace thru civil war!
the possibilities are endless. we could tour the nations universities and get coverage on all major msm.
this new zionofascist development of how to extract a country's wealth while you are loosing a war is fabulous! why wait for a decisive victory when you can use the wealth of the host nation to exterminate them!
reminds me of prisoners forced to make ammunition for the purpose of killing their own people.
Posted by: annie | Apr 10 2008 16:28 utc | 12
uncle, this one's for you
Pentagon issues pocket lie detector to troops
as part of the new policy for having iraqis pay for their own occupation i'm sure congress can find a way to extract this from their oil revenue.
Posted by: annie | Apr 10 2008 16:43 utc | 13
They always have an explanation to justify killing their own people:
Sumydai, the former Iraqi intelligence officer, says the government decided to crack down on al-Sadr to shore up its relationship with the United States after seeing Iraq's Sunnis regain American trust by going after al-Qaeda.The Shiite parties saw the growing cooperation between the Sunnis and the Americans and started to fear that maybe the Americans will turn and give power back to the Sunnis," Sumydai says. "The other Shiite parties wanted to prove that they are still America's closest allies in Iraq, so they attacked the Mahdi Army."
the government attacked us saying we are terrorists
Posted by: Sam | Apr 10 2008 16:50 utc | 14
b
there is not much to say - other than what you already have
these people are monsters
criminal monsters
they are not worthy of our comprehension nor our understanding - they are worthy only of our contempt
Posted by: remembereringgiap | Apr 10 2008 17:38 utc | 15
The neocons tried to shove neoliberal market economics onto a country that was not even in the shape to guarantee its people basic security, much less basic rights, liberties and the rule of law.
Now they are tried to shunt the blame on the Iraqis for not being born good capitalists.
Reminds me a bit of that passage in Hitler's last will and testament in which he blames the German people for their own misfortunes, as they were not capable or worthy of realizing his ideology.
Posted by: ralphieboy | Apr 10 2008 18:34 utc | 16
ralphieboy
The neocons tried to shove neoliberal market economics onto a country that was not even in the shape to guarantee its people basic security, much less basic rights, liberties and the rule of law.
in a long phone conversation last night w/an iraqi friend of mine he was telling me that as far as a governing body in iraq the most powerful one that exists presently is sadr's since the puppet one offers absolutely zilch in the form of basic services and is not even considered a governing body because they don't govern or accomplish anything. he isn't even a big fan of sadr's. same w/the situation in egypt. as long as these oppressive regimes do nothing it forces people to gravitate towards a community that can support then. the invader is just banking on it being them and that is a fool's game. when citizens rejects the arm of law (that offers them nothing and is not even an arm of law as in the case of some hired sectarian militias) we call them terrorists and pretend we are shocked they can't control themselves! (biggest pr game in the book) there is always a justification why it's the victims fault, a mind game if there ever was one.
Posted by: annie | Apr 10 2008 19:23 utc | 17
On the second day of the invasion my father in law (a Korean War Vet) flew in to visit. He thought the war was a disastorous mistake like I did and I'll never forget what he said. He said "Now we'll have to stay to prevent the Shia from taking power". That still haunts me to this day. What's fascinating is, along with the Kurds for obvious reasons, they are exactly the people the US are allied with and working with in the government. I believe this is what Michael Ware is warning about in his recent interviews on CNN.
The Supreme Council and Dawa base was a traditional religious one and often faught against Saddam's secular dictatorship. They were also US enemies from the days of the Saddam US alliance. Some of them attacked and killed US personnel and some of them faught for Iran during the Iran Iraq war. It would be kind of like the US allying with Hezbollah to invade Lebanon or allying with Hamas to invade Palestine. It makes one wonder how that can even be possible. The obvious reasons are they were enemies of Saddam and they provided bodies to fight the resistance and they in turn get the reins of power at least in the South completing the so called Shia crescent. They don't have a hope in hell of ruling over the Sunni in the north without the present US enforcement.
The US didn't want them in power and so they crowned Allawi but then Sistani forced the elctions. Now they are in power, they can't crush the resistance and the US can't do without them. What to do now?
Then there is Sadr that started out as a nationalist but his followers bought into the sectarian war and turned on the Sunni resistance. There were lots of tools - the Sunni domination a relic of the Ottoman Empire, the Sunni deal with the Brits that ended the British occupation and Shia uprising, the fact that Saddam was Sunni and Al Queda hated the apostate Shia. The strange thing is even though the collaborators were mostly Shia and the resistance was mostly Sunni both of them actually contained all the elements. Even the so called Al Queda camp in the Kurdish Zone that Powell used to justify the presence of Al Queda and al Zargawi in Iraq before the war was a Kurdish organization - Ansar al Sunna. Many of the Baath Party Shia were driven out of Basra and went to Fallujah in the early days.
And there is also the Sons of Iraq that are on the American payroll and spposedly fighting Al Queda in return for the US promise of ousting the Iranian influence (Cheny visits Iraq the Supreme Council withdraws their objections to the provincial elections). The fact that the resistance kills the Sunni collaborators just like they did the cooperating Shia proves there motives are not sectarian.
Sadr seems to be returning his followers to the nationalist roots they started with. All very complicated and hard to read sitting on the other side of an ocean.
What does seem obvious is the street is on the side of the resistance. This can go on forever because the resistance wont make any deal that doesn't include a withdrawal of occupation forces. The US wants the oil law signed and that means they will want to stay to protect their investment. It's no wonder Michael Ware talks about many more years. He might want to change that to decades. Just ask the Israelis.
Posted by: Sam | Apr 11 2008 14:21 utc | 18
like kaltenbrunner, they heyhdrichs & the eichmann's - these monsters who talk so easily of the death of other feel neither regret or remorse
the most uniformed peasant in the fields of the phillipines can comprehend that it is the people of iraq who are suffering,continuing to suffer - they are being murdered wholesale while these clowns in congress wrench words from their fear of failure
i will tell them something for nothing. they have failed. they have failed so enormously that they make the other mistakes of their empire pale in comparison. their failure is so enormous & their incompetence so grand - that like the british empire it is collapsing in on itself
& it is clear ordinary americans understand that but block it out because they are full of the fear that has been institutionalised in their culture by the cheney bush junta & by the culture that has taught them to deify monsters like those portrayed in '24'. the american people are so locked into the consequences of the crimes that have been committed in their name & with their complicity - that they understand the economic & social collapse that is coming for them - is bound entirely in the criminal acts of their political class, not only over the last 8 years but in fact over the last 50 years of malfeasance
Posted by: r'giap | Apr 11 2008 18:02 utc | 19
Yes r'giap. How to face the rest of my life as one of us?
I should tattoo my forehead: COMPLICIT
Posted by: beq | Apr 11 2008 18:08 utc | 20
If your comment is serious at all beq, I'd beq you not to accept any blame for yourself or the rest of us common yankees.
An essential part of the scam was and is to include *free-and-independent* in the brainwashing program; that way you and I can be expected to assume the blame because we were after all never forced to go along with the program, but approved it with our silence.
Now, what were/are the alternatives, assuming we could see through the scam at some point. None; at least none for mere mortals.
Posted by: rapt | Apr 11 2008 18:57 utc | 21
beq
cultures create & commit crimes & they can only continue with complicity
the american empire mirrors nazi germany before it though - in the way the culture has ramped up the fear, the rhythm of that fear is particularly american - in the same way that to a degree french society as a state & as a condition - is hysteric - there is much screaming in french culture (for example a visit to the theatre - one of the foci of my work - is particularly painful because the actors scream so much - there is no breathing - just shrieking)
the rhythm of that fear in america is the constant shifting - the shifting of focus until it melts altogether - today it possesses an apocalyptic character - & in this the producers at fox & the endtimers are enjoined in a happy mutual infantilism of their adored absolutes
to go back to haditha - haditha - this was not an exceptional crime - but it was & remains the door to us viewing what are the particulars of the crime of the us empire - it offers us a particular insight to the way a culturre can live with the massive bombardements & the genocidal actions that have occure in the past week since basra for example & a large part of this murder is being done solely to fulfill the functions of narratives of the empire - specifically in this case the petraeus crocker show before congress
i am as guilty as you beq because all this is happening before our eyes & through our conciousness
Posted by: r'giap | Apr 11 2008 19:21 utc | 22
r'giap: well put. especially the "24" reference, considering it is such a prime example of naked propaganda; fuel to keep the fear fire stoked.
Posted by: Lizard | Apr 12 2008 0:07 utc | 23
The ongoing saga of putting lipstick on the pig never ends. Remeber the 2004 presidential debate:
The charges also allege he served on an al Qaeda mortar crew and helped bin Laden and his family elude capture in Afghanistan after the U.S. invasion following the September 11 attacks in 2001.
Guantanamo defendant praises bin Laden at hearing
Recall that John Kerry accused George Bush of allowing bin Laden to get away when they could have trapped him in Tora Bora with US troops instead of contracting out the job to Afghanis. Personally I think Bush did this becuase he feared casualties would reduce support for invading Iraq. Years earlier his own base demanded Clinton remove troops from Mogadishu when US casualties were the result of the failed Black Hawk Down operation.
Of course Bush denied it becuase it would hurt his image of the strong leader fighting the War On Terror. Particularly revealing was Bush's own comments when a reporter asked him about getting bin Laden. George replied:
I truly am not that concerned about him
Fearing that his pal in the WH might lose the election if the public became aware of it, the Commander of that operation wrote an editorial in the NYT basically calling Kerry a liar:
On more than one occasion, Senator Kerry has referred to the fight at Tora Bora in Afghanistan during late 2001 as a missed opportunity for America. He claims that our forces had Osama bin Laden cornered and allowed him to escape. How did it happen? According to Mr. Kerry, we "outsourced" the job to Afghan warlords. As commander of the allied forces in the Middle East, I was responsible for the operation at Tora Bora, and I can tell you that the senator's understanding of events doesn't square with reality.
Maybe the retired General should step up to the witness stand and defend Al Qosi against such outrageous allegations?
Posted by: | Apr 12 2008 1:44 utc | 24
For the past couple days CNN has broadcasting images of a hellfire missile blowing up Arabs in Sadr City. Then you have Crocker wondering why Arabs wont support their mission in Iraq:
The U.S. ambassador to Iraq chided Arab nations on Friday for not doing more to help the country and suggested greater Arab diplomatic engagement with Iraq would help counterbalance Iran's influence.<.BLOCKQUOTE>Why wont those Arabs support us while we are plastering the media with images of blowing up Arabs?
It reminds me of all the shit being stirred up over Tibet and the Olympic torch relay. It's causing demonstrations, arrests and police confrontations all over the world. Yeah we all know that China is not a democratic state but do we really want to fan the flames of outrage in the day of the suicide bomber? How will those smug bastards feel if it works and they get to watch our athletes get blown up while they are sitting on their couches watching the events? We are truly led by the clueless.
Can we keep the politics out of sports as it was meant to be and have just one frigging thing on this planet safe from the morons that surround us?
Posted by: Sam | Apr 12 2008 2:47 utc | 25
Sorry:
For the past couple days CNN has broadcasting images of a hellfire missile blowing up Arabs in Sadr City. Then you have Crocker wondering why Arabs wont support their mission in Iraq:
The U.S. ambassador to Iraq chided Arab nations on Friday for not doing more to help the country and suggested greater Arab diplomatic engagement with Iraq would help counterbalance Iran's influence.
Why wont those Arabs support us while we are plastering the media with images of blowing up Arabs?
It reminds me of all the shit being stirred up over Tibet and the Olympic torch relay. It's causing demonstrations, arrests and police confrontations all over the world. Yeah we all know that China is not a democratic state but do we really want to fan the flames of outrage in the day of the suicide bomber? How will those smug bastards feel if it works and they get to watch our athletes get blown up while they are sitting on their couches watching the events? We are truly led by the clueless.
Can we keep the politics out of sports as it was meant to be and have just one frigging thing on this planet safe from the morons that surround us?
Posted by: Sam | Apr 12 2008 2:49 utc | 26
from #24 link..
"I believe that Osama bin Laden has succeeded in a great way in attacking you militarily and economically," the prisoner, Ibrahim Ahmed Mahmoud al Qosi, told the U.S. military court at the Guantanamo Bay naval base in Cuba.... al Qosi said the attacks on New York and the Pentagon exposed a lack of justice and equality in the United States, which preached human rights to other countries.
"The whole world has a headache from your hypocrisy," said al Qosi, who is accused by the United States of helping bin Laden escape to the Tora Bora mountains of Afghanistan after the U.S.-led invasion in 2001.
sounds reasonable to me.
from the newyorker..camp justice
re the upcoming 'tribunals'
I spoke to Brigadier General Thomas W. Hartmann, the legal adviser to the Office of Military Commissions, in the Pentagon, and, as such, the chief Administration defender of the commission process. .. “When this is over, I’d like people to say these trials were conducted as fairly and as consistently as possible, and we followed the rule of law,”....
there is a heads-I-win, tails-you-lose quality to the proceedings. If a defendant is acquitted, he need not be released; he can simply be returned to detainee status at Guantánamo, to remain in custody until the end of the war on terror—raising the question of what sort of recourse the proceedings really provide.
.....
“What’s unusual about what we’re doing is that we’re having the commissions before the end of the war,” Hartmann told me. “The Nuremberg trials were after World War Two"..... By this reasoning, even those Guantánamo detainees who are acquitted of the charges against them are analogous to Nazi war criminals.
....
“You know why the courtroom has the sealed-off press section, don’t you?” Stafford Smith said. “All they care about is the evidence of the accused being tortured. They keep saying that the accused will see all the evidence, but the accused already knows he’s been tortured. The point is to make sure that the media and the public don’t see the evidence of torture. The key thing that they say is classified is evidence of torture and abuse.” ..
To try to forestall trials centered on the alleged torture of the defendants, the prosecutors have assembled “clean teams”—investigators who were not directly involved in the interrogation—to build cases against Mohammed and the others which exclude any evidence that might be tainted. “The clean teams are a joke,” Stafford Smith said. “It’s impossible to ‘unhear’ what they said when they were tortured.”
That claim of fairness suffered a significant blow last fall, when Air Force Colonel Morris D. Davis, the chief prosecutor for the commissions, resigned his post in protest. Davis, who has served as a military lawyer for twenty-four years, took the job in September, 2005. He told me that he operated without interference for about a year. The situation changed when Susan Crawford, a protégée of Vice-President Dick Cheney who is close to his counsel and chief of staff, David Addington, was named the “convening authority” of the commissions and Hartmann took over as legal adviser. Crawford was a political appointee, and her position made her a kind of one-person grand jury. Davis came to believe that Hartmann and Crawford were more concerned with the Administration’s interests than with the integrity of the process.
.... Crawford and Hartmann, he said, made it clear that they thought that declassifying the evidence was too much trouble and that “we’ve got to get this moving quickly, even if it means doing it behind closed doors.”
Davis went on, “I knew that a few of our likely defendants had been waterboarded, and I just made a decision that we were not going to use any evidence from them that was coerced, and no one challenged that opinion.” But Hartmann, Davis says, questioned whether Davis had the authority to judge the admissibility of evidence.
In the end, it was the structure of the commissions, rather than any single decision by his superiors, that prompted Davis to resign. “I thought the whole idea was for Hartmann and Crawford to be the referees, not beholden to the defense or the prosecution,” he said. “But if Hartmann is in our office each day, assigning lawyers, deciding which cases to bring, what evidence to use, and then supervising the case—that wasn’t right.”
a political appointee of cheney/addington is convening authority.
Posted by: annie | Apr 12 2008 3:51 utc | 27
Can we keep the politics out of sports as it was meant to be and have just one frigging thing on this planet safe from the morons that surround us?
i don't think the US plans on raining down any hellfire missiles on the athletes during the olympics! i guess we all need to be prepared for the worst.
Posted by: annie | Apr 12 2008 3:57 utc | 28
anonPersonally I think Bush did this becuase he feared casualties would reduce support for invading Iraq. ...Of course Bush denied it becuase it would hurt his image of the strong leader fighting the War On Terror.
they never wanted to catch binnie. they wouldn't have had an excuse to carry on their terra war. the perfect cover. binnie is their gift that keeps on giving. dead or alive those videos will keep rolling in from SEEK 'n memri.
Posted by: annie | Apr 12 2008 4:20 utc | 29
Reminds me a bit of that passage in Hitler's last will and testament in which he blames the German people for their own misfortunes,
was watching the rather good BBC doco "The Power of Nightmares" the other evening with politically literate friends. the doco in 3 parts traces the parallel histories of the Islamist (politicised Islamic fundamentalist) movement and the US neocon/dominionist movement. one of the repeating themes is that a small extremist group with a utopian, simplistic agenda (a) decides to commit violence to "shock the masses" into coming to their senses and overthrowing the corrupt, "evil" present regime, then (b) fails to get "the masses" to rise up and adopt their cause, therefore (c) starts to blame "the masses" and see them -- their own people -- as just as much of an Enemy as the constructed, delusional external Enemy on which their politics of heroic antagonism is based. the blaming of the masses for being corrupted or "infected" with evil then justifies random terrorism against civilian targets...
DeAnander, great documentary.
starts to blame "the masses" and see them -- their own people -- as just as much of an Enemy as the constructed, delusional external Enemy
this is a constant underlying theme of the gov trolls on politico sites, blaming the 'left' for 'supporting terrorism'.
Posted by: annie | Apr 12 2008 4:56 utc | 31
I and my co-viewing friends found TPON frustrating in some of its shallower moments -- for example blandly presenting Kissinger as a realist and architect of "stability and safety" by contrast with the loony neocons (who really are pretty obviously whackjobs per their rather frank and confident interview footage); OK, it's true that the neocons make Henry look relatively sane, but evil and sane. and there's not nearly enough mention -- none really -- of all the profiteering/financial connections between the Cheney Mafia and the arms industry, mercenary "service providers", contractors and so on. my irate Quebecois friend Michel kept expostulating "But what about the money? what about the money? how can they not talk about the money?"
still, for all its limitations it's a good doco. the historical footage in particular is incredibly revealing. watching Rummie doing the exact same shuck-n-jive back in the 70s, inflating the Soviet threat just as he would later inflate the Iraqi "threat" (an even more ludicrous fabrication), with the same glib Ivy League arrogance and the same arch, appalling snicker, is pretty eerie stuff. a one-trick pony, but what a lucrative trick it is.
Posted by: b real | Apr 12 2008 6:49 utc | 33
my irate Quebecois friend Michel kept expostulating "But what about the money? what about the money? how can they not talk about the money?"
tell michael to watch curtis's prior documentary The Century of the Self
Posted by: annie | Apr 12 2008 8:17 utc | 34
annie:
i don't think the US plans on raining down any hellfire missiles on the athletes during the olympics!
I'm pretty sure nobody else on the planet would think that either so then why would you mention it? You really have to get out more:
Incidents in XinjiangOn 5 February 1992, among the four bombs set in public buildings in Urumqi, Xinjiang, China, the two on the buses of line 2 and line 30 exploded. The incidents led to at least the death of 3, and injury of 23.
Urumqi bus bombs: On 25 February 1997 three bombs exploded in Urumqi. The bombs were set on the three buses (line 10, line 44, and line 2), and made the death of 9, (including the death of 3 children at least), and injury of 74.
they never wanted to catch binnie. they wouldn't have had an excuse to carry on their terra war. the perfect cover.
On the contrary, if Bush would have caught bin Laden they would have crowned him Emporer and allowed him to invade all the countries he wanted. He didn't bin Laden to invade Iraq he framed Saddam remember?
Posted by: Sam | Apr 12 2008 9:10 utc | 35
# 35 should have read - He didn't need bin Laden to invade Iraq
Posted by: Sam | Apr 12 2008 9:17 utc | 37
why would you mention it?
my sense of humor i guess. it was a joke sam, you're so...sensitive. btw. i read something last night that reminded me of you and our earlier conversation. i was reading the new ABC report about bush approving of torture when something jumped out at me.
after Zubaydah recovered from his wounds at a secret CIA prison in Thailand,
i recalled the excellent RS article (The Man Who Sold the War Meet John Rendon, Bush's general in the propaganda war) that won the 2006 National Magazine Award in the reporting category. i recommend the article if you are unfamiliar w/it. it starts off in thailand,
But just because the story wasn't true didn't mean it couldn't be put to good use. Al-Haideri, in fact, was the product of a clandestine operation -- part espionage, part PR campaign -- that had been set up and funded by the CIA and the Pentagon for the express purpose of selling the world a war. And the man who had long been in charge of the marketing was a secretive and mysterious creature of the Washington establishment named John Rendon.....His firm, the Rendon Group, has made millions off government contracts since 1991, when it was hired by the CIA to help "create the conditions for the removal of Hussein from power." Working under this extraordinary transfer of secret authority, Rendon assembled a group of anti-Saddam militants, personally gave them their name -- the Iraqi National Congress -- and served as their media guru and "senior adviser" as they set out to engineer an uprising against Saddam.
jumping ahead seamlessly...
Her front-page story, which hit the stands on December 20th, 2001, was exactly the kind of exposure Rendon had been hired to provide. AN IRAQI DEFECTOR TELLS OF WORK ON AT LEAST 20 HIDDEN WEAPONS SITES,.....
By law, the Bush administration is expressly prohibited from disseminating government propaganda at home. But in an age of global communications, there is nothing to stop it from planting a phony pro-war story overseas -- knowing with certainty that it will reach American citizens almost instantly. A recent congressional report suggests that the Pentagon may be relying on "covert psychological operations affecting audiences within friendly nations." In a "secret amendment" to Pentagon policy, the report warns, "psyops funds might be used to publish stories favorable to American policies, or hire outside contractors without obvious ties to the Pentagon to organize rallies in support of administration policies."
just out of curiosity i googled rendon/lincoln.. ran into this NYT piece Military's Information War Is Vast and Often Secretive,
containing these little factoids...
The news that the American military was buying influence was met mostly with shrugs in Baghdad, where readers tend to be skeptical about the media. An Iraqi daily newspaper, Azzaman, complained in an editorial that the propaganda campaign was an American effort "to humiliate the independent national press." Many Iraqis say that no amount of money spent on trying to mold public opinion is likely to have much impact, given the harsh conditions under the American military occupation...While the United States does not ban the distribution of government propaganda overseas, as it does domestically, the Government Accountability Office said in a recent report that lack of attribution could undermine the credibility of news videos. In finding that video news releases by the Bush administration that appeared on American television were improper, the G.A.O. said that such articles "are no longer purely factual" because "the essential fact of attribution is missing."
The White House turned to John Rendon, who runs a Washington communications company, to help influence foreign audiences. Before the war in Afghanistan, he helped set up centers in Washington, London and Pakistan so the American government could respond rapidly in the foreign media to Taliban claims. "We were clueless," said Mary Matalin, then the communications aide to Vice President Dick Cheney.
In mid-2004, the company formed a partnership with the Rendon Group and later won a $5 million Pentagon contract for an advertising and public relations campaign to "accurately inform the Iraqi people of the Coalition's goals and gain their support." Soon, the company changed its name to Lincoln Group. It is not clear how the partnership was formed; Rendon dropped out weeks after the contract was awarded.
back to RS link
The Bush administration then decided to remove Noriega by force -- and Rendon's job shifted from generating local support for a national election to building international support for regime change. Within days he had found the ultimate propaganda tool.At the end of a rally in support of Endara, a band of Noriega's Dignity Battalion -- nicknamed "Dig Bats" and called "Doberman thugs" by Bush -- attacked the crowd with wooden planks, metal pipes and guns. Gang members grabbed the bodyguard of Guillermo Ford, one of Endara's vice-presidential candidates, pushed him against a car, shoved a gun in his mouth and pulled the trigger. With cameras snapping, the Dig Bats turned on Ford, batting his head with a spike-tipped metal rod and pounding him with heavy clubs, turning his white guayabera bright red with blood -- his own, and that of his dead bodyguard.
Within hours, Rendon made sure the photos reached every newsroom in the world. The next week an image of the violence made the cover of Time magazine with the caption POLITICS PANAMA STYLE: NORIEGA BLUDGEONS HIS OPPOSITION, AND THE U.S. TURNS UP THE HEAT.
its a great article, includes rendon's work beginning in '90 working w/US/kuwait in a disinformation campaign that led to saddams invasion of kuwait, and eventually our justification for the '91 invasion.
all seamless. i thought you would like it since you seem interested in perception management.
Posted by: annie | Apr 12 2008 16:41 utc | 38
annie:
i recommend the article if you are unfamiliar w/it. it starts off in thailand,
...
all seamless. i thought you would like it since you seem interested in perception management.
I read it when it came out in late 2005. James Banford did a good job but it took him a couple of years of souring on the war before he finally decided to inform the public. But it wasn't news, Jeffrey Steinberg already wrote all about all those juicy details back in Feb of 2003 before they even invaded. It's not a secret it's just that the main stream media don't bother to report it. They were too busy putting Judy Miller on the front page, firing Phil Donahue, banning the Dixie Chicks from the 1200 Clear Channel stations and telling us what a swell fellow Chalabi was.
Posted by: Sam | Apr 13 2008 11:13 utc | 39
Jeffrey Steinberg already wrote all about all those juicy details back in Feb of 2003
this?
Behind the Iraq Dossier Hoax:
Intelligence Was Cooked in Israel
think of the wealth of information i am missing out on not keeping up w/la rouche's EIR. you get around sam :)
Posted by: annie | Apr 13 2008 13:21 utc | 40
annie:
think of the wealth of information i am missing out on not keeping up w/la rouche's EIR. you get around sam
Just ignore the Israel did it crap because we all know it was cooked in the WH and you will see the stories match. When the real media is telling massive lies, as was obvious in the run up to the Iraq war, one is forced to look tor other sources including the looney ones. It wasn't the only source but it was the best summary I read at the time.
Posted by: Sam | Apr 13 2008 14:30 utc | 41
Just ignore the Israel did it crap because we all know it was cooked in the WH
lol, except that many of the israelis sited in the article work directly with the WH.and the WH works w/aipac. it's pretty hard to ignore our 51st state. it would be like considering iran/contra ignoring israel's contribution.
Posted by: annie | Apr 13 2008 14:36 utc | 42
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Just when you think it can't possibly get any worse...
Posted by: beq | Apr 10 2008 11:06 utc | 1