>
2501. jexster - 12/21/2003 1:19:38 PM
Our moralists compete in criticising the lies, distortions, and
exaggerations of our Master Planners. But the majesty that certain spin doctors
show in giving us nonexistent morsels to chew on should command our
admiration....Plato permitted lying in only two occupations: doctors and
statesmen...Yet it is reassuring to note that the same distortions that allow
Washington to give credibility to its war will hasten its defeat in the end."
More directly, lies have consequences.
2502. jexster - 12/21/2003 1:21:09 PM
liars, incompetents
lies, consequences
flies, flypaper
2503. jexster - 12/21/2003 1:46:02 PM
Eddie here's anoth newsflash from Planet Earth....party hearty
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The government on Sunday raised the national
threat level to orange, the second-highest, saying attacks were possible during
the holiday season and that threat indicators are ``perhaps greater now than at
any point'' since Sept. 11, 2001.
``Information indicates that
extremists abroad are anticipating near-term attacks that they believe will
rival or exceed the scope and impact of those we experienced in New York, at the
Pentagon, and in Pennsylvania more than two years ago,'' Homeland Security
Secretary Tom Ridge said in a statement released before his news conference on
the announcement.
2504. jexster - 12/21/2003 1:46:20 PM
er
2505. robertjayb - 12/21/2003 2:06:47 PM
Condi reluctant to testify under oath...Oh. I wonder, wonder
why...This could get interesting, methinks...
TIME---Poised
to convene its first hard-hitting hearings in January, the federal commission
investigating the 9/11 attacks continues to be at odds with the White House over
access to key information and witnesses. Two government sources tell TIME that
National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice is arguing over ground rules for her
appearance in part because she does not want to testify under oath or, according
to one source, in public. While national security advisers are presidential
staff and generally don’t have to appear before Congress, the commission argues
that its jurisdiction is broader—and it's been requiring fact witnesses in its
massive investigation to testify under oath.
2506. Al D - 12/21/2003 3:45:44 PM
Judith
I suggest Al D read it and I will link it in as soon as
it's available. He was asking a few months ago exactly what influence the people
mentioned in the article had on the adminisatration; he'll know after reading
that article.
Can you locate the post where I said that. There are
times that what I say and what you understand are two different things. To be
specific, certain people who were insisting that Bush fire people, at least one,
that I don't believe worked directly for the government. That people have
influence and input is another matter. I will indeed read the article you
mention, in fact I'm sure I could get it from any # of my friends who are avid
readers of MJ.
2507. judithathome - 12/21/2003 6:03:23 PM
Al, no, I cannot locate the post where you said something like what I
paraphrased because I don't obsess over posts and hold them in reserve for later
jabs and I don't pore over thousands of posts looking for one where someone
might have said something in a certain way so that I can ridicule them later
over their statements. That's a hobby others seem to enjoy. I don't.
I
am not accusing you of anything nefarious in your statements...I merely thought
you might like to read the article. It seems to be an excellent overview of waht
led up to this war and how things were interpreted by many people close
to the administration.
Speaking of reading into things what people might
not have meant: I honestly thought you might find the article interesting; I in
no way meant "Al had better read this because he is a confused old coot." But if
you took it that way, it would seem I am not the only one understanding things
differently than how they were meant.
2508. Al D - 12/21/2003 8:43:54 PM
As my dear old Dad uses to "Jesus H. Christ!" Why do you come on so strong
over such a little point. I am aware that the neo-cons had Iraq in their sights.
But when posters start talking about Bush fireing Richard Pearle when I was
under the impression he was not in the administration, I question them. I am an
old coot, I suppose, but maybe not as confused as you Liberals seem to believe.
Or is it just that age=addled. At one time, I imagine, they was respect for
elders. We have come to sadder days, alas.
Lots of family arriving tomorrow, so I will wish you a very merry
Christmas, dear Judith, and to all others also. We all know that it is love that
makes the world go round.
2509. judithathome - 12/21/2003 8:48:31 PM
Merry Christmas to you, too, Al...I am thinking you mistook my tone or maybe
I'm just stir crazy in this cast for three weeks now and overly verbose.
Whatever, have a nice visit with your family.
(And as for age and
respect for elders, I think I can put in a claim for that myself...I'm old
enough to be everyone's mother on this board except for you...ha!)
2510. Al D - 12/21/2003 8:57:18 PM
Maybe so Juith, but aren't you glad you're not!
2511. jayackroyd - 12/22/2003 7:30:24 AM
Eddie,
I'm copying 2466 over to politics in order to respond to it,
which is where I think the response belongs.
2512. jexster - 12/22/2003 9:54:15 AM
Jsy
There's very good reason behind Bush's blather about democracy -
he has absolutely no intention of allowing it to Iraq any time soon. That's how
he operates. That's what he does bes shuck, jive and lie.
The Imperial
Regime is fully cognizant of the hard reality that democracy in Iraq would
establish the rule of Shia clerics, who have the only organized political
operation in the country and whose leaders are beginning to express their
intention to take over in elected body whether it be the scam 3 caucus system or
direct elections - one man one vote/
Secular forces in Iraq, to the
extent that they had any numberical strength at all, were Baathist and mostly
Sunni.
But as this
article in today's Post discusses, the Sunnis are a people under seige with
a major leadership problem. But that vacuum is being filled, not by secularists
either
Once divided and discredited clergy have stepped forward to
try to end a crisis of identity, bringing a message of political Islam to a
community that once embraced secular Arab nationalism and tribal traditions.
No longer kingmakers, the community's leaders vow that they still
hold the key to stability. But casting a shadow over conversations with men such
as Quds is a sense of dispossession, of a minority searching for a voice in the
contest to create a new state.
2513. jexster - 12/22/2003 9:57:05 AM
Now I have taken a typically American optimistic view (as best as reality
permits me to!) many times having stated that the path to a stable Iraqi state
runs through a very narrow gate ie a major initiative by Shia clerics to take
the lead in an Iraqi nationalist movement from the Baathists and enter a
religio-nationalist coalition with the Sunnis.
Against that, I posted
Regis Debray's view that the longer the occupation lasts the more certain the
prospect of a major fundamentalist civil war and disintegration of the country.
Debray knows more about Iraq than I for sure and more than any 10 Bush
Neojacobin nutters that are this mess, and in the linked article you can see the
outlines of his scenario taking shape.
I am not sure yet that it is
inevitable. UNlike Bush's neocons, I am not nor have I ever been a fan of
Marxist dialectical materialism....But I hadn't given a seconds thought to
anything like Debray's view until recently and he is on to something.
One thing for sure though.....Bush's democracy isn't on a real world
road map....They got their "course" from the Mad Hatter.
Party Hearty..
Wuz de nite befo
Crimmus;
And all ower da hood;
ereybody wuz' sleepin';
Dey wuz sleepin' good
2514. jexster - 12/22/2003 10:07:52 AM
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A roadside bomb killed two U.S. soldiers in Baghdad
Monday, hours after troops captured a former general in Saddam Hussein (news -
web sites)'s once-feared security services on charges of recruiting ex-soldiers
to attack Americans.
The blast that ripped through a military
convoy in the late morning also killed an Iraqi interpreter and wounded two
other soldiers, the U.S. military said in a statement.
2515. jexster - 12/22/2003 10:08:55 AM
Two more sacrificed for the "course" of liars and incompetents.
Anybody clue us on what course is?
2516. jexster - 12/22/2003 10:11:07 AM
I DO! I DO! ME! Call on me Dr. Poopstain!
The Debray Scenario
"If you lose and cannot get a place in the government, you have
something to fight with," said Nadhim, wearing a white skullcap. . "It's
something to create a balance of power."
The future, he predicted, was
grim. He saw no end to the occupation. He saw sectarian strife only mounting.
"The seeds for civil war have been planted," he said, his tone matter of
fact. "I really think so."
2517. jexster - 12/22/2003 10:18:07 AM
The Debary Scenario II
Thousands of Iraqi Kurds gathered in Kirkuk
on Monday to demand inclusion of the northern oil centre in a future autonomous
Kurdish region
Attack of the Killer Kurds!
2518. jexster - 12/22/2003 10:23:49 AM
Lessons of Libya: War isn't always Necessary
2519. jexster - 12/22/2003 10:25:53 AM
The real story with the Libya development is the light it's showing on where
it likely got its nuclear starter kit: i.e., Pakistan.
New information
from North Korea and particularly from Iran is starting to show us that, in
essence, there really is no global weapons proliferation problem so much as
there's a Pakistan problem.
We now know enough to say with increasing
confidence that every state we're worrying about got either all of their help,
or their most significant help, from the Pakistanis.
This raises so many
questions and so many sharp-edged dilemmas that it is truly difficult to know
where to start.
-- Josh Marshall
Eddie, refresh me please, what
did the Queen of Hearts tell Alice Bush about making deals with dictators like
Busharaff, that fella in Uzbekistan, and the neo-commie dictator Pootie Poot
Crock of shit
Open wide
2520. jexster - 12/22/2003 10:31:16 AM
>
2521. jexster - 12/22/2003 10:33:35 AM
For those who know anything at all about Libya, however, an entirely
different interpretation is obvious. Libya proves that economic sanctions can
work. Because of its involvement in the 1988 Lockerbie bombing and other acts of
terrorism, Libya was subjected to an international embargo in 1992. The embargo
from all accounts deeply hurt Libya's economy, and it produced a stark pull-back
from support of terrorism on Qadhafi's part. The Libyan government estimated
that the world boycott cost Libya $37 billion. The economy remains small at
about GDP $40 bn. despite an oil income, but the potential for wealth is vast. A
$6 bn investment could increase Libya's daily oil production from 1.2 million
barrels a day to 2 million barrels a day. (The population at 5.5 million is so
small that this increase would yield about $1600 per person per year, if the
price of oil were about $28/b.) Western investors have been skittish (and US
entrerpreneurs have severe legal limits on their Libyan activities), and that
would have to change for oil and gas exploration to expand, e.g. There's black
gold in them thar dunes.
(Again, the hawks have explained Qadhafi's
abandonment of support for terrorism with reference to Ronald Reagan's 1986
bombing of Tripoli; not being good at math, they don't seem to realize that 1988
comes after 1986. One could more reasonably draw the conclusion that the US
aerial strike encouraged Libya to commit more terrorism.)
The UN
sanctions, but not the US ones, were eased in 1999. In the meantime, Qadhafi had
become the target of the radical Islamist Anas al-Libi, a top al-Qaeda operative
suspected of involvement in terrorism in East Africa, as well. After September
11, Qadhafi associated himself with the US war on terror, in hopes of seeing
al-Libi killed and the Libyan branch of radical Islamism devastated.
Juan Cole
2522. jexster - 12/22/2003 10:35:14 AM
Hell Iraq shows sanctions work!
Take some good advice Dear ole Dr.
Poop...believe the opposite of what Abu Dantes says..you'll get along jess fayhn
2523. jexster - 12/22/2003 11:43:35 AM
There's one thing guarandamntee ya Qadhafi didn't lose sleep over - invasion
by our Dear Leader...unless of course he's totally out of touch with reality,
living in Hope Village on another planet...
HELLO ABU ED!
Ahhhahhhahhahh
She came from
Planet Claire
I knew she came from there
She drove a Plymouth Satellite
Faster than the speed of light
Planet Claire has pink air
All
the trees are red
No one ever dies there
No one has a head
Ahhhahhhahhahh
Some say she's from Mars
Or one of the seven
stars
That shine after 3:30 in the morning
WELL SHE ISN'T
She
came from Planet Claire
She came from Planet Claire
She came from Planet
Claire
Ahhhahhhahhahhahhahh
2524. jexster - 12/22/2003 12:56:06 PM
Welcome
Back My Friends to the Show that Never Ends We're So Glad You Could Atend, Come
Inside! Come Inside!
- Welcome to the Mother of All Trials
In 1990, Sen. Alan Simpson (R-Wyo.) told Saddam that he sympathized
with his complaints that the Western media were exaggerating his mass
murders.
The
Mother of All Trials: How Reagan-Bush-Schultz-Rumsfeld Winked At Saddam's
Chemical Weapons Use
Don Rumsfeld actually went to Iraq twice,
once in
1983, and again in 1984. The work Rumsfeld did in 1983 of beginning
a rapprochement between Reagan and Saddam was detracted from by a strong State
Department condemnation of Iraqi use of chemical weapons in the Iran-Iraq war.
Schultz told Rumsfeld to explain to Saddam that the Reagan
administration
did not actually, really have any serious objections to, like, exterminating
Iranian troops like cockroaches with poison gas. It was just a general,
unspecific blanket condemnation of that sort of
thing, you know, to keep up
appearances... So, Saddam should feel comfortable about Reagan's desire to
continually improve bilateral Reagan-Saddam relations at a pace of Saddam's
choosing, and not be put off by the
unfortunate but necessary pro forma
condemnations of him as a war criminal issued at silly old Foggy Bottom."
__Despite
Saddam's Use of Chemical Weapons, GHWB Invited Tariq Aziz to DC in 1984?
>Who
Arranged the Sale of WMD to Saddam Hussein in the 1980's?
I bet
cracker jack defense counsel worldwide will line up for this MUTHA
2525. marjoribanks - 12/22/2003 3:13:33 PM
I bet you, anything you want, that the right wingers (who still shamelessly
claim humanitarian brownie-points for the ouster of Saddam) will say exactly
nothing of import about these allegations about Pak's top nuclear scientist, and
will instead bleat loudly and repetitively about something completely different
in order to distract.
This is old news, just as it is old news now that
the Bushites and the rightwingers have kept gob-shut about the fact that Daniel
Pearl's killers also backed Mohammed Atta. Incovenient reminders of, you know,
actual terrorism, actual weapons of mass destruction, actual threats to New
York's security. War on Terror, my ass.
2526. rdbrewer - 12/22/2003 3:28:01 PM
I bet you, anything you want, that the right wingers . . .
Don't forget. You already have a $200.00 bet on the table with me re
Bush winning next year. Might as well put that in the liability column and pay
up.
Welcome, back, btw.
2527. rdbrewer - 12/22/2003 3:29:19 PM
who still shamelessly claim humanitarian brownie-points for the ouster of
Saddam
And why would that be shameless? You prefer a mass murderer
in power?
2528. marjoribanks - 12/22/2003 3:50:48 PM
Brewer,
Briefly:
It is shameless to claim that Hussein's
removal, the War on Iraq, had anything but highly tangential ties to a
humanitarian impulse.
1) This was not the case made.
2) This is
not the reality, at the Azores summit a few days before hostilities were
launched it was re-iterated that even the departure of Hussein would not be
enough to call off the invasion/occupation.
3) The USA, the Republicans
in fact, had absolutely no problems doing business and cozying up to Hussein
even as the mass murderer was mass murdering. In fact, many of the same people
who now retreat to the "humanitarian war" claim did business and cozied up to
Hussein after he'd used these WMD on his own people.
4) The USA,
the Republicans in fact, stood by - with troops actually on the ground inside
Iraq - and allowed Hussein the mass murderer to mass murder his Shi-ite
opposition, an opposition the USA - A Republican president named Bush actually -
egged on to open insurrection in the first place.
5) The USA has a very
fine, and understandable, record of cozying up to and doing business with mass
murderers. Yes, I suggest you read up on the Bush buddy in Uzbekistan who has
been reliably fingered - by the recalled Brit ambassador no less - as boiling
opponents alive.
Hence, Brewer, no one is fooled by the shamelessness of
the humanitarian war angle and even less by the laughable idiocies contained in
the latter question in #2527.
2529. rdbrewer - 12/22/2003 7:40:42 PM
You're talking about the intent of the invasion, about which part of the justification was the way Hussein treated his people. I'm talking about the practical effect of his ouster. I care less what the intent was; thus, I say "so" to each of your points. Practically speaking, capturing Hussein means fewer Iraqis will be tortured and killed. That's a win in the Republican column.
2530. rdbrewer - 12/22/2003 7:43:07 PM
Please, Marj, we're friends now. You can call me "Mr. Brewer."
2531. Edmund Dantes - 12/22/2003 9:09:45 PM
This was not the case made.
Certainly it was part of the case
made, as I have demonstrated repeatedly in this thread via the most significant
speeches leading up to the conflict.
This is not the reality, at the
Azores summit a few days before hostilities were launched it was re-iterated
that even the departure of Hussein would not be enough to call off the
invasion/occupation.
Not a very good hook on which to hang such a
hat. From the Azores statement:
Iraq’s talented
people, rich culture, and tremendous potential have been hijacked by Saddam
Hussein. His brutal regime has reduced a country with a long and proud history
to an international pariah that oppresses its citizens...
We would
undertake a solemn obligation to help the Iraqi people build a new Iraq at peace
with itself and its neighbors. The Iraqi people deserve to be lifted from
insecurity and tyranny, and freed to determine for themselves the future of
their country. We envisage a unified Iraq with its territorial integrity
respected. All the Iraqi people -- its rich mix of Sunni and Shiite Arabs,
Kurds, Turkomen, Assyrians, Chaldeans, and all others -- should enjoy freedom,
prosperity, and equality in a united country. We will support the Iraqi people’s
aspirations for a representative government that upholds human rights and the
rule of law as cornerstones of democracy....
Our commitment to support
the people of Iraq will be for the long term.
We call upon the
international community to join with us in helping to realize a better future
for the Iraqi people.
Margarinebank cites this as evidence
against humanitarian liberation? I wonder if he'd even read it.
2532. Edmund Dantes - 12/22/2003 9:16:08 PM
As for this, again, I wonder what on earth he is talking about:
...even the departure of Hussein would not be enough to call off the
invasion/occupation.
...unless he's obfuscating and hiding behind
the sometimes-additional condition that Saddam's sons leave as well.
Again, from
the time of the Azores summit:
In the Azores
and on Washington talk shows, President Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and
Secretary of State Colin Powell made clear that it was too late for Iraq to
disarm, too late for further weapons inspections and too late for more diplomacy
to get the world to support the U.S. case for war. Although giving the United
Nations another day to agree with the U.S. position, Bush and his lieutenants
made clear that was mere symbolism. The only means to avoid war, they said, was
Saddam's exile.
Again, this is evidence for the WMD,
non-humanitarian position? No, it bolsters the argument that the war was about
regime change.
As it was.
2533. Edmund Dantes - 12/22/2003 9:18:55 PM
Regarding points three through five, margie is just being silly. His argument is as fallacious as saying because the United States helped Stalin against Hitler we cannot possibly have been serious in our opposition to communism.
2534. jexster - 12/22/2003 9:33:01 PM
The total number of wounded soldiers and medical evacuations by the U.S.
military in Iraq is nearing 11,000, according to new Pentagon data, and 457
troops have died. But as Aseneth Blackwell, a Vietnam War widow, says, the
casualty figures can't capture the pain and suffering she has seen during visits
to D.C.'s Walter Reed Army Medical Center this year. "To see these guys walking
around up there with an arm missing, a leg missing, that is when it hits you in
the face," said Blackwell.
Lies
Have Consquences
Welcome to the Real World
2535. rdbrewer - 12/22/2003 9:33:55 PM
That was the argument for neutering the CIA back in the '70s. Crats felt is
was wrong to work with the world's creeps, even it helped us. So CIA activity
was restricted. That kind of unrealistic thinking ignores the reality that we
occasionally with have to deal with one madman in order to crack the skull of
another.
F/x, we helped Bin Laden against the USSR. Expanding Soviet
influence was regarded as a worse alternative. Likewise, we helped Hussein
against Iran which was on our shit-list at the time. That does not mean we
(including Jimmy Carter) cozied up to Hussein because we approved of his ways.
He was merely of use to us at the time.
2536. rdbrewer - 12/22/2003 9:34:28 PM
2535 was re 2533
2537. Edmund Dantes - 12/22/2003 9:55:46 PM
PUTIN PLAYS BALL: RUSSIA WILL REDUCE IRAQ DEBT BY 65 PERCENT
2538. jexster - 12/22/2003 10:38:52 PM
If Bushiewooshie gives PootyWooty a slice of the pie.... 
2539. jexster - 12/22/2003 10:41:37 PM
Of course, since there is no state, no course and a substantial likelihood that Iraq will decompse.....sounds like Emperor Moron was given the sleeve out a KGB vest.
2540. concerned - 12/23/2003 12:37:10 AM
Re. 2528 -
Truth is the first casualty when marjoribanks goes on an
anti-GWB rampage. You could almost say that the more good George W. Bush
accomplishes, the greater lengths marjoribanks will go to to claim the exact
opposite.
Thus, it is no longer France, Germany and Russia which sold
Saddam his weapons and means to produce the WMD he gassed his own countrymen and
his neighbors in Kuwait and Iran with that should be condemned. It's the Bush
Administration and Republicans in general, who freed Iraq from this menace, who
is censured instead. Thus, in marjoribanks' world, it may be allowable to
indulge in hypocritical Xlowntoonian talk of deposing Saddam, as long as it
remains only that, but woe to any Republican who sees it through. I think it's
safe to say that the majority of Iraqis would be most unhappy with Marjoribanks'
attitude.
2541. concerned - 12/23/2003 1:13:01 AM
We were kept in the dark over American Unilateral deal with Libya,
says France
Just call it 'additional justification' for deposing
Saddam, Dominique.
2542. alistairconnor - 12/23/2003 9:48:04 AM
Clearly, the Libya deal is a triumph for the UK. More specifically, a triumph
for Robin Cook, who initiated constructive engagement with Gaddafi in 1999.
Now Blair
wants the EU powers to pursue this approach with Syria. After the success of
the UK/France/Germany trio getting Iran aboard for nuclear inspections, he looks
like he's on a roll...
But Syria is unlikely to disarm unilaterally
unless there's a breakthrough with Israel.
2543. alistairconnor - 12/23/2003 9:53:34 AM
Objectively, it looks a lot like the nice cop/nasty cop archetype...
(Europe to Iran) - Here, have a cigarette.
(to partner) No Sam, calm
down! Just let me talk to him.
(to Iran) Did you see what he did to the guy
in the next cell? Oh, I hate it when he does that. Now listen, we can get you
out of here. Why don't you just tell me what really happened?
2544. jexster - 12/23/2003 11:12:45 AM
The
Mutha of All Trials:
Your Honor, The Defendant Saddam Hussein Calls
Donald Rumsfeld
WASHINGTON, Dec. 22 — As a special envoy for the
Reagan administration in 1984, Donald H. Rumsfeld, now the defense secretary,
traveled to Iraq to persuade officials there that the United States was eager to
improve ties with President Saddam Hussein despite his use of chemical weapons,
newly declassified documents show.
2545. jexster - 12/23/2003 11:15:49 AM
2546. concerned - 12/23/2003 11:16:33 AM
AC -
So far, France has been completely MIA on all of this progress
in disarmament being made in Iraq, Iran, Syria and Libya. Much like a spoiled
child who refuses to play because she cannot change the rules at whim. Shameful,
no?
2547. jexster - 12/23/2003 11:17:58 AM
2548. jexster - 12/23/2003 11:19:10 AM
In a related development, Emperor George Bush directed the CIA to speed production of its top secret trained trial kangaroos.
2549. concerned - 12/23/2003 11:21:30 AM
jexster's sympathy for the devil is far worse than anything he accuses Rumsfeld of.
2550. jexster - 12/23/2003 11:22:42 AM
In February, Iraq warned Iranian "invaders" that "for every harmful
insect there is an insecticide capable of annihilating it." Within weeks,
the American authorities intercepted precursor chemicals that were bound for
Iraq. Finally, on March 5, the United States issued a public condemnation of
Iraq.
But days later, Mr. Shultz and his deputy met with an Iraqi
diplomat, Ismet Kittani, to soften the blow. The American relationship with Iraq
was too important — involving business interests, Middle East diplomacy and a
shared determination to thwart Iran — to sacrifice. Mr. Kittani left the meeting
"unpersuaded," documents show.
Mr. Shultz then turned to Mr. Rumsfeld.
In a March 24 briefing document, Mr. Rumsfeld was asked to present America's
bottom line. At first, the memo recapitulated Mr. Shultz's message to Mr.
Kittani, saying it "clarified that our CW [chemical weapons] condemnation was
made strictly out of our strong opposition to the use of lethal and
incapacitating CW, wherever it occurs." The American officials had
"emphasized that our interests in 1) preventing an Iranian victory and 2)
continuing to improve bilateral relations with Iraq, at a pace of Iraq's
choosing, remain undiminished," it said.
2551. concerned - 12/23/2003 11:26:11 AM
This proves that jexster is in league with Islamist whackjobs.
2552. jexster - 12/23/2003 11:26:57 AM
2553. jexster - 12/23/2003 11:29:56 AM
Anthony C. Zinni's opposition to U.S. policy on Iraq began on the
monsoon-ridden afternoon of Nov. 3, 1970. He was lying on a Vietnamese
mountainside west of Da Nang, three rounds from an AK-47 assault rifle in his
side and back. He could feel his lifeblood seeping into the ground as he slipped
in and out of consciousness.
He had plenty of time to think in
the following months while recuperating in a military hospital in Hawaii. Among
other things, he promised himself that, "If I'm ever in a position to say what I
think is right, I will. . . . I don't care what happens to my career."
That time has arrived.
2554. jexster - 12/23/2003 11:31:07 AM
TD you best sit down, take a deep breath, and I'll call an ambulance
2555. jexster - 12/23/2003 11:32:00 AM
Meanwhile Uncle Saddam has some insecticide that may help. Its MADE IN USA so there's no need for you to worry..just take a deep breath.
2556. concerned - 12/23/2003 11:35:50 AM
Re. 2553 -
The time when Zinni commits professional suicide?
2557. jexster - 12/23/2003 11:36:05 AM
Over the past year, the retired Marine Corps general (and chief of US
Central Command) has become one of the most prominent opponents of Bush
administration policy on Iraq, which he now fears is drifting toward
disaster.
Damned leftist Marine Corps Generals!
2558. jexster - 12/23/2003 11:36:49 AM
God knows speaking the truth to the Liar is a dangerous business!
2559. jexster - 12/23/2003 11:38:34 AM
Aahh the Regis Debray Scenario:
"I think a weakened, fragmented,
chaotic Iraq, which could happen if this isn't done carefully, is more dangerous
in the long run than a contained Saddam is now," he told reporters in 1998. "I
don't think these questions have been thought through or answered." It was a
warning for which Iraq hawks such as Paul D. Wolfowitz, then an academic and now
the No. 2 official at the Pentagon, attacked him in print at the time.
Now, five years later, Zinni fears it is an outcome toward which
U.S.-occupied Iraq may be drifting. Nor does he think the capture of Hussein is
likely to make much difference, beyond boosting U.S. troop morale and providing
closure for his victims. "Since we've failed thus far to capitalize" on
opportunities in Iraq, he says, "I don't have confidence we will do it now. I
believe the only way it will work now is for the Iraqis themselves to somehow
take charge and turn things around. Our policy, strategy, tactics, et cetera,
are still screwed up."
This party's going to a run a looong loooong
time Eddie, long time
2560. jexster - 12/23/2003 11:40:36 AM
Lies have consequences:
He had endorsed Bush and Cheney two years
earlier, just after he retired from his last military post, as chief of the U.S.
Central Command, which oversees operations in Iraq.
"I think he ran on a
moderate ticket, and that's my leaning -- I'm kind of a Lugar-Hagel-Powell guy,"
he says, listing three Republicans associated with centrist foreign policy
positions.
He was alarmed that day to hear Cheney make the argument for
attacking Iraq on grounds that Zinni found questionable at best:
"Simply
stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass
destruction," Cheney said. "There is no doubt that he is amassing them to use
against our friends, against our allies, and against us."
Cheney's
certitude bewildered Zinni. As chief of the Central Command, Zinni had been
immersed in U.S. intelligence about Iraq. He was all too familiar with the
intelligence analysts' doubts about Iraq's programs to acquire weapons of mass
destruction, or WMD. "In my time at Centcom, I watched the intelligence, and
never -- not once -- did it say, 'He has WMD.' "
2561. jexster - 12/23/2003 11:45:33 AM
The more he listened to Wolfowitz and other administration officials talk
about Iraq, the more Zinni became convinced that interventionist
"neoconservative" ideologues were plunging the nation into a war in a part of
the world they didn't understand. "The more I saw, the more I thought that this
was the product of the neocons who didn't understand the region and were going
to create havoc there. These were dilettantes from Washington think tanks who
never had an idea that worked on the ground."
Liars and
incompetents...party long time
2562. jexster - 12/23/2003 11:47:08 AM
Zinni vows that he has learned a lesson. Reminded that he endorsed Bush in 2000, he says, "I'm not going to do anything political again -- ever. I made that mistake one time."
2563. jexster - 12/23/2003 11:50:40 AM
>Saddam-Atta Memo is a
Fraud
Newsweek reports,"A widely publicized Iraqi document that
purports to show that 9-11 hijacker Mohammed Atta visited Baghdad in the summer
of 2001 is probably a fabrication that is contradicted by U.S. law-enforcement
records showing Atta was staying at cheap motels and apartments in
the US
when the trip would have taken place... 'Terrorist Behind September 11 Strike
Was Trained By Saddam,' ran the headline on the story written by Con Coughlin, a
Telegraph correspondent and the author of the book 'Saddam: The Secret Life.'
Coughlin's account was picked up by
newspapers around the world and was
cited the next day by NY Times [propagandist] William Safire. But U.S. officials
and a leading Iraqi document expert tell NEWSWEEK that the document is most
likely a forgery - part of a thriving new trade in dubious Iraqi documents."
Even Ahmed Chalabi's group called the memo "clearly nonsense", and Coughlin said
he had "no way of verifying it."
Aaah that London Daily
Telegraph again...sister publication - Jerusalem Post...Both owned by Conrad
Black financier of Richard Perle, William Buckley, George Will...
Get
the picture?
2564. jexster - 12/23/2003 12:01:31 PM
Bush has
thrown open Pandora's box in a paradise for international terrorists
Major League Imbecile..We party long time ..you me...Bring it on
2565. concerned - 12/23/2003 12:11:50 PM
Re. 2542 -
Actually, the Libya deal is another triumph for the Bush
Administration.
Rack 'em up. Ka-ching!
This is because the offer
from Moammar dates from the time of Operation Iraqi Freedom, not 1999.
2566. robertjayb - 12/23/2003 12:56:52 PM
The rooster crows and the sun rises...
2567. robertjayb - 12/23/2003 1:20:42 PM
Riverbend is
tense...
These last few days have been truly frightening. The
air in Baghdad feels charged in a way that scares me. Everyone can feel the
tension and it has been a strain on the nerves. It's not so much what's been
going on in the streets- riots, shootings, bombings and raids- but it's the
possibility of what may lie ahead. We've been keeping the kids home from school,
and my cousin's wife learned that many parents were doing the same- especially
the parents who need to drive their kids to school.
We've been avoiding
discussing the possibilities of this last week's developments… the rioting and
violence. We don't often talk about the possibility of civil war because
conferring about it somehow makes it more of a reality. When we do talk about
it, it's usually done in hushed tones with an overhanging air of consternation.
Is it possible? Will it happen?
2568. wonkers2 - 12/23/2003 4:07:22 PM
The Conrad Black connection with George Will, Richard Perle, William Buckley, et al, was detailed by Paul Krugman in his op-ed in the NYT today, linked in the politics thread. (#1852) The right-wing conspiracy has gone international.
2569. alistairConnor - 12/23/2003 7:24:02 PM
Message # 2546.
concerned
AC -
So far, France has been completely MIA on all of
this progress in disarmament being made in Iraq, Iran, Syria and Libya. Much
like a spoiled child who refuses to play because she cannot change the rules at
whim. Shameful, no?
I guess you missed where the foreign ministers
of France, Germany and the UK flew to Iran to sign the nuclear inspection deal.
That's OK, keep those blinkers on, Con. Never back down or apologise for
errors. Clearly, the only way you can keep your mind focused is to keep it
narrow.
2570. concerned - 12/23/2003 7:39:47 PM
Oh, so sorry to miss France's mosquito-like contribution in Iran. Very important to Gallic ego, I know.
2571. rdbrewer - 12/23/2003 8:08:24 PM
Le Figaro wails:
French diplomacy finishes the year on a morose note.
Not only must it watch American trains passing, in Iraq as in Libya, but it must
also applaud. The success obtained by George W. Bush in his fight against 'rogue
states,' with the arrest of Saddam Hussein and then Qaddafi's renouncing of
weapons of mass destruction, have placed Paris in a delicate position.
--"via Andrew
Sullivan"
2572. rdbrewer - 12/23/2003 8:09:30 PM
Le Parisien:
"If a glorious solitude is the price of greatness, no one
can doubt that France lives the highest hours of its civilization."
--ditto
2573. jexster - 12/23/2003 9:47:24 PM
The Lies Are Getting Deeper, the Liars More Desperate:
New
theory for Iraq's missing WMD: Saddam was fooled into thinking he had them
December 24: British officials are circulating a story that
Saddam Hussein may have been hoodwinked into believing that Iraq really did
possess weapons of mass destruction.
Damned winking hoods
everywhere!
2574. jexster - 12/23/2003 9:48:30 PM
Now all they have to do is figure out another reason for our being there and a way out.
2575. concerned - 12/24/2003 12:33:09 AM
Re. 2571 -
France has to learn to expand its diplomatic playbook wrt
dictatorships and terrorist states to include something besides coddling.
2576. concerned - 12/24/2003 1:39:26 AM
This one's for Alistair Connor:
Has France shot itself in the foot?
Hey, AC -
Amir Taheri compiles a truly remarkable list of French unilateralist
diplomatic arrogance and incompetence. Upon reading this, the most ignorant
snail licker would have to admit that the French clearly neither play well with
their neighbors in Europe or the United States, nor benefit from the results.
Taheri writes:
The French have seen Saddam Hussein’s capture
on television and found him not worthy of the efforts that their government
deployed to prolong his rule. They have also seen the Iranian mullahs
agreeing to curtail their nuclear programme under the threat of US military
action. And just this week they saw Muammar al-Kaddhafi, possibly the most
egocentric windbag among despots, crawl into a humiliating surrender to the “
Anglo-Saxons”.
Yet the French diplomatic community still tries to
somehow inculpate the US with hilariously revealing quotes like: “ Vengeance
is a hamburger that is eaten cold,”
Taheri does not pull his punches
wrt the abject failures of French policy wrt Iraq and Africa either, stating:
France’s policy in the Middle East and Africa is also in a mess.
France’s passionate campaign to keep Saddam in power won no plaudits
from the Arabs.
Many Arab leaders regard France as a maverick power that
could get them involved in an unnecessary, and ultimately self-defeating,
conflict with the United States.
“I cannot imagine what Chirac was
thinking,” says a senior Saudi official on condition of anonymity. “How could he
expect us to join him in preventing the Americans from solving our biggest
problem which was the presence of Saddam Hussein in power in Baghdad?”
Another senior Arab diplomat, from Egypt, echoes the sentiment.
2577. concerned - 12/24/2003 1:39:41 AM
“The French did not understand that the Arabs desired the end of Saddam,
although they had to pretend that this was not the case,” he says.
In
Africa, the recent Libyan accord with Britain and the US deals a severe blow to
French prestige. Libya is the most active member of the African Union and its
exclusion of France, also from talks on compensation for victims of Libyan
terrorism, sets an example for other African nations.
So, tell us,
AC. What delusions or overweening fatuosities could have compelled the French to
have have been so self defeatingly shortsighted?
2578. concerned - 12/24/2003 1:46:21 AM
Could it be that the notorious Inspector Clouseau is steering the French ship of state? The symptoms are certainly evident.
2579. concerned - 12/24/2003 1:50:49 AM
Of course, there is one huge difference. The movie scripts were written so that events sometimes contrived to eventually allow Clouseau to reach his objective, despite his almost inconceivable incompetence. Such a 'guardian angel' does not exist for France in the world today.
2580. jexster - 12/24/2003 9:50:58 AM
BAGHDAD (AFP) - Three US soldiers were killed in a roadside bombing near the restive city of Samarra, north of Baghdad, a US military spokesman said.
2581. jexster - 12/24/2003 10:11:10 AM
Yellow Cake Lie Born of Bush Desperation for War Scowcroft Report Charges
2582. jexster - 12/24/2003 10:13:12 AM
Occupation Forces Bomb Baghdad
2583. jexster - 12/24/2003 10:37:28 AM
The Second End to Major Hostilities? - Defense and the National
Interest
In telling us his thoughts on the capture of Saddam
Hussein, President George W. Bush did not err by re-announcing the “end of major
hostilities” in Iraq. He didn’t have to; others have been making that mistake
for him.
Commanders in Iraq, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice,
and others tell us Saddam’s loyalists will still take their toll of violence
against our forces and Iraqis who serve them. Dr. Rice and others have learned
from their past mistake of advising the President to declare the worst of the
fighting and dying to be over. However, from occupation chief Paul Bremer’s
ebullient “We got him” to the Army officer who declared “a tremendous negative
impact on the Baathist insurgency” to a virtual horde of
domestic
prognosticators, we also hear a major corner has been turned. With Saddam behind
bars, they imply or state outright the path now clear for a happy ending for the
American adventure in Iraq.
That is not the case. The tipping point –
that is, the Bush crowd’s version of the Indochinese “light at the end of the
tunnel” -- is no where in sight. This sign-post in their linear vision of the
war will remain invisible, indeed non-existent, as long as Washington D.C.
continues fundamentally to misunderstand the nature of the conflict in Iraq.
Winslow T. Wheeler is a Visiting Senior Fellow at the Center for
Defense Information.
After working on Capitol Hill on national security
issues for 31 years, he is writing a book about Congress and defense policy,
“The Wastrels of Defense.”
2584. jexster - 12/24/2003 10:38:53 AM
Our soldiers have been fighting bravely as they are
trained, equipped,
and ordered, but Washington was and remains caught in a cultural warp fighting a
war beyond its comprehension.
2585. jexster - 12/24/2003 12:48:46 PM
BAGHDAD, Iraq - A huge explosion rocked central Baghdad on Wednesday night,
quickly followed by a firefight.
The blast appeared to come from
the area around the Sheraton Hotel, on Abu Nawas Street near the east bank of
the Tigris River. U.S. military officials could not immediately be reached for
comment.
2586. jexster - 12/24/2003 2:03:52 PM
Above:
U.S. soldiers instruct an Iraqi to tell Santa what he wants for
Christmas
BAGHDAD, IRAQ—On almost every corner in Iraq's
capital city, carolers are singing, trees are being trimmed, and shoppers are
rushing home with their packages—all under the watchful eye of U.S. troops
dedicated to bringing the magic of Christmas to Iraq by force.
"It's important that life in liberated Iraq get back to normal
as soon as possible," said Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz at a press
conference Monday. "That's why we're making sure that Iraqis have the best
Christmas ever—something they certainly wouldn't have had under Saddam Hussein's
regime."
To that end, 25,000 troops from the 3rd Armored Cavalry
Regiment and 82nd Airborne Division have been deployed. Their missions include
the distribution of cookies and eggnog at major Iraqi city centers, the
conscription of bell-ringers from among the Iraqi citizenry, and the enforcement
of a new policy in which every man, woman, and child in Baghdad pays at least
one visit to 'Twas The Night... On Ice.
2587. jexster - 12/24/2003 2:04:57 PM
Above: A mosque in Baghdad decorated by U.S. troops
2588. jexster - 12/24/2003 2:08:56 PM
Still, Iraqis report that they are unable to get into the Christmas
spirit.
"Why am I supposed to feel joy for the world?" said 34-year-old
Baghdad mechanic Hassan al-Ajili as he stood in line for his mandatory visit
with Santa. "My country is still at war. I need an American identification card
to get anywhere in my own city. Now, for some reason, men with machine guns have
placed two rows of jingling antlered pigs on the roof of our house. This is
insane.
2589. jexster - 12/24/2003 8:52:40 PM
Lies Have Consequences: Iraqis rocked by mayhem and bloodshed on Christmas Eve
2590. concerned - 12/25/2003 1:16:35 AM
Re. 2588 -
jexster -
What is the point you're trying to make
here? That religious intolerance is a good thing in your opinion? Or that Iraqis
are ignorant?
2591. jexster - 12/25/2003 11:04:45 AM
BAGHDAD (AFP) - Rockets and mortars pounded Baghdad on Christmas morning as
guerrillas launched their most serious offensive in Iraq (news - web sites)
since the capture of former dictator Saddam Hussein (news - web sites).
The city was awakened by thunderous booms and gunfire as guerrillas
roamed the city, causing mayhem as they struck a major hotel and three foreign
embassies.
Four rockets struck the citadel-like main US compound in
the capital and an oil ministry guardpost was sprayed with bullets.
A woman was slightly wounded when a rocket tore into her family's
apartment, while a policeman's hand was blown off as he attempted to defuse a
roadside bomb on a busy commercial street.
After a lull, with the
arrest of Saddam Hussein on December 13, violence has spiked upwards, with
multiple attacks around the country.
2592. jexster - 12/25/2003 11:06:11 AM
Aaah isn't that what fine art is all about, meaning...what is the meaning?
What is the intention of the artist?
The true artist never tells!
A Merry Christmas to all and to all ....
2593. jexster - 12/25/2003 11:07:21 AM
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Anti-American guerrillas sent more than a dozen rockets and mortar rounds slamming into Baghdad on Christmas Day, hitting hotels, embassies and the vicinity of the U.S.-led occupation authority in Iraq (news - web sites).
2594. jexster - 12/25/2003 11:13:42 AM
Since we've failed thus far to capitalize,I don't have confidence we will
do it now. I believe the only way it will work now is for the Iraqis themselves
to somehow take charge and turn things around. Our policy, strategy, tactics, et
cetera, are still screwed up..... These guys don't understand what they are
getting into.The more I saw, the more I thought that this was the product of the
neocons who didn't understand the region and were going to create havoc there.
These were dilettantes from Washington think tanks who never had an idea that
worked on the ground....
The bill of goods the neocons sold him has been
proven false, yet heads haven't rolled. Where is the accountability?
Anthony M. Zinni
"
2595. robertjayb - 12/25/2003 3:12:15 PM
Riverbend seeks votes---Fills water tank...
2596. jexster - 12/26/2003 11:10:52 AM
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Guerrillas extended the biggest insurgent attacks in Iraq
(news - web sites) since Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s capture, killing
four U.S. soldiers in mortar and bomb attacks, the U.S. military said on Friday.
Reuters Photo
Reuters
Slideshow: Iraq
Guerillas Hit Baghdad Targets
(Reuters Video)
Latest headlines:
· Eight US soldiers killed in Iraq
Christmas violence, Japan sends troops
AFP - 30 minutes ago
· Japanese
Troops Leave for Iraq Deployment
AP - 36 minutes ago
· Iraq Ambush,
Explosions Kill 3 U.S. GIs
AP - 1 hour, 37 minutes ago
Special Coverage
A roadside bomb killed one soldier and wounded another
when it exploded by a convoy near Baquba, about 65 km (40 miles) north of
Baghdad, early on Friday. A second soldier was killed the same day trying to
defuse a bomb outside the town, a U.S. military spokesman said.
Two
other U.S. soldiers were killed in a mortar attack on a U.S. camp near Baquba on
Thursday.
2597. robertjayb - 12/26/2003 8:16:31 PM
Christmas in Baghdad with Riverbend...
2598. wonkers2 - 12/27/2003 1:25:20 PM
It seems apparent that we have ignited a civil war in Iraq. And we are in the middle of it, unloved by either side. Not to mention an unknown number of outsider fanatical, suicidal Islamists who are even unfriendlier to coalition forces, NGOs, the UN, et al. What a fiasco!
2599. concerned - 12/27/2003 1:35:17 PM
Guess LWers don't know how to close an html flag.
2600. concerned - 12/27/2003 1:46:15 PM
Re. 2598 -
If it's a 'civil war', how come you can't name the
opposing factions?
2601. judithathome - 12/27/2003 3:51:11 PM
Guess LWers don't know how to close an html flag.
God knows
centrists NEVER forget to do so!
Give it a rest...it isn't only LWers
who make mistakes and rape and plunder and kill and cheat and steal...your
fingerpointing is getting very old.
2602. jexster - 12/27/2003 5:03:47 PM
KARBALA, Iraq (AFP) - Six coalition soldiers and seven Iraqis were killed and
at least 129 people wounded as insurgents terrorised the Shiite Muslim holy city
of Karbala with four suicide car bombs, machine guns and mortar fire.
The guerrillas launched attacks on Karbala's city hall and two
military bases, a Bulgarian one located near a university and a Polish one out
of town.
2603. wonkers2 - 12/27/2003 5:45:52 PM
Well, from what I've heard and read the opposing factions are the majority Shias and the minority Sunnis/Baathists. The Kurds would be a third faction, but I haven't read anything indicating they are involved in the guerilla activities.
2604. jexster - 12/28/2003 6:50:53 AM
Sistani Stands Ground on Demand for Real Democracy & General
Elections
IGC agreed with US civil administrator Paul Bremer on
November 15 that caucus-type elections, by hand- picked pro-American local
councils, would be held by the end of May. Sistani objected that such an
election would not adequately reflect the will of the Iraqi people, and insists
on one-person, one-vote general elections.
He also wanted an up-front
guarantee that the Iraqi legislature would not pass laws at variance with Islam.
The IGC has ever since been negotiating with him in an attempt to find a
compromise. AFP said, ' "Despite obstacles that have been raised, he would only
renounce elections if a UN technical team reaches the conclusion that it is
impossible to hold them and proposes another solution that would guarantee a
better representation of the Iraqi people," Sistani's spokesman said. ' Sistani
therefore stood his ground about the need for general elections.
Sistani's refusal to budge poses a severe problem for the US, which
wants now to move quickly to an "Afghanistan" model, hold an American-invented
Iraqi "Loya Jirga" or council of hand-picked notables, "elect" a transitional
government, and turn over sovereignty to it, as they did to Karzai in
Afghanistan. This plan appears to derive from despair that the US will actually
be able to administer Iraq for very much longer, given Iraqi sullenness about
the occupation, and from a desire of the Bush administration to bring home the
reporters, if not the troops, well before the November 2004 elections. Karl Rove
probably figures that the US press simply won't cover Iraq as intensively if the
US isn't running it, just as they don't cover Afghanistan ... Sistani is
therefore standing in the way of a smooth political progression that has
enormous import for the next US election. Juan Cole
2605. jexster - 12/28/2003 6:51:01 AM
OK so Bush doesn't know what course he's on but it looks more and more
like the road runs through the town Bail, Iraq.
The Regime has dumped a
raft of pet econ projects its neocon wacks had scoped as part of their
"Democrtic revolution" ....
And good for Sistani for exposing Bush's
"democratic revolution" as just more stupefyingly vapid rhetorical gas.
2606. jexster - 12/28/2003 7:15:55 AM
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - One U.S. soldier and two Iraqi children were killed in a
roadside bomb blast in central Baghdad on Sunday, a U.S. military spokesman
said.
Capt. Jason Beck, a spokesman for the 1st Armored Division, said
the explosion in a busy shopping district also wounded 14 people.
They
included five U.S. soldiers, eight members of the Iraqi Civil Defense Corps and
an Iraqi interpreter. Beck said he did not know how serious their injuries were.
``A soldier from the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment and two Iraqi children
standing nearby were killed when the IED (improvised explosive device) detonated
as a convoy was passing,'' Beck said.
2607. robertjayb - 12/28/2003 3:27:35 PM
bushies back away from Iraq schemes...(WashPost)
BAGHDAD, Dec. 27 -- The United States has backed away from several of
its more ambitious initiatives to transform Iraq's economy, political system and
security forces as attacks on U.S. troops have escalated and the timetable for
ending the civil occupation has accelerated.
Plans to privatize
state-owned businesses -- a key part of a larger Bush administration goal to
replace the socialist economy of deposed president Saddam Hussein with a
free-market system -- have been dropped over the past few months. So too has a
demand that Iraqis write a constitution before a transfer of sovereignty.
2608. jexster - 12/28/2003 9:23:44 PM
Robert, only steers and queers grow in Tejan. You sproutin horns lately have
ya?
Post the link I was goin ta..damn your eyes...
But you did
all a service I grant ya...
The insurgeents now have hnnded the
neoJacobin Trotskyite cum free range fraud Bushie incompetents what I rate ss
the Fourth Major Defeat for Wars Without Shame, Aim or End:
4.
Defeated Neo-social engineers fantasies of creating their very own Krony
Kapitalist Tejas on the Tigris
3. That capturing th6or Demon Saddam
would have any more effect on Iraq or much less US than killing any garden
variety brown recluse spider in a hole
2. That Bush had a clue what he
was doing in Iraq.
1. Yhat Yellow Cake is fit for human
consumption..
So continue to "bring it on"...Bush is lookin to bail and
we are all lookin to Eddie to tell us
Why in hell did America waste
billions of dollars and tens of thousandd of bodies for a crock of Tejas steer
shit?
And what is the course you want us to ttay?
And why
are you so friggin fat? Some sort of sexual substiiute?
Case closed.
2609. Edmund Dantes - 12/28/2003 9:36:49 PM
In the morning, I shall be skinny. And whether drunk or sober, you'll still
be an illiterate, historically ignorant loon.
For the first time in
more than a decade, four American military aircraft landed in Iran Sunday in a
gesture between two countries more noted for acrimony than mutual aid.
2610. jexster - 12/28/2003 9:41:03 PM
And add to pending questions about Bush's insipid "tip-toe
through-My-Little-Hanging-Garden-of-Democracy/No Deals With Scuzzbag Dictators"
Flower Garden, remind us again of how a cowardly and cowering Q'adaffyi gave up
a WMD program that had produced NOTHING because he was pissin his pants in fear
that George Bush's Imperial Legions would take to the Shores of Tripoli?
I have problems recallin the short term, the wacked. the insignificant
or the scent of any number of your brain farts
Thanks.
2611. jexster - 12/28/2003 9:47:21 PM
French diplomacy finishes the year on a morose note. Not only must it
watch American trains passing, in Iraq as in Libya, but it must also applaud.
The success obtained by George W. Bush in his fight against 'rogue states,' with
the arrest of Saddam Hussein and then Qaddafi's renouncing of weapons of mass
destruction, have placed Paris in a delicate position.
WOW out of
the Mouths of Morons!
Now why would anyone in his right mind trade
one used up sorry satrap in a spider hole with no WMD's and a pathetic, has been
of Moslem secularism whose ass is threatened by Jihadists whose WMD program
could kill a cockroach, for $200-400 Billion bucks, thousands of casualties, and
unprecedented hemorraghe of power/influence?
Make mine with brie on
a baguette thank you very much.
Vive La France!
2612. jexster - 12/28/2003 9:49:58 PM
Look what they get for holding out against easy sleazy deals with
Qadaffi...Andrew Sullivan carrying a big bag of wounded French pride.
And only a few billions of dollars..bargain at twice the price
2613. Edmund Dantes - 12/28/2003 9:53:11 PM
Not fat: 
2614. jexster - 12/28/2003 9:56:58 PM
God damn Eddie ...if that's you, I how much you chargin!
Are you the
stud of my wet dreams or just another caked yeller crust on my sheets?
2615. jexster - 12/28/2003 10:04:14 PM
This is funny....Bremmer was asked to comment on Blair's claims that David
Kay had uncovered as a massive hidden net of Saddma WMD labes...kicker being
that the reporter who asked the questtion didn't attibute source...So Bremmer,
mind sharp as a tack, smelled a rat, suspected he was being set up.... Ain't
no such thing...why you've been conned...Sone shady fuck of a Saddmite done set
you up with a Red Herring just to discredit the Emperor...
Damn
but it wasn't some dickless prevert like Noam Chomsky it was Tony Blair, you'd
think that after a couple of years at the end of Bush's leash, he'd have learnt
a thing or two about Lyin...
2616. wonkers2 - 12/28/2003 10:32:46 PM
There's a lot to be said for the unvarnished truth.
2617. wonkers2 - 12/29/2003 11:01:00 AM
Last night in a preview of Fog of War Robert McNamara said that one of our mistakes in Vietnam was to regard the conflict as a war against communism when in reality it was a Vietnamese civil war. The analogy between Vietnam and Iraq can easily be overdone, but it seems to me that we have ignited a civil war there. And we are in the middle of it, increasingly disliked by all sides. It's also analogous to Yugoslavia and Saddam to Tito. Saddam is no longer around to keep the lid on the feuding factions, and we are unable to do it.
2618. robertjayb - 12/29/2003 11:40:05 AM
Speaking of keeping lids on:(LATimes---registration
required)
BAGHDAD — Seen by a distrustful public as a tool of the
occupying powers, Iraq's Governing Council is coming of age on the job as it
tries to define a leadership to take over from the United States and its allies.
But as the 25-member body steers Iraq toward sovereignty, promised in a
mere six months, it is acting like a defiant adolescent, challenging the
authority and wisdom of those who gave it life. And its bargaining position has
been strengthened by the Bush administration's apparent eagerness to declare its
mission accomplished before the U.S. presidential election.
2619. jexster - 12/29/2003 12:01:44 PM
IGC
Has Little Georgie By the Short Hairs!
That'll teach him to open
that big dumb pie hole of his -
yappin about democracy!
Liar,Liar
Pants on Fire...got em caught on the telephone wire
2620. jexster - 12/29/2003 12:11:44 PM
L'audace, toujours l'audace!
The council began flexing its
muscles last month when it undertook a review of Bremer's gubernatorial
appointments ... Council members are challenging such regional appointments by
Bremer, insisting they are better acquainted with the needs and values of Iraqis
than an American making personnel choices under deadline pressure.
While the council appears ready to accept Bremer's conclusion that
direct elections for the next leadership bodies are impossible due to time
constraints, the proposed caucus system continues to be looked at askance by
Iraq's most powerful religious leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani. His threat
to denounce the caucus method as illegitimate would probably dissuade many
Shiites, who constitute more than 60% of the Iraqi population, from
participating in the process...
Looks like the Debray scenario is
really beginning to take shape ie the longer we stay the worse things be when we
leave...
2621. jexster - 12/29/2003 1:19:30 PM
Republican Apologetics for Occupation Failures Hit Astounding
Lows
Josh Marshall writes: "This is an unfortunate passage. It
comes from David Brooks' column in tomorrow's Times:
'But ours is the
one revolution that worked, and it did precisely because our founders were
epistemologically modest too, and didn't pretend to know what is the good
life,only that people should be free to figure it out for themselves. Because of
that legacy, we stink at social engineering. Our government couldn't even come
up with a plan for postwar Iraq - thank goodness, too, because any 'plan'
hatched by technocrats in Washington would have been unfit for Iraqi reality.'
I don't know where to start. The failure to do
proper planning for
post-war Iraq, it turns out, wasn't a matter of hidebound ideologues who ignored
and attacked expertise and experience. It was the happy result of America's
tradition of non-ideological pragmatism.
This is screw-up laundering
with a spritz of history tossed on."
On the very day that i8t was
reported the Wackos dumped a half a ton of ideological social engineering
blueprints for their New World Order!
2622. jexster - 12/29/2003 1:29:32 PM
Bad enough that liars are runnings but incompetent liars, a are armadillos of
a different color entirely...
Guardian UK -
George W. Bush - Highly Toxic Weapon of Mass Political
Destruction:
Bremmer Humiliates Blair Over WMD Lies
"In a
Christmas message to British troops, Tony Blair claimed there was 'massive
evidence of a huge system of clandestine laboratories'.
The Iraq Survey
Group (ISG) had unearthed compelling evidence that showed Saddam Hussein had
attempted to 'conceal weapons', the Prime Minister said. But in an interview
yesterday, Paul Bremer flatly dismissed the claim as untrue -without realising
its source was Blair...
'I don't know where those words come from but
that is not what [ISG chief] David Kay has said,' he told ITV1 ...
Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesman Menzies Campbell said he
would be pressing Ministers when Parliament returned in the New Year on what
precisely the Government knew. 'It is high time the Prime Minister cleared this
matter up once and for all,' he said...
In recent days, senior Whitehall
officials have raised the extraordinary possibility that Saddam did not have
weapons of mass destruction after all - but believed he did after being misled
by his own advisors."
2623. jexster - 12/29/2003 2:05:59 PM
And from today's paper, Houston we have a little firestorm in here in old
London town...
Blair WMD claim a 'red herring', says Bremer
America's top man in Iraq heaps scorn on PM's allegation
Tony Blair faced fresh allegations yesterday that he had "sexed up"
an official report into Saddam Hussein's ability to produce weapons of mass
destruction after the US official running Iraq dismissed out of hand his latest
controversial claim.
The Conservatives said Mr Blair's assertion,
made to British troops in mid-December, that there was "massive evidence of a
huge system of clandestine laboratories" was a piece of "sexed-up information"
uttered "to save his skin".
Irrelevant eh?
Bush better get
his ass out of that TarPit ASAP..
2624. jexster - 12/29/2003 2:10:58 PM
Robin Cook, who has become a formidable backbench critic on the war, said:
"If there is massive evidence of clandestine laboratories it does seem rather
curious that Paul Bremer, who is running Iraq, doesn't know about it. The truth
is the Iraq Survey Group found no evidence of weapons, no delivery systems, no
chemical or biological weapons and found no laboratories to produce them.
"This is unquestionably embarrassing for those who try and claim there
is a chemical and biological arsenal and if they can't convince Paul Bremer, who
is remarkably on-message, how can they convince anyone outside?"
2625. jexster - 12/29/2003 2:15:15 PM
Yesterday the Labour backbencher Diane Abbott said the prime minister
risked further rebellions after alienating loyal MPs after using this argument.
"I never believed this thing about missiles being ready for fire in 45 minutes
but sadly some of my colleagues did, and they are the ones that are most bitter,
she told Sky's Sunday with Adam Boulton.
"They went and had private
chats with Tony, went back to their local parties and said 'the prime minister
has told me... ', and they feel like pillocks."
Yo Eddie how does
that feel exactly, like a "pillock"?
What the fuck is a pillock anyway?
2626. rdbrewer - 12/29/2003 4:05:35 PM
NYT Concludes No Profiteering by Halliburton. In a related story,
Jexter and WoW, conclude there is no god.
An examination of what has
grown into a multibillion-dollar contract to restore Iraq's oil infrastructure
shows no evidence of profiteering by Halliburton, the Houston-based oil services
company, but it does demonstrate a struggle between price controls and the
uncertainties of war, with price controls frequently losing.
--linked by Andrew
Sullivan
2627. OhioSTOPAS - 12/29/2003 6:58:11 PM
Remember that "top secret memo" that documented how Abu Nidal supposedly
trained Mohamed Atta in Baghdad? Haven't heard anything about it since Newsweek
established it was a fake (see my Message # 2394).
I didn't realize until reading "Altercation"
(http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3710880) today that the London Telegraph "reporter"
who broke the "story", Con Coughlin (yes, his first name is "Con" - should've
been a clue there) was interviewed by Tom Brokaw on "Meet the Press" the day the
Telegraph reported the story (December 14, also the day Saddam's capture was
reported).
Here it
is:
"Brokaw: . . . [T]ell us about the article that you have today
in the Sunday Telegraph about Mohamed Atta and any connections that he may have
had to the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein.
"Coughlin: Well, this is an
intriguing story, Tom. I mean, basically, when I was in Baghdad, I picked up a
document that was given to me by a senior member of the Iraqi interim
government. It's an intelligence document written by the then-head of Iraqi
intelligence, Habush to Saddam. It's dated the 1st of July, 2001, and it's
basically a memo saying that Mohamed Atta has successfully completed a training
course at the house of Abu Nidal, the infamous Palestinian terrorist . . ."
(continued)
2628. OhioSTOPAS - 12/29/2003 6:59:01 PM
"Coughlin (continued): Now, this is the first really concrete proof that
al-Qaeda was working with Saddam. I saw your interview with James Woolsey
earlier and he was talking about the article in The Weekly Standard. And there
is a lot of detail there. But this is a document, and I've had it authenticated.
This is the handwriting of the head of Iraqi intelligence, Habush, is one of the
few people still at large who is in the pack of cards. And it basically says
that Atta was in Baghdad being trained under Saddam's guidance prior to the 9/11
attack. It's a very explosive development, Tom.
"Brokaw: Thank you very
much, Con Coughlin in London this morning. His article is in The London Sunday
Telegraph. You can access it on the Internet, of course. Now, back to my
colleague, the moderator of Meet the Press, Tim Russert. Tim."
Jeeez.
Real probing interview there, Tom. Does fear of being accused of "liberal bias"
require giving air time to anyone peddling pro-war, pro-Bush misinformation, no
matter how incredible?
2629. robertjayb - 12/29/2003 7:19:41 PM
Step away from that Old Farmer's Almanac and keep your
hands up...
WASHINGTON -- The FBI has warned police
nationwide to be alert for people carrying almanacs, cautioning that the popular
reference books covering everything from abbreviations to weather trends could
be used for terrorist planning.
In a bulletin sent Christmas Eve to
about 18,000 police organizations, the FBI said terrorists may use almanacs "to
assist with target selection and pre-operational planning.
2630. jexster - 12/29/2003 7:56:05 PM
One headline says it all in the Mother of All Battles - The Two Ayatollahs!
'Great Satan' Sends 'Axis of Evil' Member Iran Aid
2631. jexster - 12/29/2003 7:58:09 PM
The NyT recycled a Halliburton press release RD...you really must work on that critical thinking...let's see what the Pentagon auditors have to say, not Andrew Sullivan or the NyT reporter...
2632. jexster - 12/29/2003 8:00:39 PM
Does fear of being accused of "liberal bias" require giving air time to
anyone peddling pro-war, pro-Bush misinformation, no matter how incredible?
You may be on to something here Ohio...
Do you think
Eddie's mom accused him of liberal bias when he was just a little fat baby
boy????
Case closed.
2633. jexster - 12/29/2003 8:21:01 PM
RD - some good advice from a Loosiana man...
1. Don't take no wooden
nickels
2. Don't give a multi billion dollar no bid contract to Texan
You'll do just fine.
2634. jexster - 12/29/2003 8:48:43 PM
Meet Hezzobolah - Iraq's Newest Shiite Political Party
Thank you George W. Bush, Holy Crusader for Democracy & Moron
Annointed of the Lord!
2635. jexster - 12/29/2003 8:49:11 PM
Watch those Shiites....just watch
2636. wonkers2 - 12/29/2003 9:53:31 PM
The London Telegraph is one of the less reliable papers there. Even worse than the Times.
2637. wonkers2 - 12/30/2003 6:00:17 AM
AP Belgrade, Serbia-Montenegro--Slobodan Milosevic, in custody and on trial
for genocide before a UN court, has been elected to Serbia's parliament,
according to weekend ballot results released Monday.
The Serbian RAdical
Party, which supported Milosevic's Balkan war campaigns in the 1990s, won 81
seats in the 250-seat parliament--FAR MORE THAN THE PRO-WESTERN GROUPS THAT
TOPPLED MILOSEVIC THREE YEARS AGO, the government electoral commission said.
I wonder if the Iraqis will let Saddam Hussein run for election from
jail? And I wonder how many votes he would get?
2638. PelleNilsson - 12/30/2003 10:41:33 AM
That news item is misleading on two accounts. First, it implies that
Milosevic is associated with the Radical Prty which he is not. The party is led
by Vojislav Seselj who is also a guest of the Hague tribunal although his trial
has not yet started. Milosevic's party, the Socialists received 7% of the vote,
barely making it into parliament.
Second, the Radical Party got 28% of
the vote against 42% for the three so called "pro-western groups".
Another example of slanted reporting uncritically accepted.
2639. TheWizardOfWhimsy - 12/30/2003 12:07:58 PM
2640. jexster - 12/30/2003 12:14:21 PM
The Latest Bush Con Job: Iraqi Police
Here's a
employment test even TD could pass:
What do you think of human
rights?" Mehdi asked.
"It's good and helps humans," Abbas answered.
"What do you think of the other sex?"
"They are half or so of
society and help men serve the community."
Mehdi nodded and scribbled
some notes in the young man's file. Abbas was in.
Need work TD????
2641. jexster - 12/30/2003 12:15:16 PM
Why even Bush might be able to pass
2642. jexster - 12/30/2003 12:29:31 PM
2643. jexster - 12/30/2003 12:30:53 PM
Like most domestic disputes, much of the fighting has been done behind
locked doors, leaving us to interpret the results based on the muffled sound of
screaming voices and the occasional smash of broken porcelain. But the signs
that the neocons are on the losing end of the battle have become fairly evident
in recent weeks:
The administration has welcomed Libya back into the
community of "civilized" nations, on terms that can only help solidify Col.
Ghadafi's dictatorial regime. The deal is about as textbook a case of
realpolitik as you will find outside the archives of the Kissinger NSC.
Jim Baker has returned to the diplomatic circuit, with the speculation
being that his assignment is to liquidate not only Iraq's debt but also the
neocon illusion of remaking the Middle East into the Community of
Israel-Recognizing Nations.
The rumor mill also has uber-neocon Paul
Wolfowitz departing the Pentagon in February. Can Doug Feith -- the other half
of the necon Laural & Hardy act, be far behind?
Bush rolled out the
red carpet -- with a 19-gun salute no less -- for Chinese prime minister Wen
Jiabao, then explicitly warned Taiwan not to ditch its allegiance to the
increasingly fictional notion of "one China." So doing, he completely ignored
the howls of protest from neocon punditry that he was selling Taiwanese
democracy down the river.
The public sniping at the administration by
said punditry has become distinctly more direct, with both Newt Gringrich and
Bill Kristol harshly criticizing the White House -- if not yet the president who
lives and sometimes even works there..
2644. jexster - 12/30/2003 12:46:57 PM
In the Middle East, on the other hand, the policy differences between the
neocons and the realists were vast, and the personal animosities intense. To the
realists, the Middle East was simply another theatre in the Cold War, in which
the moderate Arab regimes were necessary evils and the state of Israel an
unwelcome distraction. America, they believed, had little choice but to rely on
its "deputy sheriffs" in the region -- Iran and Saudi Arabia -- to keep the
Soviets out and the oil flowing.
But the collapse of the Shah knocked
that policy into crisis. Saudi Arabia, everybody understood, simply wasn't
strong enough to be America's sole watchdog in the Persian Gulf. The Iranian
revolution was a match poised over the dynamite dump of Shi'a aspirations
throughout the region. The Soviets were watching closely. What was to be done?
It's an interesting coincidence that at this particular moment in
history, in September 1980, Saddam Hussein launched his war of aggression
against Iran. The war presented a irresistable opportunity for the realists: By
tilting towards Saddam, they could contain Iran, protect Saudia Arabia and --
just perhaps -- wean Baathist Iraq away from its Soviet arms supplier.
The neocons despised this policy, which ran exactly counter to their own
desire to turn Israel into America's primary ally and deputy sheriff in the
Middle East. By cuddling up to Iraq, the realists were actually strengthening
one of the Jewish state's most powerful enemies. This was intolerable.
And here we are stuck in a Tar Pit because the Bush Regime needs an
enemy to replace the good ole Commies and his neoJacobins haven't a clue how to
run a foreign policy.
2645. jexster - 12/30/2003 12:54:47 PM
Figuring out who's minding the store is always a problem with an
administration this secretive, especially since it never admits to a mistake and
rarely tosses people overboard. Or, as General Zinni told the Washington Post:
"What I don't understand is that the bill of goods the neocons sold
him has been proven false, yet heads haven't rolled," he says. "Where is the
accountability? I think some fairly senior people at the Pentagon ought to go."
Who? "That's up to the president."
The problem, I think, is that
while the neocons may be in the dog house, it's very much in the
administration's interests to obscure that fact. Firing them would draw too much
attention to the people who allowed them to crap all over the carpet -- again.
2646. wonkers2 - 12/30/2003 3:04:16 PM
Well, according to today's NYT "The Radical Party, led by indicted war crimes suspect Vojislav Seselj is estimated to have won 82 of 250 seats in Sunday's vote, making it the largest single party in the Assembly by a clear margin. Full text here
2647. PelleNilsson - 12/30/2003 3:13:58 PM
That's what I said, isn't it? You have a point?
2648. wonkers2 - 12/30/2003 3:22:29 PM
Votes for the Radical Party (32%)and the Socialist Party (7%) total 39 percent, by any reckoning a large percentage of the vote for the parties of two accused war criminals. If there is any similarity to Iraq, it's not unreasonable to assume that Saddam Hussein supporters remain a significant percentage of the population and are likely to continue their reisitance for some time and as well are likely to be a factor in future elections. The "good guys" appear to me to be a smaller percentage of the population in Iraq than in Serbia-Montenegro.
2649. wonkers2 - 12/30/2003 3:27:18 PM
Correction: The accused war criminals' parties won 41 percent of the seats in the Serbian parliament, 81 Radical Party seats and 22 Socialist. This would appear to indicate significant public sentiment against the pro-western Serbian leaders.
2650. wonkers2 - 12/30/2003 3:38:06 PM
Interesting link on the Twilight of the Neocons. I wonder who billmon is. Bright guy.
2651. PelleNilsson - 12/30/2003 3:38:38 PM
That's very true but I doubt that the parallel with Iraq is illuminating. Of course Saddam would get votes from some of the Sunni but very few from the Shia and Kurds which together make up (I think) 70% of the electorate. Say 10-15%? Could be a good thing as far as I'm concerned.
2652. wonkers2 - 12/30/2003 3:41:16 PM
Well, the Shia and the Kurds aren't exactly house broken democrats any more than the Baathist/Sunnis.
2653. wonkers2 - 12/30/2003 4:03:52 PM
Somebody pointed out recently that when the Turks were in charge of what is now Iraq they ruled the area as three separate states, each with its own governor--Kurds in the north, Sunnis in the middle and Shia in the south. Forging these groups into a single, unified democratic country is problematical.
2654. rdbrewer - 12/30/2003 7:21:47 PM
The NyT recycled a Halliburton press release RD.
Right.
2655. rdbrewer - 12/30/2003 7:22:05 PM
Oh, yeah: In your dreams.
2656. jexster - 12/30/2003 7:25:51 PM
That's exactly what it was and it was obvious from the third paragraph that
the reporter had not read the contract; ASPR and didn't know squat about cost
accounting and procurement fraud...that's a tough subject...the prelim Pentagon
audit report and the Halliburton auditors ..they know their ASPR from a hole in
the ground..
Stick to football..its the only thing OKIES do well...
2657. rdbrewer - 12/30/2003 7:34:20 PM
You didn't read the article, Hex. "An examination of what has grown into a
multibillion-dollar contract . . . ." Leave out the prepositional phrase, and
you have, "An examination . . . ." IOW, the NYT examined the contract.
If that's not enough, the article also says:
So far this year, Halliburton's
profits from Iraq have been minimal. The company's latest report to the
Securities and Exchange Commission shows $1.3 billion in revenues from work in
Iraq and $46 million in pretax profits for the first nine months of 2003. But
its profit may grow once the Pentagon completes a formal evaluation of the work.
If the government is satisfied, Halliburton is entitled to a performance fee of
up to 5 percent of the contract's entire value, which could mean additional
payments of $100 million or more.
2658. jexster - 12/30/2003 7:42:58 PM
You pillock, look what you've done!
2659. jexster - 12/30/2003 7:44:14 PM
In a pig's eye!
They sat down with Haliburton flaks.
2660. rdbrewer - 12/30/2003 7:45:15 PM
IOW, "I've made up my mind. Don't bother me with facts."
2661. jexster - 12/30/2003 7:46:18 PM
Did they look at the contract documents? Did they look at the payment
applications?
Sheeeet no they didn't. They've neither the competence nor
the time nor the patience, let me tell ya. I've defended one or two federal
contractors
2662. jexster - 12/30/2003 7:46:46 PM
In my callow, mispent youth.
2663. jexster - 12/30/2003 7:47:00 PM
Before I ate Bush beef
2664. jexster - 12/30/2003 7:48:54 PM
IOW...you pay me the bucks give me the documents, check back in a few months, I give you the answer or we can wait for the feds...or maybe call the Halliburton auditors who spoke before the PR folks at the Dallas Head Shed took a giant dump on em.
2665. jexster - 12/30/2003 7:50:08 PM
This is heavy shit...the cases are complicated as hell and Halliburton could
be debarred.
Believe none of what you read, half of what you see.
2666. jexster - 12/30/2003 7:52:06 PM
2667. jexster - 12/30/2003 8:05:29 PM
War
Criminals: Blair acted like a 'white vigilante' by invading Iraq, says
bishop
Tony Blair came under attack from two of the Church of
England's most senior figures yesterday for acting "like a white vigilante" and
for lacking humility in forging ahead with the war on Iraq.
In the most
outspoken outburst, the Bishop of Durham, Tom Wright, accused religious
conservatives surrounding the US president, George Bush, of espousing "a very
strange distortion of Christianity" - particularly since, through Iraq's
reconstruction, many would gain financially.
"For Bush and Blair to go
into Iraq together was like a bunch of white vigilantes going into Brixton to
stop drug dealing. This is not to deny there's a problem to be sorted, just that
they are not credible people to deal with it," he said
2668. jexster - 12/30/2003 8:09:00 PM
2309 The strict conditions for legitimate defense by military force
require rigorous consideration. The gravity of such a decision makes it subject
to rigorous conditions of moral legitimacy. At one and the same time:
1.
the damage inflicted by the aggressor on the nation or community of nations must
be lasting, grave, and certain;
2.all other means of putting an end to it
must have been shown to be impractical or ineffective;
3. there must be
serious prospects of success;
4. the use of arms must not produce evils and
disorders graver than the evil to be eliminated. The power of modem means of
destruction weighs very heavily in evaluating this condition.
These are the
traditional elements enumerated in what is called the "just war" doctrine
That's what they call an O-FER in baseball...
0 for 4
That's not even counting the times they "bore false witness"
2669. jexster - 12/30/2003 8:21:51 PM
For crimes against humanity....
In a separate rebuke, the
Archbishop of York, David Hope, questioned the legitimacy of the war and said Mr
Blair would have to answer to God - a "higher authority" - for his decision to
forge ahead with the conflict.
He called on people to pray for Mr Blair
and called on him to show more humility rather than exercising power in an
authoritarian way. Referring to Iraq, he said: "One of the qualities of a good
leader is that they have to be really attentive to the views of the people. It
seemed at one stage that that was not happening."
The conflict, and the
events leading up to it, had raised questions of leadership and trust.
Dr Hope went on to call on Britons to "spend more time praying
for Tony Blair", who should exercise a "calm, quiet authority".
The
coalition leaders would have to give an account to a "a higher authority," he
added, in an echo of the warning by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan
Williams, at the Iraq war remembrance service, that Mr Blair would be "called to
account."
2670. OhioSTOPAS - 12/30/2003 8:32:10 PM
Some
good news from Iraq:
"TIKRIT, Iraq - Influential spiritual leaders
from Saddam Hussein's hometown — a bastion of anti-American sentiment — are
joining forces to persuade Iraqis to abandon the violent insurgency, one of the
leaders said Monday.
"The effort marks a new, open willingness to
cooperate with U.S. forces — a shift in the thinking of at least some key
members of Iraq's Sunni Muslim minority . . ."
This is a positive
development which I'm guessing would not be occurring if Saddam were still at
large. Let's hope we can start turning the corner now.
2671. wonkers2 - 12/30/2003 9:18:26 PM
The RNC is probably spreading a little of Bush's money around among the mullahs. I hope it works.
2672. jexster - 12/30/2003 10:31:52 PM
We'll see what the Shia think
2673. Edmund Dantes - 12/30/2003 10:41:03 PM
AL
QAEDA VIDEOS FOUND IN IRAQ WEAPONS RAID
From CNN:
In addition to the al Qaeda literature and videos, the troops
found nearly 8,000 rounds of ammunition; 160 mortar rounds and six mortar tubes;
43 rocket-propelled grenade launchers and 79 rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs);
and 19 AK-47 assault rifles, as well as dozens of other weapons.
2674. jexster - 12/31/2003 8:44:56 AM
Pentagon Terminates Halliburton Contract
Guess
they don't read the NyTimes RD
And correction wonk..if Bush is giving
money to the mullahs you can bet your bottom dinar it doesn't come from RNC
slush funds..
Your Taxpayer Dollars at Work!
2675. jexster - 12/31/2003 8:47:29 AM
Pentagon to Defer Billions in Iraq Reconstruction Work - Too Many RPG's ED
2676. jexster - 12/31/2003 8:49:24 AM
The Debray Scenario - The Longer the Bungling Bacillus of Babylon Stays,
the Worse Things Will Get
KIRKUK, Iraq - Gunfire erupted Wednesday
during a protest march in Kirkuk and at least two people were killed in this
northern city where plans for a democratic Iraq (news - web sites) are dividing
Kurd, Arab and Turkmen residents.
2677. jexster - 12/31/2003 8:50:28 AM
"What I don't understand is that the bill of goods the neocons sold him has
been proven false, yet heads haven't rolled."
Yea Ed, wassup wit dat?
2678. jexster - 12/31/2003 9:45:58 AM
In
Sunni Bastion, They Are Ready for a Fight
Even with Hussein in
custody, anti-American sentiment fuels Iraqi midsection's insurgency
Better get more moolah to the mullahs quick!
2679. jexster - 12/31/2003 12:38:09 PM
Iraqi Kurds hold up banners during an earlier demonstration in
Kirkuk. Three people were killed and dozens more wounded when Kurdish gunmen
opened fire on a demonstration by Arabs and Turkmen in this northern Iraqi
city
2680. Edmund Dantes - 12/31/2003 12:42:09 PM
THE
SUICIDAL CULTISTS
The so-called Arab street and
its phony intellectuals sense that influential progressive Westerners will never
censure Middle Eastern felonies if there is a chance to rage about Western
misdemeanors. It is precisely this parasitic relationship between the foreign
and domestic critics of the West that explains much of the strange confidence of
those who planned September 11. It was the genius of bin Laden, after all, that
he suspected after he had incinerated 3,000 Westerners an elite would be more
likely to blame itself for the calamity — searching for “root causes” than
marshalling its legions to defeat a tribe that embraced theocracy, autocracy,
gender apartheid, polygamy, anti-Semitism, and religious intolerance. And why
not after Lebanon, the first World Trade Center bombing, the embassies in
Africa, murder in Saudi Arabia, and the USS Cole? It was the folly of bin Laden
only that he assumed the United States was as far gone as Europe and that a
minority of its ashamed elites had completely assumed control of American
political, cultural, and spiritual life.
Hatred of Israel is the most
striking symptom of the Western disease. On the face of it the dilemma there is
a no-brainer for any classic liberal: A consensual government is besieged by
fanatical suicide killers who are subsidized and cheered on by many dictators in
the Arab world. The bombers share the same barbaric methods as Chechens, the
9/11 murderers, al Qaedists in Turkey, and what we now see in Iraq.
2681. Edmund Dantes - 12/31/2003 12:42:32 PM
(cont.)
Indeed, the liberal Europeans should
love Israel, whose social and cultural institutions — universities, the fine
arts, concern for the “other” — so reflect its own. Gays are in the Israeli
military, whose soldiers rarely salute, but usually address each other by their
first names and accept a gender equity that any feminist would love. And while
Arabs once may have been exterminated by Syrians, gassed in Yemen by Egypt,
ethnically cleansed in Kuwait, lynched without trial in Palestine, burned alive
in Saudi Arabia, inside Israel proper they vote and enjoy human rights not found
elsewhere in the Arab Middle East.
2682. PelleNilsson - 12/31/2003 12:53:03 PM
This imbecilic Euro-hatred is as deplorable as the unreflected anti-Americanism displayed by the folks whose political views were set in stone in the 70s.
2683. Edmund Dantes - 12/31/2003 12:58:22 PM
I wouldn't call it "Euro-hatred." Plenty of Hansen's examples come from
within America's borders.
Also, many Europeans aren't ready to watch
Western ideals garrotted by this most recent reactionary barbarism.
That
percentage appears smaller, however, in Western Europe than in the US.
2684. jexster - 12/31/2003 1:52:16 PM
BAGHDAD, Iraq - A large explosion was heard in central Baghdad on New Year's
Eve. Ambulances converged on the area near the former U.S. Embassy.
Gunfire was heard after the explosion. U.S. soldiers were seen
heading to the site of the blast, and U.S. military helicopters hovered
overhead.
Earlier in Baghdad, a car bomb exploded as a U.S. convoy
passed on a street full of shops, destroying a Humvee, Iraqi police Sgt. Thabet
Talib said. An 8-year-old Iraqi boy was killed and 21 other people were wounded,
including five U.S. soldiers and five Iraqi civil defense personnel, authorities
said.
Brig. Gen. Martin Dempsey, commander of the 1st Armored
Division, said it was not clear what kind of bomb caused the blast.
Later in the evening, a bomb hidden in shrubs outside a restaurant
in Baghdad went off as a U.S. military convoy passed, wounding three American
soldiers and three Iraqi civilians.
2685. jexster - 1/1/2004 12:23:59 PM
Bush
Lies, People Die
Iraq WMD Hunt Has Still Found Nothing
Kay Blasts
"Fiasco"
"The teams have closed their chemical and nuclear files
and David Kay is considering stepping down. The remaining hope for the operation
is in the biological area, a field U.N. inspectors were all suspicious of.
Kay's teams have found no evidence Iraq had smallpox but has continued
questioning Iraqi biologists and were pursuing information about anthrax and
aflatoxin. Of the handful of Iraqi weapons scientists remaining in U.S. custody,
two are missile experts, and seven worked on past biological programs, according
to Iraqi officials now working for the American occupation. All continue to
claim that Iraq hasn't worked on weapons of mass destruction for years... To
date, Congress has approved $700 million for the weapons hunt... [Kay's] most
notable determination to date has been that two mobile trailers found in April
and May were not biological laboratories as senior administration officials had
claimed. In a BBC interview Kay called the trailers 'a fiasco.'"
2686. jexster - 1/1/2004 12:26:00 PM
Sunday Times:
Britain's MI6 Planted Propaganda Stories in the Media to Sell Iraq War
2687. jexster - 1/1/2004 12:29:21 PM
Bush Lies, Americans Die - Iraq Occupation Force Suicide Rate "alarmingly high"
2688. wonkers2 - 1/1/2004 12:57:06 PM
Wow! The London Times story should prove to be dynamite! The White House was apparently re-cycling some of M16's lies and adding a few of their own.
2689. jexster - 1/1/2004 1:01:11 PM
Who the fuck in her right mind even half a right working mind could possibly believe anything these dirtballs say about anything?
2690. jexster - 1/2/2004 11:46:47 AM
FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters) - Guerrillas shot down a U.S. military helicopter in central Iraq (news - web sites) Friday, killing one pilot and injuring another, officials and witnesses said.
2691. jexster - 1/2/2004 1:20:45 PM
Its Always Been About the Oil - British Memo Reveals Nixon Plan to
Seize Oil Fields
Nothing to be necessarily ashamed of but
nothing worth lying about either.
2692. jexster - 1/2/2004 9:33:38 PM
US
soldiers ransack Sunni mosque
Iraq's minority faith targeted in
hunt for weapons
Gonna take more than a photo op and a little
moolah for mullahs.
Its going to take...works of great substance!
Rebranding
Bush as man of peace
White House retreats from doctrine of regime
change and returns to traditional diplomacy
2693. jexster - 1/2/2004 9:36:37 PM
"They blindfolded all the worshippers and took them away. You don't see
Muslims attacking the holy places of other people," Abu Hassan, a worshipper at
the mosque, said.
Mr Kaisey acknowledged that most of the resistance was
being directed by disgruntled Sunnis but pointed out that Shias were involved as
well.The coalition also failed to appreciate that Sunnis had suffered under
Saddam, he said.
"All of us on the shura council have spent time in
prison," he said. "We suffered under Saddam. But at the end of the day this is
our country.
"If someone invaded Britain what would you do? You would
probably go and fight."
2694. Al D - 1/2/2004 10:14:08 PM
After 9/11 UBL put out a tape and talked about how people seeing two horses would naturaly choose the strong horse. He made an astute observation which is proving true. Libia's leader is a bit of a mad man, but he knows where the strong horse is. Also, Baath Party members are turning in weapons in Iraq; they are also discovering who the strong horse is.
Islam grew because Mohammed was the strong horse, ergo, must have the
strong god on his side. Perhaps Islamic fundamentalists will start to see the
folly of taking on the west.
2695. Edmund Dantes - 1/3/2004 11:12:56 AM
GAY
AND PALESTINIAN
For these gay men, life in the
seedy parts of central Israel is far better than the virtual death sentences
they fled in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
Sani — not his real name —
grew up outside Gaza City, in a refugee camp whose clan networks and congestion
made privacy practically impossible. He said he realized he was homosexual at
age 16, in an encounter with another youth.
Sani’s secret was safe from
his father, a local sheik, but eventually it leaked out to the Palestinian
Authority police.
“They brought me in, held me for hours,” he told JTA.
“During one round of questioning, they made me strip and sit on a Coke bottle.
It hurt. And all the time I was more worried my family would learn why.”
Torture by Palestinian Authority security services or vigilante attacks
by relatives is a fate suffered by countless gays in the West Bank and Gaza
Strip, where sodomy carries a jail term of three to 10 years.
Islam
prescribes capital punishment for homosexual activity.
Those who survive
torture and attacks either fade into meek self-abnegation or, like Sani, break
away. But it’s an unlikely scenario, given the efforts Israel has made to
tighten its borders over the last three years to keep out terrorists.
2696. jexster - 1/3/2004 11:51:08 PM
TIKRIT, Iraq (AFP) - Four Iraqis were killed when a US convoy opened fire on
their car in northern Iraq (news - web sites) as three US soldiers were
confirmed dead in separate insurgency attacks.
Local police said the
Iraqis, including a woman and a child, were killed when a US convoy opened fire
on their car in the northern town of Tikrit, birthplace of captured former
dictator Saddam Hussein (news - web sites), but US troops in the area denied
involvement.
"The car, a grey Chevrolet Caprice, was hit by 27 shots
and skidded, resulting in the death of four people, including a woman and a nine
year-old child," Tikrit police chief Colonel Ussama Adham Abdel Ghaffer told
AFP.
2697. jexster - 1/4/2004 12:21:47 AM
'The Soldiers Took Him Away. We Haven't Seen Him Since'
The UK Guardian reports: "Mohammad al-Faysal pointed to a picture of his
father hanging in their darkened living room. 'They arrested him on May 24. He
didn't surrender. After the war he stayed in this house for two weeks. Nobody
came. He then moved to the house of one of our relatives. US soldiers burst in
suddenly, ordered everyone to lie on the floor, and handcuffed him and the other
men in the room, and took them away.' He added: 'We haven't seen him since.' Dr
Faysal's father - Sa'ad Abdul Majid al-Faysal - is a former Iraqi ambassador to
Russia. But he is
also the three of spades: number 55 in Washington's pack
of playing cards of the 55 'most wanted' members of Saddam Hussein's regime...
The Americans are believed to be holding several hundred prominent figures at
their military base at Baghdad international airport... With some of the
detainees in prison for eight months without charge, the airport base is rapidly
turning into an Iraqi version of Guantanamo Bay, they say."
2698. wonkers2 - 1/4/2004 12:27:30 AM
Ugly.
2699. jexster - 1/4/2004 12:29:34 AM
Like that do ya Al?
Hey then you'll just love this fella.....maybe
invite him for a round or two at Princeville???? 
2700. jexster - 1/4/2004 12:53:33 AM
Message # 2695
Touching Ed. Why I get all misty over your new found concern for gay
rights.
Ooh but they tell me you are a sneaky bastard Ed, a real clever
sort. Gee wonder if I missed the point of the post...what could it be...
Oh I know! You sly little passive aggressive devil you.
Why you
really have got me by my identity politics short hairs now don't you!
I
get it now.
Kill the bastards. Kill every last stinkin Moslem. Clean
& disinfect the mosques with Sarin. Why how about a queer auto-da-fe????
Make em suck cock or die. Show em a thing or two about real Western
values and strong horses.
2701. jexster - 1/4/2004 7:27:17 AM
Maybe they want their women to be women Ed. Ever stop to think of things from
their point of view? Perhaps your average red blooded towel head has a point.
{erhaps they do don't like it very much when the US invades their nation, its
troops but the vangaurd of the latest and greatest in culture fad chic -
"Lesbian bisexual chic now all the rage with US Teens"
Maybe the Muslim
faithful don't want to be forced to watch Madonna laying lip locks on Brittany?
Maybe they perfer to keep their women barefoot, burhka'ed and pregnant.
A US Army Jackboot on the neck - maybe that isn't such a terrific way to
win friends and influence people after all?
The
Ultimate Straight Male Fantasy Comes True - Bisexual Lesbian Love All the Rage
Among the Nearly Legal Set
Some see it as the latest cool trend
among girls in America's high schools. Others claim it is just teenagers doing
what they do best - being rebellious. Either way, a wave of 'bisexual chic' is
sweeping the United States.
Emboldened by such images as Madonna kissing
Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera on a TV awards show, girls are proudly
declaring their alternative sexualities at a younger age than ever before.
'It's a countrywide thing,' said Jessie Gilliam, a project manager for
the Washington-based gay and lesbian support group Youth Resource.
2702. jexster - 1/4/2004 7:27:46 AM
Lesby love...what will they think of next!
2703. jexster - 1/4/2004 8:25:40 AM
Message # 2650
Aaah the woosey elites! God daman let's not bother with the "root
causes"...let's just send in our glorious legions and kick some butt.
That this sort of mindless chest thumping drivel could pass for
thoughtful much less insightful commentary tells all that need be told about the
neocon dilletante. The Arab street's intellectuals are the only phoney baloney
being sliced these days.
2704. jexster - 1/4/2004 8:33:04 AM
aren't the only phoney baloney..
Have a slice...
Osama Bin
Laded and his jihadists thrive precisely because secular government in the Arab
world has failed its population and Israel, why sure its a fine place to be, but
not to the Arabs you see. To them, Israel and US policy in the region represent
yet another failure of secular government. That is precisely what Bin Laden
counted on. He doesn't sit around "hating freedom". He doesn't much care whether
we live or die. He just wants to discredit and humiliate the secular states in
the Muslim world so that he can advance his agenda.
Content? Forget
content for any who can prose like this seriously:
"parasitic
relationship between the foreign and domestic critics of the West"
(I
wonder what the "West" this guy has in mind!)
"an elite would be more
likely to blame itself for the calamity"
(there's no rage like that of a
phoney intellectual priss scorned)
"than marshalling its legions to
defeat a tribe"
(or more precisely marshalling THEIR tribes . Sort of
foreign legion I suppose - of course it was the West, with a big assist from the
USA who gave OBL his start and of course, we have left a shitload of broken
promises, a failing state, record opium production to keep the self ashamed
elites of europe well numbed the pain of that self loathing!)
2705. jexster - 1/4/2004 8:37:01 AM
ashamed elites had completely assumed control of American political,
cultural, and spiritual life
The effete elites - got that from Mein
Kampf or perhaps one of the more masculine NASDP intellectuals?
Thank
God for our Manly NeoJacobin Prisses at the National Review - a regular Army of
God - an elite that knows no shame (just look at their writing!). We need more
fine Likud family values for an Israel we can all be proud of.
Nice to
know though that gays in the military are the hallmark of an advanced culture.
I haven't read such overwrought pretentious drivel since the last time I
tried to finish a Said or Chomsky piece - years. These idiots are winning the
race to the bottom.
2706. jexster - 1/4/2004 8:48:35 AM
Of mighty legions and mighty mice droppings for my phoney baloney...WARNING
Ashamed Elite Self-Flagellation Zone
Wanna know why OBL is so
sucvessful...National Review & Weakly Standard are standard equipment in WH
crappers.
Think Again: A Forgotten War
Americans hear about
Iraq, but almost nothing about the war that, had it been better funded, planned
and executed, might actually have done something to arrest the threat of
terrorism.
2707. wonkers2 - 1/4/2004 9:08:17 AM
Making Compromises to Keep Iraq Whole
2708. arkymalarky - 1/4/2004 12:19:04 PM
Jex?
2709. jexster - 1/4/2004 12:59:58 PM
Not me I swear. Its all just a vast conspiracy of NeoJacobin
psuedo-intellectual crackpots to silence the voice of Truth, Sound Morals,
Clarity of Thought, and Purity of Essence.
2710. jexster - 1/4/2004 1:01:10 PM
A Zombie at Large in the Middle East
Current US strategy in the "war on terrorism" is a kind of
zombie. It has been killed, slowly and painfully, by the Iraqi Sunni Arab
insurgency of recent months. Its rotting corpse still walks around as if alive
but as time goes by more and more bits are going to fall off. The question for
uncommitted European governments, such as Gerhard Schroder's in Germany, is
whether they should join this spectacle.
It is their duty to their
citizens to be very careful in this matter. As the Istanbul bombings showed,
close support for US strategy brings with it an increased risk of terrorist
attack. Governments can legitimately ask their citizens to undergo this risk
only if they themselves have genuine confidence in US strategy. At present, it
is impossible to have such confidence.
2711. jexster - 1/4/2004 1:04:03 PM
It is not just in Iraq that US strategy is bankrupt. Despite tactical
successes such as Sunday's battle in Samarra, the fighting there, and the number
of US troops needed to contain it, have also in effect killed off the entire
"Bush doctrine" of pre-emptive war. As US soldiers and officials acknowledge in
private, the US simply does not have the troops or will for another war
elsewhere. If Washington were crazy enough to launch another war without having
itself been attacked, the result would be political revolt not just among US
allies but also within the US itself.
This is therefore a good moment
for European and other governments to insist that in return for help in Iraq and
the Middle East, the US must develop a new overall strategy. ...
the
conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, the issue that tends to unite the
Muslim world in hostility to the US and its allies. This is the best moment for
a long time to press for a genuine, two-state solution to this conflict. As
prominent figures in both Israel and the US have begun to warn, it may also be
the last possible moment.
If Israel continues on its present course,
what will emerge will in effect be a single state between the Jordan and the
Mediterranean in which a future Palestinian majority will be held down by
apartheid methods. Those making such a warning have included four former heads
of Israel's Shin Bet security service; one of their number, Ami Ayalon, has
declared that Israeli policy is "taking sure, steady steps to a place where the
state of Israel will no longer be a democracy and a home for the Jewish people".
Meanwhile Ariel Sharon, the Israeli prime minister, is looking increasingly weak
and isolated at home.
That explains the sudden rash of Likudite
propaganda in the National Review, breaking like a bad case of genital herpes.
Gay rights gay schmights
2712. jexster - 1/4/2004 1:33:24 PM
The Democratic Revolutionary: Policy or Slogan, Real or Faith
Based?
The advance e-mail notice to reporters from the White
House said that President Bush's Nov. 6 speech proclaiming a "forward strategy
of freedom in the Middle East" ....
Given that buildup, it's fair to
ask: Has anything changed? Articulating a philosophy is one thing; making policy
is another.
Yo succeed, Bush's vision must be backed by more than a near
religious belief in the universality of democracy and in what he termed
America's "calling" to bring it about. After all, it was just such faith that
led the White House to minimize the obstacles to democracy in Iraq.
Having set our sights beyond Iraq's borders, the Bush administration
must translate a philosophy into a long-term regional strategy suited to the
complexities of Arab politics. He must find a way to promote democratic
institutions there, not just assert his faith in them from here.
How
can the administration help Arab reformers escape the trap of liberalized
autocracy? ..Neoconservatives favor a policy of shaking up the region in the
hope that a shock to the system will empower democratic forces. Neo-realists
favor a decidedly less optimistic policy of incremental change, a strategy in
keeping with years of American efforts to promote democracy in the Arab world.
Although Bush's heart is certainly with the first camp, a close reading
of his Nov. 6 speech reveals that his head may be partly with the second.
Such caution is born of an ... anxiety about the growing influence of
illiberal Islamists who are waiting to hijack liberal reforms.
The most
telling aspect of Bush's speech, and of the policies being pursued by State's
MEPI, is the absence of any discussion of fundamental constitutional reforms.
2713. jexster - 1/4/2004 2:35:07 PM
Democracy
Snake Oil: Uncertain Antidote or Neocon Miracle Cure for the "Root Causes" of
Terrorism?
From latest issue of Current History, CEIP Democracy
& Rule of Law Project Director Thomas Carothers:
In the rush to
embrace a new line, the US government and the broader US need to recognize the
substantial
obstacles on the path to democratization.
One obstacle
is the facile assumption that a straight line exists between progress on
democratization and the elimination of the roots of Islamic terrorism. The
sources of Islamic radicalism and the embrace of anti-American terrorism by some
radicals are multifaceted and cannot be reduced to the simple proposition that
the lack of democracy in the Arab world is the main cause.
Second,
although many people in Washington may have decided that the Middle East’s
democratic moment has arrived, a discernible democratic trend in the region
itself is not evident.
Third, the United States faces a tremendous
problem of credibility in asserting itself as a prodemocratic actor in the
Middle East. Confronted with the notion that the Bush administration is now
committed to democracy in the region, many Arabs react with incredulity,
resentment, and outright
anger. They have a very hard time taking the idea
seriously...
As the USAdvisory Group on Public Diplomacy in the Arab and
Muslim World highlighted in its October 2003 report, “hostility toward America
[in the Muslim world] has reached shocking levels.”
2714. Edmund Dantes - 1/4/2004 2:44:26 PM
Why I get all misty over your new found concern for gay rights.
Eh. I have concern for human rights, Jasper.
Why you
really have got me by my identity politics short hairs now don't you!
Now, now, it's not all about you. Lots of bleeding-heart liberals are on
the wrong side of history--and even their supposed beliefs.
2715. jexster - 1/4/2004 3:06:21 PM
In the two years since, the US policy establishment has come to believe
that promoting democracy in the Middle East should be a component of the war on
terrorism—part of a broader effort to go beyond the active pursuit of terrorist
groups to address the underlying roots of terrorism.
Don't you just hate phoney intellectuals Ed, pathetic hucksters for some
worn out old ideology or other who forever root about like so many fat sows for
root causes to feed The Cause?
2716. jexster - 1/4/2004 3:20:43 PM
Why damn Ed you sure had me fooled !
Here I thought you were just
taking another poke at bleeding heart liberals and all the while there you were
bleeding like a stuck compassinate conservative pig! 
2717. concerned - 1/4/2004 5:03:31 PM