Sic Semper Tyrannis

Out of Town

 I will be out of town testifying in  a trial from 31 august to 5 September.  I will try to participate here during that period as time allows.  pl 

"Beck challenges Obama's religious beliefs after rally in D.C." Washpost

 "During an interview on "Fox News Sunday," which was filmed after Saturday's rally, Beck claimed that Obama "is a guy who understands the world through liberation theology, which is oppressor-and-victim."

"People aren't recognizing his version of Christianity," Beck added.

Beck's attacks represent a continuing attempt to characterize Obama as a radical, an approach that has prompted anxiety among some Republicans, who worry that Beck's rhetoric could backfire. The White House has all but ignored his accusations, but some Democrats have pointed to the Fox News host to portray Republicans as extreme and out of touch.

Beck made the remarks in answer to a question about his previous accusation that Obama was a "racist" who has "a deep-seated hatred for white people." He contended that that statement "was not accurate" and that he had "miscast" Obama's religious beliefs as racism."  Washpost

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We haven't had a religious war here (SST) yet. "Now's the time and now's the hour."  Beck says that Obama is a false Christian because he is saturated in "liberation theology" which he says is really Marxism in Christian clothing.  Well, maybe that is so, or maybe not.

In the same interview, he does say that a lot of Christians do not consider him (Beck) to be a Christian because he is a Mormon. Christianity is generally understood to be a religion that is monotheistic within the context of a belief in the trinity of persons in the one God.  (I know that this kind of discussion is meaningless to atheists)  The Mormon religion is not monotheistic.  Nor is it trinitarian.  For me, a necessary corollary of that theology is that the Latter Day Saints Church is Christian only by its own definition of Christianity.  

One can fairly ask, who is Glen Beck to question Obama's religious identity as a Christian?  Moreover, Romney, if nominated is probably not electable in a national election because of the reaction of many "orthodox" Christians to the LDS Church.  Is that fair?  No.  Is it true?  Probably so.  pl

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/29/AR2010082903405.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Church_of_Jesus_Christ_of_Latter-day_Saints

"Top Karzai aide says U.S. must alter its strategy" Washpost

 ""I said, 'General Petraeus, winning the hearts and minds of the Afghans is not the job of a soldier. That's the job of an Afghan,' " Daudzai said.

Daudzai described Karzai as "concerned" and committed to changing the U.S. approach to the war.

"He's putting those conditions there, that if we do not review, then we will be on the path toward losing," he said. "We need to review our strategy, our code of conduct, so that Afghans believe that this is a sovereign state and President Karzai is the ultimate decision maker in this country. . . . We are in the last stage, the last chance of winning this war. So we cannot afford to spend a lot of time on accusations and counter-accusations."

Daudzai's statements come in the wake of media reports that many of Karzai's aides have long been secretly paid by the CIA. That revelation has raised questions about the duplicity of the U.S. strategy in Afghanistan, where U.S. officials are pushing Karzai to crack down on corruption among his aides, some of whom may be collecting regular salaries from the CIA.

The Karzai administration pushed back strongly last week against growing U.S. pressure. On Monday, presidential spokesman Waheed Omer said that corruption in connection with international contracts for Afghan companies was a bigger problem than any wrongdoing within the government."  Washpost

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As I have been saying, US contractor companies are contributing to the "corruption" situation in Afghanistan.  They are enabling theft of public money,  money borrowed, money taxed from the American people.

Nevertheless, that is not the main message in what the Afghans are trying to tell us.  

COIN is a disaster  That is the message.  A foreign army, no matter how benevolent in intention, can not fundamentally change the character of a foreign people unless that army intends to stay in the homeland of that people for a very long time.  We are talking about generations, not a decade.  We are talking about hundreds of billions of dollars.  we are talking about a willingness to bleed there indefinitely and a willingness to make the objects of our benevolent intentions bleed as well.

"That is the job of an Afghan," Daudzai said.  He could not be more correct.

Obama/Petraeus are going down and COIN is taking them down.  pl 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/28/AR2010082803420.html

"Insurgents Attack NATO Base" -

 "Insurgents, some wearing United States Army uniforms, attacked a major NATO base in eastern Afghanistanon Saturday and a nearby camp where seven CIA employees were killed last year in a suicide bombing.

Twenty-one insurgents were killed — including 4 who were wearing suicide vests, NATO officials said — and 5 others were captured in the coordinated attacks on the sprawling Forward Operating Base Salerno in Khost Province and nearby Camp Chapman. Three more insurgents, including a commander, were killed in an airstrike as they fled the area, NATO said.

There were no coalition casualties, but two Afghan soldiers were killed and three wounded, according to the country’s Defense Ministry. Four United States troops were wounded, NATO officials said.

Also Saturday, three more American service members were killed -- two in a bombing in the south and the third in fighting in eastern Afghanistan, the United States command said.

The raids on Salerno and Chapman appear part of an insurgent strategy to step up attacks in widely scattered parts of the country as the United States focuses its resources on the battle around the Taliban’s southern birthplace, Kandahar."  NY Times

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These fellows are interesting.  0400, US uniforms on some of them in order to get close enough to have a chance to get into the compound, some actually got into FOB Salerno.

At the same time they are attacking in widely separated places because the US has concentrated its available force in Marja and Kandahar.

A thinking enemy capable of true "strategery."  Well, well.  pl 

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/29/world/asia/29khost.html

What?

 "Following an uproar over a policy it said was designed 30 years ago to achieve racial equality, a school district in a Mississippi town on Friday scrapped a system of student elections where race determined whether a candidate could run for some class positions, including president.

The rules sparked an outcry after Brandy Springer, a mother of four mixed-race children in Nettleton, Miss., complained that her 12-year-old daughter couldn't run for class reporter because she wasn't the right race. Read the original memo."  MSNBC

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It really hurts me to agree with Thaddeus Stevens Matthews, but this is incredible stupidity.   I like Mississippi, always have and was trying to move to The Coast when Katrina intervened, but how could this school board have let this remain policy?  That county owes the woman from Florida a debt of gratitude for pointing out this foolishness.  pl 

http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/38880820/ns/us_news-life/

PS.  Someone should tell Matthews that "Lookout Mountain" and "Stone Mountain' are different places.  pl 

Sharpsburg or Antietam (take your pick)

 I went to the battlefield yesterday with a friend.  I have been there many times.  It is about two hours from my house.  It was a beautiful, not too warm day.  The national park was being heavily visited, a good thing.  We went there to remember the ground, the topography itself.  It is a remarkable piece of ground, chosen with a 19th Century Engineer's eye.

In the Autumn of 1862 Robert Edward Lee was seeking a decisive engagement with a big Union army.  He wanted a victory somewhere in the North, a victory that would shake the capitals of Europe and perhaps bring on European mediation of the quarrel.  The North had not yet abolished slavery as an institution and so the struggle could more easily be seen as a sectional struggle than would later be the case.  Lee had wanted to fight his battle near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania or perhaps near Baltimore, Maryland, but circumstances made that impossible and he decided to fight a defensive battle on the ground just north of the Potomac River and south of Antietam Creek. There, the ground rises from the creek in a series of small ridges that seem almost to be stairs, each twenty or thirty feet high. What needs to be known is that the advancing Union infantry could not see over each successive little ridge.

Michael Rubin, the next US consul in Najaf?

 "As both an American official in 2004 -- when I served as a political adviser in the coalition provisional government-- and an American visitor in 2010, I was welcomed in the Shrine of Imam Ali, Najaf's holiest. In January, I visited one grand ayatollah and the offices of two others. Each said he welcomed dialogue with Americans. Indeed, Adnan Zurfi, the elected governor of Najaf, spent his exile years in Dearborn, Mich.

Nevertheless, Shiites remain uncertain about American intentions. During a February 1991 campaign stop, President George H.W. Bush famously called on "the Iraqi people to take matters into their own hands and force Saddam Hussein, the dictator, to step aside." The Shiites listened and rose up, but Bush had second thoughts and remained aloof as Hussein's tanks and helicopter gunships crushed the revolt. Thousands of Shiites were cast into mass graves. Perception means more than reality. In every Shiite seminary, clergy and students asked specifically why they should ever again trust the United States after the 1991 abandonment. They accuse the White House, the State Department and the Defense Department of persistent bias."  Michael Rubin

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Rubin is among the most persistent believers in the glories of the coming re-birth of the Middle East.  He sees this re-birth as the aftermath of the invasion and occupation of Iraq which he and his neocon brethren did so much to bring about.  His faith in the benefits to be realized in social revolution is admirable even if mistaken.

Since he is so well connected in Najaf, he should be appointed the first US consul in the city.  Those who share his political faith should also be appointed to help him there in this mission.

As a gesture of trust and good will I suggest that the consulate in Najaf should be guarded by locally recruited Iraqis.  His ayatollah friend can help with the recruitment and vetting of local staff.  pl 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/26/AR2010082605573.html?sub=AR

Harper on Iranian Developments

  Based on discussions with several senior intelligence officials in Washington, it appears that the majority consensus among U.S. national security policymakers, regarding the Iran situation, can be summarized as follows.   
 
1.  Iran is still well-over a year away from any substantial progress towards weaponization.  There are serious glitches in the Iran program and there is effective and coordinated sabotage and disruption involving the United States, Russia, Germany and others.  There is no imminent deadline for military action, and the Israelis perfectly well know this, too.
 
2.  The U.S. is resolved to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.  So, while there is time for diplomacy, there is a deadline, and the military option is truly on the table.  Just not during 2010.  Revisit the question after March 2011.
 
3.  Unlike the Bush Administration, the policy of the national security team under Obama is NOT to attempt regime change.  Let the volatile internal dynamics play out, with only very clandestine support for opposition reform factions.  The view is that any factional realignment further postpones the Iranian nuclear weaponization program.

Come Back Jane!

One of the regulars here asked me to appeal to "Jane" to come back.  He misses you.  pl 

AZC, AIPAC and the Media - Stephen Lendman

 "In the old days, journalists were bought off to ignore them. They now do it willingly and reflexively, knowing the consequences otherwise, the Israeli Lobby's power to remove unfriendly voices - from Congress, academia and the media.

Demanded is that Israel be portrayed as peaceful, never aggressive, surrounded, beleaguered, and victimized, acting solely in self-defense. In contrast, Palestinians are called militant terrorist threats to Israeli security, its propaganda machine relentless in pounding that message, the Senate's investigation failing to expose and halt it.

As a result, it's more virulent and pervasive than ever, what no congressional committee will touch, what no major media report will reveal. Israel's power in America suppresses everything unfavorable, willing fourth estate stooges going along, or else." 

I would welcome the opportunity to include more of Mr. Lendman's writings on SST.  pl  

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The successful AIPAC refusal to register under FARA is a national disgrace.  It is symptomatic of the degree to which the agitprop efforts of the Zionists have conquered the information world in the United States.  And then, there are other elements in the AIPAC empire; BENS, JINSA, AEI, WINEP, etc.  Should they not also be registered?  Holder sues Arizona, but walks away from obvious Israeli interference in US internal affairs.  pl 

http://www.opednews.com/articles/The-Israeli-Lobby-Declass-by-Stephen-Lendman-100826-568.html

Habakkuk on "Holocaust Trauma"

"walrus,So basically what is being said here is that American intentions and thinking is perfectly visible to Israel, as was the German High Command's thanks to Turing s work on Enigma?It does indeed seem highly likely that no information on American ‘intentions and thinking’ can be hidden from Israel. How accurately the Israelis interpret it is, however, another matter.What we saw in Jeffrey Goldberg’s recent article in the ‘Atlantic’ was a vivid portrayal of an Israeli leadership utterly unable to escape from Holocaust trauma, by an American Jew who was almost equally the prisoner of the nightmares of the past. The article made vividly clear the way in which Arab and Muslim hostility to Israel is interpreted through the lens of the Holocaust, so that it is seen as driven by an annihilationist anti-Semitism essentially similar to Hitler’s.

Open Thread - 26 August 2010

I am out of town today.  pl 

"String of Attacks Kills Dozens in Iraq" WSJ

"At least 55 people were killed in about two dozen bombings and shootings, most of them targeting police, across Iraq on Wednesday, a day after the U.S. said it had met an end-of-month deadline for the withdrawal of combat forces.

The attacks, the latest in a series of high-profile and seemingly coordinated bombings and targeted shootings, have shaken confidence in Iraq's security forces as they prepare to take over from the U.S., which officially ends its combat mission here on Aug. 31."  WSJ

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I am not going to comment.  What would be the point?  pl

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703632304575450781081946758.html

Five Million Page Views- 25 August, 2010

Another milestone over the life of SST. pl  

Pakistani treachery and US stupidity

"By 2004, the US had filmed Pakistani army trucks delivering Taliban fighters at the Afghan border and recovering them a few days later; wireless monitoring at the US base at Bagram picked up Taliban commanders arranging with Pakistani army officers at the border for safe passage as they came in and out of Afghanistan. Western intelligence agencies concluded that the ISI was running a full training programme for the Afghan Taliban, turning a blind eye as they raised funds in the Gulf and allowing them to import materiel, mainly via Dubai. By 2005 the Taliban, with covert Pakistani support, were launching a full-scale assault on Nato troops in Afghanistan and being given covering fire as they returned to their bases in Pakistan.

At the same time, Taliban attacks on Indian interests in Afghanistan intensified, beginning the process of turning the Afghan conflict, like that in Kashmir, into what it is today: an Indo-Pak proxy war. The Indian embassy in Kabul was twice bombed - in July 2008 and October 2009 - as were two city-centre hotels thought to have been used by the Research and Analysis Wing (Raw), the Indian intelligence agency. Seven Indian civilians and two Indian military officers died in the blasts."  Dalrymple

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One can only ask - what the hell do we think we are playing at in AFPAK?  We have known the Pakistanis were "two timing" us since 2004.  Now lets see, which chapter in the COIN manual deals with this?  pl

http://www.newstatesman.com/asia/2010/08/india-pakistan-afghanistan

Mossad in America - Giraldi

 "Israeli government claims that it does not spy on the United States are intended for the media and popular consumption. The reality is that Israel’s intelligence agencies target the United States intensively, particularly in pursuit of military and dual-use civilian technology. Among nations considered to be friendly to Washington, Israel leads all others in its active espionage directed against American companies and the Defense Department. It also dominates two commercial sectors that enable it to extend its reach inside America’s domestic infrastructure: airline and telecommunications security. Israel is believed to have the ability to monitor nearly all phone records originating in the United States, while numerous Israeli air-travel security companies are known to act as the local Mossad stations.

As tensions with Iran increase, sources in the counterintelligence community report that Israeli agents have become more aggressive in targeting Muslims living in the United States as well as in operating against critics. There have been a number of cases reported to the FBI about Mossad officers who have approached leaders in Arab-American communities and have falsely represented themselves as “U.S. intelligence.” Because few Muslims would assist an Israeli, this is done to increase the likelihood that the target will cooperate. It’s referred to as a “false flag” operation." Giraldi

http://www.amconmag.com/blog/mossad-in-america/

A Return to Basics - Stan Henning

Our country needs to include civics (the interaction of civil and military affairs) in the education system of our country nationwide as soon as possible. It is crucial to survival of our nation. We are sadly lacking in this field which, if taken seriously, will help develop citizens who will be more in tune with the serious issues  that can make or break our wonderful nation. We need people who, in situations of extreme danger, will be willing to make decisions  favoring our national interests as opposed to the preferences of monied interests who manage to get people elected, expecting that that those they have supported will support actions that, in actuality, serve foreign interests and fail to serve US national interests. If we don't get this straight soon we will go the way of Greece and Rome and become history. Wake up fellow Americans and focus on the realities of international politics.

An example of what this means is - don't try to declare "Victory" in Iraq. Instead, tell the Iraqi's that real victory will only be realized if Iraqi's focus on doing the right thing to include acceptance of multiethnic participation. Final "victory" lies with Iraqi's, not Americans. Admittedly, we have expended our resources so Iraqi's might find a better way, but that better way is their responsibility.

Actually, the same applies to Afghanistan - if the present government cannot manage and the Tailiban takes over and follows its established path, to include supporting Al Qaida, then we may be forced to level the place, which will actually be more easily accomplished than the approach we are taking now. 

We need to be more realistic, preserve our own resources, and quit following paths that drain our resources and cannot succeed. And we need to re-look our education system and attempt to instill a sense of responsibility that seeks to do what is right for our country as opposed to the desires of monied interests. This will likely require us to find a better way to support our electoral process as well, to include reconsidering the recent Supreme Court decision that overturned a ban on using corporate cash to finance political ads.

 Stan Henning

 

 

"The Israel Lobby Swims The Atlantic" Grant Smith

 "Israel’s massive, clandestine nuclear arsenal remains a thorn in the side of U.S. nonproliferation efforts. Building it required many unfriendly acts, such as materials theft and covert financing from U.S. donors. The Israeli nuclear arsenal story remains curiously under-reported in America, though not throughout the rest of the world. But have media outlets such as The Atlantic received assistance from Israel and its lobby for publishing helpful – but equally misleading – content?

The unqualified answer is yes.

In the early 1960s the AZC’s Magazine Committee [.pdf] met regularly with writers to prepare articles for top U.S. magazines such as Reader’s Digest, the Saturday Evening Post, and Life. In its program [.pdf] for “cultivation of editors” and “stimulation and placement of suitable articles in the major consumer magazines,” the committee pushed lighter subjects with prepared texts such as the thirteenth anniversary of Israel’s founding while killing investigative pieces at such publications as the Christian Science Monitor. The committee confronted two major news items challenging Israel: fallout from the “Lavon Affair” (a cover-up of failed false-flag Israeli terrorist attackson U.S. government facilities in Egypt) and American peace proposals calling for the return of some expelled Palestinian refugees to their homes and property in Israel. The Israeli government and its U.S. lobby invested heavily in arguing against the return of Palestinian refugees through The Atlantic, according to yet another secret AZC report[.pdf]:"  Grant Smith

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I am going to abstain from commenting on this.   At some point I am going to write about the level of infiltration and "placement" in the executive branch, but not today.  pl

http://original.antiwar.com/smith-grant/2010/08/17/the-israel-lobby-swims-the-atlantic/

"Does Barack Obama want to be re-elected in 2012?" Telegraph

"There are few Americans who see themselves as bigger than the presidency but Obama could well be one of them. In 2008, Obama showed little appetite for the down-and-dirty aspects of political campaigning.

When things got tough against Hillary Clinton, he all but conceded the final Democratic primaries and let the clock run out. Against John McCain, he developed a campaign plan and refused to deviate from it. McCain was level in the polls when the US economy imploded, handing Obama a relatively comfortable victory.

Obama is the first black American president, an established author, multi-millionaire and acclaimed figure beyond American shores.

It seems highly unlikely that Obama will decide not to run in 2012. But he might well be calculating that a embarking post-presidential role as the leading global thinker in the post-American world as a Republican successor enters office is more attractive than being sullied by the political compromises and manoeuvrings necessary to win."  Telegraph

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As I contemplate the Obama vacation summer, I am prompted to ask "why do we have Camp David?" That idyllic recreational facility for presidents is located high in the Catoctin Mountains of Maryland.  It is a place of great natural beauty, fully staffed, very private.  How many times have the Obamas used the place?  Marbella, Martha's Vinyard?  The country is in pain. Unemployment is high,  the two wars are not looking very good, Wall Street is still being allowed to loot at will, people are making fools of themselves in an orgy of nativism and a new anti-Semitism aimed at Muslims.  Is this a time when a man who wants to be re-elected would let his wife spend several hundred thousand dollars of public money on a vacation trip overseas to a resort area that caters to the Euro-trash set.  Martha's Vinyard?  Why is the Gulf Coast not a place where the Obamas could spend more than a few "symbolic" days?

People suggest to me that, having achieved the office of president, Obama has found that he doesn't like the job.  This line of suggestion continues with the thought that what the Obamas like about the presidency are the "perks;"  the house, the servants, the guards, the aircraft, the bowing and scraping, etc.

Will he announce at some point that he will not run again?  If he is going to do that, he should do it soon.  pl

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/barackobama/7958031/Does-Barack-Obama-want-to-be-re-elected-in-2012.html

"George Will’s Irrepressible Conflict With Facts" Max Blumenthal

"Nevertheless, a display case in Netanyahu’s office could teach the Obama administration something about this leader. It contains a small signet stone that was part of a ring found near the Western Wall. It is about 2,800 years old — 200 years younger than Jerusalem’s role as the Jewish people’s capital. The ring was the seal of a Jewish official, whose name is inscribed on it: Netanyahu."  Will

What is Bibi Netanyahu’s connection to the ring, and by extension, to the ancient land of Israel? There is none. His father, Benzion, changed his name from Milikovsky to Netanyahu after he emigrated from Lithuania to Palestine. Thus Bibi has  a much closer relation to Sarah Palin, whose Lithuanian maternal grandfather was rumored to be a Jew, than to any late Bronze Age “Jewish official” from the Middle East.

To understand the sheer insanity of Netanyahu’s magical ring story, consider how I would be received if my grandfather, Hymie Blumenthal, changed his name to Hymie Quetzalcoatl, then I asserted a historical mandate to rule over Mexico because Quetzalcoatl was a diety of the inhabitants of the ancient Toltec city of Teotihuacan. I would have a hard time being taken as seriously as David Koresh or the Unabomber."  Max Blumenthal 

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 "Hymie Quetzalcoatl"  I like it.  I suppose that Blumenthal's point is that nationalism, anywhere is largely based on myth-making employing exaggeration or outright falsehood.  pl

http://maxblumenthal.com/2010/08/george-wills-irrepressible-conflict-with-facts/

Requiem for a lost country - FB Ali

Requiem for a lost country

The earth gods are not mocked lightly. They are slow to anger, but scorn them long enough, defy them long enough, and they will rise up and unleash their fury upon you. This is what they are now doing. This year their baleful gaze has focussed on hapless Pakistan. They could hardly have picked a better target: a country with limitless vulnerability, and no defences. Over-populated, under-resourced, practically bankrupt, no governance to speak of, with a corrupt, bloodsucking ruling class, smothered under the weight of men with guns, some wearing uniforms, others sporting beards.

But it is not this country that I mourn. It will survive, as will its hardy people. Like the lowly of the earth everywhere, survival is about the only skill that their forbears bequeathed to them. They will pick themselves up, bury their dead, and resume their threadbare lives ‒ till the next calamity strikes. For, with Nature up in arms, it will be the drought next year, or the year after, or another flood, or some pestilence. If, at some point, the country begins to totter, one set or other of the hollow men with the guns will take it over. No joy there, for all they think about is war, all they care about is “the enemy”. To them (even the well-intentioned ones) the country is just a base to be used to mount their campaigns.

The country I mourn is the Pakistan that was meant to be, that could have been. The Pakistan that its founder wanted, the country in that vision he held out to the millions who laboured and struggled and sacrificed to help him bring it into being.

A country founded on the ideals and values of Islam, in which all its citizens would be equal whatever their faith, with liberty, social justice and the rule of law. Many forces opposed it, but the bitterest enemies were the self-proclaimed guardians of religion, for they knew their narrow, ossified creeds would have no place to thrive in the country that he wanted to create. He beat them back, as he did all the others arrayed against his mission. Muhammad Ali Jinnah’s spirit was indomitable, but the arduous struggle wore out his frail body, and he did not live long enough to shape the country that he had created.

It is the loss of this country that remained just a dream that I mourn. This dream that is now dead. It survived the depredations of man, but with Nature now joining the assault, its time is finally gone. I mourn its passing as do many others: the dwindling numbers of those whose youth, like mine, was set ablaze by the promise of this vision, the others who came to it later but gave it their allegiance, all of us who kept the dream alive in our hearts and strove to bring it into being.

And, above all, the few, the happy few, who stepped unhesitatingly forward when the dream beckoned that it may need their lives to ensure its survival.

It is necessary for all of us to bear witness to this dream while we are still around. Since, as it has faded, there have crept out of the shadows many who would desecrate its memory: those who claim that creating this country was a mistake, and the many others who falsely claim that it was meant to be a theocratic state.

We owe it to this shining dream of long ago, the Pakistan that could have been, and to ourselves, to step forward and say:

It was not inevitable that things had to be what they are. It could have been different. Our lives are proof that the dream was real, that it could have come about, that it was a goal worth striving for.

Lester Crown and Barack Obama

"Lester Crown is a Chicagoan with a net worth of four billion dollars. He owns a large stake in and is a former president and board chairman of defense contractor General Dynamics. He also has held large holdings in Hilton Hotels, Maytag (now Whirlpool), and the Chicago Bulls and New York Yankees.

Crown was an early supporter of Barack Obama’s candidacy first for the U.S. Senate, and then for president. He is one of the first and one of his most prodigious fundraisers. As the Obama presidential campaign website says, the candidate “… systematically built a sophisticated, and in many ways quite conventional, money machine.” The Crowns were an integral part of that machinery. One of Lester Crown’s children, James Crown, personally bundled $500,000 in campaign contributions for Obama and served as chairman of the Illinois fund raising effort. Lester Crown and his wife Renee hosted a fundraiser for Obama in 2007 at their home. The event invitation made it clear; their support for Obama was due to his support of Israel, its “right to exist“ and his willingness to strike militarily against Iran."  alethonews

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Lester Crown is a good and virtuous man.  In the days when i knew him well, I valued his friendshp highly.  i still have a very high opinion of him and his family, even if his German Shepherd did bite me once.  Nevertheless i think that he is mistaken about the need for a US war with Iran and I suspect that he has had some effect in causing the US to sponsor an all but hopeless negotiation between Natanyahu and Abbas.

I wish him and his well.  pl 

http://alethonews.wordpress.com/2010/08/20/israel-big-money-and-obama/

Clapper - The Great Reorganizer

 "Clapper, whose dislike for hierarchical organizations is well known, outlined a community structure that at least on paper looks relatively horizontal. He is, for instance, eliminating a layer of deputies at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and pushing their jobs down into the organization.

He has created the job of deputy director for intelligence integration to unify the collection and analysis tasks.

"It shows a refreshingly new way of thinking about what this job is about," said Mark M. Lowenthal, a former senior CIA official. "I'm upbeat about this job for the first time since it was created. It's our last chance to get it right."

Others said Clapper, who has also served as director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, might be flattening too much. "For his first shot, he's overshooting the mark and will trim back where it doesn't make sense," another former CIA official said. "He's not afraid to reorganize and reorganize and reorganize and reorganize. This is not a secret. Jim must have reorganized DIA and NGA 182 times. He's not afraid to second-guess himself.""  Washpost

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A lot of the intelligence community needs to be smashed flat and re-grown.  The community is dominated by career managerial bureaucrats both in and out of uniform. Organizational and personal ambition and self-aggrandizement are the guiding principles for much of what goes on.  The bureaucrats rule the roost getting in the way of the real intelligence people. 

My advice, knock down those embattled towers.  Purge the bean counters and all those whose main function is to tell the productive what they may not do.

Is it possible to combine and unify the collection and analytic functions?  Yes.  The best people always did that against resistance from the bureaucracy.  Most people can't get their heads around the idea that they should analyse the material that they and others collect.  Solution: Start growing a new work force who can operate this way, and dump all those who can not learn new ways.

Will Clapper last long?  The odds are that the process of undercutting him has already begun, but not here.  pl 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/20/AR2010082005272.html?hpid=moreheadlines

National Journal Blog - 20 August 2010

http://security.nationaljournal.com/2010/08/what-are-you-reading-and-watch.php#1618842

"Israeli-Palestinian peace talks expected to resume in September" Washpost

 "The Middle East peace process resumed in May, after a hiatus of 19 months, but it stalled again over the terms of moving from indirect talks, mediated by U.S. envoy George Mitchell, to direct negotiations.

Israel insists it is ready for direct talks, provided there are no preconditions. The Palestinians are ready provided there is a clear agenda. Israel says an agenda means preconditions.

Resolving the snag over terms is crucial, diplomats say."  Washpost

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The former NY Times reporter Judy Miller likes to address me as "gloomy gus" or some such thing when I encounter her.  Well, stand by for some more gloom.

The second Camp David talks failed because Dennis Ross and company placed the Palestinian delegation in a position in which a "solution" was demanded and expected by the Americans and Israelis on the basis of bargaining during the negotiations themselves.

This seemed reasonable at the time to the US and Israeli negotiators.  After all, is this not what one does?  Should not the outcome be the product of the dialectic of argument and persuasion?

Arabs generally think not.   They tend to believe that negotiations are for the purpose of of arranging the details of outcomes that are understood in advance of the conference itself. For them, anything else is an attempt to win concessions through trickery.

"The Palestinians are ready provided there is a clear agenda.  Israel says an agenda means preconditions."

Hello!  What kind of nonsense is this?  Have we learned nothing?

And then, there is the "little" matter of the non-participation of Hamas.  Does the Obama Administration really think that this 600 pound gorilla can be ignored?  Is this some sort of scheme on the part of Natanyahu, and "the boys" to discredit Abbas so that an isolated Hamas can be attacked and destroyed later?

Realism in diplomacy is a desirable thing.  George Mitchell used to be smarter than this. His staff should be advising him not to do this.  Failure will be catastrophic.

All the players should be engaged, and they are not.  The outcome should be known in advance and it is not.

This is both childish and destructive.  pl 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/19/AR2010081907203.html

"Last US combat brigade leaves Iraq" SMH

 "About 52,000 US soldiers remain in Iraq, with that figure set to drop to 50,000 by September 1, less than a third of the peak level during the 2007 "surge."

From next month the US mission in Iraq will be called Operation New Dawn instead of Operation Iraqi Freedom - the name given to American operations since the invasion.

To fill the gap left by departing troops, the US State Department will more than double the number of security contractors it employs in Iraq to around 7000, the New York Times reported.

Citing unnamed administration officials, it said private contractors would operate radar to warn of enemyfire, hunt for roadside bombs and fly surveillance drones.

"This is an irresponsible withdrawal," said Hamid Fadhel, political science professor at Baghdad University.

"There are dangers to do with security of the country, concerns and fears for Iraq's external security, because of the lack of a military that is able to protect the country.""  SMH

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Just so we all understand, the 1200 men of this Stryker mechanized brigade who entered Kuwait this morning were convoying the brigade's vehicles to Kuwait for shipment by sea to Ft. Lewis  Washington.  Lewis is the brigade's home station.  The other 2800 men of the brigade left Baghdad by air for Ft. Lewis/Mchord AFB days ago.  The departure of this brigade means that we really are through in Iraq.  The remaining 50,000 troops will be drawn down between now and the 2012 election.  By that point there will only be a handful, a few thousand left.  Will there be contract guards for the State department?  Certainly, but they will be bodyguards operating within the confines of the Vienna Convention and Iraqi law.

Let us remember that US combat forces completed their withdrawal from Vietnam in 1972.  I know because I was on one of the very last chartered aircraft (a Boeing 747) to leave Tan Son Nhut AFB at Saigon. The withdrawal was unopposed once the Paris Accords were signed after Linebacker II.  I packed up my kit, put on a good uniform and someone drove me out to the Air Base where I processed on my flight and left.

Two years passed with five thousand or so advisers, diplomats, logistics people left behind in Vietnam.  The North Vietnamese Army stayed in its sanctuaries near the borders.  There was little fighting, if any.  Then, in 1975 Congress passed a law forbidding any further assistance of any kind for South Vietnam.  The North Vietnamese Army then attacked en masse, defeated the ARVN and captured Saigon.  In defense of the ARVN, I would point out that it is a much more difficult task to defend population centers spread over a country as big as California than it is to attack in specific sectors in locally overwhelming numbers.  

Two Years! Two Years!  Talk to me about this in two years.  pl

http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-world/last-us-combat-brigade-leaves-iraq-20100820-12sb0.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_Peace_Accords

"Poll shows more Americans think Obama is a Muslim" Washpost

 "Those results, from a new Pew Research Center survey, were drawn from interviews done before the president's comments about the construction of an Islamic cultural center near Ground Zero, and they suggest that there could be serious political danger for the White House as the debate continues.

The president's religion, like his place of birth, has been the subject of Internet-spread rumors and falsehoods since before he began his presidential campaign, and the poll indicates that those rumors have gained currency since Obama took office. The number of people who now correctly identify Obama as a Christian has dropped to 34 percent, down from nearly half when he took office."  Washpost

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Collective madness?  Cynical manipulation of the bigotry of the ignorant?  A bad joke?  Some of all of that?

Do these people imagine that Islam is a sort of tribe into which one is born with an indelible mark upon the soul?  There are Muslims who think that but do the Americans who think that Obama is a Muslim also believe that?

Since the USA is a heavily Christian country, I don't understand the belief on the part of so many that Obama is Muslim.  Christians generally believe that Christ is the redeemer who died in expiation of our collective sin and that he is available to us if we take him as moral exemplar and guide.

Obama publicly proclaims his faith.  He worships as a Christian.  He educates his children as Christians.  He walks like a Christian,  prays like a Christian, etc.  Why would one say that he is not a Christian?  

Is it that he expresses compassion for Muslims?  I think that if you cannot feel compassion, then you are not much of a Christian.  pl

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/18/AR2010081806913.html

"The right's latest weapon: 'Zionist editing' on Wikipedia" Haaretz

 "Now the Yesha Council of settlements and another right-wing group, Israel Sheli, are embarking on a Wikipedia battle: Zionist editing on the Web-based encyclopedia. The first course was held yesterday in Jerusalem.

"The idea is not to make Wikipedia rightist but for it to include our point of view," said Naftali Bennett, the director of the Yesha Council.

"The Internet is not managed well enough, and Israel's position there is appalling. Take for example the Turkish flotilla [to Gaza]. During the first hours we were nowhere to be found. In those first hours millions of people typed the words Gaza-bound flotilla and read what was written on Wikipedia."

The course was designed to teach how to register for, contribute to and edit for Wikipedia.

The organizers' aim was twofold: to affect Israeli public opinion by having people who share their ideological viewpoint take part in writing and editing for the Hebrew version, and to write in English so Israel's image can be bolstered abroad."  Haaretz

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Innocent activity?  You tell me and look at the discussion of the wiki article on me on the site.  pl 

http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/the-right-s-latest-weapon-zionist-editing-on-wikipedia-1.308667

"Suicide bomber kills 59 in Iraq" Telegraph

 "By mid-morning, the Baghdad authorities had confirmed 39 dead, but the city morgue said it had already received 59 bodies. Sources said more than 120 were wounded.

Although the American military “surge” of 2008, combined with the success of the Sunni militias, drastically reduced the scale of the insurgency in Iraq, there has been a rise in violence as the time for US withdrawal approaches.

The fact that Baghdad’s intensive security has failed to stop regular major suicide attacks has particularly worried the authorities.

Last week, Lt Gen Babaker Zebari, the Iraqi chief of staff, warned that his troops might not be ready to assume full responsibility for the nation’s defences till 2020. The police are said to be even less well-prepared, though American senior officers say the overall level of training is adequate.

Failure by the major political parties to agree terms for a coalition government five months after a inconclusive general election in March has contributed to the unease. If Iraqiya, a cross-sectarian grouping that won the support of most Sunnis, is excluded from senior positions the level of disillusionment in the militias is likely to rise.

There have been reports that al-Qaeda has offered members higher wages to defect.."  Telegraph

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1.  Like the elves we are leaving Middle Earth (Iraq)  We are headed for the Grey Havens (Kuwait).

2.  What was that last about "the surge?"

3.  I thought Uncle Dave fixed this.

4.  "We've got to get out of this place, if its the last thing we ever  do," OR "I can't get no satisfaction..."

5.  "Everything old is new again."

COIN is a "dog." It always was, except in exceptional circumstance.  Once again:  It takes too long.  It is too expensive. It only makes sense if you own the place or want to own the place.  We do not want to own Iraq.

The owners are squabbling over the property.  pl  

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iraq/7949615/Suicide-bomber-kills-59-in-Iraq.html

Gates vs. Petraeus - Star Crossed?

 "In his first six weeks as the top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan, Gen. David H. Petraeus has seen insurgent attacks on coalition forces spike to record levels, violence metastasize to previously stable areas, and the country's president undercut anti-corruption units backed by Washington. 

But after burrowing into operations here and traveling to the far reaches of this country, Petraeus has concluded that the U.S. strategy to win the nearly nine-year-old war is "fundamentally sound." "  CBS News

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It sounds like the greatest general in the history of warfare (DP) and his boss (Secdef) are not on the same sheet of music.  Dave says that progress is evident, but that he may recommend that the anticipated withdrawal from Afghanistan be considered to be notional at most.  Secretary Gates contradicted him the same day reiterating the administration's determination to begin a serious withdrawal. in July of 2011.

Someone now serving explained to me yesterday that quite a few officers  are very unhappy about McChrystal's dismissal.  "It was unfair, deleterious for operations, etc."  If that is so, then classes in American government would be a good idea.  

As for DP, I wonder how many additional years he could wheedle after "recommending" an extension to a man who probably wants to be re-elected in November, 2012?

My generation learned something really basic about wars and the American people.  When they say you are through, you are finished.  pl 

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/08/16/politics/washingtonpost/main6777322.shtml

Cordoba House

 "I speak to every American Muslim who is witnessing the firestorm of prejudice reignite: America is your place. You belong here. Your religion, ethnic background and national origins are not a sacrilege just because others who pray to the same god committed unspeakable crimes."  

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The takfiri jihadis insist that their war against the West is a clash of civilizations. Evidently a lot of people like Charles Krauthammer agree with them.  And then there is Newt Gingrich, a sometimes educated man, who is saying that the name "Cordoba House"  is symbolic of Muslim triumphalism in the context of lower Manhattan.  The fact that Cordoba was the capital of Al-Andalus, the Ommayad caliphate in the Iberian Peninsula, a state that represented the flowering of all the best features of Islamicate civilization seems lost on many.  Cordoba in the Islamic period was a gem of human achievement, a place of tolerance for all, a place of great learning.  

Islam is a headless religion.  It is a religion led by laymen.   The people that are often called "clergy" are not. They are scholars of the religious sciences; law, philosophy, scripture, etc.  There are no priests in Islam.  There is no hierarchy, even in 12er Shiism.  Muslims form their view as to what is Islam by consensus (Ijma') among groups of Muslims of varying sizes, anything from millions to a few hundred.  As a result there are as many "Islams" as there are groups of Muslims who agree on their own version.  A lot of Muslims will not like that statement on my part.  Islam has universal pretensions.  God is one they will argue, so therefore Islam must be one.  No.  That opinion merely reflects their belief that their version of Islam is God's version.

The point?  This particular group of Muslims can be anything, anything they want to be, but the name is hopeful.  pl 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/15/AR2010081502755.html

The Two Davids

Today we have had the spectacle on MTP of David Gregory's "exclusive" interview with David Petraeus.  Petraeus' charm, and Gregory's puppy-like eagerness to please and be seen as being "on the team" produced a testimonial on the part of NBC "news" to the sacred COIN strategy and the irrelevance of the supposed July 2011 date for the beginning of withdrawal.  Gregory repeatedly sought to elicit from Petraeus his willingness to tell Obama that there should be no withdrawal.  Petraeus resisted that to some extent, carefully saying that he would give the president his best professional military advice, without taking into account the American political scene."  I would think that Obama wold not find that very comforting.  In effect what is implied is that Petraeus can impose his views on the president.  That may be true.  We will see.  pl 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/aug/15/general-petraeus-not-bound-afghan-exit

 http://moonshinepatriot.blogspot.com/

"Crash survivor doesn't recall unusual noises" Kyle Hopkins

The de Havilland Otter carrying nine people crashed an estimated 15 minutes after taking off from a GCI-owned lodge on the Agulowak River sometime Monday afternoon.

 "A veteran Alaska pilot and retired chief pilot for Alaska Airlines,   

Theron "Terry" Smith, was acting as a temporary replacement for the company's primary pilot who had quit midsummer, GCI President Ron Duncan said in an interview on Friday.

"Terry and several others agreed to do two-week stints to fill in," said Duncan, who was neighbors with the 62-year-old Smith on Campbell Lake in Anchorage.

On his application for employment with GCI, Smith said he had flown a total of 35 hours in an Otter. He had 1,215 hours flying a de Havilland Beaver and 2,378 hours of total time flying amphibious, single-engine aircraft, Hersman said.

Smith has flown more than 29,000 hours in his career, working for Alaska Airlines from 1979 to 2007. He died in the crash, after flying the Otter an estimated 10 hours over the course of three days for GCI, according to the NTSB." Kyle Hopkins

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This was a strange accident.  You can see from the pictures of the wreckage that the aircraft struck the mountain belly first.  That would indicate to me that the pilot was trying to fly up the slope to get over the top.  People did not feel the nose come up so it would seem that the plane had been flying in the same "attitude" for some time before it encountered the ground.  If the belly of the aircraft had not been roughly parallel to the ground everyone on board would have been killed.  i am tempted to believe that the pilot just did not realize how close he was to the ground and inadvertently "landed" on the mountain.  pl

http://www.adn.com/2010/08/13/1409237/plane-crash-survivor-doesnt-recall.html

"Obama signs $600M border security bill into law" Google News

 Actually, why quote this?  This is all a lot of political c---p.  

My view:

1- National ID cards like the one I carry and always have.  I do not feel oppressed.

2- A federal law which makes it a felony to knowingly hire illegals

3- Fund a barrier system all across the Mexican border that will make it as difficult as possible to cross the border the border illegally.

4- Once that has been done, enable a program for the eventual, penalized progress of present illegal residents toward legalization. In the absence of a secure border any program like this is merely encouragement of more illegal immigration. Many on the left are merely scofflaws concerningi US law.

My preference is really for a merger of the two countries but Mexican irredentism and nationalism make that impossible.  pl 

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gcleiR1IASV53QPzaSsB8LhaCjgwD9HIQBJG2

"America's Best Colleges" Forbes Magazine

This attracted my attention in the "whatever" category.  I have reservations about ratings schemes such as this.  The US News and World Report ratings are similar and equally dubious.  I say that in spite of the fact that my Alma Mater, VMI, did rather well at 60th.  That's pretty good for a small public school in Appalachia that lives on a shoe string budget and always has.  

The service academies should not be in this competition.  Annapolis, West Point, etc. are fully funded federal government installations at which faculty and students are salaried federal employees.  The ratings include such criteria as good jobs for graduates and student debt at graduation.  Well, graduates of the service academies are made lieutenants or ensigns and they have no debt, zero at graduation.  Including the service academies skews the result.  I also think that women's colleges are disadvantaged because even now women are often committed to family obligations in ways that men are not.  These obligations impede career possibilities in obvious ways.  pl

http://shine.yahoo.com/event/backtoschool/americas-best-colleges-2293942/

Of Chess and Baseball - David Habakkuk

 A point which puzzles me. In the thread on Jeffrey Goldberg’s ‘Atlantic’ piece, not only the Colonel, but also F.B. Ali and Phil Girald, suggested that if Israel attacked Iran, the conflict would automatically escalate so that the United States would be drawn in. And all three, obviously, are people whose assessments carry very great weight. However, Lysander suggested -- as he has in earlier threads -- that the sensible strategy for the Iranians would be to attempt to prevent the United States being drawn in, by limiting their response to a withdrawal from the NPT, and that they might well do this.According to Steve Clemons, Ali Larijani once told him that Iranians play chess, and the Americans baseball – and ‘chess beats baseball.’ And reading Goldberg's article, I did find myself wondering on what basis Israeli intelligence believed that the Iranians would necessarily respond to an Israeli strike by ordering Hezbollah to fire rockets at Israeli cities – precisely because the clever ‘chess’ move might be to instruct Hezbollah to refrain from attacking, unless attacked.The thrust of the comments of the former Israeli air-force

No Options in Iran?

 "General staffs are supposed to plan for even the most unlikely contingencies. But what the planning process will have revealed is that there is no way for the United States to win a non-nuclear war with Iran.

The U.S. could "win" by dropping hundreds of nuclear weapons on Iran's military bases, nuclear facilities and industrial centers (i.e. cities) and killing 5 million to 10 million people, but short of that, nothing works. On this, we have the word of Richard Clarke, counterterrorism adviser in the White House under three administrations."  Gwynne Dyer

----------------------------------------------------------------

Definitely worth a read.  pl 

http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/editorials/stories/2010/08/05/any-attack-on-iran-would-not-end-well.html?sid=101

National Journal Blog - 11 August 2010

http://security.nationaljournal.com/2010/08/gates-drops-a-bomb-on-norfolk.php#1614187

"Israel's Third Destruction of Al-Arakib" Max Blumenthal

http://maxblumenthal.com/2010/08/israels-third-destruction-of-al-arakib/

 

Sadly, Israel is following a pattern that has existed for many years in the region, a pattern in which the governments of the Middle East and North Africa seek to lure, or failing that to force the nomadic or semi-nomadic peoples into sedentary life on ground of the government's choosing. 

 

A Palestinian captain of the Jordanian Army once said to me that he could see that I liked the Bedu.  I said he was correct.  He wanted to know why?  I told him that they lived close to nature and were freer men than most.  He said I was wrong to approve of them, that they were backward, ignorant and generally detriments...   pl

New post on "The Athenaeum"

http://turcopolier.typepad.com/the_athenaeum/2010/08/morphing-self-portraits.html

BTW, where is this statue?

pl

"More than 50% chance of attack on Iran" JPOST

 "The chance that Israel will launch a military strike against Iran before next July is over 50 percent, according to an article to be published in the upcoming issue of the journal theAtlantic. The article's author, Jeffrey Goldberg, gleaned this information from interviews he conducted over the last year-and-a-half with forty current and past Israeli decision makers."  JPOST

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Jeffrey Goldberg's upcoming article in the "Atlantic" is summarized here by JPOST.   IMO this is about right.  The only question is timing.   Without specific knowledge of the decision on the date it is impossible to do more than guess.

Goldberg doesn't think that the US would eventually be drawn into such a war?  That is foolish.  The escalation ladder that would be climbed would be likely to include attacks on US forces and a strike on Israel would be probable from some quarter.  That would create a political situation in which US entry into the war would be likely.  

I thought several years ago that the US was on the verge of attacking Iran.  The Goldberg article tends to confirm that and informs us that President Bush himself put the brakes on such an attack at that time.  pl

http://www.jpost.com/IranianThreat/News/Article.aspx?id=184401

http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/2010/08/an_israeli_stri/

Update on Nozette

8 August 2010

In the Stewart Nozette attempted espionage case, in which he is so charged for attempting to provide highly classified information to Israel, a few things have happened since the latter part of March, and another status conference is set for this week.

Also included are some documents from the court's file.

24 March 2010: A status conference was held before Judge James Robertson. Nozette was not present, since there was no formal hearing. The case was designated a "complex case", most likely because of the Classified Information Procedures Act (CIPA).

30 April 2010: The government filed a motion under seal for a protective order regarding classified information; this would relate to CIPA.

The Badakshan Massacre 2010

 "The 2010 Badakhshan massacre involved the killing of 10 members ofInternational Assistance Mission in Kuran wa Munjan District of Badakhshan Province in Afghanistan by the Taliban.^[1][2] The bullet-riddled bodies of six Americans, two Afghans, one Briton and one German were found on August 7, 2010.^[3] The attack was the deadliest strike against foreign aid workers since the war began in 2001 in Afghanistan.^[4][5][6] Although local officials have stated that the motive was robbery, the Taliban claimed responsibility for the attacks and accused the victims of being American spies and proselytizing Christianity.^{[7]"  wiki}

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Doing good in savage places has always been dangerous and it remains so.   This team had no security force with it.  Why?  The locals might be less trusting?  True, but would that regrettable state of affairs not have been preferable to death? 

I have seen people wander off in bandit filled, tribal territory in quite a few places.  An active insurgency against the local government never seemed to stop them either.  Having more than once been involved in negotiations with tribal leaders for the return of USAID picknickers I have some small experience of this.

Trucks, watches, cash, women, all these are inducements to crime and murder but the faith of many in the goodness of all frequently trumps common sense.  "Preachers of Christianity?"  Yes, in the minds of some Muslims that is a crime punishable by death.  Did these medical missionaries not know that?  Do all Muslims think that?  Of course not, but if you run into the wrong ones...

A variant of the kind of thinking that leads to Badakshan is displayed in; tourists, pilgrims, "straphangers" of various kinds who return from places like the West Bank, Jerusalem, Kashmir, etc. and who then pooh-pooh the level of risk that they accepted in their trip.   What they do not seem to grasp is that war and violence are episodic and spasmodic in occurrence.   Situations are quiet until they are not quiet, and then, suddenly, violence and death fill the scene.  Chaos is the principle that truly rules.  

That is what happened alongside a county road in Badakshan.  pl 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_Badakhshan_massacre

Sidney O. Smith III on Race Relations North and South

 Re: A Historical Counterfactual Hi Steve: Thank you for all those insights, as you certainly gave me much to think about. I am asking many of the same questions that you raised, and, admittedly I do not know the answers. You are from the land of Faulkner, William and Walker Percy, as well as Shelby Foote, so in my opinion, the pride is justified -- I know of no literary tradition that can top it. As for the dire circumstances you faced in New Orleans I quite frankly, respect you for your decision to leave. The welfare of children must always come first. Besides, any place has its own special beauty, including Iowa. Who knows…maybe a return to New Orleans beckons at some point in your future. My fiancee took her two sons to New Orleans for a spring trip this year (via the Crescent from Atlanta!) and had a grand time, but I was calling and texting for many of the reasons you mentioned. I got a real kick out of your description of the State of Mississippi, circa 2010, and, from what I can tell, it is accurate. As a bit of comparative analysis: where I live (Atl), the mayor, sheriff, chief of police, district attorney, a great many of the state and superior court judges, my US Representative, the State Attorney General, and several members of the Georgia Court of Appeals and Supreme Court are all black. So are some of my neighbors. Re: Lysander Spooner.

"Fast-moving storms in D.C. area leave mess in their wake" Washpost

 "As of 10 a.m. Friday, about 36,000 customers still lacked electricity. More than 22,000 of the outages were in Northern Virginia, with about 14,000 outages in Prince George's County. The numbers were down from Thursday night, when, as of 9 p.m., about 96,000 customers in the Washington region lacked power. The outage affected about 50,000 Dominion Power customers in Northern Virginia and about 46,000 Pepco customers, including about 39,000 in Prince George's, 4,200 in Montgomery County and 2,800 in the District. All Prince George's schools and office buildings are closed Friday because of extensive power outages. In Alexandria, Mount Vernon Community School is closed Friday, and all summer school programs are canceled.

Parts of Prince George's and Alexandria were hit particularly hard. Thursday night, Alexandria officials declared a local emergency to boost coordination with state resources and enable the city to take "necessary actions" to respond to the storms. In Prince George's, power outages left many traffic signals dark, including at major intersections such as Route 4 and the Suitland Parkway."  Washpost

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A little local color.  It was one hell of a storm.  Power was out at my house for about 18 hours.  Well, not exactly.  Our 20 KW standby generator cranked up nicely and Chez Lang was a beacon of illumination in a black, black world.   pl 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08/06/AR2010080601564.html?wprss=rss_metro/dc&sid=ST2010080601611

The Old and The New - Sale

By Richard Sale, author of Clinton’s Secret Wars

The old proverb that nothing is more novel than the old is an adage that refuses to age. We can see this in its most astonishing form in the latest GOP savaging of Obama’s economic plan.

At the time of the G-20 conference, when talk sprang up of the necessity of government spending cuts, only Paul Krugman seemed to have any knowledge of a past history that pointed to why this course was likely to fail, and Krugman’s protests gained singularity chiefly by being the only ones to exhibit any such knowledge.

 Unfortunately, there is nothing we are experiencing now that we did not experience before. We all know about the New Deal but that term is hardly accurate. There were in fact two New Deals, the first from 1933 to 1937, and the second from 1938 to 1940. It is the second that should interest us most.

Hasbara Attacks

Not surprisingly, we have seen a renewal of Hasbara attacks, most recently from Montreal.  They will not be posted.  If you see this as a free speech issue, so be it.  pl

A Cakewalk Against Iran - Giraldi

 "A resolution (HR 1553) is making its way through Congress that that would endorse an Israeli attack on Iran, which would be going to war by proxy as the US would almost immediately be drawn into the conflict when Tehran retaliates.  The resolution provides explicit US backing for Israel to bomb Iran, stating that Congress supports Israel’s use of "all means necessary…including the use of military force." The resolution is non-binding, but it is dazzling in its disregard for the possible negative consequences that would ensue for the hundreds of thousands of US military and diplomatic personnel currently serving in the Near East region.  Even the Pentagon opposes any Israeli action against Iran, knowing that it would mean instant retaliation against US forces in Iraq and also in Afghanistan."  Giraldi

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As Phil says, such a resolution means there is little doubt that the US would follow Israel's lead.  pl

http://original.antiwar.com/giraldi/2010/08/04/a-cakewalk-against-iran/

"Attacking Iran: The Potential Negatives" Silverman

Attacking Iran: The Potential Negative 2^nd, 3^rd, and 4^th Order Effects

Adam L. Silverman, PhD[1][1]

While I don’t think anyone is particularly in favor of Iran building nuclear weapons, those who seem the most certain about what to do to prevent it from happening seem to never mention the potential follow on effects.  There seems to be a group of experts, analysts, and politicians who are very eager to see a confrontation with Iran regardless of the 2007 NIE’s findings, and the efforts of Admiral Fallon in 2008 and Admiral Mullen in 2009 to push back against a preemptive Israeli strike. This often seems to stem from wishful thinking: if we can prevent Iran from getting a bomb, and have to use force to do so, then everything will be all right.  A contact recently sent me a column that deals with this topic and asked for my take on it.  My response was a potential 2^nd, 3^rd, and 4^th order effects analysis; specifically the negative effects.  And to be very honest: I’m not really sure there would be any positive ones…  This column is an extended and expanded version of my response:

 

The Potential Negative 2^nd, 3^rd, and 4^th Order Effects of Attacking Iran

 

The potential negative effects for a preemptive attack on Iran’s nuclear development capabilities, whether done by Israeli or by the US, would essentially be the same as no distinction is going to be made between Israel acting alone or the US acting rather than Israel.  In the case of the former the US will be viewed as having blessed our client’s actions and in the latter of being manipulated by the client into doing what it wants.  

More National Journal - 4 August, 2010

 http://security.nationaljournal.com/2010/08/us-military-power-preeminence.php#1611207