Barry tries to butch it up

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

 KILLER BARRY O IS IN HOT WATER FOR HIS SEXISM.  THE MAN WHO GOT AWAY WITH CALLING FEMALE REPORTERS "SWEETIE" AS WELL AS MULTIPLE SEXIST ATTACKS ON HILLARY, DECIDED TO TRY TO PROVE HE WAS A REAL MAN BY REDUCING A FEMALE ATTORNEY GENERAL TO A PIECE OF MEAT.

PLAGUED BY NEVER-ENDING RUMORS ABOUT HIM AND FORMER "BODY MAN" REGGIE LOVE AS WELL AS RUMORS OF PAST DAYS IN A GAY CHICAGO BATH HOUSE, KILLER BARRY O TRIES REALLY HARD TO LOOK MANLY.

BEING BULIMIC AND SMOOTH OF CROTCH, IT'S A TOUGH BATTLE.

SO KILLER BARRY USES HIS DRONES AS A PENIS SUBSTITUTE.



FROM THE TCI WIRE:



Where Barack Obama flips the middle finger to the Iraqi people.  Let's go back to Kitabat reports that Brett McGurk, a US State Dept advisor, dined with journalists at the American Embassy in Baghdad and declared that a majority government was fine and dandy. We mentioned The Erbil Agreement earlier.  It's amazingly important and so rarely reported on by the western press which appears to have mistaken a major in whoring for one in journalism.

In March 2010, Iraq held parliamentary elections.  They have a parliamentary government and the person with the most members in their 'Congress' is named prime minister-designate and given 30 days to form a cabinet.  Not a partial cabinet.  A full cabinet.  You do that in 30 days or someone else named prime minister-designate.

The winner of the 2010 elections?  Iraqiya headed by Ayad Allawi.  It's a mixed political slate attempting to include of all Iraq.  Iraqiya offers and embraces a national 'we are all Iraqis' identity.  It is also the political slate that has female members of Parliament and not tokens.  (Al-Fadhila's Susan Sa'ad is not a MP I would want to represent me but she's also not a token.  One of the few non-Iraqiya female members who can make that claim.)  In the 2009 provincial elections a thread in those results was that it appeared Iraqis were moving away from a (US-imposed) Sunni-Shi'ite split and going for a national identity.  This was confirmed in the 2010 results when Nouri's State of Law was defeated by the new Iraqiya coalition (whose members were killed in the lead up to the election, whose members were barred from running by the Justice and Accountability Commission). 

Nouri stomped his feet and demanded a recount.  The results were the same.

It was now time for Nouri to step down and for a new prime minister to emerge via the process outlined in the Constitution.

But Nouri refused to allow that to happen.  It's as though, in January 2009, Bully boy Bush announced he wasn't leaving the White House and Barack Obama wasn't going to be named president.

Nouri kept the country of Iraq in an eight-month political stalemate while he refused to step down as prime minister.  He was only able to do that with the backing of the governments of Iran and the United States.  Nouri is a White House puppet.  He was first appointed by the Bush White House when they didn't want Ibrahim al-Jaafari to become prime minister in 2006.  By 2010, Nouri's secret prisons, torture cells, corruption and much more were well known and documented.  While Barack and others in the White House love to sneer at the Iranian government's alleged embrace of torture, their hands are just as dirty.

And the Iraqi people had gone to the polls.  They had expressed their wishes and the votes were counted and then recounted.  And yet the US that supposedly wanted to introduce 'democracy' to Iraq immediately pissed on democracy, pissed on the voters, pissed on the Iraqi Constitution.

During the eight month political stalemate, US officials repeatedly pressured the political blocs to let Nouri have a second term.  No surprise, most said no and said no repeatedly.  After it hit the eight month mark, US officials began telling the political leaders that Nouri was willing to go another eight months, that nothing would ever get done in Iraq.  So why not be the adult in the room, give Nouri a second term as prime minister and, in exchange, we'll put your concerns on paper in a legally binding contract that Nouri will have to follow. 

Their concerns?  One example.  Kirkuk is oil rich.  Because it's oil rich, it's disputed.  The semi-autonomous KRG in the north claims it and the Nouri's Baghdad-based government claims it.  How do you solve who gets it?  Well Iraq wrote and passed a Constitution in 2005.  Article 140 explained how this would be addressed: A census and a referendum.  Nouri took an oath in 2006 to obey the Constitution.  He never implemented Article 140.  Before you say, "Maybe he was busy," the Constitution mandates that Article 140 be instituted no later than December 2007.  Nouri ignored the Constitution.

It is thought that a vore would see Kirkuk go to the KRG.  So Nouri's delayed the vote, repeatedly ignoring the Constitution.

Okay, say US officials, we'll put it in writing, it'll be a binding contract and Nouri will have to honor it.  [He wasn't honoring the Iraqi Constitution but he was going to honor a contract?]  US officials did this with the leader of each political bloc to get them to agree that Nouri would get a second term.  This is the US-brokered Erbil Agreement.

It is extra-constitutional because it goes around the Constitution which clearly defines how someone becomes prime minister.  For example, Nouri never formed a full cabinet.  Back in July, Mohammed Tawfeeq (CNN) observed, "Shiite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has struggled to forge a lasting power-sharing agreement and has yet to fill key Cabinet positions, including the ministers of defense, interior and national security, while his backers have also shown signs of wobbling support."  Those positions were supposed to have been filled before the end of December 2010.  They were not.  They are still not filled.  Nouri refused to fill them because once the Iraqi Parliament confirms a nominee, that nominee is autonomous.  Nouri can't fire them, only the Parliament can.  (Which isn't easy.  Nouri's gotten Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi convicted of 'terrorism' and sentenced to death with the Baghdad courts he controls but he can't get Parliament to strip Tareq of his title.)

Because he was governed by The Erbil Agreement and not the Constitution, he didn't have to meet any requirements.  And he trashed The Erbil Agreement.  Immediately.  A census was supposed to take place in Kirkuk the first week of December 2010.  Nouri called it off, said it was postponed.  It's never been brought up again.  He was supposed to appoint Ayad Allawi to head an independent national security agency.  Immediately after President Jalal Talabani named Nouri prime minister-designate, Nouri told Parliament that Allawi's position would have to wait.  It's 'waited' ever since.

The US image in Iraq wasn't good before then.  For obvious reasons (an illegal war that destroyed Iraq).  Barack Obama's election meant that Iraqis thought a real change might be coming.  They were hopeful.  They no longer are.  They have seen through Barack Obama and his 'withdrawal' which is actually more counter-terrorism US troops in Iraq today than at the start of 2012.  (Not surprising because he told the New York Times he'd do that when he was first running for the presidency.) But what it mainly did was send the message to Iraqi political leaders that the US can't be trusted.  For example, there is so much damage in the trust that did exist among Kurdish leaders.  They now realize they will be screwed over every time.  It didn't have to be this way.

Barack could have supported the will of the Iraqi people, the votes, the attempt at democracy.  He refused to do so.  Let's again note John Barry's "'The Engame' Is A Well Researched, Highly Critical Look at U.S. Policy in Iraq" (Daily Beast):



Washington has little political and no military influence over these developments [in Iraq]. As Michael Gordon and Bernard Trainor charge in their ambitious new history of the Iraq war, The Endgame, Obama's administration sacrificed political influence by failing in 2010 to insist that the results of Iraq’s first proper election be honored: "When the Obama administration acquiesced in the questionable judicial opinion that prevented Ayad Allawi's bloc, after it had won the most seats in 2010, from the first attempt at forming a new government, it undermined the prospects, however slim, for a compromise that might have led to a genuinely inclusive and cross-sectarian government."


What The Erbil-Agreement put forward was a power-sharing government.  This week, Brett McGurk announced that the US government now supports a majority-government.  that's what Nouri has been insisting on all along.  He couldn't accomplish that at the ballot box -- hell, he couldn't even win a term as prime minister at the ballot box -- but now the US is backing his power grab.  This is major news and will have huge implications on the way the Iraqi people see the US.

Nouri went to Karbala today.  Speaking alongside his political cronies, Nouri refused to take off his sunglasses.  None of the over 16 people standing beside him required sunglasses but Nouri had to hide his eyes.  He has to hide a lot.  Alsumaria reports that he accused other political parties and slates of being terrorists. And what is a reach around to Deputy Prime Minister Saleh al-Mutlaq, he declared that some political parties work to keep smaller ones from success.  (al-Mutlaq is currently the leader of the National Dialogue Front which is a part of Iraqiya.  al-Mutlaq and Nouri have gotten very tight as al-Mutlaq's leadership has fallen into question.)  He also pushed his desire for majority government -- again, something the voters did not sign off on -- and declared it was the only way to end the "political impasse." Kitabat notes that he declared this is what has kept Iraq from moving forward.  Parliamentary elections are currently supposed to take place in March of 2014.  Nouri called for early elections and said the 2010 elections were marred by vote rigging.  This is the piece of crap that the United States government has backed -- under Bush, under Barack.  There's not a damn bit of difference between Bush and Barack except Barack can speak properly and Bully Boy Bush knew how to come off human (and not like the first place winner in a Leonard Nimoy competition).


Alsumaria reports that Brett McGurk has announced he will be entering discussions with various political leaders on how to solve the political crisis.  Well it's "crises" -- not crisis.  And the roots go back to the failure of Nouri to honor The Erbil Agreement and the failure of the US to keep their promise that they would ensure The Erbil Agreement would be honored.  It's 2013.  It's a little damn late, even if the US was trying to strong arm Nouri, for the 2010 contract to be honored (because come 2014, new parliamentary elections will be held).  But why would any Iraqi politician expect either Nouri or the US government to be honest at this point?  With their track record of lying over and over, why should Nouri or the US government be trusted?



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Even Helen Keller could have seen it coming

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

KILLER BARRY O IS TAKING A DRONE TO THE SAFETY NET.

THE WASHINGTON POST EXPLAINS, "PRESIDENT OBAMA WILL RELEASE A BUDGET NEXT WEEK THAT PROPOSES SIGNIFICANT CUTS TO MEDICARE AND SOCIAL SECURITY."

THAT'S WHAT HAPPENING.  MANY MEMBERS OF THE KOOL-AID CULT TRY TO DEFLECT FROM WHAT'S HAPPENING SUCH AS, "ADMINISTRATION OFFICIALS SAY PRESIDENT OBAMA WILLS END A NEW PROPOSAL TO CAPITOL HILL NEXT WEEK THAT INCLUDES CUTS TO SOCIAL SECURITY AND MEDICARE, AN ATTEMPT TO WIN OVER DEFICIT-FOCUSED REPUBLICANS."

HE CREATED THE SEQUESTRATION.  HE EARLIER CREATED THE DEFICIT COMMISSION.  THE KEY SHARED COMPONENT: ATTACKING THE SAFETY NET. 

 HEY, AMERICA, HOW DO YOU LIKE THE BITCH NOW?

FROM THE TCI WIRE:

 
Phys.org reports on finds a team of archaeologists from the University of Manchester are making in Iraq -- specifically in historical Ur. The team is lead by Dr. Jane Moon and Professor Stuart Campbell.  They began with satellite imagery before going to Ur where they've found a "complex at about 80 metres square -- roughly the size of a football pitch.  They believe the building goes back 4,000 years, going back to early Sumer and was "connected to the administration of Ur."   Ancient Digger explains:

Tell Khaiber, as the site is called, is playing host to one of the first major archaeological projects with extensive participation by foreign scientists since the hiatus caused by the political situation and hostilities of the Iraqi war. Consisting of an international mix of six British archaeologists representing four UK institutions and four Iraqi archaeologists from the State Board for Antiquities and Heritage of Iraq, the team expects to uncover not just monumental buildings, but evidence that may shed new light on the environment and lifeways of the people who inhabited the site.


Archaeology Magazine adds, "The area has been closed to foreign scholars since the 1950s, when a military air base was constructed nearby."  Noted Iraqi archaeologist Donny George passed away March 11, 2011.  For many around the world, with Iraq either closed off due to Saddam Hussein or due to violence, George was the ambassador for the early historical civilization.  May 26, 2005, he was a guest on Neal Conan's Talk of the Nation (NPR) and discussed Iraq's historical importance.  Excerpt.


 

CONAN: Give us an example, if you would. Is there a piece that is of particular significance that--or at least significance to you?

 

Mr. GEORGE: Well, at the beginning, you see, we lost some very, very important masterpieces, like the Warka vase, like the mask of the lady from Warka, but these came back. But now one of the most important pieces that is still missing is the headless statue, half-natural-size, of the Sumerian King Natum(ph), which--we still don't have it. And, by the way, this piece is inscribed on the back shoulder, and it could be one of the rare examples, the first examples, of this mentioning the word 'king' in the history of mankind. So this is -- I mean, every single piece has its own significance.

 

CONAN: We're talking with Donny George, director of the Iraq Museum in Baghdad. You're listening to TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. You mentioned Sumer; this was an early, maybe the earliest, human civilization...

 

Mr. GEORGE: That's right.

 

CONAN: ...speaking a language that appears to have no relation to any language anywhere else.

 

Mr. GEORGE: That's right. Yeah.

 

CONAN: This is a great mystery and--but these were the people who first invented the hydrographic civilization that we emerged from.

 

Mr. GEORGE: That's right. I mean, modern scholars believe that the Sumerians are the descendants of the first people coming to Mesopotamia. Those were the people coming from the Neolithic period. Those were the people who started the villages. Those were the people who actually, with the villages, started the animal domestication and agriculture and a lot of -- villages planning and, you know -- but then, in about 4,500 BC, we learn that these are Sumerians. We don't have the writing then, but in about 3,200 BC we started having the writing, the inscription that they themselves invented at the beginning. It was a kind of pictographic. And, you see, this is the greatness of the people: Out of nothing, they invent something, something very important, something that can exchange ideas and can accumulate ideas between generations and generations. That was the writing. Now we have it here.

Last month, Ur was the topic of the geo quiz on PRI's The World.  (What is the ancient capital of Mesopotamia?  Ur. Following the quiz, Marco Werman speaks with anthropologist Elizabeth Stone about Ur.)  AP reports of the newly discovered  complex that it would have existed "around the time Abraham would have lived there before leaving for Canaan, according to the Bible."  Last week, Jane Arraf (Christian Science Monitor) spoke with Dr. Jane Moon about the dig:

The last major excavation at Ur was performed by a British-American team led by Sir Charles Leonard Woolley in the 1920s and the 1930s. After the 1950s revolution, which toppled Iraq’s monarchy, a nearby military air base put the area off limits to foreign archaeologists for the next half century.
“What Wooley found were these tremendous monumental buildings, but it’s difficult to tell a coherent story about them because they were restored again and again and again, and what you see is neo-Babylonian, 7th century BC – very much later,” says Moon. “He wasn’t able to see what they were really used for and that’s where I’m hoping our modern methods might be able to say something.”
At Ur, Wooley also discovered a spectacular treasure trove that rivals King Tut’s tomb. At least 16 members of royalty were buried at Ur with elaborate gold jewelry, including a queen’s headdress made of gold leaves and studded with lapis lazuli. Other objects included a gold and lapis lyre, one of the first known musical instruments.
In the 1930s, the treasures were split between the British Museum and the University of Pennsylvania, which funded Wooley’s work, and the newly created Iraq museum.
Moon says it’s impossible to tell whether the new site might contain similar finds.
“Ultimately we’re not looking for objects we’re looking for information.… I guess it’s always a possibility. In archaeology you can always be surprised.”

For more on Wooley's historic dig, you can refer to the American Journal of Archaeology (see PDF link on the page for the article by Naomi F. Miller).  Moon's team is one of six foreign teams recently authorized to do excavations.



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More stunts from the cover boy

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

KILLER BARRY O HAS ANNOUNCED HE WILL RETURN 5% OF HIS SALARY DUE TO SEQUESTRATION.  THAT MIGHT MEAN A DAMN THING IF HE HAD TO PAY RENT (WHITE HOUSE IS PAID FOR BY THE U.S. TAXPAYERS), FOR FOOD (FOOD, LIKE LODGING, IS A BILL FOOTED BY THE U.S. TAXPAYER), FOR MEDICAL (HIS MEDICAL BILLS ARE PAID FOR LIFE BY THE U.S. TAXPAYER), TRAVEL COSTS (PAID FOR BY U.S. TAXPAYERS) . . .

IN OTHER WORDS, HIS SALARY IS THE LEAST OF THE MONEY THE U.S. TAXPAYER HANDS OVER TO BARRY O.

MORE STUNTS FROM THE LAZY MAN WHO SPENT FOUR YEARS FORGETTING THE ECONOMY.


FROM THE TCI WIRE:


No Jail Time for Lt Dan Choi, argues a new Care2Care petition:


In 2011, President Obama repealed Don't Ask Don't Tel (DADT), which finally made it legal for U.S. servicemembers to identify as gay or lesbian without fear of being fired. That's great news. The bad news is that many soldiers and former soldiers are still facing the repercussions of coming out.
One of the most recognizable of these soldiers is Lieutenant Dan Choi, a gay man who made national headlines in 2009 for publicly coming out and being summarily fired from the U.S. army. He then spent the next two years using his story to protest DADT, which he viewed as a homophobic, outdated law that had no place in the United States. In 2010, the Iraq war veteran was arrested for protesting DADT in front of the White House -- and slapped with federal charges.
While most of the other protesters were charged with a fine and released, Lt. Choi refused to plead guilty. He believes that he's being unfairly targeted by the military as a gay man who's attracting too much attention. Now, he's unable to re-enlist and facing six months of possible jail time.
Lt. Choi is a national hero, not someone who should be punished for peacefully protesting a policy that violated his Constitutional rights and left him jobless. Tell the U.S. Department of Justice: no jail time for Lt. Choi!




For more on Dan Choi refer to his Tweeter feed and you can also refer to the March 28th snapshot which was his most recent day in court fighting the charges against him.

Dan Choi stood up.  The world could use more people who take a stand.  A lot of people just hang in the background and claim to stand up.  For example, Reporters Without Borders (still) defines their own mission as:

Freedom of expression and of information will always be the world’s most important freedom. If journalists were not free to report the facts, denounce abuses and alert the public, how would we resist the problem of children-soldiers, defend women’s rights, or preserve our environment? In some countries, torturers stop their atrocious deeds as soon as they are mentioned in the media. In others, corrupt politicians abandon their illegal habits when investigative journalists publish compromising details about their activities. Still elsewhere, massacres are prevented when the international media focuses its attention and cameras on events.

The Committee to Protect Journalism insists:


CPJ promotes press freedom worldwide and defends the right of journalists to report the news without fear of reprisal. CPJ takes action wherever journalists are censored, attacked, imprisoned, or killed for their work. Our advocacy helps to ensure the free flow of news and commentary.

Wherever journalists are censored, attacked, imprisoned, or killed?  Even Iraq?  As Elaine asked of Reporters Without Borders and the Committee to Protect Journalists yesterday, "Why does it always seem that, with both of these organizations, Iraq always has to come last?"


As covered in yesterday's snapshot, Dar Addustour, Al-Parliament, Al-Mustaqbal and Al-Nas were attacked in Baghdad Monday evening, their employees threatened (five people stabbed, more left with bruises and fractures), offices destroyed and cars set on fire (a fifth Baghdad newspaper, Al Mada, was threatened but not attacked).  As Elaine notes, the press was "covering this topic this morning and this evening the Committee to Protect Journalists and Reporters Without Borders have still not managed to issue anything.  Not a statement condemning the attacks, not anything."  It's now a day later and still nothing from the 'protectors' of journalists.

Four newspapers attacked in Baghdad. And not one word from the Committee to Protect Journalists?  No condemnation from Reporters Without Borders?



That's a funny way to protect the press, a funny way to be an advocate for journalism.  But Elaine is correct, especially with regards to CPJ, when it comes to Iraq we have seen this over and over.  It's like there is the whole world and then, after they've dealt with everything else in the world, they may make times to mention something from days or weeks ago in Iraq.  Iraq doesn't matter to these outlets obviously.  Monday evening the attacks took place.  It is Wednesday evening now.  And neither press 'protector' could managed to issue a statement.  48 hours after the attacks and not one damn word.

They can take comfort in the fact that Arab social media is focusing more on the silence of the US State Dept and some very funny (and cruel) illustrations of State Dept spokesperson Victoria Nuland are popping up with her 'concern' expressed Monday about Egypt.  It's noted real concern would require Nuland -- a neocon married to neocon Robert Kagan -- to express concern for the Iraqi press.  The funniest cartoon features a nude and saggy Victoria Nuland with the question of where is her remorse for Iraq?  Obviously, no where to be found.

Dar Addustour reports that the the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council's Sheikh Humam Hamoud has joined those who have publicly condemned the attacks and he has termed them "disturbing and scary."  He has called on the security forces to double their efforts to find the assailants.  As Sheikh is a columnist for Dar Addustour and today he weighs in on the attacks noting that the solidarity many Iraqi officials, politicians and media figures have expressed with the papers attacked has been empowering.  He calls on Iraqis to reject violence and to come together to build a modern, democratic Iraq.  The attacks were a dangerous precedent, he writes, and must not happen again while the assailants must be brought to justice because this will affirm Iraq's commitment tot he law, to democracy and to Constitutional principles.  He ends his column calling for the Almighty's blessing on Iraq and thanking those Iraqis who stood up and expressed solidarity.

Sara Hamdan (New York Times) is expressing something -- bliss?  Maybe something stronger.  It's the usual neo-liberal crap advocating that state banks be replaced with private banks.  While that may not be surprising -- this is the New York Times, after all --
being low-fact, semi-fact free, may be.  Hamdan offers, "According to the Web site of the Central Bank of Iraq, the country is served by 7 state-owned banks, 32 private banks and 15 foreign banks. But analysts say that a handful of state-owned banks -- and two in particular, Rafidain Bank and Rasheed Bank -- dominate 90 percent of the business."  And that's about all she can handle.  Many days this would be less noticeable.  Too bad for Hamdan that she writes on the same day Farid Farid (Transparency International) chooses to weigh in on the topic of corruption in Iraq -- including that $800 million is "said to be unlawfully transferred out of Iraq every week."   Iraq ranks 169 out of 174 countries on Transparency International's Corruption Perception Index.  Maybe today wasn't the best day for the New York Times to again pimp privatization -- which brings about even less checks and balances?


Let's stay with the topic of the greed motivated push towards privatization.  David Bacon, whose latest book  Illegal People -- How Globalization Creates Migration and Criminalizes Immigrants (Beacon Press)  won the CLR James Award, explains the continued attacks to destroy the Iraqi oil industry -- state-owned before the start of the war.  From Bacon's "For Unionists, Iraq's Oil War Rages On; The leader of Iraq's oil union is being threatened with prison -- again" (In These Times):


The big multinational petroleum giants now run the nation’s fields. Between 2009 and 2010, the Maliki government granted contracts for developing existing fields and exploring new ones to 18 companies, including ExxonMobil, Royal Dutch Shell, the Italian Eni, Russia's Gazprom and Lukoil, Malaysia's Petronas and a partnership between BP and the Chinese National Petroleum Corporation. When they started, the U.S. military provided the initial security umbrella protecting all of their field operations. The Ministry of Oil technically still owns the oil, but functions more as the multinationals' adjunct, while stripping workers of their rights. Since 2003 the ministry has denied the union its right to exist and retaliated against its leaders and activists. As the oil corporations rush in to lay claim to developing fields, ministry spokesman Assam Jihad told the Iraq Oil Report in 2010, "Unionists instigate the public against the plans of the oil ministry to develop [Iraq's] oil riches using foreign development."
In 2011, Hassan Juma'a and Falih Abood, president and general secretary of the Federation of Oil Employees of Iraq, were first subject to legal action by the ministry and threatened with arrest. Many of the union’s elected officers have been transferred from jobs they’d held for years to remote locations far from their families, in an effort to break up its structure and punish activists. "The government doesn't want workers to have rights, because it wants people to be weak and at the mercy of employers," said Juma'a.


Currently Hassam Juma'a is being asked to appear in court Sunday, April 7th.  US Labor Against the War is asking for people to sign this petition which explains:

Despite all the talk about fostering democracy and human rights in Iraq, workers there continue to be denied the right to freely organize trade unions and negotiate over the terms of their labor - just as they were under Saddam Hussein.  
In the last two years, repression against unions has escalated.  A wave of peaceful strikes has recently swept Iraq as workers seek to redress grievances and assert their rights.  The response of the Al Maliki government has been to crack down on discontent with disciplinary action against union activists, and even criminal complaints against union leaders.

Recently the Ministry of Oil lodged a criminal complaint against Hassan Juma'a Awad, President of the Iraq Federation of Oil Unions*, claiming he was responsible for strikes in the oil industry.  

If convicted, he could face stiff fines and five years in prison. He has been ordered to appear in court on April 7th to respond to charges leveled against him.

Persecution of union leaders for exercising rights promised by Iraq's constitution and protected under international treaty must not be allowed to stand unchallenged.

Labor organizations across the U.S., including the AFL-CIO, and around the world have responded by signing a letter to Prime Minister Nouri Al Maliki demanding that all charges against Hassan Juma'a be immediately withdrawn and that persecution of Iraqi workers peacefully exercising their rights must cease.  
They further demand that the Iraqi government promptly enact a basic labor and trade union law that guarantees the right of workers to organize and join unions of their choosing free from government interference and harassment, and that both public and private employers be required to negotiate over the terms and conditions of employment with the unions chosen by their employees.

• No government that denies these basic labor and human rights can claim to be a democracy.  
  
• The U.S. and other governments ought to freeze economic aid to Iraq until these and other basic human rights are respected.
  

U.S. Labor Against the War calls on its affiliates, members and supporters in unions and allied social justice organizations to sign this petition supporting the rights of Iraq's workers and solidarity with Hassan Juma'a and other union activists who are being persecuted by the government for exercising their rights.

As Bacon notes in his article, there have been several protests in Basra by oil workers in the month of February.

Of course, there are ongoing protests in Iraq that reached the 100-day mark on Monday.  The protesters are calling for a responsive government that addresses the needs of the people.  These are the people who live in poverty.  Billions of dollars come in each month from oil and Iraq has around 30 million people but the government can't provide.  It can't provide needed jobs, it can provide consistent electricity, it can't provide potable water, it can't provide needed sanitation infrastructure (which is why the rainy seasons in Iraq meaning flooding throughout the bulk of the country -- standing water, up to the knees, in parts of Baghdad -- such as Sadr City -- even a day after the rain stops).  Nouri al-Maliki's government  also attacks political rivals and anyone who fights for a better life for Iraq, Hassam Juma'a is only one example of that.  Iraqi Spring MC notes that Nouri's forces killed activist Qahtan Adnan Shalash Hiti yesterday and then grabbed four other activists and took them away with no one providing information about where the four have been taken.




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His ego suffers

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

 KILLER BARRY O IS HAVING HIS SOAPDISH MOMENT.  LIKE SALLY FIELD'S CHARACTER IN THAT MOVIE, FROM TIME TO TIME, BARRY O NEEDS AN EGO PUMPING. 

IN THE FILM, A PLUS-SIZE WHOOPI GOLDBERG PRETENDS TO BE A STRANGER IN THE MALL WHO EXCLAIMS AND SHOUTS WHEN SHE SUDDENLY 'SEES' SALLY FIELD.

IN REAL LIFE, A PLUS-SIZE SHE-HULK EXCLAIMS AND WHOOPS ON TV THAT HER CRUSTY-LIPPED, 51-YEAR-OLD HUSBAND WITH THE COTTON FUZZ HAIR IS A "SEX SYMBOL."

NO, HE'S A MIDDLE-AGED WAR CRIMINAL WITH AN EATING DISORDER AND MORE WRINKLES THAN A CALIFORNIA RAISIN.


FROM THE TCI WIRE:



When multiple newspapers are attacked in one city, it's usually considered news.  And journalistic organizations are usually up in arms.  Unless it's Iraq apparently.  At which point Reporters Without Borders and the Committee to Protect Journalists forget to speak up. 





This morning,  Alsumaria, citing a police source, reported an attack on the headquarters of a Baghdad newspaper where four employees were stabbed with knives. [The number is now five.] The assailants demanded and recorded the names of all the paper's employees.  In a later article, the outlet reveals that four daily papers were attacked by "paramilitary" members yesterday.  Journalists are decrying the silence and indifference from the government over the attacks.  The Associated Press' Diaa Hadid Tweets:

1. Diaa Hadid ضياء حديد ‏@diaahadid 2h

   
   

   Gunmen smash offices of four #Bagdad papers, stab, beat workers & hurl one off roof in most brazen attack against media in #Iraq this year.

   
   

   
   

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   • Reply
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 AFP lists the four newspapers as: "Al-Dustour (The Constitution), Al-Parliament, Al-Mustaqbal (The Future) and Al-Nas (The People)" and quotes the editor-in-chief of Al-Mustaqbal, Ali Darraji, stating, "About 30 men in civilian clothes entered our offices after forcibly removing the door.  They set fire to my car, and they entered the office, broke all the computers and everything around.  All of this happened in about 20 minutes -- when guards outside opened fire to scare them away, they escaped, but they escaped after doing what they wanted to do." 




"Al-Dustour" is the paper we note here as Dar Addustour.  On their front page -- go to cached copy if the first link doesn't work -- they note that their attackers claimed to be affiliated with Sarkhi Hassani and that they smashed furniture and attacked the staff.  They note the attack took place in broad daylight and that a number of employees were wounded -- some left with serious fractures.   Dar Addustour has many strong journalists and, in addition to reports, we often note their columnist As Sheik (such as January 25th: "Dar Addustour columnist As Sheik notes that the protesters and their demands have been repeatedly ignored and that it appears any pretext for aggravation has been seized upon by the security forces but that there must be no more Iraqi blood spilled at the hands of the military.")  They do long form and contextual journalism and they pride themselves on being independent and not playing favorites.  They are a strong example of what the press in any country should aim for.  Another strongly independent paper is Al Mada.  Mohammed Tawfeeq and Joe Sterling (CNN) report, "Employees of a fifth Baghdad daily newspaper, al-Mada, received threats on Tuesday, the paper's director general told CNN. Mada means 'range' in Arabic."




Many papers and channels have been shut down in the 'free' Iraq.  Al Mada was repeatedly targeted last year by the government.  At one point, the editor and publisher's home was encircled by military tanks on Nouri's orders.   Out of 179 countries in the world, the World Press Freedom Index 2013 ranks Iraq at 150.  Meaning there are 29 countries in which the press is in even more danger.  And that there are 149 countries in which the press is safer.   The report notes of Iraq, "The security situation for journalists continues to be very worrying with three killed in connection with their work in 2012 and seven killed in 2011.  Journalists are constantly obstructed."  Ahmed Rasheed, Patrick Markey and Mark Heinrich (Reuters) note, "Now Iraqis have a choice of 200 print outlets, 60 radio stations and 30 TV channels in Arabic and also in the Turkman, Syriac and Kurdish languages. But while press freedom has improved, many media outlets remain dominated by religious or political party patrons who use them for their own ends. The government has also occasionally threatened to close media outlets it regards as offensive."  They also note 5 journalists killed in 2012.  



This assault on the press takes place exactly one month before the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) kicks off World Press Freedom Day and the Safe to Speak campaign:

It is in this spirit that UNESCO has chosen to celebrate the event with the global theme “Safe to Speak: Securing Freedom of Expression in All Media”. The main event will be jointly organized by UNESCO, the Government of Costa Rica and the United Nations-mandated University for Peace in the city of San José, Costa Rica from 2 to 4 May 2013.

The 2013 celebrations are within the context of the UN Plan of Action on the Safety of Journalists and the Issue of Impunity, which is co-led by UNESCO. The goal of the Plan is to join the work of various UN agencies and external partners on creating a safer environment for journalists to have a stronger impact on violence against journalists.

The media landscape has evolved over the past two decades, creating new opportunities for exchange and dialogue, and for sharing knowledge and information through new platforms. However, it has yet to be translated into stronger respect for fundamental freedoms – particularly as regards the safety of those doing journalism. While progress has been made over the last 20 years, many old challenges remain strong, and new threats to freedom of expression are emerging in the digital news environment.

The Iraq Times notes that Iraqiya MP Wissal Salim today declared it is the security forces duty to protect the press and that attacks send a negative message with the intent of killing off democracy.  She noted in a press conference today that Iraq can enjoy a democratic era with a free press and freedoms for Iraqis but not if barbaric attacks are to take place on the instruments of democracy which can lead the country forward.




Reuters notes the assailants in Baghdad carried "pistols, knives and steel pipes" and that they were "beating employees and smashing computers."  The United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI) issued the following statement:



Baghdad, 2 April 2013 -- The United Nations strongly condemns the attacks that targeted journalists and media facilities in Baghdad on 1 April. “Assaults against media organizations or journalists are unacceptable under any circumstances," the Special Representative of the United Nations Secretary-General for Iraq (SRSG) Mr. Kobler said, urging the government of Iraq to ensure that media professionals are protected against all forms of intimidation and violence because of their opinions or thoughts.

UNESCO Director in Iraq, Ms. Louise Haxthausen, expressed her deep concern about the dangerous impact of such incidents on press freedom and freedom of expression, and called for bringing to justice and prosecuting those involved in these attacks. "Freedom of expression is a crucial element for establishing true democracy and building sustainable peace in Iraq," Ms. Haxthausen stated.

Iraq's Journalistic Freedoms Observatory condemned the attacks in a statement today.  They note that along with attacking the employees, the thugs also broke desks and burned cars.  The attacks may or may not be linked to cleric Mahmud al-Hasani al-Sarkhi whose people had lodged complaints about press coverage shortly before the attacks began.  As Khalid Waleed (IWPR) reported last year, al-Sarkhi's followers have violently clashed with those of Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistanin in the past.

This morning, Qassim Abdul-Zahra (AP) could report on the story (and AP was the only Western outlet reporting this morning) and Al Jazeera and the Christian Science Monitor's Jane Arraf could Tweet on it:

1. jane arraf ‏@janearraf  33m

   #Iraq officials say 4 Baghdad #newspapers attacked by armed mob linked to Shia cleric al-Sarkhi, self-proclaimed confidante of hidden Mehdi.

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But somehow, Reporters Without Borders and the Committee to Protect Journalists never found the story.  They could and did decry the treatment of a "satirist" in Egypt.  But attacks on daily newspapers?  Not one damn word.  I'm sorry, help me out, it's now Satirists Without Borders and the Committee to Protect Satire?  I didn't realize the two organizations had changed their names and their mission statements.  My bad.
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BULLY BOY PRESS &   CEDRIC'S BIG MIX -- THE KOOL-AID TABLE

FILE IT UNDER WAR CRIMINALS CAN'T JUMP.

THE 51-YEAR-OLD WAR CRIMINAL KILLER BARRY O WAS SHOCKED TO LEARN THAT HE REALLY WAS A LOUSY BASKETBALL PLAYER.

HE'D BEEN LOUSY IN HIGH SCHOOL BUT, AS PRESIDENT, HE'D WON ONE GAME AFTER ANOTHER.  THEN THE PAST-MIDDLE-AGED MAN DECIDED TO GO UP AGAINST SOME YOUNG PLAYERS AND LEARNED JUST HOW BAD HE WAS.

IT'S SO MUCH EASIER WHEN HE JUST PLAYS WITH PEOPLE WHO TAKE ORDERS FROM HIM.  OH WELL, HE CAN SHAKE IT OFF BY ORDERING ANOTHER DRONE STRIKE -- THE 'BENEFITS' OF BEING A WAR CRIMINAL.


FROM THE TCI WIRE:

Friday, we noted how far All Things Media Big and Small fell in the lead up to the Iraq War and the years since.  Today new details on a US torture scandal break in England.  Big Media is going to avoid as they avoid all things.  If it's going to get traction in the US, it will have to be via Little Media.  Joel Bleifuss, editor and publisher of In These Times, did a mass e-mailing today.  As if to drive the point home about just how useless our 'independent' and 'alternative' media is, they tried to fundraise not by providing information -- which is what they're supposed to be paid to do, they grasp that right -- but instead by noting that Chris Hayes used to write for them and tonight his All In debuts on MSNBC.  This really trumps torture?  This back patting is going to help raise money?

No, all it says is, "We are so worthless that seven years ago we were able to employ Hayes.  For him to do anything of importance he had to leave us.  So go watch MSNBC and realize how unimportant and ineffectual we at In These Times actually are."

Want to raise money, Joel?  You do an e-mail like this:

Today, British media broke the news of systemic US torture in Iraq that took place during and after Abu Ghraib.  Testimony from British soldiers reveals torture as bad and worse than what was reported about Abu Ghraib.  Do you think the New York Times will front page this story?  No.  That's why In These Times needs your support.  To grab these stories and amplify them, to provide coverage of what Big Media doesn't want you to know about.
As we face an austerity crisis that threatens to undo the very fabric of our social safety net, In These Times is proud to bring you the news the corporate media would rather keep from you.

Help us continue to do so. Please make a donation to In These Times today.


 

 

Ian Cobain (Guardian) notes some of what British soldiers saw the US military do in the secret prison:

• Iraqi prisoners being held for prolonged periods in cells the size of large dog kennels.
• Prisoners being subjected to electric shocks.
• Prisoners being routinely hooded.
• Inmates being taken into a sound-proofed shipping container for interrogation, and emerging in a state of physical distress.



 

The facility was Camp Nama.  The Guardian offers satellite imagery of Camp Nama.  In 2009, Michael Bronner (Center for Public Integrity) turned out a very long article that briefly noted Camp Nama as a hushed aside, "Camp Nama was run by a secretive U.S. Joint Special Operations task force, and was off-limits even to most military personnel. Those who did have access retained operational anonymity -- few knew even each other by their real names. The CIA would eventually become worried enough about being associated with what went on there that it barred employees from setting foot inside."  In March of 2006,  Eric Schmitt and Carolyn Marshall (New York Times) 'reported' on a torture room at Camp Nama:

The new account reveals the extent to which the unit members mistreated prisoners months before and after the photographs of abuse from Abu Ghraib were made public in April 2004, and it helps belie the original Pentagon assertions that abuse was confined to a small number of rogue reservists at Abu Ghraib.
The abuses at Camp Nama continued despite warnings beginning in August 2003 from an Army investigator and American intelligence and law enforcement officials in Iraq. The C.I.A. was concerned enough to bar its personnel from Camp Nama that August.
It is difficult to compare the conditions at the camp with those at Abu Ghraib because so little is known about the secret compound, which was off limits even to the Red Cross. The abuses appeared to have been unsanctioned, but some of them seemed to have been well known throughout the camp. 



"Reported"?  I have no problem with Eric Schmitt's reporting.  In the years when we regularly tracked Carolyn Marshall's 'reporting' here.  We don't have time to review all of her nonsense.  'We know little and we'll tell little' really seems the point of the article with a rushed, 'Now move along now,' tacked on.  Move along is what the torture did, though Schmitt and Marshall missed that in their 2006 'report.'  In the summer of 2004, most likely in a panic over the two Navy Seals who tried to take photos, Camp Nama's torture was  halted because, Cobain explains, "the secret prison was moved to Balad, a sprawling air base 50 miles north of Baghdad, where it became known as the Temporary Screening Facility (TSF). The Army Air Force and RAF troops continued their role there."

Do the British soldiers going public have knowledge of the torture at Balad?  They may very well.  But what they've already revealed is damaging enough to the lie that what happened at Abu Ghraib was more accident and not policy.  It was policy.

In the 2006 article, Schmitt and Marshall could note a then minor figure in terms of public awareness,  mention him at the end of a sentence:  "Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, who leads the Joint Special Operations Command, the headquarters at Fort Bragg, N.C., that supplies the unit's most elite troops."  Cobain notes today, "One person who has been widely reported to have been seen there frequently was General Stanley McChrystal, then commander of US Joint Special Operations forces in Iraq."  And yet what brought this torturer down was shooting off his mouth about US Vice President Joe Biden?  Torture wasn't just policy, it was approved policy or President Barack Obama wouldn't have put McChrystal in charge in Afghanistan.

In May 2009, John H. Richardson (Esquire) pointed out as Barack named McChrystal to be the top US commander in Afghanistan:

The news that President Obama picked General Stanley McChrystal to run the war in Afghanistan put an old story of mine into the national spotlight last week. In 2006, Esquire sent me around the country to interview military interrogators with a Human Rights Watch investigator named Marc Garlasco. One of those men worked at Camp Nama, a small base near Baghdad where a Special Forces task force was interrogating Iraqis in an effort to find the head of Al Qaeda in Iraq. It was so secret that the officers went by false names there. Bad things happened. They doused people in cold water, used isolation and stress positions and sleep manipulation. These methods all appeared on a checklist. To use each one, they had to check the appropriate box and get approval.
The chain of command for that approval went through General McChrystal. Even more damning, the interrogator told us that he actually saw McChrystal in the camp while such acts were occurring. He also said that his supervisor told him and his colleagues that McChrystal had made a personal promise that the Red Cross would never be allowed into the camp — a violation of our treaty obligations under the Geneva Conventions, which is a violation of the law that we used to follow before the Bush administration.

 

Why aren't the torture criminals forced to appear before Congress, to testify in open session?  Because a lot of members of Congress signed off on the torture with their silence.  You saw that when Zero Dark Thirty came out and members of Congress attacked the film.  'That did not happen!' three senators insisted (Carl Levin, John McCain and Dianne Feinstein).  And idiots used that as 'proof' that Zero Dark Thirty was wrong.  No.  As former US House Rep Jane Harman and former CIA Director Leon Panetta noted, it was pretty accurate.

Congress looks the other way because many of them were complicit in the torture.  That's why they refused to launch an investigation into Abu Ghraib.  They are supposed to provide oversight.  They have been derelict in their Constitutional duty, they have ignored their Constitutional oaths.  And they've gotten away with it, year after year.

With McChrystal's confirmation hearing in June 2009, he was lucky to have senators who didn't want to ask about torture -- despite even the editorial board of the New York Times insisting those were the relevant questions.  Instead, helpers like John McCain asked him about Pat Tilman allowing him to grandstand on that (the lies told about Tilman's death) and look like a truth teller instead of the human waste that oversaw torture.

His unimportant remarks about Pat Tilman (we already knew, years prior, that the military and White House lied about Tilman's death -- this was established by the Congress and by the press) did what they were supposed to, lead idiots -- Taylor Marsh to name one -- to applaud him and insist he be immediately confirmed.  (The idiots also seemed unaware that McChrystal's position and immediate knowledge of the truth about Tilman's death meant he was required to immediately notify the family; something he refused to do.  And they weren't at all concerned about the mistreatment of the Tilman family when  McChrystal joined Joining Forces which is a White House group that's supposed to help military families.)

And when John McCain wasn't whoring, Harry Reid was.  Or have we all forgotten that there was reluctance to McChrystal and Reid took to the floor of the senate to deliver an impassioned speech insisting that McChrystal be immediately confirmed?

Congress always wants to rush . . . except when it involves them doing more than voting yes or no.  There's no rush -- now or then -- to investigate the torture.  Harry Reid is fine with torture as long as he is Senate Majority Leader.  Let him lose that position and believe that decrying torture can help him win it back, and Harry will be the biggest anti-torture senator.  And what of Dick Durbin?  Illinois' blubbering senator cried -- more for himself when he issued an apology -- over Abu Ghraib.

After all the senators signed off on McChrystal, Justin Rood (ABC News) reported that then-Senator Russ Feingold (who voted for McChrystal) stated McChrystal wasn't forthcoming on torture.  But they all voted for him, even Russ.

Torture was policy, not happenstance, not accidents.  That's what the latest revelations drive home. 

David Petraeus was sent back into Iraq in 2004 to implement counter-insurgency.  At the start of last month, Jim White (Empty Wheel) noted the US military order Frago 242 which was issued in June 2004 ("an order to ignore reports of torture carried out by these Iraqi groups") and that this order was issued the same month Petraeus returned to Iraq.

This is counterinsurgency.  This is the reality of counterinsurgency.  Harry Reid even noted, when McChrystal was forced out for remarks about Biden, that Petraeus was the one to replace McChrystal in Afghanistan ("General Petraeus has demonstrated that he can effectively carry out a counterinsurgency strategy . . .")

 

Today,  Cobain explains:

While Abu Ghraib prison, just a few miles to the west, would achieve global notoriety after photographs emerged depicting abuses committed there, Camp Nama escaped attention for a simple reason: photography was banned. The only people who attempted to take pictures – a pair of US Navy Seals – were promptly arrested. All discussion of what happened there was forbidden.


 

Discussion was forbidden?  No, he was enabled.  He's a War Criminal who oversaw torture but PRI's The World was happy to play patty-cakes with him last January.  Even trained monkey Jon Stewart whored in January letting McChrystal pimp his bad book and not asking any hard questions.  But, hey, Jon Stewart gave up hard questions and pointed humor when Bush left the White House.

Connecting the dots the politicians, press and pranksters don't with to is Muhammad Umer Toor (Pakistan Kakhudahafiz) explains:

Terror detention cells. Ethnic/sectarian cleansing. Butchers in place. Design, spark, initiate, support, fund, sustain and lead sectarian cleansing and civil war. That’s how America “played” with the national and sectarian life in Iraq for decades to come; that’s how they suppressed – factually speaking – sunni insurgency against America. The aim of America was to distract resistance, mainly sunnis, by pitting them against their conventional sectarian rivals – i.e. shias who were brutally oppressed by widely hated and un-Islamic ruler Saddam Hussein – from its real object: foreign occupation.
This news of US exploiting the fault line of Muslim ummah shouldn’t come as a surprise. However, this whole revelation of convincing and unequivocal evidence of US triggered civil war in Iraq is fresh: exposed by Guardian, which broadcasted on internet on 6th March 2013 a documentary on a US veteran, James Steele, the counter-insurgency ‘hero’ who led this campaign of terror and torture. Just as RAND think tank had advised US leaders when asked to work out a strategy to win war:
“Align its policy with Shiite groups who aspire to have more participation in government and greater freedoms of political and religious expression. If this alignment can be brought about, it could erect a barrier against radical Islamic movements and may create a foundation for a stable U.S. position in the Middle East.”
James Steele was a crucial element in executing the strategy.

 

James Steele is covered in the BBC Arabic and Guardian newspaper documentary James Steele: America's Mystery Man In Iraq (those unable to stream or who need closed captioning for streaming to be of any value can refer to Ava and my "TV: The War Crimes Documentary").

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