Saturday, August 23, 2003
Iraq is turning out to be a continuing battle in the war on terrorism (sic)- Bush, at
http://www.knoxstudio.com/shns/story.cfm?pk=BUSH-BADWEEK-08-22-03&cat=WW
9/11: Cover-Up Continues; Moms Battle Back:
With the Republicans in control of Congress, and with other news dominating, the investigation of 9/11 remains on the slow and quiet track.
What explains the Administration's actions before and after 9/11? As with other Bush policies, the choice is always between incompetence and deviousness/secrecy. In her article in the New York Observer, http://www.nyobserver.com/pages/frontpage3.asp, Gail Sheehy tosses those possibilities around, while citing the efforts of four widows of 9/11, the "Just Four Moms from New Jersey" who continue to investigate 9/11. Their findings include:
Lorie checked out the North American Aerospace Defense Command, whose specific mission includes a response to any form of an air attack on America. It was created to provide a defense of critical command-and-control targets. At 8:40 a.m. on 9/11, the F.A.A. notified NORAD that Flight No. 11 had been hijacked. Three minutes later, the F.A.A. notified NORAD that Flight No. 175 was also hijacked. By 9:02 a.m., both planes had crashed into the World Trade Center, but there had been no action by NORAD. Both agencies also knew there were two other hijacked planes in the air that had been violently diverted from their flight pattern. All other air traffic had been ordered grounded. NORAD operates out of Andrews Air Force Base, which is within sight of the Pentagon. Why didn’t NORAD scramble planes in time to intercept the two other hijacked jetliners headed for command-and-control centers in Washington? Lorie wanted to know. Where was the leadership?
Mindy pieced together the actions of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. He had been in his Washington office engaged in his "usual intelligence briefing." After being informed of the two attacks on the World Trade Center, he proceeded with his briefing until the third hijacked plane struck the Pentagon. Mindy relayed the information to Kristen:
"Can you believe this? Two planes hitting the Twin Towers in New York City did not rise to the level of Rumsfeld’s leaving his office and going to the war room to check out just what the hell went wrong." Mindy sounded scared. "This is my President. This is my Secretary of Defense. You mean to tell me Rumsfeld had to get up from his desk and look out his window at the burning Pentagon before he knew anything was wrong? How can that be?"
Needed: Letters-to-the-editor, major newspapers grabbing the issue (how about a special anniversary follow-up in 2+ weeks?)...
What's Happening, Iraq: An ominous week. U.S. efforts to internationalize the Occupation while maintaining control are thus far doomed by that very need to keep control as well as by the bombing and what it represents, an unstable guerilla war situation, not fitting for UN peacekeeping.
Despite Administration insistence that Saddam remnants are the source of the trouble, observers have been consistently noting the breadth of the resistance to our Occupation.
Pepe Escobar, Asian Times, (http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/EH20Ak04.html):
It is a complex guerrilla resistance movement, controlled by a shadowy joint chiefs of staff, fueled by patriotism - as it was in Vietnam - and Iraqi nationalism: the difference is that instead of the Communist Party, the vanguard is with sheikhs in mosques. The discipline does not come from the teachings of Vladimir Lenin: it comes from Allah. And the banned Ba'ath Party and its remnants are just minor players in this equation: Iraqi patriots simply don't trust them...
The rationale of the Iraqi resistance is clear, and follows the anti-American graffiti found on countless walls around Baghdad. There's no nostalgia at all for Saddam, but he is considered to be a lesser evil than the Americans, who are regarded as not treating Iraqis with even an inch of respect. Americans are simply incapable of understanding how deep is the average Iraqi's anger and resentment. With the Americans bunkered in a "circle the wagons" mentality, there's simply no possibility of winning any hearts and minds. So, contrary to Washington's argument, the liberation struggle has nothing to do with bringing Saddam's regime back, but with having Iraq ruled by Islam and not by a foreign invader.
Casualties: They keep, will keep happening; 3 British soldiers today. The Salt Lake Tribune (sltrib.com, Dawn House) noted the issue of WIAs, wounded in action, the totals of which aren't usually listed. As of Friday, 1,007 U.S.military personnel had been listed as wounded in the 5 months in Iraq. That is more than double the "non-mortal wounds" of the Gulf War, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs. The number of civilian dead continues to be listed at iraqbodycount.org (6,113-7,830). Yet, on Bill Moyers' NOW, the BBC's Caroline Hawley observed that 5-10 civilian casualties have entered one particular Baghdad hospital each day. With totals murky and the media reporting combat fatalities only, FAIR (Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting, http://www.fair.org/activism/iraq-casualties-networks.html) urges us to contact the networks and demand to know the actual totals.
Bush in Decline: With Iraq and Afghanistan unstable and the Mid East peace in jeopardy, current scuttlebutt is that Bush is in more trouble. The Republican trump-card, that security is best left to Republicans, is thus in question. Dana Milbank and Mike Allen at the Washington Post note such in a page 1 article yesterday, (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A28971-2003Aug21.html), that despite repeated Bush claims, it's now clear that "Peace is not at hand." The ranks of Bush loyalists are thinning. Conservatives such as George Will increasingly articulate their doubts.
Perhaps the administration should recognize that something other than its intelligence reports concerning weapons of mass destruction was wrong. Paul Wolfowitz, deputy secretary of defense, was wrong in congressional testimony before the war. Although he said "we have no idea what we will need until we get there on the ground," he insisted that Gen. Eric Shinseki, a veteran of peacekeeping in the Balkans, was "wildly off the mark" in estimating that several hundred thousand troops would be needed in occupied Iraq.
Jim Hightower
Caught the Texas populist in Cambridge (good crowd) on his Take Back America Organizing (Book) Tour. The dominant message- even from Kucinich people in attendance- was optimism, that the tide has turned, there's much organizing around the country... but that there's a way to go... which requires more hard work.
Blog Posting: I've mentioned it previously; If more convenient, you can find these blogs posted at the web site of the National Association of Socially Responsible Organizations (NASRO), http://www.global-equality.org/news/blog/index.shtml.
-R
http://www.knoxstudio.com/shns/story.cfm?pk=BUSH-BADWEEK-08-22-03&cat=WW
9/11: Cover-Up Continues; Moms Battle Back:
With the Republicans in control of Congress, and with other news dominating, the investigation of 9/11 remains on the slow and quiet track.
What explains the Administration's actions before and after 9/11? As with other Bush policies, the choice is always between incompetence and deviousness/secrecy. In her article in the New York Observer, http://www.nyobserver.com/pages/frontpage3.asp, Gail Sheehy tosses those possibilities around, while citing the efforts of four widows of 9/11, the "Just Four Moms from New Jersey" who continue to investigate 9/11. Their findings include:
Lorie checked out the North American Aerospace Defense Command, whose specific mission includes a response to any form of an air attack on America. It was created to provide a defense of critical command-and-control targets. At 8:40 a.m. on 9/11, the F.A.A. notified NORAD that Flight No. 11 had been hijacked. Three minutes later, the F.A.A. notified NORAD that Flight No. 175 was also hijacked. By 9:02 a.m., both planes had crashed into the World Trade Center, but there had been no action by NORAD. Both agencies also knew there were two other hijacked planes in the air that had been violently diverted from their flight pattern. All other air traffic had been ordered grounded. NORAD operates out of Andrews Air Force Base, which is within sight of the Pentagon. Why didn’t NORAD scramble planes in time to intercept the two other hijacked jetliners headed for command-and-control centers in Washington? Lorie wanted to know. Where was the leadership?
Mindy pieced together the actions of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. He had been in his Washington office engaged in his "usual intelligence briefing." After being informed of the two attacks on the World Trade Center, he proceeded with his briefing until the third hijacked plane struck the Pentagon. Mindy relayed the information to Kristen:
"Can you believe this? Two planes hitting the Twin Towers in New York City did not rise to the level of Rumsfeld’s leaving his office and going to the war room to check out just what the hell went wrong." Mindy sounded scared. "This is my President. This is my Secretary of Defense. You mean to tell me Rumsfeld had to get up from his desk and look out his window at the burning Pentagon before he knew anything was wrong? How can that be?"
Needed: Letters-to-the-editor, major newspapers grabbing the issue (how about a special anniversary follow-up in 2+ weeks?)...
What's Happening, Iraq: An ominous week. U.S. efforts to internationalize the Occupation while maintaining control are thus far doomed by that very need to keep control as well as by the bombing and what it represents, an unstable guerilla war situation, not fitting for UN peacekeeping.
Despite Administration insistence that Saddam remnants are the source of the trouble, observers have been consistently noting the breadth of the resistance to our Occupation.
Pepe Escobar, Asian Times, (http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/EH20Ak04.html):
It is a complex guerrilla resistance movement, controlled by a shadowy joint chiefs of staff, fueled by patriotism - as it was in Vietnam - and Iraqi nationalism: the difference is that instead of the Communist Party, the vanguard is with sheikhs in mosques. The discipline does not come from the teachings of Vladimir Lenin: it comes from Allah. And the banned Ba'ath Party and its remnants are just minor players in this equation: Iraqi patriots simply don't trust them...
The rationale of the Iraqi resistance is clear, and follows the anti-American graffiti found on countless walls around Baghdad. There's no nostalgia at all for Saddam, but he is considered to be a lesser evil than the Americans, who are regarded as not treating Iraqis with even an inch of respect. Americans are simply incapable of understanding how deep is the average Iraqi's anger and resentment. With the Americans bunkered in a "circle the wagons" mentality, there's simply no possibility of winning any hearts and minds. So, contrary to Washington's argument, the liberation struggle has nothing to do with bringing Saddam's regime back, but with having Iraq ruled by Islam and not by a foreign invader.
Casualties: They keep, will keep happening; 3 British soldiers today. The Salt Lake Tribune (sltrib.com, Dawn House) noted the issue of WIAs, wounded in action, the totals of which aren't usually listed. As of Friday, 1,007 U.S.military personnel had been listed as wounded in the 5 months in Iraq. That is more than double the "non-mortal wounds" of the Gulf War, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs. The number of civilian dead continues to be listed at iraqbodycount.org (6,113-7,830). Yet, on Bill Moyers' NOW, the BBC's Caroline Hawley observed that 5-10 civilian casualties have entered one particular Baghdad hospital each day. With totals murky and the media reporting combat fatalities only, FAIR (Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting, http://www.fair.org/activism/iraq-casualties-networks.html) urges us to contact the networks and demand to know the actual totals.
Bush in Decline: With Iraq and Afghanistan unstable and the Mid East peace in jeopardy, current scuttlebutt is that Bush is in more trouble. The Republican trump-card, that security is best left to Republicans, is thus in question. Dana Milbank and Mike Allen at the Washington Post note such in a page 1 article yesterday, (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A28971-2003Aug21.html), that despite repeated Bush claims, it's now clear that "Peace is not at hand." The ranks of Bush loyalists are thinning. Conservatives such as George Will increasingly articulate their doubts.
Perhaps the administration should recognize that something other than its intelligence reports concerning weapons of mass destruction was wrong. Paul Wolfowitz, deputy secretary of defense, was wrong in congressional testimony before the war. Although he said "we have no idea what we will need until we get there on the ground," he insisted that Gen. Eric Shinseki, a veteran of peacekeeping in the Balkans, was "wildly off the mark" in estimating that several hundred thousand troops would be needed in occupied Iraq.
Jim Hightower
Caught the Texas populist in Cambridge (good crowd) on his Take Back America Organizing (Book) Tour. The dominant message- even from Kucinich people in attendance- was optimism, that the tide has turned, there's much organizing around the country... but that there's a way to go... which requires more hard work.
Blog Posting: I've mentioned it previously; If more convenient, you can find these blogs posted at the web site of the National Association of Socially Responsible Organizations (NASRO), http://www.global-equality.org/news/blog/index.shtml.
-R
