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Saturday, January 06, 2007

McCain: The War Candidate…

Associated Press LIZ SIDOTI January 6, 2007 10:10 AM

Sen. John McCain (news, bio, voting record)'s call for a substantial and sustained influx of U.S. troops in Iraq sets the Republican apart from other White House candidates -- and it could help him or haunt him come 2008.

The Arizona senator's hawkish position that the United States must do what is necessary to win the war might appeal to hard-core Republicans, but it also has the potential to turn off most Americans whose support for the nearly 4-year-old war has diminished.

READ FULL STORY

Cavuto Battles Frank: ‘Congressman, Is It Always Incumbent Upon You To Be So Condescending?’

Good for you Bernie, some Democratic balls on Faux, or shoud I say some Independant Balls on Faux, hope some more come out of the woodworks
Incumbent Upon You To Be So Condescending?’

Fox News anchor Neil Cavuto had a fiery exchange with House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank (D-MA) this week. Early on in the interview, Frank criticized Cavuto for repeatedly cutting him off. “If you’re going to interrupt every five words, we don’t have a show.”

Frank also took exception to Cavuto’s suggestion that Frank was in favor of arbitrary caps on CEO pay. “I’ve never said that. I can’t deal with all of your distortions here,” Frank said. Cavuto hit back: “Congressman, is it always incumbent upon you to be so condescending or do you just want to answer my question?”

BUSH IRAQ PLAN: Dead On Arrival...

The New York Times DAVID E. SANGER January 6, 2007 02:52 PM

President Bush's new Iraq strategy calls for a rapid influx of forces that could add as many as 20,000 American combat troops to Baghdad, supplemented with a jobs program costing as much as $1 billion intended to employ Iraqis in projects including painting schools and cleaning streets, according to American officials who are piecing together the last parts of the initiative.

The American officials said that Iraq's prime minister, Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, formally agreed in a long teleconference on Thursday with Mr. Bush to match the American troop increase, made up of five combat brigades that would come in at a rate of roughly one a month, by sending three additional Iraqi brigades to Baghdad over the next month and a half.

READ FULL STORY

Does ExxonMobil Pay the New York Times a Premium to Run Ads Next to Global Warming Stories?

Right next to a NYT story that begins:

A giant ice shelf has snapped free from an island south of the North Pole, scientists said Thursday, citing climate change as a ''major'' reason for the event. The Ayles Ice Shelf -- all 41 square miles of it -- broke clear 16 months ago from the coast of Ellesmere Island, about 500 miles south of the North Pole in the Canadian Arctic.

Is an ad for the company that's done more than any other to fund global warming denialists (as a Mother Jones story nominated for a National Magazine Award reported last year):
Why not take wastes that would end up in landfills and recycle them so they end up as roads? Learn more about our committment to the environment. ExxonMobil: Taking on the world's toughest energy challenges.

So I've noticed this is a pattern with ExxonMobil, which seems to always just happen to run a corporate responsibility ad next to NYT op-eds and stories that have to do with global warming. So is the NYT ad sales staff selling against this content? Does ExxonMobil have a standing request to place ads next to global warming content? Or is it all a coincidence? (And don't forget that ExxonMobil also sponsored all the major election coverage in 2006. Maybe because it didn't like the fact that lawmakers were beginning to stand up to it.)
Back to this particular ad. Follow impact.

More outrageous is the list of links on this page to other of ExxonMobil's good works, including...wait for it..."Promoting math and science in the classroom." This from the company that funds 40 think tanks that expressly deny the science of global warming.
What are these efforts that ExxonMobil is making to addle, uh, improve the minds of our children? Further down the line of links we learn that:

Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Rex Tillerson made the announcement in Dallas on Oct. 6, where he was joined by PGA Tour golfer Phil Mickelson, astronaut Dr. Bernard Harris and several prominent educators. The first step in ExxonMobil’s expanded educational outreach is to significantly broaden the scope of programs founded by Mickelson and Harris and supported by the company.

ExxonMobil will add new sessions of the Bernard Harris Summer Science Camps, providing funding to universities for 20 camps across the U.S. Designed to enhance students’ knowledge in science, technology, engineering and mathematics, camp activities include classroom study, experiments, individual/team/group projects, weekly field excursions and guest speakers who motivate and inspire students.

The Mickelson ExxonMobil Teachers’ Academy, launched in 2005 as an annual event in Fairfax, Va., will expand to new academies in Texas and Louisiana. The Academy was created to provide selected third- through fifth-grade teachers from school districts around the country an opportunity to enhance their math and science teaching skills, and discover new ways to motivate their students. With the new locations, 600 teachers will have an opportunity to attend the academies annually.

In addition to expanding its support of the Harris and Mickelson programs, ExxonMobil announced continued funding for Reasoning Mind, Inc., and UTeach. Reasoning Mind is developing an innovative Internet-based learning environment for fifth- and sixth-grade math students. UTeach is a unique University of Texas program that prepares and supports secondary math and science teachers.

So, helping ExxonMobil (at best) whitewash its horrible environmental image and (at worst) spread misinformation to teachers and students is a champion golfer, an astronaut, and UT.

Hook 'em horns!

By the way, that ice shelf? That's really bad news. Read more about what it means here and here.

Mother Jones

Haditha Documents: Marine Officials Did Not Launch Investigation For Months...

Washington Post Josh White January 6, 2007 10:24 AM

U.S. Marines gunned down five unarmed Iraqis who stumbled onto the scene of a 2005 roadside bombing in Haditha, Iraq, according to eyewitness accounts that are part of a lengthy investigative report obtained by The Washington Post.

Staff Sgt. Frank D. Wuterich, the squad's leader, shot the men one by one after Marines ordered them out of a white taxi in the moments following the explosion, which killed one Marine and injured two others, witnesses told investigators. Another Marine fired rounds into their bodies as they lay on the ground.

READ FULL STORY

Supreme Court Hits The Talk Shows In Unprecedented Publicity Blitz...

Washington Post Robert Barnes January 6, 2007 12:02 PM

The "rare public address" by a member of the U.S. Supreme Court isn't so rare anymore.
Just in the past few months, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has invited television interrogator Mike Wallace into her chambers for a well-mannered chat. Justice Antonin Scalia has turned up at a sold-out breakfast meeting of the Northern Virginia Technology Council and mixed it up with the American Civil Liberties Union, and he has publicly debated the Constitution with fellow justice -- but not kindred spirit -- Stephen G. Breyer. Breyer has promoted his book "Active Liberty" on "Fox News Sunday" with the other television interrogator named Wallace, Chris.

READ FULL STORY

The Surge to Nowhere: Traveling the Planet Neocon Road to Baghdad (Again)

Robert Dreyfuss, TomDispatch.com

... That may be too much to ask for a Christian-crusader President, still lodged inside a bubble universe and determined to crush all evil-doers. And it may be too clever by half for an administration that has been as utterly inept as this one. At the same time, it may also be too much to expect that the Democrats will really go to the mat to fight Bush if, Kagan-style, he orders a surge that is "long and large." Maybe they will merely posture and fulminate and threaten to … well, hold hearings. If so, it will be the Iraqis who end the war. It will be the Iraqis who eventually kill enough Americans to break the U.S. political will, and it will be the Iraqis who sweep away the ruins of the Maliki government to replace it with an anti-American, anti-U.S.- occupation government in Iraq...

continua / continued

Fly me to the Moon & other "luminous"stories...

An Arab Woman Blues ...Today I stumbled on a piece of news traced back to the Jerusalem Post. Hold your breath and hear this : Israelis are rushing to "buy" (makes a nice change huh!) plots of land on the Moon. Eretz Israel is not content with having colonized and illegally appropriated Palestinian Land, thus rendering millions refugees or in Ghettos, nor is it satisfied with it's ever expanding map from the Niles to the Euphrates. Now it has decided to take over the moon too.Next thing you will hear is that being the "chosen" people , they will take over The Divine throne as well, claiming it to be theirs. Want to hear another "luminous" story ? Someone drew my attention that my name and blog were mentioned in Haaretz, another Israeli newspaper. Finally, I have reached fame and glory in the Zionist press ! Am I lucky or am I lucky ? Wait, don't get over excited. Hear what they have to say first. Referring to my post dedicated to the President of Iraq Saddam Hussein, Zvi Ba'rel in an article entitled "And now the fight for his Memory" stated that : "Anwar is a Saddam denier- reported my Egyptian friend who is in charge of monitoring blogs reacting to Saddam's Execution." Then the "friend" advised his Israeli "friend" Zvi Ba'rel saying :"She's no better than all the Holocaust deniers. People like her poison the public"...

continua / continued

Thug Bones in Bushland and Babylon

Thursday, 04 January 2007
Updated below.

George Bush lauded the hanging of Saddam Hussein as a hallmark of Iraq's efforts to create "a society governed by rule of law." But as both Steve Gilliard and Juan Cole note, Saddam was not actually hanged by the "sovereign" Iraqi government at all; he was turned over to the Mahdi Army militia of Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, religious Chekists in black leather jackets and black masks -- and the very people that Bush's viceroys say are the main instigators of the murderous violence roiling the Leader's Babylonian satrapy today.

Now, of course, there is an "investigation" afoot of how Saddam's execution was botched so badly, and how he was allowed to comport himself as a dignified martyr being sacrificed for the nation by crude thugs on one of Islam's holiest days. Or rather, there is the usual whitewash going on in which a bit of low-hanging fruit -- in this case, a guard -- will be thrown to the dogs while the true culprits escape accountability. Yet the fact remains: Saddam -- who had been a murderous blunderer throughout his reign, not unlike a certain brush-cutting goober from Crawford -- managed to pull off a PR masterstroke at the end. The level of sheer idiocy and incompetence it would take to make Saddam look good even for a nano-second is almost inconceivable; yet the remarkable Mr. Bush and his team were obviously up to the challenge.

Meanwhile Gilliard makes the telling observation that there is no essential difference between the Sadr forces and the Iraqi "government" anymore. Everything that Bush does to aid the Iraqi "government" merely augments the power of its various sectarian militias, the Sadrists above all. (Gilliard has long been penetrating, and prescient, on Sadr's role as kingmaker -- and perhaps future "king" -- in Iraq.) Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki -- the hardline leader of an extremist sectarian party that once made war directly on the United States and killed several Americans, but who is now, both Bush and Blair agree, "our guy" -- not only gave Saddam to the Sadrists to kill; he gave the very rope that hanged Saddam to Muqtada as a keepsake, as Cole reports.

But there is nothing really new in this. Bush has been backing death squads, sectarian militias and religious extremists throughout the war. As I noted in a post (Death Mask: The Deliberate Destruction of Iraq) in 2005:

Chris Floyd

Late Chief Justice William Rehnquist: Going senile or high as a kite?

January 6-7, 2006 -- The late Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist often astonished his fellow congregants at the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer in McLean, Virginia. Some commented that during his last ten years on the bench Rehnquist seemed to be "going senile."

With the FBI's release of 1,561 pages of its investigation of Rehnquist's drug dependency, we now know that the Chief Justice, appointed to the court in 1972 and elevated to Chief Justice in 1986, was dependent on the highly-addictive drug Placidyl, a pain killer he used for his back problems. The files show that Rehnquist underwent detox at George Washington University Hospital in 1981 and suffered from paranoid delusions, claiming, at one point, that CIA agents were outside his hospital room and plotting against him. He tried to escape from the hospital in his pyjamas. (The first Secretary of Defense, James Forrestal, committed suicide at Bethesda Naval Hospital in 1949 after uttering similar paranoid comments about the FBI and "Zionist agents" trying to kill him). The files also show that John Bolton, then a Justice Department official, gathered the names of anti-Rehnquist Senate confirmation witnesses in 1986 and turned them over to the FBI for investigation.
Late Chief Justice William Rehnquist: Going senile or high as a kite?

Although not a member of Rehnquist's congregation, Bolton is also a Lutheran. Although the FBI files state that Rehnquist was detoxed in 1981, that does not explain his strange behavior throughout the 1990s, an indication that his drug dependency may have continued long after his hospital stay in 1981.

Wayne Madsen Report

More Severely-Wounded Troops Being Saved by Battlefield Medics Than in Previous Wars

Bush surrounds himself with war supporters

Tim Reid, Washington

Top two generals in Iraq replaced

Divisions persist over more troops
President Bush yesterday began an overhaul of his top military and diplomatic teams as he prepared to announce a highly controversial increase of 20,000 US troops in Iraq. He is to replace his two senior generals in Iraq, both said to be sceptical about increasing troop numbers, and he has also reshuffled his national security and foreign policy teams.

The moves are part of a broad mission to surround himself, both in Washington and on the ground in Iraq, with officials who support increasing troop numbers, a move largely opposed on Capitol Hill and among the American public.

Mr Bush is also beefing up his White House legal team in anticipation of a blizzard of Iraq-related subpoenas expected to be issued by the new Democrat-controlled Congress. On Thursday he accepted the resignation of Harriet Miers, his White House counsel, after aides expressed doubts about her ability to push back against what Democrats have promised will be vigorous oversight of the war’s management.

Mr Bush has also hired an extra four assistant White House counsel in recent weeks. Ms Miers’s position is expected to be filled by a heavyweight capable of resisting the looming Democrat onslaught.

Reuters: Police ambushed after 27 bodies found in Baghdad

06 Jan 2007 12:44:42 GMT
Source: Reuters

BAGHDAD, Jan 6 (Reuters) - Iraqi police clashed with gunmen in central Baghdad
on Saturday when they went to investigate a report that 27 bodies had been
found in one location near a cemetery, police and interior ministry sources said.

Dozens of bodies are found every day around Baghdad, many tortured and shot
dead, the victims of militia death squads.

A source at Baghdad police headquarters said local police in the area near Haifa
Street, in central Baghdad, had found 27 bodies and called in reinforcements.
When they arrived, they came under fire from gunmen.

The police source said they then called in support from U.S. forces. An interior
ministry source also said there had been clashes in the area.

LinkHere

Also 47 bodies found in Baghdad Friday according to Reuters:

FACTBOX-Security developments in Iraq, Jan 6

Moscow slams U.S. sanctions on its military firms

Russia accused the United States on Saturday of illegally imposing sanctions on some Russian military firms which Washington says were cooperating with Iran and Syria.

"This is by far not the first time the U.S. resorts to illegal attempts to spread its internal legislation on foreign companies and force them to abide by the U.S. rules," Russia's Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

It said the U.S. decision was taken on Friday against several private individuals and companies in Russia, including state arms trader Rosoboronexport.

Rosoboronexport, one of the world's biggest arms traders, has recently won control of the Russian firm VSMPO-Avisma, the world's largest titanium producer. It is a key supplier of titanium parts to U.S. aviation giant Boeing and Europe's EADS.

LinkHere

New Facts Emerge in Iraqi Slayings Case

New Details Emerge in the Marine Killings of 24 Iraqi
Civilians After 2005 Bombing in Haditha
WASHINGTON Jan 6, 2007 (AP)— A Marine squad that had just endured casualties
from a roadside bombing ordered five unarmed Iraqi civilians out of a taxi, and the
squad leader shot them one by one, witnesses have told naval investigators.

Four Marines have been charged in the deaths of 24 civilians, including women and
children, that occurred immediately after a bombing in Haditha on Nov. 19, 2005,
killed one Marine and injured two others. In addition, four officers who were not
there during the killings but were accused of failures in investigating and reporting
the deaths have been charged.

According to one witness, quoted in the report by the Naval Criminal Investigative
Service obtained by The Washington Post, a white taxi happened upon the scene
shortly after the explosion. The Marines' squad leader, Staff Sgt. Frank D. Wuterich,
ordered the passengers, five unarmed Iraqis, out of the car, witnesses said.

The Post said naval investigators found that the five Iraqis were shot by Wuterich
as they stood there.

Denver Archdiocese Settles Sex-Abuse Claims For $1.6M

The Final Destruction of Babylon

John F. Robertson

President Saddam Hussein Restored Parts of BabylonThe Greatness of
Ancient Iraq
...From the beginning of Iraq's creation in the 1920s -and especially in the Baath era - the Iraqi government reached back into the greatness of Iraq's pre-Islamic civilizations (Sumerian, Babylonian, Assyrian) as a foundation of pride and unity upon which a new, distinctly Iraqi nationalism could be built that might unify Sunni Arabs, Shia Arabs, Kurds, Turkoman's, Christians, Jews, Yazidi's - all the different ethnic and religious elements of the new country. Saddam Hussein even went as far as to rebuild parts of ancient Babylon, as a symbol of Iraq's ancient greatness as well as his own putative connection to it...

WHAT THE SCRIBES SAY

Malcom Lagauche

For a few days after the hanging of Saddam Hussein, the press had a field day in analyzing and editorializing the incident as well as Saddam himself. Most were writing well out of their league and their ignorance of history shows. But, most readers do not know the history either, so their words are taken as true. Many articles stated that justice was not done because Saddam was hanged for a lesser crime than the major ones assessed against him. The "progressive" writers wanted to see him tried for the gassing incidents so they could tie together U.S. involvement in the "misdeeds" of Saddam Hussein. Article-after-article mentioned Rumsfeld’s visit to Iraq in the 1980s and said the U.S. gave Iraq the technology for Saddam’s WMD. However, not one questioned the reason for the war. They all blamed it on Saddam and wrote as if Iran was a benign and aggrieved country...

continua / continued

Democrats Rename 5 House Committees

WASHINGTON - In taking back control of the House, Democrats also are restoring the old names used for committees when they last headed them in 1994.

Republicans swept into power in that year's midterm elections had created their own monikers for several committees. As part of the rules changes adopted this week, Democrats reclaimed the old names for several committee and created a new name for one other panel:

• The Committee on Education and the Workforce was changed back to its pre-1995 name, Education and Labor. Tom Kiley, a spokesman for incoming chairman George Miller, D-Calif., said Miller "believed that the name change in 1994 was a deliberate swipe at the labor movement in this country. He wanted to reverse the insult."

• The House Resources Committee is now the House Natural Resources Committee — the name it received in 1993 and lost in 1995. (It started in 1816 as the Committee on Public Lands.) Incoming Chairman Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., said the new name shows Congress' "commitment to conserving our nation's unique natural and cultural heritage — including its natural environment, public lands and forests, and fish and wildlife."

LinkHere

Employees find noose hanging at work

Employees of a New York cable installer say they saw this noose hanging from the ceiling when they reported to work.
By Allan Chernoff
CNN

NEW YORK (CNN) -- James Jackson, a 26-year-old black employee of 180 Connect, was preparing for another day of installing cable, telephone and Internet service to residential customers of Cablevision in Nassau County, New York on December 7.

When he walked to the fenced-off area to pick up equipment for the day's jobs he looked up and was shocked to see a vicious, racist symbol in his workplace. A noose was hanging in the fenced-off equipment area, visible to the dozens of installers, the majority of whom are black, but accessible only to his boss and an equipment manager, both of whom are white.Text

LinkHere

AP Employee Found Shot to Death in Iraq


Jan 5, 12:25 PM (ET)

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - The body of an Associated Press employee was found shot in the back of the head Friday, six days after he was last seen by his family leaving for work. Ahmed Hadi Naji, 28, was the fourth AP staffer to die violently in the Iraq war and the second AP employee killed in less than a month. He had been a messenger and occasional cameraman for the AP for 2 1/2 years.

"All of us at AP share the pain and grief being felt by Ahmed's family and friends," said AP President and CEO Tom Curley. "The situation for our journalists in Iraq is unprecedented in AP's 161-year history of covering wars and conflicts. The courage of our Iraqi colleagues and their dedication to the story stand as an example to the world of journalism's enduring value."

The circumstances of Naji's death were unclear. Dozens of Iraqis are found slain almost every day in Baghdad, many believed victims of sectarian death squads.

Naji's wife, Sahba'a Mudhar Khalil, reported him missing Dec. 30 when he did not return that evening. He had left home by motorcycle in the Ashurta Al Khamsa District in southwest Baghdad at 10:30 a.m., telling her he was going to the AP office. Naji's body was found in a morgue.

In addition to his wife, Naji is survived by 4-month-old twins, a boy, Zaid, and a girl, Rand.
The death came as colleagues were still mourning Aswan Ahmed Lutfallah, 35, an AP cameraman who was shot to death by insurgents while covering clashes Dec. 12 in Mosul. He was the second AP journalist killed in that northern Iraqi city in less than two years.

On April 23, 2005, cameraman Saleh Ibrahim was killed after an explosion in Mosul. He was a father of five in his early 30s. AP photographer Mohammed Ibrahim was wounded. The circumstances surrounding the death and injury are still unclear.

In 2004, Ismail Taher Mohsin, an AP driver, was ambushed by gunmen and killed near his home in Baghdad.

Naji's death brings to 30 the number those who have lost their lives on assignments for the AP since the news cooperative was founded in 1846.

Before Naji's killing, Reporters Without Borders had recorded at least 94 journalists killed in Iraq since the war started nearly four years ago. Forty-five media assistants also have been killed, according to the Paris-based advocacy group.

The Committee to Protect Journalists had put the figure at 92 journalists and 37 media support workers killed in Iraq.
LinkHere

NY Times: Images Of Hanging Make Hussein A Martyr To Many...

The New York Times HASSAN M. FATTAH January 5, 2007 09:12 PM

In the week since Saddam Hussein was hanged in an execution steeped in sectarian overtones, his public image in the Arab world, formerly that of a convicted dictator, has undergone a resurgence of admiration and awe.

On the streets, in newspapers and over the Internet, Mr. Hussein has emerged as a Sunni Arab hero who stood calm and composed as his Shiite executioners tormented and abused him.

READ FULL STORY

Fmr. Air Force Chief: Bush's General Switch Like Putting “Old Wine In New Bottles”...

Associated Press January 5, 2007 08:48 PM

President Bush is installing two experienced commanders from vastly different backgrounds to carry out the new Iraq policy he will announce next week, substituting them for generals who had qualms about a fresh buildup of U.S. troops in the war zone.

One of the new military chiefs, Lt. Gen. David Petraeus, is an Iraq veteran who wrote a Princeton dissertation titled ''The American Military and the Lessons of Vietnam.'' Iraq has drawn more and more comparisons to that quagmire.

READ FULL STORY

Army Mistakenly Sends Re-Recruitment Letters To Soldiers Killed In Action...

Good one Georgie
Associated Press January 5, 2007 10:41 PM

The Army said Friday it would apologize to the families of about 275 officers killed or wounded in action who were mistakenly sent letters urging them to return to active duty.

The letters were sent a few days after Christmas to more than 5,100 Army officers who had recently left the service. Included were letters to about 75 officers killed in action and about 200 wounded in action.

READ FULL STORY

Friday, January 05, 2007

Democrats pick senator in intensive care to lead spending subcommittee

RAW STORYPublished: Friday January 5, 2007

"Sen. Tim Johnson won a coveted chairmanship of a Senate Appropriations subcommittee Thursday, even though he is still in critical condition after emergency brain surgery last month," an early AP wire story is reporting. Excerpts...
#
The South Dakota Democrat remains in intensive care after suffering a brain hemorrhage Dec. 13 and missed the opening day of the Senate.

Johnson's office announced that he has been named chairman of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Military Construction and Veterans Affairs. The senator ''will lose none of his rights during his absence'' and his office remains open for business, said spokeswoman Julianne Fisher.

LinkHere

No More 'Surge' Protection? Now Oliver North Comes Out Against Iraq Plan

By E&P Staff

Published: January 05, 2007 2:50 PM ET

NEW YORK Bob Herbert and our own Joe Galloway, you'd expect -- even, by this point, Thomas Friedman -- but Oliver North? But it happened, in the hawkish Fox News contributor's new syndicated column, where he came out against President Bush's reported plan to escalate the number of U.S. troops in Iraq.

North recalls that on his recent return to Iraq, "Not one of the soldiers, sailors, airmen, Guardsmen or Marines I interviewed told me that they wanted more U.S. boots on the ground. In fact, nearly all expressed just the opposite: 'We don't need more American troops, we need more Iraqi troops,' was a common refrain. They are right.

"The call for incrementally increasing U.S. troop strength in Iraq -- a 'solution' that was first proffered last summer as the congressional election campaign heated up -- sounds eerily like Lyndon Johnson's plan to save Vietnam in the mid 1960s....

"Adding 10,000 or 20,000 more U.S. combat troops -- mostly soldiers and Marines -- isn't going to improve Iraqi willingness to fight their own fight -- an imperative if we are to claim victory in this war....

"A 'surge' or 'targeted increase in U.S. troop strength' or whatever the politicians want to call dispatching more combat troops to Iraq isn't the answer. Adding more trainers and helping the Iraqis to help themselves, is. Sending more U.S. combat troops is simply sending more targets."

The entire column can be found at: www.humanevents.com.

LinkHere

Iranian TV claims Iraq rushed Saddam's execution to thwart alleged US escape plan

David Edwards and Ron BrynaertPublished: Friday January 5, 2007

A report on a 24-hour Arabic-language television channel - based in Tehran and run by the Iranian state radio and TV service - claimed that Saddam Hussein's execution was rushed by the Iraqi government in order to thwart an escape plan, masterminded by the United States.

Al-Alam TV cited an unnamed Iraqi official source who alleges that Hussein had agreed to help quell the Sunni resistance in return for a two-week postponent of his execution, and help to gain passage to Jordan, where a fugitive Iraqi Minister recently escaped.

The source told the television station that Iraqi officials discovered the purported plan at the last minute and "foiled it."

According to Reuters, the US Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad (who reportedly will be nominated by Bush for the UN ambassador post vacated by John Bolton) tried to delay Hussein's execution. Khalilzad allegedly "insisted that Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki provide certain documents, including a signature from Iraq's president," before hanging the former dictator but was unsuccesful.

"Al-Alam earned a reputation during the war for its gory footage of wounded civilians and soldiers, broadcast under the logo 'War of Mastery,'" the San Francisco Chronicle reported in 2003.

Last month, the BBC reported on Al-Alam's coverage of December's international conference on the Holocaust held in Tehran.

"Al-Alam's presenter used terms such as the 'holocaust theory' and 'what is called the holocaust' in his report," the BBC reported. "The report also included a quote from a member of the Jews against Zionism group who attended the conference, expressing doubts about the truth behind the Holocaust."

LinkHere

The War Profiteering Prevention Act of 2007

U.S. SENATOR PATRICK LEAHY

CONTACT: Office of Senator Leahy, 202-224-4242
VERMONT
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Incoming Judiciary Chairman Leahy Targets Corruption
In First Bills Of 110th Congress

Leahy Introduces Bills To Combat War Profiteering, Public Corruption

WASHINGTON (Thursday, January 4) – Signaling a renewed emphasis on combating corruption at home and abroad, incoming Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), introduced a package of bills Thursday targeting corrupt officials and private companies seeking to defraud American taxpayers and troops.

“Americans want the culture of corruption to end. From war profiteers and corrupt officials in Iraq, to convicted Administration officials, to influence-peddling lobbyists and, regrettably, even members of Congress, too many supposed public servants have been serving their own interests, rather than the public interest,” said Leahy.

Many Democratic Senators joined Leahy in reintroducing a bill creating criminal penalties for war profiteers and cheats who would exploit taxpayer-funded efforts in Iraq and elsewhere around the world. The War Profiteering Prevention Act of 2007 builds on earlier efforts by Leahy, who is also a senior member of the Appropriations Committee, to crack down on this type of rampant fraud and abuse. It is similar to legislation Leahy introduced in 2003, that was subsequently passed by the Senate as part of an appropriations bill but later torpedoed by the White House and the House Republican leadership, which stripped out the Leahy provision.

Also on Thursday, Leahy joined with Senator Mark Pryor (D-Ark.), on another anti-corruption measure aimed at strengthening the tools available to federal prosecutors in combating public corruption. This bill gives investigators and prosecutors the statutory tools and the resources that they need to ensure that serious and insidious public corruption is detected and punished, including extending the statute of limitations on some of the worst crimes.

“The American people staged an intervention during the November elections and made it clear that they would not stand for it any longer. They expect the Congress to take action, and these bills are a good first step toward meeting that call,” Leahy said. “We need to restore the people’s trust by acting to clean up the people’s government.”

# # # # #

Below are Senator Leahy’s statements on the War Profiteering Prevention Act of 2007 and the Effective Corruption Prosecutions Act of 2007 and, as well as summaries of the two bills and background information detailing a few examples of the fraud and war profiteering that have already occurred in Iraq and elsewhere.

Statement of Senator Patrick Leahy
On Introduction of the War Profiteering Prevention Act of 2007
January 4, 2007

Mr. LEAHY: Mr. President, today I am reintroducing a bill that creates criminal penalties for war profiteers and cheats who would exploit taxpayer-funded efforts in Iraq and elsewhere around the world. Last year, despite the mounting evidence of widespread contractor fraud and abuse in Iraq, the Republican–controlled Senate would not act on it. Instead, the Congress took a terrible misstep in seeking to end the work of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction. I have been proposing versions of this bill since 2003, when it did pass the Senate. Unfortunately, this crucial provision was stripped out of the final version of a bill by a Republican-controlled conference committee.

There is growing evidence of widespread contractor fraud in Iraq, yet prosecuting criminal cases against these war profiteers is difficult under current law. We must crack down on this rampant fraud and abuse that squanders American taxpayers’ dollars and jeopardizes the safety of our troops abroad. That is why I renew my efforts for accountability and action with the introduction of the War Profiteering Prevention Act of 2007. I am pleased to join with Senators Bingaman, Kerry, Harkin, Rockefeller, Dorgan, Wyden, Schumer, Cantwell, Bill Nelson, Clinton, Lautenberg and Menendez to introduce this legislation.

Widespread Fraud and War Profiteering in Iraq

Congress has sent billions upon billions of dollars to Iraq with too little accountability and too few financial controls. More than $50 billion of this money has gone to private contractors hired to guard bases, drive trucks, feed and shelter the troops and rebuild the country. This is more than the annual budget of the Department of Homeland Security.

Instead of results from these companies, we are seeing penalties levied for allegations of fraud and abuse. At least 10 companies with billions of dollars in U.S. contracts for Iraq reconstruction have paid more than $300 million in penalties since 2000, to resolve allegations of bid rigging, fraud, delivery of faulty military parts and environmental damage. Seven other companies with Iraq reconstruction contracts have agreed to pay financial penalties without admitting wrongdoing.

In 2005, Halliburton took in approximately $3.6 billion from contracts to serve U.S. troops and rebuild the oil industry in Iraq. Halliburton executives say that the company received about $1 billion a month for Iraq work in 2006. In addition, last month, we learned of new plans to spend hundreds of millions more to create jobs in Iraq.

Last year, the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction found that millions of U.S. taxpayer funds appropriated for Iraq reconstruction have been lost and diverted. Yet we continue to send more taxpayer funds to Iraq, without accountability.

Too much of this money is unaccounted for, and many of the facilities and services that these funds were supposed to pay for are still nonexistent. We in Congress must ask – where did all the money go? We need to press for more accountability over the use and abuse of billions of taxpayers’ dollars sent as development aid to Iraq, not less.

Accountability is Long Overdue

A new law to combat war profiteering in Iraq and elsewhere is sorely needed and long overdue. Although there are anti-fraud laws to protect against the waste of U.S. tax dollars at home, no law expressly prohibits war profiteering or expressly confers jurisdiction on U.S. federal courts to hear fraud cases involving war profiteering committed overseas.

The bill I introduced today would criminalize Awar profiteering@ – overcharging taxpayers in order to defraud and to profit excessively from a war, military action, or reconstruction efforts. It would also prohibit any fraud against the United States involving a contract for the provision of goods or services in connection with a war, military action, or for relief or reconstruction activities. This new crime would be a felony, subject to criminal penalties of up to 20 years in prison and fines of up to $1 million, or twice the illegal gross profits of the crime.

The bill also prohibits false statements connected with the provision of goods or services in connection with a war or reconstruction effort. This crime would also be a felony, subject to criminal penalties of up to 10 years in prison and fines of up to $1 million, or twice the illegal gross profits of the crime.

The measure also addresses weakness in the existing laws used to combat war profiteering, by providing clear authority for the Government to seek criminal penalties and to recover excessive profits for war profiteering overseas. These are strong and focused sanctions that are narrowly tailored to punish and deter fraud or excessive profiteering in contracts, both at home and abroad.

The message sent by this bill is clear -- any act to exploit the crisis situation in Iraq or elsewhere overseas for exorbitant gain is unacceptable, reprehensible, and criminal. Such deceit demeans and exploits the sacrifices that our military personnel are making in Iraq and Afghanistan, and around the world. This bill also builds on a strong legacy of historical efforts to stem war profiteering. Congress implemented excessive-profits taxes and contract renegotiation laws after both World Wars, and again after the Korean War. Advocating exactly such an approach, President Roosevelt once declared it our duty to ensure that “a few do not gain from the sacrifices of the many.”

A Fresh Start

Our Government cannot in good faith ask its people to sacrifice for reconstruction efforts that allow some to profit unfairly. When U.S. taxpayers have been called upon to bear the burden of reconstruction contracts – where contracts are awarded in a system that offers little competition and even less accountability – concerns about wartime profiteering are a grave matter.

Combating war profiteering is not a Democratic issue, or a Republican issue. Rather, it is a cause that all Americans can support. When I first introduced this bill in 2003, it came to be cosponsored by 21 Senators. The Senate Appropriations Committee also unanimously accepted these provisions during a Senate Appropriations Committee markup of the $87 billion appropriations bill for Iraq and Afghanistan for Fiscal Year 2004, and this provision passed the Senate. Passing bipartisan war profiteering prevention legislation was the right thing to do then, and it is the right thing to do now.

I am hopeful that in a new year, and with a new Congress, we can make a fresh start and forge a bipartisan partnership on this important issue that will result in passage of this bill. I ask unanimous consent that a copy of the bill be printed in the Record.

# # # # #

War Profiteering Prevention Act of 2007

§ Criminalizes war profiteering, which is defined as materially overvaluing any good or service with the specific intent to excessively profit from the war and relief or reconstruction activities

§ Statute would strengthen the tools available to federal prosecutors to combat war profiteering by providing clear authority for the Government to seek criminal penalties and to recover excessive profits for war profiteering overseas.

§ Prohibits any fraud against the United States, Iraq, or any other foreign country involving a contract for the provision of any goods or services in connection with a war, military action, or relief or reconstruction activities.

§ Subjects violators to up to 20 years imprisonment and a fine not to exceed the greater of $1,000,000 or twice the amount of any illegal gross profits, or both.

§ Prohibits making a false statement in any matter involving a contract for the provision of any goods or services in connection with a war, military action, or relief or reconstruction activities.

§ Subjects violators of this provision to up to 10 years imprisonment and a fine not to exceed the greater of $1,000,000, or twice the amount of any illegal gross profits, or both.

§ Creates extraterritorial jurisdiction over offenses committed overseas, and covers any person in the United States or abroad who violates its provisions.

(Background Information)

Billions Of Taxpayer Dollars Lost
To Fraud And Waste In Iraq And Elsewhere

The United States has spent more than a quarter of a TRILLION dollars during its four years in Iraq.

Over $50 BILLION -- more than the annual budget of the Department of Homeland Security -- has been spent to hire private contractors to guard bases, drive trucks, feed and shelter the troops and rebuild the country.

BILLIONS of taxpayer dollars are unaccounted for, according to a finding by the special inspector general examining the Iraq reconstruction effort.

Since 2000, 10 companies with billions of dollars in U.S. contracts for Iraq reconstruction have paid more than $300 MILLION IN PENALTIES to resolve allegations of bid rigging, fraud, delivery of faulty military parts and environmental damage in connection with other projects.

Examples of Fraud and Waste - Custer Battles, Halliburton and Bechtel

CUSTER BATTLES is accused of bilking the government out of $50 MILLION

Custer Battles billed the government nearly $10 MILLION when its actual costs were less than $4 MILLION, according to a government investigation.

Custer Battles over billed electricity costs by $326,000 - Actual electricity charges of $74,000 were billed at $400,000.

Custer Battles over billed for trucks that did not run by $572,000 – Actual purchase price of $228,000 for faulty trucks were billed to government for $800,000.

The two largest government contractors in Iraq -- Bechtel Corp. and Halliburton Co. -- have been fined several times in the past four years.

HALLIBURTON CO. averaged about $ 1 BILLION A MONTH from the government for work in Iraq in 2006, according to executives. The company took in $3.6 BILLION last year from contracts to serve U.S. troops and rebuild the oil industry in Iraq.

A pattern of fraud, waste, and corruption by Halliburton in Iraq emerged through news reports between December 2003 and May 2004. In December, a Pentagon investigation found evidence that Halliburton's Kellogg, Brown & Root (KBR) had overcharged the U.S. government some $61 MILLION for fuel deliveries from Kuwait to Iraq. In January, Halliburton admitted to the Pentagon that two of its employees took up to $6 million in kickbacks for awarding a Kuwaiti-based company with work in Iraq. Then in early February it was reported that the company had agreed to repay the U.S. government some $27 million for meals that were never served to American troops.

Bills From Five-Star, Beachfront Hotel And Drivers Paid to Haul Empty Trucks - In May 2006, the Coalition Provisional Authority's inspector general started raising questions about the bills that Halliburton had racked up at a five-star beachfront hotel near Kuwait City. And 12 Halliburton truck drivers claimed they risked their lives driving empty trucks in Iraq while their employer billed the government for hauling absolutely nothing.

Investigation of Overcharging And Potential Connection to Nigeria Bribery Scheme - Federal authorities are also investigating whether Halliburton broke the law by using a subsidiary to do business in Iran, whether the company overcharged for work done for the Pentagon in the Balkans and whether it was involved in an alleged $180 million bribery scheme in Nigeria. The company admitted in 2003 that it improperly paid $2.4 million to a Nigerian tax official.

BECHTEL CORP. paid more than $110,000 to the Environmental Protection Agency and the Energy Department in 2000 and 2001 to settle alleged safety and environmental violations. Bechtel has prime construction contracts in Iraq worth more than $2 billion.

Fines Exceeding $86 Million - Bechtel hired three subcontractors in Iraq that have been fined more than $86 million in the past four years, though none had been banned from getting new contracts.

Others Punished For Waste, Fraud and Abuse Of Govt. Contracts

American International Contractors Inc., paid $4.7 million in fines in 2000 after pleading guilty to bid rigging on a U.S.-funded water project in Egypt, according to published reports. AICI has part of a $325 million contract to rebuild Iraq's transportation systems, has a share of a $500 million contract for emergency construction needs in the Pentagon's Central Command region, which includes Iraq and Afghanistan, and is in a partnership that has a $70 million construction contract at Al-Udeid air base in Qatar, used to support troops in Iraq.

Fluor Corp., paid $8.5 million to the Defense Department in 2001 to settle charges it improperly billed the government for work benefiting its commercial clients, according to published reports. Fluor and AMEC created a joint venture that has $1.7 billion in contracts to rebuild Iraq's electricity, water, sewer and trash removal infrastructure.

Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Co., paid a $969,000 fine in 2002 for environmental damage in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary, according to published reports. Bechtel awarded the company a subcontract to clear the Iraqi port of Umm Qasr.

Northrop Grumman Corp., whose Vinnell Corp. subsidiary was awarded a $48 million contract to train the new Iraqi Army last year, according to published reports. Northrop Grumman has been penalized $191.7 million in the past four years, including $750,000 paid to the Pentagon in 2000 in a case involving allegations of providing faulty replacement parts for the JSTARS airborne surveillance system.

LinkHere

CNN: GOP Congresswoman Heather Wilson: U.S. operating 'catch-and-release program' for al Qaeda

Friday, January 05, 2007
GOP Congresswoman: U.S. operating 'catch-and-release program' for al Qaeda

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Saying "we need to focus on what is vital for America, not what is desirable," a GOP congresswoman sharply criticized President Bush's Iraq policy during a speech at the National Press Club Friday.

Rep. Heather Wilson of New Mexico, who won reelection to a fifth term by less than 900 votes, said that half of the Al Qaeda members targeted in Iraq have been captured -- and released -- before.

"We are operating a catch-and-release program for al Qaeda in Iraq -- this is inexcusable," Wilson said.

Wilson also question America's interests in the war-torn country.

"Too often in the last three and a half years our goals in Iraq have been described in lofty and idealistic terms that go far beyond America's vital national interests... but there is a difference between what we would wish for the Iraqi people and what we need for American security," Wilson also said.

LinkHere

White House Seals Visitor Logs After Abramoff Lobbying Scandal...

Associated Press PETE YOST January 5, 2007 04:07 PM

The White House and the Secret Service quietly signed an agreement last spring in the midst of the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal declaring that records identifying visitors to the White House are not open to the public.

The Bush administration didn't reveal the existence of the memorandum of understanding until last fall. The White House is using it to deal with a legal problem on a separate front, a ruling by a federal judge ordering the production of Secret Service logs identifying visitors to the office of Vice PresidentDick Cheney.

READ FULL STORY

CBS News: Military Tells Bush It Only Has 9,000 More Troops To Send To Iraq...

Think Progress January 5, 2007 02:06 PM

A State Department official leaked word this week that President Bush is considering sending "no more than 15,000 to 20,000 U.S. troops" to Iraq. "Instead of a surge, it is a bump," the official said.

This claim was bolstered last night by CBS's David Martin, who reported that military commanders have told Bush they are prepared to execute a troop escalation of just 9,000 soldiers and Marines into Iraq, "with another 10,000 on alert in Kuwait and the U.S."

READ FULL STORY

ABC News: If Senators Knew Then What They Know Now, By 57 To 43 They Would Have Voted Against Going To War...

ABC News JAKE TAPPER January 5, 2007 01:04 PM

As the new Democrat-controlled House and Senate take power this month, the Iraq war will be the front-and-center issue.

And as President Bush prepares to announce his new strategy for Iraq, which may include a surge in troops, the attitude of the Senate towards the war -- and whether its members regret their overwhelming 77-23 October 2002 vote to authorize the president to use force in Iraq -- is critically important.

READ FULL STORY

Is Negroponte's New Job Preparing for an Attack on Iran?

seemslikeadream

Member since Sep 14th 2005
2116 posts
Thu Jan-04-07 06:14 PM
Original Post
by Wayne Madsen

The word from the State Department is that incoming Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte will oversee an "embedded" unit of private contractors who are preparing for an attack against Iran. Although the Baker-Hamilton Commission called for dialogue with both Iran and Syria over the Iraq Civil War and quagmire the neo-cons foisted on the U.S. military, the Bush administration appears intent on confronting Iran militarily.

As reported by the Boston Globe on Jan. 2, the Iran-Syria Policy and Operations Group (ISOG) is setting the stage for a U.S. military confrontation with Iran and Syria and is supported by BearingPoint, the same contractor that provided assistance for the Iraq Policy and Operations Group (IPOG), the group that helped bring about the disaster in Iraq. BearingPoint also had the contract for selling off Iraq state-owned enterprises and was involved in a number of the dubious financial deals of Paul Bremer's Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq.

BearingPoint also came up in the FBI and NSA set-up of imprisoned NSA "Iraq shop" signals intelligence analyst Ken Ford, author of an NSA report that concluded that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction. BearingPoint acted as a go-between for an FBI confidential informant and NSA security. The confidential informant placed a classified document inside Ford's Waldorf, Maryland home that was used to trigger a false prosecution of the NSA analyst and former White House Secret Service uniformed agent under President Clinton.

BearingPoint was formerly known as KPMG Consulting. WMR has been informed that KPMG was involved in aspects of the 1980 October Surprise concocted by George H. W. Bush, William Casey, Robert Gates, and Donald Gregg. The demise of the Sun Shipbuilding and Drydock Company in Chester, Pennsylvania, outside Philadelphia, the very company from which Vice Presidential candidate George H. W. Bush spoke on October 18, 1980 just prior to his secret trip to Paris to meet with the Ayatollah Khomeini's representatives, also reportedly involved the disappearance of the SS Poet, which was "lost at sea" with its 34 crewmen, but was more likely involved in transporting the arms and spare parts to Iran promised by Bush and Casey if they held on to the American hostages until after the 1980 presidential election and "disappeared" on purpose. The Sun scandal also reportedly involved a little-known Mayor of Marcus Hook, the Sunoco "company town" adjacent to Chester, named Curt Weldon.

In a further demonstration that the Bush administration is outsourcing key government posts to the private sector, it is being reported that former National Security Agency (NSA) director Adm. Mike McConnell (retired), who is currently a senior vice president of Booz Allen Hamilton, a major intelligence contractor, will take over Negroponte's position as Director of National Intelligence. That would place two former NSA directors, McConnell, and Gen. Mike Hayden, the CIA director, in the two most powerful intelligence jobs in the United States.

LinkHere

NORAD looking for Russian rocket in Wyoming

POSTED: 2:28 p.m. EST, January 4, 2007

PETERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Colorado (AP) -- A spent Russian booster rocket re-entered the atmosphere Thursday over Colorado and Wyoming, the North American Aerospace Defense Command said.

NORAD spokesman Sean Kelly said the agency was trying to confirm a report that a piece of the rocket may have hit the ground near Riverton, Wyoming, at about 6 a.m.

Eyewitnesses reported seeing flaming objects in the sky at the time the rocket was re-entering, Kelly said.

"It was pretty spectacular," said Riverton Police Capt. Mark Stone, who said he saw the burning object while he was retrieving his newspaper. "My first concern is that we had some sort of aircraft that was coming down. It was definitely leaving a burning debris trail behind it."

He said he could tell it was a fairly large object, but it was too high to determine what it was.

NORAD identified the rocket as an SL-4 that had been used to launch a French space telescope in December, and Kelly said U.S. spacewatchers knew the rocket was coming down.

"Objects falling from space are almost an everyday occurrence," he said.

LinkHere

New Year Reflections

Ramzy Baroud

2006 was yet another year of tribulations in the ever tumultuous Middle East. It defied all early expectations that 2005 would be the worst for many years to follow. It ended on a sad note in Palestine, and left wide open the chance for many appalling possibilities that stretch from Baghdad, to Lebanon, to Mogadishu, and elsewhere. Like January 2005, January 2006 brought about momentous elections, the former in Iraq, and the latter in the Occupied Palestinian Territories; both occasions, which had the potential of becoming icons of democratic experiences, led to unmitigated disasters, exposing the American democracy charade for what it truly was, a farce, pure and simple...

continua / continued

The "Demonization" of Muslims and the Battle for Oil

MICHEL CHOSSUDOVSKY, Global Research

Throughout history, " wars of religion" have served to obscure the economic and strategic interests behind the conquest and invasion of foreign lands. "Wars of religion" were invariably fought with a view to securing control over trading routes and natural resources. The Crusades extending from the 11th to the 14th Century are often presented by historians as "a continuous series of military-religious expeditions made by European Christians in the hope of wresting the Holy Land from the infidel Turks." The objective of the Crusades, however, had little to do with religion. The Crusades largely consisted, through military action, in challenging the dominion of the Eastern trade routes, which controlled the Eastern trade routes...

continua / continued

The Lynch Mob

Felicity Arbuthnot, Globalresearch.ca

...When the US invaded Iraq, one of their first acts in their "Mission Accomplished" rampage, was to abolish the death penalty, in the "New Iraq". There was (rightly of course) no place for such barbarism; it was unworthy of a "free, democratic", society. In 2004, clearly realising that the living could still communicate, the U.S. quietly brought back the death penalty, thus Donald Rumsfeld, Britain's David Mellor and others, who had negotiated arms deals with Iraq, could not be called to the witness stand, by those beyond the grave. America of course is fourth on the league table of countries which execute (even the mentally retarded) with George W. Bush's Texas accounting for one third of U.S. State homicides. Saddam Hussein under U.S Administration (oh yes, it is) died ostensibly for 148 deaths. In today's Iraq, that would be a peaceful day...

continua / continued

I lost 11 members of my family in less than one year

Abbas Dawood, IRIN

I'm 29-years-old. I've been handicapped since 18 January, 2006, when I lost my leg in an explosion while I was working as a waiter in a Baghdad restaurant. On the same day I lost my brother Muhammad, who was working with me at the restaurant. He was only 19-years-old and didn't survive his injuries. In March of last year, I lost my mother, Suheiya, and my father Dawood. They were killed inside our home. A militia member asked them to leave the neighbourhood but they refused because they were too old. They were shown no mercy and were brutally shot dead. I'm still a bachelor because my fiancee broke up with me last September after I became handicapped. In addition to all this, I lost my only uncle, Abu Omar, his wife, and their four children, while they were trying to flee the country to Syria. Insurgents stopped them, accused my uncle of being a traitor and shot dead the entire family...

continua / continued

A Challenge to the Supreme Court: Can the US Kill Iraqi Children Legally?

Bert Sacks, www.dissidentvoice.org

"Imagine if a U.S. cruise missile were to land on a kindergarten and kill 165 children. Imagine now that it was launched knowing it would hit that kindergarten, and further, that one of these missiles was launched at a different kindergarten every day for a month. That's 5,000 children. "To kill that many children as a matter of state policy would be unspeakable. The American commander in chief would be condemned as a barbarian. And yet, that is what the economic embargo of Iraq has done." This is from a Seattle Times editorial six years ago. For ten years I have wanted to ask one very basic question: Not only were the sanctions barbaric, but were the sanctions legal? Could the US cause the deaths of thousands of Iraqi children every month for years and do so legally?...

continua / continued

The word from the State Department

January 4, 2007 -- The word from the State Department is that incoming Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte will oversee an "embedded" unit of private contractors who are preparing for an attack against Iran. Although the Baker-Hamilton Commission called for dialogue with both Iran and Syria over the Iraq Civil War and quagmire the neo-cons foisted on the U.S. military, the Bush administration appears intent on confronting Iran militarily.

As reported by the Boston Globe on Jan. 2, the Iran-Syria Policy and Operations Group (ISOG) is setting the stage for a U.S. military confrontation with Iran and Syria and is supported by BearingPoint, the same contractor that provided assistance for the Iraq Policy and Operations Group (IPOG), the group that helped bring about the disaster in Iraq. BearingPoint also had the contract for selling off Iraq state-owned enterprises and was involved in a number of the dubious financial deals of Paul Bremer's Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq.

BearingPoint also came up in the FBI and NSA set-up of imprisoned NSA "Iraq shop" signals intelligence analyst Ken Ford, author of an NSA report that concluded that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction. BearingPoint acted as a go-between for an FBI confidential informant and NSA security. The confidential informant placed a classified document inside Ford's Waldorf, Maryland home that was used to trigger a false prosecution of the NSA analyst and former White House Secret Service uniformed agent under President Clinton.

BearingPoint was formerly known as KPMG Peat Marwick Consulting. WMR has been informed that KPMG Peat Marwick was involved in aspects of the 1980 October Surprise concocted by George H. W. Bush, William Casey, Robert Gates, and Donald Gregg. The demise of the Sun Shipbuilding and Drydock Company in Chester, Pennsylvania, outside Philadelphia, the very city (at Widener University) from which Vice Presidential candidate George H. W. Bush spoke on October 18, 1980 just prior to his secret trip to Paris to meet with the Ayatollah Khomeini's representatives, also reportedly involved the disappearance of the SS Poet, which was "lost at sea" with its 34 crewmen, but was more likely involved in transporting the arms and spare parts to Iran promised by Bush and Casey if they held on to the American hostages until after the 1980 presidential election and "disappeared" on purpose. The Sun scandal also reportedly involved a little-known Mayor of Marcus Hook, the Sunoco "company town" adjacent to Chester, named Curt Weldon.

Contra death squad chief John Negroponte moves over to State Department

In a further demonstration that the Bush administration is outsourcing key government posts to the private sector, it is being reported that former National Security Agency (NSA) director Adm. Mike McConnell (retired), who is currently a senior vice president of Booz Allen Hamilton, a major intelligence contractor, will take over Negroponte's position as Director of National Intelligence. That would place two former NSA directors, McConnell, and Gen. Mike Hayden, the CIA director, in the two most powerful intelligence jobs in the United States.

Wayne Madsen Report

What became of the Sun Shipyard's 1980 slush fund of about $120 million,

January 5, 2007 -- WMR has obtained further details on the fate of the SS Poet, which is widely-assumed to have carried arms to Iran as part of George H. W. Bush's 1980 October Surprise operation against President Jimmy Carter, and was then conveniently "disappeared" along with its crew of 34. The Poet had a crew of 10 officers and 24 crew when it set sail from Philadelphia on October 24, 1980, just after George H. W. Bush visited Chester before his secret trip to Paris to arrange an arms swap with the Ayatollah Khomeini's government in return for their keeping the hostages imprisoned in Tehran until after the presidential election.

The Poet had made a trip previous to its stated late October voyage to Port Said, Egypt. Its radio officer joined the Poet's crew in Port Said around October 1, 1980. The Poet had three other names before being renamed the Poet: the SS General Omar Bradley, the SS Portmar, and the SS Port.

The US Coast Guard/National Transportation Safety Board Final Report on the Poet says she loaded corn in Philadelphia at the Girard Point Pier 3, sailing from there down river. She sailed past Sun Ship in Chester, where George H. W. Bush had been on October 18, en route to the mouth of the Delaware River and to the open Atlantic. The Final Report says corn was loaded in holds 1, 2 and 3. It makes no mention of hold 4.

The Poet was later reported missing after it failed to pass through the Strait of Gibraltar. No SOS or Mayday was ever heard from the ship. The RCA Service Company representative who repaired the Poet's radio gear in Philadelphia testified the radio officer was a 30-year Navy veteran and was a Master Chief Petty Officer. The radio officer had served on the SS Pioneer Moon before joining the crew of the Poet.

The Washington Post on November 29, 1980 reported on the Coast Guard/NTSB hearings in Philadelphia on the loss of the Poet and stated, “Families, grasping at straws, speculated that one of the steamer’s holds, whose hatch the inspectors couldn’t open, contained secret weapons. But according to testimony and other evidence, that hold was empty." The Washington Post was living up to its current reputation as water-carriers for the Bush crime family even in 1980.

When speaking at Widener University in Chester on October 18, Bush promised future help for the blighted city of Chester. According to our sources, that "help" arrived when the Bush crime family, using KPMG Peat Marwick and Mellon Bank, fronting for the CIA, facilitated the "sham sale of the [Sun] shipyard assets, a fraudulent [Navy] contract award, a contract default, and ultimate liquidation of the shipyard assets and loss of the city’s major employer." What became of the Sun Shipyard's 1980 slush fund of about $120 million, created in books cooked by KPMG Peat Marwick, Mellon, and the CIA, is still an open question.

Wayne Madsen Report

Ask "Sgt Star"



Virtual 'Sgt. Star' answers prospective recruits’ questions about enlisting.

CNN: NM Gov. Bill Richardson heads to Sudan on diplomatic trip requested by Save Darfur Coalition


Friday, January 05, 2007
Richardson heads to Sudan

WASHINGTON -- New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson said Thursday he is heading to Sudan on a diplomatic trip that would add to his extensive international experience as he prepares to announce whether he will run for president.

Richardson will try to meet with Sudanese officials and persuade them to accept a peacekeeping force in the war-torn Darfur region, according to a statement from his office. He is to arrive Sunday after traveling overnight and plans to travel to Darfur.

Sudan's president, Omar al-Bashir, has rejected a U.N. Security Council resolution that provides for bolstering the poorly funded and equipped 7,000-troop African Union force to about 22,000 peacekeepers under U.N. leadership. The nonprofit Save Darfur Coalition requested Richardson's help because of his long relationship with Bashir and is paying for the trip.

Richardson, a Democrat who was U.N. ambassador and energy secretary in the Clinton administration, would have one of the most impressive foreign policy resumes if he decides to run for president....

LinkHere

CODEPINK Delegation Travels to Guantanamo to Protest Infamous US Prison

Text of letter Dems wrote to Bush, RE: Iraq:

Now we know where that will end up, don't we Hmmmmm?


President George W. Bush The White House Washington, DC 20500
Dear Mr. President:

The start of the new Congress brings us opportunities to work together on the critical issues confronting our country. No issue is more important than finding an end to the war in Iraq. December was the deadliest month of the war in over two years, pushing U.S. fatality figures over the 3,000 mark.

The American people demonstrated in the November elections that they do not believe your current Iraq policy will lead to success and that we need a change in direction for the sake of our troops and the Iraqi people. We understand that you are completing your post-election consultations on Iraq and are preparing to make a major address on your Iraq strategy to the American people next week.

Clearly this address presents you with another opportunity to make a long overdue course correction. Despite the fact that our troops have been pushed to the breaking point and, in many cases, have already served multiple tours in Iraq, news reports suggest that you believe the solution to the civil war in Iraq is to require additional sacrifices from our troops and are therefore prepared to proceed with a substantial U.S. troop increase.

Surging forces is a strategy that you have already tried and that has already failed. Like many current and former military leaders, we believe that trying again would be a serious mistake. They, like us, believe there is no purely military solution in Iraq. There is only a political solution. Adding more combat troops will only endanger more Americans and stretch our military to the breaking point for no strategic gain. And it would undermine our efforts to get the Iraqis to take responsibility for their own future. We are well past the point of more troops for Iraq.

In a recent appearance before the Senate Armed Services Committee, General John Abizaid, our top commander for Iraq and the region, said the following when asked about whether he thought more troops would contribute to our chances for success in Iraq:

"I met with every divisional commander, General Casey, the Corps commander, General Dempsey. We all talked together. And I said, in your professional opinion, if we were to bring in more American troops now, does it add considerably to our ability to achieve success in Iraq? And they all said no. And the reason is, because we want the Iraqis to do more. It's easy for the Iraqis to rely upon to us do this work. I believe that more American forces prevent the Iraqis from doing more, from taking more responsibility for their own future. "

Rather than deploy additional forces to Iraq, we believe the way forward is to begin t he phased redeployment of our forces in the next four to six months, while shifting the principal mission of our forces there from combat to training, logistics, force protection and counter-terror. A renewed diplomatic strategy, both within the region and beyond, is also required to help the Iraqis agree to a sustainable political settlement. In short, it is time to begin to move our forces out of Iraq and make the Iraqi political leadership aware that our commitment is not open ended, that we cannot resolve their sectarian problems, and that only they can find the political resolution required to stabilize Iraq.

Our troops and the American people have already sacrificed a great deal for the future of Iraq. After nearly four years of combat, tens of thousands of U.S. casualties, and over $300 billion dollars, it is time to bring the war to a close. We, therefore, strongly encourage you to reject any plans that call for our getting our troops any deeper into Iraq. We want to do everything we can to help Iraq succeed in the future but, like many of our senior military leaders, we do not believe that adding more U.S. combat troops contributes to success.

We appreciate you taking these views into consideration.

Sincerely,

Harry Reid Nancy Pelosi
Majority Leader Speaker

LinkHere

Reid, Pelosi call on Bush not to get deeper into Iraq

Hurricane Center Chief Issues Final Warning

Frustrated with people and politicians who refuse to listen or learn, National Hurricane Center Director Max Mayfield ends his 34-year government career today in search of a new platform for getting out his unwelcome message: Hurricane Katrina was nothing compared with the big one yet to come.

LinkHere

Waxman Launches New Committee to Monitor Bush Administration

Representative Henry Waxman (D-California), the chairman of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, has created a new subcommittee that will tackle decisions made by the Bush administration regarding which government records should be made available to the public.

LinkHere

Ray McGovern and W. Patrick Lang | CIA Immune System Still Working

"Lies have consequences. All those who helped President George W. Bush launch a war of aggression — termed by Nuremberg 'the supreme international crime' — have blood on their hands and must be held accountable. This includes corrupt intelligence officials. Otherwise, look for them to perform the same service in facilitating war on Iran," write Ray McGovern and W. Patrick Lang.

LinkHere

Biden: Bush Pushing War Loss to Next President



Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Delaware), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said yesterday that he believes top officials in the Bush administration have privately concluded they have lost Iraq and are simply trying to postpone disaster so the next president will "be the guy landing helicopters inside the Green Zone, taking people off the roof," in a chaotic withdrawal reminiscent of Vietnam.

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Conduct Charges Might Help Watada's Defense

Army prosecutors might have unwittingly aided the defense of the Fort Lewis officer they're trying for his refusal to deploy to Iraq. Attorneys for 1st Lt. Ehren Watada, in their effort to win his acquittal, want his jury to hear from experts next month that the war violated US and international law. During a four-hour pre-trial hearing Thursday, one of Watada's attorneys, Eric Seitz, requested that the judge hold an evidentiary hearing about allowing that defense. The judge, Lt. Col. John Head, told prosecutors that he was not inclined to grant the evidentiary hearing, but "they opened the door for him allowing it by prosecuting his statements."

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In May of 2006, I conducted an interview with Ehren Watada while working as a freelance journalist. Watada is a 1st Lieutenant in the US Army and is the first commissioned officer to publicly refuse orders to deploy to Iraq. In the interview, Lieutenant Watada asserted that he had a duty as an officer to evaluate the legality of his orders and conduct himself accordingly. He said that he could not participate in the Iraq War because it was "manifestly illegal" and that his participation would make him a party to war crimes. In June, Lieutenant Watada made national headlines when he refused to deploy to Iraq (...) The US Army has cobbled together portions of my interview with Lieutenant Watada and these statements comprise the foundation of one charge of conduct unbecoming an officer. To substantiate this alleged crime, the Army has subpoenaed me to testify on behalf of their prosecution. ..

THE LOVE-IN IS OVER...

Washington Post Glenn Kessler January 5, 2007 10:14 AM

Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said yesterday that he believes top officials in the Bush administration have privately concluded they have lost Iraq and are simply trying to postpone disaster so the next president will "be the guy landing helicopters inside the Green Zone, taking people off the roof," in a chaotic withdrawal reminiscent of Vietnam.

"I have reached the tentative conclusion that a significant portion of this administration, maybe even including the vice president, believes Iraq is lost," Biden said. "They have no answer to deal with how badly they have screwed it up. I am not being facetious now. Therefore, the best thing to do is keep it from totally collapsing on your watch and hand it off to the next guy -- literally, not figuratively."

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Guardsmen overrun at the Border (National Guard unit stormed while patroling the border)

A U.S. Border Patrol entry Identification Team site was overrun Wednesday night along Arizona's border with Mexico.

According to the Border Patrol, an unknown number of gunmen attacked the site in the state's West Desert Region around 11 p.m. The site is manned by National Guardsmen. Those guardsmen were forced to retreat.

The Border Patrol will not say whether shots were fired. However, no Guardsmen were injured in the incident.

The Border Patrol says the incident occurred somewhere along the 120 mile section of the border between Nogales and Lukeville. The area is known as a drug corridor. Last year, 124-thousand pounds of illegal drugs were confiscated in this area.

The Border patrol says the attackers quickly retreated back into Mexico.

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