Monday, April 05, 2004

 
Iraq is out of control, civil war looming; Bush favorable poll ratings down

Chaos reigns in Iraq today. Violence has erupted all over the country. So many of our troops have died over the weekend. So many Iraqi protestors have been "liberated"..by bullets through the head. They were angered over the arrest of a man named Mustafa al-Yacoubi, an acolyte to cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. They were angered over the forced shut-down of a newspaper. They tried to take matters into their own hands by taking control of the police stations and government buildings in their neighborhood. Violence, chaos, anarchy.

With the fall of Hussein came a newfound religious freedom. After their 'liberation' In 2003, Shiites were free for the first time in a long time. Mustafa al-Yacoubi the arrested aide at the center of the eruption of mob violence, has claimed al-Sadr is supported by 75% of Iraqi Shiites. That's close to 45 per cent of Iraq’s population. 45 per cent.

The Bush administration should have invited the U.N. world-community to be part of this intervention from the start. We would have had a good chance to win over these Shiites. Listen to where they stood a year ago:

In Sayyid Muqtada’s entourage, they speak only of differences between "traditional" and "active" howzah - or schools of theology - in Najaf. The "active" theologians believe religious leaders should become involved in the day-to-day running of society.

The example of Islamic Iran is foremost in everyone’s mind. "I want an Islamic republic, but with justice," a former prisoner from the Dawa party said. "We have knocked on all the doors and we don’t see any just Islamic republics."

There is no difference between politics and religion, Sayyid Jaffar said, "but men of religion and politicians do not have to be the same ones - that is the main difference between us and Iran".

The Iraqi people, he added, were "closing an evil period" and "know very little about how other countries are ruled".

For 35 years of Baathist rule, most Shiite leaders practiced taqiya to survive. For the moment, rifts are mostly about whether they tried to live peacefully under the regime or actively fought it.

Now, says a Shiite named Tariq, "everyone is practising taqiya against the Americans, because we are under occupation. The Shiite leadership is divided and confused; they’re trying to find their bearings. Shiites in Baghdad have repeatedly told me they will fight the Americans if they don’t leave."

Had we brought in international experts to show these people clearly that this was not a U.S. occupation and to show them what democracy could do for their Islamic republic in the way of the justice they were seeking, they may have been convinced to be patient, to learn, and take part in a new government. Instead, they may see Iran as their governmental role model. That's a damned shame.


In a CBS poll taken on Sunday, we see that Americans may be grasping the reality of the security disaster in Iraq.

CBS News Poll. March 30-April 1, 2004. N=834 registered voters. MoE ±3.

"Is your opinion of George W. Bush favorable, not favorable, undecided, or haven't you heard enough about George W. Bush yet to have an opinion?"


March 30-April 1, 2004.........%

Favorable............................39

Not Favorable......................42

Undecided...........................16


Jude10:57 AM

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Sunday, April 04, 2004

 
Privatizing Our Wars
Who Are Today's Mercenaries?

James Glanz of the New York Times writes an interesting article describing the experience of today's "modern mercenaries" in Iraq. (Thanks to James for the insight). These guys (and gals?) are fighting the war on behalf of you and me, since our taxpayer dollars go toward paying them God-knows-how-much via government contracts. (Blackwater Security Consulting alone won a $35.7 million contract with the Pentagon to train over 10,000 soldiers from several states in the U.S. in the art of 'force protection,' according to Mother Jones magazine.)
The quote, "It's a bloody awful job, with guys having to live a very monastic life", makes you wonder why anyone would want to sign up for the job of "Soldier of Fortune". The money must be awfully appealing. Many of them are ex-U.S.-military. I wonder why they decided not to continue with military service and turn to the private market instead? Maybe there wasn't enough financial reward in it? I don't suppose many active military men and women pull in $250K each year.
I'd love to see more articles about what makes these people "tick". We support our troops. Now, do we support our contractors? Are we supposed to? To what extent? Are we unpatriotic if we forget to say we support the contractors? I mean, I wish them well, but what are they, exactly? They're hired help..right? These are individuals who are not obligated to follow orders or follow the Military Code of Conduct. They pledge allegiance to the employer.


The Independent UK: Coalition of the Mercenaries- Occupiers Spend Millions on Private Army of Security Men
Jude10:34 PM

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Saturday, April 03, 2004

 
9-11: THE STONEWALLS and the U-TURNS

HE NEVER WANTED ANY OF IT.
BUSH NEVER WANTED US TO THINK ABOUT 9-11 ONCE IT HAPPENED.
*UNLESS HE USED IT IN A CAMPAIGN AD.*

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


January 2002- Before the Commission

Bush and Cheney ask Sen. Tom Daschle to limit 9-11 Congressional probe

President Bush personally asked Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle to limit the congressional investigation into the events of September 11, congressional and White House sources told CNN.

“The vice president expressed the concern that a review of what happened on September 11 would take resources and personnel away from the effort in the war on terrorism," Daschle told reporters.


Senate Leader Tom Daschle said "I can tell you on January 24th, first, and on January 28th second, and on other dates following, that request [by Cheney and Bush not to conduct any Sept. 11 inquiry whatsoever] was made.

__________________________

May 2002-

Stonewall- NO Special Commission!

President Bush took a few minutes during a trip to Europe to voice his opposition to establishing a special commission to probe how the government dealt with terror warnings before Sept. 11

___________________________




October 2002-

Bush and Cheney Block 9-11 Investigation

The press asks why? Democrats keep pressing for a full hearing into the massive failures which left the U.S. open to terrorist attacks. Why were Bush and Cheney still blocking a public 9-11 investigation?

VP Dick Cheney actually threatened Democrats to keep quiet. "Press the issue," Cheney implied, "and you risk being accused of interfering with the war on terrorism."

____________________________



November 2002-

Democrats criticize Bush Administration for thwarting Commission creation

Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle criticized the Bush administration .. for thwarting creation of a commission to investigate last year’s terrorist attacks, saying an independent probe would help the country deal with future threats.

____________________________


December 2002-

A well thought-out and self-protective U-Turn for Bush

By December, "George W. Bush has tapped Thomas Kean to chair the independent investigation into the attacks of September 11th. This nomination comes in the wake of the choice of Henry Kissinger for that post, and his sudden departure. Kissinger, considered a master of secrets and a war criminal to boot."

Kean's Chairmanship is questioned within the scope of "his association with Hess Oil that has drawn concern from 9/11 victims groups, because Hess has business agreements with Saudi Arabia and oil exploration facilities in Indonesia and Malaysia."

In many ways, it is thought "this was a non-nomination. Kean has much to lose and little to gain from chairing this investigation. In the final analysis, it appears that Bush has nominated someone who will be easily controlled by the administration."

It is vital, at this point, to "remember that the Bush administration thwarted this independent investigation for the past 18 months, until they got the two things they wanted. What they wanted was a requirement that any subpoenas would be issued only after six of the ten people on the commission voted for it. The commission is comprised of five Democrats and five Republicans. If a particular subpoena seems to cut too close to the political bone, the Republicans on the committee need only stand shoulder to shoulder to stop it."

*words in quotations attributed to William Rivers Pitt.

________________________


March 2003-

The Shortchange Form of Stonewalling--Underfunding the Investigation

Many ask: Is the Bush White House trying to put the brakes on the congressional panel created last fall to investigate 9-11 attacks? Sources told TIME that "the White House brushed off a request quietly made in March, 2003, "by the 9-11 Commission Chairman Tom Kean, the Republican former governor of New Jersey, to boost his budget by $11 million. Kean had sought the funding as part of the $75 billion supplemental spending bill that the president just requested to pay for war with Iraq. Bush's recent move has miffed some members of the 9-11 panel. The money was to pay for a staff of about sixty and their resources. The White House sidestepped the issue of why the request wasn't granted in the Iraq spending bill. "We've just recently received the letter and we're reviewing it and we look forward to talking about it with Gov. Kean," White House spokesman Scott McClellan said."

___________________________________

April, 2003-

The stonewalling continues

As White House political aides planned their 2004 campaign plan designed to capitalize on the emotions and issues raised by the September 11 terror attacks, administration officials were waging a behind-the-scenes battle to restrict public disclosure of key events relating to the attacks. Sen. Bob Graham was “increasingly frustrated” by the administration’s “unwillingness to release what he regarded as important information the public should have about 9-11. In Graham’s view, the Bush administration wasn’t protecting legitimate issues of national security but information that could be a political “embarrassment”.

______________________________

May, 2003-

Rense.com creates an analysis of White House Stonewalling

"The Bush administration, the CIA, and the FBI are all refusing to cooperate with Congress as the latter tries to release for publication its 900-page report on the 9/11 terror attack on the WTC. The report contains numerous critical comments about administration and intelligence agency mishandling of forewarnings received by agents in the field-including a warning from an FBI agent that al-Qaeda supporters might be training in US flight schools."

_________________________________



July, 2003-

Some are disturbed to think that President Bush might be actively suppressing evidence of the Saudi kingdom's guilt.

Bush Under Pressure to Reveal Saudi Role' in 11 September- The Independent (UK) Jul 26, 2003

The Bush administration is under pressure to allow publication of a secret part of a congressional report on the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, which is said to point to large-scale financial backing for the hijackers from Saudi Arabia. The 28-page section, dealing with the role foreign governments may have played in the attacks, was kept out of the 900-page document issued last week by a joint House and Senate intelligence committee. But it is said to dwell almost exclusively on Saudi Arabia, 15 of whose citizens were among the 19 men who carried out the suicide strikes. According to The New York Times, it suggests that senior officials from the kingdom channelled hundreds of millions of dollars to Islamic charities and other front organisations.

____________________________________________________________



October, 2003-

The White House refuses to willingly hand over top-level papers that may be subpoenaed

References: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/11/13/terror/main583425.shtml

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F30B1EFE3B550C758EDDA90994DB404482

9-11 Commission Chairman Thomas Kean told the New York Times that he was prepared to subpoena the documents from the White House if they were not turned over within weeks.

Kean also told the Times that he believed the panel would soon be forced to issue subpoenas to other executive branch agencies because of continuing delays by the Bush administration in handing over documents and other evidence.

Members of both parties are accusing the White House of stonewalling the federal commission investigating the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, by blocking its demands for documents despite threats of a subpoena.

Sounds Of Silence - Surely the White House realizes that the perception of a cover-up is more politically damaging than turning over a few intelligence reports. (??!!?)

_________________________


January, 2004-

After months of stonewalling the panel's requests for information about the terror attacks, the White House is signaling that it opposes extra time to complete the probe.

For months, the Bush administration and the independent commission investigating the Sept. 11 terror attacks have been locked in low-intensity warfare. The White House opposed creation of the commission, and after it reluctantly yielded, it sought to bar the commission from seeing reams of documents pertaining to the attacks. The stonewalling went on so long that some commissioners say they're months behind in their work -- and yet, the White House is insisting that the May 27 deadline for the commission's final report shouldn't be extended.

___________________________________


February, 2004-

Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert Is Still Dead-Set Against Giving the 9/11 Commission Panel More (Needed) Time

From WP: House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) has hardened his opposition to extending the deadline for the independent commission studying the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, even as the panel's leaders pleaded yesterday for more time to complete their work. Hastert told Republican lawmakers in a meeting yesterday that he will not bring up any legislation to grant the commission extra time.

*BUSH HAD U-TURNED ALREADY BY THIS TIME:

After opposing the idea, President Bush reversed himself earlier this month and agreed to support an extension.


__________________________


March, 2004-

Three thousand died, yet President Bush and National Security Advisor Rice have little or no time for the commission investigating the national tragedy.


In her rush to defend the White House, Rice trips over her own words


March 14, 2004-- Meet The Press

MR. RUSSERT: Will you testify under oath in public about September 11?

DR. RICE: Tim, this is not a matter of preference; this is a matter of principle.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In March, 2004, the chairman of Bush's reelection campaign actually said the White House had been "entirely cooperative" with the independent commission conducting the probe.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~


White House U-turn on 9/11 inquiry

The White House bowed to pressure to allow National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice to testify in public and under oath to the 9/11 commission.

___________________________


April, 2004-

U-Turns and limitations reveal weaknesses in leadership

By his insistence that Cheney appear with him before the 9-11 Commission, Bush has stripped away any doubt from those who wondered about who is running the White House.

Jude1:02 PM

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Friday, April 02, 2004

 
WOW


308,000 jobs last month.
Whew....At least there's a sign of life.
President Bush was quick to take credit for the fastest rate of job creation since April 2000.
I guess that means he's as readily accountable for the past 3+ years of job losses and creation-stagnancy.

Oh, by the way, the average during Clinton's second term was a consistent 240, 000 new jobs per month.
Oh--that's every month....

Not one month out of 39.

Whoopsie--Unemployment's up..oh, but it's just a tad.

Jude4:12 PM

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Are we using mercenaries in Iraq?


Today's Eric Alterman blog says:

The horrific murders in Falluja raises the issue of whether mercenaries are being hired to fight our wars. There’s a provocative series of posts on that question here.

There's a letter in the Syracuse Post Standard today by citizen Ed Kinane concerning the topic. It reads as follows:

'Civilians' in Iraq more like 'mercenaries'

To the Editor:

Four unnamed men guarding a U.S. convoy in a war zone were killed Wednesday in Fallujah, Iraq. This is a tragedy for those individuals, for their families, for all involved.

As the folly and brutality of the invasion and occupation become daily more obvious, more doubletalk must be used to spin such deaths to the voters back home. Thursday's front-page coverage of the killings referred to the victims as "civilians" and "contractors." It kind of sounds like they may have been electricians or engineers. In the Iraq context, however, "contractor" is often simply sanitized language for "mercenary" - a growing personnel category in U.S. "defense" in Iraq and around the world.

In this case, the four men worked for Blackwater Security Consulting out of North Carolina. According to its Web site, Blackwater provides, among other lethal arts, sniping and advanced sniper training. It "employ[s] only the most highly motivated and professional operators, all drawn from various U.S. and international Special Operations Forces, Intelligence and Law Enforcement organizations." Such operators may technically be "civilians," but hardly civilians in the usual sense.

The use of mercenaries allows the jiggling of U.S. casualty stats: Dead and maimed mercenaries need not be counted. Such use evades accountability for military operations and functions. As U.S. soldiers increasingly come to doubt the wisdom and morality of their mission, more mercenaries are deployed. Mercenaries take on jobs and take risks honorable soldiers refuse.

Jude2:18 PM

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Quotes From the Headlines

"...Maxwell No. 1; Harvard No. 2 - Syracuse University's Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs edged out Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government as having the nation's top graduate program for public affairs in the latest U.S. News & World Report rankings...."

_____________

"...Those awful pictures from Falluja are a necessary part of Americans’ education and must be shown to them just as frequently as the deliberate deceptions the media so gullibly passed along when the president was misleading us into war. As horrific and inhuman as these actions may be, Bush asked for this....."

_____________

"...Former Sen. Gary Hart says he, too, warned Condi Rice about an imminent terror attack on two occasions before 9/11..."
_____________

"........the Pentagon had no coherent postwar plan and not enough troops. Mistakes followed mistakes, and today the administration is still in denial about the extent to which resistance to the Americans is becoming a popular uprising rather than the work of leftover Saddamists and foreign terrorists."

_____________

"...Before the Vietnam schism, Democrats and liberals were credibly tough about protecting America precisely because they were the realists, while the Republican right were the utopians.....Now, courtesy of Bush's astonishing bungling, Democrats are on the verge of reclaiming that legacy -- not by being more extreme saber-rattlers, but by being better realists about how best to keep America safe..."

_____________

"...if unnamed "administration officials" spread rumors about administration critics, reporters have an obligation to check the facts before giving those rumors national exposure. And there's no excuse for disseminating unchecked rumors because they come from "the White House," then denying the White House connection when the rumors prove false. That's simply giving the administration a license to smear with impunity...."

_____________

"...Fallujah should teach even the administration's most die-hard optimists that the mission is deeper and muddier than they'd imagined...Many are wondering how President Bush will retaliate for the brutal slayings of the four American contractors who were shot, beaten, dismembered, dragged down the street, and strung up on bridge poles. The universal feeling is that some response is necessary to let the insurgents know they can't get away with this. The question is what kind of response?"

_____________

"..The US is creating its own Iraqi Gaza...Military convoys trundle through or near Falluja every day. The usual tactic is to ambush them with homemade bombs, followed by grenades and small arms fire when the survivors jump out of their vehicles. Then the resistance runs off into the suburban side-streets. The American response is heavy-handed and indiscriminate. "The US is indirectly supporting the resistance by targeting innocent people. It makes us more sympathetic to the resistance," Shaban Rajab, 45, a taxi-driver, told me."

_____________
Jude1:56 PM

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Polls: Free or Safe?



Rather than asking the scaredy-cat poll question:

"Do you feel safer since 9-11?"



......why don't they ask the all-American question:

"Do you feel more free since 9-11?"

How can we be 'the home of the brave' if we're always being asked whether or not we're chickenshit?
Jude11:03 AM

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Meet Sibel Edmonds

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



"This whole situation is outrageous and I am going public."

--Sibel Edmonds

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Mrs. Sibel Edmonds is 33 years old. She's been a citizen of the United States for ten years. She is a Turkish-American who speaks Azerbaijani, Farsi, Turkish and English. (How many languages do you fluently speak?)

Sibel was hired as a translator for the FBI's Washington field office on September 13, 2001-- just two days after the al-Qaeda attacks. Her task was to translate documents and recordings from FBI wire-taps. When you work side-by-side with 200 translators, you get to see and hear a lot of things. Her job was to determine if anything was missed in the translations that related to the 9-11 plot. In her review, Sibel said the documents clearly showed that the 9-11 hijackers were in the country and plotting to use airplanes as missiles. The documents also included information relating to their financial activities. Sibel has not been able to publically comment in detail because she has been under a Justice Department gag order since October 2002. However, Sibel has testified before the 9-11 commission, the Senate Judiciary Committee and the Senate Select Intelligence Committee.

Tom Flocco has reported that Sibel was offered a substantial raise and a full time job to encourage her not to go public that she had been asked by the Department of Justice (DOJ) to retranslate and adjust the translations of [terrorist] subject intercepts that had been received before September 11, 2001 by the FBI and CIA.

Sibel has called Condi Rice an outrageous liar. Ouch. That's a politically potent accusation. I wonder how long before Sibel's character will be assassinated by the White House? She's not that big a fish....perhaps they'll just call her crazy or create a story about how she's got a grudge.

________________________________

See DEMOCRACY NOW for interview with Sibel Edmonds on Wednesday, March 31st.

AMY GOODMAN: "She [Sibel Edmonds] says the FBI had information that an attack using airplanes was being planned before Sept. 11 and calls Condoleezza Rice's claim the White House had no specific information on a domestic threat or one involving planes "an outrageous lie."

________________________________

Tom Flocco questions Commission Chairman Thomas Kean's potential conflict of interest:

....9/11 Commission Chairman and Amerada-Hess Oil director Kean's company maintained Caspian joint venture Delta Oil business ties to bin Laden's brother-in-law for 15 months after attacks despite reported terrorism finance links--and just 21 days prior to Kean's appointment by Bush to commission. This, as FBI translator Sibel Edmonds' letter and follow-up calls to Kean charging FBI internal security and espionage breaches went unanswered for a year......

Jude9:56 AM

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9-11: Bush Aides Are Blocking Clinton Papers From Commission

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"The legislature's job is to write law. It's the executive
branch's job to interpret law."

—GW Bush, 11/22/00, Austin, Texas

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Why has the Bush administration blocked thousands of pages of classified foreign policy and counterterrorism documents from President Clinton's White House files from being turned over to the panel's investigators? The Commission members are sratching their heads and wondering why. The Bush-hugging trolls will tell me it's because of an honorable defense of Executive privilege or it's "too sensitive" to release. These are merely code words. If there's one thing I understand about the Bush administration by now, it's this: they won't do ANYTHING that makes them look bad. Knowing how they operate (as Watergate-era John Dean has said, they're "creepier than Nixon's administration"), I can only assume the Bush administration is withholding Clinton's papers because it would flow perfectly with Richard Clarke's statements and would cause the current Administration to take heavy, heavy political damage. Condi's head would implode under the pressure of such scrutiny and demand for truth. The Bush Administration's extreme legalistic approach to the documents once again shows how hypocritical they are when accusing trial attorneys of gaming the legal system.

Jude9:40 AM

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