Saturday, July 23, 2016

THIS JUST IN! DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ SAYS LET THEM DRINK PISS!

BULLY BOY PRESS &  CEDRIC'S BIG MIX -- THE KOOL AID TABLE



"YOU PEONS WERE NEVER SUPPOSED TO HAVE KNOWN!"  WASHERWOMAN SCHULTZ SCREAMED AT THESE REPORTERS THIS MORNING.  "SCREW YOU ALL!  I RUN THINGS AND I RUN THEM MY WAY!  IF YOU DON'T LIKE IT, BUY A TICKET TO THE UKRAINE! WE DON'T NEED YOU! NOT ANY OF YOU!  AND IF YOU DON'T VOTE FOR US, IT WON'T MATTER, I'VE BOUGHT THE VOTING MACHINES!"




The disaster that is newly 'liberted' Falluja has many concerned about what happens to the city and citizens of Mosul when Iraqi forces attempt to 'liberate' it from the Islamic State which has held it since June of 2014.


The conflict in has severe humanitarian consequences Nearly 1/3 of the population –10,000,000 people– need aid
Too many people in Iraq are still suffering
Nearly one third of the population of Iraq –10,000,000 people– need aid. Despite limited resources, WHO has so far provided emergency health kits & 10 mobile clinics this year. But that's not enough.







We don't hear much about this but there are 1.5 million internally displaced children in alone.






Yesterday, the United Nations announced:


One of the top United Nations officials in Iraq is warning that an expected military operation in Mosul will lead to the largest and most dramatic humanitarian crisis in the world, which could impact as many as 1.5 million civilians. 
“The impact of the Mosul military campaign on civilians will be devastating,” said Lise Grande, UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Iraq. “Mass casualties among civilians are likely and families trying to flee are expected to be at extreme risk.” 
The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) is asking for an additional $284 million to start preparing food, water, emergency shelter and medical assistance, and other immediately needed aid. 
Military operations by the Government of Iraq and its allies to retake areas from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) are already forcing hundreds of thousands of civilians, including more than 85,000 people from Fallujah, to flee their homes in search of safety. 
More than 3.3 million Iraqis are currently displaced across the country and as many as 2.5 million more people may become newly displaced along the Anbar and Mosul corridors and in Mosul city in the months ahead. 


SWISSINFO CHANNEL reports Switzerland has donated the US equivalent of $1 million dollars.  Canada pledged $158 million.

Yesterday, in DC, Secretary of State John Kerry insisted, "I am pleased to announce that, by securing more than $2 billion of pledges that we know will be forthcoming, we have exceeded our expectations and the conference is by all measures successful. Within that total is more than $450 million for humanitarian assistance, much of which is going to go directly to the most recent UN humanitarian appeal.  I’m very proud to say that the United States, each of the countries here, have donated significant – hundreds of millions of dollars, and I think when we finished just making our commitments, we were well over half a billion dollars, and now we are over the – excuse me, were well over half a billion and close to the full billion, and now we’re over the billion."


Sorry to interrupt the chorus of "We Are The World" but how will it be ensured that the money goes to those in need?


Kerry's comments included, "The goal of our pledging conference is to raise money to help Iraqis in four priority areas: humanitarian aid, de-mining, immediate stabilization, and longer-term recovery."


These would have been questions to pursue but Elise Labbot didn't.

CNN's reporter got the first question -- when you're the State Dept's pet you get those sort of favors -- and immediately turned a briefing on Iraq into Turkey.

No one was surprised.

When everyone's whispering -- true or false, I don't know -- that you're sleeping with John Kerry, presumably, you're calling the shots.  He is after all married (to a very good friend of mine, so watch your back, Elise, if the rumors are true and say prayers of thanks that you don't live in China).  And if the rumors aren't true, stop pretending flirting is part of a reporter's arsenal.


Iraq's attending this conference with government officials.  Presumably their hands are out.


And Iraq is one of the most corrupt countries in the world and has been for over a decade -- see the rankings on Transparency Index.


Great to meet university students - they're angry at Iraq's politicians for stealing their future.






Yes, the students are angry, as are the people of Iraq.

Iraq is an oil rich country raking in billions in oil revenues each year -- billions more than they have millions of people.  Yet government corruption is so great that this oil rich country now has to beg the  International Money Fund for dollars.  You don't catch oil rich Saudi Arabia doing that.


RECOMMENDED: "Iraq snapshot"





Thursday, July 21, 2016

THIS JUST IN! NECK AND NECK, NECKING WITH OBSCENITY!

BULLY BOY PRESS &  CEDRIC'S BIG MIX -- THE KOOL AID TABLE

DEADLOCKED IN OHIO, CRANKY CLINTON AND DULL DONALD ARE NECK IN NECK WHICH CAN ONLY BE SEEN AS A VICTORY OF THE MOMENT FOR DULL DONALD.

THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY SUPERDELGATES PUT THEIR FAITH IN SOUR PUSS CRANKY CLINTON DESPITE HER PAST HISTORY AND WELL KNOWN DIVISIVE PERSONALITY AND THEY INSISTED SHE WAS A SURE THING.

OHIO, TRADITIONALLY A BATTLE GROUND STATE, BEGS TO DIFFER.

THINGS CAN CHANGE BETWEEN NOW AND NOVEMBER BUT FOR NOW IT'S GOOD NEWS FOR DULL DONALD AND ALL THE OTHER BLOW HARDS IN AMERICA!






Starting with War Criminal Tony Blair, Nicole Stinson (DAILY STAR) reports:

The Iraq War Families Campaign Group launched an online appeal to the raise £50,000 to "bring to justice those responsible for the war and the deaths of our loved ones" earlier today.
In the less than a day they have managed to attract 1,428 backers.
They now have their sights on raising £150,000 to cover legal costs.

THE MIRROR adds, "It comes weeks after the Chilcot report tore into Mr Blair, other leading politicians and senior officials over their actions before, during and after the conflict, in which 179 British service personnel died."  Adam Taylor (WASHINGTON POST) notes, "Blair came under renewed scrutiny after the release of the Chilcot inquiry. The report included evidence suggesting that he had misrepresented intelligence ahead of the war. In one memo from July 2002 before the war, Blair writes to President George W. Bush that 'I will be with you, whatever' -- which many took as implying that he would support the war, no matter the opposition."

But while those injured by Tony Blair have to crowd source to get money for legal bills, Robert Mendick and Ben Farmer (TELEGRAPH OF LONDON) explain, "Taxpayers will be obliged to pay all Tony Blair’s legal bills if he is sued by the families of soldiers killed in Iraq."


From thug to thug, Nouri al-Maliki.

Bully Boy Bush made Nouri prime minister in 2006.  He was not a success.  In 2010, Iraq held elections.  Nouri lost.  He then refused to step down and brought the country to a halt for eight months -- the political stalemate.

At the start of the stalemate, May 2010, Peter Kenyon (NPR's MORNING EDITION) spoke with Iraqis including Durgham Sabah:

"Why is that? Allawi got the most seats, and the constitution says he should form the government," Sabah says. "If Maliki had won, you can bet the government would have been formed in a hurry. What has Maliki done? Four years and we have no security, no jobs, no water, no electricity."

Two months later, still no prime minister and Marina Ottaway and Danial Kaysi (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace) explaining:


Maliki has shown so far that he is determined to continue as prime minister. His insistence prevented the formation of a single Shi’i coalition before the election, leading to the emergence of Maliki’s own State of Law (SoL), which he dominates, and the Iraqi National Alliance (INA), which groups the other important Shi’i parties and personalities, including the Iraqi Supreme Council of Iraq (ISCI), the Sadrists, the Badr organization, and former Prime Minister Ibrahim Jafari. Maliki’s insistence that he must remain prime minister has kept the new parliamentary Shi’i bloc, the National Coalition—which includes State of Law and the INA—from speaking with one voice. Instead, the parties in the INA are negotiating separately with Iraqiya and the Kurdish parties, and have even established their own diplomatic contacts with other countries in the region.



So how did he become prime minister for a second term?

Barack Obama gave it to Nouri.

He had the US broker a deal -- the Erbil Agreement -- a contract which went around the voters of Iraq and gave Nouri a second term in exchange for power sharing concessions Nouri agreed to.

It was a legal contract and all the parties, including Nouri al-Maliki, signed it.

November 10, 2010, The Erbil Agreement is signed.  November 11, 2010, the Iraqi Parliament has their first real session in over eight months and finally declares a president, a Speaker of Parliament and Nouri as prime minister-designate -- all the things that were supposed to happen in April of 2010 but didn't.


March 7, 2010, Iraq concluded Parliamentary elections. The Guardian's editorial board noted in August 2010, "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." 

How right they were.



RECOMMENDED: "Iraq snapshot"

Sunday, July 17, 2016

THIS JUST IN! ?????

BULLY BOY PRESS &  CEDRIC'S BIG MIX -- THE KOOL AID TABLE









The chances of a liberated Iraq most likely vanished this week with the International Money Fund announcing:

The IMF has approved a three-year, $5.34 Billion loan for Iraq focused on implementing economic and financial policies to help the country cope with lower oil prices and ensure debt sustainability. 

The loan will be provided under the Stand-By Arrangement facility and also includes measures to protect vulnerable populations—critical in a time of ongoing conflict, which has resulted in over 4 million internally displaced people. 



There has been silence on this topic -- even among notable 'lefties' like Phylis Bennis -- as we noted January 15th, "Even though the IMF will be yet another form of occupation."


Iraq's Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani has long warned against taking money from the IMF but Prime Minister Hayder al-Abadi elected to ignore al-Sistani.

There was time for American left 'leaders' to voice their objection to this take over.

The May 19th snapshot noted:


Mohammad Tayseer and Dana Khraiche (BLOOMBERG NEWS) report, "Iraq has reached a $5.4 billion, three-year loan agreement with the International Monetary Fund to help OPEC’s second-biggest producer repair public finances damaged by the plunge in oil prices and war with Islamic State militants."
The revenge fantasies, where the daughter of Saddam Hussein must be captured and flogged in the streets of Baghdad?
They are raw meat tossed to the masses to distract them from the ongoing corruption in Iraq.
Billions of dollars have disappeared from the country's coffers as a result of corrupt politicians and officials.
Rather than fretting over the daughter of Saddam Hussein, they might ask how Nouri al-Maliki's son ended up with all those sports cars and residences outside of Iraq.
Where did that money come from?
How did Nouri's two terms as prime minister of Iraq leave him such a wealthy man?
Those are questions that need to be asked.
The Iraqi people live in squalor.
They have no dependable public services.
Baghdad floods in the raining season -- water up to the knees in some sections (including Sadr City) and that's due to the crumbling public infrastructure.
The corruption is not a secret.
There have been US Congressional hearings on the topic going back to the years when Bully Boy Bush occupied the White House.
Billions have been stolen.
And now the IMF is getting their hooks into Iraq.
THE JORDAN TIMES reports:


The IMF $5.4 billion loan to Iraq will have an annual interest rate of 1.5 per cent, Iraq's Central Bank Governor Ali Al Alak said at a press conference, following a week of talks with IMF officials in Jordan, Reuters reported.
The IMF deal will allow Iraq to secure additional financial aid of around $15 billion over the next three years, including securing international bonds, according to [Iraq's Finance Minister Hoshiyar] Zebari. 



At this late stage, who's still pretending that the IMF helps out countries in trouble?





Thursday, Stephen Kalin (REUTERS) reported:

Pressured by lower-than-expected oil prices, Iraq will cut non-oil spending in its 2016 budget by 15 percent and take on several billion dollars in international debt, it said in a memo released by the International Monetary Fund on Thursday.

OPEC's second-largest producer, which relies on oil exports for nearly all its revenue, has sought donor support amid a collapse in global crude prices and a costly war against Islamic State militants that has displaced more than 3.4 million people.


Non-oil spending cut by 15%?

It's already been cut.

The Iraqi people will suffer yet again.

The corruption is never-ending.

Which is why protests never end in Iraq.


Which is why even threats do not stop the protesters.

And threats were was issued Thursday ahead of Friday's protests.


AFP noted that the security forces issued an announcement that anyone protesting would be dealt with "as a terrorist threat."


RECOMMENDED: "Iraq snapshot"