Saturday, October 08, 2005

Maybe the war in Iraq isn't that important

Maybe nothing is, really, after watching this.

Friday, October 07, 2005

I'm exhausted

reading Juan Cole's line-by-line rebuttal of Bush's rant yesterday about Iraq and terror and stuff. But I'm much edified, too.

Elect a madman, you get madness

These numbers--of the escalating cost of the war in Iraq, of the cost to clean up after two hurricanes, of US borrowing and fiscal imbalances--absolutely insane.

Can't anybody--the Republicans, say--do anything about this?

I love when that happens

When the international community, especially my Scandinavian ancestors, slap the US in the face, especially Bush and Bolton.

Wednesday, October 05, 2005

This is a democracy?

The Iraqi Parliament has made terrorism a capital offense, and has made similarly punishable the act of assisting or concealing a terrorist. Harsh, but not too bad a reaction to the nation's present state, I suppose.

But how's this for the definition of terrorism?: any criminal act against people, institutions or property that "aims to hurt security, stability and national unity and introduce terror, fear or horror among the people and cause chaos" or any "activity threatening to spark sectarian differences or civil war." Furthermore, a terrorist is defined as including anyone who provokes or enables a terrorist to do such things.

So flag-burners, strikers, demonstrators--are they now subject to the death penalty in our new democracy? What about the person who holds the flag pole, hoists a supportive sign in an anti-government demonstration or shouts encouragement to the demonstrators?

Tuesday, October 04, 2005

Ambivalence

That's my reaction to this report that the UN has taken exception to the Shiites latest move in the Iraq parliament of changing the requirement for defeat of the constitution from 2/3 of those who vote to 2/3 of eligible voters in three provinces, the latter standard making it virtually impossible for the Sunnis to vote it down on October 15. While I certainly agree with the UN position--what an outrage!--I'm coming to the conclusion that approval of the constitution, under either standard, will simply spark a greater civil war.

Monday, October 03, 2005

Link TV

My landlord (landlady, actually) has blessed my rental unit with Direct TV, which is an astoundingly confusing service, but it does provide me with a powerful benefit: access to LinkTV. This is a viewer-supported channel available on Dish TV and Direct TV and I gotta say, it's bitchin'. Right now I'm watching "Bush's Brain" and next up is a documentary on Paul Wellstone. You get the drift.

Gotta go now, wanna watch.

Sunday, October 02, 2005

Read it and weep

Riverbend has posted today on her efforts (her latest efforts, because her earlier posts were heroic) to understand the upcoming vote on the constitution--what the document said and meant in real terms. But now, she has revealed, in a desperately sad post, the reality of the political process in Iraq.

Back in the USSA

In Iraq, as in the US, the people in power create the rules, resulting in Bush's election in 2000 and (probably) in 2004. In Iraq, it's the Shiites who rule and they've just changed them to ensure that the Sunnis can't defeat the referendum on the constitution by interpreting the interim constitution to require that it be defeated by 2/3 of the voters in 3 provinces, that is 2/3 of the registered voters, not 2/3 of those who vote. Imagine the difference: In the U.S., for example, it would be impossible for 2/3 of the registered voters to agree on anything because of the low percentage of those who register who actually vote.

The Iraqi constitution, if it should be adopted, will be entirely bogus, just as the Bushies, through their operative, Tribune Bremer (author of the interim constitution) envisioned.

You can't make this stuff up

Isn't this KBR, a subsidiary of Dick Cheney's Halliburton, the same company that just got another huge no-bid contract to repair Katrina's damage to Navy facilities in New Orleans? Where the hell is Congress in all of this?