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May 7, 2009
Links May 7 09
  • Spot-on about the war preparations – Opinion Shaping and the Pakistan Threat – (WPR)
  • On Gitmo: Obama=Bush? – New Chief Prosecutor Appointed For Military Commissions At Guantánamo – (Andy Worthington)
  • A very telling graph on media bias and Africa – Congo Ignored, Not Forgotten – (FAIR)
  • This might get interesting – Weapons grade uranium found in Egypt – (PressTV)
  • Accelerating colonization – Settlement expansion seeing biggest boost since 2003 – (Haaretz)

On Israel as “the State of the Jewish People”

  • Tony Karon – Can Bibi Force Abbas to ‘Recognize’ an Oxymoron? – (TK)
  • Uri Averny – Netanyahu's Plan – (Counterpunch)
  • Roubini: Let them fail – Insolvent banks should feel market discipline – (FT, alternative link)
Posted by b on May 7, 2009 at 05:59 UTC | Permalink
Comments

I’ve been wondering when this sort of thing might crop up. Lots of broke vets with something special to sell. Not good.

Oklahoma City war veteran accused of selling bombs to gang members
Buzz up!
BY JOHNNY JOHNSON
Published: December 25, 2008
Police spent the day searching the house of a decorated, two-tour Iraq war veteran on Tuesday to investigate a tip that the former soldier was said to have been making explosive devices to sell to gang members, according to a probable cause affidavit.
Steven Andrew Jordal, 24, was an infantry tank specialist in the U.S. Army from 2002 to 2007. He received the Army’s Good Conduct medal, along with several other medals, badges and ribbons, the military confirmed.
Oklahoma City police took interest in Jordal when they received a tip he was selling improvised explosive devices to criminals.
For as little as $100, Jordal was making the same kinds of weapons he saw used against his fellow soldiers in the Iraqi deserts and selling them on the streets of Okalahoma City to gang members and known criminals, according to the document.
The police informant had seen Jordal testing explosives in an area near N. Western and 122 Street and said Jordal had custom- made a device for someone who wanted to damage the vehicle of someone who owed money on a drug deal.
With that information, police located Jordal on Monday evening and found him in possession of a device he allegedly intended to sell, and also found several concealed weapons including a loaded .38-caliber semiautomatic handgun, the affidavit said.
Police said Jordal admitted to making multiple IEDs and that he had tried to sell them. He said he was selling the device police caught him with for $100, and that he knew it would be used in the very least to cause property damage.
It was during the same interview that Jordal gave consent to search his house and vehicle, where police said they expected to find more IEDs and explosive components. Police are not disclosing what if anything they found in the search of his house.
Jordal was arrested Monday on complaints of manufacturing explosives with the intent to sell them. It is unclear if he will be facing federal or state charges.
Contributing: Staff Writer Jay Marks

Posted by: anna missed | May 7 2009 6:35 utc | 1

“A little creative orderly destruction”? Roudini must have softened his tone because he was truly spooked by Lehman.

Posted by: alabama | May 7 2009 8:59 utc | 2

Hamas feels the heat from Syria.

What Obama could learn from Karzai.
Who will stop the AIPAC Jews before it is too late?

Posted by: andrew | May 7 2009 9:56 utc | 3

“You talkin’ to me? You talkin’ to me? You talkin’ to me? […] Who the fuck do you think you’re talking to?”
Little gestures:

PESHAWAR: Despite threats from militants who consider the depiction of unveiled women as un-Islamic, billboards, which used to display only male models are slowly being replaced with women, according to a DawnNews report.
Cinemas around the city have also begun displaying billboards and posters with images of actresses.
But due to fear from militants, some advertisers are displaying female models but without displaying their faces.
It was soon after the victory of the ANP government in the 2008 elections, that companies started to replace male images with women on billboards but due to growing Taliban activities in the suburbs of Peshawar, the companies reverted back to male models for advertising campaigns.

German-Iranian relations.

Posted by: andrew | May 7 2009 10:06 utc | 4

The Top 25 Lenders Responsible For Almost $1 Trillion Of Subprime Loans.
Top CIA officials were given daily torture updates of Zubaydah.
Peres to Ban Ki-Moon: “You talkin’ to me? You talkin’ to me? You talkin’ to me? […] Who the fuck do you think you’re talking to?” (second take).

Posted by: andrew | May 7 2009 10:17 utc | 5

I found this little gem in today’s paper regarding a couple of Palestinian men arrested with ancient scrolls

It was unclear where the two men obtained it, police and archaeologists said. Similar documents have been found in caves in the Judean Desert near the Dead Sea, where they have been preserved over the centuries by the dry climate, they said.

But damnit Bea, they were Palestinian… what other proof of guilt do you need?
Israel more ‘n likely wants to make sure these scrolls don’t contain any information that would weaken the phantasy of a G_d-ordained Israeli state. Perverting history, perverting justice and perverting the truth. Damn them all!

Posted by: DavidS | May 7 2009 13:57 utc | 6

Record bombs dropped in Afghanistan in April.

Posted by: andrew | May 7 2009 14:39 utc | 7

Jordal was making the same kinds of weapons he saw used against his fellow soldiers
hmm, are we to presume the US military never uses these kinds of weapons itself. maybe he had some previous experince making them.
from the congo link
The most recent survey (IRC, 1/08) estimated that 45,000 people are dying each month from conflict-related causes (primarily hunger and disease)
that’s a shocking figure.

Posted by: annie | May 7 2009 14:59 utc | 8

Since Israel is still in the midst of recovering from a housing meltdown, it doesn’t make sense that real estate developers in Israel would want to further flood the market with homes (whether these homes are being built on the West Bank or not), for this will cause home prices across Israel to plummet even further. This especially don’t make sense given that the number of Jews immigrating to Israel is way down and the population growth for Israeli Jew is dying down.
I suppose it’s possible that this flood of homes being built on the West Bank won’t cause much downward pressure on the overall housing market in Israel, if these homes are being heavily subsidized by the Israeli government in conjunction with wealthy Zionists.

Posted by: Cynthia | May 7 2009 15:15 utc | 9

Cynthia, I don’t know squat about the housing meltdown in Israel, I presume it is ‘average’ as a hypothesis pending more information. And I doubt Israel (or the US…) will be recovering from it, in the sense of house prices stabilizing soon at some oft-called ‘bottom’ only to then gently rise again. The number of Jews immigrating to Israel is down, has been ‘down’ for years, moreover those who can get their act together try to leave…That is part of Israel’s curse, it is supported by rich expats who wouldn’t dream of living there, though they may maintain an ‘address‘ or a second home.
Building houses in the occupied territories and actually filling them with occupants is a state-funded political, territorial, tool. There are, for ex., plenty of extremely poor uneducated Americans (and others) ready to move to better climes and take the state subsidies. Israel can find the warm bodies. What this does to the Israeli state budget is another question, sends it deep into the doldrums, imho. The cost of building, minimal infrastructure (roads etc), some social services (schooling, health..), ongoing and perpetual protection (how many soldiers, or better part of soldier, per settler?) and the endless subsidies that must be handed out to them, and they have demands, you know, like pools, cheap food, that must be met, otherwise they leave…must be just stupendous. All this for territorial expansion in a kind of wildly hysterical copy of 19th cent. colonialism…turned back on itself, as originally settlers were paid once the territory was secured, not before. (Counter examples exist.)
So, the price of housing, etc. is not germane. What counts is how much the Isareli Gvmt. can afford to spend without going terminally broke. And that boils down to who will give, who will support, where can they get cash.
As you said, if these homes are being heavily subsidized by the Israeli government in conjunction with wealthy Zionists.. count on it, it is 100%…so money is no object, but the gift gives on taking, so to speak.

Posted by: Tangerine | May 7 2009 16:19 utc | 10

Roubini: Let them fail – Insolvent banks should feel market discipline – (FT, alternative link)
Obamageddon: Let Them Fail – Capitalism Should Capitulate. Capitalism in Wonderland

The issue of discounting may seem esoteric to most people, but not to economists, and deserves some examination. Discounting is fundamentally about how we value the future relative to the present—insofar as it makes any sense at all to attach numbers to such valuations. The “discount rate” can be thought of as operating in inverse relation to compound interest. While “compounding measures how much present-day investments will be worth in the future, discounting measures how much future benefits are worth today.”13 Estimation of the discount rate is based on two moral issues. First, there is the issue of how we value the welfare of future generations relative to present ones (the time discount rate). As Nordhaus states, “A zero discount rate means that all generations into the indefinite future are treated the same; a positive discount rate means that the welfare of future generations is reduced or ‘discounted’ compared with nearer generations.” A catastrophe affecting humanity fifty years from now, given a discount rate of 10 percent, would have a “present value” less than 1 percent of its future cost. Second, there is the issue of how wealthy future generations will be relative to present ones and whether it is appropriate to shift costs from the present to the future. If we assume a high rate of economic growth into the indefinite future, we are more likely to avoid investing in addressing problems now, because we assume that future generations will be wealthier than we are and can better afford to address these problems, even if the problems become substantially worse.

So, the next time a conservative, yet Capitalist, cheerleader tells you he’s/she’s concerned about the welfare of future generations (complaints about the O’s budget and how to pay it back), tell him to go fuck himself, or understand the Economic Theory behind the Capitalist Religion he/she so fervently worships, because according to that theory, future generations have no value. FYI, I don’t agee with O’s budget, but for reasons other than Bonner’s.

Posted by: Obamageddon | May 7 2009 17:57 utc | 11

The FAIR piece on Congo is quite good, and goes into some level of analysis as to why the media ignores Congo, particularly in terms of its relation to the Rwandan genocide. But I’m not sure if it goes quite far enough. The aftermath of the Rwandan genocide directly contributed to the fall of the Mobutu government, and is still, 15 years later, a massive destabilizing force in eastern Congo.
But calling attention to this calls attention to the massive global failure of dealing with the Rwandan genocide. The systems put in place, ostensibly to stop future genocides, accomplished nothing. President Clinton accurately described the atrocities as one of the great humanitarian crises of our age, with the slight mistake that he was describing the fleeing genocidaires and refugees, instead of the Tutsis who had been killed. Likewise, the French led a UN force to defend the Hutus against the Ugandan-supported Tutsi invasion/rescue force, only to discover that crimes had been committed by the Hutus whom they were supposed to be protecting.
The entire situation, in other words, demonstrates the ineffectiveness of the “peacekeeping” system. Going further back into Congolese history, of course, leads to the evils of colonialism, providing further embarassment to the “west.”
Small wonder that westerners prefer to focus on Darfur and its nasty Arab oppressors and Chinese neocolonialists as villains.

Posted by: Rowan | May 7 2009 19:09 utc | 12

Add to that the complexity of reporting on the chaos in what by now is pretty much an ungovernable country. A journalist can get plenty of relief porn out of it, but no catchy TV-grade story.

Posted by: …—… | May 8 2009 1:02 utc | 13

Study of AIPAC Manipulation of US Policy, 1994. 15-year old study by the Industrial College of the US Armed Forces. A good read.
Obama’s nominee for Chief Scientist of DHS Apparently, it’s not a great choice.

Posted by: Obelix | May 8 2009 4:21 utc | 14

Rowan wrote: The entire situation, in other words, demonstrates the ineffectiveness of the “peacekeeping” system.
Yes. The problem is the peace keeping is selective and self-serving. I have read that the commercial, corporate interests (purely extractive, zero rent-gathering or gasp!, distributive) in the Congo are mostly British and American. I expect it is a bit more complex than that.
The empty hysteria of the Save Darfur!! crowd is pathetic.
Such actions, streams of thought, lobbies, etc. are created by the media, they have no relation to reality at all, and the thinkers behind the scenes just expect the sheeples to follow and protest whatever humanitarian disaster is put out there. It always works, as proper information is suppressed, and some little trickle down money is handed out to hacks, leaders, influence peddlers…. It is a business. Managed.
In any case it all makes a complete mockery of cracking down on genocide.
This is a report by Chappate – graphic novel style – in French, about Lebanon. It was published in the mainstream french-speaking right-wing paper. link
Killing ppl outright is kinda old-hat and not PC….much better to poison their water, leave bomblets behind, and demoralise them…and tighten the hold of the IMF, international treaties, regulations, etc. which can be presented in a positive light.

Posted by: Tangerine | May 8 2009 15:37 utc | 15

Yeah, yeah, tangerine. Better, like Switzerland, to set yourself up as a glitzy money-launderer for the defacto int’l capitalists, claim happy neutrality, and bitch from your seat in the luxury box.

Posted by: slothrop | May 8 2009 17:31 utc | 16

Slothrop-
You’re making it sound like a job at the NY Times…

Posted by: DavidS | May 8 2009 17:44 utc | 17

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