“…Which is the wall the current Iraqi government is building (with the support and guidance of the Americans). It’s a wall that is intended to separate and isolate what is now considered the largest ‘Sunni’ area in Baghdad- let no one say the Americans are not building anything. According to plans the Iraqi puppets and Americans cooked up, it will ‘protect’ A’adhamiya, a residential/mercantile area that the current Iraqi government and their death squads couldn’t empty of Sunnis.
The wall, of course, will protect no one. I sometimes wonder if this is how the concentration camps began in Europe. The Nazi government probably said, “Oh look- we’re just going to protect the Jews with this little wall here- it will be difficult for people to get into their special area to hurt them!” And yet, it will also be difficult to get out.
The Wall is the latest effort to further break Iraqi society apart. Promoting and supporting civil war isn’t enough, apparently- Iraqis have generally proven to be more tenacious and tolerant than their mullahs, ayatollahs, and Vichy leaders. It’s time for America to physically divide and conquer- like Berlin before the wall came down or Palestine today. This way, they can continue chasing Sunnis out of “Shia areas” and Shia out of “Sunni areas”.[..]
On a personal note, we’ve finally decided to leave. I guess I’ve known we would be leaving for a while now. We discussed it as a family dozens of times. At first, someone would suggest it tentatively because, it was just a preposterous idea- leaving ones home and extended family- leaving ones country- and to what? To where?..[.]
It’s difficult to decide which is more frightening- car bombs and militias, or having to leave everything you know and love, to some unspecified place for a future where nothing is certain.”
Baghdad Burning
… I’ll meet you ’round the bend my friend, where hearts can heal and souls can mend…
“On Thursday April 26th, after the heaviest fighting yet, Somalia’s prime minister, Mohamed Ghedi, said that an Islamist-inspired insurgency is almost squashed. The reality may be rather different.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s threat to freeze compliance on a key arms treaty shows Moscow’s frustration at what it believes is the US disregard for its security interests.
Mr Putin has suggested compliance will be suspended on the Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) treaty until all Nato countries ratify it.
Efforts to update the treaty, one of the crowning achievements of arms control during the Cold War, have led to diplomatic rows between Moscow and the West.
Now it is contributing to a new chill between Russia and the US.
OSLO (Reuters) – The United States and its allies raised the prospect on Friday of adapting a U.N. plan for the independence of Serbia’s breakaway Kosovo province to address criticism by Russia, which could block the move.
Diplomats said it was discussed at NATO talks in Oslo.
“The U.S. and others said they were ready to accommodate some concerns about the (Kosovo) Serb minority without compromising the broad principles of the Ahtisaari proposals,” said one diplomat after the NATO foreign minister talks.
Russia has backed Serbia in vehemently opposing the plan drafted by former Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari, and there was wide recognition at a NATO meeting in Oslo that Serb concerns had to be addressed.
“U.S. Rep. Rick Renzi, R-Ariz., could soon step down in the wake of a federal investigation into his involvement in a federal land swap deal and FBI raids of an insurance agency owned by his wife.
His resignation could come as early as Friday or soon after, according to sources familiar with the matter.”
“In a letter to Wolfowitz and the bank’s executive board, the officials said they could no longer credibly implement the bank’s anti-corruption strategy, which the former U.S. deputy defense secretary zealously campaigned for since he joined the bank in 2005.
The letter was signed by 32 officials, but an official who helped draft it told Reuters it was supported by more than 50.”
How does Rumsfeld feel about Wolfie on the ropes? Do read Andrew Cockburn’s editorial in The Guardian, UK
“Among those relishing the exposure of World Bank president Paul Wolfowitz’s manoeuvres on behalf of his girlfriend, Shaha Riza, in recent weeks was almost certainly the former US defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld. Rumsfeld was driven from public life thanks to the catastrophe of Iraq, and for the moment at least lurks in obscurity.
Wolfowitz, his deputy until 2005, contributed in almost equal measure to the debacle, yet managed to slide from the Pentagon into the presidency of a leading international institution with every chance to redeem himself.
Blame for torture at Abu Ghraib and Guantánamo, bungling over troop levels, chaos in Iraq’s reconstruction, and the general meltdown in Pentagon management has all too often been laid at Rumsfeld’s door alone. However, Wolfowitz was an energetic enabler of these outrages and many other notorious initiative.” [.]
“For the second time in a generation, the United States faces the prospect of defeat at the hands of an insurgency. In April 1975, the U.S. fled the Republic of Vietnam, abandoning our allies to their fate at the hands of North Vietnamese communists. In 2007, Iraq’s grave and deteriorating condition offers diminishing hope for an American victory and portends risk of an even wider and more destructive regional war.”
This article was writted by LT COL Yingling. It is truly a wonderfully written essay. It is a long read but well worth it!
BushCo™ has caught another Al Q #…presently unassigned, the # 3’s been kinda overworked lately:
US holds ‘senior al-Qaeda figure’
BBC: Friday, 27 April 2007, 16:35 GMT 17:35 UK
Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi has been taken to Guantanamo Bay
The US says it has arrested a senior al-Qaeda operative on his way to Iraq to plan future attacks.
A Pentagon spokesman said Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi had links to militant leaders in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and had now been taken to Guantanamo Bay.
[…]
He is described by the US State Department as one of Osama Bin Laden’s “top global deputies”, personally chosen by the al-Qaeda leader to monitor operations in Iraq.
Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said the suspect was “one of al-Qaeda’s highest-ranking and senior operatives at the time of his detention.
“He is associated with leaders of extremist groups allied with al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and including the Taleban,” he added.
WASHINGTON: Paul Wolfowitz’s struggle to hold on to his job as World Bank president suffered a major setback on Thursday when more than 40 members of the organization’s anticorruption team, formed to promote transparent government and closely identified with Wolfowitz, declared that the controversy over his conduct was undermining their work.
Without directly calling for his resignation or removal, the team said that Wolfowitz and the bank’s board needed to take “clear and decisive actions to resolve this crisis,” which it said was undermining the bank’s “credibility and authority to engage” on the corruption issue.
“The credibility of our front-line staff is eroding in the face of legitimate questions from our clients about the bank’s ability to practice what it preaches on governance,” the statement said. “In these circumstances, we cannot credibly implement the GAC strategy,” using the acronym for governance and anticorruption.
President Bush warned Congress Friday that he will continue vetoing war spending bills as long as they contain a timetable for the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq.
Speaking a day after the Democratic-controlled Congress approved legislation that requires that a troop drawdown begin by Oct. 1, Bush said — as expected — he will veto it because of that demand. He invited congressional leaders to come to the White House to discuss a new piece of legislation that does not include a timetable, and expressed hope a deal could be reached. – linkage
Bush has found a new low today, an attempt at empathy.
George W. Bush, speaking today on Congress’ plan to begin bringing troops home from Iraq: “I think it — I’m just envisioning what it would be like to be a young soldier in the middle of Iraq and realizing that politicians have all of the sudden made military determinations. And in my judgment, that would put a kid in harm’s way, more so than he or she already is.”
A disgusting reminder that Habeas Corpus died a bi-partisan death in this country.
The US Supreme Court has refused to block government moves that would result in severely limiting contacts between Guantanamo war-on-terror detainees and their lawyers, a judicial source said Friday.
ADVERTISEMENT
The court rejected a request submitted Wednesday by detainee lawyers to keep alive habeas corpus petitions by detainees to protect their legal rights, including access to their lawyers. – linkage
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Influential U.S. senators vowed on Thursday to restore to foreign terrorism suspects the right to challenge their imprisonment, saying Congress made an historic blunder by stripping them of that right last year.
Riverbend has posted. It’s Goodbye
The Great Wall of Segregation
the other Iraq?: Yes, we gave a helping hand there too.
A sampling from the Economist and The Times, UK
War in the Horn
“On Thursday April 26th, after the heaviest fighting yet, Somalia’s prime minister, Mohamed Ghedi, said that an Islamist-inspired insurgency is almost squashed. The reality may be rather different.”
`We don’t have civil servants. We have guns’
“The US helped government forces into power, but now it is protesting that the regime is blocking aid to thousands of suffering people”
Imagine this!
‘The Islamists were the one hope for Somalia’– a January 8/2007 editorial in The Times, UK, republished April 26, 2007.
The warlords of death return to steal city’s brief taste of peace. For a few months, Mogadishu found respite from years of civil war. Now the guns are back — and the people are suffering again
Treaty row shows US-Russia divide
West may adapt U.N. Kosovo plan
What’s Going On?:
TPM notes Renzi could soon resign U.S. House seat
“U.S. Rep. Rick Renzi, R-Ariz., could soon step down in the wake of a federal investigation into his involvement in a federal land swap deal and FBI raids of an insurance agency owned by his wife.
His resignation could come as early as Friday or soon after, according to sources familiar with the matter.”
Looks like Wolfowitz is really on the ropes. Will he be pleading for his job?
“In a letter to Wolfowitz and the bank’s executive board, the officials said they could no longer credibly implement the bank’s anti-corruption strategy, which the former U.S. deputy defense secretary zealously campaigned for since he joined the bank in 2005.
The letter was signed by 32 officials, but an official who helped draft it told Reuters it was supported by more than 50.”
How does Rumsfeld feel about Wolfie on the ropes? Do read Andrew Cockburn’s editorial in The Guardian, UK
The puppet who cleared the way for Iraq’s destruction (H/T: World Affairs)
“Among those relishing the exposure of World Bank president Paul Wolfowitz’s manoeuvres on behalf of his girlfriend, Shaha Riza, in recent weeks was almost certainly the former US defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld. Rumsfeld was driven from public life thanks to the catastrophe of Iraq, and for the moment at least lurks in obscurity.
Wolfowitz, his deputy until 2005, contributed in almost equal measure to the debacle, yet managed to slide from the Pentagon into the presidency of a leading international institution with every chance to redeem himself.
Blame for torture at Abu Ghraib and Guantánamo, bungling over troop levels, chaos in Iraq’s reconstruction, and the general meltdown in Pentagon management has all too often been laid at Rumsfeld’s door alone. However, Wolfowitz was an energetic enabler of these outrages and many other notorious initiative.” [.]
and God bless Lee Iacocca.
Give her peace and give him a bullhorn.
An active duty officer has called out the senior military leadership and said that they have been useul idiots for the Bush/Cheney.
A Failure in generalship
This article was writted by LT COL Yingling. It is truly a wonderfully written essay. It is a long read but well worth it!
freedom’s on the march…
BushCo™ has caught another Al Q #…presently unassigned, the # 3’s been kinda overworked lately:
with aWol now at his low point of 28% in the polls…guess he’s hoping for a boost. must be thinking a bit more about OBL these days.
Can we frame this?
it all depends on what the meaning of :top: IS. with Bushco wet is dry and dry is wet and we need not count.
Wolfowitz loses ground in fight for world bank post
What is possible: A solar farm coming soon to your town…. a pic worth a thousand words.
Emission free electricity:
Ontario, Canada goes solar
who will object?
where is CG? Hope she does not mind my floating today’s news bucket.
I don’t think there is need to worry, idredit.
She has said that if it is not up by 8 am, then anyone should feel free to post one.
Hey, I was delighted to see you had stepped up and posted one – thanks! Work deadlines interfered today…
Hi CG
Whew! glad to know all is well.
Here’s a little something for you…the New York Post strikes again, trying to pretend they’re using the AP version of the story: TPM link
The Decider has Decided. Time to Impeach!
Please Impeach?
Bush has found a new low today, an attempt at empathy.
http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2007/04/27/bushiraq/index.html
A disgusting reminder that Habeas Corpus died a bi-partisan death in this country.
Just in, late afternoon
Sen. Patrick Leahy and others vowed to restore rights to detainees
At least there’s ownership.
welcomed news, idredit, thanks for letting us know.
Good people are not allowed to rise to prominence.