Tag: Government

Score several for the Lobby


They got over big time, just when I thought integrity mattered and would win out, it appears sleaze is still the driving force in American politics!

“Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair announced today that Ambassador Charles W. Freeman Jr. has requested that his selection to be Chairman of the National Intelligence Council not proceed,” read a statement from Blair’s office. “Director Blair accepted Ambassador Freeman’s decision with regret.”

“Critics have seized on retired ambassador Charles ‘Chas’ Freeman’s ties to Saudi Arabia and views on human rights in China to argue against his appointment as chairman of the National Intelligence Council (NIC), but Freeman’s defenders charge that their real aim is to impose an ideological litmus test on top government officials and ensure a continued policy of reflexive US support for Israel,”

And while it may seem to be a GOP inspired campaign to get Freeman’s nomination withdrawn it was anything but!

Steven Rosen, a former director of the American Israel Political Affairs Committee due to stand trial this April for espionage for Israel, is the leader of the campaign against Freeman’s appointment. In his wake, a host of critics from the Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg to the New Republic’s Marty Peretz have emerged to assail Freeman’s comments on Israeli policies and demand that Obama rescind the diplomat’s appointment. The campaign against Freeman spread to Congress, where a handful of representatives including the top recipient of AIPAC donations, Rep. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.), called for an investigation of Freeman’s business ties to China and Saudi Arabia.

Freeman’s would have been an ideal position to influence intelligence data on a wide variety of subjects, including whether certain states had nuclear capability, i.e. Iran and or Syria.  With some one more easily malleable, the Lobby could get intelligence to reflect its position vis-a-vis these countries and resulting American policy decisions but Freeman did not fit the bill and so had to be removed.  I’m curious what it was that got Freeman to withdraw his name from consideration.  I am looking forward to the day when American officials are willing to stand up and be counted when it comes to facing a Lobby that does not reflect American interests.  It seems Freeman was not that kind of man, so perhaps it’s good he not take the position.  Next?!

On another front it seems Hillary isn’t quite the man, or woman, I thought she was.  In an earlier post I congratulated her for what I thought was taking a position about Israeli actions that were against American interests.  Well it turns out she didn’t quite take the stand I thought she had.  Instead, Clinton is speaking political correctness, the kind of language that’s good for double speak and confusion, just the kind of predicament people like to take advantage of when oppressing others while making themselves look like victims.

When Mrs. Clinton was asked in Ramallah how she felt about Jewish settlements in the West Bank, a cause of strife with Palestinians, she said the United States would raise “the issue” with the next Israeli government. Asked about it again in Brussels, she recited the official American position that settlements were “unhelpful.”

In Israel, Mrs. Clinton did not publicly broach settlements at all. And she only gingerly raised the issue of border crossings to Gaza, which Israel has mostly kept closed, drawing criticismfrom European leaders and human rights groups.

So, it appears the juggernaut of Lobby interests continues in the face of frighten American politicians who cannot muster the courage to take stands that are consistent with the interests of their own country.  If nothing else, such blatant displays of cowardice should be good fodder for political advertisements of their opponents in future political campaigns.  It’s time to show such people the door.  Next!?

UPDATE:

At least Charles Freeman goes out with a bang.

I have concluded that the barrage of libelous distortions of my record would not cease upon my entry into office.  The effort to smear me and to destroy my credibility would instead continue.  I do not believe the National Intelligence Council could function effectively while its chair was under constant attack by unscrupulous people with a passionate attachment to the views of a political faction in a foreign country.  I agreed to chair the NIC to strengthen it and protect it against politicization, not to introduce it to efforts by a special interest group to assert control over it through a protracted political campaign.

It is apparent that we Americans cannot any longer conduct a serious public discussion or exercise independent judgment about matters of great importance to our country as well as to our allies and friends.

The libels on me and their easily traceable email trails show conclusively that there is a powerful  lobby determined to prevent any view other than its own from being aired, still less to factor in American understanding of trends and events in the Middle East.  The tactics of the Israel Lobby plumb the depths of dishonor and indecency and include character assassination, selective misquotation, the willful distortion of the record, the fabrication of falsehoods, and an utter disregard for the truth.  The aim of this Lobby is control of the policy process through the exercise of a veto over the appointment of people who dispute the wisdom of its views, the substitution of political correctness for analysis, and the exclusion of any and all options for decision by Americans and our government other than those that it favors.

So it appears what is needed in American policy is young, fresh pugnacious blood.  I respect Freeman who is at an age where he might not want to summon the rigors necessary for the job he was nominated for, so I would urge Obama to find someone equally as blunt and frank who is up to the task of making America independent of Israel and it’s interests and lobby.

The bastardization of Islam


This latest news story is an excellent example of how religion is used by a ruling class to oppress people.  It has all the elements of brutality, nationalism and ignorance that have characterized all religions but in this millieu, especially Islam.

The brutality of giving a 75 year old woman 40 lashes is apparent and obvious; that she is not Saudi and neither are at least one of the two men accused with her is troubling.  Perhaps the Kingdom is signifying to its Syrian neighbors, through this Syrian national, that attempts at peace with Israel are counterproductive?  But the ignorance, so profound so steeped in irrational behavior is the most troubling aspect.  One of the young men, and we’re talking about men 24 years old, is considered by Islamic law her son, because she breastfed him while he was an infant, which means she can legally be alone with him; the fact that the “court” didn’t allow this information because they claim it was unsubstantiated while at the same time allowing the hearsay allegation of the father of the same young man that the defendant was corrupting his son is incredulous!

I hope there is more to this story; I hope that her case is settled immediately and Mrs. Sawadi is spared the humiliation of Saudi ignorance.  It is truly from the “where do they find these people?” files.

Grasping for straws


charlesfreemanIt’s really amusing to see the Lobby going through its gyrations while opposing all the Obama administration is doing regarding foreign policy and Israel.  Theirs is a coordinated, multiprong effort at causing instability and chaos and they’ve gotten off to a good start.  Here’s their latest attempt.  They seem to be upset with the appointment of Charles Freeman as chairman of the National Intelligence Council, calling him alternately an “Arabist”, a human rights abuser, a Saudi lackey, etc. Of course what he is is someone the Lobby cannot manipulate or control and as head of the NIC would probably have a say in how intelligence is vetted or interpreted regarding Iran, a country in Israel’s sights.  So far, both Freeman and Obama have had little to say about the Lobby’s efforts at voiding his nomination.  It’ll be interesting to see who blinks first.

Clinton’s run in with the Lobby

I’m not much of a Clinton fan and whether she’s able to win me over depends a lot on how she deals with Jewish leaders in and outside America.


I was really blown away by the headline, Jewish Leaders Blast Clinton over Israel Criticism and see it as one more descent into the abyss of extremist Zionism taking over American politics.  What is it Clinton criticized Israel for?

“Israel is not making enough effort to improve the humanitarian situation in Gaza,” senior U.S. officials told Israeli counterparts last week, and reiterated Washington’s view by saying that “the U.S. expects Israel to meet its commitments on this matter.”

Sources at the defense establishment confirmed last night that pressure is increasing on Israel to reopen the crossings to larger volumes of aid for the Gaza Strip. Defense sources said that Israel will find it increasingly difficult to counter the pressure, and may agree to more extensive use of the crossings for aid. Currently, fewer than 200 trucks carrying aid are allowed through daily. The U.S., the EU and the UN are demanding that at least 500 trucks carrying aid be allowed into the Strip daily.

When Senator John Kerry visited the Strip, he learned that many trucks loaded with pasta were not permitted in. When the chairman of the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee inquired as to the reason for the delay, he was told by United Nations aid officials that “Israel does not define pasta as part of humanitarian aid – only rice shipments.”

American Jewish leaders are upset that a US secretary of State insists the Israeli government allow in pasta, and because she, Clinton, has demanded the Israeli government allow that aid into Gaza, America’s Jews are angry?  Why, would be the logical question, are they angry?  Clinton was elected to the US Senate as a senator from New York, one of the most heavily populated Jewish states and has given Israel everything it has asked for in the form of American largess yet a simple declarative sentence that Israel must allow aid to the Palestinians has leaders turning on their heads.

Methinks what has happened is the old slight of hand trick, where the media pundits have used words to categorize Clinton’s remarks on the issue to inflame public reaction.  In fact, the only direct quote from Clinton I could find was this statement from the above link:’ “We are working across the government to see what our approach will be,” Clinton said’, otherwise Kramer, the CBS reporter goes on to characterize Clinton’s remarks as “hammering”, a “change of position”, “a swift about face” and “angry messages”, all terms designed to signify a change in Clinton’s positionvis-a-vis Israel.

However, even if the essence of Clinton’s remarks was that Israel must allow aid into Gaza is that such a bad thing?  The Gazan people’s ability to maintain themselves has been decimated; their agricultural subsistence is threatened daily by Israeli snipers who shoot at people working in the farm fields of Gaza or Israeli navy ships which intimidate fisherman as they fish in Gaza’s territorial waters.  In effect the Israelis “own” Gaza and the people living there are wholly dependent on what aid the Israelis allow in.  A territory with over 1 million people living there deserves more than 200 truck loads of aid a day.  That’s a nobrainer!  So American Jewish leaders don’t have anything to cry about.   Israel always had carte blanche with the Bush administration, which meant they got away with doing whatever they wanted, no questions asked, not a peep was made, and therefore Clinton’s protestations are markedly different in style than Bush’s way of handling things.  In order to get things back to “normal” as it were, this article was able to drum up the necessary sentiment that Clinton, and by extension the entireObama administration, should keep quiet.

It will be interesting to see what Clinton’s reaction will be.  If she buckles and gives in to the white noise about her remarks it means she probably has future political aspirations.  If she ignores them and continues on the same way she began it means she realizes she has reached the end of her political career and she should finally ‘do the right thing’.  Clinton is 62 years old and if  Obama is a two term president and she tows the line, she will be gainfully employed until she reaches 70 and the party nomination for president will most likely be only a twinkle in her eye.  I wish I could say she’ll do the right thing, but American politics and the closed door wheeling and dealing that goes on with it don’t make that possibility a sure thing.  Most likely what will happen is she will moderate her comments and send all that need assurance the sign that hers will not be a wayward State department as the Powell department of State was during the first Bush term.  Remember that one, where we heard talk from the religious right about how it should nuked? I’m not much of a Clinton fan and whether she’s able to win me over depends a lot on how she deals with Jewish leaders  in and outside America.




The Elephant party with an un-Elephant like memory


The  ‘era of big government is back’ screamed the headline with a quote from republican minority leader John Boehner, talking about the stimulus package President Obama is trying to implement. “My question to my Democratic friends is how are you going to pay for it?”, claims Boehner and my answer to him would be why don’t we try to recoup all the money wasted on the Iraqi misadventure, that was documented here

Overall, the Defense Contract Audit Agency has found $4.9 billion in overpricing and waste in Iraq contracts since 2003. US auditors have identified another $5.1 billion in expenses charged without documentation.

“Clearly there has been some significant level of corruption,” says Steven Kosiak, director of budget studies at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments.

But the biggest problem may be the waste that results from doing big-budget projects quickly, with little oversight, in a war-torn country.

“Fraud has not been a significant component of the US experience in Iraq … waste is another matter,” said Stuart Bowen, special inspector general for Iraq, at a House hearing on February 15.

here

The three top auditors overseeing contract work in Iraq told a House committee of $10 billion in spending that was wasteful or poorly tracked. They pointed to numerous instances in which Defense and State department officials condoned or otherwise allowed poor accounting, repeated work delays, bloated expenses and payments for work shoddily or never done by U.S. contractors.

and here.

Though Defense has long been notorious for waste, recent government reports suggest the Pentagon’s money management woes have reached astronomical proportions. A study by the Defense Department’s inspector general found that the Pentagon couldn’t properly account for more than a trillion dollars in monies spent. A GAO report found Defense inventory systems so lax that the U.S.

Army lost track of 56 airplanes, 32 tanks, and 36 Javelin missile command launch-units. And before the Iraq war, when military leaders were scrambling to find enough chemical and biological warfare suits to protect U.S. troops, the department was caught selling these suits as surplus on the Internet “for pennies on the dollar,” a GAO official said.

Let’s not forget the $700 billion with a “b” Bush got Congress to approve that would place no restrictions on the administration of that money other than requiring semiannual reports to Congress.  That some of that money went on to build up the personal wealth of many people at the expense of the American taxpayer is without question.

The 116 banks that are receiving billions in taxpayer-provided bailout money this year actually paid out $1.6 billion in compensation and benefits to their top executives last year – even though the results at some of these institutions were so poor that they would soon have to turn to Washington for a government-engineered rescue.

The $1.6 billion was paid out to nearly 600 executives at the 116 banks that have so far accepted federal money to bolster their financial foundations, The Associated Press concluded after a review of U.S. securities filings. In addition to salary, the compensation included bonuses paid in both cash and stock. The benefits reaped by top executives included the use of company jets for personal purposes, personal chauffeurs, home-security services, country-club memberships and professional-wealth-management services, the news service said.

All of this happened during the Republican watch, so it’s really disingenuous of Boehner to claim that Obama has returned to big government spending…it’s never gone away or at least not in the last eight years.  With the Republican track record on the economy the way it is, the Party really shouldn’t throw rocks while they live in their glass houses.  My last parting shot at the Republicans who claimed the stimulus package bill was not read before passage comes this

This is not the first time this has happened. It happened with the TARP bailout bill (2008) that was rushed through Congress with few provisions for accountability; the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008 which was Congress’ Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac bailout and the PATRIOT Act (2001) that was rushed through Congress before the bill was even printed.

Congressional legislation, which can consist of hundreds or even thousands of pages of text, is routinely drafted by congressional staff members, special interest groups and/or lobbyists and oftentimes is not even read by the members of congress themselves. Although the people, via the U.S. Constitution, have exclusively given Congress the power to write our laws, many of our representatives have delegated this power to their staff members, government agency bureaucrats, special interest groups and corporate lobbyists who prepare much of the legislation.

There’s nothing new to see here people, just move along.

White man speak with forked tongue


The last years of the Bush administration have been one big lie after another, and it hasn’t taken much time to unravel all of them.  Here goes the latest revelation.

The super conservatives, led by the neocons betrayed even their main mentor Ronald Reagan, with their adoption of torture as an instrument in the war on terror, for it was Ronald Reagan who signed the Convention against torture and other cruel, inhuman degrading  punishment.  It defines torture as

any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity.

The Convention left no wriggle room for Bush and his cronies.  It expressly says there are no legitimate reasons for torture, even the phony war on terror.

No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat or war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture.

So why isn’t Bush in jail?  He certainly should be

Each State Party shall ensure that all acts of torture are offences under its criminal law. The same shall apply to an attempt to commit torture and to an act by any person which constitutes complicity or participation in torture.

Each State Party shall make these offences punishable by appropriate penalties which take into account their grave nature.

Moreover, why aren’t we the public who put him in office more outraged at his criminal behavior? Bush steadily encroached on  the rule of law very early on in his term, declaring the UN irrelevant and declaring to all that America was willing to go it alone if it could not get the support of the world community. Along the way, he simply ignored laws that got in the way of his grand schemes and paid no attention to the voices of international bodies and agencies which clamored for the US to follow the laws it signed, agreed to or even wrote. Instead he listened to the polls and until 2006 after all the damage was done, took delight in the fact that the American electorate simply went along with his programs. Our lack of condemnation and outcry for his lawlessness was all he needed to complete his coup d’etat against the American government.  We are as much to blame for torture carried out under the Bush Administration as Bush himself. But there were voices of dissent, opposition to what Bush was doing.

A United Nations anti-torture panel yesterday urged the United States to shut down its Guantanamo Bay detention camp, close any secret overseas CIA prisons, and halt the use of what it said are cruel and degrading interrogation techniques.

The panel also found that many of the detention and interrogation policies the Bush administration put in place for the war on terrorism around the world were at odds with the commitments the United States made when it ratified the global Convention Against Torture treaty in 1994.

The report said that holding detainees in secret prisons, as the CIA is reportedly doing overseas with high-level Al Qaeda suspects, violates the treaty.

So there really isn’t any  excuse for Bush not to be in jail, or Cheney or any of the others within his administration who violated a treaty that the US  Congress ratified.  It simply is a case of the people not demanding accountability of their elected officials to the law.

This is why we lose wars


I read  on some forums how what we see in the video is supposed to be a kick in the seat of the pants motivational speech for the Iraqi police.  Somehow I got the impression the person for whom the tirade was directed, the one who was supposed to get something out of this was not the Iraqi police but the US soldier himself.  He probably had come to the realization at the time he went on his rant that the war for him was over, that the wizard had been revealed and the reason for his being there was a lie, yet he had to get something out of the experience of being in a land that posed no threat to him or his country; he had to find some meaning out of the deception of it all so that it could make sense to him.

On another level however, the words and the method of that military officer are indicative of where the US has come in the last 50 years of wars and deception.  We have become a vulgar nation intent on dominating people.  We made up reasons for being in other people’s territory; made these reasons up just enough to get young men and women to sign on to the idea of fighting non-threatening people only to have that very fighting force realize mid-way through it was not worth the human sacrifice they were asked to make.  That epiphany turned itself into a rage that was directed toward essentially a non existent enemy, and eventually onto ourselves.  The statistic that more US military men died at their own hands, suicide, in January, 2009, is an indication of the futility of this and all other wars we’ve fought since WWII.  No longer able to say we are a light onto the nations, that we have an ideology that is liberating when practiced fully, we have turned into a nation of torturers, invaders, exporting an obscene philosophy of death and destruction and corruption and ignorance.

On yet another level, what was shown in that video should have been expected by all, and the way the Iraqi police endured the diatribe marks the beginning of the end for them as well.  Once they acquiesced to the invasion of their country by a foreign force clearly intent on destroying them, not just getting rid of their corrupted ruler, they signed on to the notion of indentured servitude.  The American officer despite all that’s wrong with where he is at this time still has a human nature that revolts at the idea that people can accept slavery  and that too contributed to his anger towards them.

I suspect in the end, the officer’s rage was directed towards himself, as he probably asked himself the very question many of us have asked these last eight years, and then some; how in the hell did we get here as a country? What is really going on?

Can I get an “Amen”


wwjdI am very encouraged by the news that the Arkansas state legislature is considering allowing citizens who have a concealed carry license to carry their firearms in church.  I’m somewhat sad to read the the biggest opponents of the pending legislation are the ministers and pastors themselves.  I know firearms are a cause of concern for many people, but I do firmly believe an overwhelming majority of people who legally possess firearms are responsible with their use.  I know I have been in the over 20 years I’ve owned both handguns and a rifles.  There have been several cases in the US where the absence of a firearm led to a high death rate and where the presence of one saved lives, during the commisson of a crime by a criminal, but I don’t know of a case where the presence of a firearm in the hands of a citizen contributed to the death of innocent vitims .  If someone does know of such a case perhaps they’ll comment here with specifics.

I like the spirit of responsible firearms owners….they’re independent and see themselves accountable for their own safety, not reliant on a government agency or police force.  I am put off however by the Rambo types who view firearms as a physical extension of some body part they flagrantly whip out to impress any and everyone who happens by. Theirs is a voyeurism with weapons I don’t share, a bloated Clint Eastwood, ‘make my day’ attitude that is responsible for the negative image many people have of firearms owners.  Instead I prefer those who you would never dream of possessing a firearm and being able to use one well.

I have a real problem with being told where I can and cannot carry my firearm; if I can carry it in some places why can’t I carry it in others, like churches or banks (the tellers at my local bank surely know who I am and that I’m not a violent person; they also have come to this realization from behind bullet proof glass!) and places where I have to pay for admission but aren’t allowed to carry are just as dangerous as some neighborhoods of my city.  Why can’t I carry when I go see the university football or basketball game, for instance?  Perhaps the problem is one of alcohol, and as a teetotaler I can’t begin to understand that one, and the fear is that once a person imbibes a little too much he/she may lose all control of their senses and return to the ‘my firearm is bigger than your firearm’ childish behavior.  But there are times like that just when I need to be able to protect myself from  some alcoholic who’s had more than a little too much drink and wants to impress and gets carried away at the high school Friday night football game.

I don’t like government telling me where I can and cannot go with my firearm, and that’s really the bottom line for me.  I’m glad Arkansas is coming around to that realization too that that’s not government’s job.  I hope that’s what they have realized, and note with a bit of tongue in cheek that Arkansas was the home of Bill and Hillary Clinton.  But be that as it may, it’s a positive first step and long over due.  I salute them and encourage all who go to church there to be as responsible with your weapon in the pews as you might be in the streets.  Practice a helluva whole lot and know who the enemy is.

First they came for the……


The effects of letting a rabid state like Israel get away with murder, literally, is that they consume everything and everyone in their path.  Their hatred for Palestinians is widely known and easily documented despite the protestations that their actions are only a reaction to what befalls them.  They have also issued an indirect and veiled threat towards those states that are neighbors as well as distant that they have the power to strike their capitals and reap the same destructive power against them they unleash on the Palestinians should such countries insist Israel adhere to universally accepted standards of conduct.  Despite all this aggression and hostility they still have allies among those people they’ve threatened.  Perhaps the hope is that by feeding the Israeli blood lust for others they somehow can escape their wrath?  Think again.

A few weeks ago, a senior Greek Orthodox clergyman in Israel attended a meeting at a government office in Jerusalem’s Givat Shaul quarter. When he returned to his car, an elderly man wearing a skullcap came and knocked on the window. When the clergyman let the window down, the passerby spat in his face.

The clergyman prefered not to lodge a complaint with the police and told an acquaintance that he was used to being spat at by Jews. Many Jerusalem clergy have been subjected to abuse of this kind. For the most part, they ignore it but sometimes they cannot.

On Sunday, a fracas developed when a yeshiva student spat at the cross being carried by the Armenian Archbishop during a procession near the Holy Sepulchre in the Old City. The archbishop’s 17th-century cross was broken during the brawl and he slapped the yeshiva student.

Both were questioned by police and the yeshiva student will be brought to trial. The Jerusalem District Court has meanwhile banned the student from approaching the Old City for 75 days.

But the Armenians are far from satisfied by the police action and say this sort of thing has been going on for years. Archbishop Nourhan Manougian says he expects the education minister to say something.

“When there is an attack against Jews anywhere in the world, the Israeli government is incensed, so why when our religion and pride are hurt, don’t they take harsher measures?” he asks.

According to Daniel Rossing, former adviser to the Religious Affairs Ministry on Christian affairs and director of a Jerusalem center for Christian-Jewish dialogue, there has been an increase in the number of such incidents recently, “as part of a general atmosphere of lack of tolerance in the country.”

I’d say that last quote is an understatement. Here is another manifestation of that lack of tolerance.

In a society which sees its neighbors as inhuman and treats them accordingly, and which demands citizenship tests for its own citizens who are not Jewish, a throwback to the days of Jim Crowism in America and the final solution of Nazi Germany, their behavior towards Christian is only a natural evolution of fascism. That the largest Christian community, the US,  continues to give support and comfort to such flagrant abuses against its own brethren is nothing short of amazing………. and dangerous.

Giving aid and comfort to the enemy


cheneyDick Cheney has gone off the deep end of things in ways that are really unfathomable.  In an interview on “friendly” territory where hard questions don’t exist and he can get away with the most inflammatory language that only Dick Cheney can spew he said, ‘that there is a “high probability” that terrorists will attempt a catastrophic nuclear or biological attack in coming years, and said he fears the Obama administration’s policies will make it more likely the attempt will succeed.’  That’s pretty strong language coming from a member of the Republican party that spent the last eight years challenging anyone  and everyone’s patriotism who questioned the direction of the Bush Administration.  You can go here to see a very long list of such accusations of treason against Bush policy, but here are some of the juicier remarks.

“while young Americans are dying in the sands of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan, our nation is being torn apart and made weaker because of the Democrats’ manic obsession to bring down our Commander in Chief.” Zell Miller, D. Ga.

“[T]he liberal leadership have put politics ahead of sound fiscal and national security policy. And what they have done is cooperated with our enemies and are emboldening our enemies.” – Rep. Geoff Davis (R-KY)

“divisive comments have the effect of giving aid and comfort to our enemies by allowing them to exploit divisions in our country.”- Rep. Tom Davis (R-VA)

What Cheney has done is far more egregious than give aid to an enemy, he’s practically incite it to violence towards the US by implying it should happen because of Obama’s policies.

“When we get people who are more concerned about reading the rights to an Al Qaeda terrorist than they are with protecting the United States against people who are absolutely committed to do anything they can to kill Americans, then I worry…”

This is Cheney at his best, using the politics of fear from afar, he almost seems to challenge terrorists to strike an America that is preoccupied with ‘reading them their rights’ rather than with killing them.  Those are the only two choices to Dick Cheney and his collection of  backyard warriors who watched others  fight wars they managed to miss, and who enlisted still more to fight wars built upon lies and misleading information.  He lives in his  testosterone induced haze where everything is do or die, you are either with us or against us, “us” being he and his circle of friends that languish in think tanks scattered around Washington who alone can determine who the real enemy is, and you’d better damn well fight them their  death or else you are guilty of treason.

I think the very same language used against Bush/Cheney detractors the last eight years  should be used against Cheney himself.  He is inciting the enemy to acts of violence against America and thereby giving aid and comfort to those who seek to do us harm….in the over inflated language of W. Bush and everyone should take the opportunity to say that.  Mr. Cheney, you are a traitor.

American academics stand up to be counted


Joining a growing list of people who are protesting the Israeli genocide in Gaza, American members of academe have come out to call for a cultural boycott of Israel, with five goals it wants to achieve.

“Refraining from participation in any form of academic and cultural cooperation, collaboration or joint projects with Israeli institutions that do not vocally oppose Israeli state policies against Palestine,” “promoting divestment and disinvestment from Israel by international academic institutions,” and “supporting Palestinian academic and cultural institutions directly without requiring them to partner with Israeli counterparts as an explicit or implicit condition for such support.”

The group’s press release continues,

“We believe that non-violent external pressure on Israel, in the form of an academic, cultural and economic boycott of Israel, can help bring an end to the ongoing massacres of civilians and an end [to] the occupation of Gaza and Palestine” — with “Palestine” referring to the West Bank land occupied by Israel since the 1967 war

explained David Lloyd, a professor of English at the University of Southern California.  I am glad to see Americans joining in the initiative and I note that they very clearly say they are interested ina  non-violent form of protestation, not something that is designed literally to exterminate the Jewish state.  What this boycott is asking for is a modification of Israeli behavior that will ensure its existence as well as that of its neighbors, the Palestinians.  It is NOT a zero sum game but you can expect the Israelis will portray it that way.

We are not talking about the destruction of Israel


ghaziand with that simple declaration by Ghazi Hamad, peace between Israelis and Palestinians should be close at hand, right? Wait, there’s more.

Senior officials in the Islamic group Hamas are indicating a willingness to negotiate a long-term truce with Israel as long as the borders of Gaza are opened to the rest of the world.

“We want to be part of the international community,” Hamas leader Ghazi Hamad told The Associated Press at the Gaza-Egypt border, where he was coordinating Arab aid shipments. “I think Hamas has no interest now to increase the number of crises in Gaza or to challenge the world.”

*snip*

“A dialogue with Hamas as a terror organization would be a strategic mistake, because Israel advocates dialogue with the moderates and displaying toughness against the extremists,” Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni told the Maariv daily this week.

Israel’s position is based on the fact that Hamas refuses to recognize its right to exist. However, the three Hamas leaders interviewed said they would accept statehood in just the West Bank and Gaza and would give up their “resistance” against Israel if that were achieved.

“We accept a state in the ’67 borders,” said Hamad. “We are not talking about the destruction of Israel.”

How long will it take to derail this show of goodwill from Hamas?  What kind of conditions will be placed on them that would not be worthy of consideration by any nationalist movement, forcing them to reject the idea of peace with their implacable opponent, Israel?  At first glance this should signal the end of all hostilities between the two parties, but in reality, this is only the beginning.

America’s Iran jones


What is it with US policy makers that they have to go off and antagonize Iran at every chance they get, even when it’s not necessary?  Two threads have appeared in news stories today centered around Iran with this trend as if to anticipate and undermine what Obama is going to say in a letter he’s putting together to send to that country’s leaders.

Before getting onto those two themes, let me say I’ve always been distressed at how government has this seamy undercurrent that works to under cut what official Washington is doing, and both the official and unofficial seem to like the give and take in this relationship of setting, revising, ignoring, cancelling policy.  It would seem to me once you get  your marching orders from the CiC you take them and run with them, not go off and rub his nose in them with your own pronouncements, but that’s what it seems Robert Gates, Defense Secretary has done.

When U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates accused Iran of “subversive activity” in Latin America Tuesday, it raised the question whether he is trying to discourage President Barack Obama from abandoning the hard-line policy of coercive diplomacy toward Iran he has favored for nearly three decades.

In his Senate armed services committee testimony Tuesday, Gates said Iran was “opening a lot of offices and a lot of fronts behind which they interfere in what is going on.” Gates offered no further explanation for what sounded like a Cold War-era propaganda charge against the Soviet Union.

Gates has made no secret of his skepticism about any softening of U.S. policy toward Iran. In response to a question at the National Defense University last September on how he would advise the next president to improve relations with Iran, Gates implicitly rejected what he called “outreach” to Iran as useless.

Gates’ 1992 sabotage of the Bush plan for reciprocating Iran goodwill relied in part on making public charges against Iran that created a more unfavorable political climate in Washington for such a policy.

It will be interesting to see what Obama’s reaction to all this political posturing Gates is making so early in the Administration’s efforts towards rapprochement with Iran. We will  be able to take measure of Obama depending on his response; if he lets Gates continue with his “subversive” activity he can be viewed as a weak President undeserving of a second term, the nation’s trust, or respect of his “underlings”.  If he kicks Gates out so soon after asking him to stay on as Defense Secretary he’ll find himself facing criticism for not being a stable administrator or able to hold his people in check, preferring to give in to his impetuous side and getting rid of them whimsically.  The perfect damned if you do, damned if you don’t.

The second salvo against Obama comes from of all places the Likud party’s boisterous and wrong Benjamin Netanyahu who says the Iranian nuclear weapons are more a problem than the global economy.  Netanyahu is great for hyperbole, probably something he picked up as a result of his public school education in Cheltenham, Pa. back in the day.  This we expect from Bibi who likes to somehow challenge the masculinity of America’s leaders by questioning their ability to take on his enemies for his benefit.  Using his typical adroit slight of foot maneuvers he turns everything that has to deal with anything into Iranian nukes.

Asked about achieving peace in Gaza, Netanyahu swiftly turned his answer to Iran, which he said is in a “100-yard dash” to get nuclear weapons.

*snip*

“We have had two wars with two Iranian proxies in two years and Persia has now two bases on the eastern Mediterranean,” said Netanyahu, referring to this month’s brutal fighting in Gaza against Hamas and Israel’s 2006 war with Hezbollah in Lebanon.

“I think we are going to have to deal with neutralizing the power of the mother regime,” he said. “The Hamas stronghold would be about as important, if Iranian power was neutralized, as Cuba was when the Soviet Union became irrelevant.”

What Netanyahu doesn’t tell you about his metaphor  is while the Soviet Union became irrelevant because American ideas triumphed a military dictatorship without the US having to fire a single shot at the Soviet Union, Iran’s leadership and in fact all of that country has to be laid to waste militarily, according to the Netanyahu school of thought in order for his enemies, Hamas and Hezbollah, to become irrelevant. Typical.  In any event, this kind of bluster is to be expected from this quarter, and Obama would do well to ignore it and press on with his agenda, not that of an intractable and petulant “ally”.  Unfortunately, he can’t so easily dismiss Netanyahu, and if Gates continues with his own agenda as well, it might be even more difficult.  Bush may be gone, but the neocons are still lurking and haven’t given up hope of re-establishing themselves in policy making  positions or of somehow influencing policy.

Quote of the day


We possess several hundred atomic warheads and rockets and can launch them at targets in all directions, perhaps even at Rome. Most European capitals are targets for our air force.

Our armed forces, however, are not the thirtieth strongest in the world, but rather the second or third. We have the capability to take the world down with us. And I can assure you that that will happen before Israel goes under.

Martin van Creveld – professor of military history – Hebrew University in Jerusalem

Nothing more indicates the suicidal nature of the Israeli zionist government and their complete disregard for international law and opinion than this obscure quote by a rather mainstream Israeli historian. It also explains both the reason for Israeli actions in the occupied territories and the silence of the world community towards them.  It lays to rest the notion that Israel is a client state of the US and instead confidently asserts the premise that America, along with most other western powers is a client state of Israel and can be threatened to pursue the Israeli program with military force or retaliation at the slightest hesitation on their part.  It’s an indication of the brazeness of that supposition that von Creveld make this statement to a western audience without any reservation or reluctance.

The Horror!


I’ve been watching and reading some pretty spectacularly horrific stories of how the Israelis treated the Palestinians of Gaza and ask myself we want to be allied with this kind of (in)human behavior?

The Israeli soldiers came to their house at about 5.30am, after the house had been shelled for 15 hours, and immediately opened fire on the family, killing Amer’s father with three shots. Then they told the family to leave. Amer had called an ambulance (which had to turn back after being shot at) and was refusing to leave his father’s body but the soldiers said they would shoot him if he stayed, so they fled 300 yards up the dirt track behind their house, at which point they were shot at again by another group of soldiers. This time Amer’s brother Abdullah was shot, Amer and Shireen’s 6 year old daughter Saja was shot in the arm, and their 1 year old daughter Farah was shot in the stomach. They spent the next 14 hours sheltering behind a small hill of dirt, while the wounded bled, and were not allowed to access help though the soldiers were aware of the injuries. Having no other way to comfort her small daughter, whose intestines were falling out, Shireen breastfed Farah as the little girl slowly bled to death.

After 14 hours, at about 8 in the evening, the soldiers sent dogs to chase them out of their shelter and dropped phosphorous bombs near them, but due to the wounded family members and having bare feet in an area of broken glass and rubble, escape was difficult. The army took the three wounded and put them behind the tanks, and captured Amer, but the rest of the family managed to get away and call the Red Crescent. The ambulance that eventually reached the injured people 7 hours later (driven by my medic friend S) took an hour to find them, and by this time Farah was dead.

(Hat tip to TellsToTale) But I was jolted back to reality upon reading this headline on one of the wire services. Rabbi told Israeli troops ‘to show no mercy’ in Gaza

Yesh Din said it had written to both Defence Minister Ehud Barak and Chief of Staff Gabi Ashkenazi, urging them to “take this incitement seriously and fire Chief Military Rabbi” Brigadier General Avi Ronzki.

It said a pamphlet distributed to soldiers taking part in Operation Cast Lead stressed that the troops should show no mercy to their enemies, and that the pamphlet borders “on incitement and racism against the Palestinian people.”

“When you show mercy to a cruel enemy you are being cruel to pure and honest soldiers. These are not games at the amusement park where sportsmanship teaches one to make concessions. This is a war on murderers,” Yesh Din quoted the pamphlet as saying.

It said the pamphlet quotes at length statements by Rabbi Shlomo Aviner, a spiritual leader of the Jewish settlers in the occupied West Bank who opposes any compromise with Palestinians.

“The Palestinians claim they deserve a state here, when in reality there was never a Palestinian or Arab state within the borders of our country,” the pamphlet quoted Aviner as saying.

The rights group said the pamphlet contains “degrading and belittling messages that border on incitement and racism against the Palestinian people. These messages can be interpreted as a call to act outside of the confines of international laws of war.”

The Haaretz newspaper reported on Monday that far right-wing groups also gave out pamphlets bearing racist messages on military bases.

It said one urged soldiers to “spare your lives and the lives of your friends and not to show concern for a population that surrounds us and harms us…”

“Kill the one who comes to kill you. As for the population, it is not innocent,” the daily quoted the pamphlet as saying.

and it makes all the sense in the world why Israelis see their enemy as subhuman.  It is an indoctrination that allows them to commit all manner of war crimes against the Palestinians, an ideology far worse than communism or fascism, and it threatens the lives of all who are near it. I wish those in governments around the world had the strength and courage to say as much and to hold the Israeli government accountable. It doesn’t look like that will happen anytime soon however, despite the election of Obama to President.

Just what is it about Guantanamo Bay?


Remnants of the Bush administration’s fascination with Gitmo Bay keep rearing their ugly heads at Obama’s announcement Gitmo will be closed.  First the argument was there is no place to house those who have yet to be released, or that there are no facilities sufficient to hold them, or that we don’t want them housed in our midst, as if they’ll be our  next door neighbor. This argument, meekly advanced has been rather quickly disarmed and has dropped off the political discussion.

A more sinister argument with accomplices has taken its place, and this is the argument of recidivism, or terrorists released from Guantanamo Bay who have “returned” to terrorism.   The first point to make is if they were indeed terrorist why were they released by our government?  Does this mean the US is  NOT able to determine, even under the most draconian and loosely structure  means, those who are terrorists and who are not? But to underscore this point comes this news.

Two men released from the US “war on terror” prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba have appeared in a video posted on a jihadist website, the SITE monitoring service reported.

One of the two former inmates, a Saudi man identified as Abu Sufyan al-Azdi al-Shahri, or prisoner number 372, has been elevated to the senior ranks of Al-Qaeda in Yemen, a US counter-terrorism official told AFP.

Three other men appear in the video, including Abu al-Hareth Muhammad al-Oufi, identified as an Al-Qaeda field commander. SITE later said he was prisoner No. 333.

A Pentagon spokesman, Commander Jeffrey Gordon, on Saturday declined to confirm the SITE information.

At first glance this seems rather ominous until you discover who the players are and the last sentence in the quote above really gives away what is being said/done with this “news”.   SITE is a group with an agenda, like all the other groups that have sprung up post 911 and that agenda is not even close to US interests.  Rather it appears it’s one based on settling old scores.   A terrorist cottage industry has risen on the US political landscape and it seems to have been given free hand, with the provision or understanding  that the US government won’t always rubber stamp what that industry produces.  This seems to be the meaning of the last sentence, “A Pentagon spokesman, Commander Jeffrey Gordon, on Saturday declined to confirm the SITE information”, because frankly under closer inspection the government has been burned by these self-appointed, government anointed terrorist experts.

However, what’s even sadder and more dastardly is the lies, damned lies and statistics game being played by the US when it comes to Gitmo Bay and who was once housed there.

The Seton Hall Center for Policy and Research has issued a report which rebuts and debunks the most recent claim by the Department of Defense (DOD) that “61, in all, former Guantánamo detainees are confirmed or suspected of returning to the fight.”

Professor Denbeaux of the Center for Policy & Research has said that the Center has determined that “DOD has issued ‘recidivism’ numbers 43 times, and each time they have been wrong—this last time the most egregiously so.”

Denbeaux stated: “Once again, they’ve failed to identify names, numbers, dates, times, places, or acts upon which their report relies. Every time they have been required to identify the parties, the DOD has been forced to retract their false IDs and their numbers. They have included people who have never even set foot in Guantánamo—much less were they released from there. They have counted people as ‘returning to the fight’ for their having written an Op-ed piece in the New York Times and for their having appeared in a documentary exhibited at the Cannes Film Festival. The DOD has revised and retracted their internally conflicting definitions, criteria, and their numbers so often that they have ceased to have any meaning—except as an effort to sway public opinion by painting a false portrait of the supposed dangers of these men.

“Forty-three times they have given numbers—which conflict with each other—all of which are seriously undercut by the DOD statement that ‘they do not track’ former detainees. Rather than making up numbers “willy-nilly” about post release conduct, America might be better served if our government actually kept track of them.”

I couldn’t have said it better myself!

Israel and its unholy alliances


abu_nidal_2The Obama administration has shown a willingness to work and negotiate with the Palestinians to coexist with their Israeli neighbors and that’s not a good thing for the Israelis  who believe in war and territorial expansion as instruments of state power.  Look for the Israeli  government to reach back into its old bag of dirty tricks and form partnerships with people to sabotage Obama’s efforts using terror attacks against people in any place in the world, or by forming groups that will challenge the Palestinian status quo and  offer the Israelis the opportunity to work with them at the expense of and in anticipation of  the demise of the present Palestinian leadership.

The Israelis have always set up and used one group of Palestinians against another in order to sow dissension and keep the movements for peace off balance.  Despite what they say, the Israeli government is NOT interested in a peaceful coexistence with Palestinians or any other Arab neighbor state, so turmoil is necessary to justify a militarily strong and aggressive Israeli state.  Abu Nidal is an example.  A  Palestinian terrorist who was fronted by several states, and this observer believes one of them being Israel, Nidal engaged in acts of terror and later confronted and challenged the political leadership of Yasser Arafat.

Nidal’s attempted assassination of Israeli ambassador to the  UK, Shlomo Argov was all the pretext Ariel Sharon needed to invade Lebanon and occupy that country for several years while reaping death and destruction on a scale not seen until Gaza, 2008.  Later Nidal went on to kill several members of Fatah, or so it was made to seem Nidal was responsible for their deaths, and set back  the nascent Fatah movement’s political legitimacy.  Israel was more than happy to see its enemies preoccupied with one another, or appear an existential  threat to Israel so that military action against them was justified.

There are other examples where Israel used militant groups to commit acts of terror to which they, Israel, responded with the foreknowledge of the attacks, how they would be executed, the intended outcome and how they would be concluded.  Political fortunes were built on such episodes of intrigue that until today remain dominant in Israeli politics.

An extraordinary claim that Israeli intelligence may have had a hand in an airline hijacking before sending in commandos to rescue the hostages at Entebbe was made to the Foreign Office….

*snip*

……the attack was carried out by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine with help from the Israeli Security Service, the Shin Bet.

It was designed to torpedo the rival Palestine Liberation Organisation’s standing in France and to prevent what they saw as a growing rapprochement between the PLO and the Americans.

Fast forward to today, where Hamas, a group that was aided by Israel during its infancy is now the target of Israeli aggression.  Hamas too was formed to challenge the legitimacy of Arafat’s Fatah, and since its inception has been the excuse for several Israeli military incursions.

“Hamas, to my great regret, is Israel’s creation,” says Mr. Cohen, a Tunisian-born Jew who worked in Gaza for more than two decades. Responsible for religious affairs in the region until 1994, Mr. Cohen watched the Islamist movement take shape, muscle aside secular Palestinian rivals and then morph into what is today Hamas, a militant group that is sworn to Israel’s destruction.

Instead of trying to curb Gaza’s Islamists from the outset, says Mr. Cohen, Israel for years tolerated and, in some cases, encouraged them as a counterweight to the secular nationalists of the Palestine Liberation Organization and its dominant faction, Yasser Arafat’s Fatah. Israel cooperated with a crippled, half-blind cleric named Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, even as he was laying the foundations for what would become Hamas.

A look at Israel’s decades-long dealings with Palestinian radicals — including some little-known attempts to cooperate with the Islamists — reveals a catalog of unintended and often perilous consequences. Time and again, Israel’s efforts to find a pliant Palestinian partner that is both credible with Palestinians and willing to eschew violence, have backfired. Would-be partners have turned into foes.

The consequences for Israel have been anything but perilous. Israeli political fortunes and the sympathy it has been able to attract with a minimal amount of damage to itself have been built on their overtures to Palestinian suitors who seemingly have had no interest in the Jewish state, and Hamas is no different.  That Hamas, after much Israeli grooming, has become a foe is precisely what the Israelis wanted.

Having tried to paint Hamas as the aggressor in the days preceeding an Obama administration and failed, the Israelis no doubt will resort to even larger operations they hope to pin on the Palestinian group to make it unpalatable to the new American administration.  If that doesn’t work, look for them to set up group(s) that will challenge Hamas’ authority in Gaza and leave Americans wondering with whom they should negotiate.  These are tricks that have been tried before with amazing success.  There is no reason to think, by Israeli standards, they can’t work again.  You can’t teach an old dog new tricks, or so the saying goes.