BULLY BOY PRESS & CEDRIC'S BIG MIX -- THE KOOL-AID TABLE
ON THE HEELS OF THE AMERICAN PEOPLE DECLARING FADED CELEBRITY BARRY O THE WORST PRESIDENT SINCE WWII COMES NEWS THAT HE'S STILL THE LITTLE PIGGY WHO, CAMPAIGNING AGAINST HILLARY, FELT THE NEED TO MENTION 'CLAWS' AND 'PERIODICALLY' AND SO MUCH MORE.
THOUGH MS. MAGAZINE SHAMED THEMSELVES FOREVER BY TOSSING HIM ON THE COVER AND PROCLAIMING HIM THE FACE OF FEMINISM, BARRY O IS THE MAN WHO LOVES MEN -- SWEATY MEN ON THE GOLF COURSE, SWEATY MEN PLAYING HOOPS. HE SHUTS WOMEN OUT EVERY CHANCE HE GETS. AND NOW COMES MORE DISTURBING NEWS:
The pay gap between men and women working at the White House has not narrowed since President Barack Obama’s first year in office, according to a new report, despite Obama’s emphasis on pay equity ahead of the midterm elections.
REACHED FOR COMMENT BARRY O INSISTED THE PAY GAY WAS NO PROBLEM, "IF THE GIRLS NEEDS A FEW MORE BUCKS, THEY CAN ASK THEIR HUSBANDS."
FROM THE TCI WIRE:
First off, US President Barack Obama is polling very poorly these days. Cedric and Wally noted it in their joint-post this morning:
Barry O takes it hard!
7 hours ago
THIS JUST IN! HE'S THE WORST!
7 hours ago
Alsumaria notes it here. And, possibly as a result of this latest poll, two White House friends asked if I would note this. The White House has created a webpage for people to follow what is going on in Iraq -- US efforts and otherwise. I said I would note it and I have -- however, a page they're pushing that hasn't updated since June 19th? Not sure how that's going to restore any confidence in the White House.
What is The Huffington Post?
It has no consistency whatsoever. Two idiots were whining -- and you know their idiots because Bernie Sanders has since linked to them -- about the 'groovy' men who were right about Iraq all along. Ava and I took on the idiots nonsense in "TV: The useless huffing and puffing of flaccid men" Sunday at Third. The HuffyPost whined about one man after another being blocked out and we explained why the HuffyPost chose bad people to root for. We'll use Kent Conrad here as an example:
They started with former US Senator Kent Conrad. He, they informed you, was one of 21 senators to vote against the Iraq War.
They then thunder over the refusal of networks to book Kent!
Oh, the horror.
Poor Kent Conrad!
Not booked for TV because he took a stand against the Iraq War.
Or maybe not booked because he's off putting on TV?
His voice irritates.
But the Huff Post never wants to offer facts, mind you.
So they pretend that Kent's being overlooked because he was right.
Was he right about Countrywide Financial?
Because that is why he left the Senate, didn't run for re-election, remember?
Yes, a Democratically controlled ethics panel did say he hadn't broken the law.
But the financial scandal touched him since he was pro-Countrywide and they'd been so very generous to him with loans.
It's called corruption and most hosts would be leery booking someone like Kent Conrad as an 'expert.' That'd be like booking pedophile Scott Ritter.
And then there's that other detail: "former" senator.
Today, on ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox News and CNN, Iraq will be addressed by the following officials: US President Barack Obama, former President Bill Clinton, former US Ambassador to Iraq James Jeffrey, Senator Joe Manchin, Senator John Barrasso, US House Rep. Peter King, U.S. House Rep. Mike Rogers, and former NSA director and CIA director Michael Hayden.
Please note, all members of Congress?
They're currently serving.
No Congressional member invited on is a 'former' member of Congress except maybe Barack who is, after all, a sitting president.
So Kent Conrad, who left the Senate in disgrace, who chose not to run for re-election because of the Countrywide scandal?
He's really not the ingredients for a solid argument.
So HuffPost is now in the position that Congressional members receiving favors from banks is a good thing? Didn't Arianna entitle one of her books Pigs at the Trough and weren't those pigs supposed to be seen as a bad thing?
Regardless, the bad piece Ava and I took on was two (bad) writers arguing their personal faves were being shut out while those who helped the war -- booster, supporter, planner, whatever -- were getting media attention today and invited to pen columns and appear in the media.
Can we have a little consistency? Is that too much to ask?
Huff Post was insisting over the weekend that the pro-war voices needed to be shut out today. So today they run garbage written by dimwit Ibrahim al-Marashi?
For those who don't know or just don't remember, al-Marashi wrote the Middle East Review of International Affairs article "Iraq's Security & Intelligence Network: A Guide & Analysis." This ended up as part of Colin Powell's blot. His 2003 UN speech arguing for war on Iraq lifted who passages of al-Marashi's article -- without crediting them as borrowed. So even a dim bulb at Huffington Post should be able to grasp that al-Marashi's work argued for war on Iraq and was used by the US and British government to argue for war on Iraq.
So why, today, is Huffington Post running al-Marashi's ""?
I'm not saying he should be shut out of the conversation. But I haven't called for any to be shut out except those who lied (getting it wrong is not the same as lying).
Again, is consistency from Huffington Post too much to ask for?
The article in question is laughably bad and entitled "These Are the Three Most Common Myths About What's Happening in Iraq."
In the first 'myth,' this writer whose work was an embarrassment in 2002 and 2003 wants to take on history. Robert Fisk and others -- including many historians -- have made the argument regarding the WWI partitioning of Iraq and its possible consequences. I've never made such an argument. I'm happy to entertain one but I'm just not that interested or vested in it. I don't dispute it or slam those who are interested in that argument. And I certainly wouldn't call it a myth.
Then the idiot wants to take on the 'myth' of sectarian divisions.
That's not a myth and he's an idiot.
Shi'ites were persecuted under Saddam Hussein. Like many, I stupidly ignored that during the first years of the Iraq War. As more and more Iraqi Shi'ites contacted this site over the years, I realized that I was the one in the wrong. Saddam's government included many Shi'ites. There's no way the system couldn't, they were the majority of the population (and still are). But there were those -- especially those who did not embrace secularism -- who felt persecuted and were persecuted.
The US deepened the divisions. Laura Flanders loved to go into that when she had her radio shows. By asking who was a Sunni and who was a Shia, the US military was reinforcing a division.
You know what?
No.
That's a minor thing.
You can blow it off as 'dumb foreigners' if you're an Iraqi.
Here's where the US deepened the division: Installing Shi'ites opposed to Hussein who had fled the country. Nouri and so many others returned with chips on their shoulders, scores to settle and grudges to f**k. These people, installed into the government by the US, went about staging holy wars. If they had a real beef, (a) grown ups learn to get over it and (b) Saddam Hussein was executed.
So why does Nouri still target and attack the Sunnis.
As Lily Tomlin's wise Edith Ann once observed, "To get back is to go back."
The third myth?
The idiot wrote:
Maliki became prime minister in 2006 because the U.S. believed he would be a compromise candidate that could reconcile Iraq's factions. Calls, particularly in the U.S., for Maliki to step down would not resolve the current crisis, as there are no guarantees that his successor will resolve political differences between Iraqis.
Ironically, America's stance has made it harder for Maliki to step down. The Iraqi elections do not elect the prime minister but rather the party that choses the prime minister.
Let's deal with the last sentence first. They do not, the elections, elect "the party that choses the prime minister." This is bad interpretation of the Iraqi Constitution, first and foremost. Second of all, this argument (well made or poorly) became null and void by a court decision in 2010. It is now the post-election period in which alliances are made and formed and the group that does that successfully is the one who gets first show at prime minister-designate. (Not even prime minister, but, hey, when have we ever expected idiots writing for The Huffington Post to actually possess a functioning knowledge base?)
Let's go back to the first part:
Maliki became prime minister in 2006 because the U.S. believed he would be a compromise candidate that could reconcile Iraq's factions. Calls, particularly in the U.S., for Maliki to step down would not resolve the current crisis, as there are no guarantees that his successor will resolve political differences between Iraqis.
That's not the argument being made and I know since I put it forward here on April 12th and put it forward to members of Congress, two think tanks and White House friends in the days after.
What is termed 'al-Qaeda' in Iraq is actually a group of bodies. Their only common issue at present is opposting to Nouri's rule.
Want to break them up right now? Pay attention, Barack -- remove Nouri from power.
That requires no troops. It only requires an honest election (as took place in 2010) and that the results be honored (which did not happen).
If Nouri is not prime minister for a third term, you're going to see the bond that binds the various groups break away.
Violence, once another person is named prime minister-designate, could actually fall as a result.
I was not arguing -- read "I Hate The War" in full as well as what we did the following day at Third in "Editorial: If the US wants to reduce the violence ..." -- that violence would vanish and rainbows would pour out of gun barrels while grenades turned into candy. I was arguing that Nouri's oppression of so many had made him a common enemy. That his track record meant he would not be able to lead the people to a new Iraq. I was arguing that a new prime minister would be a 'reset.' Not a cure, a reset. It would allow a brief window of time for people to wait and see if this was going to usher in an inclusive Iraq or not.
Iraqis who are participating in the violence? The bulk don't want to be. They've been pushed into this by 8 years of Nouri's policies which have targeted them, disappeared their loved ones and so much more.
Nouri gone doesn't mean Iraq finds peace. It could mean, Iraq gets a few weeks -- maybe even a few months -- of lower violence (lower -- I'm not saying violence goes away) as the country has a chance to collectively take a breath.
At Kitabat, Khadr Ramahi argues that Ayad Allawi might be able to pull off the reset.
Unlike the idiot of The Huffington Post, I don't like writing about this.
Why?
I'm not a half-wit.
While Prime Minister New could lower levels of violence, Prime Minister New could also do a few weeks or months of pretend actions while he or she uses that time and this pretend move forward to weaken the resistance and pick them off.
I hope that does not happen but it could. The fear of this happening is, in part, behind the reluctance of some to get behind Tareq Najm as the next prime minister-designate (due to his closeness to Nouri). Kitabat notes strong pressure coming down on the Sadrist bloc and Ammar al-Hakim's bloc to accept Tareq for the post.
I wrote what I wrote -- and advocated for it to officials -- because it was before the elections and if the US government had stepped away from Nouri at that point -- even State Dept friends (including two officials who both called May 30th and asked me to walk them through what they'd dismissed in April) -- it could have made a difference in the election.
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