BULLY BOY
PRESS & CEDRIC'S BIG MIX -- THE KOOL-AID
TABLE
CELEBRITY IN CHIEF BARRY O IS IN A PICKLE!
NEVER HAVING AN ACCOMPLISHMENT ANYONE COULD ACTUALLY POINT TO, BARRY O IS A CELEBRITY FAMOUS FOR BEING FAMOUS. AS SUCH, HE CAN'T AFFORD TO MISS ANY EVENT THAT MIGHT RESULT IN MEDIA ATTENTION.
FOR THAT REASON, HE HAS TO ATTEND A CONCERT TONIGHT! HE HAS TO! IT WILL BE BROADCAST ON TNT! THAT'S BASIC CABLE!
HAVING ALREADY PLANNED HIS NIPPLE SLIP FOR THE NIGHT, BARRY O IS BOUND AND DETERMINED TO ATTEND AND THE FACT THAT THE CONCERT WILL FEATURE PSY IS JUST SOMETHING HE'S NOT GOING TO WORRY ABOUT.
SURE, PSY CALLED -- TWICE! -- FOR THE DEATH OF U.S. SOLDIERS. SOME MIGHT POINT OUT THAT HE DID THAT AND CALLED FOR THE DEATHS OF THE SOLDIERS' FAMILIES. THOSE POINTING THAT OUT WOULD BE CORRECT.
BUT BARRY O NEEDS TO BE ON CAMERA! HE NEEDS TO BE ON CAMERA AT ALL TIMES! IF A CELEBRITY BREAKS WIND WHEN NO ONE'S AROUND, DID HE REALLY FART?
YES, BARRY O IS COMMANDER IN CHIEF OF THE MILITARY, BUT HE'S ALSO A WOMAN IN LOVE -- OR AT LEAST A CELEBRITY. SO LET HIM TWINKLE ALREADY!
FROM THE TCI WIRE:
The month isn't even ten days old yet, through Thursday, Iraq Body Count
counts 39 people killed from violence in Iraq so far this month (13
alone yesterday). Violence continues today. Alsumaria notes a Diwainya armed dispute lead to 2 people dead and a third injured, and a Baghdad home invasion killed 1 Sahwa. All Iraq News adds a Mosul attack left 1 police officer dead and two more injured, a Musayyib mortar attack left six people injured, a Mosul internet cafe owner was shot dead and 1 person was shot dead outside their Mosul home. and a Babylon roadside bombing left one person injured.
Yesterday, Al-Shorfa reports,
Nouri al-Maliki's Baghdad government announced that 7 previously armed
groups were joining the political process and they "include the 20th
Revolution Brigades, Malek al-Ashtar Brigade, Khalid Bin al-Walid
Brigade, Arab Tribes Sons Brigade, Omar Bin al-Khattab Brigade, Children
of Iraq Brigade and Saqr Quraish Brigade." This as Al-Bayyna reports a
member of the Parliament's National Reconciliation Committee issued a
statement declaring that reconciliation does not mean bringing in former
Ba'athists. He asserts that de-Ba'athifcation is the law of the land.
De-Ba'athification is the policy Paul Bremer oversaw in Iraq that forced
Iraqis out of jobs. That was the military, that was the government.
The reason? Belonging to the Ba'ath political party. That's a part that
Saddam Hussein would eventually head in Iraq. It's also a player
throughout the Middle East and part of a pan-Arab movement.
De-Ba'athifcation is seen as a huge mistake. And Nouri agreed to what we
call de-de-Ba'athifcation. He agreed to that in 2007. But he never
implemented it and, judging by the remarks today, there is no
governmental interest in healing that division.
Alsumaria reports that Minister of Transportation Hadi al-Amiri declared today that 15,000 families have suffered as a result of the refusal to implement Article 140. al-Amiri states that this has led some families to be denied Iraqi nationalities. As the leader of the Badr Organization, al-Amiri is part of the National Alliance (also known as the Ntional Iraqi Alliance which is led by Ibrahim al-Jaafari). What is going on? Why are so many Shi'ite politicians turning on Nouri publicly as he goes after the Kurds and the threat of a war with the Kurds looms? Qassim Khidhir Hamad (Niqash) spoke with the Islamic Supreme Council's Bashir Adel Gli this week. The Islamic Supreme Council is another Shi'ite political party which belongs to the National Alliance.
Alsumaria reports that Minister of Transportation Hadi al-Amiri declared today that 15,000 families have suffered as a result of the refusal to implement Article 140. al-Amiri states that this has led some families to be denied Iraqi nationalities. As the leader of the Badr Organization, al-Amiri is part of the National Alliance (also known as the Ntional Iraqi Alliance which is led by Ibrahim al-Jaafari). What is going on? Why are so many Shi'ite politicians turning on Nouri publicly as he goes after the Kurds and the threat of a war with the Kurds looms? Qassim Khidhir Hamad (Niqash) spoke with the Islamic Supreme Council's Bashir Adel Gli this week. The Islamic Supreme Council is another Shi'ite political party which belongs to the National Alliance.
NIQASH: How do you feel about the current relationship between the Shiite Muslims of Iraq and Iraq's Kurdistan people?
Bashir
Adel Gli: The relationship between Iraq's Shiite Muslims and the
Kurdish people is a historic one. It goes back to the time that
[religious leader] Grand Ayatollah Muhsin al-Hakim [the grandfather of
Ammar al-Hakim, current leader of the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council]
issued a fatwa [religious edict] in 1965 that forbade Shiite Muslims to
fight with the Kurdish.
This decree was copied and distributed all over Iraq and it had a big impact on Shiite Muslim soldiers.
He
issued that decree after some Sunni Muslim clerics issued a totally
different fatwa saying that their followers were allowed to kill the
Kurdish. The [Sunni Muslim-dominated] authorities were trying to find
some way of justifying their ethnic cleansing and killing of the Kurdish
people. And what al-Hakim said at the time made them very angry.
As a result, 70 members of al-Hakim's family were arrested and later killed.
Basically
Shiite Muslim ideology says that Shiites must support the oppressed at
all times; and that they must not support the dictator, no matter who
that dictator is.
NIQASH: So how do you see the current problem between Erbil and Baghdad: is it a Shiite Muslim-Kurdish problem?
Bashir
Adel Gli: No, it is the problem between the Dawa Party [headed by Nouri
al-Maliki] and the government of Iraqi Kurdistan. It is not a problem
between Shiites and Kurds in general.
And that is part of the how and why Nouri is losing ground at present on this issue. Turning to a Twitter conversation. Derek Brower is the editor-at-large of Petroleum Economist and he just left the KRG.
Kirk H. Sowell
If
Maliki still pushing idea of Peshmerga replaced in territories by local
force, don't see KRG accepting that since implies Pesh withdrawal
Derek Brower
a scrap. Either serious brinkmanship or impending war.
James
"I'd be skeptical" of the AP
report "unless things changed in the few hours since I've returned from
Kirkuk" Twetted Derek Brower yesterday afternoon. Apparently we're all
going to have to learn to be skeptical of AP because their report was wrong.
There has been no agreement. Tonight, Alsumaria reports
that KRG President Massoud Barzani issued a statement stating that the
only way to end the current crisis is to implement Article 140. The
main part of Article 140 of the Iraqi Constitution reads:
The
responsibility placed upon the executive branch of the Iraqi
Transitional Government stipulated in Aerticle 58 of the Transitional
Administrative Law shall extend and continue to the executive authority
elected in accordance with this Constitution, provided that it
accomplishes completely (normalization and census
and
concludes with a referendum in Kirkuk and other disputed territories to
determine the will of their citizens), by a date not to exceed the 31st
of December 2007.
That's from Iraq's
2005 Constitution. In the spring of 2006, after the Iraqi Parliament
wanted Ibrahim al-Jafaari as prime minister (it would have been his
second term) and the White House nixed the choice and insisted that
Nouri al-Maliki be made prime minister, Nouri took an oath to uphold the
Constitution. Article 140 is a part of the Constitution and it is very
clear in its wording that it must be implemented by December 2007. Yet
for Nouri's entire first term he refused to honor the Constitution.
Kirkuk is oil-rich and it is claimed by Nouri's central government out
of Baghdad and by the Kurdistan Regional Government with both set of
players making historical arguments on why they should be the one to lay
claim to Kirkuk. The way to settle it, as the Constitution made clear,
was a census and a referendum. But Nouri refused to implement Article
140. His term came to an end in early 2010. Iraq held parliamentary
elections in March 2010. Nouri's State of Law came in second to
Iraqiya. 2010 saw the continuation of a trend that emerged in the 2009
provincial elections. Iraqis were not interested in sects. They were
interested in a national identity.
Having
come in second to Ayad Allawi's Iraqiya, Nouri quickely stepped down --
and, no, he didn't. He refused to. He refused to let Iraqi move
forward. From the November 1, 2010 snapshot:
March 7th, Iraq concluded Parliamentary elections. The Guardian's editorial board noted in August,
"These elections were hailed prematurely by Mr Obama as a success, but
everything that has happened since has surely doused that optimism in a
cold shower of reality." 163 seats are needed to form the executive
government (prime minister and council of ministers). When no single
slate wins 163 seats (or possibly higher -- 163 is the number today but
the Parliament added seats this election and, in four more years, they
may add more which could increase the number of seats needed to form
the executive government), power-sharing coalitions must be formed with
other slates, parties and/or individual candidates. (Eight Parliament
seats were awarded, for example, to minority candidates who represent
various religious minorities in Iraq.) Ayad Allawi is the head of
Iraqiya which won 91 seats in the Parliament making it the biggest seat
holder. Second place went to State Of Law which Nouri al-Maliki, the
current prime minister, heads. They won 89 seats. Nouri made a big show
of lodging complaints and issuing allegations to distract and delay the
certification of the initial results while he formed a power-sharing
coalition with third place winner Iraqi National Alliance -- this
coalition still does not give them 163 seats. They are claiming they
have the right to form the government. In 2005, Iraq took four months and seven days to pick a prime minister. It's seven months and twenty-five days and still counting.
The
stalemate would continue for over a week more. Nouri was able to stamp
his feet and stop the political process because the US government
refused to side with the Iraqi voters. Instead of calling for the will
of the people to be honored, the Barack Obama White House demanded that
Nouri get a second term. From John Barry's "'The Engame' Is A Well Researched, Highly Critical Look at U.S. Policy in Iraq" (Daily Beast) last September:
Washington has little political and no military influence over these developments [in Iraq]. As Michael Gordon and Bernard Trainor charge in their ambitious new history of the Iraq war, The Endgame, Obama's administration sacrificed political influence by failing in 2010 to insist that the results of Iraq's first proper election be honored: "When the Obama administration acquiesced in the questionable judicial opinion that prevented Ayad Allawi's bloc, after it had won the most seats in 2010, from the first attempt at forming a new government, it undermined the prospects, however slim, for a compromise that might have led to a genuinely inclusive and cross-sectarian government."
Washington has little political and no military influence over these developments [in Iraq]. As Michael Gordon and Bernard Trainor charge in their ambitious new history of the Iraq war, The Endgame, Obama's administration sacrificed political influence by failing in 2010 to insist that the results of Iraq's first proper election be honored: "When the Obama administration acquiesced in the questionable judicial opinion that prevented Ayad Allawi's bloc, after it had won the most seats in 2010, from the first attempt at forming a new government, it undermined the prospects, however slim, for a compromise that might have led to a genuinely inclusive and cross-sectarian government."
When
your preferred candidate loses the vote, how do you install him to a
second term? You ignore the Constitution and create a new
'understanding.' So in November 2010, the White House brokered a new
contract known as the Erbil Agreement. The contract was signed by the
leaders of Iraq's various political blocs. In the contract, Nouri
agrees to give political party A various concessions if political party A
will allow him a second term as prime minister. So Nouri promises
various things to the various parties. To the Kurds, he promises, among
other things, that he will finally implement Article 140.
