Anything They Say

Sign off

2007-10-08T16:02:00.000-04:00

I started this blog exactly two years ago today. Today, it ends.

I have found it increasingly onerous, mentally draining and difficult to justify the enormous amount of time and energy spent here, all largely for the benefit of search engines and Google bots. I really can't tell how many actual people visit here, but considering that the hit statistics are 95% driven by search engines and hardly anyone comments, there is no strong sense that I am providing much of anything that people find very interesting. As we all do, I had hopes for a little more circulation, but, since a peak last summer, visits have been ignominiously sliding and it feels like I could pretty much accomplish the same things I do here by simply talking to myself in a room. I think we can all agree, that gets pretty boring after awhile.

I've met some great people through this venue, though, and for that I am grateful. I've been pointed to some fine blogs, and I encourage those so inclined to trip on over to any or all of them, which will be listed below (I will leave this blog up for awhile anyway). For the most part, these are blogs you won't find the Blog Establishment mentioning very much, as the A-list has ossified into its own self-referential structure. It was bound to happen, of course, as all social networks do. Nonetheless, I wish them all well and hope the struggle does not seem as fruitless as it does to me right now. Some people have boundless faith and energy in fighting the corruptions and crimes of the political classes of this country and let's give thanks for them. I am not one of them, however. Day after day after day of seeing the same cruel intentions and mean-spirited bullshit spilling across the pages and airwaves has rendered me near limp and lifeless.

I may start up another venue at some point but it will be focused on a subject that, while writing this blog, I have discovered is really where my own true interests lie: the ongoing projects of various competing world powers, the jockeying for position and the American empire's response to the rising and would-be hegemons. I can no longer stand listening and watching the asinine spectacle that passes for politics in these United States; horse races, money races and who wears a lapel pin and who doesn't.

I've come to a conclusion that echoes Chomsky. It really doesn't make any difference on the world stage whether Democrats or Republicans are in charge. And as our corporate media will continue to ensure, that situation will only become more solidified. Sure a few domestic policies get shuffled around but the tide has been turning against the social compact for thirty years. The vast majority of people in this country have lost ground on real wages and wealth accumulates at geometric rates in the upper reaches of the richest households of America. And the Democrats had been in charge for most of this period.

But the real march of empire, the undeclared wars, the assassinations, the death squads, the black ops, the coups, all conducted for the advancement of "American interests," has mercilessly continued to beat a deadly path across much of the most destitute and ravaged parts of the world. This has happened with Democratic presidents and Republican ones; with Democratic majorities and Republican ones. Lie after lie after lie about US government comportment in the world, whether it was lying about the Gulf of Tonkin or lying about Iran-Contra or lying about Iraq WMD, has never resulted in even the slightest whiff of accountability for any of the perpetrators, whether Democrat or Republican. What did result in an impeachment? Lying about a blowjob. But you won't see impeachment for real crimes. We all know this is true. To borrow a favorite phrase of our current epoch's lexicon, accountability for real crimes has always been "off the table," forever and always. And as long as that remains the case, then, no, things are not going to change anytime soon.

Key to this, of course, is that Americans must remain misinformed, entertained or otherwise distracted from the real news. The real news is not whatever the fuck Hillary said, or whether Obama wears a pin or Larry Craig in an airport bathroom. It is not even what their "policies" are right now, because, a year from the election, it means nothing. You cannot get a straight answer out of Clinton about Iraq, and for good reason. But you won't be told what that reason is. The truth is known but no one can acknowledge it.

The real news is hard to come by through passive absorption of corporate media and for good reason: they are corporations making fortunes from arrangements as they exist today and which are intended to be extended as long as possible. Those arrangements are not very pleasant viewing for most Americans, which is why news about them is not forthcoming. In fact, most Americans would be damned horrified to know all the things that are executed "in their name." This is why, having been publicly exposed, torture must to be turned into something palatable, something that "must be done" to save lives. Can you conceive of having conversations about the efficacy of torture before Abu Graib was brought to light? But we do it now. And on national television and especially on Fox News, where it is now pumped into the soft heads of millions that torture is not only necessary but just, while presidential candidates are asked whether they "pray for the troops." Torture and praying. All together now. Torquemada would be proud.

So, no, I can't really stand paying any attention to that which passes for politics in the United States. It is increasingly stupid and always irrelevant to the conduct of American empire.

***

Well, I've certainly gone on a bit longer than I first imagined. I hope I haven't bummed you out too much. As I said, another outlet may arise sometime later and I'll let those I know about it, if or when it happens. And visit the blogs linked below. You are sure to find some good work there.

Cheers and good luck in your endevours, whatever they may be.

-- Ken Anderson

(in no particular order)

The Newshoggers
Hotpotatomash
The Osterley Times
The November Blog
Swedish Meatballs Confidential
Leftwingnutjob
Existentialist Cowboy
Another Point of View

and special shout to*

Toner Mishap and
The Heretik

and thanks to

spiiderweb

for all the comments.

*I think the Misanthrope may have been my first link and The Heretik punched up the first comment.

Blackwater blimps and beyond

2007-10-07T19:29:00.000-04:00

Coming to a neighbourhood near you.

It looks like Blackwater has already found a use to which they are shoveling those hefty profits: building their own airships, among other things, that will then be leased back to the DoD, the DHS and "other government agencies," no doubt at exorbitant rates.

Blackwater Airships LLC was established in January 2006 as the newest Blackwater venture -- with a mission to build a remotely piloted airship vehicle (RPAV). Although seemingly different from the traditional Blackwater mission, this new venture to provide a persistent surveillance capability is fully consistent with the Blackwater goal of offering solutions which help to protect our forces wherever they are deployed and support our homeland security.

The Blackwater Airships team completed design work at the end of 2006 and is now building the Polar 400 airship. This highly capable RPAV will provide a platform ready to accomodate a wide variety of state-of-the-art surveillance, communications and detection equipment that can record and store events and downlink them in real-time to ground operators. The make-up of the mission payload of up to 400 lbs will be determined by customer requirements -- whether for combat areas, port or border security, or coastal patrol.

The prototype Polar 400 is completing propulsion ground tests and when fully assembled will undergo test flights and then move into production by mid-year 2007. Following successful demonstration flights, Blackwater Airships will begin selling or leasing airships to Department of Defense, Department of Homeland Security and other government customers. The Polar 400 is designed to operate for 48 to 60 hours at altitudes from 5,000 to 15,000 feet. The unique design of the RPAV propulsion system will give it the capability to loiter over a desired location with excellent low-speed maneuverability, along with an ability to fly at up to 50 knots to move quickly to and from a target area.

Joe Rathbun's entire article is worth reading. Check it out.

[via Covert History]

Private efficiencies

2007-10-07T16:24:00.000-04:00

The Bush administration, and Republicans in general, hold up privatization as -- always -- the most efficient way to use taxpayer dollars. Privatization leverages the efficiencies of the market, which, we are constantly told, always delivers the best product or service for the price. It is a disastrous myth, of course, but it is nonetheless pervasive, made purposefully so, even in the face of prima facie evidence of its falsity. What privatization does appear to be quite good at is efficiently sluicing taxpayer dollars directly to private contractors, who rarely fail to impress with bad practice, loathsome performance and outright connivance. Two examples have recently popped onto the headlines.

Exhibit A: The $600 billion Medicare privatization boondoggle, which, since its inauspicious debut, has benefited both health insurance companies and pharmaceutical manufacturers. Efficiency of the market was again the cry. And now, after 91 audits, "health insurance" companies have been found to pose an "imminent and serious threat” to tens of thousands of their own Medicare patients by improperly denying claims and practicing deceptive sales tactics while stalling on claims not already denied and failing to respond to complaints. They have ruthlessly and improperly canceled HIV and AIDS patient care. All of this is done in the name of quarterly profit margins, of course, since that is the real efficiency that the market seeks these days. On top of this egregious behaviour, government agency must constantly monitor and audit these activities because, clearly, "the market" cannot be trusted to deliver anything close to satisfactory service.

Exhibit B: Blackwater. The unprecedented growth of this Republican party outpost is a direct result of an illegal war and deep ties to the GOP and the Christian conservative movement and is hardly the result of market forces. As a House committee investigation has uncovered, Blackwater costs the State Department six to nine times what it would for an Army soldier to perform the same duties. But when US military forces are scarce and stretched, privateers leap into the void for extraordinary fees: $445,000 a year for each "protective security specialist." The efficiency of this profit margin is demonstrated by the fact that is has been the US government itself that has trained most Blackwater forces, at considerable expense, an expense that Blackwater has efficiently externalized.

But this is not the worst of it. The supposed efficiencies of the mercenary market have caused nothing but harm to the military efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Blackwater specifically has been a drain on US forces, not only with their contemptible disregard for the local population but for sparking the horrific campaign in Falluja, where Blackwater purposefully skimped on armoured humvees in an effort to undercut contract bidding. When Blackwater paid off the family of one of their victims to the tune of $15,000, that too will likely be paid for with taxpayer dollars, charged as an expense on their cost-plus contract.

And now, after the most recent Blackwater shooting incident, the State Department has finally agreed to a new protocol whereby State officials will now ride with and oversee the conduct of Blackwater mercs as they perform their market-blessed task of security for State Department officials for the princely sum of $1200/day. To reiterate this arrangement: Blackwater mercenaries have become such a liability that government officials will now oversee and monitor the privatized security for ... government officials.

In spite of the obvious fact that privatization results not in efficient delivery of what would otherwise by government delivered services, but, rather, in the efficient delivery of tax payer funds tuned to hefty profits, lives are lost and the true costs of the putative expeditious service are buried under a malaise of untrustworthy if not outright criminal conduct, the one thing we know deregulated privatization is capable of delivering efficiently.

The beasts and the Buddhists

2007-10-06T15:10:00.000-04:00

From This is London posted in its entirety.

Thousands of protesters are dead and the bodies of hundreds of executed monks have been dumped in the jungle, a former intelligence officer for Burma's ruling junta has revealed.

The most senior official to defect so far, Hla Win, said: "Many more people have been killed in recent days than you've heard about. The bodies can be counted in several thousand."

Mr Win, who spoke out as a Swedish diplomat predicted that the revolt has failed, said he fled when he was ordered to take part in a massacre of holy men. He has now reached the border with Thailand.

Meanwhile, the United Nations special envoy was in Burma's new capital today seeking meetings with the ruling military junta.

Ibrahim Gambari met detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi in Rangoon yesterday. But he has yet to meet the country's senior generals as he attempts to halt violence against monks and pro-democracy activists.

It is anticipated the meeting will happen tomorrow.

Heavily-armed troops and police flooded the streets of Rangoon during Mr Ibrahim's visit to prevent new protests.

Mr Gambari met some of the country's military leaders in Naypyidaw yesterday and has returned there for further talks. But he did not meet senior general Than Shwe or his deputy Maung Aye - and they have issued no comment.

Reports from exiles along the frontier confirmed that hundreds of monks had simply "disappeared" as 20,000 troops swarmed around Rangoon yesterday to prevent further demonstrations by religious groups and civilians.

Word reaching dissidents hiding out on the border suggested that as well as executions, some 2,000 monks are being held in the notorious Insein Prison or in university rooms which have been turned into cells.

There were reports that many were savagely beaten at a sports ground on the outskirts of Rangoon, where they were heard crying for help.

Others who had failed to escape disguised as civilians were locked in their bloodstained temples.

There, troops abandoned religious beliefs, propped their rifles against statues of Buddha and began cooking meals on stoves set up in shrines.

In stark contrast, the streets of Rangoon and Mandalay - centres of the attempted saffron revolution last week - were virtually deserted.

A Swedish diplomat who visited Burma during the protests said last night that in her opinion the revolution has failed.

Liselotte Agerlid, who is now in Thailand, said that the Burmese people now face possibly decades of repression. "The Burma revolt is over," she added.

"The military regime won and a new generation has been violently repressed and violently denied democracy. The people in the street were young people, monks and civilians who were not participating during the 1988 revolt.

"Now the military has cracked down the revolt, and the result may very well be that the regime will enjoy another 20 years of silence, ruling by fear."

Mrs Agerlid said Rangoon is heavily guarded by soldiers.

"There are extremely high numbers of soldiers in Rangoon's streets," she added. "Anyone can see it is absolutely impossible for any demonstration to gather, or for anyone to do anything.

"People are scared and the general assessment is that the fight is over. We were informed from one of the largest embassies in Burma that 40 monks in the Insein prison were beaten to death today and subsequently burned."

The diplomat also said that three monasteries were raided yesterday afternoon and are now totally abandoned.

At his border hideout last night, 42-year-old Mr Win said he hopes to cross into Thailand and seek asylum at the Norwegian Embassy.

The 42-year-old chief of military intelligence in Rangoon's northern region, added: "I decided to desert when I was ordered to raid two monasteries and force several hundred monks onto trucks.

"They were to be killed and their bodies dumped deep inside the jungle. I refused to participate in this."

With his teenage son, he made his escape from Rangoon, leaving behind his wife and two other sons.

He had no fears for their safety because his brother is a powerful general who, he believes, will defend the family.

Mr Win's defection will raise a faint hope among tens of thousands of Burmese who have fled to villages along the Thai border.

They will feel others in the army may follow him and turn on their ageing leaders, Senior General Than Shwe and his deputy, Vice Senior General Maung Aye.

[h/t to CCNWON]

Weaponized Anthropology

2007-10-05T17:13:00.000-04:00

In this isolated Taliban stronghold in eastern Afghanistan, American paratroopers are fielding what they consider a crucial new weapon in counterinsurgency operations here: a soft-spoken civilian anthropologist named Tracy.

Tracy, who asked that her surname not be used for security reasons, is a member of the first Human Terrain Team, an experimental Pentagon program that assigns anthropologists and other social scientists to American combat units in Afghanistan and Iraq. Her team’s ability to understand subtle points of tribal relations — in one case spotting a land dispute that allowed the Taliban to bully parts of a major tribe — has won the praise of officers who say they are seeing concrete results.

Not all are pleased.

Hugh Gusterson, an anthropology professor at George Mason University, and 10 other anthropologists are circulating an online pledge calling for anthropologists to boycott the teams, particularly in Iraq.
“While often presented by its proponents as work that builds a more secure world,” the pledge says, “at base, it contributes instead to a brutal war of occupation which has entailed massive casualties.”

Overheard in the far-flung reaches of Waziristan:

Dammit Jim! where's our anthropologist? We're sitting ducks out here without social science! Get her over here now!

Oh shit! In coming!!!

Tarnish or polish?

2007-10-05T16:03:00.000-04:00

Senator Larry Craig was for leaving his senate seat before he was against it.

Shortly after a judge denied his request to withdraw the August plea admitting to disorderly conduct, Mr. Craig said he had reversed his previously announced decision to leave the Senate if he could not get the plea thrown out. He said he would instead serve out his third term, which expires in January 2009. He said he would not run for a fourth.

With the judge's decision to maintain the guilty plea, we will now be treated to the fitting sight of convicted criminal sitting in the "august" chambers of the world's most serious deliberative body (at least, that's what I think they like to call themselves). Craig will now rejoin all his fellow unconvicted criminal Senators for another blessed year until he quietly retires.

GOP leadership is still worried, however.

Republicans are unlikely to lose Idaho’s Senate seat but are worried Mr. Craig could tarnish the party’s overall reputation.

They must be worried about some heretofore unknown reputation, because compared to the vast roster of felony convicted Republicans, Craig's misdemeanor nuisance conviction ought to appear as a point of pride. This actually polishes the GOP image as far as I'm concerned. Craig is one of the few, if not the only, convicted Republicans whose conviction was not centered on graft, money, and corruption of American government. Craig should be viewed by the GOP as a poster boy of personal foible as opposed to public scoundrel.

I say to the GOP, run with it! The new clarion call of Republican rectitude:

I'm not a felon! I've only been convicted of a misdemeanor!

Luft balloons

2007-10-04T15:08:00.000-04:00

For someone about whom it is claimed specializes in "strategy, geopolitics, terrorism, Middle East and energy security," Gal Luft doesn't seem to know very much about strategy, geopolitics or energy security. Because there, on the pages of the Baltimore Sun, Gal Luft refutes Alan Greenspan's ad hoc confessional and tells us that the war in Iraq is not about the oil, or even about the geopolitical significance of the Middle East. He says such claims just "don't fit the facts." These would be the facts as Luft is aware of them and not, apparently, a larger superset of facts about which he is either blatantly misleading or singularly unaware.

He begins,

As director of an organization dedicated to reducing America's dependence on oil, I'd be last to deny the toxic influence oil dependence has on America's foreign policy, its international conduct and its selection of "friends and allies" in the Middle East. There is no doubt that since the 1945 meeting between President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Saudi King Ibn Saud, the United States has been militarily committed to the stability of the Persian Gulf and time and again has used its muscle to guarantee the supply of oil from the region.

And then proceeds to deny the "toxic influence" of oil considerations in the invasion of Iraq. He proceeds with one of the most fatuous statements imaginable.

While proponents of the view that "it's the oil, stupid" offer little evidence to support their claim, the evidence to the contrary is ample. Take, for example, the report of the 2000 National Energy Policy Development Group, also known as the Cheney Report. This policy paper, composed by no fewer than eight Cabinet members, reflects the pre-9/11 mindset within the Bush White House on how to achieve energy security. Yet it has almost no mention of Iraq and its vast oil reserves. The opposite is true: The report warns against concentration of world oil production in one region and calls for the United States to diversify its energy supply away from the Middle East.

Luft offers up this boilerplate nonsense as his "ample" evidence -- Cheney's conspicuous name attached to lend some heft and seriousness -- but it was really nothing more than a stale plate of public grits designed, as these things usually are, to assuage and mollify by sounding ponderous and meaningful. In offering us this less than convincing evidence and claiming that little evidence otherwise exists, he conveniently seems to be unaware that other reports were being drawn up for the National Security Council at the very same time.

In January 2001, the first meeting of Bush's NSC focused on a particular subject:

the top item on the agenda of the National Security Council's first meeting after Bush entered the Oval Office was Iraq. That was January 30, 2001, more than seven months before the 9/11 attacks. The next National Security Council (NSC) meeting on February 1st was devoted exclusively to Iraq.

Among the relevant documents later sent to NSC members ... was one prepared by the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA). It had already mapped Iraq's oil fields and exploration areas, and listed American corporations likely to be interested in participating in Iraq's petroleum industry.

Another DIA document in the package, entitled "Foreign Suitors for Iraqi Oilfield Contracts," listed companies from 30 countries -- France, Germany, Russia, and Britain, among others -- their specialties and bidding histories. The attached maps pinpointed "super-giant oil field," "other oil field," and "earmarked for production sharing," and divided the basically undeveloped but oil-rich southwest of Iraq into nine blocks, indicating promising areas for future exploration.

The contents here hardly strike as containing "no mention of Iraq." From one meeting for public consumption to the private ones of the NSC, the differentiation of content could not be starker.

But, of course, there is much more.

On October 11, 2002 the New York Times reported that the Pentagon already had plans to occupy and control Iraq's oilfields. The next day the Economist described how Americans in the know had dubbed the waterway demarcating the southern borders of Iraq and Iran "Klondike on the Shatt al Arab," while Ahmed Chalabi, head of the U.S.-funded Iraqi National Congress and a neocon favorite, had already delivered this message: "American companies will have a big shot at Iraqi oil -- if he gets to run the show."

On October 30, Oil and Gas International revealed that the Bush administration wanted a working group of 12 to 20 people to (a) recommend ways to rehabilitate the Iraqi oil industry "in order to increase oil exports to partially pay for a possible U.S. military occupation government," (b) consider Iraq's continued membership of OPEC, and (c) consider whether to honor contracts Saddam Hussein had granted to non-American oil companies.
...
Halliburton, the energy services company previously headed by Vice President Dick Cheney, had prepared a confidential 500-page document on how to handle Iraq's oil industry after an invasion and occupation of Iraq.

Now, after his remarkable display of ignorance on these points, Luft really dives in, with both arms flapping, by saying that Big Oil is on the sidelines, apparently unable to enjoy the fruits of war.

Before the war, the United States imported very little oil from Iraq, and oil stood at $30 a barrel. Today, only 4 percent of U.S. oil imports come from Iraq, and oil is at $80. With 160,000 American troops in Iraq, America's oil companies are nowhere to be seen. Russian and Chinese companies are enjoying the spoils of war.

Sky-high record profits for ExxonMobil, Chevron and other western oil interests are of no seeming concern here and it is really the Russian and Chinese who are benefiting from the Iraq war.

While I would certainly agree that that is true: nemeses Russia, China, and Venezuela, as well as every other oil producing country, are certainly gaining tremendous advantage from the high price of oil without having dumped $500 billion into the heart of the Iraqi insurgency, it is also true that Big Oil is making out extremely well. The difference here, which Luft also fails to grasp, is that Russia, China and Venezuela profit -- as national entities -- from the high price of oil. The United States does not. The profits go straight to Exxon, while the Bush administration does what it can to ensure that oil companies don't even pay the proper royalties on domestic oil here. Russia and Venezuela are flush with oil revenue and doing things they could not have dreamed when oil was $20/bbl before the invasion. As the Bush administration, and likely the next one, continue to dump untold American tax payer dollars into the Middle East sinkhole, ensuring a lengthy extension to the hostilities and, hence, the high price of oil, emerging powers will only emerge more. There is no "upside" here for the American citizen, who will bear of the brunt of increased prices for everything and will continue to pay for the privilege to pay those prices. But to claim that Russian and Chinese companies are the only ones enjoying the spoils of war? Please, Dr. Luft, we know better than that. After all, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) just signed four more oil contracts along with the one already signed with Hunt Oil of Dallas, Tx, while the big American oil companies are simply awaiting the passage of a national oil law.

But Luft really augers in when he ventures into a discussion of Afghanistan, which he offers as prima facie evidence that the invasion of Iraq was not about oil.

Despite the involvement of Saudi nationals in the 9/11 attacks, the Bush team did not for one moment contemplate invading oil-rich Saudi Arabia. Instead, it chose to invade Afghanistan, the country with the least amount of oil in Central Asia. Furthermore, the administration decided to end the decades-long American military presence in Saudi Arabia, a country that produces five times as much oil as Iraq, and move U.S. bases to Qatar, which produces one-tenth as much as Saudi Arabia, and Bahrain, which has essentially run out of oil - a questionable move for a nation whose supposed main driver was oil.

Got that? We didn't invade close allies with lots of oil and hijackers -- Saudi Arabia -- therefore invading Iraq was not about oil. Oh, and as a specious side note, Afghanistan has no oil. So there!

But, of course, to those who are not associated with the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security, the reality of Afghanistan's crucial geopolitical position is more than clear. Texas oil companies like Enron and Unocal were wining and dining the Taliban government in the late 90's, efforts geared toward building the potentially lucrative Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) pipeline, a project meant as a direct competitor to the Iran-Pakistan-India (IPI) pipeline that had been in the works for years prior. While Afghanistan itself is not much of a petroleum producer, the country is a locus for major pipeline projects planned througout Central and Southeast Asia.

One year after the invasion of Afghanistan and the rout of the Taliban, the TAPI pipeline deal was signed in December, 2002 with the encouragement of then interim president Hamid Karzai. Karzai had also reportedly been a consultant for Unocal, and was made Chairman of the Transitional Administration shortly after the US-led invasion and then appointed interim president.

In fact, Luft's specious reasoning about the fact that "the Bush team did not for one moment contemplate invading oil-rich Saudi Arabia" actually argues against his very ill-conceived point. If oil was not a consideration, the Bush administration should have invaded Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan, routed al Qaeda there and then knocked out the terrorist funding networks in Saudi Arabia. But they didn't do that. At all. The Sauds are long time Bush family friends, the major supplier of petroleum and have been firm American allies since the early seventies. No need to invade Riyadh, no matter the provenance of 9/11 hijackers or their source of funding. That Bush further acceded to bin Laden's demand that US troops withdraw from Saudi Arabia, which they did, is hardly encouraging behaviour from someone who claims he won't heed terrorist demands.

As a specialist in "strategy," Luft once again displays an uncanny thickness of mind in claiming that moving US troops in the Middle East from Saudi Arabia to Qatar and Bahrain surely indicated that the invasion of Iraq was not about oil, as though this troop movement must have devastating consequences for US strategic position in the region because Bahrain itself has "essentially run out of oil." Once again, please Dr. Luft. Look at a map. Perhaps Dr. Luft simply understands the word "strategy" differently than you and I.

Gal Luft's ridiculous article has all the trappings of COIN (I hope Meatball 1 would agree) -- a damn poor one to be sure -- something put out to counter Greenspan's headline making claim. One look at some of the staff of Luft's organisation, which include war-humpers and various neocon "advisors" as James Woolsey, Kenneth Pollock, and Eliot Cohen, is all one needs to be sure that the piece is nothing more than officious disinformation; one of a flotilla of distracting balloons designed to ease the pain of the reality of the invasion, that it was not done for that which it obviously was, that we invaded for good reasons and not grimy ones and because we, as a nation, simply cannot be allowed to admit the truth about the nature of our own foreign policy.

Mukasey: the soon-to-be Attorney General

2007-10-04T11:01:00.000-04:00

On the afternoon of September 11, 2001, five Israelis, at least two of which were later identified as Mossad agents, were arrested at gun point in New Jersey after witnesses reported "suspicious" behaviour of men in a white van. This suspicious behaviour included filming the smoldering ruin of the World Trade Center and appearing to be "happy" about it.

"They seemed to be taking a movie," the resident who noticed them said. The men were taking video or photos of themselves with the World Trade Center burning in the background, she said. What struck her were the expressions on the men's faces. "They were like happy, you know … They didn't look shocked to me. I thought it was very strange," she said.

First reported by ABC News, these men, the so-called Five Dancing Israelis, were arrested by the FBI and it was learned that the van belonged to Urban Moving Systems, believed by the FBI to be a front company for the Israeli intelligence organisation, Mossad. The owner of the Urban Moving Systems, Dominic Suter, quickly cleared out the company's office and fled to Israel. During their two months in detention, the Israelis failed as many as seven lie detector tests while their van had tested positive for explosives. The New York Times also had reported that the men had positioned video cameras prior to attack on the WTC the morning of September 11, 2001.

Before any investigation had occurred, a judge had ordered the release of these men to Israel after two weeks detention. The CIA and FBI held up the deportation but not for long, and soon the Mossad agents were returned to Israel where, on Israeli television, they said that their purpose in the United States had been to "document the event," an event that supposedly was a surprise and shock to the world.

The judge who had ordered the immediate release and extradition of the Mossad agents was a one Michael B. Mukasey, our soon-to-be new Attorney General.

Promises to keep

2007-10-04T09:59:00.000-04:00

After a week in glorious Amsterdam, what are my eyes treated to upon arrival? Why, the sight of George Bush making good on his promise and exercising his resolve to protect the country from the malevolent maw of expanded children's health care. Bush said he was standing firm against the evils of government health care and that the "cost" would be too great. Indeed, those paltry few billion that would have gone to the S-CHIP program will be far better spent profiting Blackwa ... uh ... fighting terror! I ask you, what good are healthy children when terror lurks everywhere? Healthy children, utterly useless for fighting terror and prone to being targets, are simply more people Bush would have to protect and he has quite enough people to protect already. When there is a war on terror to be won and taxes to be kept low, an expansion of the children's health care program is simply ill-advised. That much is surely obvious.

And really, how can you not admire the man? When he says he will veto something, by god, he does it! No intelligence failures there! Sure a bunch of electioneering Republicans are huffing about Bush's firm stand, thinking that it makes the GOP look bad, and eight states are planning to sue the Bush administration over newly restrictive S-CHIP rules but they clearly don't get it. Nor, for that matter, do the voting public. One day, they all will see clearly the master strokes of this painterly maestro. This vision may takes decades to dawn, but, one day, it will arrive.

Besides, Bush's brave veto has made Dominican tobacco growers happy. What more could we ask for? After all, isn't that what American domestic policy is all about?

Thankfully, the Democrats are "in charge" so, in all likelihood, we won't have to worry about them countering Bush's resolve.

Total information awareness

2007-09-29T07:36:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, French oil giant Total insisted that their presence in Myanmar is crucial and that they would not pull out of the country, despite international uproar over the incidents there.

The French oil company Total said shutting its operations in Myanmar could cause even greater hardship in the country, despite a hardening attitude by France toward new investment amid a conflict between citizens and the ruling military junta that has left nine people dead.

Vice president for "pulic affairs," Jean-François Lassalle, indicated Total's depth of commitment to the beleaguered citizens of Myanmar.

We are convinced that through our presence we are helping to improve the daily lives of tens of thousands of people who benefit from our social and economic initiatives. Our departure could cause the population even greater hardship and is thus an unacceptable risk.

Indeed, the actual population Total appears to be committed to is the military junta.

Total is one of the biggest foreign investors in Myanmar, where its joint venture earns the military regime hundreds of millions of dollars a year....

The brutality of the military asaults, including night time raids of monks dormotories complete with beatings, appears to have been seriously downplayed by official versions,with now several times the number of dead as admitted.

Burmese forces on Friday intensified their suppression of peaceful pro-democracy protests as credible accounts emerged that the death toll from Thursday’s crackdown was far higher than the official figure of nine.
...
Bob Davis, Australian ambassador to Burma, told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation he had heard credible reports that “several multiples of the 10 [sic] acknowledged by the authorities [were killed on Thursday].”

Despite Total knowing the brutality of this military junta, the company is far more invested in operations and obviously will insist on continuing to make Myanmar's ruling military junta "hundreds of millions of dollars."

Total would rather the population of Myanmar believe all that stuff about "freedom and democracy" is not nearly as good as having a job working for Total.

Hiro:How the Bush Administration's Iraqi Oil Grab Went Awry

2007-09-26T16:17:00.000-04:00

Before I head off to Amsterdam for a week, here is today's must read. Fun facts about the Bush administration, Iraq's oil and how those grand schemes have been turned awry, Dilip Hiro smacks one out of the park as he puts Greenspan's comment in context; the comment in his book, that is, not his ridiculous backpedaling about the "Straits of Hormuz."

... the top item on the agenda of the National Security Council's first meeting after Bush entered the Oval Office was Iraq. That was January 30, 2001, more than seven months before the 9/11 attacks. The next National Security Council (NSC) meeting on February 1st was devoted exclusively to Iraq.

Advocating "going after Saddam" during the January 30 meeting, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said, according to O'Neill, "Imagine what the region would look like without Saddam and with a regime that's aligned with U.S. interests. It would change everything in the region and beyond. It would demonstrate what U.S. policy is all about." He then discussed post-Saddam Iraq -- the Kurds in the north, the oil fields, and the reconstruction of the country's economy. (Suskind, p. 85)

Among the relevant documents later sent to NSC members, including O'Neill, was one prepared by the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA). It had already mapped Iraq's oil fields and exploration areas, and listed American corporations likely to be interested in participating in Iraq's petroleum industry.

Another DIA document in the package, entitled "Foreign Suitors for Iraqi Oilfield Contracts," listed companies from 30 countries -- France, Germany, Russia, and Britain, among others -- their specialties and bidding histories. The attached maps pinpointed "super-giant oil field," "other oil field," and "earmarked for production sharing," and divided the basically undeveloped but oil-rich southwest of Iraq into nine blocks, indicating promising areas for future exploration.
...
(read it all)

This is not to say that the Bush administration and -- to borrow a phrase directly from the draft of the Iraq Oil Law -- "executive managers from important related petroleum companies" cannot recover from the present difficulties. Hunt Oil demonstrated at least a halting ability to get PSAs signed in Kurdistan.

l8r

Deadwood, N.J.

2007-09-26T14:48:00.000-04:00

From the "sowing and reaping" files:

A little more than a year ago, the Township Committee in this faded factory town became the first municipality in New Jersey to enact legislation penalizing anyone who employed or rented to an illegal immigrant.

Within months, hundreds, if not thousands, of recent immigrants from Brazil and other Latin American countries had fled. The noise, crowding and traffic that had accompanied their arrival over the past decade abated.

The law had worked. Perhaps, some said, too well.

With the departure of so many people, the local economy suffered. Hair salons, restaurants and corner shops that catered to the immigrants saw business plummet; several closed. Once-boarded-up storefronts downtown were boarded up again.

Meanwhile, the town was hit with two lawsuits challenging the law. Legal bills began to pile up, straining the town’s already tight budget. Suddenly, many people — including some who originally favored the law — started having second thoughts.

So last week, the town rescinded the ordinance, joining a small but growing list of municipalities nationwide that have begun rethinking such laws as their legal and economic consequences have become clearer.

“I don’t think people knew there would be such an economic burden,” said Mayor George Conard, who voted for the original ordinance. “A lot of people did not look three years out.”

There seems to be a lot of that going around these days. Some are still undaunted by their shortsightedness, however:

By and large, they said the ordinance was a success because it drove out illegal immigrants, even if it hurt the town’s economy.

“It changed the face of Riverside a little bit," said Charles Hilton, the former mayor who pushed for the ordinance.

Yes, it did change "the face" of the town. Fewer brown people, more plywood.

War, Inc.

2007-09-26T10:45:00.000-04:00

John Cusack has a new film coming out soon that promises to be a scathing look at the privatisation of war.

War, Inc.

As I plow into The Shock Doctrine, you might want to check out this little discussion Cusack has with Naomi Klein about her book.

Post-traumatic stress disorder and you

2007-09-25T21:04:00.000-04:00

A big heads-up from Swedish Meatballs Confidential to an article by former Army Ranger and paratrooper, Lt. Col. Dave Grossman regarding the provenence of the increasingly high rates of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) that have been seen in American soldiers since Vietnam. PTSD is not something that soldiers are simply more susceptible to, or some phantom menace as it is derrided by right wing yowlers, but has been the result of modern psyops training of military forces since WWII. This training was designed to overcome the natural reluctance of soldiers to actually shoot at the enemy, an effect well documented by a variety of studies of various historical battles.

Marshall was a U.S. Army historian in the Pacific theater during World War II and later became the official U.S. historian of the European theater of operations. He had a team of historians working for him, and they based their findings on individual and mass interviews with thousands of soldiers in more than 400 infantry companies immediately after they had been in close combat with German or Japanese troops. The results were consistently the same: Only 15 to 20 percent of the American riflemen in combat during World War II would fire at the enemy. Those who would not fire did not run or hide—in many cases they were willing to risk greater danger to rescue comrades, get ammunition, or run messages. They simply would not fire their weapons at the enemy, even when faced with repeated waves of banzai charges.

Once discovering this, the military clearly had to find some way to overcome the human reluctance to kill. It's what they do.

By the time of Vietnam, bootcamp had become hate camp (possibly Jesus Camp these days). New psyops techniques were developed to create "enemy contempt," something that had never been done in previous generations of war. This has led to the high rates of post traumatic stress now seen in modern soldiers as a result of the internal conflict created by natural aversion to killing and the now highly increased levels of participation in the act. The more effective and efficient the training, the greater the rate of aggravated PTSD.

Since World War II, a new era has quietly dawned in modern warfare: an era of psychological warfare, conducted not upon the enemy, but upon one’s own troops. The triad of methods used to enable men to overcome their innate resistance to killing includes desensitization, classical and operant conditioning, and denial defense mechanisms.

Authors such as Gwynne Dyer and Richard Holmes have traced the development of boot-camp glorification of killing. They’ve found it was almost unheard of in World War I, rare in World War II, increasingly present in Korea, and thoroughly institutionalized in Vietnam. “The language used in [marine training camp] Parris Island to describe the joys of killing people,” writes Dyer, helps “desensitize [marines] to the suffering of an ‘enemy,’ and at the same time they are being indoctrinated in the most explicit fashion (as previous generations were not) with the notion that their purpose is not just to be brave or to fight well; it is to kill people.”

The ability to increase the firing rate, though, comes with a hidden cost. Severe psychological trauma becomes a distinct possibility when military training overrides safeguards against killing: In a war when 95 percent of soldiers fired their weapons at the enemy, it should come as no surprise that between 18 and 54 percent of the 2.8 million military personnel who served in Vietnam suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder—far higher than in previous wars.

Once again, our modern methods of warfare are coming back to haunt us. Sadly, being a military man, Grossman's prescription for this is not to stop turning human beings into killing machines against their will and predisposition, but rather, to advise the afflicted soldiers to seek help. Because we are in a long war. And the killing must go on and on and on.

[big h/t to meatball1. fascinating.]

Beginning the Blackwater backpedal

2007-09-25T12:54:00.000-04:00

prediction: Maliki caves, Blackwater stays and yet more hell breaks loose.
-- The Blackwater Nexus

Well, it looks like Prime Minister al-Maliki is beginning the predicted, initial retreat from the his and other Iraqi officials' initial stance on the presence of Blackwater in Iraq. When asked about the Blackwater incident at a meeting with the Council on Foreign Relations, Maliki bobbed, weaved and elicited nothing but equivocation.

Maliki, who will speak to the U.N. General Assembly tomorrow, deftly dodged questions about last week's incident in which employees of Blackwater, a private U.S. security firm, allegedly killed 11 Iraqi civilians. While "initial signs" are that "there was some wrongdoing from Blackwater," he said, he will await the results of a U.S.-Iraqi investigation. He dismissed a statement by the interior minister in Baghdad that Blackwater will be banned from Iraq, saying the positions of the ministry and his office are "the same."

He also said that Iranian intervention in Iraq had "ceased to exist" and civil war had been averted. Which one can only take to mean that the program of ethnic cleansing has been somewhat completed.

Advice and dissent

2007-09-25T01:37:00.000-04:00

You go girls!

Dammam, Asharq Al-Awsat- Members of Khobar's Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice were the victims of an attack by two Saudi females, Asharq Al-Awsat can reveal.

According to the head of the commission in Khobar, two girls pepper sprayed members of the commission after they had tried to offer them advice.

Head of the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice in the Eastern province Dr. Mohamed bin Marshood al-Marshood, told Asharq Al Awsat that two of the Commission's employees were verbally insulted and attacked by two inappropriately-dressed females, in the old market in Prince Bandar street, an area usually crowded with shoppers during the month of Ramadan.

According to Dr. Al-Marshood, the two commission members approached the girls in order to "politely" advice and guide them regarding their inappropriate clothing.

Consequently, the two girls started verbally abusing the commission members, which then lead to one of the girls pepper-spraying them in the face as the other girl filmed the incident on her mobile phone, while continuing to hurl insults at them.

Which means ... we might see this show up on youtube? By the hoary beard of Satan, I await these inappropriately clothed ones to make their resistance of the oppressors known to all!

The rule of law is in shambles

2007-09-23T21:46:00.000-04:00

In The Baffler No. 17, Thomas Geoghegan presents a fascinating perspective on the state of the rule of law in America. It is not a good state according to Geoghegan, and this is so because, as a labor lawyer, he has watched the gutting of the United States federal civil service, where administrative and regulatory agencies charged with oversight of all kinds have been systematically rendered nearly useless by 30 years of a constant right wing assault on domestic government budget. This has been accomplished quite silently, of course, and Grover Norquist's prescription for government -- "drown it in a bathtub" -- appears to be nearly filled.

Georghegan points out that the last peg of accountability left to American citizens in keeping the corporations even remotely responsible is tort law; the ability to sue companies because they easily and jauntily forsook government regulations and endangered the public. Because of this, it is no surprise that the GOP, led by the indefatigable charlatan in chief, George Bush, have been crusading against those pesky trial lawyers and insisting on "tort reform." By which they mean, severely limit punitive awards handing out by juries.

Having just read Geoghegan's "The Rule of Law in Shambles," it was remarkable to see, the very next day, a front page story at the New York Times about nursing homes being bought up by private equity firms, with predictable results:

The facility’s managers quickly cut costs. Within months, the number of clinical registered nurses at the home was half what it had been a year earlier, records collected by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services indicate. Budgets for nursing supplies, resident activities and other services also fell...

Much of this violated federal regulations, as mandatory nurse/patient rations were treated more as ignorable suggestions and, with yet more grim predictability, patients died in the midst of a stye.

Regulators repeatedly warned the home that staff levels were below mandatory minimums. When regulators visited, they found malfunctioning fire doors, unhygienic kitchens and a resident using a leg brace that was broken.

“They’ve created a hellhole,” said Vivian Hewitt, who sued Habana in 2004 when her mother died after a large bedsore became infected by feces.

Note again, as Geoghegan has, that the regulatory bodies have no ability to enforce compliance with these regulations. On the happy side of this equation, the investors "were soon earning millions of dollars a year from their 49 homes."

As noted, this is really par for the American course. These companies can and do willfully ignore federal regulations because they know, perhaps more than anyone, that the thirty years war on government agency has rendered it inefffectual and entirely unable to oversee or enforce those regulations.

managers at many other nursing homes acquired by large private investors have cut expenses and staff, sometimes below minimum legal requirements.

The only real recourse left those suffering at the hands of these piranha is the lawsuit.

But now even the lawsuit is being marginalized even without "tort reform" which has momentarily faded from the public sphere. Uncontented with the prospect of facing big awards for wrongful death lawsuits, the private equity firms have gone to some length to make such lawsuits dificult.

In the past, residents’ families often responded to such declines in care by suing, and regulators levied heavy fines against nursing home chains where understaffing led to lapses in care.

But private investment companies have made it very difficult for plaintiffs to succeed in court and for regulators to levy chainwide fines by creating complex corporate structures that obscure who controls their nursing homes.

There is no rule of law here. All that is left is the rule of the lawsuit. But now that final ex post facto recourse in law is slowly being dismantled. And then what? Corporate America runs amok, killing and maiming in the name of expedient profit, arguing that "the market" will correct to the proper course. But there is no proper course here, only a remorseless tack of impunity, carcasses strewn in the wake of a very sick ship of state as it plies an ocean of avarice and plumbs the depths for profit.

The Blackwater Nexus

2007-09-23T15:31:00.000-04:00

Despite repeated denials that they did "nothing wrong" and their swift reinstatement Friday by the State Department, Blackwater continues to draw ire and fire from Iraqi officials. Led and emboldened by vocal public outcry, the Iraqi Interior Ministry, the National Security Ministry and the Defense Ministry have reported that

the murder of citizens in cold blood in the Nisour area by Blackwater is considered a terrorist action against civilians just like any other terrorist operation.

And Iraqi officials appear insistent on pursuing prosecution of the Blackwater perpetrators.

The criminals will be referred to the Iraqi court system.

This is not the rhetoric of people who seem willing to compromise on the issue. In fact, so insistent on this path are Iraqi government officials, they have sought to document and report several other incidents, which, it is claimed, Blackwater has wantonly opened fire on civilians.

The American Blackwater company has made for the seventh time the same mistake against the Iraqis and in different places in Baghdad.

Now, when something happens seven times, it is a bit of a stretch to call such behaviour a "mistake." Perhaps what was contained in the Arabic report was lost in translation. Does this look like a "mistake" to you?

[N.B. there is some confusion at youtube over who the culprits are in this video. One says that it is Blackwater contractors, another says Aegis. But the larger issue, of course, is the general behaviour of American contractors.]

The argument over the truth of the Nisour Square incident is not the issue that I find to be the interesting aspect of this, however. (Iraqi officials now say they have video tape of the incident that proves Blackwater opened fire.) What is interesting is just how adamant the Iraqi government is in its pursuit of what they are calling "terrorist action." Those are some pretty strong words from government officials who are supposed to be our puppets.

Except they are not "our puppets." At least, not in any traditional socio-political sense of that word. The Iraqi "government" is really a collection of militarized fiefdoms, even within various ministries. But one things is clear from the Blackwater shooting, various ministries have all come together against the operations of Blackwater and, more generally, private security contractors. Even Maliki is taking up the cause, though there is a strong possiblity that his position will be mitigated when he meets with Rice at the UN. She will try to publicly placate him with promises that the US will "examine the rules of engagement," which obviously means nothing.

But the question is whether Maliki will compromise on this or not. Given the stance of many Iraqi government factions, he is in a rather difficult position. If he bends to US pressure on this, he becomes even more despised and weakened in Iraq, although considering the level of animosity in Iraq toward him already, he may not care. If he holds the official Iraqi line, he may find himself subject to some sort of ouster. Either way, he could find himself tossed out, if not by the hands of the Americans, then surely by the hands of a coalition of the willing-to-punt-Maliki. A vote of no confidence in parliament could remove him efficiently. Considering that there is no obviously legal way for the Bush administration to get rid of the prime minister, Maliki may choose to stand firm and with the other Iraqi officials. He knows that the US cannot possibly remove him without the entire "freedom and democracy" enterprise of the White House looking like a complete and utter farce. Right now, it is only mostly a farce.

This episode could rightly be viewed by Maliki as one that would actually strengthen his position in Iraq -- to the chagrin of the White House -- should he stand firm and insist on Blackwater's removal. That means Maliki working for the interests of Iraqis and not the Americans. Should he choose this path, he might rally support and bring more than a few factions together in a very real and positive way. Positive, that is, from the Iraqi perspective. If the White House insists on ignoring the demands of the Iraqi government -- it is easily imagined that they would, since they have already -- this will only muster yet more resentment of the American occupation. I'm not entirely sure if more resentment to the occupation is possible there, but if it is, retaining Blackwater is certainly a way to stir it up. Blackwater should expect to become increasingly targeted. Another Falluja incident seems waiting in the wings.

As with most White House policy, sedulously insisting on a continued Blackwater presence in Iraq is senseless. Can the Bush administration by that wedded to the profiteering of this one company? There really is no other reason to insist that Blackwater remain. Should the White House concede this point, it might actually improve their image in Iraq, at least marginally. If the Bush administration are morbidly affixed to Blackwater's exceedingly profitable enterprise, this will surely only inflame the insurgency further and any of Petreaus' questionable security gains could easily evaporate in a flurry of attacks brought on by a policy predicated on crony profiteering. Which, of course, is exactly what is going on at larger scales and maintaining Blackwater's contract is simply one facet of the American enterprise in Iraq writ large.

Probably to most, it seems likely that Maliki will cave to White House intransigence on this point. I wish he wouldn't, but I don't see him as a leader let alone a leader with any kind of vision. Using a strong stance against Blackwater could be a first, albeit small step in reconciling the many factions he has to deal with, all of which want Blackwater gone. Somewhat strengthened by this, Maliki could begin the other and serious efforts that are needed. This is a long road and not one that can be imposed by any American timetable. It is also a road that the White House really doesn't want the Iraqi government tripping down any time soon. For an actual unified Iraqi government -- a government of the Iraqi people -- would, first and foremost, insist on the departure of US forces. And that is not in concordance with White House plans for Iraq.

Unfortunately, Maliki does not appear to be the one Iraq needs and given the decrepit and factionalized state of the country right now, it is hard to imagine that there is anyone on earth who could pull the country together. Which is probably just how the White House likes it. Continued chaos, continued occupation. Mission continuing to be accomplished.

Therefore, my prediction is as follows: Maliki caves, Blackwater stays and yet more hell breaks loose.

Iraq: weening the Kraft slice nation

2007-09-21T17:16:00.000-04:00

Patrick Graham offers an sweeping, on-the-ground overview of the real situation in Iraq today. An absolute must read for everyone who has never been there and thinks they know what they're talking about.

With the newly-enfranchised Sunni insurgents, the Bush administration is moving back the days of Saddam Hussein.

How George Bush became the new Saddam

Depreciation

2007-09-21T16:27:00.000-04:00

Well, Mandela's dead...
-- George Bush, Sep. 20, 2007

President George W. Bush insisted on Thursday he will be a "strong asset" for Republicans battling for election in 2008...

A significant escalation

2007-09-21T14:18:00.001-04:00

After the military junta in Myanmar arrested and jailed "student leaders and democracy advocates" protesting military rule and a 500% increase of fuel prices, now the big guns of peace and justice have moved in. And, no, I'm not talking about the Bush administration.

Hundreds of Buddhist monks marched through rain-washed streets for the third day in Myanmar’s main city yesterday, taking the lead in month long protests that the military junta has so far been powerless to contain.

Who cannot be moved by the thought that Burma's military is "powerless" in the face of hundreds of Buddhist monks walking barefoot in the rain. I know I'm rather enjoying that notion, however fleeting it may be. And it likely will be fleeting, I'm afraid. Remember, this is where Noble Peace Prize winner, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, has been under house arrest since before her award in 1991.

An undistinguished fellow

2007-09-21T13:40:00.001-04:00

Rumsfeld is stirring up the shit again.

The appointment of Donald H. Rumsfeld, the former defense secretary, as a distinguished visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution is drawing fierce protests from faculty members and students at Stanford University and is threatening to rekindle tensions between the institution, a conservative research body, and the more liberal campus.

Some 2,100 professors, staff members, students and alumni have signed an online petition protesting Mr. Rumsfeld’s appointment, which will involve advising a task force on ideology and terrorism. Faculty members say he should not have been offered the post because of his role in the Bush administration’s prosecution of the Iraq war.
...

Can't this fucking guy just stay tucked away in his Eastern Shore slave-breaking compound or at the American Enterprise Institute (I doubt there is much difference in philosophy between the two)? For a "think tank" that is clearly short on serious thinking and long on Manichean world views, they surely have some use for the advice of "one of the worst secretaries of defense in history."

Rumsfeld's merely anticipated presence in the world outside beltway "think" tanks seems to foam people up. Here's some advice: stay out of the public sphere. You are not needed. You are not welcome. Your time is done. You've caused enough damage. Consider yourself lucky that you have managed to avoid any accountability for your disastrous existence. Tuck in and be quiet before someone finally arrests your for the war crimes you should be arrested for, you vile bastard.

Icecapades

2007-09-21T13:03:00.000-04:00

Thanks to the miracles of modern technology,
the long-fabled Northwest Passage is now a reality

Mere weeks after it was reported that an area of arctic ice the size of Florida had melted in just six days, another bleak ice assessment is in the news. As reported by the National Snow and Ice Data Center, the smallest arctic ice coverage ever recorded was seen this year, measured now at what is nominally the annual maximum of ice melt. In typically Amero-centric fashion, the NY Times says that six "Californias" of ice, one million square miles, disappeared this summer.

The cap of floating sea ice on the Arctic Ocean, which retreats under summer’s warmth, this year shrank more than one million square miles — or six Californias — below the average minimum area reached in recent decades, scientists reported Thursday.

The minimum ice area for this year, 1.59 million square miles, appeared to be reached Sunday. The ice is now spreading again under the influence of the deep Arctic chill that settles in as the sun drops below the horizon at the North Pole for six months, starting Friday.

While satellite tracking of polar sea ice has been done only since 1979, several ice experts who have studied Russian and Alaskan records going back many decades said the ice retreat this year was probably unmatched in the 20th century, including during a warm period in the 1930s. “I do not think that there was anything like we observe today."

See the Arctic Sea Ice News page for more rather frightening imagery and data, including this time-lapse, quicktime movie of the ice cap from 1979 through 2006.

The beat goes on

2007-09-20T18:19:00.000-04:00

President Bush accused Congressional Democrats today of playing politics with the health of children, and he warned again that he would veto a children’s insurance bill if it emerged from Congress in its present form.

... the White House prefers to cast the disagreement with Congress as a battle between financially responsible stewards of the taxpayers’ money against heavy-spending Democrats...
-- Bush Assails Democrats Over Child Health Bill,
Sep 20, 2007

The federal government recorded a $1.3 trillion loss last year — far more than the official $248 billion deficit — when corporate-style accounting standards are used

"We're on an unsustainable path and doing a great disservice to future generations," says Chris Chocola, a former Republican member of Congress from Indiana and corporate chief executive who is pushing for more accurate federal accounting.
-- Taxpayers on the hook for $59 trillion,
Sep 20, 2007

This liability didn't just pop up since November. It amazes me that Republicans still get away with calling the Democrats heavy spenders and that they can publicly call themselves "financially responsible stewards of taxpayer's money."

Ignorance is strength. Truth is a lie. War is peace.

An army of god

2007-09-20T17:04:00.000-04:00

Pretty soon it will be a Christian army fighting the Muslims hordes, just what the fanatics long for.

A military watchdog organization filed a lawsuit in federal court Tuesday against the Pentagon, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, and a US Army major, on behalf of an Army soldier stationed in Iraq. The suit charges the Pentagon with widespread constitutional violations by allegedly trying to force the soldier to embrace evangelical Christianity and then retaliating against him when he refused.
...
Moreover, the complaint alleges that on August 7, when Hall received permission by an Army chaplain to organize a meeting of other soldiers who shared his atheist beliefs, his supervisor, Army Major Paul Welborne, broke up the gathering and threatened to retaliate against the soldier by charging him with violating the Uniform Code of Military Justice. The complaint also alleges that Welborne vowed to block Hall's reenlistment in the Army if the atheist group continued to meet - a violation of Hall's First Amendment rights under the Constitution. Welborne is named as a defendant in the lawsuit.

"During the course of the meeting, defendant Welborne confronted the attendees, disrupted the meeting and interfered with plaintiff Hall's and the other attendees' rights to discuss topics of their interests," the lawsuit alleges.

The complaint charges that Hall, who is based at Fort Riley, Kansas, has been forced to "submit to a religious test as a qualification to his post as a soldier in the United States Army," a violation of Article VI, Clause 3 of the Constitution.

More ...

But then, this can't be too surprising, what with weekly prayer meetings in the Pentagon.

Fedsday Stupidity

2007-09-20T16:39:00.000-04:00

This guy is pissed that Bernake bailed out the speculators (otherwise known as investment banks), something Bush himself said he would never do. A righteous rant indeed. This guy should call himself Mr. Furious.

Mother of all facts

2007-09-20T15:26:00.000-04:00

It is rather gratifying to see that George Lackoff, the Richard and Rhoda Goldman Distinguished Professor of Cognitive Science and Linguistics at UC Berkeley, is finally on board with the ongoing assessment of the Iraqi oil law and attendant behaviour that readers have seen here over the last several months. It took Prof. Lackoff awhile, but he seems to have caught up. Unfortunately, he didn't arrive at these conclusions by checking in on ATS occasionally but, rather, had to finally face the truth of the matter now that The Oracle has made it known.

Greenspan put the mother of all facts in front of our noses, and we can no longer be in denial. The US invaded Iraq for the oil.
...
The contracts that the Bush administration has been pushing the Iraqi government to accept are not just about the distribution of oil among the Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds. The contracts call for 30-year exclusive rights for British and American oil companies, rights that cannot be revoked by future Iraqi governments. They are called “production sharing agreements” (or “PSA’s”) - a legalistic code word. The Iraqi government would technically own the oil, but could not control it; only the companies could do that. ExxonMobil and others would invest in developing the infrastructure for the oil (drilling, oil rigs, refining) and would get 75% of the “cost oil” profits, until they got their investment back. After that, they would own the infrastructure (paid for by oil profits), and then get 20% of oil profits after that (twice the usual rate). The profits are estimated to be in the hundreds of billions of dollars. And the Iraqi people would have no democratic control over their own major resource. No other Middle East country has such an arrangement.

Incidentally, polls show the Iraqi people overwhelmingly against “privatization”, but “production sharing agreements” were devised so they are technically not “privatization,” since the government would still own the oil but not control it. The ruse is there so that the government can claim it is not privatizing.

But none of this will work without military protection for the oil companies. That is what would keep us there indefinitely. The name for this is our “vital interests.”

These are, of course, things regular readers have seen here often enough before. But I'm happy that a professor of cognitive science has come around to finally noting the obvious.

When Wishful Thinking Replaces Resistance

2007-09-19T18:04:00.001-04:00

Jean Bricmont offers up a sobering assessment about the possible attack on Iran. It is, he argues, entirely unpreventable should Bush/Cheney decide to push the button. Included with this is a damning indictment of the left and especially the academic left, who fret about "whether Capital is a Signifier or a Signified." Indeed.

Why Bush Can Get Away with Attacking Iran

Nonsense, I tell you, nonsense

2007-09-19T16:49:00.000-04:00

Brian Lando posts an interview with Thamir Ghadhban, two-time Iraq oil minister whom Lando describes as the "top Iraq oilman." They discuss plans for Iraq's oil and gas future and do so in a way that is quite remarkable for its seeming lack of consideration about the security problems facing the oil industry there, especially regarding the extant and large scale oil smuggling and sabotage of these facilities (the Kirkuk-Bayji pipeline was just struck by an explosion).

Ghadhban does his best to slough off concerns about the federal oil law, that it will allow undue foreign influence over Iraq oil development and revenues.

People talking about PSAs and people converting it from a comprehensive law into whether we have a PSA or not. And there will be a rip off of the Iraq oil wealth. This is completely nonsense. Or that 70 percent of the profit will go to the foreign company, again this is completely nonsense.

Ghadhban insists that contracts will be awarded through a purely "transparent" process and -- surely comforting coming from an Iraqi government official -- that there are "anti-corruption laws" that will guarantee a happy faces all round. Despite Ghadhban's assurances, judgment shall remain reserved.

All in all, the chat is fairly benign and uninformative, unfortunately, and Lando fails to asked Ghadhban anything about the Kurdistan Regional Government passing its own regional oil law or about the recently announced PSA struck between the KRG and Hunt Oil, or about the many other companies already operating in Kurdistan, an oversight that seems, to say the least, rather glaring.

The shock doctrine, missionary style

2007-09-19T15:42:00.000-04:00

We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity.
-- Ann Coulter

Unbeknownst to most Americans, that sweeping policy prescription appears to be operative in its entirety. While we have certainly invaded their countries and killed their leaders, the final act is something that has received little if any attention here.

This German news broadcast, which appears to have been produced prior to the 2004 election, details the presence and activities of "radical Christians" in Iraq doing god's work and converting Muslims to Jesus.

Notable quotables:

We, Christians, are always in war.

Some Muslims get very angry.
Q: Wouldn't that mean that your activities can lead to people dying?
A: Our activities can lead to people dying. We are aware of that. But to spend eternity in heaven and not in hell seems like a good deal.

All Iraqis should be converted. All of the Middle East, in fact.

It's a spiritual war.

Conflict is a natural part of the Christian life.

I don't remember seeing this during Amanpour's CNN special, "God's Warriors."

You will be assimilated

2007-09-18T21:06:00.000-04:00

When John Kerry spoke today at the University of Florida Gainesville, student Andrew Meyer asked three questions during the Q&A:

1) Given that you won the 2004 election per Greg Palast's book, Armed Madhouse, why did you concede so on the day of the election itself when there were many reports on the day of the election of disenfranchisement of black voters and corrupted vote count? Kerry while the question was in progress said he didn't need to read the book b/c he already had read it.

Meyer said he had two more questions and asked them.

2) If you are really so opposed to the Invasion of Iraq(Iran?), why don't you urge impeachment of Bush now before he can invade Iran? Clinton was impeached for a blow job, invading Iraq/Iran is much for serious than that.

3) Were you a member of the secret society Skull & Bones in college?

Police swarmed Meyer to pull him from the microphone and remove him from the room. When he, like Rev. Lennox Yearwood at the D.C. Capital, whose leg was broken by D.C. b/c he asked why he was singled out to be refused admission to hear Petraeus testify, Meyer was thrown to the ground, swarmed, and tasered, screaming in pain. The fact that he didn't do anything wrong did not matter.

(between seconds 28-30, one officer can be seen with his taser(?) pistol drawn, aimed at the student.)

It is difficult to gauge what is worse in this whole despicable scene, the ridiculous behaviour of the cops, who clearly wanted to shut him down before he even asked a question, the sound of the monotonous Kerry, droning on in the background as though nothing was going on, or indeed the pathetic sight of an entire audience of Americans, who clearly have been quelled into submission by decades of rough police tactics and endless media browbeating, sitting on their hands while a fellow citizen is tackled and tasered for daring to ask some difficult questions.

While the episode is a small one, it speaks volumes about the real state of the union. And that state is none too healthy. That the questions were rather uncomfortable is without doubt and the first question is one that everyone who voted for the dopey drone would probably like to ask. But rather than demand that security leave the student alone and let him sit down, Kerry blathered on, apparently comfortable with the idea that, in the United States, such brute force in response to questioning authority figures is perfectly reasonable. No wonder the limp excuse for a suit rack gave up without a fight. Dissent holds no quarter with John Kerry, who apparently didn't think he was fighting for freedom when he was in Vietnam.

Says this guy:

The Majors

2007-09-18T16:57:00.000-04:00

The United States Department of State has just released its Annual Report on the Major Illicit Drug Producing Countries for FY 2008. The Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement, Christy McCampbell, spoke at a news conference about the countries that are considered "Majors" on the list.

What attributes define these "Majors"? McCampbell explains:

The law stipulates that a major illicit drug producing country is defined as one that either cultivates or harvests at least a thousand hectares or more of coca or opium or also five thousand hectares of cannabis during a single year.

McCampbell then goes on to enumerate these countries, which are listed, I imagine, in order of presumed dope-producing badness.

Afghanistan, the Bahamas, Bolivia, Brazil, Burma, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Guatemala, Haiti, India, Jamaica, Laos, Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, Panama, Paraguay, Peru and Venezuela.

What is passing strange here is the complete lack of appearance by or any mention of the United States as a Major drug producer, which, according to the report, Marijuana Production in the United States (full pdf), demonstrates the following production capacity in this country, as itemized in the Executive Summary*:

1. Marijuana is the largest cash crop in the United States, more valuable than corn and wheat combined. Using conservative price estimates domestic marijuana production has a value of $35.8 billion. The domestic marijuana crop consists of 56.4 million marijuana plants cultivated outdoors worth $31.7 billion and 11.7 million plants cultivated indoors worth $4.1 billion.

2. The top ten marijuana producing states are California, Tennessee, Kentucky, Hawaii, Washington, North Carolina, Florida, Alabama., West Virginia, and Oregon. Five states (California, Tennessee, Kentucky, Hawaii and Washington) had marijuana crops worth over $1 billion.)

3. Despite intensive eradication efforts domestic marijuana production has increased ten fold over the last 25 years from 1,000 metric tons (2.2 million pounds) in 1981 to 10,000 metric tons (22 million pounds) in 2006, according to federal government estimates.

4. Marijuana is the top cash crop in 12 states, one of the top 3 cash crops in 30 states, and one of the top 5 cash crops in 39 states. The domestic marijuana crop is larger than Cotton in Alabama, larger than Grapes, Vegetables and Hay combined in California, larger than Peanuts in Georgia, and larger than Tobacco in both South Carolina and North Carolina.
...
6. The ten-fold growth of production over the last 25 years and its proliferation to every part of the country demonstrate that marijuana has become a pervasive and ineradicable part of the national economy....

Now, I'm guessing here, but it seems likely that 68 million marijuana plants probably use up more than 5,000 hectares (12,000 acres) and American soil is definitely producing a shitload of pot. Eradication efforts have not just failed but have failed spectacularly. Which means, by definition under US law, the United States should be on the list of Major Illicit Drug Producers. Oddly, the United States is not on the State Department list. One gets the distinct impression from the State Department that the US is simply an innocent victim of all those bad countries, filled with bad people, who just want to dope us into oblivion with illegal shipments of narcotic contraband.

When you're the "good guy," you get to keep your name off "the list."

* This is report is for FY 2006, though, as McCampbell says, the State Department list of Majors has been the same for the last two years and the US has not been on that list.

Worlds apart

2007-09-17T13:24:00.000-04:00

Their world:

And their world:

Women driven out of Darfur by Sudanese government
and militia attacks wait on the outskirts of Tine, Chad
for buses to take them to camps. Many had been there for weeks.

Their world:

And their world:

Faisa Adam Ali holds her 27-month-old daughter,
Mazar Abdullah Mousa, in her arms at a feeding centre
inn Tawila, north Darfur. They had been driven from
their home in Hilla Jawama by janjaweed militia.
Mazar had developed fever and diarrhoea.
One in 10 of the children passing through the clinic died.
Mazar's fate is unknown

Their world:

And their world:

A man weeps on returning to find his home in the
village of Nami, north Darfur, burned down.
Adam Saleh said janjaweed militia rode in and
shot dead 10 villagers, forcing the rest to flee.

JFK: The Bush Connection

2007-09-16T22:09:00.000-04:00

Never having been a follower of the JFK conspiracy theories, I confess to not keeping up with the latest stuff. Besides, I have Covert History to do that for me. And there are plenty of current conspiracies of all manner and form on which to keep abreast. So, other than knowing that the Warren Commission was a farce and a sham (like our own contemporaneous version known as the "9/11 commission") and that Vincent Bugliosi must be seriously deranged to have spent years and a thousand pages proving the magic bullet theory (I actually thought I liked the guy after his scathing indictment of the Supreme Court in Bush v. Gore), I really wasn't up on the latest research and some of the weird, weird shit that has been coming out.

But I have to tell you -- everyone -- you have got to watch this. The deep background on Prescott Bush and the rest of the Nazis he hung out with can start to blur into an inscrutable web, but then I love that kind of stuff. If you've got an hour and half, watch it. Well done and mesmerizing at times.

I predict what you will do after watching this. You will shake your head. And you will chuckle. It will be a deep and cynical chuckle.

[thanks to Existentialist Cowboy for the video link]

What everyone knows

2007-09-16T11:54:00.000-04:00

In times of universal deceit, telling the truth will be a revolutionary act.
-- George Orwell.

I am saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: the Iraq war is largely about oil.
-- Alan Greenspan

... it is [Greenspan's] view on the motive for the 2003 Iraq invasion that is likely to provoke the most controversy.
-- Sunday Times,
Sep. 16, 2007

... [Greenspan's] declaration that America’s prime motive for the Iraq war was oil will set off one political storm...
-- Sunday Times,
Sep. 16, 2007

Stay tuned for White House and GOP counterinsurgency efforts that may paint Greenspan as a "disgruntled former employee" who is "motivated by politics." If unable to feasibly manage that, Greenspan will become a daft old man suffering senility in his remaining days.

Update: Oh, here's a little used one, but still effectively dismissive:

That sounds like Georgetown cocktail party analysis.
-- Tony Fratto, Whitehouse spokesman

I've long thought that that little Greenspan was nothing but a cocktail party whore. Now I know it.

Spineless in the long war

2007-09-15T02:42:00.000-04:00

This is how news that the CIA has banned waterboarding is greeted by the right wing extremists in this country:

CIA Wimps Hand Another Weapon to al-Qaeda

Tagged with the phrase "spineless fucks." We can't let the "savages" get the upper hand on savagery. Normally we just have tea with them and ask them not to be bad.

Heaven help us. We’re at war for our very existence, and we’re being led by a bunch of sniveling pussies.

There they are, in full-metal-jacket, torture-lovin' glory. Hook, line and sinker.

Flock of eagles

2007-09-14T15:23:00.001-04:00

True to form and unable to conduct a "pro-war" rally except as a knee-jerk response to an anti-war protest, the dwindling ranks of war supporters are due to set up in Washington on September 15, the same day as a long-planned anti-war protest organized by ANSWER and being led by Iraq Veterans Against the War. Michelle Malkin is summoning the cheering war party for a third annual "counter-protest" otherwise fondly know by wingers as a "Gathering of Eagles." I shit you not.

This gathering is putatively meant to "support the troops," of course. Which, in their, minds means keeping the troops in Iraq ad infinitum or until victory happens along, whichever comes first. If this is anything like their previous efforts, the aerie will be sparsely populated. The rallying cry is expected to be something like,

support the troops over there! so we don't have to support them over ... uh ... here!

Blow up

2007-09-14T12:43:00.000-04:00

A few months ago, I had the privilege of attending a screening of Catherine Pancake's documentary, Black Diamonds, about mountain top mining in West Virginia (and elsewhere). Hotpotatomash has produced a new video mashup that quickly conveys the horrors of this disastrous mining practice as contrasted with the happy smiley faces mining companies try to slap on it. As one might expect, this incredibly destructive methodology has only been enabled and encouraged by the Bush administration. I won't delve into the utter devastation this mining "process" causes. That is easy enough to see in the video.

The screening I attended was hosted by Pancake and Julia Bonds, the woman who appears in mash's video and who is the main character in Black Diamonds. Bonds went from convenience store clerk to winning the Goldman Prize for environmental activism. At the end of the screening, Bonds stood up and said to the audience, "I want you to think about something, something that should inform your everyday behaviour: every time you turn on a light, a mountain in West Virginia gets blown up."

And Massey Energy is there to profit from the destruction.

Nice job on the mashup, mash!

The troops support...

2007-09-14T00:33:00.000-04:00

the Democrats.

Realizing that the GOP are never going to haul their asses out of Iraq, US military are shifting political contributions to the Dems.

Since the start of the Iraq war in 2003, members of the U.S. military have dramatically increased their political contributions to Democrats, marching sharply away from the party they've long supported. In the 2002 election cycle, the last full cycle before the war began, Democrats received a mere 23 percent of military members' contributions.* So far this year, 40 percent of military money has gone to Democrats for Congress and president, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics. Anti-war presidential candidates Barack Obama and Ron Paul are the top recipients of military money.

Unfortunately, given what we've seen of late, the Democratic party is sure to disappoint. It is nothing but a useless money pit; contributions go in and nothing publicly demanded comes out. At least when you give your money to the GOP, you know you're going to get more war.

Fallon Gong

2007-09-13T18:44:00.000-04:00

In sharp contrast to the lionisation of Gen. David Petraeus by members of the U.S. Congress during his testimony this week, Petraeus's superior, Admiral William Fallon, chief of the Central Command (CENTCOM), derided Petraeus as a sycophant during their first meeting in Baghdad last March, according to Pentagon sources familiar with reports of the meeting.

Fallon told Petraeus that he considered him to be "an ass-kissing little chickenshit" and added, "I hate people like that", the sources say. That remark reportedly came after Petraeus began the meeting by making remarks that Fallon interpreted as trying to ingratiate himself with a superior.

Stay tuned for a GOP resolution denouncing the statements of the CENTCOM commander. Wait for it. I can feel it coming. Any day now....

Burn baby burn

2007-09-12T16:43:00.000-04:00

This is, to say the least, a rather interesting development.

An Erie cancer researcher has found a way to burn salt water, a novel invention that is being touted by one chemist as the "most remarkable" water science discovery in a century.

John Kanzius happened upon the discovery accidentally when he tried to desalinate seawater with a radio-frequency generator he developed to treat cancer. He discovered that as long as the salt water was exposed to the radio frequencies, it would burn.

The discovery has scientists excited by the prospect of using salt water, the most abundant resource on earth, as a fuel.

Rustum Roy, a Penn State University chemist, has held demonstrations at his State College lab to confirm his own observations.

The radio frequencies act to weaken the bonds between the elements that make up salt water, releasing the hydrogen, Roy said. Once ignited, the hydrogen will burn as long as it is exposed to the frequencies, he said.

The discovery is "the most remarkable in water science in 100 years," Roy said.

"This is the most abundant element in the world. It is everywhere," Roy said. "Seeing it burn gives me the chills."

Roy will meet this week with officials from the Department of Energy and the Department of Defense to try to obtain research funding.

The scientists want to find out whether the energy output from the burning hydrogen — which reached a heat of more than 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit — would be enough to power a car or other heavy machinery.

"We will get our ideas together and check this out and see where it leads," Roy said. "The potential is huge."

Huge may be either an overstatement or an understatement if, in fact, the process can be made to be energy positive. Which means we cannot use self-generated radio energy to break the bonds. Otherwise, it's a dead end. Given the constraints of thermodynamics, the energy input in breaking the bonds must be exactly equal to the energy gained by bond reformation (i.e hydrogen oxidization plus bond energy). This can only be an energy positive equation for us if we do not have to produce the input radio energy, which means exploiting some external radio source, like the sun.

While a fascinating idea, it is likely not quite the saviour that it might at first seem. Nonetheless, a rather amazing discovery. So amazing, in fact, it seems hard to believe that this hasn't already been seen.

Kill the Messenger

2007-09-12T11:30:00.000-04:00

In the post-9/11 panic, Sibel Edmonds tried to blow the whistle on a vast array of criminal activities she came to learn of through her job as a translator for the FBI. While her story and what she tried to expose was covered somewhat in the mainstream media, the tale of a conspiracy of US government officials involved in nuclear arms and drug trafficking has been effectively ignored. Edmonds, however, has remained on the war path against this vast network of corruption, although she remains under a gag order.

A year ago, Kill the Messenger came out and subsequently was ignored along with the rest of her story. Like much that surrounds the fateful day of 9/11, vast realms of criminality remain effectively veiled and have never been addressed by pathetic efforts laughingly labeled "investigations" in this country. Check out Luke's 9/11 post,

The real culprits of 911

Kill the Messenger:

Success is a big hole in the desert

2007-09-11T22:31:00.000-04:00

A few days ago, reports had come in that Israel had dropped munitions on Syria after their aircraft had been detected. Syrian officials claimed that anti-aircraft fire sent the Israeli fighters scrambing back to home base. At the time, Israel's official position was that such reports did not merit response. The meaning of that was obvious:

The Israeli military spokesman's office said in a statement: "It is not our custom to respond to these kinds of reports."

Which probably means they are either true or close to being so.

Well, things appear beyond close to being true and are escalating rather severely:

Syria accused Israel of a "flagrant violation" of its obligations when it carried out an airstrike inside the country last week, according to a copy of a letter released Tuesday.

Syria called the incursion a "breach of airspace of the Syrian Arab Republic" and said "it is not the first time Israel has violated" Syrian airspace, the letter to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon read.

Depending on one's perspective, things appear either better or worse because ground forces may have also been involved

....sources told CNN the military operation, which happened Wednesday into Thursday, may have also involved Israeli ground forces who directed the airstrike, which "left a big hole in the desert" in Syria.

Oddly, the IDF seems to be "happy with the success of the operation" they know nothing about.

Of course, "success" for the IDF carries a variety of meanings, at least one of which is that a major violation of international law will go the way all the other and multifarious violations of international tend to go for them: quitely away.

Moving swiftly on MoveOn

2007-09-11T18:36:00.001-04:00

They won't stop a war the country hates, but by god they sure can move swiftly against a newspaper ad.

House Republican leaders introduced a resolution Monday condemning a full-page newspaper ad from MoveOn.org that criticizes the character of Gen. David Petraeus, the commanding general of U.S. troops in Iraq.

The resolution, authored by Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio), is cosponsored by 11 Republicans, including Reps. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.), the ranking member of the Armed Services Committee, and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), the ranking member of the Foreign Affairs panel.

Amping up the rhetoric in the war on extremism, Boehner himself became rather ... shrill. In fact, by the sound of Boehner's bleating, the next GOP move may be to call in the Marines. They usually have little else in their arsenal of responses.

The despicable attack MoveOn.org launched against General Petraeus today should be condemned by all Members of Congress, including the Democratic leadership. I urge Members on both sides of the aisle to join in support of this resolution so the House speaks with one voice rejecting the character assassination tactics employed by this extremist group.

The GOP hasn't quite learned that everyone is onto the White House game of politicizing the military. If Petreaus deigned to be used a political tool, perhaps he wouldn't suffer the slings and arrows of the theatre that is American politics, here no better demonstrated than by Boehner himself with his unhinged ranting about voter organisations that publish advertisements in newspapers.

Boehner sounds every bit like the school girl whose boyfriend just got smacked on the playground. And these are the dumb shits who spout on about how the Democrats can't face al Qaeda?

A Yearwood of living dangerously

2007-09-11T17:46:00.000-04:00

Reverand Lennox Yearwood was waiting in line to attend the Petraeus family circus on Capitol Hill. He was wearing a lapel button that said, “I LOVE THE PEOPLE OF IRAQ." He was refused entry into the hearing room and, as he was asking a Capitol Hill police officer why he was not being allowed passage as others in line went freely into the room, six cops surrounded him, tackled and injured him and then arrested him. As though the cringe-inducing sight of six beefy, armed police piling on top the elderly minister was not grotesque enough, they added more Orwellian spice to the scene and as the Reverand was carried away in a wheel chair, he was cited for "assaulting a police officer."

This happened -- it cannot be overstated -- while the US military, at the behest of Congress and the White House, testified about the progress of a war that is supposedly protecting our freedoms. The incident occured within spitting distance of a document that suppposedly guarantees certain unalienable rights, which are now known to be entirely alienable.

Quite a sight. Six cops tackling a black minister in the halls of Congress. My, my, how far we've come.

The Liberal plot continues apace

2007-09-10T20:55:00.000-04:00

An area of Arctic sea ice the size of Florida has melted away in just the last six days as melting at the top of the planet continues at a record rate.

2007 has already broken the record for the lowest amount of sea ice ever recorded, say scientists, smashing the old record set in 2005.

Currently, there are about 1.63 million square miles of Arctic ice, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colo. That is well below the record of 2.05 million square miles set two summers ago and could drop lower before the final numbers are in.

In just the last six days, researchers say 69,000 square miles of Arctic ice has disappeared, roughly the size of the Sunshine State.

Scientists say the rate of melting in 2007 has been unprecedented, and veteran ice researchers worry the Arctic is on track to be completely ice-free much earlier than previous research and climate models have suggested.
...

More ...

Phrase of the day

2007-09-10T10:39:00.000-04:00

Israeli neo-Nazis. But, hey, when you live in a militarized police-state, Nazi shit happens.

Wired

2007-09-10T02:00:00.000-04:00

I can hardly wait to see the winger reaction to news that their brains are less active than liberals in processing new information. That has generally appeared to be true on an anecdotal level and seems nearly irrefutable in browsing rightwingistan, but now there is clinical evidence.

Exploring the neurobiology of politics, scientists have found that liberals tolerate ambiguity and conflict better than conservatives because of how their brains work.

In a simple experiment reported today in the journal Nature Neuroscience, scientists at New York University and UCLA show that political orientation is related to differences in how the brain processes information.

Previous psychological studies have found that conservatives tend to be more structured and persistent in their judgments whereas liberals are more open to new experiences. The latest study found those traits are not confined to political situations but also influence everyday decisions.

The final results:

liberals were 4.9 times as likely as conservatives to show activity in the brain circuits that deal with conflicts, and 2.2 times as likely to score in the top half of the distribution for accuracy

Unable to deal with this new emperical data, the study itself pressages the reaction from the right; they'll either ignore it or fulminate, merely confirming the results of the study.

Now, I can see a possible bias in the test.

Participants were college students whose politics ranged from "very liberal" to "very conservative." They were instructed to tap a keyboard when an M appeared on a computer monitor and to refrain from tapping when they saw a W.

M appeared four times more frequently than W, conditioning participants to press a key in knee-jerk fashion whenever they saw a letter.

Each participant was wired to an electroencephalograph that recorded activity in the anterior cingulate cortex, the part of the brain that detects conflicts between a habitual tendency (pressing a key) and a more appropriate response (not pressing the key). Liberals had more brain activity and made fewer mistakes than conservatives when they saw a W, researchers said. Liberals and conservatives were equally accurate in recognizing M.

The bias is obvious. By using a "W," researchers ensured that conservatives would twitch uncontrollably, so perhaps the choice of letters could have been better controlled.

The continued bursting

2007-09-09T20:39:00.001-04:00

I was browsing around the SMU website and found this interesting and rather dire prophesy from SMU economist, Ravi Batra, who spot-on predicted the extant mortgage crisis. In a word, grim:

The single most worrisome global economic problem today is the U.S. housing bubble that has been primarily financed by foreign money. While it is in the self-interest of foreign governments to finance the U.S. trade deficit, private groups have no such interest or obligation. The continued bursting of the U.S. bubble will result in increased loan defaults and could start a foreign stampede out of American assets, leading to a collapse of the dollar by the end of the decade.

This from a guy who previously predicted

The ayatollahs would take over Iran in 1979.
Soviet Communism would vanish by the end of the century.
The United States would be entangled in a major fight with fundamentalist Islam starting around 2000.

Yikes.

Texas and Kurdistan oil each other up

2007-09-09T19:19:00.000-04:00

Despite the fact that US and other oil companies have been operating in Kurdistan for quite some time already, the passage of a Kurdish version of an oil law was sure to further spur activity. And so it is. Within a month of the KRG passing their oil law, Texans are now able to officially move in.

Texas' Hunt Oil Co. and Kurdistan's regional government said Saturday they've signed a production-sharing contract for petroleum exploration in northern Iraq, the first such deal since the Kurds passed their own oil and gas law in August.

A Hunt subsidiary, Hunt Oil Co. of the Kurdistan Region, will begin geological survey and seismic work by the end of 2007 and hopes to drill an exploration well in 2008, the parties said in a news release. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
...
Revenue will be shared by the KRG throughout Iraq, consistent with the Iraq constitution and the Kurds' new petroleum law, issued by the Kurdistan National Assembly early last month.

Despite Iraq's vast oil reserves, major international companies have sat on the sidelines, not only for security reasons but because of the absence of legislation governing the industry and offering protection for investments.

A draft oil law for all of Iraq has been bogged down for months, in part because of disputes over who will control the proceeds.

In August, however, the Kurdish self-governing region in northern Iraq enacted its own law governing foreign oil investments. The move angered the central government in Baghdad, but the Kurds are determined to push ahead with oil exploration.

I love the conceit Ashti Hawrami, the regional government's minister of natural resources, espouses that the oil law has produced a "a supportive and transparent business environment," while simultaneously preventing the disclosure of contract terms. And don't expect this to change. The terms of these PSAs will likely never be revealed and the direction and share of oil revenues in Iraq will likely have to be pieced together from a variety of sources, if it can be done at all.

Now, it is indeed a curious sight: all these Texas oil companies moving in on Kurdish oil fields, even while being admonished by the State Department. Ballsy, really. Even Exxon doesn't seem to be doing this but perhaps this only because their profile is bit larger than some of the small lights in the oil and gas industry.

As I pointed out earlier, if they're from Texas and oil companies, they probably have some relationship to either Dick Cheney and/or George Bush. Well, Hunt Oil certainly has that. From Hunt Oil's own website, we can learn that Hunt Oil's CEO is a one Ray Hunt.

[I]n October 2001 and again in January 2006, Mr. Hunt was appointed by President George W. Bush to the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board in Washington, D.C.

Furthermore, Ray Hunt serves on the National Petroleum Council which advises the Secretary of Energy. As interesting is Hunt Oil's Senior Vice President and Director, Tom Muerer, who serves on the board of The Middle East Institute, a "think tank" whose major funders are Chevron, ConocoPhillips, ExxonMobil, Raytheon, Saudi Aramco, Shell. In a not unrelated note, both Hunt and Muerer are or have been trustees for the Southern Methodist University, where, despite the protests of actual Methodist ministers, the George W. Bush presidential library is likely to be housed.

How convenient it is that Hunt Oil, with a CEO on the president's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, winds up with, as far as I can tell, the first officially sanctioned oil contract in Iraq.

I love it when a plan comes together.

Preparedness

2007-09-08T15:08:00.000-04:00

One of the many "unprecedented" features of the Bush administration's domestic policy has been its drive in using US military forces within the territorial United States. We certainly saw the push to bring in military force in under martial law after Katrina, when Bush infamously tried to "wrest authority" of Louisiana from that state's governor. Shortly after this effort, he then further requested that Congress repeal the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878. This latter request he made, not in response the chaotic conditions in post-hurricane New Orleans, indeed, not specifically for that situation at all, but, rather, for some imagined avian flu epidemic, which his administration felt would need a forceful military response. There is hardly any situation the Bush administration imagines that should not be met with a forceful military response and, perhaps sensing this, neither effort produced the desired resultant at the time.

Which doesn't mean that White House efforts ended there. For, in conjunction with the Military Commisions Act of 2006, which scrapped habeas corpus, the Defense Authorization Act of 2007, also passed merrily by Congress, effectively repealed posse comitatus. Given the proper circumstances, these two dispensations now allow Bush to toss anyone in prison without judicial review and can use the US military -- on US soil -- to do it. But what, exactly, would have to happen for such circumstances to present themselves?

In May of 2007, the White House issued NATIONAL SECURITY PRESIDENTIAL DIRECTIVE/NSPD 51, signed by George Bush . This document lays the foundation for Bush to ensure "continuity of Federal Government structures and operations" -- a phrase that is truly state of the art in its ambiguity. Bush will ensure this continuity in the event of a "catastrophic emergency," a calamity defined as "any incident" that can or may result in

extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the U.S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government functions;

Within two months of the signing of this directive, the Department of the Treasury, of all things, held a "disaster drill" in Tampa, Fl. for some also-imagined disaster in order to ensure that financial institutions could "rebound" in the face of, to borrow a phrase from the above directive, a "disruption severely affecting the ... economy." A month after this drill and after DHS chief Michael Chertoff declared that his "gut" was sensing something ominous, United States Northern Command (NORTHCOM) announced plans to hold a five day session for "federal responders" and others that will

exercise their response abilities against a variety of potential threats during Exercise Vigilant Shield ‘08.

VS-08, as it is called, is described as

the nation’s premier exercise of terrorism preparedness sponsored by the Department of Homeland Security, and several other linked exercises as part of the National Level Exercise 1-08. These linked exercises will take place October 15-20 and are being conducted throughout the United States...

Much of this wordage is obviously and purposefully vague.

On top of all this preparedness, the US government also employs religion to quell popular resistance and has established "clergy response teams," using chaplains to convince people to submit because, according to Romans 13, "the government is established by the Lord." (click through and watch the KSLA news report.)

This is an interesting convergence of activity, not the least of which is the release of the latest "bin Laden" video, especially in light of the extremely negative performance, not only of Wall Street, but of the economy as a whole. The latest jobs report, which detailed a net loss of jobs for the first time in five years, combined with the further pummeling stocks and the US dollar are receiving, all spell nothing but gloom. Given the various federal directives and exercises planned or currently implemented, it is not hard to imagine that almost any "disruption" could be co-opted, claiming such a disruption, however Bush defines it, is "severely affecting the economy."

Now, I know this all sounds rather conspiratorial and, frankly, the one thing that is missing is motive. I cannot for the life of me understand why any administration would gear up for martial law and salivate at the thought of imprisoning who knows how many people. I just don't see the upside of any of this. What is the point? With toadies installed throughout the federal government and a compliant Congress, the Bush administration is pretty much doing whatever it wants anyway, so why bother creating conditions like this? Surely Bush and Cheney have realized that, if they haven't been tossed out already for lying the country into war and killing and maiming tens of thousands of Americans, chances are there isn't much else they can do to bestir any sense of outrage among the American population.

Besides, if one thing is guaranteed to rile up a population, it is arbitrary arrest and detention by a military that was not supposed to be used against citizens. Though, considering the gitmo-like state many Katrina victims live in at the moment -- with no end in sight -- I'm not even sure that would do it, so dull and bedimmed do Americans seem right now.

Perhaps to most megalomaniacs, martial law and the US military are nice tools to have at one's disposal, but I don't see the complacent population of this country suddenly rising up in any sense of that phrase, unless, of course, many of them start getting arrested and arbitrarily thrown into Halliburton detention centers. The whole notion is ultimately destined to defeat itself. Besides, once the clergy are dispatched to calm the rabble, we'll all be sucking thumbs and rocking in a corner, praising Jesus. I'm sure of it.

Perhaps, in the most diabolical sense, the whole thing, the whole blasted surveillance police-state is a McGuffin; something designed to look important and especially nefarious, while the real plot continues merrily along.

I wish I knew.

Dirty pretty things

2007-09-07T14:34:00.000-04:00

Scott Ritter's latest, Reporting from Baghdad, rails on Katie Couric and her voguing in Iraq, but contains a little blurb about oil company activity that I hadn't heard elsewhere. Deciding that waiting for the Iraqi parliament to pass the Oil Law they likely never will, oil companies are already operating there.

If Couric would visit the Iraqi Oil Ministry, she might be shocked to witness the legal maneuvering and exploitation carried out by foreign oil companies (including, directly or indirectly, American oil companies).

Working with local Kurdish officials, small oil exploration and drilling camps are sprouting up all over northern Iraq, where they siphon off the wealth of the Iraqi people. Shipped out of Iraq via Turkey and (surprisingly) Iran, using long-established smuggling routes, these illegal ventures are generating billions of dollars in income for oil companies, and because these ventures aren't supposed to exist, this income goes unreported. You can't miss these sites. Any review of Google-Earth imagery would show these facilities springing up like mushrooms over the last few years. The U.S. military knows about them, and yet does nothing. Note to Richard Kaplan (Katie Couric's producer): If you want to investigate this story, I'll provide you with the geographic coordinates. Drive up and try to talk your way into the security perimeter. Position Katie well for the camera shot and demand answers. Just look out for the Canadian, South African or American mercenaries who are charged by "Big Oil" to keep this dirty little secret "secret."

In fact, an initial foray of this activity was reported a year and a half ago, with the Kurds taking things into their own hands and dealing with Norwegian oil company, DNO.

A controversial oil exploration deal between Iraq's autonomy-minded Kurds and a Norwegian company got underway this week without the approval of the central government here, raising a potentially explosive issue at a time of heightened ethnic and sectarian tensions.

The Kurdistan Democratic Party, which controls a portion of the semiautonomous Kurdish enclave in northern Iraq, last year quietly signed a deal with Norway's DNO to drill for oil near the border city of Zakho.

Considering all the other explosions in Iraq, this Kurdish move appears not to have been quite as "explosive" as initially imagined and looks to have led to more activity. This was a singular deal, which has obviously sprouted many more, as Ritter indicates. Given that the US occupation has been in no position to dictate any behaviour to the Kurds, it seems clear that US interests were best served by getting in on the action in Kurdistan before non-US interests started staking out the lion's share of the oil contracts, contracts that are now run under the Kurds own recently passed oil law.

Indeed, well before the Kurdish regional oil was passed, American-based Calibre Energy Inc. and Hawler Energy Ltd., both of Houston, Tx., entered into a Production Sharing Agreement (PSA) with the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) at about the same time as DNO started drilling. Confirming what Ritter has said, PSA operations are overseen by Turkish-based Petoil, which no doubt expedites safe passage of the oil through Turkey.

As an aside, whenever I see the words "Houston," "oil" and "Iraq" in conjunction, a strain of curiosity sets in, which naturally leads to a little Googling. As an interesting point of information, Calibre Energy is run by CEO Prentis Tomlinson, who is also Chairman and Director. Tomlinson is also the founder and still large stockholder of the company Particle Drilling Technologies, Inc., a company of which Dick Cheney owns a significant amount of stock. The current president and CEO of Particle Drilling Technologies is Jim Terry, who served as a Director at Halliburton while Dick Cheney was CEO. Chairman of the Board at Particle Drilling Technologies is a one Ken LeSuer, who served as Vice Chairman at Halliburton while Cheney was CEO.

Interestingly, while the official position of the US government was that no deals would be made outside federal Iraqi government auspices, the State Department delivered a "scolding" to Tomlinson, at which Tomlinson apparently winked, and went on his merry drill-happy way. Meanwhile, Calibre Energy and other American firms appear undeterred in their exploration and drilling of northern Iraq despite official State Department policy. But then, isn't that always how it is with Dick Cheney?

Naomi Klein: The Shock Doctrine

2007-09-07T13:42:00.000-04:00

Naomi Klein has a new book out today, The Shock Doctrine, which looks like a great study of the corporate embrace of the detestable Friedman philosophy that radical policy change can and should occur through crisis, policy change a less stunned population would surely resist. This was "economic shock treatment," as Friedman called it. If the establishment has ever broken down and displayed its true nature, it was in awarding Friedman a Noble Prize.

Klein invited the talented Alfonso Cuarón (Children of Men) to make a short film as a preview of the book. After watching it, it should be become a full length documentary.

Get your copy of The Shock Doctrine.

The Real Rudy

2007-09-06T15:56:00.000-04:00

Robert Greenwald pounds Giuliani for seven minutes.

Customary means

2007-09-06T15:03:00.000-04:00

It is surely a grim sign of the times when one is more likely to believe the Syrians than the Israelis, not that I ever believe much of what the Israelis ever say. Nonetheless, Syria is claiming that Israeli aircraft violated Syrian airspace and dropped bombs on Syrian territory.

Syria accused Israel of bombing its territory on Thursday and said it could respond to the Jewish state's "aggression and treachery."

Israel declined to comment on the charge by Syria, which said no casualties or damage were caused. The Syrian accusation was partly responsible for triggering a rise in world oil prices of more than $1.40 a barrel.

"It appears that the Israeli planes were on a reconnaissance mission when they got caught by Syrian defenses and were forced to drop their bombs and extra fuel tanks," said a Western diplomat in Syria's capital Damascus.

"This shows that Israel cannot give up aggression and treachery," Syrian Information Minister Mohsen Bilal told Al Jazeera television.

Another Syrian official said: "They dropped bombs on an empty area while our air defenses were firing heavily at them."

What is interesting here is Israel's official response to the charges.

The Israeli military spokesman's office said in a statement: "It is not our custom to respond to these kinds of reports."

Which probably means they are either true or close to being so. After all, it's not like the Israelis haven't done this before.

Ahh, the nation of peace.

Patriotism struck down

2007-09-06T14:41:00.000-04:00

Hard after their "liberal" values like constitutionality, "activist judges" are at it again:

A federal judge today struck down portions of the USA Patriot Act as unconstitutional, ordering the FBI to stop issuing "national security letters" that secretly demand customer information from Internet service providers and other businesses.

U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero in New York ruled that the landmark antiterrorism law violates the First Amendment and the separation of powers because it effectively prohibits recipients of the FBI letters from revealing their existence and does not provide adequate judicial oversight of the process.

Marrero wrote in his 106-page ruling that Patriot Act provisions related to NSLs are "the legislative equivalent of breaking and entering, with an ominous free pass to the hijacking of constitutional values."

Doesn't this judge realize that "constitutional values" is just a code phrase designed as a cover for their appeasement of terrorists?

Besides, how can the plainly patriotic Patriot Act possibly be "unconstitutional"? Being unconstitutional would mean that the Patriot Act is not patriotic. But it is clearly called the Patriot Act, ergo, it is patriotic and hence constitutional. Ipso facto, the judge is wrong. See how simple this is?

I should be a legal scholar for the Bush administration.

Hard questions sure to go unasked

2007-09-06T14:11:00.000-04:00

It is not at all clear as to who might ask some tough questions of General Petraeus when he sits in front of Congress and tries to sell the surge, but Brent Budowsky provides a fine list of points that ought to be covered, with my own highlighted favourites:

Do you agree that the government of Iraq is indebted to, and dependent on, Shiite factions that control death squads and militia that favor Shiite military victory in sectarian wars that have raged for hundreds of years?

Do you agree that many of the same forces and factions that we support through the Iraqi government are recipients of support from the government of Iran?

Are we not today providing money, weapons and bribes directly or indirectly to both sides in the Shiite-Sunni sectarian war?

In your estimation, general, on a scale of 1 to 10, what is the probability that the current Iraqi government will legitimately seek and achieve reconciliation between Shiites and Sunnis?

If there is no reconciliation, do you agree that the ultimate result of American support of former Sunni insurgents who were recently killing Americans, and of the Iraqi government with deep ties to Iran and Shiite militia and death squads, will be increased carnage, bloodshed and ethnic cleansing made even more catastrophic because we are providing weapons and money to both sides today?

General, how do you evaluate the long-term damage to the United States Army and how do you compare the effectiveness of our military force structures, and capability for deterrence, in 2007 compared to 2003?

Do you agree with the Marine Corps pathologist that many of those killed and wounded in Iraq were preventable casualties resulting from lack of armor, protection and support from Washington, and that tax cuts during wartime, with such needs continuing to be unmet, are morally unacceptable?

Do you agree, general, that from 2003 until 2007 major damage has been done to our mission in Afghanistan by diversion of our military to Iraq, and that such damage poses a significant and increasing threat to our security by endangering our mission in Afghanistan and our campaign against the Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan and along the Afghani-Pakistani border?

Do you agree with many experts that the long-term costs of supporting troops and veterans of Iraq, Afghanistan and previous wars for the duration of their lives is measured in hundreds of billions of dollars for needs that are unmet, unplanned, unbudgeted and neglected?

How concerned are you about the decline in recruiting standards that have led to increasing enlistments of those who are obese, have criminal records, fall short of educational standards, or are enticed into service to meet personal financial crises more than to express traditional values of duty, honor and country?

General, don’t you agree that the major retention failure in which large numbers of West Point graduates leave the service does major damage to our future command structure, and loses many of the future Pattons, MacArthurs and Eisenhowers?

Do you support the Geneva Convention in full, oppose what Gen. Antonio Taguba suggests is a cover-up of the Abu Ghraib crimes, and understand the damage that Guantanamo, the challenge to the traditional code of military justice, and the entire torture debate do to undermine our position in the battle of ideas and increase the number of recruited terrorists, even as we lower the standards for recruited soldiers?

Do you regret the op-ed you wrote for The Washington Post in September 2004, shortly before the presidential election, in which you made dramatically over-optimistic forecasts for the Iraqi army, police and government leadership three full years ago?

What lessons have you learned and what changes have you made from your previous tour of duty in Iraq, when far too few in the Iraqi military were trained under your command, when far too many weapons were stolen or lost under your command, and when your September 2004 forecasts were so mistaken compared to the realities of the Iraqi military and police at the time you made them?

Roll out

2007-09-06T13:29:00.000-04:00

Gary at Covert History has a nice little summary of the rhetorical -- and possibly non-rhetorical -- roll-out against Iran that has been more or less promised and expected in the post-labour day haze. Included, but not limited to, is aggravation from the usual suspects, the same ones who trumpeted the Iraq invasion, "designed" the surge, and that effort's less than obvious success:

William "the bloody" Kristol in The Weakly Standard*, who asks the now seriously pressing question, "Terrorist Training Camps in Iran: Should they be safe havens?"
The Anti-Defamation League demanding that Iran not be allowed nukes.
Keith Timmerman, in the dreadful Front Page Magazine, insisting that the President "call it war."
Fox News claiming that the IAEA has been "hoodwinked" by Iranian mullahs on the nuclear program.
Reuel Marc Gerecht, yet another war zealot from the AEI, declaiming "Deadly Persian Provocations," in the pages of Newsweek.

A heady scrum, to be sure. And there is sure to be more on the way. This is merely the initial volley. But there is possibly more than just words being deployed here as Larry Johnson takes note of the nuclear warheads "mistakenly" attached to a B-52 and accidentally winding up in Barksdale, Louisiana:

I called a old friend and retired B-52 pilot and asked him. What he told me offers one compelling case of circumstantial evidence. My buddy, let’s call him Jack D. Ripper, reminded me that the only times you put weapons on a plane is when they are on alert or if you are tasked to move the weapons to a specific site.

Then he told me something I had not heard before.

Barksdale Air Force Base is being used as a jumping off point for Middle East operations. Gee, why would we want cruise missile nukes at Barksdale Air Force Base. Can’t imagine we would need to use them in Iraq. Why would we want to preposition nuclear weapons at a base conducting Middle East operations?

His final point was to observe that someone on the inside obviously leaked the info that the planes were carrying nukes. A B-52 landing at Barksdale is a non-event. A B-52 landing with nukes. That is something else.

Now maybe there is an innocent explanation for this? I can’t think of one. What is certain is that the pilots of this plane did not just make a last minute decision to strap on some nukes and take them for a joy ride. We need some tough questions and clear answers. What the hell is going on? Did someone at Barksdale try to indirectly warn the American people that the Bush Administration is staging nukes for Iran? I don’t know, but it is a question worth asking.

*Asked previously about the spelling of The Weakly Standard, the answer is yes. I hate when I have to explain things like this.

A new benchmark for Iraq

2007-09-05T14:53:00.000-04:00

In a tea cozy chat with CBS's Katie Couric, George Bush, unwittingly or perhaps not, off-handedly announced a new metric by which to measure the success of the "surge" in Iraq.

If you look at my comments over the past eight months, it's gone from a security situation in the sense that we're either going to get out and there will be chaos, or more troops. Now the situation has changed where I'm able to speculate on the hypothetical. . . . Isn't that remarkable?

Why, yes, that is remarkable! and no less than for who actually uttered such a multisyllabic phrase. Bush speculating about "the hypothetical" hardly seems like something he's done before, ergo, this is a sign of certain progress. Bush's ability to "speculate on the hypothetical" is the new, new benchmark of success. Which means ... we've already won! Hooray!

It's just business

2007-09-05T14:00:00.000-04:00

Despite German authorities' arrest of three "Islamic militants" for allegedly planning a "massive terror attack" -- which certainly has the mouth-breathers huffing vaporously -- German technology has made it into Iranian nuclear facilities via a Russian "businessman," while at the same time, German national Gerhard Wisser has been convicted of illegally aiding and abetting Libyan and Pakistani nuclear programs through the A.Q. Kahn network.

No word yet on when the Bush administration will "roll out" its plan to bomb Germany as a state supporter of nuclear terrorism.

From Russian, with love

2007-09-05T13:51:00.000-04:00

While Bush is popping in on Iraq for a few disingenuous photo-ops amidst his bouts of Texas brush clearing, Vlad the Impaler is keeping himself busy with a little armament outreach program for his Asian neighbours.

On the way to the annual summit meeting of Asia-Pacific leaders in Australia, President Vladimir Putin of Russia has scheduled a brief stop-off in Jakarta on Thursday. High on Mr. Putin’s agenda: the signing of a $1 billion arms deal that includes supplying Indonesia with two Kilo-class submarines, the first of a small fleet of the vessels.

It comes on the heels of other deals to sell advanced Su-27 and Su-30 combat fighters to Indonesia, Malaysia and other countries in the region, helping to entrench Russia’s place as the leading arms supplier to Asia.

The signs that the Russian bear wants to return to its old stamping grounds in East Asia and the Pacific have become increasingly apparent in recent times, analysts say.

Mexicans and Mexicants

2007-09-04T14:20:00.000-04:00

Be careful not to credit the ruling class with too much cleverness or intelligence for having achieved their heinous end, for most of them don't begin to understand what they're doing either.
-- Arthur Silber

At the small scale, there is perhaps no better example of Silber's sentiment than the conflicting treatment the Bush administration is currently doling out to the business community in this country. For at the same time Bush's Department of Homeland Security pledges to "crack down" on business by threatening them to comply with immigration laws or face full retribution, this same administration's Department of Transportation is happy to ease the way for efficient transportation of goods by planning to "open the U.S. border to long haul Mexican trucks" because it will "benefit US consumers."

Business groups predict the results of such a DHS crackdown will be "disastrous" and

will lead to severe labor shortages in some industries and eventually weaken the overall economy.

Indeed, it is already happening as we now see US farmers moving to Mexico to set up shop because they are tired of "fighting the fight on the immigration issue.”

How, then, does one reconcile the conceit that the Bush administration is "business friendly" and embraces a policy, dictated by NAFTA, that will benefit US consumers and the economy, with an immigration crack down that will most assuredly harm US consumers and the economy? Well, the answer is you can't. The positions are mutually inconsistent.

But that doesn't really matter in the dank realm of US politics and especially within the realm of Republican politics where we are treated to the grim sight of a Republican administration needing to appease two disparate groups within its putative "base": business and ignorant racist xenophobes. That's a tough nut.

Given the GOP's political calculus, such conflict -- blowback, if you will -- was bound to arise when illegal immigration was pulled out of the draw for no other reason than because the GOP had nothing else at which to direct their base's anger. And just as the faction of the base that got riled up about Mexicans never seemed to grasp that Bush's other political faction fully embraced the cheap and unaccountable labour pool, so too will they likely ignore this particular friction. Meanwhile, the business community is fully aware as to why exactly these draconian policies on immigration are now making themselves known, and they may find themselves in search of a different brand of political ally. Not there is much of a choice.

I, for one, would love to be down on the border observing, as apoplectic Minutemen watch Mexican long haul trucks cruise past them unmolested and on their way toward benefiting "US consumers," even as a few of those Mexican drivers fall asleep at the wheel while their trucks violate state emission standards.

Yes. That would be quite a sight.

Who you callin' accountable?

2007-09-04T13:17:00.000-04:00

Bush administration officials have already signaled that, in their view, the president retains his constitutional authority to do whatever it takes to protect the country, regardless of any action Congress takes. At a tense meeting last week with lawyers from a range of private groups active in the wiretapping issue, senior Justice Department officials refused to commit the administration to adhering to the limits laid out in the new legislation and left open the possibility that the president could once again use what they have said in other instances is his constitutional authority to act outside the regulations set by Congress.
-- Concerns Raised On Wider Spying Under New Law,
New York Times,
Aug 19, 2007

We seek an Iran whose government is accountable to its people -- instead of to leaders who promote terror...
-- George Bush,
Aug. 28, 2007

When did the rule of law become "regulations"?

Tax dollars at work

2007-09-03T22:10:00.000-04:00

[Update below]

Tony Schumacher won the US National top fuel dragster competition. This is not the interesting aspect of the story, however. At least, not to me.

What is interesting to me is that fact that the vehicle, Schumacher and his crew are sponsored by the US Army, which runs the fastest quarter mile car in the nation. I'm not entirely sure how the US Army justifies this expense to Congress, which must run in the millions. Perhaps they advertise it to the simps on Capitol Hill as an effective recruiting tool. Or perhaps they don't tell Congress at all -- I doubt anyone in Congress hangs out in the crowd, watching drag racing. Perhaps it is funded through some black budget. However the expense is justified, I doubt the numbnuts in the crowd rush out to sign up for Iraq after Tony rips out a 4.575s quarter mile.

In the winner's circle, Schumacher is surrounded by US Army soldiers in full combat fatigues, just to add an air of the authoritarian military machine to the scene. All of it was a surprise to me.

Whatever is happening here, it is clearly not good and further indicates the continuing onslaught of military idolization that has been on view since the Bush wars began. Anything, any expense is now justified by the Defense Department. And to US taxpayers, now so numbed by unbridled military spending and the attendant future debt, laying down a few more million so that cheering crowds can watch Tony Schumacher hit 331.94 mph in winning the US Nationals top fuel competition appears to be of no concern at all. It seems not to register. And no one, as far as I can see, questions any of this.

Is this a great country or what?

Update: This guy seems pissed, too.

Post mortem

2007-09-03T20:52:00.000-04:00

A deeply powerful piece by Chris Floyd. America ignores the true state of republic at its own peril. Authoritarianism, once complete, can only be doomed to failure. Eventually.

Post-Mortem America:
Bush's Year of Triumph and the Hard Way Ahead

Tomorrow is here. The game is over. The crisis has passed -- and the patient is dead. Whatever dream you had about what America is, it isn't that anymore. It's gone. And not just in some abstract sense, some metaphorical or mythological sense, but down in the nitty-gritty, in the concrete realities of institutional structures and legal frameworks, of policy and process, even down to the physical nature of the landscape and the way that people live.

The Republic you wanted -- and at one time might have had the power to take back -- is finished. You no longer have the power to keep it; it's not there. It was kidnapped in December 2000, raped by the primed and ready exploiters of 9/11, whored by the war pimps of the 2003 aggression, gut-knifed by the corrupters of the 2004 vote, and raped again by its "rescuers" after the 2006 election. Beaten, abused, diseased and abandoned, it finally died. We are living in its grave.

The annus horribilis of 2007 has turned out to be a year of triumph for the Bush Faction -- the hit men who delivered the coup de grâce to the long-moribund Republic. Bush was written off as a lame duck after the Democrat's November 2006 election "triumph" (in fact, the narrowest of victories eked out despite an orgy of cheating and fixing by the losers), and the subsequent salvo of Establishment consensus from the Iraq Study Group, advocating a de-escalation of the war in Iraq. Then came a series of scandals, investigations, high-profile resignations, even the criminal conviction of a top White House official. But despite all this -- and abysmal poll ratings as well -- over the past eight months Bush and his coupsters have seen every single element of their violent tyranny confirmed, countenanced and extended.

More. Much more....

"Gazprom is a mutant"

2007-09-03T18:05:00.000-04:00

I've spent a goodly amount of time here covering the geopolitical chess game over oil resources in Central Asia, a game in which the Russians are handing US interests a drubbing. This story about Gazprom, though, must be read. Fascinating and frightening at the same time, Gazprom, as a commercial entity, is far exceeding the bounds of that description. As the Russians call it, Gazprom is a "state within a state."

How Gazprom turned up the heat on the West

...
But Gazprom is not just a company providing a quarter of Europe's gas supplies. In 2005, it staged the biggest takeover in Russian history by buying the Sibneft oil firm for $13bn from Roman Abramovich, the owner of Chelsea Football Club.

It has gobbled up Russian television stations, major newspapers, a football team and Russia's third-largest bank. It owns an insurance company. It has an airline, and it builds roads. It

has Black Sea holiday resorts. It has controversial plans to build another soaring tower bang in the historic centre of St Petersburg. And, just for good measure, it runs a private army.

Its tentacles spread way beyond Russia's borders, thanks to the purchase of strategic energy assets in countries ranging from Belarus to Germany, where the Gazprom-sponsored FC Schalke football team wear blue Gazprom shirts, and is currently trying to muscle its way into the US market via Trinidad.

Last week, it emerged that a Gazprom associate, the billionaire Uzbek-born oligarch Alisher Usmanov, had bought a 14.5 per cent stake in Arsenal – fuelling speculation of a Russian-led buyout at another of Britain's top football clubs.

More....

Weak kneed and worry free

2007-09-03T17:07:00.000-04:00

Democrats have promised to keep up the investigation [of Gonzales] and will likely face further media wrath should they try to keep that promise. Considering Democratic cringing in the face of previous threats of name-calling, this promise will likely go unfulfilled.
-- me

Chuck Schumer and Dianne Feinstein told myself and Jonathan Weisman in separate interviews Monday that if Bush picks a consensus AG, that the spirit and drive of the Dem investigations into the U.S. attorney firings likely would dissipate.
-- Paul Kane

Send in the clowns!

2007-09-03T16:38:00.000-04:00

I am happy -- overjoyed really -- to pass along a post from the Asheville Indymedia Center about the 100th ARA (Anti Racist Action) clown block confronting and defeating a gathering of hate-filled Aryan Nation racists in Knoxville, Tn. Truly, one of the best things I read in a long time:

Saturday May 26th the VNN Vanguard Nazi/KKK group attempted to host a hate rally to try to take advantage of the brutal murder of a white couple for media and recruitment purposes.

Unfortunately for them the 100th ARA (Anti Racist Action) clown block came and handed them their asses by making them appear like the asses they were.

Alex Linder the founder of VNN and the lead organizer of the rally kicked off events by rushing the clowns in a fit of rage, and was promptly arrested by 4 Knoxville police officers who dropped him to the ground when he resisted and dragged him off past the red shiny shoes of the clowns.

“White Power!” the Nazi’s shouted, “White Flour?” the clowns yelled back running in circles throwing flour in the air and raising separate letters which spelt “White Flour”.

“White Power!” the Nazi’s angrily shouted once more, “White flowers?” the clowns cheers and threw white flowers in the air and danced about merrily.

“White Power!” the Nazi’s tried once again in a doomed and somewhat funny attempt to clarify their message, “ohhhhhh!” the clowns yelled “Tight Shower!” and held a solar shower in the air and all tried to crowd under to get clean as per the Klan’s directions.

At this point several of the Nazi’s and Klan members began clutching their hearts as if they were about to have a heart attack. Their beady eyes bulged, and the veins in their tiny narrow foreheads beat in rage. One last time they screamed “White Power!”

The clown women thought they finally understood what the Klan was trying to say. “Ohhhhh…” the women clowns said. “Now we understand…”, “WIFE POWER!” they lifted the letters up in the air, grabbed the nearest male clowns and lifted them in their arms and ran about merrily chanting “WIFE POWER! WIFE POWER! WIFE POWER!”

It was at this point that several observers reported seeing several Klan members heads exploding in rage and they stopped trying to explain to the clowns what they wanted.

As Digby notes, it gets even better as the local cops then offered to give the ARA clowns an escort:

After the VNNers left in their shiny SUVs to go back to Alabama and all the other states that they were from the clowns and counter demonstrators began to march out of the area chanting ‘WHOSE STREETS? OUR STREETS!”

But the cops stopped the clowns and counter protestors. “Hey, do you want an escort” an African-American police officer on a motorcycle asked. “Yes” a clown replied. “We are walking to Market Square in the center of town to celebrate.”

The police officers got in front of the now anti racist parade and blocked the entire road for the march through the heart of Knoxville. An event called imagination station was taking place and over 15,000 thousand students and their parents were in town that weekend. Many of them cheered as the clowns, Knoxvillians and counter protestors marched through the heart of Knoxville singing and laughing at the end of the Nazi’s first attempt at having a rally in Knoxville.

Nazis. Beaten back by white flowers and wife power.

On that uplifting note, have a great labour day.

Futile ground

2007-09-03T15:37:00.000-04:00

Another year older and what have I done
My aspirations have shriveled in the sun...
-- The The

The withdrawal of British forces from Basra Palace, ahead of an expected full withdrawal from the city as early as next month, marks the beginning of the end of one of the most futile campaigns ever fought by the British Army.

Ostensibly, the British will be handing over control of Basra to Iraqi security forces. In reality, British soldiers control very little in Basra, and the Iraqi security forces are largely run by the Shia militias.

The British failure is almost total after four years of effort and the death of 168 personnel. "Basra's residents and militiamen view this not as an orderly withdrawal but rather as an ignominious defeat," says a report by the Brussels-based International Crisis Group. "Today, the city is controlled by militias, seemingly more powerful and unconstrained than before."
...

more...

Heads up

2007-09-03T15:31:00.000-04:00

This is a quick heads-up and pointer to Palestinian Pundit. Lots of stuff here, some of it easily found but a fair amount from off the beaten track. Now on the blogroll so check it out.

Signals from afar

2007-09-02T21:58:00.000-04:00

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is very upset with critics of the war and with his so-called government. And he has learned well from his mentors in the White House about how to deal with those critics: tell them to shut up. Borrowing a line straight from Dick Cheney, Maliki says that rather than a monthly death toll of 2000+ civilians, 4 million refugees, little water, less electricity, rampant malnourishment and outbreaks of cholera, it is bad talk that sends

signals to terrorists luring them into thinking that the security situation in the country is not good.

If only those damnables in Washington would stop telling the terrorists that things are "not good," why, the terrorists would really have no idea. If only people would just stop saying the security situation was "not good" presumably the terrorists would walk away, at which point things would be good. Maybe even real good. Why do grousing Democrats and Republicans hate goodness?

Legacy boy

2007-09-02T17:53:00.000-04:00

Robert Draper has taken on the unenviable though presumably lucrative task of writing a book about George Bush and the "legacy" that Bush postulates will be his. Except for some blood money royalty payments, this will certainly be a grim and fruitless charge, one that can only result in aspersions directed against the complicit author. Nonetheless, there appear to be no end of saps and dullards who aspire to hagiography. But this is made easier for Draper considering that, ironically enough, Bush Sr. was a pall bearer at the funeral of Draper's grandfather, Leon Jaworski, special prosecutor in the Watergate scandal. Yes, they really are just like the mafia.

We've been hearing about Bush's imagined divinity for sometime now, as he ignores his broadening lack of contemporaneous popularity in favour of some future historical praise that he is sure will see the wisdom and virtue of his currently poorly understood vision for a better world. Bush denies that he thinks about this, though, by telling us,

I don’t have that much time to think beyond my presidency.

Oddly, this echoes most critics, who regularly point out that Bush clearly doesn't have much time to think within his presidency, consumed as he is by the near continuous effort expended in his rush to break Reagan's vacation record. Bush does assure us, however, that in his retirement he will be running a "fantastic Freedom Institute," otherwise to be known as the FFI of Dallas. One imagines this as a sister organisation of the AEI, known publicly as the American Enterprise Institute but thought to be colloquially known by denizens as the "awesome Enterprise Institute."

But it didn't take too long before Bush spilled the beans about Iraq by indicating, not only his own unwavering intentions to stay in Iraq as long as possible, but to ensure that any incoming president will be happy to do so as well.

“I’m playing for October-November.” That is when he hopes the Iraq troop increase will finally show enough results to help him achieve the central goal of his remaining time in office: “To get us in a position where the presidential candidates will be comfortable about sustaining a presence,” and, he said later, “stay longer.”

Given what we've been hearing from Democrats lately, it looks like Bush has succeeded in attaining this "position."

Dying every day

2007-09-02T15:55:00.000-04:00

Though his candidacy will likely go nowhere, Mike Gravel continues to offer some harsh truths the establishment just doesn't want the American public to hear, let alone think about. Which is precisely why his candidacy will likely go nowhere.

[via The Largest Minority]

There are journals and there is Fred's "private" journal

2007-09-01T15:32:00.001-04:00

With Fred Thompson's announcement that he will possibly announce his potential candidacy, keep an eye on Fred Thompson's Private Journal for the latest thoughts and wisdoms of the good ol' boy who would be president. An invaluable resource in tracking the hunt for an elusive authenticity.

Countervailing facts on Iran

2007-09-01T14:28:00.000-04:00

Anyone interested in the countervailing facts surrounding the growing White House narrative on Iran, check out Cernig's summary of the state so far. An excellent compendium of information entirely at odds with the current narrative being issued by the Bush administration.

A sampler:

Despite repeated claims by neoconservative pundits and Bush administration officials that Iran is arming the Taliban in Afghanistan with EFP bombs, neither the US Army's own bomb expert in theatre, NATO allies nor the commanding US general agree with that assessment.

As former CIA field officer Robert Baer points out, co-operation between Iraqi fighters and Hezboullah has an 18 year history and any assessment of Iranian involvement in the transmission of EFP technology from Hezboullah to the Iraqi insurgency is reaching further than the evidence provides for.

Hezboullah got EFP technology - including the use of infra-red triggers - from the Irish Republican Army in the early 1990's. The IRA had also traded the same technology to various other terrorist groups including Columbia's FARC and Spain's ETA. Iraqis fighting for Hezboullah and then returning to their homeland took their gained knowledge of EFP manufacture with them. Claims that only Iran knows how to make EFP's are ludicrous.

Check it out, and all the supporting links.

Show Snow the money

2007-09-01T13:51:00.000-04:00

Outgoing White House press secretary, Tony Snow, is resigning, not for the usual "more time for his family" excuse but because he just can't make it on $168,000 a year.

Mr. Snow insisted that money, not health, was the reason for his resignation.

“We took out a loan when I came to the White House,” he said. “That loan’s now gone. So I’m going to have to pay the bills.

How's that for patriotic fervor? Happily, this does appear to be one if not the only brief moment of honesty that has emanated from the mouth of Snow in the last two years, other than the occasional issuance of the phrase, "I don't know."

Snow claims his health is good, thanks to his taxpayer-funded health care plan, and that health is not the reason for his departure. Bucks is what it comes down to. Once the book deals and on-air yapping contracts coming rolling in, expect the soon-to-be former press secretary to assume the new roll as Toney Snow.

Back to the maddening crowd

2007-08-31T14:03:00.000-04:00

I've been filled with useless information
Spewed out by papers and radio stations
-- The The

Two weeks "off the grid" impart a certain clear-eyed view of things not normally examined at larger scales. This is not a comforting realization, however, when that view results in the observation that very little actually changes on such a time scale. Rejoining the scene, all the familiar memes are seen to be operational, while various propaganda campaigns, both of commission and omission, jump at rested eyes. The bucolic laze and earnest manor of rural reaches accentuate and heighten an awareness of the dreadful nature of much of what passes for "information" in the age of corporate media, serving as it does an even worse agenda destined for an awful end. Except there is no end, only a continuation of the blight. And much of that, of course, is purposefully hidden, while we are daily inundated by rafts of utter nonsense and noise. Extracting oneself from this shit stream is not only refreshing but should be seen as mandatory. Once accomplished, the daily scandals and puerile behaviour of the political class take on the appearance of soap bubbles; ephemeral blips of scum that rise from the frothy surface of a deeply polluted body politic. We see these bubbles, of course, but not the gross and fetid waters below.

The beast does not sleep nor does it loll in its daily toil to service the imperial mission. Hence, the ongoing though stepped-up agitprop regarding Iran and that country's now presumed WMD and the continuing news that the Cheney branch of American government has, once again, engaged the war crime of planning an aggressive war, something that has been in the works for literally years. As well, the public is now nearly constantly informed that the "surge" in Iraq is going well despite obvious evidence and even the authoritative admonitions of soldiers on the ground. Afghanistan is failing, at least in the nominal sense of the word, but that is a near ignorable frisson in the larger sphere of globalized conflict. After all, the drug lords are making out rather well, which only fuels another of America's wars: the "war on drugs." Both for the drug lords and those supposedly tasked with fighting them, by an unrepentant and cynical calculus, this is undoubtedly a win-win situation, as more and more money is poured into both ends of that particular pipeline.

The wars must be kept alight. As the world's only arbiter of "freedom and democracy," proudly, America must hold firm. Given the debilitated state of US troops, a state we are surely not allowed to imagine of the world's preeminent military, increasing reliance on pure and indiscriminate air power is bound to further populate the world with more "terrorist" foes bent on stopping, or at least increasing the price of, a now decades-long imperialism. This battle has been wisely branded as the "war on terror" so that it appears to be something other than what it actually is. For select segments of the "economy," the profits from this war have been enormous, which further conflict will only enhance. On top of the marginally indirect profiteering, others slurp up large sums of unaccounted taxpayer funds through all manor of hook and crook. And all of this continues apace, with nary peep nor protest by the corporations that supposedly bring us "the news." Profits without conscience are good for the American economy.

Meanwhile, on the domestic front, the president continues to rely on his religion. God tells him to make war and the corporate media lavish him with praise for his "faith." The imperial mission is portrayed as a divine good. To that end, potentially high profile speakers who utter even a scrap of the truth of these things must be marginalized, ostracized or, preferably, ignored outright. Which, of course, render such people low profile, made purposefully so, and therefore not representative of the American public. This is a lie. Most Americans want universal health care, an end to the wars, a preemption of an attack on Iran, and New Orleans properly and honestly rebuilt. None of this is happening nor will it be allowed to happen on the current watch. Despite electoral demand, the wars continue, universal health care is "controversial" and New Orleans slowly morphs into an adult Disneyland, the poor and disposed now efficiently cordoned, under armed guard and subject to arrest by mercenaries should they try to return home.

Furtherance of this ultimately doomed agenda is aided and abetted by the corporate media with a constant ringing that America is ruled by free and fair elections. Purposefully ignoring the vast "irregularities" of recent elections, throat-wobblers appear on television and decry the investigation of the US attorney firings as a "witch hunt." Representative of the corporate punditocracy, David Brooks, resplendent in pasty complexion and purple necktie, declaims on public television that the investigation of the firings was unnecessary, the Attorney General "incompetent," and there was no underlying conspiracy when clearly there was. Though the corporate media remain unable to state the purpose of the politically motivated dismissals, the strategic firing of US attorneys obviously indicated yet another facet of an election rigging apparatus designed to deliver the Rovian wet dream of a permanent Republican majority. Despite these efforts, the public will was strong enough to thwart the game and put an end to GOP majorities. Not that that has seemed to matter. For, far from reigning in White House overbearing and illegality, the now Democratic majority appears entirely incapable of even of pouring piss out of a boot. Despite the blessed departure from the Justice Department of the universally despised White House toady, Democrats have promised to keep up the investigation and will likely face further media wrath should they try to keep that promise. Considering Democratic cringing in the face of previous threats of name-calling, this promise will likely go unfulfilled.

While administration supporters see nothing wrong with any of this -- in fact, argue for more of it -- critics lambaste this particular government as amazingly incompetent. Americans are constantly told that all these debacles are the result of ineptitude, as though one "mistake" after another after another, all of which obviously derive from a uniform and tightly controlled agenda, are nothing but signs of "failure." While it may appear to be that way to anyone with a sense of nominal governance, if one thing has been made clear by the Bush administration, it is surely that this is no nominal government. Claims that the Bush administration is both incompetent and ruthlessly capable of rigging government agency to service a self-interested agenda induces a certain dissonance. Clearly, both cannot be right. Clearly, both are not right. If the behaviours of the Bush administration demonstrate one thing, it is that they are not incompetent. They have done exactly as they have intended while the rest of the country has paid a very dear price for those intentions.

Two weeks away and none of this changed. Not that this should be expected. The Iraq war is promised to continue by both Democrats and Republicans. Darfur will simmer and boil. Iran will be a threat until they do what they are told. Pakistan and India will roil for years yet. American administrations will continue to supply arms to practically everyone. Forget New Orleans as it once was. The granularity of world events is far larger than any of what most Americans are often distracted by. This is important for the continuance of any imperial mission. For when the public looses sight of the imperial forest for the trees of daily strife, as they do and will, the engine of empire is allowed to rumble in the distance, and the larger narratives and sickly agendas will continue to run roughshod over the land. Until the whole sordid, violent mess collapses.

This is entirely preventable. But such an effort, like those of the imperial engine, will have to be sustained and long term. Seeds of such an effort are being sown even today. If the Bush administration has demonstrated ineptitude in one thing, it is their own misunderstanding of the sentiments of American citizens, who clearly want something far better than what they are being dealt right now. Resistance is not futile and this country's leadership has stirred the public from a purposefully induced torpor. Now is the time to wake up. Stop listening to the lies and look at the world. It can be far, far better than the way it has been made.

Splish splash

2007-08-30T16:27:00.000-04:00

As I work up a post-hiatus post, I had to pass along this little bit of entertainment, spotted over at Dvorak Uncensored. Excitable Japanese people watch a crazy American jump into a kiddie pool from a 10 metres height. The glamour! The excitement! as only the Japanese can muster it on the most banal of activities.

Live free and Die Bold

2007-08-16T22:30:00.000-04:00

This is great news, naturally via Bradblog:

Diebold Elections Systems, Inc. is no more. At least in name.

After a year and a half of conversely trying to dump their failed voting unit and/or lying to customers about the reliability and security of their voting systems, corporate parent Diebold is giving up the ghost of their election business which, according to an analyst in a Reuters report, was "responsible for less than 10 percent of Diebold's revenue, and 100 percent of its bad publicity."

According to a company statement [PDF] just released, Diebold Elections Systems, Inc. will become Premier Election Solutions as of today. The company president, David Byrd, who has overseen the disastrous election unit for some time, will stay on as President to go down with the ship, apparently

Applying full lipstick to the pig, the company statement declares, "The change to Premier signals a new beginning for the company." And President Byrd picks up where he left off, furiously polishing his turd, with the claim that "This is both a fresh identity for our company and a unique opportunity for us to concentrate our focus solely on proving best-in-class elections solutions for current and potential customers."

No word on when they'd begin that "focus" after years of claiming same, but doing anything but. They have, however, radically lowered their expected revenue statement for the year by $120 million.

After a string of disastrous reports on the quality and security of their voting systems, along with plummeting stock prices since last week, it seems clear that Diebold, the once-great, more-than-100-year old company, is doing whatever they can at this point to save the corporate parent. While their stock price (DBD) plummeted at today's opening bell, and is currently down some 5.6% from yesterday, the price has begun to rise again in the last hour or so on news of the sale.

more ...

Who knows if this is enough to fix things, especially with Rove on the loose, but it is a start.

AWOL and Wikiganda

2007-08-16T14:20:00.000-04:00

Just a quick note that I will be away for a couple more weeks.

But a recommendation comes to keep an eye on Wikipedia, a story which I'm sure many have already heard. It is becoming "rife with propaganda," as the CIA, Microsoft, Wal-mart, Fox News and Diebold have all been found to be editing a spectrum of entries, not only about themeselves but historical events as well, where I suspect the CIA is most involved. For instance, did you know that, according the hacked Wikipedia, the Taliban ruled Iraq before the invasion?

Great. The fetid and corrupt corpse of the American establishment is rendering what once promised and had the potential to be a fantastic tool into a useless trove of disinformation, propaganda and outright lies. In other words, they are curling an expert community-based reference into an establishment record of a false history, like much of the rest of our so-called historical "knowledge" of the American empire. Entirely expected and wholly disappointing.

Later.

It's all good

2007-08-16T13:55:00.000-04:00

It is inarguable that General David Petraeus’ Iraq surge plan is moving toward success, and there is no reason to doubt that greater progress is in the offing.
-- Jonathon Strong, Family Security Matters, Aug 15, 2005

Iraq Set to Disintegrate, New Study Warns

That Iraq is threatening to break apart is, of course, nothing new. The Kurds in northern Iraq have established an autonomous Kurdish region. In the south of the country, the Shiites are interested in doing the same. Meanwhile, in the center of Iraq,violence remains part of everyday life as Shiite and Sunni extremist groups continue campaigns of car and suicide bombings.

Fractures, in otherwords, are not difficult to find. And the fractures are made all the worse by the fact that the groups involved rarely have the best interests of Iraq foremost in mind. In northern Iraq, the study points out, the two leading Kurdish political parties are demanding that the city and province Kirkuk be joined with the Kurdish dominated region -- a demand, Steinberg writes, that is likely to increase violence in the until now largely quiet north.

Indeed, the massive attack in the Kurdish area near the Syrian border on Tuesday seemed like proof that sectarian violence is rapidly spreading north. Four truck bombs exploded in villages killing at least 200 people. The bombs were likely detonated by Sunni groups angered by a Kurdish-speaking sect called the Yazidis. In April, a Yazidi woman was stoned to death for dating a Sunni Arab.
[more ...]

-- Der Spiegel, Aug 15,2007

Housing bubble? there is no housing bubble

2007-08-15T01:55:00.000-04:00

After the Dow dropped another 207.61 points today, I've got share the headlines of the financial world. It sounds like the fucking apocalypse:

Sentinal warns of losses if clients panic.
Tokyo stocks may loose ground after Wall St. tumble
Asian stocks may fall on U.S. drops and credit woes
Stocks drop as U.S. credit, consumer worries weigh
Credit woes, metal prices slam Toronto stocks
WRAPUP 3 -ECB calls for calm, credit worries roil markets

Let slip the surly bonds of lies

2007-08-14T22:22:00.001-04:00

A talking head on national television let slip one of those telling and overlooked burps that no one in the mainstream media will acknowledge or even repeat. In fact, the reaction to the statement was notable for its non-existance: nothing to see to here, people!

In what can only be described as a surreal discussion about General Lute's previous suggestion that a draft might be considered, wherein we are treated to the sight of "Democratic strategist," Stephanie Cutter, talking about the "tremendous amount of political will" that will be required to "get this done" [instituting the draft, that is], Washington Times' Tony Blankley blurted out something at which the host, the indubitable Pat Buchanan, and his supposed Democratic counterpart barely blinked:

Obviously, the politics isn't there for it, but if you have some future disasters, and we're not up to being able to defend the oil fields or ....

Whoa!! Now, just wait a minute. Only moments prior, Pat Buchanan was lamenting the fact that the American people are not up to doing battle for democracy.

... the American people are willing ... they're not willing to do battle, I mean they don't want to loose this war in Iraq, but they're not willing to do battle endlessly for democracy in Iraq....

This is tremendously instructive and is indicative of just how stupid these people think the "American people" actually are; what little regard they have for these "American people." I also wonder who are these "American people" that the Buchanans and Blankleys and Cutters of the world talk about. Because most seem not to buy into that load of bullshit.

Since I've been pounding on the idea that US troops are not going to be leaving and will become garrison guards of the oil fields after an initial draw-down, I've probably acclimated Alan Breslauer, aka, hotpotatomash, to noticing something like this and hats-off to Alan for catching it. At least, I would like to believe that might be the case. He's a smart guy, though, and I probably had nothing to do with his acute attention to detail.

Watch the vid at Bradblog. And watch the mewling Stephanie Cutter again if you need to be convinced that the Democrats are just as much of a problem as the GOP.

Rush to judgment

2007-08-14T17:48:00.000-04:00

That Patriot Act is yielding all sorts of exquisite little provisions:

The Justice Department is putting the final touches on regulations that could give Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales important new sway over death penalty cases in California and other states, including the power to shorten the time that death row inmates have to appeal convictions to federal courts.

The rules implement a little-noticed provision in last year's reauthorization of the Patriot Act that gives the attorney general the power to decide whether individual states are providing adequate counsel for defendants in death penalty cases. The authority has been held by federal judges.

That Gonzales would be or even could be concerned that "adequate council" is provided to defendants is risible. If anything, Gonzales would come down on the side of providing less council, not more, as his term as Texas Governor Bush's executioner so plainly demonstrated. There couldn't possibly be a more inappropriate candidate for receiving fast track powers over death penalty cases.

The Denial Machine: a repetitive rationale

2007-08-14T17:11:00.000-04:00

After following George Monbiot's exposé about the global warming denial machine, modeled as it is on the Big Tobacco denial machine, I didn't imagine that I would see such a story in an American mainstream media outlet. That such a story would appear in Newsweek seems even more amazing. But it is there and, if you are not familiar with the infrastructure of the Denial Machine, check out

The Truth About Denial

Since the late 1980s, this well-coordinated, well-funded campaign by contrarian scientists, free-market think tanks and industry has created a paralyzing fog of doubt around climate change. Through advertisements, op-eds, lobbying and media attention, greenhouse doubters (they hate being called deniers) argued first that the world is not warming; measurements indicating otherwise are flawed, they said. Then they claimed that any warming is natural, not caused by human activities. Now they contend that the looming warming will be minuscule and harmless. "They patterned what they did after the tobacco industry," says former senator Tim Wirth...

As soon as the scientific community began to come together on the science of climate change, the pushback began," says historian Naomi Oreskes of the University of California, San Diego. Individual companies and industry associations—representing petroleum, steel, autos and utilities, for instance—formed lobbying groups with names like the Global Climate Coalition and the Information Council on the Environment. ICE's game plan called for enlisting greenhouse doubters to "reposition global warming as theory rather than fact," and to sow doubt about climate research just as cigarette makers had about smoking research....

Groups that opposed greenhouse curbs ramped up. They "settled on the 'science isn't there' argument because they didn't believe they'd be able to convince the public to do nothing if climate change were real,"

Wow, that strategy sure sounds familiar. Because it was Paul Wolfowitz, on how the neocons were going to convince the American public that Iraq needed invading, who said,

The truth is that for reasons that have a lot to do with the U.S. government bureaucracy, we settled on the one issue that everyone could agree on which was weapons of mass destruction as the core reason.

If by "government bureaucracy" Wolfowitz meant "public opinion," then this might have borne some vague resemblance to the discussion. And they sure knew the American public would not bone up to war for a program of "spreading freedom."

The Newsweek story is great lesson in how these organisations work and exactly why much of the public thinks there is significant debate about this. Check out it out.

What not to do

2007-08-14T15:53:00.000-04:00

Also from the blog at Foreign Policy comes FP's own amusing round-up of places not to be.

The World’s Most Overhyped Vacation Spots,

a list of avoidances that includes, Iceland, Ibiza ("it's mayhem"), and Badaling, China, where the Great Wall is closest to Beijing.

Woo hoo! I'm on the Great Wall of China!

Virtual foreclosure vultures circling overhead

2007-08-14T15:10:00.000-04:00

Considering the attention the collapse of the sub-prime mortgage industry is suffering and the continued rippling shocks, (the Dow is plunging again today, down 184 points as of 3:34PM EST; FINISHED at -207.61, did the Fed stepped in to prevent yet more disconcerting market behaviour?), the attendant foreclosure boom the country is experiencing was bound to turn into a bonanza for engaging entrepreneurs. Which means that it isn't too surprising to see that some other engaging entrepreneurs have turned Google maps into a foreclosure tracking tool.

Indeed, from the comfort of the keyboard, visitors of ForeclosureRadar.com (beta) can perform virtual fly-overs of all malign properties of the recently evicted. Complete with full spectrum presentation of high-to-low "activity," "pre-foreclosure," "bank-owned," and "auction" status, viewers and prospective property predators can view the foreclosure markets in a variety of parameter spaces, allowing one to really zero-in on the optimal target in what is an increasingly target-rich environment.

They aren't kidding about this being beta, though. California appears to be the only state available so far. Which is certainly where a lot of carrion lie, so it was probably the obvious place to start.

Baghdad on the Hudson

2007-08-14T12:03:00.000-04:00

Simply Appalling notes a particular feature of the recent manhunt in New Jersey. Police now "tear through" entire neighborhoods searching for bad guys:

In the days since the shootings, investigators have recovered various pieces of evidence, including shell casings from at least one gun and a beer bottle with what they say are Mr. Carranza’s fingerprints. On Wednesday night, after the police recorded a formal statement made by Ms. Aeriel identifying Mr. Carranza, they obtained an arrest warrant and descended on the street in Orange where he lives.

About two dozen officers went house to house, said one neighbor, Pauline Bourne, “tearing right through them.”

The officers did not find Mr. Carranza....

Sure to become modus operandi for our police state constabulary. What is notable about this feature of the tale is how un-notable it was; a mere toss off in the story, designed, I suspect, to convey the sense of urgency, as though this is perfectly fine action on the part of the police. I suspect the people who had their houses rifled didn't think anything about it. Ms. Bourne seems only a tad miffed and certainly does not sound like someone whose constitutional rights had been violated. Are we simply getting used to this?

Frictional forces

2007-08-13T18:29:00.000-04:00

Now, don't tell me this surprises anyone (via Dvorak Uncensored):

Political spin masters in Lebanon have been trying in recent days to explain the results of a pivotal special election last Sunday, which saw a relative unknown from the opposition narrowly beat a former president, Amin Gemayel.

There has been talk of the Christian vote and the Armenian vote, of history and betrayal. One explanation, however, that all agree on proved crucial in this race: Gemayel's support by the Bush administration, and the implied agendas behind such support, seem to have helped doom him.

"It's the kiss of death," said Turki al- Rasheed, a Saudi reformer who watched Sunday's elections closely. "The minute you are counted on or backed by the Americans, kiss it goodbye, you will never win."

The paradox of American policy in the Middle East - promoting democracy on the assumption it will bring countries closer to the West - is that almost everywhere there are free elections, the American-backed side tends to lose.

Since this is not a surprise and anyone with even impaired cognitive ability would obviously realize that, as overwhelming Middle Eastern sentiment stands at odds with "American interests," any reasonable attempt at a "free and fair" election in the Middle East would never result in a favourable outcome for the White House.

By favourable outcome, I mean that which is ostensibly the one publicly desired. But, more and more, it seems obvious that US foreign policy is tending toward achieving increased conflict and stress, not less. And not just in the Middle East.

Indeed, Bush administration policy paints a wide swath of intensified friction across Eurasia. Hence, agitation with Iran; arms sales to Saudi Arabia and other gulf states; arms sales to both Pakistan and India; a nuclear deal with India with a proviso for nuclear testing; arming and funding Sunnis and the Shiite Maliki government; missile defense deployment in Eastern Europe, Hamas elections happily fractionating Palestinians, and by which Condeleezza Rice claimed to be "surprised" though signs were readily apparent; subsequent funneling of arms to Fatah. Iraq, of course, is the hot zone in the middle of it all.

In light of this smorgasbord of hot and cold conflict entrées, "losing" a few hundred thousand guns in the middle of it seems like par for the policy course and hardly appears to be anything out of the ordinary.

That's pretty cynical on my part, I know. Either that, or it is really cynical on the part of the White House (I will again urge a viewing of No End in Sight to further enhance cynicism about this administration). Given what we know about how the Bush administration really cares about the troops, I doubt the White House has much concern for the US forces caught in the middle of a conflagration onto which the administration continues to dump fuel.

I would appreciate seeing some kind of reasonable argument that increased tensions do not serve this administration's interests. I haven't seen one yet. And I strongly suspect the prevailing attitude within the White House remains: Hell, just send 'em some more Red Bull.

See this movie!

Razing the stakes

2007-08-13T11:21:00.000-04:00

Katrina apparently didn't destroy enough of the city of New Orleans. Now city officials are razing houses on their own.

While Willie Ann Williams waited for federal aid to rebuild her home in the hurricane flooded 9th Ward, it was demolished — apparently by mistake.

There was nothing left but bare dirt.

A city official told her family that the wood-frame house should not have been torn down, but no one has told them why it happened or what happens next.

Mrs. Williams had a building permit and wanted to fix up her house once she received money from the federally funded, state-run Road Home grant program. Now, with no house to repair, she's living 70 miles away in Franklinton, La., and doesn't know whether she'll be able to come back, said Mrs. Williams' daughter, Vonder McNeil.

Shrinking turd blossom

2007-08-13T11:08:00.000-04:00

Karl Rove, President Bush's close friend and chief political strategist, plans to leave the White House at the end of August, joining a lengthening line of senior officials heading for the exits in the final 1 1/2 years of the administration.

I have a certain amount of skepticism about this but it is not entirely unexpected. In fact, it has been expected for sometime.

Of course, amusement rears up with the words of deputy White House press secretary, Dana Perino, who informs us that Karl, along with his "brilliant mind," is leaving because he will be "giving more to his family." Before that happens, though, Rove is going to spend some quality time shooting doves.

Warning: objects in mirror are more unscrupulous than they appear.

Rudy awakening

2007-08-13T11:01:00.000-04:00

From the Orwellian realm of the police state Republican party.

Freedom is not a concept in which people can do anything they want, be anything they can be. Freedom is about authority. Freedom is about the willingness of every single human being to cede to lawful authority a great deal of discretion about what you do.
-- Rudy Guiliani

Freedom's just another word for ... doing what you're told.

[h/t The Right's Field and The November Blog]

That's the way you do it

2007-08-13T01:55:00.000-04:00

4 easy steps:

1) Chronically underfund a hospital in a poor section of LA, symbolically called Martin Luther King Jr.-Harbor Hospital.

2) See, or otherwise ensure, that it fails to pass federal inspection.

3) Apply this failure to federal standards and pull federal funding.

4) The Hospital closes.

That's just one way. There are others.

Coming to an African American neighborhood near you.

The wall between church and gay

2007-08-13T01:46:00.000-04:00

Bloody Lutherans and their ... their tolerance. Why can't we keep all this a not-so-secret dirty little secret? American is crumbling, crumbling I say!

A national assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America urged its bishops Saturday to refrain from defrocking gay and lesbian ministers who violate a celibacy rule

Fly zone

2007-08-13T00:46:00.000-04:00

Speaking on terrorism thinking and how to prevent another terrorist attack, without regard for causal arguments, Steven Levitt offers up a little gem that might cause believers some concern:

Beyond this, I think there are a few more prospective things we can do. If the threat is from abroad, then we can do a good job screening risky people from entering the country. That, too, is obvious. Perhaps less obvious is that we can do a good job following potential risks after they enter the country. If someone enters on a student visa and isn’t enrolled in school, for instance, he is worth keeping under close surveillance. Another option is one the British have used: putting cameras everywhere. This is very anti-American, so it probably would never fly here.

Oops:

The Bush administration is funneling millions of U.S. dollars to local governments nationwide for purchasing high-tech video camera networks for street surveillance ....

The move could accelerate the rise of a "surveillance society" in which the sense of freedom that stems from being anonymous in public will be lost, privacy rights advocates were quoted by the report as saying.

Since 2003, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has doled out millions of dollars on surveillance cameras, transforming city streets and parks into places under constant observation.

You might want to reassess some of those assumptions, Dr. Levitt. The terrorists haven't attacked, perhaps because they can see that they don't need to. We're doing the work for them.

Why look over here, China and Zimbabwe are following our lead. Admirers, no doubt.

Class warfare: Fox v. Edwards

2007-08-12T23:58:00.000-04:00

Also from mash, this excellent film by TPM.

I like mash's appraisal and he sums it up adroitly:

There are two Americas. The rich elite corporatist America that stole two presidential elections, controls the country and repeatedly gives the rich tax cuts and the rest of us. Guess which one Fox 'News' represents? Which is why the John Edwards gets no love from Fox 'News' and the mainstream media. It's either no media coverage or bad media coverage for Edwards. The fact is that even talk of the two Americas scares the shit out of the ruling class. They fear it could awaken the sleeping beast that is the American people.

The rest of us can only hope.

It's disbelief!

2007-08-12T23:45:00.000-04:00

I had to post this after seeing at Hotpotatomash.

iPhone Bills are killing people!

2007-08-12T23:13:00.000-04:00

Ok, well, not quite. But soon! Very soon.

As you enjoy your weekend, ponder this bit of humor: while the iPhone may be master of the digital mobile experience (for now), dead trees come in for a flogging, as AT&T's iPhone bills are quite impressive in their own right. We're starting to get bills for the iPhone here at Ars, and while many of us have had smartphones for some time, we've never seen a bill like this.

One of our bills is a whopping 52 pages long, and my own bill is 34 pages long. They're printed on both sides, too. What gives?

The AT&T bill itemizes your data usage whenever you surf the Internet via EDGE, even if you're signed up for the unlimited data plan. AT&T also goes into an incredible amount of detail to tell you—well, almost nothing. For instance, I know that on July 27 at 3:21 p.m. I had some data use that, under the To/From heading, AT&T has helpfully listed as "Data Transfer." The Type of file? "Data." My total charge? $0.00.

This mind-numbing detail goes on for 52 double-sided pages (for 104 printed pages!) with absolutely no variance except the size of the files.

Read the Ars Technica post for images of the bills and more hilarity.

Bellyaching

2007-08-12T18:06:00.001-04:00

Sometimes, having zero recognition can be frustrating because it means that days -- weeks -- later, some "big name" will bumble onto something that should have been immediately obvious from various code phrases contained in the original story. The now infamous O'Hanlon/Pollock op-ed generated an enormous amount of media coverage, mostly because these effete ninnies reported that the surge was making things better. That they did this on the coattails of the US military was admitted, if coyly, in the op-ed itself, though no one at the time seemed to recognize the admission. Except here, where the opening statement made in the op-ed was easily decipherable:

VIEWED from Iraq, where we just spent eight days meeting with American and Iraqi military and civilian personnel....

The meaning was obvious:

Readers are to be convinced of the veracity of this report because, despite their being handled by the US military the entire time, O'Hanlon and Pollock have "harshly criticized the Bush administration’s miserable handling of Iraq."

But now Glenn Greenwald, in an interview with O'Hanlon, is revealing that this is exactly how the propaganda effort went down. The DoD arranged the entire trip.

How did you arrange the meetings with the Iraqi military and civilian personnel?

MO: Well, a number of those -- and most of those were arranged by the U.S. military. ... The predominant majority were people who we came into contact with through the itinerary the D.O.D. developed.

Now, don't get me wrong. I have great respect for Greenwald and it is especially good that he got O'Hanlon on record saying this. But everyone is claiming to be surprised by this "revelation" when it was no revelation at all. At least, not here. But "here" is pretty much the middle of nowhere.

Apologies for the self-indulgent bellyaching. I will now return the the regular bellyaching program.

O'Reilly movie review

2007-08-12T17:12:00.000-04:00

The Bourne Ultimatum sucked because it "bashed America."