THE US, THE UN AND IRAQ VI

JM, November can't get here soon enough.
we are about to find ourselves in the middle of 25 or 30 milllion Iraqi and non Iraqi .... why not call them 'holy warriors' hell bent on the making right of some age old scores .... and we are just in the way.

H. W. and G. W.'s new world order thing are about to become dust in the wind.

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BillW wrote:

Nice try, doesn't work ... Get a grip

Then where is your outrage that Clinton failed to prevent all of those bombings?

You may choose to pretend to yourself that reality isn't what it is and that your position is not blatantly partisan and hypocritical, but I'm confident that most of the fine folks here in A2K can read and think for themselves, which leaves you looking the partisan windbag, with no real standard other than a strong desire to spin any events against Republicans.

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What does Clinton have to do with the Invasion of Iraq?
Shocked

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Scrat has reminded us of a heavy and time consuming responsibility implicit in being American. That is: an American's every day civic responsibility towards not only the expression of his own values but the every day tolerance of the values of others that naturally flows from our heritage , such that:

"most of the fine folks here in A2K can read and think for themselves".

A statement that seems kind but simultaneously implies personal responsibility that should be manifest in our replies on this forum.

JM

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Adrian wrote:

McTag wrote.

Quote:
Australian diplomat: "Syria is a country which has been a bastard state for 40 years".

Makes you wonder what the undiplomatic Australians might say.

This is a misquote.

Quote:
"CORRECTION. A story headlined 'Syria seeks our help to woo US' in Saturday's Weekend Australian misquoted [NSW] National Party senator, Sandy Macdonald. "The quote stated, 'Syria is a country that has been a bastard state for nearly 40 years, but should have read, 'Syria is a country that has been a Baathist state for nearly 40 years.' The Australian regrets any embarrassment caused by the error."

Sandy Macdonald is not a diplomat either.

Yee, I knew he wasn't, but it fitted the joke better. Joke, yes? Sorry Oz, I love you really, you know that.

McT

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No worries McT, was only pointing it out because this is in politics and people tend to take political quotes seriously.

Carry on.

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JamesMorrison: Just wanted to say I liked your last post and loved the one before that. I look forward to reading more.

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Attention American viewers of PBS: tonight on Bill Moyer's show John Dean, late of the Nixon White House, will say that he believes Bush has committed an impeachable offense by taking the USA to war on false information. Check your local listings.

For those under thirty, John Dean was one of the few Nixon White House officials who showed he had that most uncommon Washington attribute : integrity.

Joe

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And his other attribute is that he is a convicted felon.

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JM, I too wanted to state that I appreciated your post (the second one up). It led me to think, and to think in ways that I had not heretofore.

I would also like to take the liberty of quoting 3 short paragraphs from the Biden piece (linked above by JM) because it suggests a way to proceed. On first reading, it makes a great deal of sense to me.

"The president should convene a summit with our allies in Europe, including countries that opposed the war, and repair the transatlantic alliance. He should tell them that none of us can afford failure in Iraq, that he understands they need political cover to support us and that he will seek a U.N. Security Council resolution to create a high commissioner who would be in charge of managing Iraq's political transition. This arrangement has worked before -- in the Balkans and Afghanistan.

Some suggest that our European allies who opposed the war want to see us fail. The European leaders I have spoken with understand they have as much, if not more, to lose as the United States does from the economic dislocations, refugee flows and rising radicalism that would result from a failed state. We have to ask for and give them a way to help. An international high commissioner would provide the legitimacy that has been missing both inside and outside Iraq. It would give our allies more of a stake and a reason to contribute more money and even more troops. It would also pave the way for a gradual shift in security operations to NATO command. NATO can't take over Iraq tomorrow, but it could soon begin to patrol Iraq's borders, train its army and take on responsibility for northern Iraq or the Polish sector.

Finally, a high commissioner, speaking not just for the United States but for the entire international community, would have far more legitimacy than an American ambassador in helping Iraqis select a caretaker government and then serving as a referee until elections are held. "

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We are our own worst enemies

Quote:

U.S. Helicopters Strike Shi'ite Area in Baghdad
1 hour, 43 minutes ago

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By Michael Georgy

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - U.S. helicopters blasted targets in Baghdad Monday as a showdown intensified with radical Shi'ite militiamen challenging America's postwar blueprint for Iraq (news - web sites).

Reuters Photo

AP Photo
Slideshow: Iraq

Latest headlines:
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Special Coverage

Reuters journalists said they saw two Apache helicopters attacking targets in the mainly Shi'ite Shuala district in the northwest of the city, where a U.S. vehicle was in flames.

There was no firm word on casualties in the strike, thought to be the first of its kind in Baghdad since the war that toppled Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) nearly a year ago, but an anti-U.S. cleric said five people had been killed and 10 wounded.

Iraq's U.S. administrator Paul Bremer vowed to crack down on firebrand Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, a day after battles in Baghdad and near the shrine city of Najaf killed 48 Iraqis, eight American soldiers and one Salvadoran soldier.

In other violence, the U.S. army said a Marine was killed west of Baghdad Monday, an American soldier was killed by a car bomb in the city of Kirkuk Sunday, and another soldier was killed Sunday in a roadside bomb attack in Mosul.

A U.S. Marine also died Sunday from wounds sustained in an attack the previous day. Overall, 12 U.S. troops have been killed in combat over the past 24 hours.

Since the start of the war, 422 U.S. soldiers have been killed in action. Thousands of Iraqis have been killed.

The violence opens a new front for U.S.-led forces already struggling to contain attacks by Sunni Muslim insurgents.

It also complicates the task of U.N. envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, who arrived in Baghdad Sunday to discuss U.S. plans to hand sovereignty to Iraqis at the end of June and future elections.

Bremer said Sadr was an outlaw trying to usurp legitimate authority. "We will not tolerate this," he told an Iraqi ministerial committee for national security.

Sadr responded defiantly. "I'm accused by one of the leaders of evil, Bremer, of being an outlaw," he said in a statement read out in a mosque in Kufa, near Najaf, where he is staging a sit-in.

"If that means breaking the law of the American tyranny and its filthy constitution (for Iraq), I'm proud of that and that is why I'm in revolt," the 30-year-old cleric said.

U.S. tanks patrolled the Shi'ite slum district of Sadr City, where a hospital official said Sunday's battles with U.S. troops had killed 28 Iraqis and wounded 74.

SADR'S GRIEVANCES

A senior U.S. military official said the violence was not a generalized Shi'ite uprising, adding that he expected "moderate majority Shi'ites to come out and speak against this level of extremism" in the coming days.

Sadr has been angered by the arrest of one of his aides, Mustapha Yacoubi, seized by U.S.-led forces Saturday in connection with the killing of Shi'ite cleric Abdul Majid al-Khoei last year.

Interior Ministry officials said Monday Yacoubi was in Iraqi custody and would be tried for complicity in the murder. Sadr's group has denied involvement.

Sadr's followers are also demanding the reopening of al-Hawza newspaper, a Sadr mouthpiece that U.S.-led authorities closed, saying it was inciting anti-American violence.

Gunmen loyal to Sadr occupied the governor's building in the southern city of Basra. His supporters also staged protests in the shrine city of Kerbala, witnesses said.

U.S. forces sealed off the troubled Sunni town of Falluja, where four American security guards were killed last week. Witnesses reported heavy firing on the outskirts overnight and U.S. forces closed the nearby Baghdad-Amman highway.

In west Baghdad, insurgents attacked foreigners traveling in a civilian car, detonating a roadside bomb and firing small arms. A passenger, apparently American, said he had fired back. A U.S. Marine said no one had been hurt. The car was on fire.

Sadr had faded from Shi'ite politics in recent months while the spotlight focused on leading moderate cleric Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani and his objections to U.S. transition policies.

But Sadr's Mehdi Army has said for months it is ready for holy war against the Americans if the order comes, and their sudden challenge shows splits within the Shi'ite majority.

In Najaf, the local leader of the Badr militia, linked to a moderate Shi'ite group, said he had helped mediate a truce between Sadr's group and Spanish-led forces after Sunday's fighting there in which 20 Iraqis were killed and 200 wounded.

Hassan al-Battan told Reuters Sadr fighters had now handed back the Najaf police station and the Badr militia's office which they had occupied Sunday.

An aide to Sadr at the Kufa mosque said the cleric wanted U.S. troops to withdraw from Shi'ite areas.

"It is not up to us to defuse the situation but the Americans. They started to shoot at peaceful demonstrators," the aide, Qais al-Khazali, said.

Hundreds of Sadr's gunmen milled around the mosque. Some could be seen riding around town in looted police pickup trucks, wearing blue police-issue flak jackets.

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Tarantulas wrote:

And his other attribute is that he is a convicted felon.

You REALLY do need to understand the notion of logical fallacy and how this is an instance of it. It's a logical error you continue to make, in your own posts, and in what you paste.

ps...joe, thanks for the headsup on NOW.

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Not to mention being completely irrelevant to the subject matter at hand.

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JamesMorrison said, re the MEI...

Quote:

Maybe to some, but the goal was to seed the area with the kernel of democracy, not to plunder its resources.

James

Lovely to see you back. Thoughtful post, as we've come to expect. I remain uncertain, however, that your claim, quoted above, reflects a sufficient portrayal of motive. Oil resources - access to or functional control of - is perhaps the most fundamental economic factor of the modern industrial world. Clearly, the US would not have even considered a military entrerprise of anything like this magnitude in, for example, some resource-poor African or Asian state. I grant that other factors are relevant...proximity of ally Israel, emergence of nuclear capabilities in the ME, dangers of instability in the region, etc.

The most troubling single element, to my mind, is Cheney's adamant refusal to make transparent the Energy Task Force meetings - participants, agenda, documents, etc., taking this refusal all the way to the SC. His insistence on maintance of the 'executive priviledge' barrier here is consistent with his understanding of it as regards other issues too, certainly, and with the Straussian notions of the appropriateness of a quite Machiavellian style of governance. But it remains entirely conceivable that this war was driven, at least in part, by the vision of petroleum industry corporate voices.

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sumac wrote:

Not to mention being completely irrelevant to the subject matter at hand.

sumac

Yes, precisely. Tarantulas is guilty here, again, of the 'ad hominem fallacy', which is one of the fallacies of relevance, and it's the one we most commonly bump into. Eg, "The man is a homosexual. You're going to believe what he says?!" Whatever factual claim has been made remains unaddressed, with attention purposefully shifted over to the irrelevancy of some other factor. It's the prime tool of discreditation, and it is used by this administration every day. It is also the fundamental tool of people like Ann Coulter.

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And it is so obvious when used. I am continually surprised by the number of people who buy into it, regardless of their previous predilection.

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I agree the current US administration should attempt now to awaken the nations of the world to the common enormous terrorist danger (CETD), mid east sponsored or other.

Unfortunately the UN is presently severely limited in its ability to lead an international effort to confront and destroy the CETD. Too many members of the UN are themselves presently sponsors of the CETD. While that probably can be corrected to some extent by focused diplomatic efforts, the UN cannot be counted on as the exclusive organization for leading this effort. Perhaps NATO is a viable alternative. Perhaps a special purpose organization of states individually committed to destroying the CETD represents a better choice of leadership.

I recommend that the US follow up on part of JM's recommendations and hold an international summit with the twin objectives of destroying the CETD and developing secure representative democracies (SRD) in all the world's nations.

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ican711nm wrote:

I recommend that the US follow up on part of JM's recommendations and hold an international summit with the twin objectives of destroying the CETD and developing secure representative democracies (SRD) in all the world's nations.

This would be about ... how many new wars do you think?

And: how far left or right can a elected government be, to fall out of the term "SCR"?

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If I like you, you're okay - if I don't, I'm gonna destroy you.

Now, make me like you!

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I too thank Joe for the heads up.

blatham wrote:

Tarantulas wrote:
And his other attribute is that he is a convicted felon.

You REALLY do need to understand the notion of logical fallacy and how this is an instance of it. It's a logical error you continue to make, in your own posts, and in what you paste.

blatham wrote:

sumac wrote:
Not to mention being completely irrelevant to the subject matter at hand.

sumac

Yes, precisely. Tarantulas is guilty here, again, of the 'ad hominem fallacy', which is one of the fallacies of relevance, and it's the one we most commonly bump into. Eg, "The man is a homosexual. You're going to believe what he says?!" Whatever factual claim has been made remains unaddressed, with attention purposefully shifted over to the irrelevancy of some other factor. It's the prime tool of discreditation, and it is used by this administration every day. It is also the fundamental tool of people like Ann Coulter.

I would ask you two to reconsider this bit of criticism. Do you really think the existence of a criminal record is irrelevant when assessing a person's credentials to speak as an expert on criminal law? A person's sexual preference is indeed irrelevant, but a person's criminal background (or lack thereof) most certainly is not. This isn't true when considering a jury, a judge, an attorney or politician so why should it be when determining the credibility of an "expert witness"? I'm not suggesting it is grounds to dismiss his opinion out-of-hand, but it is certainly worthy of consideration when weighing the credibility of his opinion. Ad-Hominem it is not.

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THE US, THE UN AND IRAQ VI

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