Cedric's Big Mix

Thursday, April 05, 2012

Maybe he needs a new hair cut?

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

IT'S BEEN A BUSY WEEK FOR PRINCESS BARRY O AS HE WENT AROUND TELLING EVERYONE ELSE HOW TO DO THEIR JOBS. BUT, HEY, WE GUESS THE CLAWS COME OUT PERIODICALLY WHEN PRINCESS BARRY O IS FEELING LOW.

AMERICA'S FAVORITE LITTLE BITCH ATTACKED THE SUPREME COURT AND BECAUSE HIS ALLEY CATS HAVE NO MORALS, THEY APPLAUDED IT.

FROM THE SWALLOW AND SMILE TABLE, LITTLE JONATHAN BERNSTEIN HUFFED THAT PRINCESS BARRY O CAN BE AS BITCHY AS HE WANTS AND NO ONE HAS A RIGHT TO RESPOND. MEANWHILE ANDREW COHEN WILL HAVE TROUBLE WORKING HIS MR. CLEAN, DADDY BEAR ACT AT CBS NOW THAT HE'S COME OUT AS A CLEAR PARTISAN AND NOT AN OBJECTIVE LEGAL ADVISOR.

FROM THE TCI WIRE:

This week's. Black Agenda Radio, hosted by Glen Ford and Nellie Bailey (first airs each Monday at 4:00 pm EST on the Progressive Radio Network), features coverage of the United National Anti-War Coalition conference in Stamford, Connecticut where both hosts were among the speakers. Another speaker was International Action Center's Sara Flounders.

Sara Flounders: In fighting today's wars, it's more important step is building a movement that acknowledges the relationship between the war at home and the war abroad. It's a big challenge. How dare any US official lecture any, any other country on prisoners, human rights or on democracy. What hypocrisy. This -- this country has the largest prison population in the world and that's not counting the secret prisons, the secret renditions, the secret kidnappings, the drones, it's not counting immigration detention. We need to consciously step back from ever being an echo of the State Dept and their arrogant charges and target other countries. US wars, they rely on an arrogance of empire. Can they once again get a population to believe that humanitarian war is possible? That they're bringing democracy, advancement for women, an end to sectarian violence. We need an anti-war movement that is really, consciously against all US wars. That's simple. And against all the forms that US wars take today. Bombs and occupations, yes. But sanctions, sabotage, drones, media onslaughts, demonetization of leaders, racist stereotypings of whole peoples. We represent here many different political currents and traditions here in this room. And we can't and won't agree on many issues. So how do we proceed how do we stay united and keep our focus? If we focus on US imperialism, on its crimes, whatever our views on many social issues, we will be together because we need an antiwar movement that opposes US war. Consider the US-NATO war against Libya. Eleven countries simultaneously dropping bombs on a country with no means of defense all claiming they were on a humanitarian mission while they target the electric grid, the water supply, civilian communications. Now let's talk about WikiLeaks' latest Stratfor revelation -- and, by the way, Free Bradley Manning -- the latest WikiLeaks' document in the Stratfor files, they describe in some detail the White House meeting that reviews British and French and US Special Forces, units on the ground in Syria, planting bombs, running guns, training and seeking total destabilization. Now that's the truth. UNAC today stands for self-determination and demands that all US troops, drones and sabotage teams out. Unconditional US withdrawal. That's a big contribution, a big step. We can't be making demands on any country at the very time it's under attack, at the time that the bombs are falling, at the time the sanctions are strangling, Today, in the last weeks, we see the most cynical and arrogant approach. Kony. Kony 2012. Right? Invisible children? And what is it? Young people cheering AFRICOM, US troops in Africa? That's the way they sell US wars today. There's a rapidly expanding US military presence in Africa. It includes troops in Uganda, a military mission in Mali, drone bombings in Somalia, political intervention in Sudan, all under the umbrella of AFRICOM. It's blame the victim. It saturates the media and it saturates the mass movement. We need to stand up to it. And a just on a personal level and to give a comparison, there was a time when if a woman was attacked, sexually assaulted, what was the defense of the attacker, of the courts and of the police? It was to ask, what was she wearing? Doing? Where was she walking? That she invited or deserved this attack. And one gain of the women's movement was to say: It's irrelevant. That is irrelevant. That's the way we have to see US wars. That is the way. Let's talk about Syria and Libya and Iraq and Iran and Venezuela and Bolivia and Sudan. US imperialism wants to destroy each of these countries. Not because they've made any compromises to survive -- and they have. But because they've nationalized the source of wealth, because it's US domination, corporate domination, that they want. This empire has problems they can no longer solve. Capitalism can no longer bail itself out with war. The capitalist crisis is global. It's unsolvable So our unity is more important. The United National Anti-War Coalition, UNAC, was founded on the principle of self-determination for all the oppressed nations and people. What do we want to demand that they abolish NATO, we want to talk about march on the RNC and the DNC. Abolish NATO and end the wars abroad.

Yesterday, we noted Margaret Kimberley's speech to the conference. Of the conference, Glen Ford explains:

I was privileged to present the coordinating committee's draft of the Action Plan to UNAC's national conference in Stamford, Connecticut, this past weekend. "This action plan does not just target some U.S. wars," said the committee's statement. "It does not target the currently unpopular wars. It does not shy away from condemning wars that remain acceptable to half the population because the real reasons for them are obscured in the rhetoric of humanitarian intervention. It does not advocate that we avoid putting U.S. boots on the ground by mounting embargoes that bring economic devastation on the peoples of Iran. It does not condone war by other, more sanitized, means. It does not cheer on wars that minimize U.S. combat deaths by the use of robotic unmanned planes or the highly trained murder squads of the Joint Special Operations Command. It does not see war by mercenary as somehow less threatening to the peoples of the world and the U.S. than war by economic draft. It does not give credit to Washington for removing brigades from one country in order to deploy them in the next."

The document demands an end to "all wars, interventions, targeted assassinations and occupations" and U.S. withdrawal from "NATO and all other interventionist military alliances."

UNAC's reasoning is rooted in the principle that all the world's peoples have the inherent right to self-determination, to pursue their own destinies -- the foundation of relations among peoples, enshrined in international law but daily violated by the United States.

Moving from wars to one, Iraq. We're going to do a little exercise first. It's 2016. I decide to throw a party and send out invites to Jane Arraf (Christian Science Monitor and Al Jazeera), Sam Dagher and Gina Chon (Wall St. Journal), Liz Sly, Alice Fordham, Ernesto Londono and Ed O'Keefe (Washington Post), Jack Healy, Tim Arango. Alissa J. Rubin, Damien Cave, Sabrina Tavernise and Stephen Farrell (New York Times), Nancy A. Youssef, Sahar Issa and Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers), Deborah Haynes and James Hider (Times of London), Lourdes Garcia-Navarro, Quil Lawrence and Kelly McEvers (NPR), Borzou Daragahi, Ned Parker, Alexandra Zavis, Tina Susman (Los Angeles Times), Lara Jakes, Rebecca Santana, Hamza Hendawi and Brett Barrouquere (Associated Press), Jomana Karadsheh, Mohammed Tawfeeq and Arwa Damon (CNN), Trudy Rubin (Philadelphia Inquirer) and Anna Badkhen (San Francisco Chronicle, among others).

That's 34 people. I need a head count so I'm asking everyone to RSVP. It's a week away and only 10 have. That's not a really good sign. 12 show up (11 invited, one not invited). Tim Arango insists he Tweeted his RSVP and since I'm not on Twitter, I missed it. 5 show up just to be kind (Damien Cave, Liz Sly, Borzou Daragahi, Ed O'Keefe and Alissa J. Rubin). 5 show up to tell off the crazy bitch that's slammed everyone online for so many years (Jane Arraf, Arwa Damon, Stephen Farrell, Sam Dagher, Jomana Karadsheh and party crasher David E. Sanger). As we sit down to eat, there is silence that only momentarily vanished during dinner, most people talk to one another, I make some idiotic toast that further alienates everyone present.

The next morning, not even I am stupid enough to delude myself into thinking my dinner party was a success. If someone says to me, "Well people showed up," even I'm not stupid enough to assume they showed up due to some love for me. They showed up for various reasons including manners and to tell me off. I am not idiotic enough to assume that my decision to host a party means my hosting a party makes it a success. Good or bad (and mine was bad), my just hosting a party I invited people too does not make it a success.

The Arab League Summit was not a success for Iraq. Less than half of the heads of countries who are members of the Arab League attended. With the exception of Kuwait, no leader attended because of Nouri. Those other heads of state that attended did so for a variety of reasons but Iraq and Nouri weren't among them.

Today, Liz Sly (Washington Post) offers that "the goodwill generated between Iraq and its Arab neighbors by an extravagant summit in Baghdad last week began unraveling at speed." No goodwill was generated. Iraqi President Jalal Talabani was lavishly praised in public remarks by those attending. And some of that praise was probably for him (he was a gregarious host from all account) but some of the heavy praise was just to make a point -- via contrast -- about Nouri al-Maliki (prime minister and thug of Iraq) who got far less public praise from those attending. When you grasp that most were not there for Nouri and not impressed by Nouri, you can grasp that he's shot himself in the foot every day since as he's verbally attacked Qatar and Saudi Arabia. He has no real ties to the Arab neighbors. If Kuwait didn't want the borders redrawn, they probably wouldn't be as chummy with him as they are.

Sameer N. Yacoub (AP) broke the news this morning that the national conference had been called off according to Speaker of Parliament Osama al-Nujaifi. Yamei Wang (Xinhua) adds that the the Speaker "attributed the postponement to the mounting differences among political blocs during a meeting by the prepatory committee held on Tuesday." The national conference is something that Jalal Talabani and Osama al-Nujaifi have been calling for since December 21st in order to address the ongoing political crisis.

Political Stalemate I (when Nouri wouldn't honor the results of the March 7, 2010 elections) only ended in November 2010 because all parties -- including Nouri -- agreed to the US-brokered Erbil Agreement. Once he was made prime minister -- the main gift to Nouri in the Erbil Agreement -- he tossed it aside, that's December 2010 and the start of Political Stalemate II which has been ongoing ever since. Over the summer, the Kurds began calling for a return to the Erbil Agreement. They were then joined by Iraqiya (who came in first in the March 7, 2010 elections) and Moqtada al-Sadr, among others. The Erbil Agreement found Nouri making various concessions if the others would allow him to remain prime minister. But he got to be prime minister and trashed the agreement, refusing to honor what he agreed to, the very things that made the other political blocs sign off on the agreement.

Liz Sly reports:

Maliki had agreed to hold the reconciliation conference as a last-minute concession to the Sunnis and Kurds ahead of the Baghdad summit, which the government hoped would showcase Iraq as stable, safe and assuming its rightful place in the firmament of Arab nations after the withdrawal of U.S. troops late last year.

But relations with Arab states have since been deteriorating fast, along with any hopes that Iraq will soon be able to resolve its own internal problems. On Sunday, Maliki issued a forceful defense of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, saying his ouster would destabilize the region. On the same day, at a U.S.-backed gathering of "Friends of Syria" in Istanbul, Saudi Arabia endorsed a plan to fund and equip Syrian rebels.

Did Nouri want the meet up to take place? Rami Ruhayem (BBC News) argues that today "his opponents said they would not attend, and his allies said there was no point."

This morning, before the meet-up got the axe, Dar Addustour reported on Nouri's paranoia and how he was girding himself for a possible takeover attempt. He doesn't name Barzani but, as Dar Addustour points out, that is who he's referring to when he frets that he may be replaced. Nouri fears his puppet masters in the US may be about to dump him and that's why Barzani is in DC. (Why would the White House dump him? Nouri thinks they might move towards someone more willing to favor an attack on Syria.) He also fears Tareq al-Hashemi's current diplomatic tour of other countries might have something to do with Arab leaders of other countries gearing up for a coup. Unnamed confidants of Nouri state that he is preparing himself for those possibilities and also for a military coup staged by Iraqi security forces loyal to DC. (Last month, State of Law repeatedly floated that there were several Iraqi military officers -- high ranking -- who were spying for the United States.)

Does that really sound like he wanted the meet-up?

Yamei Wang (Xinhua) reports, "Nujaifi attributed the postponement to the mounting differences among political blocs during a meeting by the prepatory committee held on Tuesday." Wang's reporting that the agenda was agreed to but some other issues came up on Tuesday.

Nouri al-Maliki is not a genius, he's barely literate. But when throwing out possibilities, it's worth remembering that Nouri stalls and stalls and stalls again. He stalled on the national conference to begin with. As Liz Sly noted he postponed it until after the Arab League Summit. Most of the other players -- not just Iraqiya -- were saying that it needed to be held in February, then that it needed to take place before the summit.

The reason for the national conference is what? The Erbil Agreement. He's stalled on implementing that for over a year. When the major protests hit Iraq on February 25, 2011 and the people were demanding basic services, jobs and end to corruption and to the 'disappearing' of people in Iraq's legal system, what did Nouri do?

He said, "Give me 100 days and I'll address it." He took 100 days, he never addressed it. Even now, approximately 400 days after he asked for 100 days, he's never addressed the issues that Iraqis raised. He stalls and stalls. He hopes people forget or that he can exhaust them. That's what he did in his first term as prime minister.

Others may have called off the meet-up (they may not). But if something happened on Tuesday night to bring about this decision, don't put it past Nouri to have instigated that. It his pattern.

Wednesday, April 04, 2012

The slow drift away from him

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

CELEBRITY IN CHIEF BARRY O IS THE MAN WHO WOULD DO EVERYTHING BUT HIS OWN JOB. SO YESTERDAY HE TURNED HIMSELF INTO A JOURNALISM COACH.

SADLY, AS THE ASSOCIATED PRESS POINTED OUT, HE WAS WOEFULLY SHORT ON FACTS. LESS LECTURES, MORE STUDY BARRY O.

MEANWHILE THE DRS. WOLF WRITE OF THEIR DISENCHANTMENT WITH BARRY O WHILE ROCK STAR GENE SIMMONS MAKES CLEAR THAT, UNLIKE IN 2008, HE WILL NOT BE VOTING FOR BARRY O THIS YEAR.

REACHED FOR COMMENT DAVID AXELROD STATED, "LET THEM ALL GO. IF WE HAVE TO, WE'LL RECRUIT FOREIGN VOTERS, THE SAME WAY WE DO FOREIGN DONORS!"

FROM THE TCI WIRE:

Margaret Kimberley: It's a great pleasure to be here today, speaking to a group of people who proudly proclaim themselves to be anti-war. Now I was told I only had three minutes to speak which is both a hard and easy task at the same time so I'll get to my main point which is pretty simple: You cannot be anti-war and pro-Obama. We can't discuss the issue of NATO and the G8 without talking about Barack Obama. The two events were initially planned to take place in Chicago which is no coincidence -- it's the President's home and his political base. His former Chief of Staff [Rahm Emanuel] now serves as the mayor there. And these events were intended to be coronations for the Obama Doctrine which states that the United States can kill and steal whenever it wants to and wherever it wants to and does so in a fashion which keeps liberals happy even as acts which they decried under Bush are carried out by Obama. Those of us who are anti-war are not fooled because a Democrat makes war instead of a Repbulican or because the current war making Democrat is a Black man. As we all know, the G8 meeting was moved from Chicago to Camp David because the President and his G8 friends are afraid of protest. They are afraid of us. The change of venue for the G8 summit is a sign of success but we can't rest on our laurels and forget the awful forces represented by NATO and the G8. These forces will not be happy until the people of the world accept their rule without question or protest. We know that the goal of the G8 is to turn the whole world into Greece -- a country which, among other things now, has no mimimum wage, no regulation of corporate activities and a shrunken welfare safety net. NATO is an organization which should have outlived its usefulness. It was always a counter-weight to the Warsaw Pact nations but the Soviet Union no longer exists and former Warsaw Pact and Soviet Republics like Poland, Bulgaria, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Romania, Latvia and Estonia are now all NATO members. Actually, I should correct myself there. There is a reason for NATO to exist and that is to further the interest of empire and western capitol. NATO is a tool of western imperialism and we saw that all very clearly in Libya. The United States, France and the UK conspired to bring down a sovereign nation's government, kill its leader,spread a race war and lynch law and divide Libya into weak fiefdoms incapable of stopping their collaborators from turning over their resources to NATO and G8 countries. The bombings of civilians and the lies told to the world about a phony humanitarian agenda were all carried out in NATO's name. Now I know that anti-NATO and G8 protests are being planned this weekend and I also know that the Nobel Peace Prize winning president recently signed legislation which makes it a felony to protest at national security events where Secret Service are present and that makes these actions very dangerous. But speaking of protest just as an aside, the actions at political conventions this summer should be restricted to the Democrats. They are, after all, the party in power. They are the only ones who we need to protest to. But even so -- even so, resistance is still the order of the day. Thank you very much.

Of the conference, Glen Ford explains:

The document demands an end to "all wars, interventions, targeted assassinations and occupations" and U.S. withdrawal from "NATO and all other interventionist military alliances."

Alsumaria TV reports a TV broadcaster was killed by a sticky bombing in Tirkit yesterday. AGI notes that the journalist's name is Kamiran Salaheddin and that he "worked for the Salaheddin channel, which was founded in 2004" by US forces. The Journalistic Freedoms Observatory has a photo of the 35-year-old here and they explain that he held a Masters degree in the Arabic language, had previously worked for the Iraqi Red Crescent Society, that he had been working for the channel since 2005 and that his survivors include his wife and their two children. Reporters Without Borders notes:

Reporters Without Borders condemns Salahaddin TV presenter Kamiran Salaheddin's murder last night in the centre of Tikrit (170 km north of Baghdad). Aged 35 and the father of two children, he was killed at around 9 p.m. by a bomb placed under his car.

"We offer our condolences to Salaheddin's family, friends and colleagues," Reporters Without Borders said. "The Iraqi authorities must do everything possible to ensure that those responsible for his death are brought to justice. His murder must not go unpunished."

In addition, Alsumaria TV notes the Hilla home of one of Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani was bombed today and the iman of one of the al-Sistani mosques in Diwaniya Province was injured today when assailants attacked it firing machine guns. Aswat al-Iraq reports the man died.

The White House released the following today:

Read out of the President's Call with Iraqi Prime Minister al-Maliki

President Obama called Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki today to congratulate the Iraqi people on the success of the Arab Summit hosted in Baghdad last week, and on Iraq's continued reintegration into the region as a sovereign, independent state. The two leaders discussed the United States and Iraq's joint efforts to advance peace and security in the region as strategic partners. The discussion also covered the political situation in Iraq, and a range of other shared interests. President Obama expressed the United States' firm commitment to a unified, democratic Iraq as defined by Iraq's constitution, as well as his support for Prime Minister Maliki's participation in the ongoing dialogue convened by President Talabani tasked to reconcile Iraqi political blocs in a flexible and open manner.

Barack must have been bored and needing to play with his puppet today. The Arab League Summit, for Iraq, was a failure (see "Editorial: Successful summit for Iraq?"). But for those who delude themselves otherwise, the question to ask is why Barack called Nouri today? The summit was Thursday. Had Barack run out of his March minutes? Exactly what was the hold up on that call?

Oh, because the summit praise was smoke up the ass. The actual point of the call was to try to coax the puppet into playing nice tomorrow when a national conference is supposed to be held.

Iraq's been in political crisis for over a year now. Since December 21st, President Jalal Talabani and Speaker of Parliament Osama al-Nujaifi have been calling for a National Conference. Supposedly that will take place tomorrow. Hevidar Ahmed (Rudaw) reports that Iraqiya's Haidar Mulla states they "will only paticipate in the convention if the Erbil Agreement is implemented and the security posts are finalized beforehand." The three security ministries -- Ministry of the Interior, Ministry of the Defense and Ministry of National Security -- were supposed to be named by the end of December 2010. That was how Nouri al-Maliki would move from prime minister-designate to prime minister -- per the Constitution. Instead, he was moved without naming a full Cabinet and those posts remain empty all this time later, have never been filled while violence has increased in Iraq.

By not filling them, Nouri controls them. He ignores the Constitution and declares someone 'acting' minister. Then they do what he tells them or he fires them. If he nominated someone for the post and the person was confirmed, Nouri could not fire them. He would not Parliament's backing. Since December, he's been trying to strip Deputy Prime Minister Saleh al-Mutlaq of his post. Thus far Parliament has refused to go along with him so al-Multaq retains his post.

Ahmed reports:

Muayad Taiyb, spokesperson for the Kurdistani bloc in Iraqi Parliament, believes Barzani is avoiding the convention because he believes it won't solve anything.
"Massud Barzani is not hopeful about the results of the convention; that's why he will not participate in it."
Mulla believes that Barzani's decision to not attend the convention will affect the positions of other political leaders.
"If President Barzani does not participate in the convention, then neither will Alawi," he said. "Massoud Barzani is a key figure in the political process in Iraq. His absence at the convention will make it have no value."
The State of Law Coalition has left many political issues unresolved with the Kurdistan Region and the Sunni-dominated Iraqiya bloc.
Taiyb says, "The State of Law bloc has issues with both the Iraqiya bloc and the Kurds. The convention is meaningless without Iraqiya's participation because the main issues in the political process in Iraq are between Iraqiya and the State of Law."

Earlier this week, Al Rafidayn noted that Iraqiya's concerns include Saleh al-Mutlaq and Tareq al-Hashemi and that, for the conference to have real meaning, KRG President Massoud Barzani, the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq's Ammar al-Hakim and Moqtada al-Sadr would need to attend. Barzani will not be attending. He's out of the country on a diplomatic tour and has already arrived in the United States. Today he spoke with the Washington Post's Jackson Diehl and Jim Hoagland and Diehl reports:

"The more you look at it, the more you see the situation going toward conflict and chaos," he said Tuesday.

To the south, in Baghdad, Barzani sees Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki "concentrating power," having driven the leader of Iraq's Sunni population to seek de facto asylum in Kurdistan. "Iraq right now is facing a crisis," he told me and The Post's Jim Hoagland during a visit to Washington. "There may be some people who do not want to call it a crisis, but it is a crisis. This is not the Iraq we struggled for: We are seeing the consolidation of power under one party and one ruler."

Hadi Jalo tells Hamza Hendawi (AP), "The sectarian war has moved away from violence to soft conflict fought int he state institutions, government ministries and on the street. What was once an armed conflict has turned into territorial, instituationalized and psychological segregation." Henawi explains that Sunnis are basically blacklisted from employment in the government and at colleges and that Shi'ites in charge "stonewall them when they seek help locating the remains of loved ones."

Iraqiya members Saleh al-Mutlaq and Tareq al-Hashemi are political rivals of Nouri al-Maliki's -- he leads State of Law, they belong to Iraqiya. (Iraqiya came in first in the March 7, 2010 elections.) In addition, while Nouri is a Shi'ite, al-Mutlaq and al-Hashemi are both Sunni and some see the attacks on the two men by Nouri as both political attacks and sectarian attacks.

Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi, whom Nouri wants arrrested but has been in the KRG as a guest of KRG President Barzani and Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, went to Qatar on Sunday (and states he will return to Iraq when he finishes up his diplomatic tour that will include visits to other countries). Nouri's government is engaging in a war of words with the government of Qatar over Iraqi Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi's visit to the country. Yesterday the Deputy Prime Minister of Energy al-Sharistani -- who apparently believes his title is much more elastic than it would appear to be -- declared that Qatar should hand over al-Hashemi. It was never going to happen. But Nouri and his minions have their answer today. AP reports that Qatar's State Minister Khaled al-Aiityah has stated that they will do no such thing. RTT News adds, "Qatar's State Minister for Foreign Affairs Khaled al-Attiyah stated at a press conference held Tuesday that Hashemi could not be extradited to Iraq as requested by Baghdad because there was no court judgment against him. The minister also noted that Hashemi still holds the post of vice-president." Alex Delmar-Morgan (Wall Street Journal) offers, "Qatar's stance is likely to sour already strained ties with Iraq where the pursuit of Mr. Hashemi by the Shiite-led government is stoking political tensions and threatening to destabilize the country's delicate sectarian balance."

Jermone McDonnell spoke with DePaul University's Laith Saud about the current conflicts on Worldview (WBEZ) today. Excerpt.

Laith Saud: Well let's look at this from three different angles. The first angle being that the moment the United States departed from Iraq, Nouri al-Maliki, the current prime minister, began to consolidate his power and go after any potential political rivals. So, in terms of analysis, there's a great deal -- a great deal of evidence to suggest that these are trumped up charges against Tareq al-Hashemi, the Vice President of Iraq. So he seeks refuge in the Kurdish region, in northern Iraq, which is semi-qutonomous and has its own security forces and which he was there until very recently. He decides to go to Qatar this past Sunday in order to engage in diplomatic talks with the Qataries, in particular the Prime Minister of Qatar, which was a huge slap in the face to al-Maliki considering that the vice president is wanted. However, if you look at what happened at the Arab League just these recent days ago --

Jerome McDonnell: And it took place in --

Laith Saud: In Baghdad.

Jerome McDonnell: For the first time in forever.

Laith Saud: Yeah, for the first time since 1990. The Qataries sent very low-level representation to that Arab Summit which was kind of a slap in the face of Iraq again or, in particular, Nouri al-Maliki. The message that the Qataries were sending was that they believe the Sunnis in Iraq are being marginalized, that, in fact, they are being repressed, and this was their way of challenging what they see as the more sectarian role that they feel that Iraq is playing in the Middle East.

Jerome McDonnell: And Iraq sees that there are some Shi'ites that are being marginalized in Bahrain.

Laith Saud: Exactly.

Jerome McDonnell: And they see some actions where they think the Saudis drive -- driving the old army into Bahrain is not cricket with some of the Shi'ites there.

Laith Saud: No, you're absolutely right, Jerome. And what's happening is the sectarian discourse, the sectarian narrative is really reaching a high level pitch in recent years. So you have Shi'ite governments or so-called Shi'ite governments if we could use such a term talking about the persecution of Shias in Bahrain and, on the flip side, you have Sunni governments -- if you want to use such a term -- talking about the persecution of Sunnis in Shi'ite countries like Iraq and in the middle of all of this is Syria where you have a -- an essentially Shi'ite government that is seen to be persecuting its largely Sunni population. Now, is this posturing? Are these really sectarian conflicts? Are these essentially not sectarian conflicts and this is a guise by which people are battling out for resources? I tend to think so. But there's no question that the sectarian nature of the narrative has reached a new level.

And of course it's not just Qatar. AP notes, "Nouri al-Maliki, launched a thinly veiled attack on both nations during a news conference on Sunday in Baghdad, saying their desire to arm Syrian rebels would deepen the conflict there." They go on to note "a column published in Tuesday's Saudi-owned, pan-Arab Al-Sharq al-Awsat, editor-in chief Tariq al-Hamid . . ." That's this column. We noted it yesterday, we noted Tariq Alhomayed's column yesterday, when Arab News ran it. Excerpt.

Likewise, the Al-Maliki government has remained in power as a result of Iranian pressure, despite Al-Maliki losing the elections and coming second behind Iyad Allawi, so how can he fear for the region now if Assad is overthrown by force?

How can Al-Maliki attack Saudi Arabia and Qatar following the Arab summit in Baghdad, after both countries attended the meeting, and especially given the positions of both countries in the days leading up to the event.

Meanwhile, ahead of the summit Al-Maliki had announced that his government could not defend Assad. So how, nearly three days after the Baghdad summit, can Al-Maliki turn on Saudi Arabia and Qatar today? Of course, this is clear deception, and evidence that Al-Maliki's government cannot be trusted. Had he attacked "these two countries" before the Baghdad summit, then matters would have turned out differently.

Most important of all, in addition to the fact that we cannot trust the Al-Maliki government, is that the Iraqi government is trying to secure a safe passageway for the transfer of Iranian weapons to the Assad regime, and this is what a witness -- a dissident Syrian official -- reported to the Friends of Syria conference in Istanbul.

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Tuesday, April 03, 2012

Can he woo the Court?

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

TO MAKE AMERICANS LEGAL HOSTAGES TO THE RUNAWAY INSURANCE INDUSTRY, CELEBRITY IN CHIEF BARRY O RAMMED THROUGH OBAMACARE.

NOW HE'S ATTEMPTING TO SHAME THE SUPREME COURT INTO GOING ALONG WITH HIS ILLEGAL PLAN.

IT'S A SHAME HE COULDN'T USE THAT ENERGY BACK IN 2009 TO PROVIDE AMERICANS WITH SOMETHING THEY NEED INSTEAD OF WHORING FOR THE INSURANCE INDUSTRY.

FROM THE TCI WIRE:

It's not a good day to be an 'expert.' Marc Lynch (Foreign Policy) is often insightful. This isn't one of those times. We'll get to his larger points in a moment but first we'll note these supporting 'facts' Lynch supplies:

The real story of America's withdrawal from Iraq is how little impact it has really had on either Iraq or the region. There are even signs that the withdrawal has helped to nudge Iraqis onto the right path, though not as quickly or directly as I might have hoped. This month's death toll was the lowest on record since the 2003 invasion, while Iraqi oil exports are at their highest level since 1980. Baghdad successfully hosted an Arab Summit meeting, which may have done little for Syria but did go further to bring Iraq back into the Arab fold than anything since 2003.

Let's address this lowest toll first. Ben Armbruster (Think Progress) is also running with that, opening with, "The AP reports that according to data released . . ." No, they're not really reporting. They're repeating. They're not reporting. Reporting isn't just repeating what someone said. What the Iraq Ministry of Defense (no head to the ministry) and the Ministry of Interior (no head to the ministry) and the Ministry of Health released was 112 people died in March. That's those classified as civilians or security. And the Iraqi government said that 357 were injured. That is a low figure. Reuters stopped tracking the violence because . . . Well, ask them. So I guess there's just no way to confirm or refute . . . Oh, wait, there's Iraq Body Count. Their March total is 295. Let's see, the independent Iraq Body Count or the two ministries Nouri controls (by refusing to appoint a Minister to head them) and the Ministry of Health, who do we believe? Any rational, sentient person would tell you you don't believe the struggling government sliding further towards authoritarianism.

We can also go over AKE's totals. March 5th, they reported 63 dead the previous week (41 wounded), March 12th they noted 70 killed (76 injured) the week prior and reminded that this did not include Iraqi youth who were or perceived to be either Emo or LGBT. March 19th they reported 26 dead (22 injured) the week before. March 26th they reported 73 dead (270 injured) the week prior. Today they report 29 people were killed the week prior (22 injured).

Leaving out the first week of March, we're already at 198. Repeating that's leaving out the first week of March (due to the fact that the first week of March also included four days of February). AKE advertises it's Iraq Services:

AKE can fully support your business in Iraq. We can provide transport, security and accomodation in a home-from-home environment in central Baghdad. [. . .] We can provide logistical support in and out of the country, giving you access to clients, partners, business opoerations and government ministries. Visa faciliation is available (subject to status) and we can provide recommendations for drivers, fixers as well as local translators and other services.

Do you know how much AKE charges? Do you know they couldn't get five cents if they weren't seen as much more than merely competent.

So 112 is rejected by both IBC's count and AKE's count? Maybe in the future, allegedly educated people could remember that governments have an interest in lying about how much violence takes place in their country. That's true of the US, that's true of all countries. And maybe in the future, when you 'report' a number, you could try confirming it and even contrasting it with counts from other outlets?

As for the nonsense about the Arab League Summit being a success for Iraq, we've addressed those false claims here and we addressed it yesterday at Third in "Editorial: Successful summit for Iraq?" which goes over one aspect after another demonstrating that you cannot grade it a success for Iraq. And that was before Ahmed Hussein (Al Mada) was reporting that the number of Iraqis living at the poverty level or below is five and a half million persons. That's outrageous in any country but especially in Iraq which has somewhere between 25 to 30 million people (the population is an estimate, there has not been a census in decades). So basically, one-fifth of the country lives in poverty and yet Nouri wasted at least a billion dollars on the summit.

Back to Marc Lynch. His argument is that Barack did no great harm to Iraq by withdrawing most of the troops. And I would agree with that and agree that US troops feed into resentments. Even more their presence postpones the sorting out -- violent or otherwise that Iraqis have to do. But there's another problem besides being gullible about government figures. Lynch writes:

This is not to say that there aren't reasons to worry about Iraq's future. There are many. It is troubling that Maliki has driven Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi into exile on terrorism charges and has rebuffed all efforts at meaningful cooperation with his political rivals. It is troubling that core constitutional issues such as the oil law and the limits of federalism remain unresolved. It is troubling that violence and terrorism continues to claim Iraqi lives and unsettle its politics. It is troubling that the Iraqi Parliament appears inept and incompetent [. . .]

But what's striking is that these problems are the same ones which kept us all up nights in previous years. None of these trends is remotely new, and few have become palpably worse since the American departure. Iraqis have been worried about the centralization of power in Maliki's office and his authoritarian tendencies for the last four years.

Yes, those things are, to say the least, troubling. As for it be striking that these are the same problems from the previous years and that Nouri's "authoritarian tendences" have been a concern "for the last four years," Marc Lynch, what do you think Iraqis could have done about that?

Gee, I guess March 7, 2010, they could have gone and voted for someone other than Nouri's political slate State of Law. If they'd done that, they'd be rid of Nouri.

Oh, wait. They did do that. That's why despite the threats, despite the demonization of Iraqiya as "terrorists" and "Ba'athists" (the latter especially a serious charge in the Shi'ite majority Iraq), Iraqiya won more votes. Who backed Nouri, Marc Lynch?

That's right, Barack Obama. The White House backed Nouri. The White House didn't give a damn about the vote, didn't give a dam about democracy, didn't give a damn about the will of the Iraqi people, didn't give a damn about the Iraqi Constitution.

So if you're going to note that the problems are similar or claim they're the same (they're not the same, they're far worse and today's events after Lynch's piece went up demonstrate that they're worse), then you better be willing to talk about why they're the same. They're not the same because the Iraqi people didn't attempt to solve the problem. They're not the same because the Iraqi people believed that their votes would matter. The problems are similar because the White House overruled the voice of the Iraqi people.

At least Marc Lynch is consistent. (And, again, often insightful.) If Phyllis Bennis suffering from MPD? Which personality is attempting to communicate with us today? In a piece at Real News Network she attempts to cover various wars. Here she is on Iraq:

Last week was the 9th anniversary of that war. And looking back, it's clearer than ever that the U.S. failed to achieve any of its goals. I don't mean the lying goals, the fake goals, of finding weapons of mass destruction or bringing democracy to Iraq. I mean the real goals, the ones that kept hundreds of thousands of U.S. troops and hundreds of thousands of Pentagon-paid mercenaries in Iraq for so many years:

Consolidating U.S. control over Iraqi oil -- nope, U.S. oil companies are just some among many of the myriad of foreign interests in Iraq's oil fields.
Leaving behind a pro-U.S. government in Baghdad -- hardly, Prime Minister Maliki is barely on speaking terms with anyone in Washington.
Permanent access to U.S. bases across Iraq -- not even close, every one of the several hundred bases was either closed down or turned over to the Iraqi government; even the giant 5,000-person embassy, biggest in the world, had to be scaled back when Iraq refused to guarantee immunity to enough U.S. troops to protect it.
Creating a government and military more accountable to the U.S. than to Iran -- oops, seems we got that one wrong too; despite continuing billions of dollars of our tax money to prop it up, Baghdad today is allied more closely to Iran than to the U.S.

So the U.S. lost in Iraq too. Iraq hasn't been "liberated" -- violence is rampant, the sectarian violence resulting from early U.S. policies after the 2003 invasion continues to escalate. And U.S.-paid contractors (paid by the State Dept this round, instead of the Pentagon, that's the technical difference) are still there. Thousands of them. What's not there, so far, is one dollar for reparations or compensation. That's the battle that lies ahead. The U.S. war in Iraq may be over, but our responsibilities are not.

Okay, help me out, was it not Phyllis insisting the Iraq War wasn't over after December 19th (the big withdrawal). And now she's insisting it is? Again, which personality is attempting to communicate with us? January 23rd, she was at US News & World Reports and, in her opening sentence, telling readers, "Far from being 'too soon,' the U.S. troop withdrawal from Iraq came more than eight years too late -- and still, the war isn't over."

How did the US troops in the region -- still in the region around Iraq -- depart, how did the CIA depart Iraq, how did Special Ops depart Iraq, how did all the contractors depart, the 700 US soldiers who are 'trainers,' the Marines guarding the embassy, how did all of those people leave between December 19th and today and we didn't even notice? How did that happen? To the personality now insisting that the war is over, let us speak to Phyllis. We want to speak with Phyllis.

Nouri al-Maliki pretends he wants to speak with Tareq al-Hashemi. Really he wants him imprisoned. The Vice President is a member of Iraqiya, a Sunni and in his second term as vice president. Iraqiya and State of Law are political rivals. Nouri doesn't play well with others. Iraqiya announced they were boycotting the government December 16th and did so on December 17th entry. December 18th is al-Hashemi and Deputy Prime Minister Saleh al-Mutlaq are attempting to fly to the KRG from Baghdad when they and their bodyguards are pulled off the flight by Nouri's forces. For less than an hour, they are detained. Then they're waived through and allowed to fly out. December 19th, Nouri issues an arrest warrant for al-Hashemi -- after the Vice President is in the KRG.

At this late date, anyone who falsely states that Tareq al-Hashemi fled to the KRG after an arrest warrant was issued for him has problems far larger than chronology.

Yesterday, al-Hashemi went to Qatar. In reporting that development, both . Aseel Kami (Reuters) and Jack Healy and Duraid Adnan (New York Times) were unable to get the facts right. In addition, while reporting on the trip to Qatar and the outrage by Nouri, they failed to bring in Qatar's message to Nouri last week. Dropping back to Friday's snapshot:

There are 22 countries in the Arab League. Hamza Hendawi and Lara Jakes (AP) put the number of Arab League leaders who attended at 10 and they pointed out that Qatar, Saudi Arabi, Morocco and Jordan were among those who sent lower-level officials to the summit. Patrick Martin (Globe & Mail) explains that Sheik Hamad Bin Jassem Bin Jabr Al Thani (Prime Minister of Qatar) declared on television that Qatar's "low level of representation" was meant to send "a 'message' to Iraq' majority Shiites to stop what he called the marginalization of its minority Sunnis."

If Nouri is outraged and furious, it seems like you might want to note the above. Because it makes clear that receiving al-Hashemi wasn't accidental and that all of Nouri's thundering really isn't going to make too much of an impression on Qatar. Only Jomana Karadsheh (CNN) managed to touch on that issue yesterday:

The vice president's trip comes several days after Qatar's foreign minister said his country had sent a low-ranking representative to last week's Arab League summit in Baghdad in order to send a message over "factionalism in Iraq," the state-run Qatar News Agency reported.

The US State Dept was not bothered by the news and had hoped/urged it for weeks now. They feel the issues surrounding Tareq al-Hashemi prevent Iraq from focusing on other needed issues. They also feel al-Hashemi can't get a fair trial. They worry that he will return to Iraq as he has stated he intendes to do (not years from now, but when this current diplomatic tour is over).

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Saturday, March 31, 2012

The greed

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

CELEBRITY IN CHIEF BARRY O HAS LATELY BEEN SHARING ALL OF HIS PLANS FOR THE FUTURE WITH THE RUSSIANS WHILE TELLING THE AMERICAN PEOPLE NOTHING.

WHILE SOME ARGUE THIS IS A CAMPAIGN MISTAKE, DAVID AXELROD INSISTS THIS IS A NEW MODEL FOR INCOME.

"WHAT WE'LL DO," EXPLAINED AXELROD, "IS CHARGE AMERICANS TO KNOW THE PLATFORM. WANT TO KNOW OUR STANCE ON ABORTION? PAY $350. THE ENVIRONMENT? $400. AND EACH PERSON WHO PAYS WILL HAVE TO FIRST SIGN A NON-DISCLOSURE AGREEMENT. WITH ALL THE INTEREST IN BARRY O, WE'RE CONVINCED THIS WILL MAKE US BILLIONS!"

FROM THE TCI WIRE:

Jane Arraf (Christian Science Monitor) wants you to know that, as Sly Stone once sang, everybody is a star, that we're all winners. Probably Charlotte Caffey and Jane Wiedlin were closer to the truth with, "We're all dreamers, we're all whores" ("This Town," first appears on the Go-Gos' Beauty and the Beat). Journalists are supposed to be critical thinkers not advance men for the company. The Arab League Summit was only a success if we're all toddlers and everyone gets a trophy for showing up. Or if you're stupid enough to think something's true just because a two-bit thug like Nouri al-Maliki says it is.

There are 22 countries in the Arab League. Hamza Hendawi and Lara Jakes (AP) put the number of Arab League leaders who attended at 10 and they pointed out that Qatar, Saudi Arabi, Morocco and Jordan were among those who sent lower-level officials to the summit. Patrick Martin (Globe & Mail) explains that Sheik Hamad Bin Jassem Bin Jabr Al Thani (Prime Minister of Qatar) declared on television that Qatar's "low level of representation" was meant to send "a 'message' to Iraq' majority Shiites to stop what he called the marginalization of its minority Sunnis." Yussef Hamza (The National) offers, "Iraq has looked to the summit, the first it has hosted in a generation, to signal its emergence from years of turmoil, American occupation and isolation. It wanted the summit to herald its return to the Arab fold. But the large number of absentees told a different story." That's reality.

Who's the liar pimping success? Why it's not just Nouri al-Maliki, it's Jane Arraf and Prashant Rao's Twitter buddy, the idiot Reider Visser. A fool not qualified to discuss legalities of the Erbil Agreement as evidenced by his dime store 'legal' 'analysis' that makes Elle Woods look, by comparison, like a legal giant along the lines of Thurgood Marshall. And of course Jane and Prashant and the others weren't trained in the law either so they idiotically retweet Reider's ignorance there by multiplying it as well as endorsing it. Reider's a Nouri al-Maliki groupie so he's hardly an impartial voice. He's also buddies with trash Nir Rosen. Though Nir's more famous right now for turning over the names of Western reporters to the Syrian government (that's what led to the recent charges that he was a spy), he of course became infamous for presenting the 'legal' 'analysis' that Lara Logan 'had it coming.' Nir really wasn't qualified for anything other than blowhard status but the Circle Jerk -- the same one that Jane and Prahsant employ on Reider's behalf -- ensured that a man was elevated and it didn't matter that he pisses on women or anything else. It's really past time that so-called professional journalists started examing their own ethics. At best, Reider is nothing but a whore for Nouri. There's no reason to treat him as impartial. There's no reason to treat his 'legal' renderings as worth passing on.

And to make his lack of value clear, he's pronounced the summit "a landmark achievement." (You sort of picture him panting that as he pulls on himself for a minute and ten seconds.) (Though I may be implying more endurance than he actually has.)

Only a whore for Nouri would pronounce the summit "a landmark achievement." It's cute the way he and Jane Arraf and Prashant Rao and the rest ignore the assault on the Communist Party in Baghdad this week. That took place in Baghdad. That took place as supposedly part of 'security sweep' on the neighborhood for the summit. 12 people were arrested and forced to sign papers they hadn't read. And that's not news? But what a little pig and prig named Reider Viseer thinks is supposed to carry weight?

Why?

Because like the 'professional journalists,' he ignores what was done to the Communist Party this week. It's really interesting and illuminating to see what gets covered and what gets ignored and, excuse the hell out of me, but let's also point that when we spent a week here covering the assault on Iraqi youth, Prashant, Jane and their beloved Reider couldn't be bothered with the story.

I guess it's easy to judge Iraq a success when you ignore all the people who suffer and die. I guess it's real damn easy -- real damn easy to lie.

And to whine. I seem to remember these 'professional journalists' and their whines about it took two hours or four hours or they didn't have phone service wah, wah, wah. Did any of those self-obsessed fools stop to write one damn article about the Iraqi journalists who were denied the right to cover the summit?

Did they note that printing presses were down?

Did they mention that outlets like Dar Addustour were basically forced into a holiday for the entire summit?

No, they didn't. But they did let you know that, golly, they ate their breakfast and it was digesting but now it was two hours later and their tummies were rumbling and goodness knows the bus they were on should be moving towards food a whole lot faster.

Everyone pimping the damn lie that the summit was a success should be ashamed of themselves. Not Reider Visser -- his kind is immune to shame. But so-called 'professional journalists,' I don't know what the hell you think you did this week but most of you didn't do reporting.

Not only did you ignore the threats to the Iraqi people, you ignored the staples you usually cover. Radical cleric and online tween advisor Moqtada al-Sadr takes questions from his followers and posts answers. These are usually the 'quotes' of Moqtada's that you see in the press. They love to cover this -- often forgetting to note it was written and it's an online exchange -- but they love to cover it. Strangely, they ignored what he said this week.

He said the US citizen that was released was a soldier. We're talking about Randy Michael Hills. He was in the news March 17th and 18th. The most fitting headline of all the coverage went was on Jack Healy's New York Times article: "Militans Free American No One Knew Was Missing." Randy Michael Hills, a 59-year-old American, former US military or current US military (take your pick) was released by forces once attached to Moqtada al-Sadr who explained that they had held the man for nine months (that he was held for nine months was confirmed by Victoria Nuland in a US State Dept press briefing).

Peter Graff (Reuters) reported that the man "was shown on telievision in a U.S. military univorm with no insignia, flanked by two members of parliament from Sadr's movement." Mohammed Tawfeeq (CNN) reported:

Maha al-Douri, a lawmaker and a member of the al-Sadr movement, said Michael had been in captivity for nine months. A spokesman for the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad said officials were working "to verify the information regarding the alleged U.S. captive."
A Pentagon official said the Defense Department is also looking into the reports, but added that to the best of defense officials' knowledge, no active duty military person has been missing in Iraq.
The website of the Defense Prisoner Of War/ Missing Personnel Office on Saturday showed three Defense Department contractors as still missing from Operation Iraqi Freedom. Michael was not among them.

Al Mada's coverage made clear that the Sadr brigade considers him a soldier and states they captured a US soldier (not contractor) and they state he took part in the 2004 attack on Najaf and Sadr City as well as 2008 attacks in southern and Central Iraq -- what is known as the Charge of the Knights -- that begins March 25th and is a joint US-Iraq operation targeting Moqtada's forces. And this week, Moqtada answered a question about this released hostage and again stated he was US military, not former military, not a contractor. He may or may not be telling the truth or he may be telling what he thinks is the truth and be mistaken. But Moqtada al-Sadr does know the difference between a US soldier and a contractor. It's interesting that no one wanted to quote Moqtada this week. They usually break their necks trying to follow Moqtada. (Moqtada was a press created 'political figure.' Had it not been for the international press -- as well as Paul Bremer's demonization of Moqtada throughout 2004 -- he would not be the celebrity and power player he is today.)