THE US, THE UN AND THE IRAQIS THEMSELVES, V. 7.0

The Fix Isn't In
Speaking in Alabama yesterday, President Bush repeated a familiar claim: "We're fixing the deficit." It doesn't matter how many times he says it - it's still not true. In fact, the President's most recent proposed budget would make the federal deficit much worse. A March 4 analysis by the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) reveals the President's budget would increase the deficit by $1.6 Trillion over the next ten years. Most of the additional shortfall is a result of Bush's proposal to extend his 2001 and 2003 tax cuts for the rich. According to the CBO, new tax cuts proposed by Bush "would increase the deficit by more than $1.5 trillion in 2006 through 2015." Even these bleak numbers understate the scope of the fiscal crisis. The President's budget excludes all costs for continued operations in Iraq and Afghanistan - expected to cost at least $300 billion over the next 10 years - so do the CBO estimates. The fact is, President Bush's policies are leaving an enormous tab that future generations will have to pick up. And he's not being honest about it.

Friday, 11 March, 2005

Poles held in Iraq bribe inquiry

Polish authorities have arrested five officers suspected of taking bribes while serving in Iraq.
They were allegedly receiving money from companies hoping to be granted reconstruction contracts.

The Polish defence ministry said two of them had been caught red-handed as they returned from Iraq in early February with $90,000 (£46,706).

Armed forces prosecutors are currently leading the preliminary phase of an investigation into the scandal.

The officers, including a colonel and two majors, are thought to have accepted money from both US and Iraqi companies.

They were stopped at a Polish airport upon returning from Iraq and could not explain where the money had come from, the Polish authorities said.

Two civilian workers have also been arrested as part of the same investigation.

Meanwhile, Poland's President Aleksander Kwasniewski told a news conference on Friday that troops were likely to be withdrawn from Iraq by the end of the year.

"We are confident that 2005 will be a decisive year, and will allow either a withdrawal or a significant reduction of the Polish presence," he said.

"But in a question so important, you can't make decisions irresponsibly or tendentiously - certain countries have made such decisions overnight, and I don't think that helped stability in Iraq," he added.

Poland has 1,700 soldiers in Iraq, and leads a multinational security force south of Baghdad.

Meanwhile, Poland's President Aleksander Kwasniewski told a news conference on Friday that troops were likely to be withdrawn from Iraq by the end of the year.

"We are confident that 2005 will be a decisive year, and will allow either a withdrawal or a significant reduction of the Polish presence," he said.

"But in a question so important, you can't make decisions irresponsibly or tendentiously - certain countries have made such decisions overnight, and I don't think that helped stability in Iraq," he added.

Poland has 1,700 soldiers in Iraq, and leads a multinational security force south of Baghdad

REUTERS: Italian minister rebukes hostage shot by US troops
11 Mar 2005 21:06:30 GMT
Phil Stewart

Italy's justice minister urged former hostage Giuliana Sgrena on Friday to stop making"careless" accusations after being shot by US forces in Baghdad, saying she had already caused enough grief.

Sgrena has repeatedly suggested US soldiers shot her on purpose and said on Friday she had little faith in a joint investigation by Italy and the United States into the "friendly fire" incident.

"She has created enormous problems for the government and also caused grief that perhaps was better avoided," JusticeMinister Roberto Castelli told reporters in Bologna.

Italian intelligence agent Nicola Calipari was shot dead by U.S. forces as he shielded the newly freed hostage while taking her to the airport.

Sgrena herself said in interviews this week that had she been more cautious in Baghdad, she perhaps would not have been kidnapped in the first place.

The award-winning war reporter, who works for Communist newspaper Il Manifesto, was abducted as she conducted interviews outside Baghdad University and held for a month.

Many Italians have been irked by her descriptions of her kidnappers. She said they were not killers and that she may have over-dramatised her videotaped appeal from captivity for Italy to withdraw its 3,000 troops from Iraq.

She sobbed in the video and begged her family and the government to do something to save her life.

"Sgrena, I think, should perhaps be more careful. She has said a load of nonsense, speaks somewhat carelessly and makes careless comments," Castelli said.

The US army says Sgrena's vehicle sped toward the checkpoint outside the airport and ignored warning shots, an explanation rejected by Rome and the car's driver.

Italy's centre-right government, while rejecting any hint that the shooting was intentional, has until now largely refrained from directly criticising Sgrena.

Sgrena has told ANSA news agency she does not expect official inquiries into the incident to produce results "because we know how they end up".

She also complained of being treated unfairly.

"I feel like I'm being accused for being kidnapped and then saved," Sgrena said, speaking from a Rome hospital, where she is undergoing treatment for her injuries.

Ican, you wrote in boldface type:-
The lies are emphasized here in boldface by me.
So presumably as its in boldface, that was a lie. That means the lies were not emphasised or you didn't emphasise them. Or it was one of those funny sentences with a built in logical paradox, e.g. "I always lie".
Do you always lie? And if so, how do we know?

"Did not believe?" NOw, how the fxxx you gonna prove that? All we know is that 1) we had UN weapon's inspectors looking for those weapons when Bush forced them our of Iraq, 2) Bush said "Satellite photographs reveal that Iraq is rebuilding facilities at sites that have been part of its nuclear program in the past." Colin Powell even showed those photographs to the UN Security Council, and claimed we knew the location of those weapons, 3) he continued to REPEAT THOSE LIES when the intelligence community insisted that the information was weak and unreliable, because they have not been independently reconfirmed by our intel, and 4) he lied to congress. Senator Diane Feinstein said they were lied to; that most of the Democrats who voted for war would not have done so if they did not hear those lies.

He opened his mouth and words came out, proof enough!

Ican, you wrote in boldface type:-
The lies are emphasized here in boldface by me.
So presumably as its in boldface, that was a lie. That means the lies were not emphasised or you didn't emphasise them. Or it was one of those funny sentences with a built in logical paradox, e.g. "I always lie".
Do you always lie? And if so, how do we know?

"Did not believe?" NOw, how the fxxx you gonna prove that? All we know is that 1) we had UN weapon's inspectors looking for those weapons when Bush forced them our of Iraq, 2) Bush said "Satellite photographs reveal that Iraq is rebuilding facilities at sites that have been part of its nuclear program in the past." Colin Powell even showed those photographs to the UN Security Council, and claimed we knew the location of those weapons, 3) he continued to REPEAT THOSE LIES when the intelligence community insisted that the information was weak and unreliable, because they have not been independently reconfirmed by our intel, and 4) he lied to congress. Senator Diane Feinstein said they were lied to; that most of the Democrats who voted for war would not have done so if they did not hear those lies.