BULLY BOY PRESS & CEDRIC'S BIG MIX -- THE KOOL-AID TABLE
YESTERDAY, UNITED STATES NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISOR SUSAN RICE INSISTED THAT WAR ON SYRIA WOULD NOT BE LIKE WAR ON IRAQ.
OF COURSE, DIRTY RICE IS NSA ONLY BECAUSE SHE COULDN'T GET SENATE CONFIRMATION FOR ANY JOB REQUIRING IT. THAT'S A RESULT OF HER LYING LAST YEAR ABOUT THE ATTACK ON BENGHAZI.
NEXT UP, DIRTY RICE TELLS AMERICA THAT THE ECONOMY IS BOOMING, HONEST, FOR REALS!
FROM THE TIC WIRE:
Richard Cohen is a Washington Post columnist. He's come under
intense criticism this year, more so than at any other time. It could
actually be a great thing. Columnists are supposed to generate
controversy, ideas are supposed to be provocative. The criticism also
allows Cohen to take a look at how he presents himself in his writing
and decide whether he's mispresenting or whether he thinks people are
misunderstanding what he's stating. Most of all, the constant dogpile
means that he is eagerly read by his harshest critics in the hopes that
they can catch something to criticize him for. All of that spells
success if you respond to it correctly.
I'm not one of Richard's harshest critics. I know him and I like him
and I will forever applaud his work on the illegal government spying of
the seventies. But his column showing up all over the place this week (here for San Jose Mercury News, here for Real Clear Politics to cite only two) is dead wrong. "Where's the moral outrage?" the headline asks.
Uh, don't know, Richard? Is the 'moral' outrage aimed at a same-sex
couple attempting to adopt? Or maybe it's aimed at an unwed, pregnant
woman? Who knows where the 'moral' outrage is and who really gives a
f**k? How about we talk ethical and leave 'morality' to the cowards who
are unable to debate ethics? Once again, from the classic comedy sketch (about the quiz show scandal) . . .
Mike Nichols: It's a moral issue.
Elaine May: Yes!
Mike Nichols: A moral issue.
Elaine May: Yes! Yes! Yes! It is a moral issue.
Mike Nichols: A moral issue.
Elaine May: And to me that's always so much more interesting than a real issue
Truly, let's talk about something that actually matters.
Richard is outraged by the deaths in Syria. I don't doubt that. And
he's worked himself up over it to write a column whose sincerity I don't
question.
Deaths are sad, wherever they take place. Syria's in the midst of a
civil war. Deaths take place in a civil war, as any student of history
knows. Deaths take place in revolutions as well. The American
Revolution was very bloody, for example. These are facts.
Cohen writes:
What perplexes me is how the
calls for Congress to rebuff President Obama are empty of moral
outrage. The civil war in Syria has cost more than 110,000 lives. It has
produced a humanitarian calamity -- well over 2 million refugees.
Bashar al-Assad has massacred his own people by conventional means and
is accused of using poison gas several times, most recently on Aug. 21,
when his military murdered 1,429 people, including more than 400
children.
Again, let's leave 'morality' out of it. Refugees? The Iraqi refugee
crisis had/has a higher number and as the BBC -- and only the BBC -- has
recently reported, violence returning to 2008 levels in today's Iraq
means that, yet again, Iraqis are fleeing the country in large numbers.
What has Bashar al-Assad done or not done? I have no idea. Nor does
Richard Cohen. But if they are "his own people," I guess he can feed
them or kill them or whatever.
"His own people"? Do you get how insulting that is, that mind-set?
It's truly imperialism at its worst. And that's what harms Cohen and
his column.
He's outraged. That's a feeling, we can talk about it, we can process it. But he has a feeling and he wants to act on it.
Somewhere along the way, a very smart man has lost his toolbox. All
Cohen has is killing. That is now his answer to everything. Something
must be done? Kill! Kill! Kill!
He's like a 'sexy vixen' in a Roger Corman film.
Cohen is smart enough to grasp -- if he'd take a breath -- that there are many ways to respond.
Cohen writes, "We should all be ashamed. The inescapable truth is that
the world needs a policeman. The inescapable truth is that only the U.S.
can play cop."
If that's all he has to offer, he needs to consider a serious vacation
because the well's gone dry and it's time to refill. More importantly,
he needs to shake off the tension because he is consumed with fear.
We need peace makers, we need diplomats. If America has a gun problem
(I'll leave that to others to decide, I do not support changes to the
Second Amendment), why wouldn't it? The government constantly threatens
at the barrel of a gun and this is treated as normal, people like
Richard Cohen will even applaud it. So why wouldn't many citizens in
the country model the behavior in their own lives? When your government
acts like a bully and gets applauded for it, it sends a message.
So those who treat the threats of violence as normal really shouldn't be
surprised as the society in the same country grows even more violent.
Cohen wants to provide a service? Try breaking with a culture that embraces violence.
Also stop attacking the American people (left, right, center,
apolitical) for 'not caring.' As donations and volunteer work in Haiti
demonstrate, there is no lack of humanitarian concern among Americans.
But Cohen and others don't want to measure that as "humanitarian" --
that which truly is humanitarian -- and that's what's so disturbing.
Bombing is not humanitarian. Bombing is war. If you want to advocate
for it, do it honestly. Stop being so chicken s**t that you try to
pretend you're being a humanitarian.
If you don't believe diplomacy can work, if you don't believe peace
talks could be productive, that's fine, state your opinion on that. But
don't ignore humanitarian means while insisting that bombing a people
is "humanitarian." It's war.
There's also a lack of honesty when what US President Barack Obama might order on Syria is 'discussed.' Tom Hayden (Beyond Chron) speaks bluntly about what is possible:
Secretary of State John Kerry even already has suggested a role for
American ground forces in his Senate testimony, for example in the case
of chaos or a takeover by Syrian militants in a vacuum. This was purely
"hypothetical" Kerry said, under sharp questioning. Then in his classic
way, Kerry retracted his retraction, sort of, by saying that there would
be no boots on the ground during "the civil war" phase of the conflict.
This statement left open the possibility of American ground troops if
and when the Assad regime begins disintegrating. At that point, does
anyone seriously believe there would be another Congressional debate?
The parallel with Iraq is crystal clear. That earlier war was based on
false information about "weapons of mass destruction" in the terrifying
hands of Saddam Hussein. In an interview, Paul Wolfowitz, one of the
war's architects, said that the non-existent weapons were the best
argument for mobilizing public opinion and a reluctant Congress. In this
war, there seems to be no question that a sarin-type gas attack killed
one thousand people, although a UN investigation is incomplete and there
are questions about who exactly ordered the attack. That major
difference aside, the eerie parallel with Iraq is that the chemical
weapons attack is a pretext for expanding the American war in Syria on a
much broader basis than is acknowledged.
The American public deserves a full explanation for what we are expected to support.
John Kerry . . . As a White House friend said to me today, "You know
Joe's loving this. For once, he's not the [administration] buffoon."
No, John holds that title. We have warned here repeatedly that Barack
needed to stop being such a little wimp and take control of his own
message instead of attempting to hide behind others. We've noted how
bad it makes Barack look on the world stage when John Kerry's acting as
'president' and not Secretary of State.
As we noted yesterday,
Kerry declared, "Sure, he could turn over every single bit of
his chemical weapons to the international community in the next week --
turn it over, all of it without delay and allow the full and total
accounting (of it) but he isn't about to do it and it can't be done."
He was speaking off the cuff, acting like he was the policy setter.
Now it's bit him in the butt as the government of Russia has grabbed it
and run with it. Of course they would grab it. They were already
mocking Kerry and calling him a liar because, well, he lied. So, of
course, they were looking for more to score with. And they ran with
John's adlibs.
Late Monday, the Russian government announced they'd be happy to help
with such an arrangement (securing any chemical weapons Syria may have)
and, as the AP reports, the White House immediately tried to distance themselves from Kerry's words until they were forced to go along.
Reuters notes, "Syria
accepted a Russian proposal on Tuesday to give up chemical weapons and
win a reprieve from U.S. military strikes but serious differences
emerged between Russia and the United States that could obstruct a U.N. resolution to seal a deal."
Russia's issue is they want a pledge of no attack on Syria from the US
government. That's actually a smart demand considering the way the US
government forced UN weapons inspectors out of Iraq to start the Iraq
War and then repeatedly lied that then-Iraqi President Saddam Hussein
wouldn't let the inspectors do their work.
Kerry went before the House Armed Services Committee today and insisted:
If we don't answer Assad today, we will
irreparably damage a century-old standard that has protected American
troops in war. So to every one of your constituents, if they were to say
to you, "Why did you vote for this even though we said we don't want to
go to war?" Because you want to protect American troops, because you
want to protect America's prohibition and the world's prohibition
against these weapons.
There's no need to protect American troops from those alleged weapons.
American troops aren't in Syria. Keep them out of Syria -- which does
not border the United States -- and it shouldn't be an issue.
RECOMMENDED: "Iraq snapshot"
"Over 300 killed in Iraq in the first 10 days of th..."
"Iraq and Syria"
"Where are the televised rebuttals?"
"The cracks emerge"
"Blunder Man and Barack"
"revenge"
"Benghazi"
"The public opinion has grown firm"
"The truth about the media"
"Movie lists"
"NSA"
"Barack's illegal spying"
"Go away, Goody"
"THIS JUST IN! BIG NOSE BUTTS IN AGAIN!"
Wednesday, September 11, 2013
Tuesday, September 10, 2013
THIS JUST IN! BIG NOSE BUTTS IN AGAIN!
BULLY BOY PRESS & CEDRIC'S BIG MIX -- THE KOOL-AID TABLE
IT TAKES A GOODY WHORE, DOESN'T IT?
RACE BAITER AND HONKY CRACKER AMY GOODMAN CAN'T GET HER NOSE OUT OF BLACK BUSINESS LIKE SHE THINKS SHE'S (A) AN HONORARY AFRICAN-AMERICAN OR (B) THE NEEDED VOICE OF THE BLACK COMMUNITY.
SHE'S JUST ANOTHER MEDIA JEW WORKING THE RACE BEAT.
TODAY SHE WASTED TIME FOR REAL NEWS BY PLAYING THE CLIP OF WHAT APPEARS TO BE A LIAR CALLING 9-11. NOT ONLY WAS THE WOMAN CALLING 9-11 ALREADY SEEN AS A LIAR GOODY HELPED THE LIES BY SAYING THAT THE WOMAN NOW DENIES HER HUSBAND HAD A GUN.
NO GOODY WHORE, THE POLICE REVEALED THERE WAS NO GUN. ONLY AFTER THAT -- AND OTHER DETAILS OF THE WOMAN'S 9-11 CALL WERE REVEALED TO BE FAKE DID THE WOMAN ALLOW THERE WAS NO GUN.
GOODY, STOP GIVING PUSHY NEW YORKERS SUCH A BAD NAME. LEARN TO MIND YOUR OWN F**KING BUSINESS AND GET YOUR BIG NOSE OUT OF THE AFRICAN-AMERICAN COMMUNITY. YOU ARE NOT AN HONORARY BLACK. YOUR WAR ON GEORGE ZIMMERMAN DOES NOT MAKE YOU LOOK 'DOWN WITH THE PEOPLE.' IT JUST MAKES YOU LOOK LIKE THE PUSHY, RACE BAITER YOU ARE.
FROM THE TCI WIRE:
In 1990's film adaption of John le Carre's The Russia House, Michelle Pfeiffer's Katya declares, "I hope you are not being frivolous, Barley. My life now only has room for truth." It should be the axiom of today.
Law and Disorder Radio booked biggest waste of time Rashid Khalidi.
It was an embarrassment. Any insight Khalidi may have had in this interview was buried by his wet dreaming, mattress humping of how Barack is too smart for this (an attack on Syria). We're then reduced to nutty conspiracies. Since the military appears against this, who's forcing it?
Citing a 'report' on The Daily Show, Khalidi begins listing William Kristol and others.
Kristol does not control Barack. The push for war comes from Barack and only Barack. He is the one who wants it. Even he admits that the buck stops with him. As war looms, the country does not have time to indulge Khalidi's immature fantasies.
His nonsense is as bad as Medea Benjamin. CodeStink did not lead on Syria and wouldn't be doing anything on any scale now were it not for the fact that they got called on their b.s. While refusing to lead on Syria, they were happy to speak to the press as 'experts' on today's antiwar movement.
Why aren't more people in the streets? It's just hard to mobilize whimpered Medea (and other 'leaders').
Reality, more people are getting in the streets. This week's protests have been larger than last week's and they will continue to grow. Credit A.N.S.W.E.R., IRC and The World Can't Wait for that, they have been among the ones doing the heavy lifting.
But the biggest obstacle to protests have been the idiots like Medea and Khalidi. You want people in the street, you have to personalize it. That's reality. Concepts have not gotten people into the streets in post WWII America. Occupy in NYC couldn't get a crowd going until they lied that Radiohead would be giving a free concert.
To protest US actions, the face on the pinata has to be the US president.
But fools like Khalidi go on the radio to excuse Barack, to praise his alleged intellect and what have you. Fools like Medea call out a Hillary Clinton or a John Kerry but heaven forbid that they ever show the same contempt for Barack that they do for those in his administration or the same contempt for Barack that they expressed for Bully Boy Bush.
Outrage over Barack's actions grow and then comes CodeStink to clamp down on it. No, be outraged. When you consistently insist he's smart, rational and peaceful, why the hell should I leave the comfort of my home, give up time I could be using on something fun and go out into the streets to protest?
When you go out in the street
So many hassles with the heat
No one there can fill your desire
Cops out with the megaphones
Telling people stay inside their home
Man, can't they see the world's on fire?
-- "Safe In My Garden," written by John Phillips, first appears on the Mamas and the Papas' The Papas and the Mamas
The 'cops' today include the worthless trash like Medea Benjamin. You may remember I-Need-Attention Benjamin heckled Barack in May. She immediately went on Democracy Now! to insist, "And I didn't do what I did to embarrass the president. I did it because I feel that he needs to be pushed more." To what? Use more drones? Why the f**k do you apologize for calling out the leader of The Drone War? Grown ups don't. America's Mental Mall Cops do.
Barack is over The Drone War, he's over the assault on Libya, he's refused to talk to the American people about the army unit he sent back into Iraq last fall, he's over the illegal spying, go on down the list.
Stop protecting him. Glen Ford (Black Agenda Report) isn't afraid to call it like it is, "The First Black U.S. President, who was hired (by corporate sponsors, and later elected) to put a new face on U.S. imperial policy after his predecessor’s defeat and international isolation over Iraq, now finds himself more alone in the world than George Bush, and with even less support at home." Cornell West explains to Chris Hedges (Truth Dig):
"He is a shell of a man," West said of Obama. "There is no deep conviction. There is no connection to something bigger than him. It is a sad spectacle, sad if he were not the head of an empire that is in such decline and so dangerous. This is a nadir. William Trotter and Du Bois, along with Ida B. Wells-Barnett, were going at Book T tooth and nail. Look at the fights between [Marcus] Garvey and Du Bois, or Garvey and A. Philip Randolph. But now if you criticize Obama the way Randolph criticized Garvey, you become a race traitor and an Uncle Tom. A lot of that comes out of the Obama machine, the Obama plantation."
The failure of supposed antiwar 'leaders' to hold Barack accountable, to call him out the way they would Bully Boy Bush, goes a long way towards explaining the attacks on Cornel West for truth telling. Medea and her ilk harm Cornel, harm all of us, harm the state of discourse.
Barack Obama has been elected president twice. How weak and helpless do you really think he is?
The people are outraged, stop trying to prevent that. The outrage is genuine and understandable and it is the only thing that will prevent more indiscriminate killings by Barack. He is not a community organizer. He is the president of the United States. As he established in his first term, he intends to use the office as enemy of the people.
And at this point, you're either a defender of Barack or you're a defender of the people attacked. You can't rush around, as CodeStink does, defending Barack and also be defending the people of Libya, Syria, Yemen, Pakistan, etc. It's as ridiculous as Gloria Steinem in 1972 saying she was supporting Shirley Chisholm in 12 states and George McGovern in the rest -- as Shirley herself publicly pointed out, that wasn't helping Chisholm's presidential campaign at all.
And covering for Barack isn't helping the people of Syria. Ralph Nader (CounterPunch) notes in an open letter to Barack:
Your argument for shelling Syria is to maintain “international credibility” in drawing that “red line” regardless, it seems, of the loss of innocent Syrian civilian life, causalities to our foreign service and armed forces in that wider region, and retaliation against the fearful Christian population in Syria (one in seven Syrians are Christian). But the more fundamental credibilities are to our Constitution, to the neglected necessities of the American people, and to the red line of observing international law and the UN Charter (which prohibit unilateral bombing in this situation).
As Ava and I noted Sunday:
The heart of the argument to attack Syria these days goes something like, "What will it say about Barack Obama, after he's made clear he wants to attack Syria, if the Congress denies him?" Assuming that a Congressional denial did say something about Barack, isn't the more important question: What will it say about the American people and democracy, after the people have made clear that they don't want an attack on Syria, if the people's elected leaders refuse to heed public sentiment? In a functioning press, that question would be asked far more often than what-will-this-mean-to-Barack because, in case you've forgotten, no supreme law of the land opens, "I, the President"; however, the Constitution opens, "We the People . . ." It's a fact that the politicians and the media repeatedly ignore and silence.
MoveOn is stepping up, to their credit, and being a voice of the people. Rebecca Shabad (The Hill) reports they have followed up on last week's promise, "Liberal group MoveOn released a 30-second TV ad Monday opposing U.S. intervention in Syria that will run on MSNBC this week, according to its website." Click here to stream the commercial. Transcript:
Announcer: We never set out to spend 8 years in Iraq or to be mired down for more than a decade in Afghanistan
Title Card: NEARLY 7,00 AMERICAN LIVES LOST IN IRAQ & AFGHANISTAN, washingtonpost.com/facesofthefallen
Title Card: ALMOST $2 TRILLION SPENT IN IRAQ & AFGHANISTAN The Washington Post, 3/28/13
Announcer: So what should America expect if we rush into Syria alone with no real plan for the consequences.
Title Card: "SHOULD U.S. GOT IT ALONE IN SYRIA?" USA TODAY, 9/5/13
Announcer: We already know, it gets worse. Congress, most Americans oppose missile strikes in Syria. Don't lead us down this road again.
Title Card: CALL CONGRESS AT (202) 224-3121 & TELL THEM: VOTE NO ON MILITARY ACTION IN SYRIA
Good for MoveOn. I'm not a MoveOn booster. We long ago dubbed them WalkOn.com. But I have no problem noting that on this issue, they listened to their members and they took action. Good for them.
What's more offensive than government officials who won't listen to the public? How about those who also openly spit on the law? Samantha Power, A Problem From Hell, has no respect for the law. Today, Steve Inskeep spoke to her for Morning Edition (NPR -- link is audio and transcript):
INSKEEP: Let me ask a central question for you, because you're representing the U.S. to the United Nations, which has not authorized a strike. Would an American strike on Syria be legal?
POWER: If we take military action in this context, it will be a legitimate, necessary and proportionate response to this large-scale and indiscriminate use of chemical weapons by the regime. [Blah blah blah of Power lying and spinning and we're not in the mood. She's avoided the question.]
INSKEEP: So let me just make sure that I'm clear on this. You're saying that something needs to be done and it is time to go outside the legal system, outside the legal framework. You believe it is right to do something that is just simply not legal.
POWER: In the cases of - we've seen in the past, there are times when there is a patron like Syria backed by Russia. We saw this in Kosovo as well, where it was just structurally impossible to get meaningful international action through the Security Council. And yet, in this case, you have the grave breach of such a critical international norm in terms of the ban on chemical weapons use, it is very important that the international community act so as to prevent further use.
In other words, legality doesn't matter. In other words, the law matters when Power says it does and the law is irrelevant when Power desires to ignore it. That may be how she sees the law but that's not actually how it works. IPS analyst Phyllis Bennis has repeatedly explained how the law works. We'll note her speaking to Peter Hart on FAIR's Counterspin two Fridays ago:
Phyllis Bennis: Only if the [United Nations] Security Council votes to endorse the use of force is the use of force legal. No other agency, institution, organization has that right. So the Kosovo precedent that you refer to and that unfortunately this is being talked about in the press. It's being asserted that if the Security Council doesn't agree, there are other options. Yeah, there are other options. The problem is they're all illegal. The Kosovo model was illegal. What the US did in 1999, when it wanted to bomb, to start an air war against Serbia over Kosovo, realized it would not get support of the Security Council because Russia had said it would veto. So instead of saying, 'Well okay we don't have support of the Security Council, I guess we can't do it,' they said, 'Okay, we won't go to the Security Council, we'll simply go to the NATO High Command and ask their permission.' Well, what a surprise, the NATO High Command said 'sure.' It's like the hammer and the nail. If you're a hammer, everything looks like a nail. If you're NATO everything looks like it requires military intervention. The problem is, under international law, the UN charter is the fundamental component under international law that determines issues of war and peace. And the charter doesn't say that the Security Council or NATO or the President of the United States can all decide over the use of force. The only agency that can legally approve the use of force is the Security Council of the United Nations. Period. Full stop.
It's that basic. Alan Greenblat (NPR) reports:
In terms of calls and emails coming into Congress, opposition has been closer to unanimous.
Florida Republican Rep. Steve Southerland that of the 300 people who called or emailed his office, 96 percent opposed U.S. intervention in Syria. On Thursday, Oregon Democratic Rep. Peter DeFazio of constituents who called, emailed or wrote his office: 1135 opposed, 18 for.
Senate offices don't appear to be much different.
Apparently the White House and some members of Congress are less interested in listening to the people and more interested in helping the 'rebels.' Ken Klippenstein (RT) points out:
In a twist of irony that has escaped mainstream commentators, during the week of 9/11, the US is considering a course of action that will empower Al-Qaeda, i.e. bombing Syria.
As terror expert Evan Kohlmann put it, “two of the most powerful insurgent factions in Syria are Al-Qaeda factions.” Kohlmann is an authority on the subject, having worked as a consultant in terrorism matters for the DoD, DOJ, FBI, and other law enforcement agencies.
At least one organization is listening to the people. Paul Steinhauser and John Helton (CNN) report, "The CNN/ORC International poll released Monday shows that even though eight in 10 Americans believe that the Bashar al-Assad regime gassed its own people, a strong majority doesn't want Congress to pass a resolution authorizing a military strike against the regime. More than seven in 10 say such a strike would not achieve significant goals for the U.S. and a similar amount say it's not in the national interest for the U.S. to get involved in Syria's bloody two-year long civil war." AP's poll "found that most Americans oppose even a limited attack on Syria."
Some do listen. US House Rep Tulsi Gabbard's office released the following:
Washington, DC
– Today, Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard (HI-02) announced her strong
opposition to a U.S. military intervention in Syria. She made her
decision after returning to Washington early last week for the House
Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on the situation in Syria, and
attending several classified briefings with Administration officials and
meetings with her colleagues in the House and Senate. She released the
following statement:
“I am sickened and outraged by the carnage and loss of lives caused by the use of chemical weapons in Syria. It is with gravity that I have carefully considered all the facts, arguments, and evidence and soberly weighed concerns regarding our national security and moral responsibility. As a result, I have come to the conclusion that a U.S. military strike against Syria would be a serious mistake.
“I will therefore vote against a resolution that authorizes the use of military force in Syria. I will also strongly urge my colleagues to do the same.
“The reasons behind my decision are many. Here are a few:
RECOMMENDED: "Iraq snapshot"
"Iraqi officials oppose US strike on Syria"
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"Isaiah's The World Today Just Nuts "Defending Miss..."
"Hejira"
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"I Hate The War"
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"Syria"
"They don't care and they don't listen"
"Kerry swears support is growing"
"THIS JUST IN! IT'S GROWING!"
IT TAKES A GOODY WHORE, DOESN'T IT?
RACE BAITER AND HONKY CRACKER AMY GOODMAN CAN'T GET HER NOSE OUT OF BLACK BUSINESS LIKE SHE THINKS SHE'S (A) AN HONORARY AFRICAN-AMERICAN OR (B) THE NEEDED VOICE OF THE BLACK COMMUNITY.
SHE'S JUST ANOTHER MEDIA JEW WORKING THE RACE BEAT.
TODAY SHE WASTED TIME FOR REAL NEWS BY PLAYING THE CLIP OF WHAT APPEARS TO BE A LIAR CALLING 9-11. NOT ONLY WAS THE WOMAN CALLING 9-11 ALREADY SEEN AS A LIAR GOODY HELPED THE LIES BY SAYING THAT THE WOMAN NOW DENIES HER HUSBAND HAD A GUN.
NO GOODY WHORE, THE POLICE REVEALED THERE WAS NO GUN. ONLY AFTER THAT -- AND OTHER DETAILS OF THE WOMAN'S 9-11 CALL WERE REVEALED TO BE FAKE DID THE WOMAN ALLOW THERE WAS NO GUN.
GOODY, STOP GIVING PUSHY NEW YORKERS SUCH A BAD NAME. LEARN TO MIND YOUR OWN F**KING BUSINESS AND GET YOUR BIG NOSE OUT OF THE AFRICAN-AMERICAN COMMUNITY. YOU ARE NOT AN HONORARY BLACK. YOUR WAR ON GEORGE ZIMMERMAN DOES NOT MAKE YOU LOOK 'DOWN WITH THE PEOPLE.' IT JUST MAKES YOU LOOK LIKE THE PUSHY, RACE BAITER YOU ARE.
FROM THE TCI WIRE:
In 1990's film adaption of John le Carre's The Russia House, Michelle Pfeiffer's Katya declares, "I hope you are not being frivolous, Barley. My life now only has room for truth." It should be the axiom of today.
Law and Disorder Radio booked biggest waste of time Rashid Khalidi.
It was an embarrassment. Any insight Khalidi may have had in this interview was buried by his wet dreaming, mattress humping of how Barack is too smart for this (an attack on Syria). We're then reduced to nutty conspiracies. Since the military appears against this, who's forcing it?
Citing a 'report' on The Daily Show, Khalidi begins listing William Kristol and others.
Kristol does not control Barack. The push for war comes from Barack and only Barack. He is the one who wants it. Even he admits that the buck stops with him. As war looms, the country does not have time to indulge Khalidi's immature fantasies.
His nonsense is as bad as Medea Benjamin. CodeStink did not lead on Syria and wouldn't be doing anything on any scale now were it not for the fact that they got called on their b.s. While refusing to lead on Syria, they were happy to speak to the press as 'experts' on today's antiwar movement.
Why aren't more people in the streets? It's just hard to mobilize whimpered Medea (and other 'leaders').
Reality, more people are getting in the streets. This week's protests have been larger than last week's and they will continue to grow. Credit A.N.S.W.E.R., IRC and The World Can't Wait for that, they have been among the ones doing the heavy lifting.
But the biggest obstacle to protests have been the idiots like Medea and Khalidi. You want people in the street, you have to personalize it. That's reality. Concepts have not gotten people into the streets in post WWII America. Occupy in NYC couldn't get a crowd going until they lied that Radiohead would be giving a free concert.
To protest US actions, the face on the pinata has to be the US president.
But fools like Khalidi go on the radio to excuse Barack, to praise his alleged intellect and what have you. Fools like Medea call out a Hillary Clinton or a John Kerry but heaven forbid that they ever show the same contempt for Barack that they do for those in his administration or the same contempt for Barack that they expressed for Bully Boy Bush.
Outrage over Barack's actions grow and then comes CodeStink to clamp down on it. No, be outraged. When you consistently insist he's smart, rational and peaceful, why the hell should I leave the comfort of my home, give up time I could be using on something fun and go out into the streets to protest?
When you go out in the street
So many hassles with the heat
No one there can fill your desire
Cops out with the megaphones
Telling people stay inside their home
Man, can't they see the world's on fire?
-- "Safe In My Garden," written by John Phillips, first appears on the Mamas and the Papas' The Papas and the Mamas
The 'cops' today include the worthless trash like Medea Benjamin. You may remember I-Need-Attention Benjamin heckled Barack in May. She immediately went on Democracy Now! to insist, "And I didn't do what I did to embarrass the president. I did it because I feel that he needs to be pushed more." To what? Use more drones? Why the f**k do you apologize for calling out the leader of The Drone War? Grown ups don't. America's Mental Mall Cops do.
Barack is over The Drone War, he's over the assault on Libya, he's refused to talk to the American people about the army unit he sent back into Iraq last fall, he's over the illegal spying, go on down the list.
Stop protecting him. Glen Ford (Black Agenda Report) isn't afraid to call it like it is, "The First Black U.S. President, who was hired (by corporate sponsors, and later elected) to put a new face on U.S. imperial policy after his predecessor’s defeat and international isolation over Iraq, now finds himself more alone in the world than George Bush, and with even less support at home." Cornell West explains to Chris Hedges (Truth Dig):
"He is a shell of a man," West said of Obama. "There is no deep conviction. There is no connection to something bigger than him. It is a sad spectacle, sad if he were not the head of an empire that is in such decline and so dangerous. This is a nadir. William Trotter and Du Bois, along with Ida B. Wells-Barnett, were going at Book T tooth and nail. Look at the fights between [Marcus] Garvey and Du Bois, or Garvey and A. Philip Randolph. But now if you criticize Obama the way Randolph criticized Garvey, you become a race traitor and an Uncle Tom. A lot of that comes out of the Obama machine, the Obama plantation."
The failure of supposed antiwar 'leaders' to hold Barack accountable, to call him out the way they would Bully Boy Bush, goes a long way towards explaining the attacks on Cornel West for truth telling. Medea and her ilk harm Cornel, harm all of us, harm the state of discourse.
Barack Obama has been elected president twice. How weak and helpless do you really think he is?
The people are outraged, stop trying to prevent that. The outrage is genuine and understandable and it is the only thing that will prevent more indiscriminate killings by Barack. He is not a community organizer. He is the president of the United States. As he established in his first term, he intends to use the office as enemy of the people.
And at this point, you're either a defender of Barack or you're a defender of the people attacked. You can't rush around, as CodeStink does, defending Barack and also be defending the people of Libya, Syria, Yemen, Pakistan, etc. It's as ridiculous as Gloria Steinem in 1972 saying she was supporting Shirley Chisholm in 12 states and George McGovern in the rest -- as Shirley herself publicly pointed out, that wasn't helping Chisholm's presidential campaign at all.
And covering for Barack isn't helping the people of Syria. Ralph Nader (CounterPunch) notes in an open letter to Barack:
Your argument for shelling Syria is to maintain “international credibility” in drawing that “red line” regardless, it seems, of the loss of innocent Syrian civilian life, causalities to our foreign service and armed forces in that wider region, and retaliation against the fearful Christian population in Syria (one in seven Syrians are Christian). But the more fundamental credibilities are to our Constitution, to the neglected necessities of the American people, and to the red line of observing international law and the UN Charter (which prohibit unilateral bombing in this situation).
As Ava and I noted Sunday:
The heart of the argument to attack Syria these days goes something like, "What will it say about Barack Obama, after he's made clear he wants to attack Syria, if the Congress denies him?" Assuming that a Congressional denial did say something about Barack, isn't the more important question: What will it say about the American people and democracy, after the people have made clear that they don't want an attack on Syria, if the people's elected leaders refuse to heed public sentiment? In a functioning press, that question would be asked far more often than what-will-this-mean-to-Barack because, in case you've forgotten, no supreme law of the land opens, "I, the President"; however, the Constitution opens, "We the People . . ." It's a fact that the politicians and the media repeatedly ignore and silence.
MoveOn is stepping up, to their credit, and being a voice of the people. Rebecca Shabad (The Hill) reports they have followed up on last week's promise, "Liberal group MoveOn released a 30-second TV ad Monday opposing U.S. intervention in Syria that will run on MSNBC this week, according to its website." Click here to stream the commercial. Transcript:
Announcer: We never set out to spend 8 years in Iraq or to be mired down for more than a decade in Afghanistan
Title Card: NEARLY 7,00 AMERICAN LIVES LOST IN IRAQ & AFGHANISTAN, washingtonpost.com/facesofthefallen
Title Card: ALMOST $2 TRILLION SPENT IN IRAQ & AFGHANISTAN The Washington Post, 3/28/13
Announcer: So what should America expect if we rush into Syria alone with no real plan for the consequences.
Title Card: "SHOULD U.S. GOT IT ALONE IN SYRIA?" USA TODAY, 9/5/13
Announcer: We already know, it gets worse. Congress, most Americans oppose missile strikes in Syria. Don't lead us down this road again.
Title Card: CALL CONGRESS AT (202) 224-3121 & TELL THEM: VOTE NO ON MILITARY ACTION IN SYRIA
Good for MoveOn. I'm not a MoveOn booster. We long ago dubbed them WalkOn.com. But I have no problem noting that on this issue, they listened to their members and they took action. Good for them.
What's more offensive than government officials who won't listen to the public? How about those who also openly spit on the law? Samantha Power, A Problem From Hell, has no respect for the law. Today, Steve Inskeep spoke to her for Morning Edition (NPR -- link is audio and transcript):
INSKEEP: Let me ask a central question for you, because you're representing the U.S. to the United Nations, which has not authorized a strike. Would an American strike on Syria be legal?
POWER: If we take military action in this context, it will be a legitimate, necessary and proportionate response to this large-scale and indiscriminate use of chemical weapons by the regime. [Blah blah blah of Power lying and spinning and we're not in the mood. She's avoided the question.]
INSKEEP: So let me just make sure that I'm clear on this. You're saying that something needs to be done and it is time to go outside the legal system, outside the legal framework. You believe it is right to do something that is just simply not legal.
POWER: In the cases of - we've seen in the past, there are times when there is a patron like Syria backed by Russia. We saw this in Kosovo as well, where it was just structurally impossible to get meaningful international action through the Security Council. And yet, in this case, you have the grave breach of such a critical international norm in terms of the ban on chemical weapons use, it is very important that the international community act so as to prevent further use.
In other words, legality doesn't matter. In other words, the law matters when Power says it does and the law is irrelevant when Power desires to ignore it. That may be how she sees the law but that's not actually how it works. IPS analyst Phyllis Bennis has repeatedly explained how the law works. We'll note her speaking to Peter Hart on FAIR's Counterspin two Fridays ago:
Phyllis Bennis: Only if the [United Nations] Security Council votes to endorse the use of force is the use of force legal. No other agency, institution, organization has that right. So the Kosovo precedent that you refer to and that unfortunately this is being talked about in the press. It's being asserted that if the Security Council doesn't agree, there are other options. Yeah, there are other options. The problem is they're all illegal. The Kosovo model was illegal. What the US did in 1999, when it wanted to bomb, to start an air war against Serbia over Kosovo, realized it would not get support of the Security Council because Russia had said it would veto. So instead of saying, 'Well okay we don't have support of the Security Council, I guess we can't do it,' they said, 'Okay, we won't go to the Security Council, we'll simply go to the NATO High Command and ask their permission.' Well, what a surprise, the NATO High Command said 'sure.' It's like the hammer and the nail. If you're a hammer, everything looks like a nail. If you're NATO everything looks like it requires military intervention. The problem is, under international law, the UN charter is the fundamental component under international law that determines issues of war and peace. And the charter doesn't say that the Security Council or NATO or the President of the United States can all decide over the use of force. The only agency that can legally approve the use of force is the Security Council of the United Nations. Period. Full stop.
It's that basic. Alan Greenblat (NPR) reports:
In terms of calls and emails coming into Congress, opposition has been closer to unanimous.
Florida Republican Rep. Steve Southerland that of the 300 people who called or emailed his office, 96 percent opposed U.S. intervention in Syria. On Thursday, Oregon Democratic Rep. Peter DeFazio of constituents who called, emailed or wrote his office: 1135 opposed, 18 for.
Senate offices don't appear to be much different.
Apparently the White House and some members of Congress are less interested in listening to the people and more interested in helping the 'rebels.' Ken Klippenstein (RT) points out:
In a twist of irony that has escaped mainstream commentators, during the week of 9/11, the US is considering a course of action that will empower Al-Qaeda, i.e. bombing Syria.
As terror expert Evan Kohlmann put it, “two of the most powerful insurgent factions in Syria are Al-Qaeda factions.” Kohlmann is an authority on the subject, having worked as a consultant in terrorism matters for the DoD, DOJ, FBI, and other law enforcement agencies.
At least one organization is listening to the people. Paul Steinhauser and John Helton (CNN) report, "The CNN/ORC International poll released Monday shows that even though eight in 10 Americans believe that the Bashar al-Assad regime gassed its own people, a strong majority doesn't want Congress to pass a resolution authorizing a military strike against the regime. More than seven in 10 say such a strike would not achieve significant goals for the U.S. and a similar amount say it's not in the national interest for the U.S. to get involved in Syria's bloody two-year long civil war." AP's poll "found that most Americans oppose even a limited attack on Syria."
Some do listen. US House Rep Tulsi Gabbard's office released the following:
Sep 9, 2013
Press Release
“I am sickened and outraged by the carnage and loss of lives caused by the use of chemical weapons in Syria. It is with gravity that I have carefully considered all the facts, arguments, and evidence and soberly weighed concerns regarding our national security and moral responsibility. As a result, I have come to the conclusion that a U.S. military strike against Syria would be a serious mistake.
“I will therefore vote against a resolution that authorizes the use of military force in Syria. I will also strongly urge my colleagues to do the same.
“The reasons behind my decision are many. Here are a few:
- “As a soldier, I understand that before taking any military action, our nation must have a clear tactical objective, a realistic strategy, the necessary resources to execute that strategy—including the support of the American people—and an exit plan. The proposed military action against Syria fails to meet any of these criteria.
- “Presently, Syria does not present a direct security threat to the United States. Military action will undermine our national defense, as even a limited strike could very easily escalate into a regional conflict, stretching thin a military that has been at war for more than 12 years.
- “We should learn from history; we cannot afford to be the world’s policeman. The United States should not insert itself in the midst of this civil war, which is rooted in sectarian hatred and animosity between various warring religious groups.
- “All Americans are saddened and angered by the carnage that has resulted from the use of these chemical weapons. However, even after the many hearings and classified briefings I have attended, I am unconvinced that this military strike would eliminate Syria’s chemical weapons or prevent them from being used again. Indeed, the risk may increase, due to the possibility these weapons could fall into the hands of Syrian opposition group factions such as Al-Qaida, who we can be confident would use them without hesitation.”
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"Kerry swears support is growing"
"THIS JUST IN! IT'S GROWING!"
Saturday, September 07, 2013
THIS JUST IN! IT'S GROWING!
BULLY BOY PRESS & CEDRIC'S BIG MIX -- THE KOOL-AID TABLE
SECRETARY OF STATE JOHN KERRY FINALLY EMERGED IN THE PUBLIC EYE TODAY LOOKING FETCHING IN A PAIR OF TINA FEY GLASSES.
HE DECLARED THAT SUPPORT FOR BARACK'S ILLEGAL WAR IS GROWING.
ALSO GROWING IS THE CANCER ON THE PRESIDENCY.
FROM THE TCI WIRE:
At the Washington Post today, conservative Michelle Bernard tries (and fails) to make a coherent case for war on Syria. Her prop of choice? Iraqi women. Bernard's part of the cheap trash who ignore Iraqi women. The women of Iraq suffer and they suffer without any help from world government's so Bernard's lies aren't needed. She insists that women are suffering in Syria. It's similar to the propaganda Women's Media Center -- in the roll out for war that Gloria Steinem, Robin Morgan and Jane Fonda all hope you never call them on -- was featuring a few months back. That shouldn't surprise you.
When The Brides of War enlist to become love slaves of Barack, they run to Lauren Wolfe for information. The hustler also works for The Atlantic. She specializes in "OHMYGOD!WOMENAREBEINGKILLEDSOMEWHEREANDIMUSTANDWILLSTOPIT!"
'journalism.'
Here's some information for all the tricked out sex slaves in the nunnery of St. Barack: War kills.
War kills indiscriminately. There is no 'precision' in war. It is bloody, it is messy and it is deadly.
Do women suffer during war?
Yes, children they do. In The War Against Women, the late Marilyn French established this with a historical overview of war and how it functions alongside the patriarchy, how the domination sought in war is also sought in society.
I realize this is new ground for Michelle Bernard. And probably for the idiot Lauren Wolfe.
Bernard wants you to know that, in 2003, shortly after the start of the Iraq War, she actually managed to chat with a few Iraqi women in DC who had been brought in, by the Bully Boy Bush administration, to speak to Congress. Guess what they told Bernard? They wished the war had started sooner! Isn't it shocking? Iraqi women, as the war had just started, would be flown to the US to lobby Congress and they supported the war! Well case closed, yet again!
But before Bernard does her victory lap, let's all grasp that the women were propaganda tools of the White House -- which is why they were able to travel to the US to begin with.
And let's further grasp what Michelle Bernard doesn't grasp or won't tell you.
The year is 2013. Michelle insists that Iraqi women told her they were better off due to war ("What took you so long!" she quotes one Iraqi saying) so the US should attack Syria.
What's she leaving out?
How about today?
How about the effects of ten years of war on Iraq and, yes, on Iraqi women? Let's start with Wednesday's snapshot:
And in southern Baghdad, NINA reports:
Police source told NINA that an improvised explosive device, emplaced near women beauty salon in Shurta neighborhood, went off wounding the salon's owner and three other civilians, happened to be nearby, as well as causing damages to the salon.
That attack is very important. al Qaeda may or may not be responsible for that attack but for years they have launched attacks in that area. The attack, if carried out by al Qaeda, may have been an attack on business or anything. But the best guess is it being an attack on women who refuse to live in Iraq as though Iraq is Afghanistan.
That attack was and remains important but no western news outlet treated it as such. No one filed a report on it. As always when women are the intended targets, the press looked the other way. In fact, the only time the western press tends to note women dying is when they can (accurately or inaccurately) label them a prostitute. Zainab Salbi founded Women for Women International. Last March, she wrote a column for CNN on the status of women in Iraq:
On the political front, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has not appointed a single woman to a senior cabinet position, despite the fact women are guaranteed 25% of the seats in parliament by the constitution. The Ministry of Women's Affairs, a poorly-funded and mostly ceremonial department, is the lone ministry headed up by a woman.
If you talk to women in war zones anywhere, they’ll tell you that domestic violence increases in war-time. But in Iraq, violence against women has also been systematic. And unknown to most Americans, it has been orchestrated by some of the very forces that the US boosted to power.
Like religious fundamentalists everywhere, these sectarian militias and clerics have a social vision for their country that depends on subjugating women. But because the US wagered that they could deliver stability, these men were cultivated as allies in Iraq. As we now know, they never even got the stability they traded women’s rights for.
The dynamic was clearly at work in the drafting of Iraq’s constitution, heavily brokered by the US. To pass it, the US needed support from Islamist parties. They got it by trading away women’s rights. In fact, the current constitution is a huge step backwards for Iraqi women. It replaces one of the Middle East’s most expansive laws on the status of women, dating from 1959, with separate and unequal laws on the basis of sex. They subjected Iraqi women to a newly introduced Sharia law promoted in an article in the new constitution.
PHIL DONAHUE:
Well, I'm pleased to have this chance to chat with you for a lot of reasons. One, I don’t know who else has more cred than you.
What would a 23-year graduate of West Point offer us now regarding the dilemma in which Obama finds himself, regarding Syria?
ANDREW BACEVICH: Well, I mean, if I could have five minutes of the president's time, I'd say, "Mr. President, the issue really is not Syria. I mean, you're being told that it's Syria. You're being told you have to do something about Syria, that you have to make a decision about Syria. That somehow your credibility is on the line."
But I'd say, "Mr. President, that's not true. The issue really here is whether or not an effort over the course of several decades, dating back to the promulgation of the Carter Doctrine in 1980, an effort that extends over several decades to employ American power, military power, overt, covert military power exercise through proxies, an effort to use military power to somehow stabilize or fix or liberate or transform the greater Middle East hasn't worked.
“And if you think back to 1980, and just sort of tick off the number of military enterprises that we have been engaged in that part of the world, large and small, you know, Beirut, Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen, Somalia, and on and on, and ask yourself, 'What have we got done? What have we achieved? Is the region becoming more stable? Is it becoming more Democratic? Are we enhancing America's standing in the eyes of the people of the Islamic world?'
"The answers are, 'No, no, and no.' So why, Mr. President, do you think that initiating yet another war, 'cause if we bomb Syria, it's a war, why do you think that initiating yet another war in this protracted enterprise is going to produce a different outcome? Wouldn't it be perhaps wise to ask ourselves if this militarized approach to the region maybe is a fool’s errand.
"Maybe it's fundamentally misguided. Maybe the questions are not tactical and operational, but strategic and political." You know, I have to say, I'm just struck by the fact that Secretary of State Kerry has become the leading proponent for war. It's our secretary of state's job apparently--
PHIL DONAHUE: He threw his medal-- he threw his medals back.
ANDREW BACEVICH: Well, that's why it's doubly ironic. 'Cause the Secretary of State is the war promoter. And that our secretary of state happens to be a guy who came into politics basically advertising himself as the guy who because of his--
PHIL DONAHUE: Understands war?
ANDREW BACEVICH: --Vietnam experiences, understands war, understands the lessons of Vietnam, and is therefore going to prevent us from doing dumb things. On the contrary, he's the lead cheerleader to go through another dumb thing.
PHIL DONAHUE: President Obama would say to you, "These are children being grossly and painfully killed."
ANDREW BACEVICH: Yeah.
PHIL DONAHUE: "How can you watch these videos with the foam coming out of the nostrils. And we've got to do something."
ANDREW BACEVICH: Well, the attack is a heinous act. Now does the fact that they were killed with chemicals make it more heinous than if they were killed with conventional ammunitions? I'm not persuaded.
I mean, I think the issue, one of the issues here, to the extent that moral considerations drive US policy, and I would say as a practical matter they don't, but let's pretend that they do to the extent that moral considerations drive US policy, there's a couple of questions to ask. One would be, "Why here and not someplace else?"
I mean, just weeks earlier, the Egyptian Army killed many hundreds of innocent Egyptians. And we sort of shook our finger at Egypt a little bit, but didn't do anything. So why act in Syria? Why not act in Egypt? I think that that needs to be sort of, that needs to be clarified.
And the other question will be, "Well, if our concerns are humanitarian, why is waging war the best means to advance a humanitarian agenda?" If indeed US policy is informed by concern for the people of Syria, let's just pretend that's the case even though I don't think it is. If it's informed by concern for the people of Syria, why is peppering Damascus with cruise missiles the best way to demonstrate that concern?
I mean, a little bit of creative statesmanship it seems to me might say that there are other things we could do that would actually benefit the people of Syria, who are suffering greatly, who are fleeing their country in the hundreds of thousands. Who are living in wretched refugee camps. Why don't we do something about that? Why wouldn't that be a better thing to do from a moral perspective than bombing Damascus?
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"THIS JUST IN! MORE WORDS, MORE WORDS!"
SECRETARY OF STATE JOHN KERRY FINALLY EMERGED IN THE PUBLIC EYE TODAY LOOKING FETCHING IN A PAIR OF TINA FEY GLASSES.
HE DECLARED THAT SUPPORT FOR BARACK'S ILLEGAL WAR IS GROWING.
ALSO GROWING IS THE CANCER ON THE PRESIDENCY.
FROM THE TCI WIRE:
At the Washington Post today, conservative Michelle Bernard tries (and fails) to make a coherent case for war on Syria. Her prop of choice? Iraqi women. Bernard's part of the cheap trash who ignore Iraqi women. The women of Iraq suffer and they suffer without any help from world government's so Bernard's lies aren't needed. She insists that women are suffering in Syria. It's similar to the propaganda Women's Media Center -- in the roll out for war that Gloria Steinem, Robin Morgan and Jane Fonda all hope you never call them on -- was featuring a few months back. That shouldn't surprise you.
When The Brides of War enlist to become love slaves of Barack, they run to Lauren Wolfe for information. The hustler also works for The Atlantic. She specializes in "OHMYGOD!WOMENAREBEINGKILLEDSOMEWHEREANDIMUSTANDWILLSTOPIT!"
'journalism.'
Here's some information for all the tricked out sex slaves in the nunnery of St. Barack: War kills.
War kills indiscriminately. There is no 'precision' in war. It is bloody, it is messy and it is deadly.
Do women suffer during war?
Yes, children they do. In The War Against Women, the late Marilyn French established this with a historical overview of war and how it functions alongside the patriarchy, how the domination sought in war is also sought in society.
I realize this is new ground for Michelle Bernard. And probably for the idiot Lauren Wolfe.
Bernard wants you to know that, in 2003, shortly after the start of the Iraq War, she actually managed to chat with a few Iraqi women in DC who had been brought in, by the Bully Boy Bush administration, to speak to Congress. Guess what they told Bernard? They wished the war had started sooner! Isn't it shocking? Iraqi women, as the war had just started, would be flown to the US to lobby Congress and they supported the war! Well case closed, yet again!
But before Bernard does her victory lap, let's all grasp that the women were propaganda tools of the White House -- which is why they were able to travel to the US to begin with.
And let's further grasp what Michelle Bernard doesn't grasp or won't tell you.
The year is 2013. Michelle insists that Iraqi women told her they were better off due to war ("What took you so long!" she quotes one Iraqi saying) so the US should attack Syria.
What's she leaving out?
How about today?
How about the effects of ten years of war on Iraq and, yes, on Iraqi women? Let's start with Wednesday's snapshot:
And in southern Baghdad, NINA reports:
Police source told NINA that an improvised explosive device, emplaced near women beauty salon in Shurta neighborhood, went off wounding the salon's owner and three other civilians, happened to be nearby, as well as causing damages to the salon.
That attack is very important. al Qaeda may or may not be responsible for that attack but for years they have launched attacks in that area. The attack, if carried out by al Qaeda, may have been an attack on business or anything. But the best guess is it being an attack on women who refuse to live in Iraq as though Iraq is Afghanistan.
That attack was and remains important but no western news outlet treated it as such. No one filed a report on it. As always when women are the intended targets, the press looked the other way. In fact, the only time the western press tends to note women dying is when they can (accurately or inaccurately) label them a prostitute. Zainab Salbi founded Women for Women International. Last March, she wrote a column for CNN on the status of women in Iraq:
On the political front, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has not appointed a single woman to a senior cabinet position, despite the fact women are guaranteed 25% of the seats in parliament by the constitution. The Ministry of Women's Affairs, a poorly-funded and mostly ceremonial department, is the lone ministry headed up by a woman.
Constitutionally, women
were able to secure the ability to pass their citizenship on to their
children by non-Iraqi husbands, making Iraq one of a handful Arab
countries with such a provision for their female citizens.
But on the other hand,
women are no longer guaranteed equal treatment under one law in terms of
marriage, divorce, inheritance and custody. That law, the Family
Statutes Law, has been replaced one giving religious and tribal leaders
the power to regulate family affairs in the areas they rule in
accordance with their interpretation of religious laws.
This not only is making
women more vulnerable, it is giving women from various sects (Sunni or
Shia) or religion (Muslim or Christian) different legal treatments on
the same issues.
Economically, women have
gone from being visibly active in the Iraqi work force in the 1980s --
particularly in the farming, marketing and professional services sectors
-- to being nearly non-existent in 2013.
The women who could
afford it withdrew from the public space due the violence dominating the
streets. 10 years ago Iraq produced much of its own food and had a
productive industrial sector -- but now Iraq imports practically all of
its food, and farmers and factory workers simply found themselves out of
a job as industry ground to a halt. And while both women and men
suffered as a result, the impact on women was greater due to their
limited mobility in the face of poor security.
Violence against women -- and the lack of legal protection for women --
is also on the rise. Women's rights groups blame the increase in
violence on the social and economic pressure that families face, the
lack of public and political will to stop it, and the increase religious
conservatism that often justifies the violence.
MADRE's Yifat Susskind and Organization of Women's Freedom in Iraq's Yanar Mohammed wrote a column on the status of women in Iraq this year as well:
If you talk to women in war zones anywhere, they’ll tell you that domestic violence increases in war-time. But in Iraq, violence against women has also been systematic. And unknown to most Americans, it has been orchestrated by some of the very forces that the US boosted to power.
Like religious fundamentalists everywhere, these sectarian militias and clerics have a social vision for their country that depends on subjugating women. But because the US wagered that they could deliver stability, these men were cultivated as allies in Iraq. As we now know, they never even got the stability they traded women’s rights for.
The dynamic was clearly at work in the drafting of Iraq’s constitution, heavily brokered by the US. To pass it, the US needed support from Islamist parties. They got it by trading away women’s rights. In fact, the current constitution is a huge step backwards for Iraqi women. It replaces one of the Middle East’s most expansive laws on the status of women, dating from 1959, with separate and unequal laws on the basis of sex. They subjected Iraqi women to a newly introduced Sharia law promoted in an article in the new constitution.
So the ridiculous Michelle doesn't just remain a groupie in the Cult of St. Barack,
she's also a dumb liar who thinks she can trick America into supporting
war on Syria by insisting war was what Iraqi women wanted and it made
their lives better. And Women's Media Center -- Gloria Steinem, Robin
Morgan and Jane Fonda -- need to be called out for entering into the
dangerous relationship with Lauren Wolfe. You'd think Gloria would
especially avoid that relationship which makes it appear that Women's
Media Center is nothing but a government propaganda outlet -- she will
never escape working for the CIA in college or the rumors that she
continued working for them after college. I do not believe she worked
for them after college. She would deny the "working for" in college but
she received rewards and she did their work, including reporting back
afterwards -- a detail that she bragged about repeatedly in the 60s --
check the articles from that era -- but rewrote history a decade later
when the Red Stockings went public with Gloria's CIA work. For those
unfamiliar with the charges, post-college, a sort of diagram is drawn of
Gloria with various CIA and CIA-linked figures. The Red Stockings felt
that feminism was being watered down in the seventies and felt Gloria
had a great deal to do with it. They began digging around and found
Gloria's college CIA link. They raised the issue publicly and it was in
all of the feminist press of the era except Ms. magazine (which Gloria
controlled -- though one of the charges was that Ms. was a CIA front).
Gloria ignored the charges and people began lying for Gloria. When she
finally answered the charges, after Betty Friedan had helped publicize
them, she suddenly never knew it was a CIA front funding her travel
until after the fact. And the media was kind to Gloria and ran with
that crap without questioning it. The same MSM printed articles in the
60s where Gloria bragged about her work for the CIA in that era,
portraying herself as some sort of Agent 99.
It's very telling that Gloria, Jane and Robin would fund a Syrian
project (Wolfe's) to begin with. Feminists should be focused on Iraq
where women's rights and status suffered a tremendous blow. You want to
speak out against war, how about you chronicle the effects war has had
on the lives of Iraqi women. Instead, they've funded alarmist
propaganda which, no surprise, is now being used to argue war.
Gloria, Jane and Robin are you really that stupid? (Answer: Yes, they apparently are.)
Gloria, Jane and Robin are silent on Syria. They won't decry an attack
on it and they have funded a propaganda mill whose intent is to force
action. What's going on here?
Three elderly women have made it their goal to cure male impotency.
At the heart of the arguments for an attack on Syria is the male impotency. Scott Lemieux (American Prospect) notes today, "At bottom, as James Fallows notes,
the case for action against Syria is based on the same logical error as
too many foreign-policy disasters past: we have to "do something," and
military action is ... something." That feeling of powerlessness, that
heaven forbid, even men might have to feel. Instead of telling the
Peter Pans of the world to go with it, explore it, grasp it and become
better humans as a result, the elderly Wendys of Jane, Robin and Gloria
intend to hover the beds in the nursery at night ensuring ejaculation,
no limp noodles on their watch.
There is not a need to do anything. Syria has a civil war. Now Spain
had a civil war (1936 to 1939) and the US government stayed out of it.
Many of those Americans back then who had a side in that war traveled to
Spain and fought. That's certainly an option for Nicholas Kristof and
the other saggy penises. 600,000 deaths is considered a conservative estimate of the death toll. You can also review these stats offered by PBS for the American civil war.
On this week's Moyers & Company (link is video and text, airs on many PBS stations across the country), Phil Donahue is the guest host and he speaks with Andrew Bacevich about an attack on Syria. Excerpt.
What would a 23-year graduate of West Point offer us now regarding the dilemma in which Obama finds himself, regarding Syria?
ANDREW BACEVICH: Well, I mean, if I could have five minutes of the president's time, I'd say, "Mr. President, the issue really is not Syria. I mean, you're being told that it's Syria. You're being told you have to do something about Syria, that you have to make a decision about Syria. That somehow your credibility is on the line."
But I'd say, "Mr. President, that's not true. The issue really here is whether or not an effort over the course of several decades, dating back to the promulgation of the Carter Doctrine in 1980, an effort that extends over several decades to employ American power, military power, overt, covert military power exercise through proxies, an effort to use military power to somehow stabilize or fix or liberate or transform the greater Middle East hasn't worked.
“And if you think back to 1980, and just sort of tick off the number of military enterprises that we have been engaged in that part of the world, large and small, you know, Beirut, Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen, Somalia, and on and on, and ask yourself, 'What have we got done? What have we achieved? Is the region becoming more stable? Is it becoming more Democratic? Are we enhancing America's standing in the eyes of the people of the Islamic world?'
"The answers are, 'No, no, and no.' So why, Mr. President, do you think that initiating yet another war, 'cause if we bomb Syria, it's a war, why do you think that initiating yet another war in this protracted enterprise is going to produce a different outcome? Wouldn't it be perhaps wise to ask ourselves if this militarized approach to the region maybe is a fool’s errand.
"Maybe it's fundamentally misguided. Maybe the questions are not tactical and operational, but strategic and political." You know, I have to say, I'm just struck by the fact that Secretary of State Kerry has become the leading proponent for war. It's our secretary of state's job apparently--
PHIL DONAHUE: He threw his medal-- he threw his medals back.
ANDREW BACEVICH: Well, that's why it's doubly ironic. 'Cause the Secretary of State is the war promoter. And that our secretary of state happens to be a guy who came into politics basically advertising himself as the guy who because of his--
PHIL DONAHUE: Understands war?
ANDREW BACEVICH: --Vietnam experiences, understands war, understands the lessons of Vietnam, and is therefore going to prevent us from doing dumb things. On the contrary, he's the lead cheerleader to go through another dumb thing.
PHIL DONAHUE: President Obama would say to you, "These are children being grossly and painfully killed."
ANDREW BACEVICH: Yeah.
PHIL DONAHUE: "How can you watch these videos with the foam coming out of the nostrils. And we've got to do something."
ANDREW BACEVICH: Well, the attack is a heinous act. Now does the fact that they were killed with chemicals make it more heinous than if they were killed with conventional ammunitions? I'm not persuaded.
I mean, I think the issue, one of the issues here, to the extent that moral considerations drive US policy, and I would say as a practical matter they don't, but let's pretend that they do to the extent that moral considerations drive US policy, there's a couple of questions to ask. One would be, "Why here and not someplace else?"
I mean, just weeks earlier, the Egyptian Army killed many hundreds of innocent Egyptians. And we sort of shook our finger at Egypt a little bit, but didn't do anything. So why act in Syria? Why not act in Egypt? I think that that needs to be sort of, that needs to be clarified.
And the other question will be, "Well, if our concerns are humanitarian, why is waging war the best means to advance a humanitarian agenda?" If indeed US policy is informed by concern for the people of Syria, let's just pretend that's the case even though I don't think it is. If it's informed by concern for the people of Syria, why is peppering Damascus with cruise missiles the best way to demonstrate that concern?
I mean, a little bit of creative statesmanship it seems to me might say that there are other things we could do that would actually benefit the people of Syria, who are suffering greatly, who are fleeing their country in the hundreds of thousands. Who are living in wretched refugee camps. Why don't we do something about that? Why wouldn't that be a better thing to do from a moral perspective than bombing Damascus?
RECOMMENDED: "Iraq snapshot"
"US said to be targets in Iraq"
"New revelations on Barack's illegal spying"
"Corn Quesadillas in the Kitchen"
"Barack is the date you hate"
"The endless selling of war on Syria"
"guantanamo"
"Is the C.I.A. lying?"
"He keeps selling war (plus Janis Ian news)"
"Barack and his lies of war"
"Riddick"
"War Criminals"
"Humanitarian intervention and other lies"
"He's going to speak again"
"THIS JUST IN! MORE WORDS, MORE WORDS!"
Friday, September 06, 2013
THIS JUST IN! MORE WORDS, MORE WORDS!
BULLY BOY PRESS & CEDRIC'S BIG MIX -- THE KOOL-AID TABLE
HAVING FAILED AT SELLING WAR ON SYRIA IN AN ADDRESS LAST WEEKEND, THE DAHLIBAMA HAS DECIDED THAT WHAT THE WORLD NEEDS IS EVEN MORE WORDS FROM HIM.
HE WAS OBSERVED SINGING TO HIMSELF, "WHAT THE WORLD NEEDS NOW . . . IS MY WORDS, MY WORDS . . . THEY'RE THE ONLY THING, THAT THERE'S JUST TOO LITTLE OF . . . WHAT THE WORLD NEEDS NOW . . . IS MY WORDS, MY WORDS . . ."
THAT IS HIS ANSWER TO EVERYTHING, AFTER ALL, SPEECHIFY THE COUNTRY INTO SUBMISSION.
HE ANNOUNCED HE WOULD ADDRESS THE NATION TUESDAY.
BY WHICH TIME, SECRETARY OF STATE JOHN KERRY SHOULD HAVE FINISHED PICKING THE BONES OF SECRETARY OF DEFENSE CHUCK HAGEL.
FROM THE TCI WIRE:
US President Barack Obama wants war on Syria. It's wrong for many reasons. One that no one seems to be raising is cost. The authorization the White House wants from Congress -- passed by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee -- does not prohibit "boots on the ground." Secretary of State John Kerry had a meltdown over 'no boots on the ground' being in the authorization during the Senate committee's hearing on Tuesday. He also spoke in terms of actions additional to a 'precision strike' which is why it is a 90 day authorization that Barack's enablers have passed. It has not passed the Senate, it has not passed the House. Judging from complaints to the public e-mail account, either local anchors across the country are really stupid or they're being intentionally stupid to imply it's a done deal. All that being voted out of Committee does is send it to the Senate floor for a vote. Being voted out of Committee does not change a bill into a law. Jason Ditz's Antiwar piece that just went up may make that clearer. Opening sentence: "After yesterday’s 10-7 committee vote set the stage for a tight vote in the Senate about the Syrian War, the issue may end up entirely academic, as ABC News is the first to call it, and based on the public comments the war is headed for a defeat in the House of Representatives."
Many are noting the lack of restrictions to the authorization Barack Obama wants. (See Jason Ditz' "Senate Committee Approves Loophole-Ridden Syria War Resolution" at Antiwar.com.) Who's going to point out the blank check aspect? Congress controls the purse. The measure the White House wants and that the Senate committee passed is a blank check and isn't the US supposed to be in the midst of a fiscal crisis?
You've not only got the failed economy, you've also got sequestration. Across the board cuts.
So why is the US Congress being asked to authorize any new action without such an action having a clear and public price tag?
The US economy remains in the toilet, services are being cut (further cut) across the country and more cuts are due to come shortly and on top of this outstanding (unpaid) bill, Barack wants to toss on military actions when there is no threat to Syria?
And the White House will not return to extend the 90 day authorization. It will just plow on through if it feels the need. Meaning ten years from now someone may write a letter to the Seattle Times' editors on the money spent on the Syrian War the way Kathy Swoyer writes them now:
Today in Iraq, 10 years later, countless lives -- military and civilian-- have been and continue to be lost, hundreds of millions of our tax dollars were spent, and Shiite/Sunni violence is rearing up again. Al-Qaida terrorism is now robust.
What, exactly, have we gained?
The biggest threat to the US economy has been and remains Barack Obama.
He now wants to turn that destructive force on Syria.
The years long effort for war on Syria has already run up a large tab -- in money and resources. In resources, you have John Kerry and the State Department spending 2012 and this year attempting to persuade foreign countries into supporting war and pressuring them to cut off ties to Syria.
That has a huge cost. Might life be better for the Iraqi people if high-profile US visits to Iraq in the last two years had been about the needs of the Iraqi people and not the US government's need for war with Syria? And what was Nouri given to make him announce (briefly) that they would stop flights from Iran to Syria?
If diplomacy had been used for humanitarian reasons, then high-profile US visits would have been about wrongful imprisonments, the need to stop torturing, the need to stop shooting at Iraqis taking part in a sit-in and, at the very least, the need to provide the people with basic public services (electricity, potable water, etc.).
A lot of liars in Congress and in the press want to insist attacking Syria would be a "humanitarian action." They ignore the reality of what they're demanding. As Steve Chapman (Chicago Tribune) observes, "It may look antiseptic from Washington, but only because the Syrians have no means to respond [to an attack] in kind. But to anyone in Syria, there will be no doubt that we are waging war." Activist, author and candidate for governor in California Cindy Sheehan weighs in on these 'humanitarian concerns' at Cindy Sheehan's Soapbox:
Now, Obama and Pelosi want to kill Syrian children so their government doesn’t kill them? I don't want the Syrian government or US supported rebels to kill anyone, but I am sure that dying by a US made and launched missile is much more compassionate than any other way? Obviously the “problem” that the US has, is not that it loves children so much, but that it’s Murder, Inc and wants a global monopoly on carnage.
To me, and many others who really pay attention to needs of children, what is urgent is for the US to stop all its wars that harm families all over the world, even here. Why do you think our economy is tanking and the social safety nets are being greatly reduced or eliminated? Our overwhelming monetary and psycho investment in the military industrial complex!
FYI, Cindy's campaign site is here. If the liars in Congress and the press have are so concerned about 'humanitarian' intervention in Syria, why have they expressed no humanitarian concerns about Iraq?
KUNA reports the European Union's High Representative Catherine Ashton issued a statement condemning Tuesday's attacks in Iraq. Her statement in full [PDF format warning] can be found here:
I condemn in the strongest terms the series of car bombings that killed many civilians on Tuesday in predominantly Shia districts of Baghdad. My thoughts go out to the many innocent victims and I express my condolences to their families.
I am seriously concerned by the escalation of violence in Iraq over the past months which is fueling sectarianism and undermining the stability of the country. I call on all political, religious and community leaders to increase their efforts to end this dangerous cycle of vilence. I am confident that the Iraqi people will remain steadfast in their rejection of sectarian violence and work towards a successful transition to democracy and long term stability for the benefit of all of Iraq's citizens.
The US government has nothing to say about Tuesday's attacks which killed 87 people (Iraq Body Count tally). It rarely has anything to say about anything to do with Iraq. Yes, Sunday, they did issue the following:
Press Statement
But before you applaud them, that's idiotic.
All the ones arguing humanitarian grounds for Syria -- including the ridiculous US House Rep Debbie Wasserman-Schultz with her "as a Jew" statement -- need to ask where is the humanitarian concern for the Ashraf community?
The United States could actually put more boots on the ground in Iraq as a result of that attack. International law would allow that (some legal scholars would argue that international law compels it).
I must have missed Debs Wasserman weighing in on the attack, "as a Jew," right?
Adam Schreck (AP) reported Tuesday that the United Nations just confirmed the deaths of 52 Ashraf residents. Al Mada noted Monday that Nouri's declared he should be over the Iraqi investigation since he's commander-in-chief. And that's exactly why he shouldn't be over it. Tuesday, the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq issued a statement which included:
Reiterating his previous statement, the UN Envoy expressed his outrage at the brutal killing of the camp’s residents. Mr. Busztin took note of the statement issued by the Government of Iraq announcing it has initiated its own investigation into the tragic events and acknowledging its responsibility for the safety of the camp’s residents. “I call on the Iraqi government to ensure that a thorough, impartial and transparent investigation into this atrocious crime is conducted without delay and that the results of the investigation are made public”, he said.
Deb Wasserman may not grasp the basics so let's review slowly.
Camp Ashraf housed a group of Iranian dissidents who were welcomed to Iraq by Saddam Hussein in 1986 and he gave them Camp Ashraf and six other parcels that they could utilize. In 2003, the US invaded Iraq.The US government had the US military lead negotiations with the residents of Camp Ashraf. The US government wanted the residents to disarm and the US promised protections to the point that US actions turned the residents of Camp Ashraf into protected person under the Geneva Conventions. This is key and demands the US defend the Ashraf community in Iraq from attacks. The Bully Boy Bush administration grasped that -- they were ignorant of every other law on the books but they grasped that one. As 2008 drew to a close, the Bush administration was given assurances from the Iraqi government that they would protect the residents. Yet Nouri al-Maliki ordered the camp repeatedly attacked after Barack Obama was sworn in as US President. July 28, 2009 Nouri launched an attack (while then-US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates was on the ground in Iraq). In a report released this summer entitled "Iraqi government must respect and protect rights of Camp Ashraf residents," Amnesty International described this assault, "Barely a month later, on 28-29 July 2009, Iraqi security forces stormed into the camp; at least nine residents were killed and many more were injured. Thirty-six residents who were detained were allegedly tortured and beaten. They were eventually released on 7 October 2009; by then they were in poor health after going on hunger strike." April 8, 2011, Nouri again ordered an assault on Camp Ashraf (then-US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates was again on the ground in Iraq when the assault took place). Amnesty International described the assault this way, "Earlier this year, on 8 April, Iraqi troops took up positions within the camp using excessive, including lethal, force against residents who tried to resist them. Troops used live ammunition and by the end of the operation some 36 residents, including eight women, were dead and more than 300 others had been wounded. Following international and other protests, the Iraqi government announced that it had appointed a committee to investigate the attack and the killings; however, as on other occasions when the government has announced investigations into allegations of serious human rights violations by its forces, the authorities have yet to disclose the outcome, prompting questions whether any investigation was, in fact, carried out." Those weren't the last attacks. They were the last attacks while the residents were labeled as terrorists by the US State Dept. (September 28, 2012, the designation was changed.) In spite of this labeling, Mohammed Tawfeeq (CNN) observed that "since 2004, the United States has considered the residents of Camp Ashraf 'noncombatants' and 'protected persons' under the Geneva Conventions." So the US has an obligation to protect the residents. 3,300 are no longer at Camp Ashraf. They have moved to Camp Hurriyah for the most part. A tiny number has received asylum in other countries. Approximately 100 were still at Camp Ashraf when it was attacked Sunday. That was the second attack this year alone. February 9th of this year, the Ashraf residents were again attacked, this time the ones who had been relocated to Camp Hurriyah. Trend News Agency counted 10 dead and over one hundred injured. Prensa Latina reported, " A rain of self-propelled Katyusha missiles hit a provisional camp of Iraqi opposition Mujahedin-e Khalk, an organization Tehran calls terrorists, causing seven fatalities plus 50 wounded, according to an Iraqi official release."
"As a Jew," Debbie Wasserman, shouldn't attacks on encampments of persons alarm you? Attacks carried out by government forces? Shouldn't that bother you? Or do use Nazi Germany allusions as rarely as you use soap and water? There is no oil crisis, we need only figure out how to tap into all the oil on Debbie's face and in her hair and the term "energy crisis" will be a relic of the past.
RECOMMENDED: "Iraq snapshot"
"Message to the Media: Stop Whoring"
"Pope calls for peace talks"
"Saying no to war on Syria"
"Barack and Pelosi's Syria Lust"
"Again with Lindorff and the Orange Tabby"
"again on fonda"
"Stop the attack on Syria"
"Barack, stop using my tax dollars to fund al Qaeda"
"The press sells the war"
"Does Winona Ryder have a classic film?"
"The Joan Rivers Presidency"
"Barack's fragile ego"
"Kerry is disturbed"
"THIS JUST IN! KERRY UNABLE TO SPEAK AT PRESENT!"
HAVING FAILED AT SELLING WAR ON SYRIA IN AN ADDRESS LAST WEEKEND, THE DAHLIBAMA HAS DECIDED THAT WHAT THE WORLD NEEDS IS EVEN MORE WORDS FROM HIM.
HE WAS OBSERVED SINGING TO HIMSELF, "WHAT THE WORLD NEEDS NOW . . . IS MY WORDS, MY WORDS . . . THEY'RE THE ONLY THING, THAT THERE'S JUST TOO LITTLE OF . . . WHAT THE WORLD NEEDS NOW . . . IS MY WORDS, MY WORDS . . ."
THAT IS HIS ANSWER TO EVERYTHING, AFTER ALL, SPEECHIFY THE COUNTRY INTO SUBMISSION.
HE ANNOUNCED HE WOULD ADDRESS THE NATION TUESDAY.
BY WHICH TIME, SECRETARY OF STATE JOHN KERRY SHOULD HAVE FINISHED PICKING THE BONES OF SECRETARY OF DEFENSE CHUCK HAGEL.
FROM THE TCI WIRE:
US President Barack Obama wants war on Syria. It's wrong for many reasons. One that no one seems to be raising is cost. The authorization the White House wants from Congress -- passed by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee -- does not prohibit "boots on the ground." Secretary of State John Kerry had a meltdown over 'no boots on the ground' being in the authorization during the Senate committee's hearing on Tuesday. He also spoke in terms of actions additional to a 'precision strike' which is why it is a 90 day authorization that Barack's enablers have passed. It has not passed the Senate, it has not passed the House. Judging from complaints to the public e-mail account, either local anchors across the country are really stupid or they're being intentionally stupid to imply it's a done deal. All that being voted out of Committee does is send it to the Senate floor for a vote. Being voted out of Committee does not change a bill into a law. Jason Ditz's Antiwar piece that just went up may make that clearer. Opening sentence: "After yesterday’s 10-7 committee vote set the stage for a tight vote in the Senate about the Syrian War, the issue may end up entirely academic, as ABC News is the first to call it, and based on the public comments the war is headed for a defeat in the House of Representatives."
Many are noting the lack of restrictions to the authorization Barack Obama wants. (See Jason Ditz' "Senate Committee Approves Loophole-Ridden Syria War Resolution" at Antiwar.com.) Who's going to point out the blank check aspect? Congress controls the purse. The measure the White House wants and that the Senate committee passed is a blank check and isn't the US supposed to be in the midst of a fiscal crisis?
You've not only got the failed economy, you've also got sequestration. Across the board cuts.
So why is the US Congress being asked to authorize any new action without such an action having a clear and public price tag?
The US economy remains in the toilet, services are being cut (further cut) across the country and more cuts are due to come shortly and on top of this outstanding (unpaid) bill, Barack wants to toss on military actions when there is no threat to Syria?
And the White House will not return to extend the 90 day authorization. It will just plow on through if it feels the need. Meaning ten years from now someone may write a letter to the Seattle Times' editors on the money spent on the Syrian War the way Kathy Swoyer writes them now:
Today in Iraq, 10 years later, countless lives -- military and civilian-- have been and continue to be lost, hundreds of millions of our tax dollars were spent, and Shiite/Sunni violence is rearing up again. Al-Qaida terrorism is now robust.
What, exactly, have we gained?
He now wants to turn that destructive force on Syria.
The years long effort for war on Syria has already run up a large tab -- in money and resources. In resources, you have John Kerry and the State Department spending 2012 and this year attempting to persuade foreign countries into supporting war and pressuring them to cut off ties to Syria.
That has a huge cost. Might life be better for the Iraqi people if high-profile US visits to Iraq in the last two years had been about the needs of the Iraqi people and not the US government's need for war with Syria? And what was Nouri given to make him announce (briefly) that they would stop flights from Iran to Syria?
If diplomacy had been used for humanitarian reasons, then high-profile US visits would have been about wrongful imprisonments, the need to stop torturing, the need to stop shooting at Iraqis taking part in a sit-in and, at the very least, the need to provide the people with basic public services (electricity, potable water, etc.).
A lot of liars in Congress and in the press want to insist attacking Syria would be a "humanitarian action." They ignore the reality of what they're demanding. As Steve Chapman (Chicago Tribune) observes, "It may look antiseptic from Washington, but only because the Syrians have no means to respond [to an attack] in kind. But to anyone in Syria, there will be no doubt that we are waging war." Activist, author and candidate for governor in California Cindy Sheehan weighs in on these 'humanitarian concerns' at Cindy Sheehan's Soapbox:
Now, Obama and Pelosi want to kill Syrian children so their government doesn’t kill them? I don't want the Syrian government or US supported rebels to kill anyone, but I am sure that dying by a US made and launched missile is much more compassionate than any other way? Obviously the “problem” that the US has, is not that it loves children so much, but that it’s Murder, Inc and wants a global monopoly on carnage.
To me, and many others who really pay attention to needs of children, what is urgent is for the US to stop all its wars that harm families all over the world, even here. Why do you think our economy is tanking and the social safety nets are being greatly reduced or eliminated? Our overwhelming monetary and psycho investment in the military industrial complex!
FYI, Cindy's campaign site is here. If the liars in Congress and the press have are so concerned about 'humanitarian' intervention in Syria, why have they expressed no humanitarian concerns about Iraq?
KUNA reports the European Union's High Representative Catherine Ashton issued a statement condemning Tuesday's attacks in Iraq. Her statement in full [PDF format warning] can be found here:
I condemn in the strongest terms the series of car bombings that killed many civilians on Tuesday in predominantly Shia districts of Baghdad. My thoughts go out to the many innocent victims and I express my condolences to their families.
I am seriously concerned by the escalation of violence in Iraq over the past months which is fueling sectarianism and undermining the stability of the country. I call on all political, religious and community leaders to increase their efforts to end this dangerous cycle of vilence. I am confident that the Iraqi people will remain steadfast in their rejection of sectarian violence and work towards a successful transition to democracy and long term stability for the benefit of all of Iraq's citizens.
The US government has nothing to say about Tuesday's attacks which killed 87 people (Iraq Body Count tally). It rarely has anything to say about anything to do with Iraq. Yes, Sunday, they did issue the following:
Press Statement
Marie Harf
Deputy Spokesperson, Office of the Spokesperson
Deputy Spokesperson, Office of the Spokesperson
Washington, DC
September 1, 2013
The
United States strongly condemns the terrible events that took place at
Camp Ashraf today, which according to various reports resulted in the
deaths of and injuries to numerous camp residents. Our condolences go
out to the families of the victims and those who were injured in today’s
violence.
We are deeply concerned about these reports and are in regular contact with the United Nations Assistance Mission in Iraq (UNAMI), as well as Government of Iraq officials. We support UNAMI's efforts to conduct its own assessment of the situation and call on the Government of Iraq to fully support those efforts.
We further call on Iraqi authorities to act with urgency to immediately ensure medical assistance to the wounded and to secure the camp against any further violence or harm to the residents. We underscore the responsibility of the Government of Iraq and all relevant stakeholders to ensure the safety and security of residents at both Camp Ashraf and Camp Hurriyah, and we affirm the call by UNAMI for a full and independent investigation into this terrible and tragic event. Those found to be responsible must be held fully accountable.
We are deeply concerned about these reports and are in regular contact with the United Nations Assistance Mission in Iraq (UNAMI), as well as Government of Iraq officials. We support UNAMI's efforts to conduct its own assessment of the situation and call on the Government of Iraq to fully support those efforts.
We further call on Iraqi authorities to act with urgency to immediately ensure medical assistance to the wounded and to secure the camp against any further violence or harm to the residents. We underscore the responsibility of the Government of Iraq and all relevant stakeholders to ensure the safety and security of residents at both Camp Ashraf and Camp Hurriyah, and we affirm the call by UNAMI for a full and independent investigation into this terrible and tragic event. Those found to be responsible must be held fully accountable.
But before you applaud them, that's idiotic.
All the ones arguing humanitarian grounds for Syria -- including the ridiculous US House Rep Debbie Wasserman-Schultz with her "as a Jew" statement -- need to ask where is the humanitarian concern for the Ashraf community?
The United States could actually put more boots on the ground in Iraq as a result of that attack. International law would allow that (some legal scholars would argue that international law compels it).
I must have missed Debs Wasserman weighing in on the attack, "as a Jew," right?
Adam Schreck (AP) reported Tuesday that the United Nations just confirmed the deaths of 52 Ashraf residents. Al Mada noted Monday that Nouri's declared he should be over the Iraqi investigation since he's commander-in-chief. And that's exactly why he shouldn't be over it. Tuesday, the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq issued a statement which included:
Reiterating his previous statement, the UN Envoy expressed his outrage at the brutal killing of the camp’s residents. Mr. Busztin took note of the statement issued by the Government of Iraq announcing it has initiated its own investigation into the tragic events and acknowledging its responsibility for the safety of the camp’s residents. “I call on the Iraqi government to ensure that a thorough, impartial and transparent investigation into this atrocious crime is conducted without delay and that the results of the investigation are made public”, he said.
Deb Wasserman may not grasp the basics so let's review slowly.
Camp Ashraf housed a group of Iranian dissidents who were welcomed to Iraq by Saddam Hussein in 1986 and he gave them Camp Ashraf and six other parcels that they could utilize. In 2003, the US invaded Iraq.The US government had the US military lead negotiations with the residents of Camp Ashraf. The US government wanted the residents to disarm and the US promised protections to the point that US actions turned the residents of Camp Ashraf into protected person under the Geneva Conventions. This is key and demands the US defend the Ashraf community in Iraq from attacks. The Bully Boy Bush administration grasped that -- they were ignorant of every other law on the books but they grasped that one. As 2008 drew to a close, the Bush administration was given assurances from the Iraqi government that they would protect the residents. Yet Nouri al-Maliki ordered the camp repeatedly attacked after Barack Obama was sworn in as US President. July 28, 2009 Nouri launched an attack (while then-US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates was on the ground in Iraq). In a report released this summer entitled "Iraqi government must respect and protect rights of Camp Ashraf residents," Amnesty International described this assault, "Barely a month later, on 28-29 July 2009, Iraqi security forces stormed into the camp; at least nine residents were killed and many more were injured. Thirty-six residents who were detained were allegedly tortured and beaten. They were eventually released on 7 October 2009; by then they were in poor health after going on hunger strike." April 8, 2011, Nouri again ordered an assault on Camp Ashraf (then-US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates was again on the ground in Iraq when the assault took place). Amnesty International described the assault this way, "Earlier this year, on 8 April, Iraqi troops took up positions within the camp using excessive, including lethal, force against residents who tried to resist them. Troops used live ammunition and by the end of the operation some 36 residents, including eight women, were dead and more than 300 others had been wounded. Following international and other protests, the Iraqi government announced that it had appointed a committee to investigate the attack and the killings; however, as on other occasions when the government has announced investigations into allegations of serious human rights violations by its forces, the authorities have yet to disclose the outcome, prompting questions whether any investigation was, in fact, carried out." Those weren't the last attacks. They were the last attacks while the residents were labeled as terrorists by the US State Dept. (September 28, 2012, the designation was changed.) In spite of this labeling, Mohammed Tawfeeq (CNN) observed that "since 2004, the United States has considered the residents of Camp Ashraf 'noncombatants' and 'protected persons' under the Geneva Conventions." So the US has an obligation to protect the residents. 3,300 are no longer at Camp Ashraf. They have moved to Camp Hurriyah for the most part. A tiny number has received asylum in other countries. Approximately 100 were still at Camp Ashraf when it was attacked Sunday. That was the second attack this year alone. February 9th of this year, the Ashraf residents were again attacked, this time the ones who had been relocated to Camp Hurriyah. Trend News Agency counted 10 dead and over one hundred injured. Prensa Latina reported, " A rain of self-propelled Katyusha missiles hit a provisional camp of Iraqi opposition Mujahedin-e Khalk, an organization Tehran calls terrorists, causing seven fatalities plus 50 wounded, according to an Iraqi official release."
"As a Jew," Debbie Wasserman, shouldn't attacks on encampments of persons alarm you? Attacks carried out by government forces? Shouldn't that bother you? Or do use Nazi Germany allusions as rarely as you use soap and water? There is no oil crisis, we need only figure out how to tap into all the oil on Debbie's face and in her hair and the term "energy crisis" will be a relic of the past.
RECOMMENDED: "Iraq snapshot"
"Message to the Media: Stop Whoring"
"Pope calls for peace talks"
"Saying no to war on Syria"
"Barack and Pelosi's Syria Lust"
"Again with Lindorff and the Orange Tabby"
"again on fonda"
"Stop the attack on Syria"
"Barack, stop using my tax dollars to fund al Qaeda"
"The press sells the war"
"Does Winona Ryder have a classic film?"
"The Joan Rivers Presidency"
"Barack's fragile ego"
"Kerry is disturbed"
"THIS JUST IN! KERRY UNABLE TO SPEAK AT PRESENT!"
Thursday, September 05, 2013
THIS JUST IN! KERRY UNABLE TO SPEAK AT PRESENT!
BULLY BOY PRESS & CEDRIC'S BIG MIX -- THE KOOL-AID TABLE
RUSSIAN PRESIDENT VLADIMIR PUTIN HAS CALLED U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE JOHN KERRY A LIAR.
THE RESPONSE FROM KERRY?
NOT EVEN A MEEK "TRUTH HURTS!"
TODAY, THESE REPORTERS WERE USHERED INTO KERRY'S OFFICE WHERE THEY DISCOVERED HIM STILL GNAWING ON THE BONES OF SECRETARY OF DEFENSE CHUCK HAGEL (SEE "Kerry had a hankering for Hagel" AND "THIS JUST IN! KERRY DEVOURS HAGEL!" ).
WHEN ASKED FOR A REPLY TO PUTIN'S COMMENTS, KERRY JUST GROWLED AND SHOWED TEETH AS HE ATTEMPTED TO COVER ACCESS TO HAGEL'S BONES BY PRESSING HIS SNOUT OVER THEM.
FROM THE TC WIRE:
While Obama has long spoken out against Bashar al-Assad and the use of chemical weapons,
it was the president’s apparent off-the-cuff comments one year ago that
may now be most responsible for putting the U.S. in a bind.
Obama’s warning in August 2012 that use of a “whole bunch” of chemical weapons would cross a “red line,” triggering “enormous consequences,” went much further than aides had planned, several told the New York Times earlier this year. Some reportedly wished Obama could have taken those words back.
Now, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate, who has made ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan his signature foreign policy achievement, is at risk of entangling the U.S. in a fresh Middle East conflict.
Because Barack Obama, two years ago, said “Assad must go,” and, one year ago,
said any use of chemical weapons crosses his “red line,” Congress has no choice
but to plunge America into yet another Mideast war.
Can this be? Are we really, as a nation, required to go to war to make good the simple-minded statements of an untutored president who had no constitutional authority to issue his impulsive ultimata?
Are we really required to go to war to get the egg off Obama’s face?
With obscene imperial arrogance, President Obama proclaimed
that the “world” – not he – has drawn a bloody “red line” in Syria. “I
didn’t set a red line,” said Obama, at a stop in Sweden on his way to a
Group of 20 nations meeting in St. Petersburg, Russia. “The world set a
red line.”
That’s news to the rest of the planet, including most of the Group of 20 and the meeting’s host, Russian President Vladimir Putin, who described Obama’s claims that Syria used sarin gas against civilians in rebel-held areas as “completely ridiculous.” “It does not fit any logic,” said Putin, since Syrian President Assad’s forces “have the so-called rebels surrounded and are finishing them off.”
It’s news to China, which will surely join Russia in vetoing any Security Council motion to provide legal cover for Obama’s aggression. And it’s news to the usually compliant UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, who this week reaffirmed that “the Security Council has primary responsibility for international peace and security" and “the use of force is lawful only when in exercise of self-defense in accordance with article 51 of the United Nations Charter and or when the Security Council approves such action.”
It’s news to Great Britain, America’s temporarily wayward poodle, whose parliament rejected any militarily entanglement in Obama’s red line. As esteemed political analyst William Blum points out, 64 percent of the people of France oppose their government’s planned participation Obama’s Battle of the Red Line.
Apparently, a young and impressionable Obama took the 1985 USA for Africa song “We are the World” too literally, and believes that all one need do is sing or shout the words to make it so.
Justin Raimondo (Antiwar.com) calls out Pelosi's stupidity:
To the reporters crowding around her, who share the globalist assumptions of the political class, her remarks seemed… well, unremarkable. To ordinary people, however, Pelosi’s smart-as-a-whip grandson posed a very good question, perhaps the only pertinent one in this whole debate: what does the Syrian civil war have to do with us? Which makes one wonder: what was Pelosi thinking as she related a narrative whose real meaning seemed to elude her.
Which brings us rather neatly to the central question underlying the debate over whether to strike Syria: What was the Obama administration thinking when they decided to try to pull this off? Do they live on another planet from the rest of us?
That is really the central issue here. Forget the "weapons of mass destruction:" let’s not even talk about the vague and very shaky "evidence" linking the Assad regime to the use of sarin gas – and it’s probably best to ignore the "moral" arguments users of phosphorus bombs and depleted uranium weaponry invoke when justifying this war. The real question is what kind of mindset are the Nancy Pelosis of this world operating under. It’s not a partisan mindset: the leadership of both parties, as well as the White House have all drunk from the same pitcher of Kool-Aid.
For Congressional advocates for war, international law doesn't matter. Nor, as Jason Ditz (Antiwar.com), does public opinion appear to matter:
But while the president can count on old-guard hawks to vote yes before they even hear what country they’re voting to lob missiles at, the American public is nowhere near so easy to trick, and despite top officials repeatedly advocating the war in public addresses, the polls continue to show broad, bipartisan opposition among Americans for the conflict.
Nationwide, the administration can’t even crack the 30% mark on selling the war to the public, even with television news networks shamelessly reiterating administration lies about unquestionable “proof” of Assad’s guilt and Secretary of State John Kerry loudly and repeatedly comparing Assad to Adolf Hitler.
Yesterday, MoveOn sent out the following e-mail:
Today Rebecca Shabad (The Hill) reports, "The liberal group MoveOn said Wednesday it opposes military action in Syria and will work to defeat it in Congress. The group, which spearheaded liberal opposition to the Iraq War, said it surveyed its 8 million members and found overwhelming opposition to President Obama’s call for Syria strikes."
I'm honestly surprised by that move -- not by the results of the vote but that MoveOn listened to their membership. Maybe if John Kerry would stop repeatedly hissing "Hitler," he could hear the voice of the people as well? Or maybe the question to ask is WWHB: Who Would Hitler Back?
Today on Morning Edition (NPR -- link is audio and transcript), US-backing efforts in Syria were discussed:
RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:
And I'm Renee Montagne.
President Obama has promised limited military action against Syria. He says missile strikes are not about regime change and there will be no boots on the ground. But even as the Congress debates the president's plans for action, the White House is looking at broader options.
NPR's Tom Bowman reports the president may call on the U.S. military to help build up the Syrian opposition.
TOM BOWMAN, BYLINE: Right now it's not the Pentagon but the CIA that's working with the Syrian rebels, mostly providing training in Jordan. But the president also promised weapons for the rebels back in June and they haven't arrived. So yesterday at a Senate hearing, Republican Bob Corker of Tennessee put this question to Secretary of State John Kerry.
(SOUNDBITE OF HEARING)
SENATOR BOB CORKER: Why have we been so slow, so inept in so many ways at helping build capacity of this opposition that we have said publicly that we support?
SECRETARY JOHN KERRY: I think, Senator, we need to have that discussion tomorrow in classified session. We can talk about some components of that.
BOWMAN: Classified session, meaning behind closed doors; that's because the CIA is handling the effort. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel told Senator Corker the U.S. military is on the sidelines.
Again, WWHB? As Robert Fisk (ZNet) pointed out last week:
It's full circle for the CIA, back in business with al Qaeda after training and funding them to fight against the USSR military in Afghanistan.
RECOMMENDED: "Iraq snapshot"
"Will Kerry's ignoring Iraq bite him in the butt?"
"Barack goes to Sweden while others battle for his ..."
"Why's Joy-Ann so angry?"
"Breaking with the pack"
"Barack wants Congress to go down with him"
"scandal"
"Equality benefits stalled in two states"
"Another great column from Laurie Penny"
"John The Liar Kerry"
"Cher needs to inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame"
"Oh, Matthew Rothschild, really?"
"The spying, the selling of war"
"Kerry had a hankering for Hagel"
"THIS JUST IN! KERRY DEVOURS HAGEL!"
RUSSIAN PRESIDENT VLADIMIR PUTIN HAS CALLED U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE JOHN KERRY A LIAR.
THE RESPONSE FROM KERRY?
NOT EVEN A MEEK "TRUTH HURTS!"
TODAY, THESE REPORTERS WERE USHERED INTO KERRY'S OFFICE WHERE THEY DISCOVERED HIM STILL GNAWING ON THE BONES OF SECRETARY OF DEFENSE CHUCK HAGEL (SEE "Kerry had a hankering for Hagel" AND "THIS JUST IN! KERRY DEVOURS HAGEL!" ).
WHEN ASKED FOR A REPLY TO PUTIN'S COMMENTS, KERRY JUST GROWLED AND SHOWED TEETH AS HE ATTEMPTED TO COVER ACCESS TO HAGEL'S BONES BY PRESSING HIS SNOUT OVER THEM.
FROM THE TC WIRE:
Tom Cohen (CNN) reports
US President Barack Obama declared today, "A red line for us in we star
seeing a whole bunch of chemical weapons moving around or being
utilized." What is The Dalibama of War babbling about? His push for
war on Syria and, Cohen states, "Conservative critics have
said Obama painted himself into a corner with his statement last year
that Syria's use of chemical weapons was a red line that would change
his approach to its civil war." Cohen's mistaken, it's not just
conservative critics who are making this claim and Cohen is wrong in
that he refuses to explain really what the claim is. Devin Dwyer (ABC News) reported last week:
Obama’s warning in August 2012 that use of a “whole bunch” of chemical weapons would cross a “red line,” triggering “enormous consequences,” went much further than aides had planned, several told the New York Times earlier this year. Some reportedly wished Obama could have taken those words back.
Now, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate, who has made ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan his signature foreign policy achievement, is at risk of entangling the U.S. in a fresh Middle East conflict.
AFP's Prashant Rao Tweets:
-
Obama Assures Americans This Will Not Be Another 1456 Ottoman Siege Of Belgrade -
@TheOnion: http://onion.com/1dGfS32
Prashant Rao
It was beyond stupid for Barack to make that ultimatum and it was the
action of a politically naive savant which really makes you wonder who
really runs the White House? But that's how the US government ended up
where they are now and, note, Some White House aides "reportedly wished
Obama could have taken those words back." That doesn't sound like
conservative critics. Betty's certainly not a conservative and, last night, addressing Secretary of State John Kerry
went on and on about "reputation" in yesterday's hearing which can be
boiled down as Barack shot off his mouth and Kerry feels it is the duty
of the Congress to ignore the will of the people to protect The
Dahlibahma of War from his own big, fat mouth. This led Betty to state
what we should all be wondering, "And for that, you want innocent
Syrians to die in your pretend 'precision strike'."
Can this be? Are we really, as a nation, required to go to war to make good the simple-minded statements of an untutored president who had no constitutional authority to issue his impulsive ultimata?
Are we really required to go to war to get the egg off Obama’s face?
On Barack's false claim that he didn't draw the red line, Glen Ford (Black Agenda Report):
That’s news to the rest of the planet, including most of the Group of 20 and the meeting’s host, Russian President Vladimir Putin, who described Obama’s claims that Syria used sarin gas against civilians in rebel-held areas as “completely ridiculous.” “It does not fit any logic,” said Putin, since Syrian President Assad’s forces “have the so-called rebels surrounded and are finishing them off.”
It’s news to China, which will surely join Russia in vetoing any Security Council motion to provide legal cover for Obama’s aggression. And it’s news to the usually compliant UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, who this week reaffirmed that “the Security Council has primary responsibility for international peace and security" and “the use of force is lawful only when in exercise of self-defense in accordance with article 51 of the United Nations Charter and or when the Security Council approves such action.”
It’s news to Great Britain, America’s temporarily wayward poodle, whose parliament rejected any militarily entanglement in Obama’s red line. As esteemed political analyst William Blum points out, 64 percent of the people of France oppose their government’s planned participation Obama’s Battle of the Red Line.
Apparently, a young and impressionable Obama took the 1985 USA for Africa song “We are the World” too literally, and believes that all one need do is sing or shout the words to make it so.
Also calling out leaders -- in Congress and out -- is Margaret Kimberley (Black Agenda Report):
The black misleadership scoundrels are also worthy of scorn in this crime. Van Jones was tossed under the wheels of Obama’s bus yet has sung his praises ever since. As a “left” commentator on CNN he said, “If you kill Assad right now, wonderful.” Jones also claimed that the United States overthrew a dictator in Iran in 1953. Of course Mohammed Mossadegh was democratically elected and Jones was left to feebly explain that he meant to use the word leader.
Jones wasn’t alone in trashing black Americans’ historic opposition to military aggression. We didn’t really need further proof that black politics has reached its nadir under Obama, but Eleanor Holmes Norton provided us with more. The non-voting Washington DC delegate to congress had this to say about why Obama will probably win congressional approval for more death and destruction. “If [Obama] gets saved at all, I think it’ll be because, it’ll be because of loyalty of Democrats. They just don’t want to see him shamed and humiliated on the national stage.” Not satisfied at her public expression of stupidity she had this to say. “At the moment, that’s the only reason I would vote for it if I could vote on it.” So shallow and shameful were Norton’s words that one might be tempted to support the district’s powerless status.
The black misleadership scoundrels are also worthy of scorn in this crime. Van Jones was tossed under the wheels of Obama’s bus yet has sung his praises ever since. As a “left” commentator on CNN he said, “If you kill Assad right now, wonderful.” Jones also claimed that the United States overthrew a dictator in Iran in 1953. Of course Mohammed Mossadegh was democratically elected and Jones was left to feebly explain that he meant to use the word leader.
Jones wasn’t alone in trashing black Americans’ historic opposition to military aggression. We didn’t really need further proof that black politics has reached its nadir under Obama, but Eleanor Holmes Norton provided us with more. The non-voting Washington DC delegate to congress had this to say about why Obama will probably win congressional approval for more death and destruction. “If [Obama] gets saved at all, I think it’ll be because, it’ll be because of loyalty of Democrats. They just don’t want to see him shamed and humiliated on the national stage.” Not satisfied at her public expression of stupidity she had this to say. “At the moment, that’s the only reason I would vote for it if I could vote on it.” So shallow and shameful were Norton’s words that one might be tempted to support the district’s powerless status.
Today Barack got a little closer to getting his war on Syria. Paul Richter (Los Angeles Times) reports, "A divided Senate Foreign Relations Committee
voted narrowly Wednesday to authorize a punitive U.S. strike against
Syria, opening the way for a vote in the full Senate next week." Ruth asked that we note her Senator Chris Murphy was one of the votes against authorizing an attack on Syria. On Labor Day, Ruth noted
Murphy's comments about Syria and would have guessed that he would have
voted for authorization. She notes that she and a friend in her
neighborhood went door to door speaking to those home about the need to
contact Murphy and distributing fliers with contact info. Jake Miller (CBS News) explains, "With the exceptions of Sens. Tom Udall, D-N.M., Chris Murphy, D-Conn.,
and Ed Markey, D-Mass., all of the panel's Democrats voted in favor of
the resolution. Udall and Murphy were opposed, while Markey voted
'present.'" Gregory Korte (USA Today) notes,
"The vote was 10-7. Five Republicans and two Democrats voted against
it. The
committee's consensus followed closed-door meetings Wednesday morning,
which delayed the start of the committee's meeting by nearly three
hours." Along with Murphy and Udall, the other "no" votes were
Republican Senators John Barasso, Ron Johnson, Rand Paul, James Risch
and Marco Rubio. "Yes" votes were Democratic Senators Barbra Boxer,
Chris Coons, Dick Durbin, Ben Cardin, Tim Kaine, Robert Menendez and
Jean Shaheen. Republicans voting "yes" to attack were Bob Corker, Jeff
Flake and John McCain.
If it surprises you that more did not stand up, look at the House minority leader and the idiotic story she told:
"I’ll tell you this story and then I really do have to go. My five-year-old
grandson, as I was leaving San Francisco yesterday, he said to me, Mimi, my
name, Mimi, war with Syria, are you yes war with Syria, no, war with Syria.
And he’s five years old. We’re not talking about war; we’re talking about action.
Yes war with Syria, no with war in Syria. I said, ‘Well, what do you think?’
He said, ‘I think no war.’ I said, ‘Well, I generally agree with that but you
know, they have killed hundreds of children, they’ve killed hundreds of children
there. ‘ And he said, five years old, ‘Were these children in the United States?’
And I said, ‘No, but they’re children wherever they are.’
To the reporters crowding around her, who share the globalist assumptions of the political class, her remarks seemed… well, unremarkable. To ordinary people, however, Pelosi’s smart-as-a-whip grandson posed a very good question, perhaps the only pertinent one in this whole debate: what does the Syrian civil war have to do with us? Which makes one wonder: what was Pelosi thinking as she related a narrative whose real meaning seemed to elude her.
Which brings us rather neatly to the central question underlying the debate over whether to strike Syria: What was the Obama administration thinking when they decided to try to pull this off? Do they live on another planet from the rest of us?
That is really the central issue here. Forget the "weapons of mass destruction:" let’s not even talk about the vague and very shaky "evidence" linking the Assad regime to the use of sarin gas – and it’s probably best to ignore the "moral" arguments users of phosphorus bombs and depleted uranium weaponry invoke when justifying this war. The real question is what kind of mindset are the Nancy Pelosis of this world operating under. It’s not a partisan mindset: the leadership of both parties, as well as the White House have all drunk from the same pitcher of Kool-Aid.
For Congressional advocates for war, international law doesn't matter. Nor, as Jason Ditz (Antiwar.com), does public opinion appear to matter:
But while the president can count on old-guard hawks to vote yes before they even hear what country they’re voting to lob missiles at, the American public is nowhere near so easy to trick, and despite top officials repeatedly advocating the war in public addresses, the polls continue to show broad, bipartisan opposition among Americans for the conflict.
Nationwide, the administration can’t even crack the 30% mark on selling the war to the public, even with television news networks shamelessly reiterating administration lies about unquestionable “proof” of Assad’s guilt and Secretary of State John Kerry loudly and repeatedly comparing Assad to Adolf Hitler.
John Kerry calls Assad "Hitler" today but Anthony Bond and David Martosko (Daily Mail) point out
that he didn't feel that way in 2009 when he and his wife, Teresa
Heinz, shared "a cozy and intimate dinner with Bashar al-Assad" and the
First Lady of Syria Asma al-Akhras. But today, Kerry screams al-Assad
is Hitler? Jason Ditz (Antiwar.com) observes:
Officials are throwing every rhetorical trick in the book at Congress to see what sticks at this point, from Hitler to Iran, and making any empty promises about keeping the war limited to skeptics while talking up escalation to hawks.
There is palpable desperation in the administration’s attempts to sell the war at all costs, and while officials have regularly tried to trick the country into war throughout history, there have been few that have been so flagrant about it. Fortunately, the polls are still not on their side, and the American public appear unwilling to be fooled this time.
Antiwar.com urges all readers to contact their Congressmen and urge them to vote against attacking Syria. Click here for contract information.
Officials are throwing every rhetorical trick in the book at Congress to see what sticks at this point, from Hitler to Iran, and making any empty promises about keeping the war limited to skeptics while talking up escalation to hawks.
There is palpable desperation in the administration’s attempts to sell the war at all costs, and while officials have regularly tried to trick the country into war throughout history, there have been few that have been so flagrant about it. Fortunately, the polls are still not on their side, and the American public appear unwilling to be fooled this time.
Antiwar.com urges all readers to contact their Congressmen and urge them to vote against attacking Syria. Click here for contract information.
Yesterday, MoveOn sent out the following e-mail:
**OFFICIAL VOTE**
Dear MoveOn member,
We need your help making an important decision.
President Obama has asked Congress to authorize the use of military force in Syria in response to recent reports of a chemical
weapons attack by the government there.1
Because MoveOn is its members, the stance MoveOn takes on this issue will be decided by MoveOn members.
Should MoveOn support or oppose the congressional authorization to use military force in Syria?
Click here to cast your vote:
Voting starts now and will go
through 10:00 a.m. ET tomorrow. The more people who participate, the better the decision will be—so please take
a moment to vote now by clicking here:
Thanks for all you do.
–Anna, Mark, Susannah, Linda,
and the rest of the team
Today Rebecca Shabad (The Hill) reports, "The liberal group MoveOn said Wednesday it opposes military action in Syria and will work to defeat it in Congress. The group, which spearheaded liberal opposition to the Iraq War, said it surveyed its 8 million members and found overwhelming opposition to President Obama’s call for Syria strikes."
I'm honestly surprised by that move -- not by the results of the vote but that MoveOn listened to their membership. Maybe if John Kerry would stop repeatedly hissing "Hitler," he could hear the voice of the people as well? Or maybe the question to ask is WWHB: Who Would Hitler Back?
Today on Morning Edition (NPR -- link is audio and transcript), US-backing efforts in Syria were discussed:
RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:
And I'm Renee Montagne.
President Obama has promised limited military action against Syria. He says missile strikes are not about regime change and there will be no boots on the ground. But even as the Congress debates the president's plans for action, the White House is looking at broader options.
NPR's Tom Bowman reports the president may call on the U.S. military to help build up the Syrian opposition.
TOM BOWMAN, BYLINE: Right now it's not the Pentagon but the CIA that's working with the Syrian rebels, mostly providing training in Jordan. But the president also promised weapons for the rebels back in June and they haven't arrived. So yesterday at a Senate hearing, Republican Bob Corker of Tennessee put this question to Secretary of State John Kerry.
(SOUNDBITE OF HEARING)
SENATOR BOB CORKER: Why have we been so slow, so inept in so many ways at helping build capacity of this opposition that we have said publicly that we support?
SECRETARY JOHN KERRY: I think, Senator, we need to have that discussion tomorrow in classified session. We can talk about some components of that.
BOWMAN: Classified session, meaning behind closed doors; that's because the CIA is handling the effort. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel told Senator Corker the U.S. military is on the sidelines.
Again, WWHB? As Robert Fisk (ZNet) pointed out last week:
If Barack Obama decides to attack the
Syrian regime, he has ensured – for the very first time in history –
that the United States will be on the same side as al-Qa’ida.
Quite an alliance! Was it not the Three
Musketeers who shouted “All for one and one for all” each time they
sought combat? This really should be the new battle cry if – or when –
the statesmen of the Western world go to war against Bashar al-Assad.
The men who destroyed so many thousands on
9/11 will then be fighting alongside the very nation whose innocents
they so cruelly murdered almost exactly 12 years ago. Quite an
achievement for Obama, Cameron, Hollande and the rest of the miniature
warlords.
It's full circle for the CIA, back in business with al Qaeda after training and funding them to fight against the USSR military in Afghanistan.
RECOMMENDED: "Iraq snapshot"
"Will Kerry's ignoring Iraq bite him in the butt?"
"Barack goes to Sweden while others battle for his ..."
"Why's Joy-Ann so angry?"
"Breaking with the pack"
"Barack wants Congress to go down with him"
"scandal"
"Equality benefits stalled in two states"
"Another great column from Laurie Penny"
"John The Liar Kerry"
"Cher needs to inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame"
"Oh, Matthew Rothschild, really?"
"The spying, the selling of war"
"Kerry had a hankering for Hagel"
"THIS JUST IN! KERRY DEVOURS HAGEL!"
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