THE US, THE UN AND IRAQ, TENTH THREAD.

How about we:
-Remove Bush and his cronies from leadership before things can get worse?
...
Cycloptichorn

Kurdish leader bans Iraqi flag
Abdelhamid Zebari
AFP
September 1, 2006

ARBIL, Iraq -- The leader of northern Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region has ordered officials not to fly the Iraqi national flag, in a further sign of the country's separatist tensions.

"According to the Kurdistan Administration of Iraq's decree number 60, we decide to hoist the flag of Iraqi Kurdistan officially on all offices and government institutions in the Kurdistan region," a statement from Kurdish President Massud Barzani's office in Arbil said Friday.

The order said that "regions in Iraq's Kurdistan which have been hoisting the Baathist flag should lower it and hoist only the Kurdistan flag."

Iraq's Kurdish minority associates Iraq's red, white, and black banner with the ousted leader Saddam Hussein's hated Baath party, although it has been retained as the national flag by the post-Saddam government in Baghdad.

On May 7 the Kurdish administrations of Arbil and Sulaimaniyah provinces were united with one parliament and government for the whole of the northern Kurdish region, which enjoys broad self-rule.

Before unification some official buildings in the Sulaimaniyah region - which was ruled by Iraqi President Jalal Talabani's Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) - used to hoist the Iraqi flag along with the PUK party flag.

Barzani's Arbil administration never hoisted the Iraqi flag.

Last year Barzani, the current leader of the Kurdish region, said that Iraq's flag "dates back to 1963 since when many pogroms and mass-killings were committed in its name. Therefore, it is impossible to hoist this flag in Kurdistan."

Iraq's Kurdish minority has enjoyed wide autonomy since Saddam's defeat in the 1991 Gulf War over Kuwait and strongly supported the 2003 US-led invasion which unseated him.

Since Saddam's fall Kurdish politicians have taken part in national politics and put their historic demands for independence on hold but, as violence rages around the country, separatist tensions remain high.

In April 2004 the then interim government of Iraq attempted to resolve the controversy over the flag, which is emblazoned with three green stars and the legend "God is greatest," by proposing a new national banner.

The new blue and white design, however, caused much controversy - some felt that it was too close to the Israeli flag - and it was swiftly abandoned.

Most Arab Iraqis accept the 1963 design as their national flag, although the design of the Islamic slogan - which was reportedly based on Saddam's own handwriting - has been changed to a generic typeface.

Kurdistan's banner is three red, white, and green horizontal bars emblazoned with a golden sun motif. It flies across the Kurdish region over government buildings and military bases.

Some Kurdish official bodies fly Iraq's 1958-63 flag, which was Abdel Karim Qassim's republic after he overthrew the monarchy in preference to the later Iraqi symbol and its Baathist associations.

ican,

The date IBQ updates their numbers has nothing to do with the month people are killed in. It only is the date that a death was added to their database.

Who or what is IBQ? The data I post comes from IBC (i.e., Iraq Body Count).

On May 7th, 2006 IBQ added roughly 1390-1420 deaths because they added both the Feb and March morgue numbers that day. I notice you don't use May as a seperate month. What was your total for the end of March?

Your statements mischaracterize what IBC does and what I do with what IBC does. IBC posts the actual dates of violent civilian deaths as well as the dates of the morgue reports when it posts morgue reports. In August for example, IBC posted this:

[quote="IBC"]
k3703 18 Aug 2006 -
19 Aug 2006 overnight Muqdadiya - gunfire 1 1 VOI 19 Aug
KUNA 19 Aug
k3702 19 Aug 2006 - Mosul police patrol sniper fire 1 1 REU 19 Aug
NYT 20 Aug
x589 28 Apr 2006 -
4 May 2006 - near Taji Rafet Ibrahim "kidnapped and killed" 1 1 AFP 06 May
DPA 05 Jun
(morgue)
x588 2 May 2006 -
4 May 2006 - Resident of Sadr City: body found at Baghdad city morgue Ali Hassan al-Duri gunfire; also "signs of electric shocks on his body" 1 1 AFP 06 May
DPA 05 Jun
(morgue)

FROM IBC DAILY COUNTS AS OF August 24, 2006
http://www.iraqbodycount.org/database/

01/01/2003 through 12/31/2005 = 36,859; 36,859 / 36 = about 1,024 per month;

01/01/2003 through 05/31/2006 = 42,922;

01/01/2003 through 06/30/2006 = 43,778;

01/01/2003 through 07/31/2006 = 44,911;

01/01/2006 through 05/31/2006 = 42,922 - 36,859 = 6,063;

January 2006 = 6,063 / 5 = about 1,213;

February 2006 = 6,063 / 5 = about 1,213;

March 2006 = 6,063 / 5 = about 1,213;

April 2006 = 6,063 / 5 = about 1,213;

May 2006 = 6,063 / 5 = about 1,213;

June 2006 = 43,778 - 42,922 = 856;

July 2006 = 44,911 - 43,778 = 1133;

01/01/2003 through 08/24/2006 = 45,613;

08/01/2003 through 08/24/2006 = 45,613 - 44,911 = 702; (702 / 24) x 31 = about 907.

Iraqi forces have taken full military control of only one province so far -- Muthanna, in a relatively calm area of southern Iraq -- but Maliki said they would soon take security responsibility of the area around Diwaniyah, in Qadisiyah province.

Idiocy, to compare Soros to Bush.

That's really out there for you, Ican.

Cycloptichorn

The Constitution of the United States of America
Effective as of March 4, 1789
...
Article III
...
Section 3. Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort. No person shall be convicted of treason unless on the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act, or on confession in open court.

The Congress shall have power to declare the punishment of treason, but no attainder of treason shall work corruption of blood, or forfeiture except during the life of the person attainted.

How many of those Iraqi units are capable of taking control of a whole providence completely on their own? Answer, one.
...

What People Believe

By Charley Reese

05/28/06 "Information Clearing House" -- -- How do you persuade a man who has a wife and children and who works hard but can barely make ends meet to take a pay cut and go do something that has a high probability of getting him killed or seriously injured?

Clearly, it is not in a man's self-interest to go to a foreign country and fight in a war, the outcome of which won't affect him or his family. So how do you persuade him to do it?

The answer lies in the nature of the human being. We are mind-directed creatures. We act on the basis of our beliefs. Therefore, if you can control what people believe, you can control what they do. That's the whole purpose of advertising, for example ?- to instill in people's minds the belief that a product or service will be beneficial to them.

Persuading people to go to war is much more complicated and involves identity, which is constructed of beliefs. When we are born, we don't know who we are or where we are. We only know we've just been pushed out of the warm womb into the drafty world of giants who can pick us up by our feet and whack our backsides. We protest the only way we can - by yelling.

The first beliefs that will come to constitute our identity come from parents or caregivers. Any psychiatrist can tell you how important these beliefs are and how difficult they are to shed. Then we begin to add more from our peers, from the culture and from education. So, we learn we are Americans, and just what are Americans? Well, we are told about that largely through history, through stories told by our own family and stories we read or see in the movies.

And once we identify ourselves as Americans, then we will act as we believe Americans, as we have defined them, ought to act. It was not in my self-interest to go into the Army. I had a good job. I had already decided against the military as a career. But, as an American, I believed it was my duty, so I went, and if the Army had said to go to Vietnam, I would have gone without question. My identity as an American was based on my beliefs, and part of those beliefs was that every American had a duty to take his turn on watch.

Millions of men have gone to war because, as Americans or British or French or Germans or Russians or Japanese, they believed it was their duty. The danger lies in the fact that unscrupulous men, through misrepresentation and propaganda, can motivate people to go to war even though it is not in their country's interest, much less their own. Unless there is an invader threatening one's home and hearth, it is never in the interest of an individual to go war ?- unless he decides to be a mercenary.

It is an evil paradox that men with the lowest motives can launch wars by appealing to the highest ideals of better men.

The millions killed in all the wars were nobodies as far as the leaders who sent them into war were concerned. They were cannon fodder. They all shared in common the fact that their political leaders were willing to sacrifice them for greed or ego. For all practical purposes, all of the dead in wars are unknown soldiers in the war leaders' eyes. The dead are known only to the people who loved them.

The trick is to remember to make the distinction between America in the abstract and America in reality. The America in the abstract is made up of all our experiences, memories, stories, legends and myths. The America in reality consists of what exists right at this moment.

And what exists right at this moment is a corrupt federal government with a foolish man in the White House. What exists at this moment is a military-industrial complex with a vested interest in war and conflict. What exists at this moment are unnecessary wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. What exists at this moment is a government solicitous of corporate welfare, but one that doesn't give a hoot about the individual American.

Rudyard Kipling said it so well when in a poem he wrote: "If any question why we died / Tell them, because our fathers lied." Be alert when you hear politicians talk about abstractions like patriotism, national security and international stability. They are trying to control you by controlling your mind.

Perhaps we should take Venezuela. :wink:

Pentagon: Conditions exist for civil war in Iraq
Report says violence is spreading but still can be quelled
MSNBC News Services

Updated: 8:33 p.m. ET Sept 2, 2006

WASHINGTON - Conditions that could lead to a civil war exist in Iraq, reflecting the "most complex" security challenges since the U.S. invasion in 2003, the Pentagon said Friday.

The "core conflict" has changed into one pitting Sunni Muslims against Shiites, with the Sunni Arab insurgency overshadowed, it said in a quarterly report to Congress on U.S. efforts to stabilize the country.

In the notably gloomy report, The Pentagon said illegal militias have become more entrenched, especially in Baghdad neighborhoods where they are seen as providers of security as well as basic social services.

The report described a rising tide of sectarian violence, fed in part by interference from neighboring Iran and Syria and driven by a "vocal minority" of religious extremists who oppose the idea of a democratic Iraq.

Death squads targeting mainly Iraqi civilians are a growing problem, heightening the risk of civil war, it said.

"Death squads and terrorists are locked in mutually reinforcing cycles of sectarian strife," the report said, adding that the Sunni-led insurgency "remains potent and viable" even as it is overshadowed by the sect-on-sect killing.

"Conditions that could lead to civil war exist in Iraq, specifically in and around Baghdad, and concern about civil war within the Iraqi civilian population has increased in recent months," the report stated.

That assessment, which has been expressed publicly by U.S. military commanders and others in recent weeks, was tempered by a degree of optimism that the Iraqi government ?- with support from U.S. troops ?- will succeed in quelling the sectarian strife. Optimism among ordinary Iraqis, however, has declined, the 63-page report said.

Attacks up by 15 percent
The report provided a sober assessment of the situation in Iraq over the past three months, saying attacks increased by 15 percent over the prior three months and casualties among Iraqis surged 51 percent.

Peter Rodman, the assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs, told reporters that although there has been progress this summer in reviving the Iraqi economy and raising electricity production, the security conditions have deteriorated even as the number of trained Iraqi troops has increased.

The report covered the period since the Iraqi government led by Prime Minister Nouri al-Malaki was seated May 20.

"The last quarter, as you know has been rough," Rodman said. "The levels of violence are up and the sectarian quality of the violence is particularly acute and disturbing."

Rising sectarian fighting between minority Sunnis, who controlled Iraq under Saddam Hussein, and the majority Shiites, who are ascending in power after decades of oppression, defines the emerging nature of violence in Iraq, the report stated.

When asked whether they believe "things will be better" in the future, the percentage of Iraqis responding positively has dropped fairly consistently over the past year ?- whether they were asked to look ahead six months, one year or five years ?- according to polling data cited in the report.

The report is the first to Congress since the Iraqi government assembled its full slate of ministers in early June. Since then, sectarian tensions have increased, "manifested in an increasing number of execution-style killings, kidnappings and attacks on civilians" and growing numbers of people forced from their homes, it said.

Spreading outside Baghdad
It said sectarian violence has spread from Baghdad into Diyala and Kirkuk provinces north of the capital. It also cited a rising problem with violence in the predominantly Shiite southern region, especially in the city of Basra.

"The security situation is currently at its most complex state since the initiation of Operation Iraq Freedom," the report said, using the U.S. military's name for the war that was launched in March 2003 to topple Saddam Hussein.

Although it acknowledged the risk of civil war, the report said the current violence does not amount to civil war and asserted momentum toward a civil war can be stopped.

"Breaking the cycle of violence is the most pressing goal of coalition and Iraqi operations," it said.

The release of the report comes as the Bush administration pursues a campaign to bolster sagging U.S. public support, with Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and others attacking critics two months before U.S. congressional elections.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14622992/

ICAN PREDICTIONS MADE IN JUNE 2006

1,050 Iraqi civilians died violently in June 2006.

950 Iraqi civilians died violently in July 2006.

850 Iraqi civilians died violently in August 2006.

http://libertyonline.hypermall.com/Paine/Crisis/Crisis-TOC.html

The American Crisis
by Thomas Paine
(1776 - 1783)
...
I shall conclude this paper with some miscellaneous remarks on the state of our affairs; and shall begin with asking the following question, Why is it that the enemy have left the New England provinces, and made these middle ones the seat of war? The answer is easy: New England is not infested with Tories, and we are. I have been tender in raising the cry against these men, and used numberless arguments to show them their danger, but it will not do to sacrifice a world either to their folly or their baseness. The period is now arrived, in which either they or we must change our sentiments, or one or both must fall. And what is a Tory? Good God! what is he? I should not be afraid to go with a hundred Whigs against a thousand Tories, were they to attempt to get into arms. Every Tory is a coward; for servile, slavish, self-interested fear is the foundation of Toryism; and a man under such influence, though he may be cruel, never can be brave.

But, before the line of irrecoverable separation be drawn between us, let us reason the matter together: Your conduct is an invitation to the enemy, yet not one in a thousand of you has heart enough to join him. Howe is as much deceived by you as the American cause is injured by you. He expects you will all take up arms, and flock to his standard, with muskets on your shoulders. Your opinions are of no use to him, unless you support him personally, for 'tis soldiers, and not Tories, that he wants.

I once felt all that kind of anger, which a man ought to feel, against the mean principles that are held by the Tories: a noted one, who kept a tavern at Amboy, was standing at his door, with as pretty a child in his hand, about eight or nine years old, as I ever saw, and after speaking his mind as freely as he thought was prudent, finished with this unfatherly expression, "Well! give me peace in my day." Not a man lives on the continent but fully believes that a separation must some time or other finally take place, and a generous parent should have said, "If there must be trouble, let it be in my day, that my child may have peace;" and this single reflection, well applied, is sufficient to awaken every man to duty. Not a place upon earth might be so happy as America. Her situation is remote from all the wrangling world, and she has nothing to do but to trade with them. A man can distinguish himself between temper and principle, and I am as confident, as I am that God governs the world, that America will never be happy till she gets clear of foreign dominion. Wars, without ceasing, will break out till that period arrives, and the continent must in the end be conqueror; for though the flame of liberty may sometimes cease to shine, the coal can never expire.

America did not, nor does not want force; but she wanted a proper application of that force. Wisdom is not the purchase of a day, and it is no wonder that we should err at the first setting off. From an excess of tenderness, we were unwilling to raise an army, and trusted our cause to the temporary defence of a well-meaning militia. A summer's experience has now taught us better; yet with those troops, while they were collected, we were able to set bounds to the progress of the enemy, and, thank God! they are again assembling. I always considered militia as the best troops in the world for a sudden exertion, but they will not do for a long campaign. Howe, it is probable, will make an attempt on this city [Philadelphia]; should he fail on this side the Delaware, he is ruined. If he succeeds, our cause is not ruined. He stakes all on his side against a part on ours; admitting he succeeds, the consequence will be, that armies from both ends of the continent will march to assist their suffering friends in the middle states; for he cannot go everywhere, it is impossible. I consider Howe as the greatest enemy the Tories have; he is bringing a war into their country, which, had it not been for him and partly for themselves, they had been clear of. Should he now be expelled, I wish with all the devotion of a Christian, that the names of Whig and Tory may never more be mentioned; but should the Tories give him encouragement to come, or assistance if he come, I as sincerely wish that our next year's arms may expel them from the continent, and the Congress appropriate their possessions to the relief of those who have suffered in well-doing. A single successful battle next year will settle the whole. America could carry on a two years' war by the confiscation of the property of disaffected persons, and be made happy by their expulsion. Say not that this is revenge, call it rather the soft resentment of a suffering people, who, having no object in view but the good of all, have staked their own all upon a seemingly doubtful event. Yet it is folly to argue against determined hardness; eloquence may strike the ear, and the language of sorrow draw forth the tear of compassion, but nothing can reach the heart that is steeled with prejudice.
...

Cycloptichorn wrote:

Idiocy, to compare Soros to Bush.

That's really out there for you, Ican.

Cycloptichorn

You are right! George Soros has been many orders of magnitude more destructive than George Bush. One order of magnitude in this context is a factor of 10.

George Soros and the faithful adherents to his particular gospel of pseudology (i.e., falsity or lying), have encouraged IT to keep on killing non-combatants, and have thereby made the Afghanistan and Iraq efforts to secure democracies there, far more difficult and deadly than they would have been had he early on been removed from control of the Democratic party. I'll give that damn pseudology gospel an acronym: GSPG = George Soros Pseudology Gospel.

IT = Islamo Totalitarians (e.g., Fatah, Hamas, Hezbollah, al-Qaeda, Taliban, Baathists).

GSPG gives "aid and comfort" to IT, the enemy of humanity in general and of Americans in particular.

emphasis by ican

Quote:

The Constitution of the United States of America
Effective as of March 4, 1789
...
Article III
...
Section 3. Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort. No person shall be convicted of treason unless on the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act, or on confession in open court.

The Congress shall have power to declare the punishment of treason, but no attainder of treason shall work corruption of blood, or forfeiture except during the life of the person attainted.