The UN, US and Iraq IV

Tartar, King GWBush will never relinquish control of Iraq to the UN. After all, he has his king's men and women on the ground that requires no personal sacrifice on his part. c.i.

Lip service is his only contribution during the past three years, and he's managed to fool most of the people most of the time; why change? c.i.

And now, tonight, I actually heard someone on a panel say that if they can't get the North Korea nuclear thing cleared, Bush's credibility will be on the line. Six months ago he wouldn't have said it out loud.

I think they'll work something out somehow with the U.N., but the U.S. has already had to step down over this, which does diminish that absolute authority role they thought they had.

Incidentally, just exactly what has Halliburton done? Everything I've read says very little has been fixed, built or rebuilt, and the oil lines aren't really working. So what has Haliburton done to earn the money? Has anybody asked, and I've missed it?

a

George W Bush to Barbara Walters, ABC "20/20," 12/13/02

"There's only one person who is responsible for making that decision , and that's me. And there's only one person who hugs the mothers and the widows, the wives and the kids on the death of their loved ones. Others hug, but having committed the troops, I've got an additional responsibility to hug, and that's me, and I know what it's like."

That is so sad, Tartarin, but it was inevitable. If we could only see ourselves as others see us. Why would other countries sign on to provide cannon-fodder in Iraq unless they could control the destiny of their countrymen? We ourselves would not do that. And yet we want other nations to sign on to that mandate.

Y'know, I'm particularly offended that the man has a degree in history.

"mothers, widows, wives, and kids...." I wonder if the women in the military are hearing these words of their commander in chief? c.i.

mamajuana, that is a sick quote.

We do not realize what we have done. The North Koreans are reacting in a not-surprising way to our agression against Iraq. They say they need defensive nuclear weapons in light of no non-agression treaty with the US.. The Iranians surely see the same threat, although they are cloaking their program as an energy resource. We have set the cat amongst the pigeons.

Kara, That's only a small part of the world chaos this president has created, but most people are either too lazy or too dumb to see it. c.i.

Yes, it is, Kara, from a sick person. I get an on-line zine called The Black Commentator, and it has some interesting things, their latest being a take on Condoleeza Rice that is explosive. You can bring it up on google just by typing in the name.

Hey, hob - what makes you think that person has a degree in anything? He also says he's a veteran, and the AWOL story is pretty well documented, although well hidden.

Tart - I think Dean caught them all off guard. A number of us have been discussing him for a while, and I know I signed on shortly after they started the site. But I also signed on to Kerry's, and here's a difference. What I get from Kerry is slick and standard, and I am disappointed. Dean has caught the imagination of many people, and many see him the way they want a presidential candidate to look. Bush affects a swagger, but doesn't have it. Incidentally, I watched a Steven Seagal movie tonight (I am a fan!) and realized that Bush is probably trying to imitate that Seagal swagger, which is nothing to imitate. But.......Dean is growing in the role, and that's another thing that's hard for some of the pundits to take. The fact that he's smarter than some of them want him to be; has actual plans; has human emotions; and seems to speak his own mind has a powerful pull. And the stronger Dean gets to look, the less Bush gets to look.

It will be interesting to see the visual and other spin the WH puts on all this when he returns from Texas.

BTW, Kara, it also said that Bush has not once made a phone call, gone to a funeral, or visited a grave of any of the fallen. Nor invited any of the grieving kin to the WH. Not that he has to do any of this - but I should think in the interests of the spin they would have done something to make him appear sympathetic to the misery he's brought.

mamajuana, what do you think about Clark? I was, have been, interested in Dr. Dean, but I don't like jumping on bandwagons. This thing has a long way to play out, and we need most of all someone who can defeat Bush. But it has to be someone of substance. If we can't have a statesman, who could probably not get elected, then we must fight for a person who has the most principle and the least baggage.

I like Clark, but I agree with Ann Richards, the ex-governor of Texas, and one of the most savvy people I've ever heard (besides being funny). It's late. If he were going to do this, he should have done it before.

Although I've written a lot about Dean (because I find him the most interesting), I'm still hedging. Kerry was my starting pick, but now I don't know. My husband feels there are several things that could help Kerry: always stand beside that statue of Lincoln, and dress in uniform with one of the George Bush dolls in uniform on a table beside him.

Dean has color. The rest, right now, seem washed out. And although I've heard a lot of loyalist talk about Bush, I've never really heard anybody rave about him. He too is pale. Here's a theory. Maybe we're all tired of the really blah television stuff that's been on, and crave a litle more excitement. The, too, there's sex appeal. Bush has none. But I've always understood that short men make great lovers. (Speaking, you understand, as one who's been married forever to a tall man...but in my youth...)

Is Dean short? I did not know that. If he is not tall, he does not have to deal with the Tall Poppy syndrome.

I flirted with Kucinich, but he is anti-globalization. I cannot go with someone who denies what will happen.

I heard today that Schwartzenegger is against this new idea of driver's licences for non-citizens (read undoc'd immigrants) in CA. He has gathered up a few items to fling at his conservative wing, this one among them. I had not heard of this initiative and want to know more about it. The idea makes sense to me. The license does not have to be just like other CA licenses and could be more of an ID card, with driving privileges. Hey, who else will till the soil?

And isn't it amazing that Schwartzenegger is always tan and sort of glistening, as if oiled?

Emphasis in the following is mine:



L.A.Times (reg. req.)

Now people, I find this exceptionally revealing in light of Richard Perle's recent comments about "mistakes being made", and "we should turn Iraq over to the Iraqis as soon as possible", and also the fact that, quite suddenly, the administration is selling the hard the idea of a UN peace-keeping force.

I think there's more chance than even that we're out of Iraq before the election. Perhaps before the end of the year even.

Rove can read tea leaves. Word for word.

(Besides, we're going to need the soldiers in order to start the war on North Korea. )

How to convince people you are really only thinking of their best interest ... have a home invasion party. 'Get down on your knees' is the usual greeting in a formal invasion of a persons home.


:: Friday, August 29, 2003 ::

Our house was searched by the Americans. That happened almost ten days ago. I wasn't home, but my mother called the next day a bit freaked out.
They came at around 12 midnight they were apparently supposed to do a silent entrance and surprise the criminal Ba'athi cell that was in my parents house, unfortunately for them our front gate does a fair amount of rattling so my brother heard that and opened the door and saw a couple of soldiers climbing on our high black front gate. When the silent entrance tactic failed they resorted to shouty entrance mode. So they shouted at him telling him that he should get down on his knees, which he did. He actually was trying to help them open the door, but whatever. Seconds later around 25 soldiers are in the house my brother, father and mother are outside sitting on the ground and in their asshole-ish ways refused to answer any questions about what was happening. My father was asking them what they were looking so that he can help but as usual since you are an Iraqi addressing an American is no use since he doesn't even acknowledge you as a human being standing in front of him. They (the Americans) have a medic with them and he seems to be the only sane person amongst them, my brother tells me they were kids all of them. Anyway so my brother and father start talking to the medic and he tells them what this is about. They have been "informed" that there are daily meetings the last five days, Sudanese people come into our house at 9am and stay till 3pm, we are a probable Ansar cell. My father is totally baffled, my brother gets it. These are not Sudanese men they are from Basra the "informer" is stupid enough to forget that there is a sizeable population in Basra who are of African origin. And it is not meetings these 2 (yes only two) guys have here, they are carpenters and they were repairing my mom's kitchen. Way. To. Go. You have great informers.
While my family is waiting outside something strange happens, one of the soldiers comes out, empties his flask in the garden and start telling the medic to give him his, the medic shoos him away. They all think that the soldier is filling his flask with cold water from the cooler. Later it turns out that he emptied my father's bottle of Johnny Walker's into his flask and was probably trying to convince the medic to give him his to empty another bottle. Weird ****.
Aaaaanyway, they are looking thru my father's papers by now and their genius translator comes to the commander of operation [Pax House Bust] and tells him he has found "suspicious documents". They are passes to various conferences he has attended and bank cards for old closed accounts he used to have and most alarmingly for the person in charge was an invitation my father received a couple of days earlier to a meeting with General Abi Zaid to which he and others were flown to the Bakr Air Base north of Baghdad. Now the guy who was in charge starts trying to cover his ass and asks a lot of pointless questions, one of the more surreal ones was "so if one of your sons is writing for a foreign newspaper why are you still here?". After this goes on for a while he gets the family out of the house again, closes the door and stays in there for 15 minutes. Comes out with the 20 galactic troopers and tells my father that he should inside check everything "I don't want any complains filed later on", my father just opens the front gate and tells him that if he wants to file a complaint he will thank you and bye-bye.

They came, freaked out my mother, pissed off my father, found nothing and left.
After refusing to get one my father finally conceded to get one of those cards that basically say you are a "collaborator", and my mother will be spending a couple of weeks at her sister's in Amman
:: salam 12:43 AM [+] ::
...

Ge, incredibly sad.

I'd still like to see a thread in which we pair candidates (Dean and Clark for starters) and play them off against each other as we know more and more about them.

Dean is 5'8"? 5'9"? Though I've got at least an inch on him, I prefer men whose brain power gives them stature, vs. men who try to compensate with abs and tennis shoulders.

There's suddenly a lot, A LOT,of attention on Halliburton, on (see NPR this morning) the mother who had to send her soldier son air conditioners because Halliburton had not supplied enough. There's some delicious dirt there (delicious for us, horrendous for those who were expected to depend on Halliburton). Look forward to seeing it spread widely. Meanwhile, Halliburton does well on the stock market. Ah, the family values...

But the family values are starting to resemble those of the Sopranos.