THE US, THE UN AND IRAQ VI

Vote for Nader with me, CI...

Or vote for me in the Other category.

Kucinich!

A number of my Democrat acquaintenances have stated they intend not to vote at all. They are disgusted with Kerry. Also a number of my Republican acquaintenances have stated the same because they are disgusted with Bush.

My advice to them has been vote for a minor party candidate, any minor party candidate, in November. That will be equivalent to voting for "none of the above." It might prove interesting if "none of the above" actually succeeded in virtually winning the election.

To Rebel is Easy, to Think is Divine
Thank you for your kind words, ican711nm, they are dearly appreciated.

Most people don't realize it, but in order to be an airplane or jet pilot, one must be extraordinarily equipped mentally and physically, to understand and handle the most complicated piece of machinery ever built by man. Nothing comes close to it, other than spacecraft. I respect a person who can master that kind of challenge, because few can achieve it.

The pastor of my church is a jet pilot, and is believing for a new Citation X. President Bush was a pilot in the service, I might add, a fact which flies in the face (pardon the pun) of those who would like to think of him as a common idiot. I realize now that this kind of grotesque misrepresentation is actually just a psychological projection.

Some people are just hell-bound and determined to be unhappy individuals. No matter what you say or do, the seeds of truth will not grow on their ground. So I wasn't at all surprised when I read the dissecting, contorting reply, because it reminded me of a few individuals I've encountered in the past, who actually took pleasure in pulling the wings off of flies. It's rather sad.

I don't mind a sensibly debated topic, but I will not waste my time bantering with those who take such a seething spin on rational thought. God bless their hearts, I guess they just can't help it.

"The Eyes of Texas are Upon You"

WTF does that mean?


Really? Perhaps you need to realize that your opinion of "truth" is lacking for people who aren't you.


Don't feel bad. I woudln't expect you to be able to hold up your end of teh discussion anyway.

As a matter of fact, Kucinich fits my profile as the candidate that mirrors my political philosophy. He's looking better every day.

My vote is for
Bill the Cat

Reason
Double digit IQ

I like Kucy, but he is not electable.

Would that be 01?

Ack!

CI, wouldn't that have to be Dubya ..................

Yeah, but I thought his name was George Walker Bush. Wher'd Bill come from?

Two hunters are out in the woods when one of them collapses. He doesn't seem to be breathing and his eyes are glazed. The other guy takes out his phone and calls the emergency services.

He gasps: "My friend is dead! What can I do?" The operator says: "Calm down, I can help. First, let's make sure he's dead." There is a silence, then a gunshot is heard. Back on the phone, the guy says: "OK, now what?"

THPTTTTTTTTTTTTT

(April 19, 2004 -- 12:36 AM EDT // link // print)

Bob Woodward's new book is making a lot of news with the report that President Bush directed Secretary of Defense Don Rumsfeld to began planning for war with

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Iraq on November 21, 2001 -- little more than two months after the 9/11 attacks.

I hear it was much sooner than two months -- more like two weeks. That is to say, in September 2001.

At the same time Don Rumsfeld tasked Centcom with drawing up plans for attacking the Taliban in mid-September 2001, they were also tasked with putting together a plan to seize Iraq's southern oil fields.

(British officers, who were embedded in the planning process and actually on location in Tampa, Florida from mid-September 2001 onwards, reacted with something close to disbelief that this was what the Secretary of Defense had ordered.)

This plan -- pushed by Wolfowitz -- is referred to obliquely in the Saturday article on Woodward's book in the Post. But this wasn't just some idea Wolfowitz proposed prior to 9/11, as the author implies. Centcom planners began putting together the plan for it right as they were putting together the war plan for Afghanistan.

What happened in November was still important, and qualitatively different, because this earlier tasking was not explicitly aimed at regime change, simply seizing the southern oil fields. But whether it was formally aimed at regime change or no, within less than two weeks after 9/11, Centcom planners were at work putting in place a plan to make war on Iraq.
-- Josh Marshall

Been away for a while so apologise for not reading all the last several hundred posts.

I've come to the conclusion that Bush Rumsfeld Cheney and co have snatched defeat out of the jaws of victory. They have succeeded in uniting the opposition in a national war of liberation. It will be long. It will be bloody, but the people will win in the end.

Repeat, this war is now lost. All that remains is to determine the final cost of this hopeless adventure.

The Wrong War
April 19, 2004
By BOB HERBERT

Follow me, said the president. And, tragically, we did.

With his misbegotten war in Iraq, his failure to throw
everything we had at Al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden, and his
fantasy of using military might as a magic wand to "change
the world," President Bush has ushered the American people
into a bloody and mind-bending theater of the absurd.

Each act is more heartbreaking than the last. Pfc. Keith
Maupin, who was kidnapped near Baghdad on April 9, showed
up on a videotape broadcast by Al Jazeera last Friday. He
was in the custody of masked gunmen and, understandably,
frightened.

"My name is Keith Matthew Maupin," he said, looking
nervously into the camera. "I am a soldier from the First
Division. I am married with a 10-month-old son."

Private Maupin is 20 years old and should never have been
sent into the flaming horror of Iraq. Now we don't know how
to get him out.

On the same day that Private Maupin was kidnapped,
20-year-old Specialist Michelle Witmer was killed when her
Humvee was attacked in Baghdad. Ms. Witmer's two sisters,
Charity and Rachel, were also serving in Iraq. All three
women were members of the National Guard.

American troops are enduring the deadliest period since the
start of the war. And while they continue to fight
courageously and sometimes die, they are fighting and dying
in the wrong war.

This is the height of absurdity.

One of the things I remember from my time in the service
many years ago was the ubiquitous presence of large posters
with the phrase, in big block letters: Know Your Enemy.

This is a bit of military wisdom that seems to have escaped
President Bush.

The United States was attacked on Sept. 11, 2001, by Al
Qaeda, not Iraq.

All Americans and most of the world would have united
behind President Bush for an all-out war against Al Qaeda
and Osama bin Laden. The relatives and friends of any
troops who lost their lives in that effort would have known
clearly and unmistakably what their loved ones had died
for.

But Mr. Bush had other things on his mind. With Osama and
the top leadership of Al Qaeda still at large, and with the
U.S. still gripped by the trauma of Sept. 11, the president
turned his attention to Iraq.

Less than two months after the Sept. 11 attacks, according
to Bob Woodward's account in his new book, "Plan of
Attack," President Bush ordered Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld to have plans drawn up for a war against Iraq. Mr.
Bush insisted that this be done with the greatest of
secrecy. The president did not even fully inform his
national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, or his
secretary of state, Colin Powell, about his directive to
Mr. Rumsfeld.

Thus began the peeling away of resources crucial to the
nation's fight against its most fervent enemy, Al Qaeda.

Gen. Tommy Franks, who at the time was head of the United
States Central Command and in charge of the Afghan war, was
reported by Mr. Woodward to have uttered a string of
obscenities when he was ordered to develop a plan for
invading Iraq.

President Bush may truly believe, as he suggested at his
press conference last week, that he is carrying out a
mission that has been sanctioned by the divine. But he has
in fact made the world less safe with his catastrophic
decision to wage war in Iraq. At least 700 G.I.'s and
thousands of innocent Iraqis, including many women and
children, are dead. Untold numbers have been maimed and
there is no end to the carnage in sight.

Meanwhile, instead of destroying the terrorists, our real
enemies, we've energized them. The invasion and occupation
of Iraq has become a rallying cry for Islamic militants.
Qaeda-type terror is spreading, not receding. And Osama bin
Laden is still at large.

Even as I write this, reporters from The Times and other
news outlets are filing stories about marines dying in
ambush and other acts of mayhem and anarchy across Iraq.
This was not part of the plan. The administration and its
apologists spread fantasies of a fresh dawn of freedom
emerging in Iraq and spreading across the Arab world.
Instead we are spilling the blood of innocents in a
nightmare from which many thousands will never awaken.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/19/opinion/19HERB.html?ex=1083377560&ei=1&en=61eecd7753c641bd

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

ci the Bob Herbert piece was well written.

"follow me, the President said and tragically we did"

And so did we Brits.

We gave all our support to the US. We (I) gave money to New York. We sent soldiers to fight "shoulder to shoulder" with you in Afghanistan. We insisted on going with you into Iraq. We fight al Qaida world wide. We have given our blood our money our toil sweat and tears etc. We have put ourselves in harm's way. We sacrificed our national interests to do what (tony Blair) deemed to be the right thing. How much easier to side with our European partners Germany France + Russia. But no, Blair was passionate about it, getting rid of Saddam was the right thing to do. Blair faced a choice go with France Germany etc or go with USA. Blair chose America. It has finised his career. Its split the Labour party. Its destroyed our relations with our European neighbours, it has ruined our position of respect at the UN. But we went with Bush. Now Bush has a choice, Britain or Israel, and of course he went with the war criminal Sharon, because there are a few Jewish votes up for grabs in Florida. Sorry if I sound bitter. Its not (obviously) with you or with the American people. But I sound bitter because I am bitter.

All we ever wanted was for America to play even handedly in the middle east. But a sense of fairness, of justice, of doing the right thing for the sake of doing the right thing, is clearly beyond the understanding of the man currently occupying the White House.

Just being reminded (by a German paper) that Iraq's leading opposition figures (like Kanan Makiya) told President George Bush in January 2003 that U.S. soldiers would be greeted "with sweets and flowers" upon entering Iraq.

And yesterday Bremer said in a statement




Besides, now the Danes have A WMD problem, too:
SOURCE