CELEBRITY IN CHIEF BARRY O IS STILL SELF-SOOTHING AFTER BEING PUNKED BY HAMID KARZAI WHO BLEW HIM OFF EVEN THOUGH BARRY O FLEW ALL THE WAY TO AFGHANISTAN FOR A MEET-UP.
REACHED BY PHONE, KARZAI TOLD THESE REPORTERS, "UH, EXCUSE ME? WTF? ROBERT DE NERO IS PLAYING ME ON 'SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE.' MY STAR IS ON THE RISE. I WOULD BE CAUGHT DEAD WITH BARRY O. THAT'S LIKE BEING PHOTOGRAPHED WITH ELIZABETH BERKELEY. YOU JUST DON'T RECOVER FROM 'SHOWGIRLS'."
THINGS ARE SAID TO BE SO BAD THAT BARRY O'S BEING COUNSELED NOT TO CHOKE ON A PRETZEL.
FROM THE TCI WIRE:
WikiLeaks remains under attack but more defenders are stepping forward and common sense might yet win out. Max Calloway (Daily Collegian) weighs in, "What these cables represent, however, is a level of hypocritical foreign and domestic policy that even the most paranoid conspiracy theorists couldn't have foreseen. We are fighting two wars for freedom and democracy, but heaven forbid another country contests our actions – cough, Spain, cough. Foreign policy aside, these cables and the international reaction surrounding them are unbelievably frightening. Since the end of the Vietnam War, our government has relied on increasing secrecy in order to pursue agendas which often stand in direct opposition to public opinion. If there was ever any doubt to this statement, these cables should serve as proof of our representative body's true motives." Luke Cherney (Daily Titan) contrasts Hillary Clinton's bad spin last week with reality, "She argued that this kind of reporting is dangerous to individuals and state representatives alike saying, 'There is nothing laudable about endangering innocent people, and there is nothing brave about sabotaging the peaceful relations between nations on which our common security depends.' One of the functions of news is to be a watchdog for the public, not the administration, not diplomats or government agents. That means that there should be news that can be antagonistic to the current administration or whatever the party. The ability to disclose unfavorable documents is part of our freedom of the press." Thomas Harvey (St. Louis Beacon) argues, "WikiLeaks directly threatens the power and credibility of both government and media. Governments seek to control information and bristle when anyone threatens their dominion. While the media historically played this role, (and ended up on enemies lists as a result) they now see their role as patriotic defenders of government secrecy. At its best, WikiLeaks lays bare government lies as well as the media's failure to point them out to us. Ultimately, the unseemly collusion between government and media in the defense of secrecy threatens more than just WikiLeaks and Julian Assange; it threatens our democracy." The latest support comes as Max Fisher (The Atlantic) reports, "British police say they are now seeking to arrest WikiLeaks founder Juilan Assange, who is thought to be in London." Owen Bowcott (Guardian) adds, "Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, is expected to appear in a UK court tomorrow after his lawyers said he would meet police to discuss a European arrest warrant from Sweden relating to alleged sexual assaults." And it comes as Saturday Night Live elected to attack WikiLeaks and Julian Assange in a smutty skit which aired Saturday -- a smutty attack which demonstrated just how far gone SNL had become. Friday, Reporters Without Borders noted, "Reporters Without Borders condemns the blocking, cyber-attacks and political pressure being directed at cablegate.wikileaks.org, the website dedicated to the US diplomatic cables. The organization is also concerned by some of the extreme comments made by American authorities concerning WikiLeaks and its founder Julian Assange." Marcia's called for a boycott of Amazon for dropping WikiLeaks and Justin Raimondo (Antiwar.com) points out:
Echoing the government-Big Media lie that WikiLeaks is purveying "stolen property," Amazon is making propaganda for the regime and its efforts to take down WikiLeaks. Although it isn't very convincing propaganda: after all, who "owns" those 250,000 diplomatic cables – or the "Collateral Murder" video, for that matter? Why, the people whose involuntary contributions paid for them, i.e. the American taxpayers. Now, instead of being kept in the dark about the often dangerous and provocative shenanigans our government is up to overseas, the American people have access to what is their property, not the government's.
Far from stealing anything, WikiLeaks, in effect, returned stolen property to its rightful owners. To argue otherwise is to maintain a deeply statist and proto-authoritarian stance: that the state exercises sovereignty over the people, rather than vice versa.
Daniel Ellsbergs is another person calling for a boycott of Amazon and he makes his case at ZNet.
AFP reports that the latest cables released include one on Iraq where the State Dept gets a report on Saddam Hussein's execution, with Saddam being told to "go to hell" by the man walking him to the hanging platform, with observers videotaping and filming the hanging, with attempts to interrupt "his final prayer" with a chant of "Moqtada, Moqtada, Moqtada." David de Sola (CNN) adds that "six Iraqi government personnel arrived at the scene an hour before the execution. These six are described as the Iraqi government's 'video personnel' and personal security detail." The National Post notes this on the cables having to do with Iraq:
Today's Iraqi leaders are struggling to restrain the ambitions of the countries that share Iraq's porous borders, eye the country's rich resources and vie for influence. "All Iraq's neighbors were interfering, albeit in different ways, the Gulf and Saudi Arabia with money, Iran with money and political influence, and the Syrians by all means," Jalal Talabani, Iraq's president and the senior Kurdish official, told Defense Secretary Robert Gates in a Dec. 10, 2009, meeting, according to a diplomatic cable. "The Turks are 'polite' in their interference, but continue their attempts to influence Iraq's Turkmen community and Sunnis in Mosul."
AFP reports on a cable that they credit to former US Ambassador to Iraq Chris Hill. We won't quote from the story. It's Chris Hill. Over the weekend, Shashank Bengali (McClatchy Newspapers) reported:
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki fired dozens of officers from the security and intelligence services early this year and replaced them with inexperienced political officers loyal to his Shiite Dawa party, U.S. officials reported in February, according to newly leaked diplomatic cables.
The firings were carried out under the guise of purging members of Saddam Hussein's long extinct Baath party, but U.S. officials in Baghdad fretted in cables that Maliki would do "serious harm to the intelligence institutions by drumming out experienced and proficient officers," including many Sunni Arabs.
The cables, published on the website of al Akhbar, a left-leaning Beirut daily, bolstered U.S. and Iraqi critics who've accused Maliki of building a sectarian security structure during his first term in office.
Max Fisher (The Atlantic) continues:
The Baghdad cables are part of a cache of 183 U.S. State Department communications from the Middle East and North Africa recently published online by Lebanon's Al Akhbar newspaper. It's unclear how Al Akhbar got the cables, which they say are "exclusive," and whether they posted them with the permission of Wikileaks, which has tightly controlled who publishes which of its cables and when.
In the week before Iraq's election began, the U.S. embassy in Baghdad warned that Maliki and his office "directed the removal" of security and intelligence officials, including "some of the highest quality personnel" and "some of the most experienced intelligence officers," over dubious allegations of ties to the long-defunct Baath party. Maliki, the cables say, then replaced those officials with "political officers" from Maliki's Da'Wa party who "lack intelligence or related backgrounds." They cite "troubling" concerns that Maliki's changes were designed "to eliminate internal opposition in the run-up to the elections."
The purges and political replacements targeted the Ministry of Defense, the Ministry of Interior (which oversees intelligence), the Iraqi Joint Headquarters Intelligence Directorate, and the Iraqi National Intelligence and Investigation Agency. Those agencies handle much of Iraq's internal security and the ongoing battle against still-present sectarian and terrorist groups, both roles that are increasingly important as the U.S. reduces its troop presence. "The politically linked command changes are corrosive to Iraqi Security Force command and control integrity and unit readiness," a February 2010 cable from Baghdad warned. Maliki, they say, was likely "trying to hedge post-election fall-out by seeding security forces and intelligence services with allies."
And that's who is the prime minister-designate today. Nouri has 21 more days to propose cabinet ministers and have them approved -- individually, one by one -- by the Parliament. He's pushed back the census (again) which is having at least a small spillover effect in terms of the Kurds. Whether it will be large enough to cost him votes or not is an unknown.
But he barely put together a power-sharing coalition. When he did put it together, he did so with the promise of the census and the promise of a new post for Ayad Allawi. And neither of those things have come to pass. If they don't come to pass before the thirty day deadline (they've fudged his being named prime minister-designate and are stating it didn't occur until November 25th), Jalal Talabani is supposed to nominate another prime minister-designate and that's written into the Constitution.
The Baghdad cables are part of a cache of 183 U.S. State Department communications from the Middle East and North Africa recently published online by Lebanon's Al Akhbar newspaper. It's unclear how Al Akhbar got the cables, which they say are "exclusive," and whether they posted them with the permission of Wikileaks, which has tightly controlled who publishes which of its cables and when.
In the week before Iraq's election began, the U.S. embassy in Baghdad warned that Maliki and his office "directed the removal" of security and intelligence officials, including "some of the highest quality personnel" and "some of the most experienced intelligence officers," over dubious allegations of ties to the long-defunct Baath party. Maliki, the cables say, then replaced those officials with "political officers" from Maliki's Da'Wa party who "lack intelligence or related backgrounds." They cite "troubling" concerns that Maliki's changes were designed "to eliminate internal opposition in the run-up to the elections."
The purges and political replacements targeted the Ministry of Defense, the Ministry of Interior (which oversees intelligence), the Iraqi Joint Headquarters Intelligence Directorate, and the Iraqi National Intelligence and Investigation Agency. Those agencies handle much of Iraq's internal security and the ongoing battle against still-present sectarian and terrorist groups, both roles that are increasingly important as the U.S. reduces its troop presence. "The politically linked command changes are corrosive to Iraqi Security Force command and control integrity and unit readiness," a February 2010 cable from Baghdad warned. Maliki, they say, was likely "trying to hedge post-election fall-out by seeding security forces and intelligence services with allies."
And that's who is the prime minister-designate today. Nouri has 21 more days to propose cabinet ministers and have them approved -- individually, one by one -- by the Parliament. He's pushed back the census (again) which is having at least a small spillover effect in terms of the Kurds. Whether it will be large enough to cost him votes or not is an unknown.
But he barely put together a power-sharing coalition. When he did put it together, he did so with the promise of the census and the promise of a new post for Ayad Allawi. And neither of those things have come to pass. If they don't come to pass before the thirty day deadline (they've fudged his being named prime minister-designate and are stating it didn't occur until November 25th), Jalal Talabani is supposed to nominate another prime minister-designate and that's written into the Constitution.
Alsumaria TV reports, "Iraqi political leaders, political parties' representatives and provinces administrative units officials held a meeting on Sunday night in Baghdad attended by appointed Prime Minister Nuri Al Maliki and President Jalal Talabani." It was decided that they would attempt to find a solution to the problem "by December 19." Kick the can, kick the can. And Nouri hoped he could kick it on past December 25th. He used the promised census to woo Kurdish support. No sooner was he declared prime minister-designate than the census was called off. What's forcing the issue now is Kurdish outrage as Kurdish rank-and-file grasp how little their leaders got out of the deal with Nouir and demand action, fueled in part as a result of a leaked cable. Wladmimir Van Wilgenburg (Rudaw) reports:
In leaked US diplomatic cables the Turkish ambassador to Iraq, Murat Ozcelik, told US officials on January 11th that for the first time a Kurdish official understood that Kirkuk would not be included in the semiautonomous Iraqi Kurdistan region, indicating to Turkey that a compromise and a special 10-year status for Kirkuk was needed.
Ozcelik said that, during tri-lateral negotiations on December 21st 2009 in Erbil involving Turkey, the Iraqi government and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), Kurdistan Interior Minister Karim Sinjari said the KRG had now understood that Kurdistan would not be incorporating Kirkuk into the region.
The KRG is a wealthy region of Iraq. More importantly, it has support from Kurds around the world (including in the US). Certain Kurdish leaders might have thought they could play off the Kurdish desires for their own selfish reasons (hello, Jalal) but they underestimated both the desires of those living in the KRG and what the KRG has come to mean for Kurds around the world. Their actions were ignorant and may have resulted in turning Goran into a real political party.
In leaked US diplomatic cables the Turkish ambassador to Iraq, Murat Ozcelik, told US officials on January 11th that for the first time a Kurdish official understood that Kirkuk would not be included in the semiautonomous Iraqi Kurdistan region, indicating to Turkey that a compromise and a special 10-year status for Kirkuk was needed.
Ozcelik said that, during tri-lateral negotiations on December 21st 2009 in Erbil involving Turkey, the Iraqi government and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), Kurdistan Interior Minister Karim Sinjari said the KRG had now understood that Kurdistan would not be incorporating Kirkuk into the region.
The KRG is a wealthy region of Iraq. More importantly, it has support from Kurds around the world (including in the US). Certain Kurdish leaders might have thought they could play off the Kurdish desires for their own selfish reasons (hello, Jalal) but they underestimated both the desires of those living in the KRG and what the KRG has come to mean for Kurds around the world. Their actions were ignorant and may have resulted in turning Goran into a real political party.
RECOMMENDED: "Iraq snapshot"
"The violence and the stalemate continue"
"Speaking out on behalf of WikiLeaks"
Isaiah's The World Today Just Nuts "Hiding Behind The Leg Of Her Pantsuit
"And the war drags on . . ."
"E-mails and music"
"Thug Nouri"
"Not in the damn mood today"
- Truest statement of the week
- A note to our readers
- Editorial: Lies rewarded, truth attacked
- TV: SNL as a TGIF staple
- The Black Roundtable
- Only 17% of the guests were women (Ava, C.I. and A...
- Corruption and waste
- Book discussion
- Dorm Room Poster From Hell
- Highlights
"The Google"
"Something to talk about"
"THIS JUST IN! HE GAVE THEM SOMETHING!"
No comments:
Post a Comment