"Proud to be an American?"

This lengthy NYT article about US military prisoner abuse in Afghanistan leaves no doubt: Our military is no different from other nations'. It is a cruel tool of a war-mongering empire that is due to fail as have all others before it because of the inherently bestial nature of war. We were taught, as citizens of previous empires were taught, that we have a special place in history, that we are a benign force. Wrong. We're not only not special, we're more dangerous than any previous force because of our global dominance.

I pray for all of us--for America, sure; but more urgently for the rest of the world.

Baghdad seething

Riverbend's latest post, describing Condi Rice as The Vampire and relating the horror of car bombs in Baghdad, concludes with this compelling observation:

Detainees coming back after weeks or months in prison talk of being forced to eat pork, not being allowed to pray, being exposed to dogs, having Islam insulted and generally being treated like animals trapped in a small cage. At the end of the day, it's not about words or holy books or pork or dogs or any of that. It's about what these things symbolize on a personal level. It is infuriating to see objects that we hold sacred degraded and debased by foreigners who felt the need to travel thousands of kilometers to do this. That's not to say that all troops disrespect Islam- some of them seem to genuinely want to understand our beliefs. It does seem like the people in charge have decided to make degradation and humiliation a policy.

By doing such things, this war is taken to another level- it is no longer a war against terror or terrorists- it is, quite simply, a war against Islam and even secular Muslims are being forced to take sides.

We have guided missles, why can't they?

It's a bit chilling, but it seems the insurgency in Iraq has found a way to make sure their car bombs get to the target. Duct tape.

"The officer said that in two of the recent Baghdad bombings, investigators
had found indications that the men driving the cars had been bound with duct
tape before the attacks. He said the foot of one of the attackers, in a
marketplace bombing last week that killed 22 people in south Baghdad, had been
found taped to his vehicle's accelerator. In another case, the officer said, the
attacker's hands were taped to the vehicle's
wheel.
"The implication was that those planning the
attacks wanted to be sure that the vehicles would continue to their targets even
if the drivers were killed by American or Iraqi gunfire as they
approached."

Modern medicine, modern war

There have been various reports of this before, but here's a chilling one: The prevalence of brain trauma among US soldiers who're wounded in Iraq. Our modern medicine saves their lives, keeping them from being counted as war dead, but at what cost?

What does it take

for the "smoking gun" story to get legs. For weeks (two-plus, now) bloggers have been beating the drum about the "fix the facts" memo that surfaced in Britain and so far, besides some random mentions, nothing, nada, nichts, in any MSM publication, including cable TV. Maybe the publication of the entire memo in the NYT Review of Books will change that, but I wouldn't hold my breath, especially in light of Newsweek's recent cave-in on the Koran-flushing story.

If Nixon had managed equally to cow the press, he'd have served out his term and been hailed as a much-maligned leader of the free world.

My hope: The Bushies weather all of these early storms, only to have all the revelations pile up at the end of his term so that he leaves in disgrace and his Republican successor loses to anybody in a landslide.

Surprise, surprise

Rummie, and now Condie, have made surprise visits to Iraq of late. Here's another example of how the media is cowed by the administration's verbiage. These visits aren't surprises to anyone but the media and the Iraqi insurgents. Obviously both our military and the administration knows of the visits in advance. The only people who're surprised are the media and the Iraqis, who, if they were told, would make the visits impossible due to the overwhelmingly negative response, and possible danger, the visits would engender.

Now isn't that special...

Iraq, according to the International Drug Control Board, has now become a key artery for smuggling drugs that are grown in Afghanistan. The route through porous borders and a fractured security system takes heroin, speed and marijuana, from their source to the Mediterranean and then into the European marketplace.

So--with all the money and lives we've expended, we've managed to turn Iraq from a harsh dictatorship into a violent hotbed of terrorism and a major drug-trafficking center. I suppose if we drop some more cash and bodies into the fray, we can add civil war to the list.

Update about the AWOL MSM story

It's been a couple of days now, and still no MSM story about the British memo about how the Bushies predetermined the attack on Iraq and "fixed the facts" to justify it, all as reported in my previous post, "I'm soliciting suggestions." Several bloggers have commented on the MSM silence, and 88 Congresspersons have jointly authored a letter to the President to inquire about the story (while noting the MSM silence on the subject), but still so far nothing from NYT or WaPo or any of the TV channels, not even cable, so far as I can see.

I just don't get it

With CEOs' salaries skyrocketing (even after all the scandals involving over-compensated corporate managers), it turns out that the workers' pensions will fall to the axe because of United Airlines' bankruptcy reorganization. Result: its defined-benefit plan will pay $800 per month as a pension to an employee who'd been promised $1700.

Isn't it time Americans woke up to what's afoot in America? Apparently not, so long as the same companies that are sucking up our money own the media that doesn't report it.

I'm not making this up

Halliburton's KBR unit, the one that's been all over the news in the last two years for overcharges and missing documents in its Iraq rip-off, was just awarded bonuses of millions of dollars by the Defense Department for its "very good" work.

This essay from a Louisville, Kentucky, paper, says it all

Louisville, Kentucky? How can a city in a red state have such a blue paper? No, not blue. True blue.

I'm soliciting suggestions

for a word to be applied to that temporal gap between when a story is reported in the foreign press, or on a blog, and when it is finally (if indeed it ever is) picked up by MSM here in the US. This powerful piece of information about Bush's predetermination to attack Iraq and "fix the facts" to justify the invasion lay outside of US news for at least a week until just now, when the Chicago Tribune finally gave it a small half-column. Now, let's see if it gets any further legs or whether it'll be washed away by stories about runaway brides and weird pop singers.

Two questions arise from this news story

in today's NYT.

First, where on Earth does the reporter get the phrase, "fully and freely elected democratic government" in describing Iraq's present set of office-holders? The nation was under occupation and a large segment of the populace boycotted the election because of the Sunnis' outrage at the US presence in the country. That phrase certainly isn't necessary for the story that follows (about the selection of a cabinet) and is clearly the product of the same herd instinct and bias that characterized the reporting of events in Iraq since Bush set his eyes on it. It's an indication, and an obvious one, of how colored the US reporting is on this war, notwithstanding the mea culpa the NYT has previously expressed over just that bias.

Second, if Iraq can have a Human Rights ministry in their government, why can't we?

Ooops, here it comes

This mass grave isn't Saddam Hussein's doing. It's apparently the product of some pissed off Shiites getting even with Sunnis, from deeds back in the day. Or not. Either way, it's a dangerous turn of events.

Whazzup?

I just finished a book by George Johnson, who writes, among other things, science pieces for the NYT. Fire in the Mind. A super read, an in-depth analysis of various scientific theories--math, physics, geology, biology--juxtaposed against native American tales and myths, all with a view to explaining why we seem to have a "fire in the mind" to learn about ourselves and our meaning. He concludes thus (I'm leaving out some really good stuff):

"Sometimes the intelligence of our species seems like a tiny flame
flickering on the periphery of a vast blackness, trying to illuminate the
void. Who gave us this burden? Will anyone or anything beyond our
celestial campsite ever care? If this web is just something we are
spinning for our own amusement, it will die along with its
creators.

"...[I]t is hard not to believe that we are all
participating in something universal, something holy, that the pageant must
unfold beyond our planet. Perhaps we are merely one among a myriad of
players--gathering bits, abstracting concepts, building great edifices of
theory, these mathematical Towers of Babel, that reach higher and higher above
the plains. High enough, perhaps, to make out, just barely, the
rhythm of other dancers, the flickering of other fires."

Was that conclusion just Johnson's late-night musing, or perhaps--more cynically--his way of satisfying his editor with a final phrase signaling a role for faith, or at least an instinct for mysticism? I'm not sure, but to me it doesn't matter. While I disagree with some people's interpretation of the quote attributed to Einstein ("God does not play dice with the universe"), namely, that Einstein was expressing a belief that something mystical was at work in the universe, I am coming to believe that we humans aren't anywhere near capable of knowing everything--even of seeing everything. I believe Einstein was saying something like, "We don't know what game is afoot, because we can't see God or the dice, or even ourselves."

That I truly believe, for me anyway. I'll always be playing dice in the dark. The question then becomes, Why play at all?

Cofer the Beheader

This quote of our counterterrorism chief, seeking bin Laden's head in a box, reveals all one needs to know about the propensitites of Bush appointees.

A reason to watch Entertainment Tonight

Here's a take on why "serious bloggers" should keep connected to the topics of lesser significance. Does this mean we must watch all the trash on TV? No, but we score no style points for ignorance, either.

Now just a goddam minute

Now they're going after PBS. We'll lose not only Nova, Amercian Experience and Now, but the Antiques Road Show too, the latter not on political grounds, but because it's competitive with, and hence to be absorbed by, commercial television, just like Siskel and Ebert were.

Thank God for the NYT

Not just that it (and a few other MSM outlets, such as the LA Times) more than occasionally provides an outlet for news that's not reported by the other sources, such as this one on the recent ouster of the UN investigator of prison practices in Afghanistan, but that it's a big enough source that its stories can't be ignored. Right? Let's see if the story is picked up anywhere else. I'll report back on this.

Soft Patch or Hard Times

With increasing inflation and declining GDP, there has been mention by the economic pundits of the possibility of stagflation. This phenomenon last occurred in the seventies, when inflation soared and the economy remained flat, so that there was no apparent fiscal or monetary remedy that wouldn't either trigger higher inflation or drive the economy downward. We're probably not headed there yet, but there are ominous signals--and little indication that anything in being done to stem the tide, while both the U.S. trade imbalance and federal deficit continue to grow unchecked. If I were a dollar-holder, or a treasury bond trader, I'd be looking to get out pronto.

There's got to be something wrong with this poll

I simply don't believe that 63% of Americans believe that the bible is literally true. Just don't believe it, that's all.

What's wrong with America?

Here, in detailed presentation, are two features of American global policy that I detest: Its militarism and its blind, greed-driven dependence on oil. There are others: Its crass materialism and dollar-dominated corporatism, the inequities of world wealth that it causes and perpetuates, its aspiration to empire and a few others. But the first two--they're the ones that are going to ruin our nation and destroy the planet first.

This scathing report

on the status of Iraq's security forces, detailing the absenteeism, lack of training, absence of morale (contrary to the recent representation of the US military command): Is it contained in some left-wing opinion piece? No--it's found in a news analysis by Business Week Online.

Condi's solution to terrorism

The surest way to deal with the ever-increasing numbers of terrorist activities around the globe, despite the assurances of Bush and Rice that the US is winning the "war on terr'r" is to stop publishing the embarrassing statistics. Especially since last year, the administration's attempt to minimize the numbers of attacks was found out and the report revised upward.

So--no more annual report on global terrorism will be submitted by the new Secretary of State. What you don't know won't hurt us, is Condi's motto.

SIP's

This new Amazon.com feature sounds interesting. Surely it's the basis for a new board game.

Where's the outrage?

I'm not posting regularly, nor am I on the Internet much, because I've traveled to Tucson for several days and I'm relegated to a dialup connection. As a result, I haven't yet checked Google News to see whazzup, but I'll be surprised to find broad Mainstream Media coverage of this outrageous situation about armored vehicles in Iraq. This is at least the third separate time the absence of armor has been raised--the first being within three months of the invasion, the second being about three months ago, and still we've heard only muttering about it on the MSM.

Meanwhile, Rumsfeld and his Pentagon minions roll on: mindless, callous criminals. And more mindless and callous than they? The MSM, which allows them to do so.

Bottoming out

I watched a Frontline TV show last night called, "The Architect," devoted entirely to Karl Rove's activities and orchestration of Bush's electoral victories and the rightward shift of the Republican Party which has lately led to its dominance in Washington and in many states. (Rove declined to be interviewed for the show, which was co-produced by The Washington Post).

There wasn't anything new in the presentation for those who follow politics and certainly not for those who've read Bush's Brain. However, I came away with a sense that the Democrats, at least many of those in power, haven't yet gotten the fundamental message that the show demonstrated: The way to achieve political strength is by perseverance, organization and adherence to a resonant message.

Rove's drive as a youth stemmed from Goldwater's loss in 1964, a nadir for the Republicans--and for the conservative message. From that bottom there was nowhere to go but up, and within four years Nixon was in the White House, followed by Ford and, with but a brief interruption, twelve more years of conservative rule, during which time Rove rose in the ranks and plied his trade by carving out a rightist agenda of low taxes and capitalist hegemony over the economy. Now, in the wake of the damaged image of the Democrats caused by the Clinton presidency he's aligned the Republicans with the religious right, armed them with the "war on terror" and is firmly in control of the national pulse, with his candidate cutting taxes, cutting federal programs, opting out of treaties, gaining control over strategic resources and calling out religious slogans to invigorate the faithful to support his causes and his candidate.

Well, the Democrats have bottomed out now, too. True, the 2004 presidential race was no landslide, like those Goldwater, Dukakis and McGovern suffered. But the Republicans hold sway in all three branches of the federal government and in most states. They have the resonant messages, too: The "Ownership society and "culture of life" being the latest.

I've been watching the Democrats in Congress lately, during the confirmation hearings of Gonzales, Rice, Negroponte, and, most recently the brute, John Bolton. With the exception of a few members of Congress, including Barbara Boxer, from my state, the Democrats' responses are pitiful. Where's the outrage that Bush should appoint and retain those who failed America during his first term? Where's the message that we've lost thousands of lives and limbs in a war that wasn't necessary? Where's the demand that these appointees be held accountable?

The Democrats must adopt an affirmative message and a consistent means of its delivery. It has always been the party of the working class, it has always protected minorities, the environment, the freedoms of press and religion--causes that are now being trampled by the Republicans. The Democrats must now, as any twelve-stepper knows, acknowledge the problem and, one day at a time, take steps--forward and upward--to correct it, starting at the bottom.

What a difference two years make

The famous square in Baghdad where Saddam Hussein's statute was toppled is shown in two telling photos. The first--taken as the statue fell--shows the square nearly empty except for some US troops and a handful of Iraqis. The second, taken last week, shows tens of thousands of Iraqis rallying to protest the US occupation. (BTW, during the first anniversary of the invasion the square was blocked off for security reasons.)

What a dolt

When asked about his reaction to attending the funeral of the Pope our wise and eloquent leader had this to say: "It was one of the highlights of my presidency."

I kid you not. The quote was reported by no less stolidly supportive newspaper that the Houston Chronicle. http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/pope/3124793

And there's this gem casting aspersions on the worth of US debt securities, as reported by the NYT. Not just doltish, demonic.

The Whites get richer and the Blacks get poorer

Economic recovery? Compassionate Conservatism? Equality, Liberty, "Ownership"? Not for Blacks in America.

I don't get it

Nascar Dads, whose wages, in real terms, are steadily declining under Bush, and big-money investors, whose stocks--according to the S&P 500, the broadest-based index of publicly-traded shares--have experienced the first-ever five-year decline during Bush's watch, are among his ardent supporters. This can't be based on his performance. How come he's still their darling? Any ideas? What am I missing?

Kinda makes you wonder, doesn't it?

Given the benefits of pot smoking--new ones being discovered every day--who caused marijuana to be made illegal? There are hundreds of sites, but check out this succinct recital of the feds' intervention in the age-old debate.

Give that woman a Pulitzer

for reporting, under the name Riverbend, what the media is like in Iraq. And in the US, too.

Surprise, surprise

The US will likely establish permanent military bases in Afghanistan. Who'da thunkit?

Irrational irrationality

Who the fuck does Alan Greenspan think he is, all of a sudden becoming the guru on oil supply, demand and prices? He may know something about the effect of interest rates on borrowing and investing, but what magic wand has he recently found to predict inflation based on future oil exploration and refining?
Answer: None.

Many oil experts, contrary to Greenspan's expression of calm, orderly adjustment to price and demand, have told us the Earth's production has now peaked and that as the third-world nations, particularly India and China, adopt our Western ways, we're in for decades of creeping price increases. And maybe not creeping.

Under the radar

The lack of job growth under Bush's regime (worst job rebound after a recession--ever), as well as the decline, in real terms, of purchasing power by workers over the last four years, has simply slipped out of public debate. We hear about economic growth in the US economy, but there's no expansion of earnings for the middle and lower classes.

Of course, what else should I expect from a Republican administration.

What a fucking hypocrite

Bush has sunk to a new low--and he's already a champion at such sinking--with his "right"eous expressions of condolences on the death of the Pope. Only once in Bush's administration did the Pope's intervention become relevant, and Bush, bleeding from the lips to make war, cast aside the Pope's prayers that he not invade Iraq.

Bush is a man incapable of truth and principle. He's a monster, now, hopefully, seen as capable of anything--even lies and politics--while pretending to mourn over the death of a true spokesman of peace.

If there's an afterlife--as Bush and his minions claim--may Bush rot in Hell.

Neocon-fection

Here's the video of William Kristol's pie-ing during a speech at a college in Indiana--a Red State, BTW.

Is this the United States we want?

We're building military outposts throughout the world, holding onto territories by force of arms. Anyone who fails to see the parallels to all other previously failed empires is blind.

April Fool!

The price of gasoline hits new highs, the number of new jobs created plummets, inflation continues to increase, the stock market drops--and the deceased Terry Schiavo and the soon-to-be deceased Pope dominate the American news. The MSM in the second quarter of 2005 is carrying on in its new-found tradition: without insight, without truth, without genuine purpose except to entertain in the basest manner possible. For Bloomberg's story about today's economic developments, check out this story from a source that's decidedly pro-business.

Democracy?

These stories of lists of persons who're escorted out of Bush's "conversations" is old news, I know. But they trouble me still because nobody's complaining about them. Have we become so complacent about the loss of first amendment rights peaceably to assemble and express ourselves that it's no longer outrageous when those rights are obviously breached?

Riverbend remembers

Two years after the US invasion of Iraq, this woman blogger in Baghdad recalls the endless days and nights of shock and awe--and tells us how hard it is to be shocked and awed by the misery of occupation anymore.

Is it just me?

Or are there a few others out there who don't have a clue why the US peddles armaments to other nations, even momentarily "friendly" nations. I mean, whazzup with that?

Talk about your soft targets

These attacks on hospitals have got to stop. The Marines began last autumn's assault on Fallujah by storming the city's main hospital, the justification being that it was a source of figures and photos of dead Iraqis that revealed the extent of our devastation of the city by pre-invasion bombing. Anti-US propoganda, they said. Now we're doing it again, this time in Ramadi.

Happy Easter, everybody. He is risen. But too far, apparently.

The silence is deafening

Iraq Body Count, a website that keeps track of reported civilian deaths, reports that the frequency of attacks and deaths is spiraling upward, and has risen sharply since the "democratic" election in January, 2005. I keep wondering when, if ever, the US citizenry will learn of this. If anybody out there spots a MSM news item to this effect, please advise.

Who are those guys?

I'm acquainted with some of these folks, but not many. I'm talking about the 76% of Americans who, according to a recent Rasmussen poll, actually believe Jesus rose from the dead.

How can so many people believe something for which there's not only no scientific support, but which is actually contraindicated by accepted tenets of physiology? Are many of these believers the same people who believe there were WMD in Iraq? Do they believe because it makes them--makes their existence on the planet--more comfortable than acceptance of the alternative, namely that the story of Jesus is a fable, well-intended and finely based, but, after all, just a tale--a tale that tells us how to live a moral life, but doesn't demand that we do so in order to achieve some eternal reward?

Perhaps so. After all, it wouldn't be the only occasion in which human understanding has been based on what's comfortable, what's comforting. For centuries, Westerners believed the Earth was the center of the universe in spite of solid, contrary observations; or that the Earth was flat, even though sailboats appeared to sink, but then emerge, on the horizon. The idea of a spherical, isolated planet--one object of billions massed and scattered through the universe--wasn't acceptable until supporting proof was undeniable, and until we'd been sufficiently conditioned to accept it, to adopt it within our sense of things, to make it comfortable.

So--what about this idea? Maybe, someday we humans will become evolved enough to quit this bullshit about the existence of a God and/or Allah, with sons and spokemen like Jesus and Mohammed and Krishna and so on. Maybe we have to kill each other, fight and litigate and destroy each other for a few more centuries until we tire of these silly notions and just plain stop and become that which we truly are: Billions of animals trying to find a way to survive in peace on Earth.

Home, sweet home

Here's what the Bushies are up to in my old home town. Remind me never to say "It can't happen here."

It takes a student of Islam

to recognize a Christian radical.

"The cynical use by the US Republican Party of the Terri Schiavo case
repeats, whether deliberately or accidentally, the tactics of Muslim
fundamentalists and theocrats in places like Egypt and Pakistan. These tactics
involve a disturbing tendency to make private, intimate decisions matters of
public interest and then to bring the courts and the legislature to bear on
them. President George W. Bush and Republican congressional leaders like Tom
Delay have taken us one step closer to theocracy on the Muslim Brotherhood
model."

Breaking the silence

I've been so overwhelmed by Bush's recent machinations that I didn't know where to begin to post in reaction. His cabinet appointments--keeping Rummie, elevating Condi, appointing Gonzalez, to name a few--and his other appointments--Bolton, Negraponte, Wolfowitz--are enough to silence anyone. Now his assault on Alaska, his ramroding bills through Congress for war funding and diminishing social programs. It's too much!

But, guess what? It's precisely what he did in his first term. Recall when we couldn't believe his early actions, his appointments and agenda? We thought "he can't mean it," "it can't be happening." But it was, and it is again. Make no mistake, Bush/Cheney are out to transform the United States into a Christian fascist state--and the media is allowing it to happen. Even the Democrats are stifled, their occasional dissent but a whisper in the wind.

I told one of my fellow peace marchers that it's an exciting time, in a way. We are allowed to witness an historical earthquake, the end of a democracy, the finest democracy on Earth. Exciting, but painful indeed.

Whither the dollar?

Today's report, showing a sharp rise last month in the foreign purchase of US debt instruments (treasury bonds, corporate securities) appeared on its face to be good news for the dropping dollars. Indeed, it brought a quick reaction of the Forex market, in which the dollar gained a penny against the euro, which fell from $1.34 to $1.33.

But the underlying data are troubling, because, as has been rumored in recent weeks, it appears that the foreign governments (Japan, China, chiefly) in fact cut back their purchases, whereas foreign-based private hedge funds increased theirs mightily last month. As the Reuters analysis points out, monthly fluctuations in the amount of these private purchases are great, leaving the prospect of an upcoming period, not long from now, when there'll be neither private nor governmental foreign purchase of our equity and our debt, which presently accounts for one fourth of the market for such securitites. Such a vacuum would immediately cause a rise in interest rate of our debt to attract purchasers, and could trigger further inflationary fears. The likely result: The dollar would weaken even more as it cheapens, the dollar debt would become yet less attractive, and the interest rate needed to peddle that debt would rise further, starting a spiral of inflation, increase of interest rates for all kinds of borrowing in the US, and loss of buying power for US consumers, a credit-saddled bunch, who are, after all, the only engine our economy has.

It could get real ugly, real soon.

Scott Ritter for President

This second part of a three-part interview with former UN weapons inspector Ritter, long an opponent to the Iraq invasion, nails the neocons perfectly. They thrive on our fears and whenever we become complacent about their "war on terror" grab their well-placed microphones to frighten us anew. As I've long said, both Osama and Bush gain from our fear, and the US media profits from it. It takes insight to recognize this awful symbiosis and courage to voice it. The question is, what can be done about it?

Rain, rain go away

I don't want to wish ill on anybody, really I don't, but if there's going to be a huge wildfire season this summer, wouldn't it be wonderful if it took place in Montana?

I told you so

For months I (and other bloggers) have been predicting the economic catastrophe that the NYT is now, finally, suggesting.

The story about the capture of Saddam Hussein

in a "spider hole" was fabricated? Hmm. Could it be so? Absolutely, say I. After the Jessica Lynch bullshit and the Army's tale about recent shooting of the Italian agent who freed the woman reporter I don't believe a thing that the military tells us about the goings-on in Iraq. Actually, I haven't believed a military-minded person--ever. To me, men and women in the higher echelons of the military--any nation's military--is inherently untrustworthy on account of having a warped sense of humanity,demonstrated by their voluntary decision to join and direct martial force against fellow human beings. That decision, in my view, disqualifies a person from engaging in human discourse.

"What a revoltin' development this is!"

A signature line from an old radio show, "The Life of Riley," starring William Bendix. (Shows you how old I am!) It's apropos the Bushies' likely reaction to the Iraqi leaders' response to the question whether the US will be allowed to maintain permanent bases in Iraq.

The "f" word

Finally, somebody (somewhat) responsible has uttered it, and backed it up with reasoned analysis. And for a frightening, compelling review of the traits of fascism, and how they translate into the actions of the Bush regime, check out this.

I gotta hand it to Bush and his advisors

They benefit no matter what happens in Iraq. If a pro-US government is formed, the US can keep its bases in Iraq and can suck up its oil, etc. If the present squabbling continues, the US can stay too, since no founded Iraqi administration will be formed to speak with a sufficiently authoritative voice to oust our military. Only if a passionately anti-US government prevails, and it can speak with one anti-US voice, will the US be compelled to leave--and that's not going to happen so long as the anti-US violence continues, which, in turn, is assured by the continued US presence. Like I say: Brilliant.

Greenspan's an idiot, a fascist, or worse.

A national sales tax? Oh, boy. Just what our out-of-whack economy needs, with the poor, who are growing poorer, and who'd be hit disproportionately with such a tax, bearing the burden of equalizing our federal income and outgo.
The man's got no clue about the need for government to be fair-minded and just in its efforts and impacts. He's a money-monger; he's the first one Christ cast from the temple. He does nothing but crunch numbers and mumble conservative platitudes, while Wall Street and Congress bow and scrape. His solution for fixing imbalances is never to tax the wealthy, but rather to do what comes naturally: tread on those who holler faintest.

Don't despair

I've not been posting, I know it. I'm distracted by a book I'm reading at the suggestion of Kyle. Toward the End of Time, by Updike. Magnificent writing, too good to put down. Posts will reappear later today, maybe.

Somebody do something, somebody say something

Now we're gonna lay antipersonnel mines in Iraq, to be triggered by laptop computer. Isn't there something we can do to stop this madness?

Pat Buchanan on Bush's interventionist foreign policy

How can someone who's completely full of shit on most issues be so right on about Bush's international policy of intervention to spread democracy?

What have we become?

Up to 30 billion dollars of US tax money is going to pay for private paramilitary companies in Iraq. Our "all volunteer Army" isn't that at all. It's a half-mercenary army, with the private half paid up to $500 a day for the less dangerous work, while our soldiers receive $1200 a month to fight and die.

Isn't this how the British lost the colonies, by hiring out to the Hessians? Isn't this why Rome fell?

I suppose I should be pleased that we're using mercenaries, but I gotta tell ya, it feels really gross. Slimy. UnAmerican.

"Both sides are sharpening their knives."

The insurgents--Sunnis and others--attack the Shiites and Kurds, and others (the US). The latter attack the insurgents. Now, we learn that since the most recent election, which favored the Shiites, the latter are systematically murdering former Baathists, mostly Sunnis, in revenge for years of oppression.

If that's not a civil war, what is it? Chopped liver?

Without the Internet, where would we be?

A few nights ago, quite late, I read this article on the web, wherein Scott Ritter, former US marine and UN weapons inspector--who's been anti-Iraq-war and right-on in his predictions about its outcome for three straight years--told us he'd learned that the US plans to attack Iranian nuclear plants "in June."

Guess what? This morning, I learn from the MMM (that's mainstream media to the cyberincognenti) that the Bushies are issuing an ultimatum-sounding fiat to Europe: Bring Iran to heel by June, or we act.

Brothers and sisters: Take to the streets. Now!

I hate to say I told you so, but...

the world economy, much too much dependent on the flaccid US economy, is gonna collapse pretty soon, says the Executive Director of the International Monetary Fund. America is drunk with buying foreign goods, not producing anything much and is spending wildly on wars and unproductive defense items.

In four more years this drunk in the White House is going to leave America--no, the entire planet--with a hangover even he can't lie and cheat and slime his way out of.

Ya know, I hope so. I want an end to these evildoers that have seized power in the US, and the only way we'll get rid of them, seems to me, is for them to so screw things up that even their monied supporters bail out.

So--spend on, Bush. March on, Bush. Lie and cheat and steal. Do your worst. I've decided to root for you, all the way into oblivion.

Smoking gun

One doesn't often see a murder on videotape, so when a newsman films a US soldier shooting an already-injured Iraqi at point-blank range--and then joking about it--one would think there might be grounds for a court martial. But no, not in this man's army. There's apparently "insufficient evidence."

Raimondo scores again

with this excellent piece about the NeoCons' march to war against Syria, in particular the baseless drumbeat that Syria was behind the recent bombing of a former Lebanese prime minister.

The most telling part of the essay is his quote from an article by Ron Suskind, recounting his conversation with a Bush admininstration aide on the nature of truth in the American Empire:

The aide said that guys like me were 'in what we call the reality-based community,' which he defined as people who 'believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.' I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. 'That's not the way the world really works anymore,' he continued. 'We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality – judiciously, as you will – we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.'

Mourning

No posts today. I'm in mourning. Sandra Dee and Hunter Thompson died. Nobody left to look up to.

The man on the street, a German street, reacts to Bush's imminent visit.

Essentially saying it's a pain in the ass.

Don't hold your breath

waiting for this UN report on the miserable conditions and prospects for Afghanistan to be reported by the mainstream media (hereinafter MSM) in the US.

"I serve in shame"

Check out this post from an army man serving in Iraq. The cartoon at the bottom is telling too.

Talk about a quagmire

In addition to arming Sunnis, in case the Shiite government turns in the wrong direction in Iraq, a I reported a few posts ago, the US, it turns out, is now negotiating with the Sunnis to end their involvement in the insurgency. Doubtless, they're being promised some position in the new "popularly elected" government. To the chagrin, of course, of those in that government.

What hypocrites the members of the administration are. What liars and frauds.

A fine kettle of fish

The Bremer-dictated "transitional law" that allowed him to escape Iraq without a shot was crafted, at the insistence of the Kurds, to allow them an effective veto over the terms of the constitution. This kept the Kurds happy, but even as the veto provision was inserted in the transitional law, the Shiites objected--but were over-ridden by the force of our occupation.

Now, however, the Shiites are contending that the new assembly can change that veto provision, effectively canceling the Kurds' power--which the Kurds covet so that they can exercise control over their northern provinces, including Kirkuk, which contains vast oil deposits. The Shiites contend the transitional law is not binding because it was produced during the occupation by the US. And, of course, the Sunnis take that same position, a position which, in effect, leaves the transitional law in effect only as to the parts that no one objects to.

Let me say this: I wouldn't want to be in that assembly this summer when these matters are decided. For that matter, I wouldn't want to be in the streets of Baghdad or Mosul or elsewhere in Iraq, where they are more likely to be decided.

I can't wait to hear

what Rummie says about the Army's destruction of photos of torture, having assured us, in Senate testimony, that the world would judge us by our transparency in dealing with the allegations of prisoner abuse.

When is it going to dawn on somebody that the Bushies are no different from other regimes that have run the US, or, for that matter, other empires--except that they're better at it. Namely, they lie and they've convinced a majority of us they're saintly. Come to think of it, there was a similar regime in Germany six decades ago.

The past is prologue

Here's a fine piece, showing what British kids are being taught about the VietNam war, comparing the revisionist version of that terrible conflict to what's happening to the truth in Iraq.

Upbeat? I think not

Greenspan's long-awaited testimony before the Senate was ambiguous at best. My take: He sees that the US in the long run can't continue as it is, spending, not taxing, continuing both as a nation and as its citizens to borrow from the future.

He's right, but he's not being heeded, not by consumers, not by our president or congress. At the end of Bush's second term we're going to be in the same situation we were at the end of the last trickle-down president, Reagan, who left us a heritage of massive debt that we still haven't paid. off.

Ya know, sometimes bad is better

With Kerry's outlandish push for more, not fewer, troops in Iraq, and approving, without question, Bush's 80-plus billions as a supplement for the defense department, I'm not sure Bush's election wasn't, in the long run, a good deal for us lefties. After all, what would we do with Kerry in control? Protest against our victor? Sure, he wouldn't be privatizing everything, but he's got an odd set of priorities in international relations, namely, the time-worn ideas that power makes peace.

So much for John Kerry

Now that he's shown himself to be a gutless, principle-less clot. I'm glad we elected Bush. He's easier to hate, and he's their asshole, not ours.

The power of the press

"Stocks Mixed Despite Strong Retail Report," is the headline of an AP story, dated today, at 11:01 a.m., EST. "Retail Sales are Weakest in Five Months," reads the headline of another AP story, same date, 15 minutes earlier, but this report by an economics reporter, referring to the same "retail report," which, in actuality, showed a significant drop in retail activity, but a slightly smaller drop than some economists forecast.

This is how the world works these days: All is illusion, spin, hype. All is lies. Karl Rove knows this and works precisely this way, over-stating projections of budget shortfall and then claiming victory when the budget doesn't do as badly; understating cost of Medicare benefits, then claiming foul when he later releases the higher true cost figures.

We've not only got to take back the White House, we've got to take back the media that got them into power and keeps them there.

The power of the press

"Stocks Mixed Despite Strong Retail Report," is the headline of an AP story, dated today, at 11:01 a.m., EST. "Retail Sales are Weakest in Five Months," reads the headline of another AP story, same date, 15 minutes earlier, but this report by an economics reporter, referring to the same "retail report," which, in actuality, showed a significant drop in retail activity, but a slightly smaller drop than some economists forecast.

This is how the world works these days: All is illusion, spin, hype. All is lies. Karl Rove knows this and works precisely this way, over-stating projections of budget shortfall and then claiming victory when the budget doesn't do as badly; understating cost of Medicare benefits, then claiming foul when he later releases the higher true cost figures.

We've not only got to take back the White House, we've got to take back the media that got them into power and keeps them there.

Tell me it isn't so

That the US is secretly arming Baathists in Iraq, using Pakistani arms to do so, in order to fashion a strong resistance to the possibility that the elected assembly might turn toward a fellow Shi'ite state, Iran, for allegiance.

I don't doubt the report, actually, because it's the kind of thing we regularly do in the world. We are, after all, the chief cause of unrest around the globe, and have been for decades.

War drums

The media are doing Bush's job for him. On the Sunday morning talk shows--I'm making myself watch these clowns--the ongoing discussion is about nukes in Iran and Korea and what the US is going to do about them. I've heard no discussion of initiatives to defuse these situations or to deal with the problems that have caused them to arise. No, the news programs make more money when the production is dramatic, and what's more dramatic than war?

What the hell?

It's less than a month after the inauguration of president who claims he has a mandate to do, essentially, as he pleases, and who, for the next four years (if the last four are any indication), will indeed do just that. And yet according to the just-released poll by AP, fifty-eight percent of Americans believe the country is on the "wrong track" as opposed to thirty-eight who believe it's headed in the right direction.

There's a disconnect here that's more than troubling. It's scary.

What if only one-fifth of this is true?

Even so, this dispatch from Iraq, a report of an Iraqi doctor in Fallujah after the siege, is as ugly as it gets. As feared, too, he equates the actions of Bush and the Army with "Americans," all of us. So much for a trip to Baghdad by any American tourist in our lifetimes.

Compassionate conservatism in action

Bush's reaction to a woman's plight of having to work three jobs to support her "mentally challenged" son: classic.

If I were religious

Especially a Christian, I'd be mighty miffed that my religion had been taken over by a bunch of stupid, warmongering bigots. I mean, I'm pissed off that the Democratic Party has sold out to the middle-roaders and am protesting and organizing against it, as are millions nationwide over the last few years. But from the Christian left, even the Christian middle, not a peep about the theft of their religion by the pro-Bush faction. No organization, no spokespersons, nobody standin up to say, Enough. Jesus was a peacemaker. God is justice and tolerance, not war.

I'd like to hear about this from somebody who's religious, Whazzup with the silence?

A couple of things, both profound

1. The Bushies have denied--and hand-wringing Democrats have been worried about--the prospect of a "civil war" in Iraq. Well, we now have an "elected" government, with its troops (and with the U.S. as its allies), doing daily battle with "insurgents" who are blowing up people, pipelines, buildings. If that's not a civil war, what is?

2. I do a lot of reading about the human psyche and mind and stuff. My conclusion, backed by a bunch of heavy-hitting Ph.D.'s, is that the mind is a super-computer, with electric energy and sophisticated chemical happenings that we don't understand. But, at base, "just" a computer. So, if that's true, isn't it absolutely certain that the reason Bush got elected again is because of the elemental computer maxim that is based on the current state of the media coverage of his administration prior to the election, namely, "Garbage in, garbage out"? I mean, the Democrats and others have done much soul-searching over the question "what happened?" and "where do we go from here?" and I think the answer is simple: We take back the media.

Marquette's Student Republican

recently adopted an "Adopt a Sniper" campaign, supporting our Army sharpshooters in Iraq and Afghanistan. I kid you not.

Official dispatches, too?

You'd think, when the Army releases official notices of wounded or killed soldiers it wouldn't engage in politicking. But no. Notice how, in this dispatch, it mentions that the wounded were riding in an "uparmored Humvee," whereas in this dispatch , reporting a death, it simply notes that the soldier was killed "in his vehicle."

Why I'm anti-Amercian

Don't be alarmed. Even though Gonzales' drones are likely monitoring this blog, I'll surely be acquitted of whatever crime they create to jail me on account of the title to this post (provided, of course, that I get a trial). You see, it's not the founding documents I detest. Not the marvelous geography of our nation, nor its powerful ideals. Not the finer moments of our history. No, it's things like this: a war between beer advertisers vying for position on the Super Bowl telecast; and worse, an hour-long CBS--a major network--broadcast this evening of a "special" in which Super Bowl ads vie for viewer approval with commercials from other nations. I tried to watch it to get the taste, but I had to tune away. Too base, too demeaning. I'd like to know its Nielsen rating, may check it out tomorrow and report back.

We have become a crass commercial culture. We aren't worthy of the power and place we inhabit in the world. A majority of Americans are ugly, mean people, driven to consume. It's not their fault, but it's surely their condition, spawned and fueled by greedy corporate enterprises that have for decades fueled our consumption, profited from it, and have finally created its product. The dull-witted consumer, whose ethic is theirs.

Republican economics

This article cuts through the figures, analyzes the reality of the state of the union's economy.

Watch what we do, not what we say

Remember back when the Abu Ghraib prisoner-abuse scandal surfaced? The Bush administration mantra was that this would provide the world with a window into our process, that we, as a democracy, would deal with the question of our conduct forthrightly and justly. Rummie said this in his Senate testimony repeatedly.

Well, it's almost a year later and what has happened? A few "bad apples" have been tried and convicted of various maldeeds--with coverage of the trials utterly absent from our media--but none of the higher-ups punished, not even chastised. Including, of course, Gonzales, author of the torture memo that probably formed the basis for our barbarous conduct.

And as to the window on our process? Not opening, not even when a federal judge repeatedly orders it.

In a separate case yesterday that could reveal more details about Abu Ghraib and other detention facilities, a federal judge in New York ordered the CIA to comply with the Freedom of Information Act and turn over to watchdog groups records concerning the treatment of prisoners in Iraq. It was the second time in six months that the judge suggested the government was impeding the American Civil Liberties Union's quest to monitor government actions in the war on terrorism.

Huh?

The chief of police in Mosul "was able to negotiate" with the coalition forces the release of 84 persons in coalition custody who were found not to be participants "in the terrorist minority." Whazzupwiththat? Who's on first?

Right on

This essay, as depressing as it is for those of us who want truth and justice to win out, is unfortunately the most accurate assessment of the future of Iraq and its neighbors. Bush/Rove, the author concedes, have successfully manipulated the US media into buying their entire war agenda.

One man, one vote

I demonstrate against the war here in Santa Barbara by marching up and down State Street weekly and otherwise hanging out a protest sign wherever possible. Silly me. In my marches I've encountered opponents, who, like the one who defaced this antiwar poster, has just as many votes as I.

Is it possible democracy is overrated?

The sky is falling

When an analyst from Bloomberg News, hardly a rad, frets about the future of the dollar and its possible decline into valuelessness--with an economic cataclysm to follow--the only answer is, as we learned during the fifties, "Duck and cover!"

Setting the record straight

Look, let's be clear about one thing: The U.S. invasion of Iraq, and subsequent occupation, are an outrage. A violation of international law; an action taken without justification, legal or factual; and done without UN sanction and for discredited, or clandestine, purposes.

The US, to my knowledge, has never declared war on, invaded and occupied another sovereign nation without a direct attack by that nation. The Spanish-American War, as unwarranted and devious as that was, at least didn't result in our invasion of Spain (although we took over many of their colonies, including The Phillipines). The war with Mexico did indeed result in our temporary occupation of two of its major cities, but we withdrew shortly afterward. Neither of these episodes was particularly honorable--certainly not hallmarks of US diplomacy--but they were small potatoes compared to this Iraq madness.

We invaded and occupied Germany and Japan, both of which had attacked us and declared war on us. But Iraq? What the hell did it do to justify our "shock and awe" and our ruination of their cities and citizenry? They had a tyrant as a leader. Big deal. Tyrants abound in the world, and we support most of them. They'd made war on Kuwait, but were beaten back and sanctioned by the community of nations.

So now, having taken over their country, having built barricades and zones of danger, we, through the "leaders" we put in power, "hold elections." The Shiites and the Kurds rejoice, because they get to vote. The Sunnis, however, resist and fight the occupation because they're in the minority and will lose power because of the invasion/occupation/election. I ask you: Wouldn't you do exactly the same thing?

The US was wrong to invade. Morally, legally, factually. The occupation and "election" don't make it right. This awful sequence is a blemish on the history of our nation, and it was the action of two men, Bush and Cheney, who are as tyrannical and maniacal as any leaders on Earth.

Sour grapes--or grapes of wrath?

I'm aware that this sounds like I'm just plain negative about Iraq's election, that because my candidate lost the US election, my antiwar protests have gone unheeded, and my call for Bush's ouster in some lawful way aren't going to happen, I refuse to acknowledge even the titular legitimacy of the polling in Iraq.

Okay, I admit it. My bias is strong to call the election in Iraq a sham, even to deem the courage of the voters who dodged bullets to get to the polls an exercise in infuriated self-interest, not freedom. But hear this: There are elections and there are elections. The Soviet Union had elections for seven decades, Germany had elections three decades, the United States had elections in 2000 and 2004, and each year scores of "democracies" hold elections, including Cuba and Egypt and, for God's sake, Iran, and we--the Bushies--deem them frauds.

Now, I wasn't "on the ground" (Oh, how I hate that phrase!) in Iraq, but here's somebody who was, and his take on this "election" is this: You can't have democracy when foreign troops occupy all roads, all access, to the polling places. What that amounts to is a Vichy government, able to function only at the sufferance of the occupiers.

That may be the Bushies' definition of democracy--it certainly seems to be lately in this country--but it sure as hell ain't mine.

Will there ever be a last straw?

Now it turns out the US has failed to account for $9 billion in Iraq, money that was supposed to go for the reconstruction of the country. If this doesn't cause Congress to demand that Bush's latest request for a "supplemental appropriation" be pared by a like amount, I don't know what.

Iraq's election

Here's a cogent analysis of today's "election" in Iraq by Professor Juan Cole.

I have this additional take. Let's say the US was invaded by forces (imagine a coalition of Mexico, Canada, Germany, France and Brazil, et al) that opposed our administraton (let's say it's Bushies) and was then occupied by those forces which, by force of arms, isolated and eliminated the Bushies and after years of insurgency by Bush's supporters, reduced them to armed militants and then, by the vote of those who weren't killed or ostracized, elected a panel of Gore/Kerry/Kennedy.

I wonder how Republicans would react to that development.