December 29, 2003
Underwhelmed
The Results of a Military Times poll of 933 active-duty members of the military aren't receiving much play. It features in a small item in the December 29 Seattle Times, while Google News returns, as of this writing, only a single reference (from the Arizona Republic).
The poll finds only 56% of responders "approve of Bush's handling of Iraq", while 77% feel the military is "stretched too thin to be effective".
Maybe not too surprising, given the Bush Administration's atrocious treatment of both current members of the military and veterans.
Maybe not too surprising, either, that the Administration itself would find the results "a pleasant surprise". After all, the Administration's big-wigs know full well that soldiers are treated as cogs in a machine. They also know that the military is comprised largely of minority and/or impoverished sectors of our society -- cannon fodder that it doesn't give fuck one about.
A shame those 56% don't have the option of bugging out -- this is a Democracy, right? -- rather than seeing their retirement dates indefinitely extended. Wouldn't that be a sight to see?
Anyway, the Administration's reaction to the poll must come as a surprise to casual viewers of the American scene. They're "pleasantly surprised" to be going into combat with only 56% support? What about all the rabidly cheering soldiers Bush and Cheney address seemingly every week? What about the "Mission Accomplished" spectacle? What about Thanksgiving (those troops were pre-screened, as it turns out)? Doesn't the Bush Administration love the troops?
Uhh...
Posted by Eddie Tews at 01:25 PM
| Comments (0)
"Measures to fight global warming will have to be at least four times stronger than the Kyoto Protocol if they are to avoid the melting of the polar ice caps, inundating central London and many of the world's biggest cities, concludes a new official report."
Somebody wanna make a case for continuing to own and operate his or her motor-car?
December 25, 2003
Quote Of The Moment #0038
"Measures to fight global warming will have to be at least four times stronger than the Kyoto Protocol if they are to avoid the melting of the polar ice caps, inundating central London and many of the world's biggest cities, concludes a new official report."
Somebody wanna make a case for continuing to own and operate his or her motor-car?
Posted by Eddie Tews at 07:18 PM
| Comments (0)
Saddam's capture didn't, mysteriously, raise the obvious question in the mainstream media: what the fuck are we still doing in Iraq?
The Bush Administration's justifications for the invasion, abominable as the were on their own terms, have now been anwered for.
Weapons hunter extaordinaire David Kay has failed to turn up anything -- and is walking off the job. Meanwhile, the United States is ramping up its own WMD programmes.
Saddam's supposed links to al-Qaeda, which ultimately sold the American public on the war -- but which were never taken seriously by the Administration's own intelligence services, nor by a solitary soul outside the United States (yes, this blog is accusing Tony Blair of bald-faced lying) -- have now been publicly disavowed by Bush, Cheney, Rice, et al.. Meanwhile, the United States continues to maintain freindly relations with and/or arm and/or otherwise support the world's most notorious State Terrorist regimes -- Russia, Colombia, Israel, Uzbekistan, Indonesia, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, China, Egypt. There's a fucking "axis of evil" for you George -- go get 'em, bitch.
Saddam has not only been dethroned, but taken into custody. The "liberation", in other words, has been accomplished. Granted, the United States, if it were to leave off, would be leaving the country in a much sorrier state than when it found it. So reparations would only be right and proper. But, as, "The Iraqis who hated Saddam hate Americans more," staying on should be out of the question, should it not?
Yet not only is immediate withdrawal not scheduled, the issue isn't even open for discussion. Truly, another magnificent accomplishment of the Free Press.
Begging The Question
Saddam's capture didn't, mysteriously, raise the obvious question in the mainstream media: what the fuck are we still doing in Iraq?
The Bush Administration's justifications for the invasion, abominable as the were on their own terms, have now been anwered for.
Weapons hunter extaordinaire David Kay has failed to turn up anything -- and is walking off the job. Meanwhile, the United States is ramping up its own WMD programmes.
Saddam's supposed links to al-Qaeda, which ultimately sold the American public on the war -- but which were never taken seriously by the Administration's own intelligence services, nor by a solitary soul outside the United States (yes, this blog is accusing Tony Blair of bald-faced lying) -- have now been publicly disavowed by Bush, Cheney, Rice, et al.. Meanwhile, the United States continues to maintain freindly relations with and/or arm and/or otherwise support the world's most notorious State Terrorist regimes -- Russia, Colombia, Israel, Uzbekistan, Indonesia, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, China, Egypt. There's a fucking "axis of evil" for you George -- go get 'em, bitch.
Saddam has not only been dethroned, but taken into custody. The "liberation", in other words, has been accomplished. Granted, the United States, if it were to leave off, would be leaving the country in a much sorrier state than when it found it. So reparations would only be right and proper. But, as, "The Iraqis who hated Saddam hate Americans more," staying on should be out of the question, should it not?
Yet not only is immediate withdrawal not scheduled, the issue isn't even open for discussion. Truly, another magnificent accomplishment of the Free Press.
Posted by Eddie Tews at 07:05 PM
| Comments (0)
"You don't have to be a genius to know that the destruction from a one-tonne bomb is massive, so someone up there made a decision to drop it knowing it would destroy buildings. Someone took the decision to kill innocent people. This is us being terrorists. This is vengeance." -- Israeli Air Force Captain Assaf L
December 23, 2003
Quote Of The Moment #0037
"You don't have to be a genius to know that the destruction from a one-tonne bomb is massive, so someone up there made a decision to drop it knowing it would destroy buildings. Someone took the decision to kill innocent people. This is us being terrorists. This is vengeance." -- Israeli Air Force Captain Assaf L
Posted by Eddie Tews at 06:01 PM
| Comments (0)
While the execrable AWOL President struts around in a flight suit a few yards off the coast of San Diego, and makes a two-hour made-for-tee-vee plastic-turkey-layover in Baghdad airport; those that have actually walked his talk are presenting some of the most compelling eviscerations of the chicken-hawks' policies.
A trio of recent examples make must-reading for those interested in learning what it's really like to be one of the few, the proud.
Vietnam Vet Bruce Patterson, writing for the indispensible Anderson Valley Advertiser, has produced perhaps the finest piece to-date regarding the Bush Administration's Iraq adventures. Patterson explains in excruciating detail the life of the soldier on the ground in hostile territory, and, more heartbreakingly, the public indifference awaiting those veterans returning home with permanent physical and emotional scars.
Thirty-year Veteran (and whose son is currently on duty in Iraq) Stan Goff, whose despatches to Counterpunch have placed him among the very top ranks of its vaunted stable of writers, offers up a truly harrowing speculative analysis (based on his experiences in the military) of Jessica Lynch's experiences before, during, and after the fateful events which made her famous.
Filmmaker Michael Moore has reprinted letters to him from troops in Iraq, which spare no enmity in their scathing denunciation of the fat-assed politicians who've gotten them into this predicament.
Wanna "support the troops"? Do everything in your power to get them the fuck home, now, then make sure they're not abandoned upon their return.
And then, in the words of another Vietnam Vet, "We as a nation must stop thinking of ourselves as exceptional and worthy of special privileges above other nations and peoples. We must stop glorifying war. We must stop praising institutional murder."
Live To Tell
While the execrable AWOL President struts around in a flight suit a few yards off the coast of San Diego, and makes a two-hour made-for-tee-vee plastic-turkey-layover in Baghdad airport; those that have actually walked his talk are presenting some of the most compelling eviscerations of the chicken-hawks' policies.
A trio of recent examples make must-reading for those interested in learning what it's really like to be one of the few, the proud.
Vietnam Vet Bruce Patterson, writing for the indispensible Anderson Valley Advertiser, has produced perhaps the finest piece to-date regarding the Bush Administration's Iraq adventures. Patterson explains in excruciating detail the life of the soldier on the ground in hostile territory, and, more heartbreakingly, the public indifference awaiting those veterans returning home with permanent physical and emotional scars.
Thirty-year Veteran (and whose son is currently on duty in Iraq) Stan Goff, whose despatches to Counterpunch have placed him among the very top ranks of its vaunted stable of writers, offers up a truly harrowing speculative analysis (based on his experiences in the military) of Jessica Lynch's experiences before, during, and after the fateful events which made her famous.
Filmmaker Michael Moore has reprinted letters to him from troops in Iraq, which spare no enmity in their scathing denunciation of the fat-assed politicians who've gotten them into this predicament.
Wanna "support the troops"? Do everything in your power to get them the fuck home, now, then make sure they're not abandoned upon their return.
And then, in the words of another Vietnam Vet, "We as a nation must stop thinking of ourselves as exceptional and worthy of special privileges above other nations and peoples. We must stop glorifying war. We must stop praising institutional murder."
Posted by Eddie Tews at 03:28 PM
| Comments (0)
As we know, and as described Sunday by the Secretary of "Homeland" Security, the nation's terror-alert status has been raised from "an Elevated to High risk of terrorist attack -- or as more commonly known, from a Yellow Code to an Orange Code."
Was Tom Ridge's announcement a result of a genuine concern that the risk of an attack has been heightened, or simply a made-for-teevee event calculated to make citizens grateful that the Feds have our best interests in mind, and are doing their level-best to protect us? Don't know. But logical considerations might make us suspect the latter.
If the "strategic indicators" are really "perhaps greater now than at any point since September 11th, 2001," why would the Feds advise citizens to go about their lives as usual (albeit with increased vigilance), rather than hunkering down and preparing for the worst? Furthermore, upon learning that the public had virtually ignored his announcement ("A little terrorist threat isn't going to stop us from doing what we've got to do,") why didn't Ridge issue a follow-up announcement: "Hey motherfuckers! This shit is serious, and you'd better take it seriously, unless you want me to put a boot in your ass!"
If the Bush Administration were serious about preparing the country for a possible attack, wouldn't it, rather than engaging in periodic tele-visual fear-mongering, be attempting to address recent warnings to the effect that, for example: "U.S. fails to share terror information with State and Local governments," or, "U.S. no safer than two years ago," or, "Cities say terrorism aid slow in coming," or, "Iraq war diverting resources from 'War On Terror', experts say"?
If "threat-related intelligence reports" from "credible sources" are a reliable indicator that an attack may be imminent, why have the numerous attacks upon "interests" of the United States and its allies -- both before and after September 11th -- not been sniffed out and derailed before their implementations?
If the current "reports" are of sufficient magnitude to suggest that "extremists abroad are anticipating near-term attacks that they believe will either rival, or exceed, the attacks that occurred in New York and the Pentagon and the fields of Pennsylvania nearly two years ago," there presumably was a similar level of "reports" in the days prior to September 11th. Why weren't they taken seriously?
If we're able to determine both that "extremists abroad" are anticipating a September-11th-level attack, and that "al-Qaida continues to consider using aircraft as a weapon," and that "they are constantly evaluating procedures both in the United States and elsewhere to find gaps in our security posture that could be exploited," then those working in Ridge's department must either: be able to intercept the extremists abroads' communications with a great degree of competence, have infiltrated the extremists abroads' organisations, or be practiced in the art of long-distance extra-sensory perceptions. But if this were the case, shouldn't our heroes be able to easily apprehend the extremists abroad before they're able to launch another attack upon our freedoms?
Those who've studied al-Qaida closely have averred that it is indeed a network, rather than a hierarchy. That, in other words, bin Laden provides some training and some funding, but then individual cells formulate and execute their own plans without the prior knowledge of bin Laden and associates -- thus making infiltration and/or interception of communications exceedingly difficult. (And this is why bin Laden can truthfully utter something on the order of, "I didn't know the attack was going to take place, but I approve of it.") If this is indeed the case, one has to wonder just how credible the "credible sources" are.
Even if it weren't the case, why, knowing that Ridge's "credible sources" are able to intercept communications, would the extremists abroad rise their level of "chatter" to September-11th-like levels prior to an attack? If somebody is planning to rob a bank, let's say, and knows his phone has been tapped, does he excitedly call up all of his bank-robber friends gleefully announcing his intentions? Not a very smart move even if one's phone hasn't been tapped. Let's get real, here.
Similarly, why would the Feds broadcast the "reporting" of their "credible sources" to the nation and world -- thus alerting the extremists abroad that they've been found out, and allowing them to react? Shouldn't we now expect the extremists abroad to wait until this latest period of "heightened awareness" blows over before attempting to launch an attack?
If the Bush Administration is expecting American citizens to feel a large degree of confidence in its abilities to prevent attacks, why would it trot out Secretary Ridge to answer a pointed question, such as the following, with a series of evasions bordering on complete gibberish?
QUESTION: President Bush has said in the past that the war on terror has greatly hampered al-Qaida's ability to communicate within its network. What does it say that now you believe that the chatter is at a greater point than any time since 9/11?
SECRETARY RIDGE: Well, first of all, I think the President's assessment is correct. I mean, we've decapitated or imprisoned from one-half to two-thirds of the known leadership. We have literally taken off the table for their use probably a couple hundred million dollars by freezing those assets. Those that were in leadership have been dispersed so the communication is more difficult.
So, in reality, all those -- that may be the reason that it has been so long -- I'm not going to speculate, but remember, we haven't raised this level of alert for over a half a year.
But make no mistake about it, the President has said this is -- we have to be into this -- we are in this for the long term, that in spite of the extraordinary success of the military and the CIA, the cooperation with our allies, the apprehension or death of a lot of the principals and the freezing the assets, this is still an international war, international terrorist cells including al-Qaida, and the fact that we are picking up information that results in us going to Orange, I think is a reflection of increased capacity, probably on our side, not necessarily greater ability on theirs.
"There's no nexus that I'd be prepared to draw now." How can we possibly take seriously a government official who could vocalise this sentence?
Why would Ridge answer the question whether a Red alert (rather than merely Orange) were considered in the negative by asserting that "the quantity, the quality, and the credibility and the scope and the notion that they are near-term attacks of the scope that is equal to or greater than those that occurred on 9/11, there is a general consensus within the community, now is the time to go up." What conditions would be needed for a Red alert? That the extremists abroad are going to blow up the moon?
Last, but most beguilingly of all: given that he's just announced that the threat level is the greatest at any time since September 11th, why the fuck would Ridge's handler (Mr. Roehrkasse) set a time limit on questions from the press? What, Ridge has something more important to do than fully explain to the teevee-viewing public the implications of, and necessary precautions needed as a result of, his announcement? His fucking ice cream sundae is melting, or something?
A humble prediction: there will not be a terrorist attack upon American soil during the Orange alert period.
December 22, 2003
The Puppeteer Of Fear
As we know, and as described Sunday by the Secretary of "Homeland" Security, the nation's terror-alert status has been raised from "an Elevated to High risk of terrorist attack -- or as more commonly known, from a Yellow Code to an Orange Code."
Was Tom Ridge's announcement a result of a genuine concern that the risk of an attack has been heightened, or simply a made-for-teevee event calculated to make citizens grateful that the Feds have our best interests in mind, and are doing their level-best to protect us? Don't know. But logical considerations might make us suspect the latter.
If the "strategic indicators" are really "perhaps greater now than at any point since September 11th, 2001," why would the Feds advise citizens to go about their lives as usual (albeit with increased vigilance), rather than hunkering down and preparing for the worst? Furthermore, upon learning that the public had virtually ignored his announcement ("A little terrorist threat isn't going to stop us from doing what we've got to do,") why didn't Ridge issue a follow-up announcement: "Hey motherfuckers! This shit is serious, and you'd better take it seriously, unless you want me to put a boot in your ass!"
If the Bush Administration were serious about preparing the country for a possible attack, wouldn't it, rather than engaging in periodic tele-visual fear-mongering, be attempting to address recent warnings to the effect that, for example: "U.S. fails to share terror information with State and Local governments," or, "U.S. no safer than two years ago," or, "Cities say terrorism aid slow in coming," or, "Iraq war diverting resources from 'War On Terror', experts say"?
If "threat-related intelligence reports" from "credible sources" are a reliable indicator that an attack may be imminent, why have the numerous attacks upon "interests" of the United States and its allies -- both before and after September 11th -- not been sniffed out and derailed before their implementations?
If the current "reports" are of sufficient magnitude to suggest that "extremists abroad are anticipating near-term attacks that they believe will either rival, or exceed, the attacks that occurred in New York and the Pentagon and the fields of Pennsylvania nearly two years ago," there presumably was a similar level of "reports" in the days prior to September 11th. Why weren't they taken seriously?
If we're able to determine both that "extremists abroad" are anticipating a September-11th-level attack, and that "al-Qaida continues to consider using aircraft as a weapon," and that "they are constantly evaluating procedures both in the United States and elsewhere to find gaps in our security posture that could be exploited," then those working in Ridge's department must either: be able to intercept the extremists abroads' communications with a great degree of competence, have infiltrated the extremists abroads' organisations, or be practiced in the art of long-distance extra-sensory perceptions. But if this were the case, shouldn't our heroes be able to easily apprehend the extremists abroad before they're able to launch another attack upon our freedoms?
Those who've studied al-Qaida closely have averred that it is indeed a network, rather than a hierarchy. That, in other words, bin Laden provides some training and some funding, but then individual cells formulate and execute their own plans without the prior knowledge of bin Laden and associates -- thus making infiltration and/or interception of communications exceedingly difficult. (And this is why bin Laden can truthfully utter something on the order of, "I didn't know the attack was going to take place, but I approve of it.") If this is indeed the case, one has to wonder just how credible the "credible sources" are.
Even if it weren't the case, why, knowing that Ridge's "credible sources" are able to intercept communications, would the extremists abroad rise their level of "chatter" to September-11th-like levels prior to an attack? If somebody is planning to rob a bank, let's say, and knows his phone has been tapped, does he excitedly call up all of his bank-robber friends gleefully announcing his intentions? Not a very smart move even if one's phone hasn't been tapped. Let's get real, here.
Similarly, why would the Feds broadcast the "reporting" of their "credible sources" to the nation and world -- thus alerting the extremists abroad that they've been found out, and allowing them to react? Shouldn't we now expect the extremists abroad to wait until this latest period of "heightened awareness" blows over before attempting to launch an attack?
If the Bush Administration is expecting American citizens to feel a large degree of confidence in its abilities to prevent attacks, why would it trot out Secretary Ridge to answer a pointed question, such as the following, with a series of evasions bordering on complete gibberish?
QUESTION: President Bush has said in the past that the war on terror has greatly hampered al-Qaida's ability to communicate within its network. What does it say that now you believe that the chatter is at a greater point than any time since 9/11?
SECRETARY RIDGE: Well, first of all, I think the President's assessment is correct. I mean, we've decapitated or imprisoned from one-half to two-thirds of the known leadership. We have literally taken off the table for their use probably a couple hundred million dollars by freezing those assets. Those that were in leadership have been dispersed so the communication is more difficult.
So, in reality, all those -- that may be the reason that it has been so long -- I'm not going to speculate, but remember, we haven't raised this level of alert for over a half a year.
But make no mistake about it, the President has said this is -- we have to be into this -- we are in this for the long term, that in spite of the extraordinary success of the military and the CIA, the cooperation with our allies, the apprehension or death of a lot of the principals and the freezing the assets, this is still an international war, international terrorist cells including al-Qaida, and the fact that we are picking up information that results in us going to Orange, I think is a reflection of increased capacity, probably on our side, not necessarily greater ability on theirs.
"There's no nexus that I'd be prepared to draw now." How can we possibly take seriously a government official who could vocalise this sentence?
Why would Ridge answer the question whether a Red alert (rather than merely Orange) were considered in the negative by asserting that "the quantity, the quality, and the credibility and the scope and the notion that they are near-term attacks of the scope that is equal to or greater than those that occurred on 9/11, there is a general consensus within the community, now is the time to go up." What conditions would be needed for a Red alert? That the extremists abroad are going to blow up the moon?
Last, but most beguilingly of all: given that he's just announced that the threat level is the greatest at any time since September 11th, why the fuck would Ridge's handler (Mr. Roehrkasse) set a time limit on questions from the press? What, Ridge has something more important to do than fully explain to the teevee-viewing public the implications of, and necessary precautions needed as a result of, his announcement? His fucking ice cream sundae is melting, or something?
A humble prediction: there will not be a terrorist attack upon American soil during the Orange alert period.
Posted by Eddie Tews at 01:09 PM
| Comments (4)
As pontificated on the December 21st episode of Meet The Press.
[Concerning the "situation in Iraq".] "Well, I think it's very exciting."
"Iraq, as the president has said, is a battle in that war on terror, and we're going to fight terrorists whether it be in Israel, or Iraq, or Syria, or Afghanistan, or anywhere in the Philippines; this is a war that we're in." [Got that? Anywhere in the Philippines.]
"Well, first, Tim, I don't accept your premise. The president didn't overemphasize weapons of mass destruction as the only reason to go into Iraq." [As the President himself wondered aloud recently: "What's the difference" whether he had them or not?]
"He was violating UN resolutions for 10, almost 12 years. He violated every agreement that he made after he lost the war in Desert Storm." [Translation: no banned weapons found proves once and for all that he was violating resolutions mandating the destruction of his banned weapons...]
"This was the Clinton administration, who wasn't exactly good on the war on terrorism." [No comment.]
"So everybody knew that we had to have a regime change." ["Everybody", presumably, includes that 90% of the World's population opposed to the war. Does this mean that 90% of the World's people were Saddam apologists? No more so than anybody opposing a hypothetical war for "regime change" in the United States would want to be considered a Bush apologist. George Bush is, after all, a far, far, far greater threat to world peace that Saddam could ever conceive of being. But murdering tens of thousands of a country's people, irradiating its environment for 4.5 Billion years, uprooting it into complete chaos, shooting innocent civilians dead, destroying homes on the "suspicion" that "bad guys" live there, selling off the country's resources to the "liberators"' cronies, & cetera might -- just might -- not be the best way to go about removing a Saddam (or a Bush, or a Sharon, or a Putin, or a Uribe, or a Musharraf...) from office.]
"If we don't find weapons of mass destruction -- and I think we will, and we've already found evidence that not only did he have it, but he violated United Nations resolutions all along the lines, particularly when it comes to weapons instructions. So, you know, we are winning this war on terror." [Do we have a winner for the lost-train-of-thought-slash-non-sequitur-of-the-year award? And, actually, we didn't find any evidence that he had "it". We did, though, hear credible testimony, before the war was initiated, indicating that he'd gotten rid of "it" no later than 1998, while the inspectors tasked with determining the status of Iraq's weapons programmes bitterly denounced the "coalition"'s cutting short of their work in order to begin bombing.]
"I knew that that would be the first thing the Democrats said after we got Saddam Hussein. They said, 'Oh, well, that's good we got Saddam Hussein, but you haven't gotten Osama bin Laden.' What we have gotten is we've destroyed his network. The president took the war to them in Afghanistan." [How embarrassing that the Department of "Homeland Security" raised the "terror-alert" level to "high" more less at the same time DeLay was speaking. Er, and, uh, he may have missed Aschcroft's warning of just a few months ago that, "The potential for us to be hit again is a very real potential," not to mention the warning of Western and Arab intelligence agencies from just a few weeks ago that al-Qaida has "split into dozens of autonomous, hard-to-find 'franchises'." Finally, what the fuck was Tom DeLay doing when he was supposed to be learning English grammar -- out snorting lines with George W., or something?]
"You'd think it would come from the French or their party or from these demonstrators that demonstrate in the streets that you see. But these are supposed to be legitimate people saying some pretty outrageous things, like Wesley Clark." [Straight from the horse's mouth: the French or their party, and the demonstrators demonstrating in the street that you see (and, one assumes, the rest of the 90% of the World opposed to the Bush Doctrine), are "illegitimate". (Though that's not how DeLay's gramatically-challenged sentence would literally decode.)]
"If we left it up to Wesley Clark, Saddam Hussein would still be in place and he'd be paying the families of suicide bombers in Israel." [As it now stands, the American Taxpayer ponies up several billions of dollars a year in support of the Israeli occupation. (Uh, was DeLay mentioning UN resolutions before? No, didn't think so.)]
"But they've gone over the top. I mean, Howard Dean saying that we're not safer because Saddam Hussein is out of office..." [Of course, Hussein's been "out of office" since April. But anyway, damn that Tom Ridge!]
"If we were waiting for permission, we wouldn't be in Afghanistan." [He's right. While 90% of the World's population opposed the war on Iraq, something like 80% opposed the war on Afghanistan. Democracy can be a real bitch, sometimes.]
"Howard Dean just is an extreme extremist." [Maybe that's why Dean is so popular with the kids: he's extremely extreme. Sadly, DeLay did not classify Dennis Kucinich's standing on the extreme-scale.]
"Tax cuts will lower the deficit and bring us to balance. That's how we balance the budget." [No comment. Would make a nice children's song, though: "This is the way we balance the budget / Balance the Budget / Balance the Budget / This is the way we balance the Budget / Early in the morning".]
"You cut taxes so it leaves more money in people's pockets. They save. They invest. The economy grows. And from the economy, the revenues to the government grows. It's history. It's always happened that way." [No examples given.]
"It's how you balance the budget that's important. You know, the Democrats want to balance the budget by raising spending and raising taxes. The Soviet Union had a balanced budget. Well, you can raise taxes until you balance it, but the economy will go into the toilet. We have shown and we have credibility on the economy and the economy's recovering because of Republican policies." [No comment, except that: this motherfucker's meds are either working way too well or not nearly well enough. Maybe there's a puzzle-book logic problem in here somewhere: "Using only his Words of Wisdom displayed below, help Tom DeLay determine his proper dosage."]
December 21, 2003
The Wisdom Of Tom DeLay
As pontificated on the December 21st episode of Meet The Press.
[Concerning the "situation in Iraq".] "Well, I think it's very exciting."
"Iraq, as the president has said, is a battle in that war on terror, and we're going to fight terrorists whether it be in Israel, or Iraq, or Syria, or Afghanistan, or anywhere in the Philippines; this is a war that we're in." [Got that? Anywhere in the Philippines.]
"Well, first, Tim, I don't accept your premise. The president didn't overemphasize weapons of mass destruction as the only reason to go into Iraq." [As the President himself wondered aloud recently: "What's the difference" whether he had them or not?]
"He was violating UN resolutions for 10, almost 12 years. He violated every agreement that he made after he lost the war in Desert Storm." [Translation: no banned weapons found proves once and for all that he was violating resolutions mandating the destruction of his banned weapons...]
"This was the Clinton administration, who wasn't exactly good on the war on terrorism." [No comment.]
"So everybody knew that we had to have a regime change." ["Everybody", presumably, includes that 90% of the World's population opposed to the war. Does this mean that 90% of the World's people were Saddam apologists? No more so than anybody opposing a hypothetical war for "regime change" in the United States would want to be considered a Bush apologist. George Bush is, after all, a far, far, far greater threat to world peace that Saddam could ever conceive of being. But murdering tens of thousands of a country's people, irradiating its environment for 4.5 Billion years, uprooting it into complete chaos, shooting innocent civilians dead, destroying homes on the "suspicion" that "bad guys" live there, selling off the country's resources to the "liberators"' cronies, & cetera might -- just might -- not be the best way to go about removing a Saddam (or a Bush, or a Sharon, or a Putin, or a Uribe, or a Musharraf...) from office.]
"If we don't find weapons of mass destruction -- and I think we will, and we've already found evidence that not only did he have it, but he violated United Nations resolutions all along the lines, particularly when it comes to weapons instructions. So, you know, we are winning this war on terror." [Do we have a winner for the lost-train-of-thought-slash-non-sequitur-of-the-year award? And, actually, we didn't find any evidence that he had "it". We did, though, hear credible testimony, before the war was initiated, indicating that he'd gotten rid of "it" no later than 1998, while the inspectors tasked with determining the status of Iraq's weapons programmes bitterly denounced the "coalition"'s cutting short of their work in order to begin bombing.]
"I knew that that would be the first thing the Democrats said after we got Saddam Hussein. They said, 'Oh, well, that's good we got Saddam Hussein, but you haven't gotten Osama bin Laden.' What we have gotten is we've destroyed his network. The president took the war to them in Afghanistan." [How embarrassing that the Department of "Homeland Security" raised the "terror-alert" level to "high" more less at the same time DeLay was speaking. Er, and, uh, he may have missed Aschcroft's warning of just a few months ago that, "The potential for us to be hit again is a very real potential," not to mention the warning of Western and Arab intelligence agencies from just a few weeks ago that al-Qaida has "split into dozens of autonomous, hard-to-find 'franchises'." Finally, what the fuck was Tom DeLay doing when he was supposed to be learning English grammar -- out snorting lines with George W., or something?]
"You'd think it would come from the French or their party or from these demonstrators that demonstrate in the streets that you see. But these are supposed to be legitimate people saying some pretty outrageous things, like Wesley Clark." [Straight from the horse's mouth: the French or their party, and the demonstrators demonstrating in the street that you see (and, one assumes, the rest of the 90% of the World opposed to the Bush Doctrine), are "illegitimate". (Though that's not how DeLay's gramatically-challenged sentence would literally decode.)]
"If we left it up to Wesley Clark, Saddam Hussein would still be in place and he'd be paying the families of suicide bombers in Israel." [As it now stands, the American Taxpayer ponies up several billions of dollars a year in support of the Israeli occupation. (Uh, was DeLay mentioning UN resolutions before? No, didn't think so.)]
"But they've gone over the top. I mean, Howard Dean saying that we're not safer because Saddam Hussein is out of office..." [Of course, Hussein's been "out of office" since April. But anyway, damn that Tom Ridge!]
"If we were waiting for permission, we wouldn't be in Afghanistan." [He's right. While 90% of the World's population opposed the war on Iraq, something like 80% opposed the war on Afghanistan. Democracy can be a real bitch, sometimes.]
"Howard Dean just is an extreme extremist." [Maybe that's why Dean is so popular with the kids: he's extremely extreme. Sadly, DeLay did not classify Dennis Kucinich's standing on the extreme-scale.]
"Tax cuts will lower the deficit and bring us to balance. That's how we balance the budget." [No comment. Would make a nice children's song, though: "This is the way we balance the budget / Balance the Budget / Balance the Budget / This is the way we balance the Budget / Early in the morning".]
"You cut taxes so it leaves more money in people's pockets. They save. They invest. The economy grows. And from the economy, the revenues to the government grows. It's history. It's always happened that way." [No examples given.]
"It's how you balance the budget that's important. You know, the Democrats want to balance the budget by raising spending and raising taxes. The Soviet Union had a balanced budget. Well, you can raise taxes until you balance it, but the economy will go into the toilet. We have shown and we have credibility on the economy and the economy's recovering because of Republican policies." [No comment, except that: this motherfucker's meds are either working way too well or not nearly well enough. Maybe there's a puzzle-book logic problem in here somewhere: "Using only his Words of Wisdom displayed below, help Tom DeLay determine his proper dosage."]
Posted by Eddie Tews at 05:37 PM
| Comments (2)
When the Christian Science Monitor reported, a few months back, that, "For U.S. soldiers wondering what they should and should not do in their role as occupiers of Iraq, help may be on the way from the Israel Defense Forces," this blog jokingly noted the occasion by remarking that, "You can't make this shit up."
But it turns out that it wasn't a joke. The New York Times has now noticed that the military's "new approach" in responding to the resistance -- "wrapping entire villages in barbed wire", for example -- "is beginning to echo the Israeli counterinsurgency campaign in the occupied territories."
Indeed, it's been acknowledged that, "Ahead of the war, Israeli defense experts briefed American commanders on their experience in guerrilla and urban warfare" (what was it that Dick Cheney and friends said about expecting to be welcomed as liberators?), and that, "American officers had recently traveled to Israel to hear about lessons learned from recent fighting there."
The tactics, of course, are -- besides being a major violation of the Geneva Conventions (what else is new?) -- completely idiotic.
Not only are "liberated" Iraqis royally pissed off ("I see no difference between us and the Palestinians. We didn't expect anything like this after Saddam fell," says one), but U.S. support of the Israeli occupation was one of the bin Ladenites' three principle grievances -- grievances that found great resonance in the Arab world, even if it didn't approve of their methods of addressing these grievances. Aping the Israelis isn't likely to win over many "hearts and minds" in the Arab World.
But that's only to be expected, apparently. For, in justifying the "provisional" authority's "new" population-control tactics in Iraq (new for Iraq, perhaps, though thoroughly tested in Vietnam, The Philippines, Central America, Colombia, Iran, Indonesia, East Timor, etc.), Capt. Todd Brown, a company commander with the Fourth Infantry Division, argues that, "You have to understand the Arab mind. The only thing they understand is force -- force, pride, and saving face."
This blog would normally, in response to such an assertion, offer up a series of sarcastic rejoinders concerning the "redneck mind", or the "military mind". But this particular comment is so disguntingly vile that the blogger can only hang his head in shame.
Can't help wonder, however, if the military actually believed this fucking crap, why it waited until eight months into the occupation to initiate this campaign? Why did it waste so much time and so much of its taxpayers' money, having been aware for the entire period that the "Arab mind" was incapable of appreciating the occupation's hertofore "friendly" tactics? (You know: shooting civilians dead, selling off the country's resources to White House cronies, watching in bemusement as anarchy gripped the country and nuclear waste went missing, failing to clean up its radioactive weapons and unexploded cluster bombs -- and blaming it all on Saddam Osamadama.)
December 08, 2003
Nigger Psychoanalysis
When the Christian Science Monitor reported, a few months back, that, "For U.S. soldiers wondering what they should and should not do in their role as occupiers of Iraq, help may be on the way from the Israel Defense Forces," this blog jokingly noted the occasion by remarking that, "You can't make this shit up."
But it turns out that it wasn't a joke. The New York Times has now noticed that the military's "new approach" in responding to the resistance -- "wrapping entire villages in barbed wire", for example -- "is beginning to echo the Israeli counterinsurgency campaign in the occupied territories."
Indeed, it's been acknowledged that, "Ahead of the war, Israeli defense experts briefed American commanders on their experience in guerrilla and urban warfare" (what was it that Dick Cheney and friends said about expecting to be welcomed as liberators?), and that, "American officers had recently traveled to Israel to hear about lessons learned from recent fighting there."
The tactics, of course, are -- besides being a major violation of the Geneva Conventions (what else is new?) -- completely idiotic.
Not only are "liberated" Iraqis royally pissed off ("I see no difference between us and the Palestinians. We didn't expect anything like this after Saddam fell," says one), but U.S. support of the Israeli occupation was one of the bin Ladenites' three principle grievances -- grievances that found great resonance in the Arab world, even if it didn't approve of their methods of addressing these grievances. Aping the Israelis isn't likely to win over many "hearts and minds" in the Arab World.
But that's only to be expected, apparently. For, in justifying the "provisional" authority's "new" population-control tactics in Iraq (new for Iraq, perhaps, though thoroughly tested in Vietnam, The Philippines, Central America, Colombia, Iran, Indonesia, East Timor, etc.), Capt. Todd Brown, a company commander with the Fourth Infantry Division, argues that, "You have to understand the Arab mind. The only thing they understand is force -- force, pride, and saving face."
This blog would normally, in response to such an assertion, offer up a series of sarcastic rejoinders concerning the "redneck mind", or the "military mind". But this particular comment is so disguntingly vile that the blogger can only hang his head in shame.
Can't help wonder, however, if the military actually believed this fucking crap, why it waited until eight months into the occupation to initiate this campaign? Why did it waste so much time and so much of its taxpayers' money, having been aware for the entire period that the "Arab mind" was incapable of appreciating the occupation's hertofore "friendly" tactics? (You know: shooting civilians dead, selling off the country's resources to White House cronies, watching in bemusement as anarchy gripped the country and nuclear waste went missing, failing to clean up its radioactive weapons and unexploded cluster bombs -- and blaming it all on Saddam Osamadama.)
Posted by Eddie Tews at 11:30 AM
| Comments (6)
Donald H. Rumsfeld, on the "coalition"'s methods for dealing with its "enemies" (i.e., the Resistance) in Iraq: they're being "rounded up, captured, killed, wounded, and interrogated."
He didn't, of course, say, "In that order." But given the level of competence shewn so far by the "liberators", it wouldn't be all that surprising:
"Can't get him to talk, sir!"
"Bloody wogs..."
December 02, 2003
Kill First, Ask Questions Later
Donald H. Rumsfeld, on the "coalition"'s methods for dealing with its "enemies" (i.e., the Resistance) in Iraq: they're being "rounded up, captured, killed, wounded, and interrogated."
He didn't, of course, say, "In that order." But given the level of competence shewn so far by the "liberators", it wouldn't be all that surprising:
"Can't get him to talk, sir!"
"Bloody wogs..."