Your reaction?

"Mission Accomplished" makes it into the Memory Hole. When I watched the video, I didn't know whether to laugh or cry or toss a bomb somewhere, at someone.

Letter to the editor

Here's a letter to the editor of the News-Press that I wrote today. If someone should see its publication, please let me know. (I seldom read that paper.)

To the editor:

Iraq’s leaders want US forces to remain in country, no doubt largely to protect them from the insurgency. However, segments of the parliamentary coalition, including the Shiite Sadr group, want us out of Iraq, and is backed by a fierce militia that Iraq's leaders are unwilling to quell for fear of losing Shiite political support.

Meanwhile, US forces are deployed throughout Sunni-dominated areas of Iraq--Ramadi, Fallujah, etc.—trying to quell that sect’s insurgency. Ostensibly, Sunni insurgents want the US to leave Iraq so they can engage in unrestrained attacks against what they deem a "puppet government." But according to a report by Tom Hayden on The Huffington Post, a delegation of these insurgents is negotiating with US officials to gain its ends--formation of a new government, rescission of decrees against Baathists, amnesty--and wants our troops to remain in Iraq to police these results. As inducements, it's offering permanent US bases in Iraq and access by private companies to Iraqi oil.

It’s plain to see: We're being played the fool, while our forces are under assault from three sides: Sunni insurgents, al-Qaida fighters and an array of private militias. And now, with the escalation of retributive attacks between Sunnis and Shiites, our troops have come under indiscriminate fire, trying to stop sectarian battles.

How do we extricate ourselves from this mess? An AA slogan says it best: "The way to stop drinking is to stop drinking." The way out of Iraq is to get out of Iraq.

Whodathunkit?

Sacramento has a leftist weekly newspaper. Check it out here.

Wanna have some fun?

Listen to these radio clips.

That's gotta smart!

A civil war, my ass. Nothing civil about this.

A day to remember

Not today, Thanksgiving Thursday, but rather Sunday, the day our war in Iraq becomes a longer war than America's involvement in World War Two.

Not a day to give thanks, not at all.

Malachi Ritscher

Rest in peace.

From the tenor of the comments to this article, he already is.

Comic relief

I've been getting a bit too heavy on my blog lately, so I thought I'd lighten it up by linking to these guys. (I'm probably the last kid on the block to turn onto them, but what the hell.) Enjoy.

Vegas, anyone?

I wonder if somewhere in cyberspace there's a site that's taking bets on Bush's decision about our troop level in Iraq, and what the odds presently are on "going big, going long or going home."

Here's my bet: "Going long," which means an immediate infusion of about 20,000 more troops, coupled with announcements about it being a "final surge" or some much more clever Rovian (remember him?) phrase, followed (maybe, maybe) by a phased drawdown of troops over the next several months. This is nothing but "stay the course" with the awful prospect of more US and Iraqi deaths, with an added taste of "as Iraq's troops stand up, we will stand down" flavoring. But given Bush's personality, and the politics of the times (especially with Senator McCain calling for more troops), it seems to be the most likely option.

Any takers?

Ouch!

Poor Bush (II). By nearly three-to-one, his father leads him in approval, according to a recent CNN poll. That's gotta hurt.

Winning their hearts and minds

After viewing this video, I can only ask, What kind of monsters are we sending to Iraq?

I was just thinking...

however implausible it is that a bill of impeachment would be returned against Bush--and I've more or less given up on the prospect--it's possible that if Bush keeps up his craziness, he could trigger it. Certainly if during one of the several imminent Congressional investigations he and/or Cheney acts too highhandedly or are discovered to have engaged in a coverup of some significance, I could see some Democrats calling for impeachment. And with the list of those condemning his handling of the Iraq war growing ever more weighty, I could imagine that if he called up more troops, the American public would demand some way to stop him, and if the threat of impeachment would do it, then perhaps even that.

(BTW, in view of the state of affairs in Iraq, as well as of the military, consider how cynically nuts McCain is, with his call for more troops. He's clearly posturing for the presidential election in 2008, stirring up the Rightwing nutcases at Bush's expense, knowing that if no more troops are sent and Iraq explodes (as it will, no matter what), he can play "I told you so.")

Can you imagine

How difficult it would be to take a stroll in downtown Jakarta today?

Your thoughts?

Two Rasmussen polls of interest:

1. Forty-one percents of Americans believe the nation's best days are yet to come, and about an equal number don't.

2. Sixty-one percent believe American society is generally fair and decent.In each case, note the disparity in outlook between Republicans and Democrats, and between young and old.

Your view?

Somebody, stop the madness!

A huge facility at Gitmo, costing $125 million, to hold the military's "show trials" in? Have we gone nuts?

(I've gotten into a habit of asking rhetorical questions, I realize--see previous post. I'll watch this tendency in the future.)

Struck dumb.

That's not Bush, that's me. I find myself unable to formulate words to react to--unable, even, to get my mind around--Bush's statement about the applicability of the VietNam experience to Iraq. Doesn't he realize the "freedom" he's talking about only took root after we were driven out of the country after a decade of slaughter? Was he too busy snorting to read the papers back then?

Watch what he does, not what he says

After pledging cooperation and bi-partisanship with the Democratic Congress, Bush's first acts after the election are to try to get twice-denied John Bolton confirmed for the UN ambassadorship (a "nonstarter," it's said), and just today has resubmitted the names of six bigoted assholes for federal judgeships.

In the linked-to article, Senator Schumer says he hopes this last act isn't a precursor to Bush ideological intransigence over the next two years. Chuck, baby, where have you been for the last six?

Didja ever wonder

how you manage to hold 80 hostages? Are we talking cafeteria lines for food, Porta-potties, rows of cots? I mean, how do you keep secret their location, a group bigger than most art show openings?

You read it here first...or maybe second

This piece in the Guardian lays out what we can expect from Bush about Iraq in the upcoming weeks. Recall, in addition to the Iraq Study Group (the Baker bunch), which is a Congressionally-authorized entity, Bush has lately called together his own studiers, Pentagon-types and Cheney acolytes, to come up with his own report, and the Guardian has the scoop. There will be "one last push" to "win" and after that...defeat.

If I'm an "insurgent" or an al Qaeda fighter in Iraq, this is terrific. I just keep on keeping on and in time I will prevail. If I'm a Congressional Democrat, it's terrific too. I rail against this outrageous waste, and, again, simply wait for it to fail. Terrific, too, for McCain-bashers like me, who want him and his militaristic outlook to be shown for the fakey macho bravado that it is.

But if I'm a U.S. soldier, or an Iraqi, or an American taxpayer--or a decent human being--not so terrific.

"Never mind"

This Time Online piece, about the recent "Ooops" statements by NeoCons Perle and Adelman expresses my sentiments exactly. I'll be even more enraged when one or both of them peddles a book, to huge sales, on the subject of the Iraq war, focusing, of course, on how it was mishandled, not how it was wrong.

Three observations about the 2008 presidential election

1. It's two years away, boys and girls, and already the media's pumping the story since they think it will sell ad revenue to do so. Can you imagine how tired we'll be of the story in two years?

2. Barack Obama's rise from a single speech to the Democratic Convention two years ago (he's done nothing, really, in his two years as junior Senator from Illinois--although of course he was powerless) to becoming the media darling is a commentary on how ordinary is the que of Democratic presidential candidates right now. Somebody's got to emerge and catch fire, but not Obama, please. First, he's black; second, he's young; third, he's completely unknown as a politician, and as a person. Get real, Democrats. Not a pretty face, a fancy name. A real person with sound progressive principles that are tested under fire. George McGovern, anyone?

3. We gotta kneecap John McCain before his bandwagon gets too far along. He's an archconservative, benefiting from the few times he's sponsored "maverick" legislation, but make no mistake, he's bad news. His media popularity is overwhelming, based largely on his personality, which is indeed charming, but behind it are views--from agressive militaristim to nasty capitalism--that almost make Bush look benign. Really, I know. McCain was my Senator for years, and I've paid attention. So--to stop the bandwagon, we've got to call attention to these traits right now and repeat them every time his name comes up. I suggest we start with his most recent warmongering message: that we should increase the troop levels in Iraq, to "get the job done." Not only is this wholly out of step with the vast majority of the public and the pols, it is madness, utter madness. So mad, that even Bush/Cheney haven't suggested it. My notion, then, is to label the Senator something like, "Madman McCain" to isolate him and call attention to his crazy position on the war. Now, repeatedly, forever. Because if we don't stop him now, he's likely to be our next president.

Take a coupla minutes

Read and sign Michael Moore's pledge.

(I really like Moore's wit. My favorite is the pledge to allow Republicans to breathe the cleaner air and drink the purer water we've created.)

Definitions, please

Bush/Cheney/Condi use the terms "achieving victory" and "success" in Iraq before our troops are withdrawn. Anybody have a clue what these terms mean in that setting? Perhaps a daily body count of Iraqis below twenty?

Surely they can't be saying that our troops remain there until the streets of Bagdad and Fallujah are as safe to walk as Coast Village Road in Montecito; the lately-closed TV stations are reopened and blaring truths; the kids are in school; the hospitals are emptied of corpses and clean as a whistle; the parliament has wide-ranging debate (including nationalizing the oil fields); and the ruling group swears eternal fealty to the US and UK. Surely they can't imagine such an Iraq. Can you? Can you imagine anything like that in the near (or distant) future?

Whither Republicans?

Some months ago, I wrote a post that bemoaned the demise of "liberal" Republicans, those folks who, back in the day, were sensitive to social, civil-rights and environmental issues, but who fashioned themselves fiscal conservatives. Folks like John Lindsay, mayor of New York; Lowell Weicker, Connecticut Senator, and others whose names escape me now. In the sixties and seventies they were a voice that was quite in tune with the liberal issues of the day: abortion rights, separation of church and state, environmental protection.

Well, here's whadup with them. Which means, I guess, that from now on (for the foreseeable future, anyway) the Democratic Party will encompass the center, center left and left (plus quite a bit of the right, in my view) leaving it the majority party in national politics for some time to come. The exception, of course, will be in the presidential race, where for some reason the Republicans seem to come up with the candidate who is more appealing to the media and the great unwashed. Candidates like Bush, Reagan and, horror of horrors, John McCain.

It's lonely at the top

Especially for Tony Blair, who has apparently been hung out to dry by his ally, Bush, in Bush's latest machinations to get his own ass out a crack. You haven't heard a lot of "consult and confer with the 'Coaltion'" talk lately, just about how Bush is trying to salvage his legacy (as if there was any legacy to salvage.)

And now, with four Brits dying in Iraq yesterday, I wouldn't want to be toady Tony when next he faces his peers in Parliament.

You want some insightful analysis?

Here's an essay that touches bases in the Middle East mess that I've not seen before. Maybe because it's written by someone "on the ground."

Lean to the left

I agree with this analysis that reminds us peaceniks that the Democrats who replaced Republicans on November 7 are no doves. Indeed, they're mostly "Blue Democrats," as likely to hold conservative views on domestic and foreign affairs as not.

So, I agree, this is no time for us lefties to dance with glee. Rather, we must, with as much determination as before November 7, take to the barricades to demand the same changes in policy that we've been demanding for years. The only change, perhaps, is the environment in which we make those demands: an environment that may be a bit more receptive. Which means, of course, that we must make our demands all the louder, all the more strident, now driven by the hope that we may, at long last, be heard.

(Here, however, is a different take on the result of the election in the House: The progressive coalition of representatives will be the largest of the sub-coalitions of the Democratic majority and this, coupled with the presence of many progressives in leadership positions, make the progressives the most powerful component of the House.)

The Split

Forget about those silly elections and Rummie's resignation. Here's the important news of the day.

I will be really pissed off

if those 25,000 Green votes for US Senate in Virginia (a one-issue campaign by a candidate favoring a monorail or something) ends up costing the Democrat (Webb) a victory over the racist swine George Allen, he of "macaca" infamy, and therefore ends up placing tied Senate votes in Cheney's hands.

I mean really pissed off.

I'm disappointed

You mean that after all that hoopla the only October/November surprise Karl Rove could pull off was the Saddam Hussein verdict?

Thanks to BBC

we--those few Americans who dial past Faux News and the other faux news outlets--are exposed to succinct, finely written analysis of historic events like this.

My previous post

It, and the two comments it has received so far, capture the span of fair-minded reaction to the future of the US as presaged by tomorrow's election: Fear of seismic shift vs. fear of not much happening at all.

My wish is that somehow, one way or another (or by some path we can't foresee) we end up in a kind of benign Swedish-ish, or Danish-ish or Swiss-ish socialist democracy that's content to be just another fine peaceloving nation that is willing to participate on an equal basis with other nations of the world, and that long after I'm gone all nations merge into one body of loving humanity.

In case that doesn't sound familiar, check out John Lennon's lyrics.

Okay, I admit it

There's a tiny part of me (not my best part, I concede) that wants the Republicans to carry the day. Hold the Senate, hold the House majority, hold a bunch of governorships. Why? First, so that they maintain responsibility for the messes they've created and can't fault the Democrats for not cleaning it up by 2008. Second, because it might convince me, and the rest of the world, that the US is done. Put-a-fork-in-it done as a decent nation. Finally, because it might lead to a bottoming out, a true revolution, in the US. A takeover, in the next decade or so, by the people who live in that nation.

Worth thinking about, isn't it?

Nuclear bombshell

Sometimes it pays to have insomnia, because occasionally you're allowed to report a scoop like this. (The full NYT story, three pages in length, is much more detailed--and much more damning to the Republicans--but is available only upon registration, so I've linked to a much more sketchy secondary source. For those who are registered, the NYT story is here.)

Now, maybe I'm no political pundit, but I gotta tell ya, this story is to me so (excuse the pun) explosive--posting Iraq's nuclear secrets on the Internet in the hope to gain some political advantage!!--that it could mean the end of any doubt about the outcome of the upcoming election. It plays directly into the "war on terr'r" issue that is supposedly the Republicans' trump card. If this story isn't blown up at least to the dimension of the Kerry flub, I don't know what...

(Update: It's now twelve hours later--two pm PST--and so far this story, despite first appearing on the front page of the NYT, has gotten no traction whatsoever, not even on AirAmerica talkshows. The "sex scandal" du jour, about "Rev." Haggard and his foibles, has bounced this incredible story of security breach off the news. It makes one wonder: Has Rove now devised a way to blast truly significant terrible news away from public attention by covering it with slightly less ugly news?)

(Up-update: End of the Friday news cycle, ten pm. The story did make some TV newscasts as a secondary or tertiary item, without much analysis, however. The implications weren't explored much, and Bush supporters were quick to chime in that the existence of such atomic plans were proof that Saddam Hussein had WMD potential, notwithstanding that these plans were pre-1991 papers that had been turned over to the UN inspectors already. But then finally, KO--that's my new hero, Keith Olberman--led his MSNBC Countdown newscast with the story, with extended commentary, and just now, on the web, the Truthout commentator, William Rivers Pitt, nailed the story. )

I can go to sleep now.

Kim Bush-il?

You've really got to work at it to become more feared as a world leader than the dictator of North Korea.

Fun, fun, fun

Writing a speech for George Bush. Try it.

Meanwhile,

elsewhere in the world, interesting things are happening.

My first reaction to this story (after thinking it was an Onion-style spoof) was of course outrage. But then, I thought this: This world we live in is peopled by bunches of peoples we simply don't comprehend. And this corollary: How grotesquely ignorant and presumptuous it is for us to think we can expect these various peoples to think and act like us, especially in matters as "civilized" as forms of political and social governance. (You knew I'd bring this around to politics, right?)

We're said to be "exporting democracy" to the world, to the Middle East and--if you listen to Bush--to all peoples and that our soldiers' presence in Iraq and Afghanistan is part of that effort. Well, I gotta tell ya, there may be peoples out there who just plain don't want it, don't understand it, don't give a damn. And there are surely people out there who resist having "democracy" imposed on them from outside, by force of arms.

Which brings me to my point. Bring the troops home! Now!

It does make you wonder

who chose the background music in this radio ad. (There's an audio link at the end of the article.)

Rhetoric trumps reality

The airwaves abound with discussion of "timelines" and "benchmarks," "cut and run" and "stay the course," "tipping point" and "last throes." And--this is awful to behold--TV pundits readily acknowledge, without critical comment, any significant change in "boots-on-the-ground reality" in Iraq must await America's election. I wonder what it would feel like to be the mother of a child who was killed or injured in the interim.

If the Republicans win the upcoming elections

this book becomes an instant bestseller.

WTF?

Our troops must wonder the same thing after a few outings like this.

Rooting for Rooney

Or, "Andy is dandy." Whatever. This clip shows why.

(In case you're wondering, the answer to Andy's question--"Why are we in Iraq?"--is this: Because Bush/Cheney/Rummie/Condi/Rove don't want to lose face.)

Riverbend is back

after two months away from her blog--and she's not happy, not one bit.

BTW--I note that my first post on this blog, in August 2003 (check my archives, listed on the left side of this blog) linked to Riverbend's "Baghdad Burning" blog--and was dated a week after Riverbend started hers. And if you happen to read our respective initial posts from that long-ago period, you'll see how sadly prophetic they are.

And you wonder why so few good folks enter politics?

Here's why.

A last-ditch effort at peace

If this doesn't work, will anything?

Twisting in the wind

That's a phrase that became popular in the Watergate era, referring, as I recall, to the plight of one of Nixon's protectors (Jeb Magruder, I believe) when he was summoned to a grand jury. Someone (Nixon's domestic adviser, John Ehrlichman, I think) decided not to intervene, to leave him "twisting in the wind" as a result of his adverse testimony.

Well now, Bush is twisting in the wind over his Iraq madness, and but for the death and destruction his policy is inflicting on innocents, I would be giggling as he twisted. Indeed, to be honest, I am giggling.

BTW, while Googling "twisting in the wind," I stumbled on this site. I didn't discover the source of the phrase, but I sure had fun.

A Cheap Shot, I admit it

Look, I'm as disappointed in AirAmerica as are other true political leftists, who view the "alternative" radio network as nothing more than silly, wimpish noise from naysaying talk-radio freaks. I've stopped listening, actually, unless KPFK and our local UCSB channel are doing rap music. And so--it's with a bit of chagrin that I offer this tidbit, which sounds precisely like what Al Franken or his ilk on AirAmerica would come up with: Bush has conceded that our recent Iraq experience appears quite like the Tet offensive in VietNam, which turned the tide of American sentiment againt the war. Except with regard to VietNam, Bush had planned and effected a successful exit stategy.

Amnesty revisited

Some months ago, the amnesty issue raised the spectre of the US placing our soldiers in the gunsights of Iraqis, only to have the Iraqi government extend amnesty to Iraqis who shot American troops. I recall at the time how luxurious it was to watch Bush/Cheney twist in the wind over such a prospect. Now it has surfaced again, and I intend again to enjoy the show, except that this time I hope the question is addressed full-on, and that question is, Does the US really respect the sovereignty of Iraq? And, as a corollary, Does the US really want Iraq to try, with full force, to effect a reconciliation between the warring factions? If the answers to the foregoing two questions is yes, Rummie/Bush/Cheney/Condi, then (1) shut the fuck up about Iraq's amnesty grants, and (2) get our troops the hell out of that country.

The Polish army at work

Check out the heading on this banner. LOL.

Poring over polls

Spend more than a moment over these poll figures about Bush's approval rating. Check out the level of "disapproval" over time, for example. You'll note, going back a year over the various poll results, that at no time has Bush's disapproval consistently been near the 60% level, until the last month or so. Check out the spread between his approval and disapprovals levels. At an alltime high now, with the disapproval percentage being so much higher than the approval percentage that one wonders how he still manages to have so much influence in our political system.

Wanna change to a parliamentary system? I sure do. At least--as happens on live TV from London--the leader gets grilled by those parliamtentarians who chose him.

I get weary, just plain weary

of reading books and news reports and essays from "frontline" authors telling us stupid Americans what we already know, what we've known for years. Of course the baldest example is Bob Woodward, who makes millions putting into print the truisms that Bush is in denial about the state of everything; that Rumsfeld is a demagogue; that Condi is an idiot. Lately we're informed that it's likely that American oil interests will soon take over Iraq's oil production. Oh, really?!!! Imagine my surprise!!

Here's what I want to know, oh smarty-pants pundits. When are you going to tell us something we don't already know?

Don't do as I do

I got out of the stock market entirely about three months ago, and since then the Dow has gone up and up, hitting new highs. I knew this would happen--always does.

And yet, just take a gander at this chart and the accompanying comment. China and Japan own us now, and all it will take is one sneeze, one burp, and the American Empire is over.

It feels good to be on the sidelines watching, rather than in the arena, fighting with lions and tigers and bears, oh my.

Goddam right!

Ship this illegal immigrant outa here!

That silence you hear

is the absence of cheering on Main Street (as opposed to Wall Street) from the new high recently hit by the Dow Jones Industrial Average. Here's why.

"A great day for Iraq."

That's a quote from a US general, commenting on new uniforms for Iraqi military that visually differ from the old ones so insurgents can't conceal themselves as soldiers. You gotta read the entire article, and if you're not teared up (with either laughter or sadness) by the end, you're not a human being.

I have my limits

For years, I've posted tales of the miseries Iraqis have undergone because of our invasion and occupation of their country. But tonight, at one o'clock a.m., PDT, I found myself unable to keep at it, unable to click at the bottom of page one of this report about the hundreds of bodies found in the Tigris River, unable to bear more ugliness and depravity. If you can, feel free, but don't tell me what appears. I'm going to sleep--like most Amerkcans.

"Why do they hate us?"

Hmm. I wonder. Could it be because of this?

They're finally getting it

Our troops in Iraq are asking--of themselves now, but, hopefully, of their commanders, including their commander-in-chief--"Why are we here? Who is the enemy?"

Job has nothing on the Iraqis

Now we learn that the Tigris River is poisonous--dead fish and dead birds floating along, covering the banks of the river north of Baghdad. And of course the river is a main source of drinking water for Iraqis--and flows south.

WTF?

Some posts ago I wondered "who's on first?" Now, with this latest madness among the Iraqi power structure, I wonder, "who's at bat?"

Pot and kettle

During the first three days of October, seventeen US soldiers have been killed in Iraq. Now that's an horrific average daily death toll--more than twice the average over the three-plus years of the war--but an even more horrific raw figure. Seventeen dead GI's. If a helicopter carrying that many troops went down outside of Atlanta, Georgia (or somewhere), the event would bounce every other story off the front page, at least for one news cycle.

But not over the last few days. The seventeen GI died unnoticed, the news of the carnage swamped by stories of Congressman Foley's folly.

Not that I'm not enjoying watching the Republicans twist and squirm, but in truth the left-wingers, including all AirAmerica radio hosts, have given time to only that one story, mimicking the right commentators during the Clinton scandal. So--Al Franken, Randi Rhodes, all you folks--don't for a moment think you've got the high ground on yellow talk. You're no different from the Limbaugh's and Hannity's. You're all in the entertainment business, pure and simple.

I missed my calling

I shoulda been a headline writer, so I could come up with lines like this. Wonderful.

If you wrote a novel with these developments

you'd be ridiculed as a sci-fi author. An eleventh-hour scandal about a Republican Congressman, soliciting sex from a teenage intern while heading up House's Internet solicitation committee; a growing unrest about foreign wars; a hard-headed president, with hard-headed advisors, resisting all. And now, we learn that the Senate is up for grabs, headed for a dead heat which, of course, would leave any significant political votes in that chamber tied--and with Cheney, the most hard-headed of all, able to cast the deciding vote.

Condi, you're a lying bitch

This monster has been given a free ride for too long. Now, less than a day after she denied meeting on July 10, 2001, with Tenet and Cofer Black about an imminent al Qaida attack, it turns out, oops, that meeting did indeed happen.

A new movement

Take a minute or two, and make your whole day.

McCain, as in Abel

This essay nails it. The "maverick" senator from Arizona is no moderate, no maverick. He's dangerous, and he's a media darling. Sound like some sitting president you know?

Who's on first?

When Iraqi police attempt to assasinate the governor of a province, you gotta ask yourself.

Flipping burgers

That used to be the job reserved for the high school dropout, the lowest rung on the service-industry poll. Well, if you scroll down (or, if you can handle reading) this lengthy analysis of how "free trade" is wrecking the American job market, you'll find this paragraph.

"According to Norm Augustine, former CEO of Lockheed Martin, even McDonald jobs are on the way offshore. Augustine reports that McDonald is experimenting with replacing error-prone order takers with a system that transmits orders via satellite to a central location and from there to the person preparing the order. The technology lets the orders be taken in India or China at costs below the U.S. minimum wage and without the liabilities of U.S. employees."

The prospect of leaving my newly-arrive grandchild a third-world (or lower) economy is truly frightening--as is this article.

You know you've got construction problems

When a ceiling light fixture fills with fecal matter seeping through the floor above.

In case you wondered...

Here's what's going on in Iraq lately. The author of this blog, an Iraqi journalist, keeps track of the ongoing carnage throughout the country, not just the latest car bomb in Baghdad. It makes for tough reading, but it's necessary to get a true picture of how ugly it is, day after day, in that sorry nation.

The looming debacle

Here's why I got out of the stock market.

The Congress nobody wanted

Yesterday I suggested that Democrats may not want to take control of Congress, to allow the Republicans to stew in their own juice. Now, it seems, some Republicans don't want to control Congress either.

Who's in charge?

I thought we had a free press in America (not really, lately, but I still enjoy saying it), but now I know different. Newsweek has dropped both its cover and its cover story about the lost war in Afghanistan. Too tough for its American readership, but not too tough for the rest of the world. Could it be that Newsweek as self-editing on the eve of the midterm elections? Oh, no. Say it isn't so.

Should the Democrats lose the mid-term elections on purpose?

I've lately read a couple of essays (can't find them just now to link to) proposing that Democrats ought not take control of Congress in 2006, so that the ongoing misery and madness of the Republicans may continue unabated for two more years. This, the theory goes, would so demolish them that a wholesale revolt in 2008 would sweep in the Democrats to govern for the next decade or more. Further, the Democrats would avoid having to make the tough choices that are necessary to clean up the Republicans' mess of wars, deficits and so on, at least until they had a free hand to do so, while able to blame the Republicans for the mess, without equivocation.

As awful a prospect as it seems right now, it does have at least one redeeming feature. It lets Bush fester in the warmaking of his own making, in particular, to wallow in a decision whether to allow Iran to continue enriching uranium, after North Korea succeeded in getting the bomb. He would thereby have made two ruinous wars (Iraq and Afghanistan) and failed to disarm two of three of the members of the "axis of evil" he declared when he took office.

It's a breathtaking prospect. Two more years of madness, followed by a true takeover of the nation by peaceloving, fairminded souls who would govern in the best interests of all Americans, of all citizens of the planet.

Nevermind. I was crazy to imagine such a thing could happen, in 2008 or ever. So--elect a Democratic Congress six weeks, and impeach Bush/Cheney as soon as possible. It's already too late, but it would sure save the ratings of CNN.

Right on

Tom Tomorrow has got it right, absolutely. If Bush wants to call it a war on terror, the terrorists are surely winning. They're surely inflicting more terror on us than we are on them.

Chavez the publicist

Ya gotta love it.

A bit of history

Nothing new here, but an illuminating insight into "why they hate us."

Faith-based initiatives?

So, Bush, what do you do when your church doesn't agree with you? Follow its teachings, or "stay the course" of your political mentor, Rove? Who would Jesus bomb?

Chavez rocks

Here's an incomplete, incompetent translation of Hugo Chavez's remarks at the UN General Assembly. Here's a more complete, competent one. Just compare the first few lines and you'll notice significant differences, including the Chomsky references.

The press in the US, and Democrats like Pelosi too, are villifying Chavez for his "sulfur" remark. I for one found it amusing, as did several of the delegates to the UN, who could be heard laughing in the background. And if you read the entire text of the well-presented translation you'll see that the sulphur references, in context, are solidly metaphorical, speaking of the stench of the demon who'd spoken from that podium the day before.

Declaring war

What do you think? Should we declare war? And on what?

Rove's a genius

I've got to admit it, much as it hurts. You see, here's what he's lately attempting--after years of manipulating a majority of us on other matters. He's got his minions, with one voice, conflating our soldiers' ongoing miseries in the Iraq occupation, with honorable sacrifice in support of the "global war on terror." This will, if successful, not only isolate us peaceniks as traitors but concurrently completely reverse the effect of bad news from Iraq. Now, deaths of American soldiers will be no longer be hidden. They'll lose their nature as outrageous waste and be trumpeted as necessary tragedy.

Rove's campaign is already underway, as can be seen in this AP dispatch, in which the Army spokesman, as part of the revelation that deaths of American troops increased lately, appeared to connect that fact with the announcement by al Qaida in Iraq's recent call to arms. In the past, the two wouldn't be connected, for fear of being evidence of al Qaida's effectiveness. But now, the connection serves the administration's purpose of showing Iraq to be part of the "global war on terror," and the soldiers' deaths as heroic losses in that cause.

Goldwater for President

I just watched an HBO special about the life and politics of Barry Goldwater. Although most of my life I've been far left of his position on issues of government involvement in issues of social welfare, and certainly I've opposed his bent toward military might, I always believed in the truthful, principled posture he maintained about limited government in the citizen's personal affairs. Goldwater opposed the intrusion of government in issues of abortion, homosexuality, religion and the like. Once, in 1964 when he was running against Lyndon Johnson for President, he came to Tucson for a fundraiser and I heard a local interview of him on radio. I even recall where I was when I heard the interview, driving down Broadway near Park Avenue, headed west. Here's what I recall hearing:

"Senator Goldwater, what is your position on the question of legalizing marijuana?"

"Well, I'm a conservative, and on that issue my position is clear. I think that unless the government can demonstrate an evil--a tangible, danger--from any behavior, I think government should keep the hell out of it. That goes for marijuana use, or any other thing that hasn't shown to be dangerous."

That's as close as I can get to a direct quote, and my recollection is borne out by the positions Goldwater was shown on the HBO special to have held on similiar issues. Maybe now he'd be called a Libertarian, but back then he was a true conservative. And what the special pointed out at the end was this: Goldwater's views about conservative government didn't change throughout his life. What changed was the Republican Right. It's now a bunch whose beliefs Goldwater abhored. Intrusive, driven by religiosity and small-minded. All of which leads me to say: Goldwater for President.

A sick society

You want to know what's propping up the US economy? Check out this article. And no wonder so much money's being spent on health care, with the billions of dollars being spent on advertising for drugs, health insurance and treatment of various illness, many of which have been created by advertising. Take ED (erectile dysfunction) for example. Ten years ago we didn't know it was a disease. It may have been for some men a condition, probably mostly situational, but it hardly warranted as much attention as the television audience is exposed to.

I've been spending the last few days in a motel room with a TV that has but a few channels, and so have been subjected to many network shows (although they're not the sole source of such ads) and I'm amazed at how much advertising time is spent on health issues. And it's only going to increase as the baby-boomers age.

It's time to consider nationalizing the medical profession. "Nationalized medicine" was discussed by in the sixties, but of course it didn't stand a chance. But something's got to be done, or our spending and concern about "health" will ruin us.

Democratizing Iraq?

So this is progress--building a trench, with checkpoints around Baghdad. Why not a moat, or for that matter a Berlin (or an Israeli) wall?

D.O.A.P.

Some thoughts about the movie.

First, it will probably fire up the Bushites, maybe cause Bush to rise in the polls or at least cause a spike in the Republican base. That's probably why it's being presented to the US by the same company that bankrolled Mel Gibson's movie about Christ.

Second, I want to see it, and I think it's partly because I wanna get my rocks off without having to do the deed myself and partly because I want to see how convincingly is portrayed the deperation that leads someone to such an act. Also, I'd like to see how the aftermath is depicted.

Third, I want to see it because it feels subversive to do so. To see it and--and to want to see it.

Very interesting

One person's take on why American movies are so popular abroad. I never thought in these terms before--about literature, too--so I don't yet know whether or how much I agree. Your thoughts?

I'm amazed, actually

Today all the media sources are full of 9/11 remembrances, the politicos--Bush in particular--are in center frame of the ceremonies all day and all night. Much weeping and moaning (some of it genuine, much of it not) is heard around the country.

Given the fact that both the administration that's in charge of our nation's governance and the media that so strongly influence our national psyche are profiting from recounting that tragedy, it's amazing to me that so firmly a majority of Americans isn't swallowing all of it, especially the violence that this administration has precipitated in response to it. Perhaps as a nation we're not the gullible monsters I thought we were. Perhaps.

I'm not alone

The letter to the editor of the NewsPress that I submitted (see my 9/6 post), was published last Saturday. I received an email suggesting that the last line was over the top (that Bush was the number one terrorist), but according to this report of press reaction around the globe, I'm not alone in this thought.

A true test

of whether, short of running out of each other to kill, the sectarian violence in Iraq will cease. Al-Sistani, the heaviest Shiite cleric, has called for unity among all Iraqis and an end to the killing. If his words aren't heeded, it's going to be a long, hard slog indeed.

On a blustery Sunday afternoon

check out this site to learn (and view) what some thinkers have to say about "the meaning of life."

Thank God for the Internets

Where else, how else, could one learn in such effectively-presented detail the history of the Bush administration's lies that allowed it to invade Iraq? Ya done good, MoJo.

"Another country heard from"

on the subject of those secret foreign prisons. Ya gotta love those pesky Europeans.

If it walks like a duck

This isn't civil war?

What's in a name?

Here's the only essay I've found addressing the question of terminology of the administration's dealing with the attacks on US people and property in the last several years. Rather than adopting the GWOT lingo the writer, supported by numerous authoritative sources, contends the "global war" term is not just inappropriate but counterproductive. It turns out that, as John Kerry contended in the 2004 presidential race, the most effective way to deal with those who would attack the US by "terrorist" means is through law-enforcement and intelligence channels. It's only the Bush cabal that prefers to call it "war," and they do so for a solidly successful purpose: to become warriors and to cow the opposition--not the enemy, but the political opponents at home.

Proof positive

In case you ever doubted it, here's a headline and a lede that says it all:

"Wall Street Lower, Wage Hikes Stir Fears AP -
Stocks fell Wednesday after the Labor Department said productivity decreased and wages increased in the spring, stoking fears that wage inflation will prompt the Federal Reserve to return to a policy of interest rate hikes."

You see, neither the Federal Reserve nor investors in the stock market--large financial and capital institutions, mostly--are fundamentally at war, economically, with the workers who toil in investor-owned corporations. During the "Bush recovery" increased productivity (meaning a decrease in, or stable, number of worker hours needed to produce increasing corporate revenue) resulted in escalating corporate profits while wages didn't move in dollar terms, and actually decreased in terms of the cost per unit of production. This allowed corporations to gain profit without increasing price--without, therefore, causing price-driven inflation--and to do so on the backs of the workers' increased productivity, without, in other words, passing any of the increased profit down to the workers in the form of wage increases.

But now, with signs that wages may actually be increasing (as certainly they must, to keep up with the increasing prices of consumer goods, especially gasoline but also most other products)investors fear that the foregoing situation may no longer be extant, that workers may actually be able to participate in the increased profit of their employers' business. This, "wage inflation" may, they worry, cause the Fed to slow down corporate activity--meaning, to the worker, fewer jobs and no more pay increases--by raising the cost of borrowing.

That prospect--of the Fed's increase of interest rates--will do two things that stock investors fear: (1) It will diminish corporate profit; and (2) it will make bond interest-rates more attractive as an investment. The market's negative reaction to pay increases for workers is therefore classically anti-worker and is built into the system. Even if, in theory, such pay increases should lead to greater consumer spending--and hence a well-founded continuation of economic recovery--it is now the case that such increases will likely only go to lending institutions which, by way of credit-card debt and increased mortgage payments due to the flurry of mortgage refinancing, have been the source, for the last five years, of most of consumers' cash availabilty.

So--it's bad news for Wall Street that the workers are finally getting a pay increase. Except, perhaps, for the brief periods when workers actually gained wages in tune with increasing productivity, it always has been.

Here's something I didn't know

The US is going to turn over to Iraq its "operational control" of Iraq's military force in a day or so. What I didn't know is that the US military has all this time been in control of Iraq's military. I thought we'd turned over to Iraq its "full sovereignty" more than a year ago, didn't you?

Letter to the editor

Herewith is a letter I sent to the SB News-Press this evening. Nothing new in it, just thought I'd shake the readership up a bit. Not easy to do with a 250-word limit. If you stumble across it in the paper, let me know since I rarely read the thing and I'd like to cut it out for my memoirs.

To the editor:

Bush’s "war on terror" has doomed Americans to endless conflict, the continuation of which benefits both the terrorists and the Bush administration. The terrorists of course gain from our ongoing turmoil; but so does Bush, as evidenced by his reliance on repeated chants of fear come midterm-election time, in the hope that Americans will once again vote for his party out of reaction rather than for the opposition through reason.

Indeed, the administration’s chants have lately taken an insidious, demonic twist, with Bush/Cheney/Rummie drawing parallels between this conflict and World War Two and calling those of us who demand our troops’ withdrawal from Iraq "appeasers"; while Condi likens us to those who opposed engaging the South in the Civil War.

Enough.

A handful of crazed men attacked us before 9/11, twenty more on 9/11. A few hundred men trained to do so, perhaps a thousand, five thousand tops. But now, because of Bush’s rampant warmaking, those who aspire to kill Americans number in the hundreds of thousands and are spread around the globe. His policies have ensured that their enmity will last lifetimes: the lifetimes of the children of thousands of the people he’s killed—and the lifetimes of our children, too.

The resultant eternal, world-wide “war on terror” is therefore more the product of Bush’s actions than it is of Osama bin Laden’s; and so it is correct to say, as many Americans—and others—have concluded, George W. Bush is the world’s most dangerous terrorist.

Where Liberals and Libertarians meet

Okay, I know I've linked to Justin Raimondo's Antiwar.com blog before, but his latest essay about fascism is too good. If you're too busy, I present herewith the money quote:

"There is a fascist threat to America, all right, but it isn't coming from overseas. It isn't hiding in the caves of Wahhabistan, but lurking in Washington's corridors of power. The same people who warn us of a "fascist" threat coming from abroad are the main purveyors of authoritarianism on the home front. And that is what life is like in the Bizarro World of America in the year A.D. 2006, where the most militant fascists of all style themselves the leaders of a new "anti-fascist" popular front."

Is state warfare terrorism?

A debate has long raged about the distinction between bombing done by state-owned and directed machines and non-state explosions, and more specifically between bombing that theoretically targets an armed enemy (but incidentally kills innocents) and bombing that targets innocents. Certainly, if the latter is done by a state, it's as much "terrorism" as if done by a nonstate, which is why our bombings of Dresden and Tokyo (not to mention Hiroshima and Nagasaki) were clearly acts of terrorism. The targets were not militarily significant, the purpose of the bombings being to break the political will of the people.

So the question is one of intent, right? If one intends to kill civilians for the purpose of changing a nation's course of action, it's terrorism; whereas if one intends to inflict military damage, but incidentally kills civilians, it's not.

So what about bombing that purports to target a military objective (or, even, an objective that has "military significance" such as a roadway or a radio station or a bank or an oil depot). Or for that matter, what about bombing that targets a neighborhood in which both civilians and enemy activists live?

Here's how Howard Zinn sees it.

The repeated excuse, given by both Pentagon spokespersons and Israeli
officials, for dropping bombs where ordinary people live is that terrorists
hide among civilians. Therefore the killing of innocent people (in Iraq, in
Lebanon) is called accidental, whereas the deaths caused by terrorists (on
9/11, by Hezbollah rockets) are deliberate.
This is a false distinction, quickly refuted with a bit of thought. If a bomb is deliberately dropped on a house or a vehicle on the grounds that a ``suspected terrorist" is inside (note the frequent use of the word suspected as evidence of the uncertainty surrounding targets), the resulting deaths of women and children may not be intentional. But neither are they accidental. The proper description is
``inevitable."

I of course agree, and Zinn's analysis calls to mind a legal principle, under US law, that defines intent as including the notion that one can intend a result--can be held to have intended it--if the result is so likely as to be undeniably predictable. If one shouts fire in a crowded theatre and some is killed in the stampede, one is as guilty of murder as if the victim were shot in the face. You get the drift.

To me, both the Bush/Cheney/Rummie cabal with, inter alia, its "shock and awe" campaign over Baghdad, and , Osama and his buddies with their shock and awe over NYC and DC on 9/11, are terrorists. And so, to me, the "war on terror" includes war on both forces.

Cats in a gunnysack

What's next in this sorry land? If they can't agree on a flag, what can they agree on?