What b.s.

Check out the refinements that appear in this article from Islam Online--admittedly not Faux News or even CNN in "independence" (although probably more accurate). First, check out the photos of troops boarding and getting off choppers. How were these taken, since no "embeds" were allowed to accompany the troops? Obviously the Army took the photos, which are pure publicity shots.
Second, note the quoted line near the end.
"There has been no contact with the insurgents," admitted Major John Calahan of the 101st Airborne Division, a unit specialized in helicopter-borne air assaults that spearheaded the attack.

No insurgents. Not even one? Can we have our money back?

BTW--I'm not the only one to notice the appearance of poorly-disguised political hype in support of this assault.

Be (more) afraid, be very (more) afraid

This article about the "current account deficit" (the astounding imbalance between the flow of dollars into the US and the dollars out) is indeed scary. It's beginning to look like the glacier thing, where the process becomes irreversible because its continuing behavior fuels accelerating behavior. There's talk, these days, about so many "tipping points"--in Iraq, in the economy and the environment--that one wonders whether the Democrats are awaiting post-tipping-point in order to act on anything. In fact, one doesn't wonder. It's clear, from the Democrats' tepid reaction to Senator Feingold's resolution to censure Bush for his illegal wiretapping activities, that there are only a few people in that party who are actively trying to save America, as opposed to saving their own chances for re-relection.

Okay, now I'm getting scared--and pissed off

A federal district judge has denied a defense motion to dismiss a prosecution of two alleged terrorist-supporters, and has not only sealed his decision but has denied to the defense attorneys the right to see it. We are talking about the worst sign of fascism, where even the judiciary caves in to the executive, a distinct prelude to what happened in Germany in the thirties. Be afraid, be very afraid. And be mad.

Oh, wouldn't it be loverly?

If the Republican nominee for President in 2008 was Bill Frist? Even a Democrat could beat him.

What else is new?

Bush lied (again). He's skated so many times (most recently when he was caught telling us that federal wiretaps always require a "court order" but hasn't been called to account for the NSA warrantless surveillance program that he authorized, and scores of times re-authorized), that it's hard to imagine that he'll be caught in this outrageous prevarication.

Recall, when he sought to justify the Dubai ports deal, he said that port security in the US was handled by the Coast Guard and US Customs? Well, not so. According to a just-revealed Congressional report, the security at US ports is woeful, and many of the defects in security are due to lapses by foreigners: shippers, distant port operators, as well as US port operators who don't report to any federal entity.

Goodbye Knight-Ridder

It's going to come down to Reuters, the (London) Times, the Telegraph and Independent of UK, plus some of the foreign press--disseminated by bloggers--to be responsible for the news now that Knight-Ridder's on the block.

Update: Here's the report of the successful bidder for Knight-Ridder. I don't know what it means in terms of reportage and independence (I gotta tell ya, though, that the San Jose Mercury News is one of the truly independent papers).

Hold onto your hats!

It turns out another Dubai company already provides security to the US Navy and at twelve US ports. It apparently is informed of the movement of our ships, and provides the security barriers at naval installations.

On a cold day...

like today in Santa Barbara (there's snow on the Santa Ynez Mountains, just three hundred yards from my deck!), and I'm delaying my almost-daily run to await a bit of warming, I inevitably find my way to this site, which even on a sunny day is fun. Check it out, including the ever-better Search function. (I put in Kafka and learned a lot about "The Prisoner," saving myself the price of rental of the DVD.)

We have met the enemy and he is us

Or, to put Pogo's quote another way, and the NYT did in a recent editorial commenting on Bush's imprisonment without trial of innocents at Gitmo, "Now America is becoming the thing they sought to end."

Bush, the softie

Ya gotta admit, Busy does give us a lot of humorous takes.

Has it come to this?

A music festival in Germany has refused a performance by a leading rock group because one of their songs, "God is a Pop Star," might be offensive.

The man is a monster

I'm not talking about this man, an injured (check out the extent of his injuries here) veteran from my hometown in Arizona. I'm talking about the man who sent him to war: George Bush.

I can't believe, it; simply can't believe it

A new rationale (rationalization) for our troops' continued occupation of Iraq, presented without comment by CBS talking-head, Bob Schieffer (what else would you expect from that blockhead): Our troops are needed to keep the peace between Sunnis and Shiites, especially the armed militias of each, because neither group trusts the other. So there you go, we've morphed into guardians of Iraq's peace--from Iraqis.

The sum of all fears

A few days after Bush decides to peddle nuclear technology to India, France decides to sell some to Libya. That's Libya, spelled Muammar Qadhafi, until a year or so ago an inveterate international terrorist. And BTW, France has much better technology to sell than the US does. Its reactors account for a large percentage of their power and are more modern than ours by far.

So--off we go, into a new nuclear race, this one pretending to be for "peaceful purposes." What madness!

Oscars, Iraq-style

Riverbend, from Baghdad, awards "Oscars" for roles played by various actors in current events. She's a serious blogger, revealing in this post a sense of humor, cynical, but funny.

Mortal fear

That, and only that, can explain AP's rushing out a "clarification" of its earlier story that Bush was shown in a videoconference to have been told before Katrina's landfall that the New Orleans levees might be "breached." Not so, AP "clarified." Bush was only told that the levees might be "overrun."

Family ties

You gotta read this, but I'll summarize. A group of Iraqi women tried to get visas to enter the US, at the behest of activist organization Code Pink, to tell their stories about the deaths of their families, innocent Iraqis shot by US troops during the invasion/occupation. However, the American consulate refused them visas on the ground that they hadn't sufficiently demonstrated that they'd return to Iraq on expiration of the visas. The stated reason for the denial: Absence of family ties in Iraq.

Okay, here goes: My first out-on-a-limb analysis

Heretofore, I've relied on others' news accounts and opinions about events before I've ventured my own, citing others' of course, as I adopted them. But this time I'm venturing my own opinion without backup, and will await the learned press and pundits' reaction.

The India deal is a tragedy for the American worker. Put aside the nuclear thing--that's already been condemned by those who seek true disarmament, and rightfully so. I'm talking about this "opening of markets, thawing the Cold War" nonsense. Here's what it really means: American corporations will gain a new huge expanse of consumers for their goods, while they pay dirt wages to produce those goods, wages set by the low-level margins that are prevalent in the Third World. The "sucking sound" of American jobs that Ross Perot talked about twenty years ago will become a tornado, a devastating drain of jobs out of America, while American corporations, with their powerful brand-names will profit mightily from this new horde of consumers.

The India deal is nothing but a payoff to giant American companies, a spit in the face of American workers, with Bush saying we shouldn't fear competition, meaning, of course, that the corporations won't fear it because they'll reduce wages to meet it. But the American worker with no health care, a huge mortgage and credit-card debt, and kids to educate? Is he/she supposed to compete with a worker in India/Korea/Malasia/Singapore who's happy to earn the equivalent of $2.00 an hour?

Yes, says Bush. Let the American worker eat cake.

You heard it here first. The India deal is the most outrageous insult to our economic system--trashing our wage-earners in favor of big business--since the days of the robber barons.

Smoking guns

This article reveals that two papers, hand-delivered to and read by Bush in the months before the invasion of Iraq, show his knowledge that (1) the aluminum-tubes intelligence was in doubt and (2) the "imminent threat" of an Iraq attack was unanimously discounted by all US sources. The documents, still secret, have been leaked and are quoted.

Question one: Will this information ever make it to the MSM?
Questions two and three: Who's the leaker, and why the leak?

Baghdad blogging

Here are a couple of recent posts by another Iraqi blogger, a dentist in Baghdad. I feel so damned sorry for these folks, just trying to live their lives while chaos reigns all around them and their world is crumbling.