Boxer vs. Rice

Senator Boxer, originally uploaded by Wazdat!.

Make 'em Pay Barbara!

Lettres Du Cachet

bastille 2, originally uploaded by Wazdat!.

Seems Like Old Times

"In French history, lettres de cachet were letters signed by the king of France, countersigned by one of his ministers, and closed with the royal seal, or cachet. They contained orders directly from the king, often to enforce arbitrary actions and judgements that could not be appealed.


“In the case of organized bodies lettres de cachet were issued for the purpose of preventing assembly or to accomplish some other definite act. The provincial estates were convoked in this manner, and it was by a lettre de cachet (in this case, a lettre de jussipri) in which the king ordered a parliament to register a law in the teeth of its own refusal to pass it.

The best-known lettres de cachet, however, were penal, by which a subject was sentenced without trial and without an opportunity of defense to imprisonment in a state prison or an ordinary jail, confinement in a convent or a hospital, transportation to the colonies, or expulsion to another part of the realm. The wealthy sometimes bought such lettres to dispose of unwanted individuals.*”

“The Algerian experience confirms how a type-A secret police force is born. Torture in Algeria followed logically from the dictates of the Special Powers Law of March 16, 1956, which permitted the Prefect of Algiers to delegate to the military exceptional authority beyond ordinary police powers. As the historian John Talbott has put it: ‘These powers, as exercised in the circumstances prevailing in Algiers in early 1957, opened the door to the practice of torture. It is not hard to see how this happened. The Laws of the Fourth Republic required a suspect to be brought before an examining magistrate . . . within twenty-four hours of his arrest. Such a procedure was one of the safeguards against frivolous arrest and illegal detentions. But in Algiers, the paratroopers arrested and detained for questioning hundreds of men and women suspected of nothing more than possessing useful information. The key provision of the Special Powers Act, and in some respects, the key to much of the controversy over the Battle of Algiers, was the authority to intern suspects, the right of assignation a’ re’sidence.”**

Indefinite Detention scares me. It strikes at the core of human dignity and liberty. The principle of equality under the law rests partially on the idea that the right to freedom is based on the right to privacy. Each person has the right to his or her own private destiny, his or her own private ideas, and freedom of action. And what makes it worse is that the idea that the police state doesn’t need to “show cause” in order to detain someone, allows that state to take people at will, and to incarcerate them secretly. What if, in four years this country turns into a police state? With a sufficient amount of paranoia a people could knock out the very few safeguards that prevent a police state, and keep the national police from turning into a secret police. Secret police are not called “secret” because no one knows that they exist, but because their actions are entirely beyond the purview of any official, or legal body of the government. Secret police are – officially – unofficial. When an arrest or what I would term “abduction” takes place, no paper trail, no witnesses, no known whereabouts of the “abductee” are given, because secret police are not responsible to any court, or any review but their own. Secret police tend to become “states within the state”, shrouded in – secrecy. It is a country no one willingly visits, or travels into, but is rather “abducted” into. One just simply disappears into the mist, “the night and fog” and is never seen again.

You can’t have a secret police without a witch hunt every now and then, and you can’t have that without a dire outside, or internal threat. In a democracy, that threat would unify, but in a police state, it breeds paranoia.

According to the Bush and Blair governments in the U.S. and Britain respectively, terrorism is just that kind of threat.

It helps of course if that threat initially is thought to come from some group on the fringes of society. At one time it was Jews, Gypsies, (The Soviet Union had it in for Baptists.) and other groups outside of the norm. Now it is people with a foreign passport. But soon some other disaffected group may come under suspicion. Soon we could add minorities to the group. The poorer you are the more vulnerable you will be. And then for good effect let’s add other fringe groups that simply – don’t follow the main lifestyle. Persecute Goths for instance, or speed metal freaks, who’ll miss’em?

Well if you don’t raise a finger to stop it, and they get to arresting your son, or daughter, you’ll miss them. I seem to remember the words of Martin Niemöller, when they asked him how a democratic society like that of Weimar Germany could be allow itself to turn into the Third Reich:

"In Germany, they first came for the communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Catholic. Then they came for me -- and by that time there was nobody left to speak up."


*From Wikipedia
**“Secret Police” by Thomas Plate and Andrea Darvi Doubleday & Company, Inc. Garden City, New York 1981

The Shot Heard 'Round the World

Representative Jones, originally uploaded by Wazdat!.

The Fight At It's Beginnning

I consider Representative Jones's bold move as the first shot in resisting the oncoming onslaught of neocon destruction. Every person who stood up and protested the certification of the falsified votes of Ohio deserves praise. Each and every one of them was able to quote chapter and verse on what went wrong, how it went wrong and what must be done about it. They did not go quietly into the night, but protested loudly and sharply. They spoke of crowds waiting and shortchanged beaten down and cheated. The Republicans could only reply with platitudes and homilies, and not one piece of evidence for their defense. I have some news for so-called "Patriots", my patriotism is manifested by my ability to protest as well as my right to praise. For the contumely hypocrisy of Tom DeLay, (of whom I have more to say later), a man thrice rebuked by the House for his lack of ethics, a man tied to a questionable, disturbing cabal and dirty political tricks of machine politics, I have nothing but contempt. Just as I have no sympathy for those who say one thing and do another, and abuse your trust while they are at it. Namely Senators Clinton and Schumer, who turned tail and voted "Nay" on sustaining the objection. Every person, be they old or young who stood there, in the cold only to cheated later, was doubly shafted today. Therefore, be on notice that we know how you voted, and will remember it next year when you are up for an accounting. From this time on the fight begins, and it won't end until we take back this country from modern day feudalists who would bring us to serfdom!

The Dangers of Partial Privatization

Old Woman On Thin Ice, originally uploaded by Wazdat!.

Gambling With Our Old Age.

“Social Security” The Cato Way, or The Century Foundation To The Rescue.

So, let me get this straight. Social Security is the tax that we pay to ourselves and our children right? We pay the tax when a part of our salaries is withheld so our employer can send that to the Treasury as part of the Social Security Trust Fund. That fund goes to present day people who are retired, right? Part of how much money goes into the fund depends on how many people are working at the time correct? I’m assuming of course, that when I’m taxed it is in a proportion commensurate with my pay. 12% is taken for Social Security. Sometimes the government needs to borrow money from the Trust to keep the machinery going. Well and good so long as it doesn’t take too much. That money goes into government bonds, which are always stable. After all, we are the government. We “pay ourselves first” through taxation, not handouts. Now once, there were 16 people working to every one that was retired right? So, that was 16 benefactors to one recipient huh? And now there are only 2 or 3 to one, is that straight? In about 20 years there will be more people retired than are working? And old people will live longer right? On the face of it, it looks like cash flow problem.

But now I hear that 20 years ago Greenspan figured this was coming and asked for a rate hike to create a surplus. And I hear he was persuasive. We raised the Social Security Tax, (though I hear that folks in my income bracket paid more than their fair share thanks to Reagan) and now have that surplus. And some people say it ought to last us until 2042 give or take ten years. So, what’s the hullabaloo? There was a time when we knew that the money was safe, that there was enough money to last.

Then George Bush gave people who don’t need it, a tax cut, spent like a sailor on a war we didn’t need, among other useless things. Now we have a deficit. Now George Bush says the Social Security sky is falling. That we will run out of Social Security money around 2018. Or, from the preface of the “2004 Economic Report of the President”:

“Even after the baby-boom generation’s effect is no longer felt, Social Security is projected to incur annual deficits greater than 50 percent of payroll tax revenues. These deficits are so large that they require a meaningful change to Social Security in future years. Reform should include moderation of the growth of benefits that are unfunded and would otherwise require higher taxes in the future. However, the benefits promised to those in or near retirement should be maintained in full. A new system of personal retirement accounts should be established to help pay future benefits. The economic rationale for under-taking this reform in an era of budget deficits is as compelling as it was in an era of budget surpluses.”

And he concludes with:

“The Nation must act to avert a long-foreseen future crisis in the financing of its old-age entitlement programs. The crisis results mainly from the fundamental demographic shifts to lower birthrates and longer lives rather than the impending retirement of the baby-boom generation. However, the scope for enacting meaningful reform will disappear as the baby-boom generation begins to retire and an ever greater share of the population sees its current income arrive in the form of a government check. The design of the Social Security program has failed to keep pace with emerging demo-graphic realities. The benefits promised to those currently in or near retirement must be honored, but a new course must be set to ensure that Social Security is viable and available to Americans in the future. To do nothing at this point to restrain the growth of entitlement programs would bequeath to future generations an increasing tax on their income to support Social Security. The only way to avoid such an outcome without reducing the living standards of future retirees is to save more today. Greater saving will increase the capital stock and increase the productive capacity of the economy so that it can support those higher payments. The combination of reducing the projected cost of taxpayer-financed benefits and shifting the revenues into personal retirement accounts provides the best mechanism for achieving that result.”

He means “everything will be gone”, even the surplus George? What then, poverty? Yeah George, then that deficit will be real!

Well, serious problems require drastic solutions, and – I must say, this one’s a doozy! Now, we are supposed to have a portion of our Social Security allotment put into a private account to invest it into stocks and bonds! And there, the good and honest stockbrokers and middlemen will invest our money into the good and honest corporations that will take care of themselves good and honestly, and keep our money good and honestly snug an’ cozy!

That’s assuming that your 65-year-old grandmother knows her way around things like stocks and bonds! Now maybe she does. That would make one of the lucky few that could do it. There is an element of roulette in playing the stock market. As long as a company does well, then so will you, but if it doesn’t you won’t do so hot. And stocks could shoot up, and dive down! Will anyone, at 75 have the instinct to maneuver in a timely fashion? The level of uncertainty will be staggering. And you know who loves old people with uncertainties? Scam artists! Stock scams are as old as the Rockies, and wiser people than your grandmother got taken!

But maybe the biggest scam of them all is this whole idea of Social Security being at all in danger. Don’t get me wrong. At around 2042, even the surplus will run out. Then we will have a real deficit! We’d better start birthin’ babies! But…

Maybe the solution need not be as drastic as the Bushies want it to be! That four-plus-one word, the one that Bush would rather wash his mouth out with battery acid than say - taxes, would not be so bad if introduced and gradually raised only slightly, we could overcome the shortfall. And we need more jobs people, a little less “outsourcing,” and more “insourcing.” Get rid of the tax incentives to take our jobs abroad! Businesses should start front-loading business ventures with things like safety and healthcare. Ethical behavior is the best lawsuit repellant.

Why then, are the neocons so insistent?

It has to be that they simply need to find another way to make money. Let’s look again at the problem and then at the solution they propose.

It’s a given that under the present circumstances, the money taken out of Social Security in 20 years will be more than that which is put in. I agree. Yet the neocons seem to think that the only alternative to their solution of privatization is either massive cuts in benefits, or massive taxation. But that is disingenuous, because 20 years will give us time to make more gradual changes in all these areas so that neither would be painful. Also, if those of the higher income brackets were to once again pay their fair share, and if (under a Democratic administration), we were to conclude our costly occupation of Iraq in a just manner, we would be slightly more ahead of the game than we are now!

Nothing made sense to me about the “Chicken Little Hawk’s” “problem” and their “solution”. I wanted to get at the root of their thinking, and who better to show me where the genesis of these crazy ideas came from than that bastion of neocon thinking, The Cato Institute.

Now let’s look at their “solution” to the “problem”: Partial privatization of Social Security means that the government would transfer a portion of our money into private accounts that could then be invested by the holder into stocks. This is supposedly beneficial to pensions. The reasons given are:

1. The American people seem to “know” instinctively that returns from a privately invested account would be better for them rather than the “alleged investment of pay as you go” in Social Security we have today. They say that the Trust Fund of Social Security is not real. To quote address given by the Cato Institute’s President Edward H. Crane before the S.O.S. Retraite Sante on December 10, 1997:

“To repeat, in the United States the payroll tax is not invested, just as it's not invested in most Social Security systems around the world. It goes directly into payouts to current retirees, with whatever excess there may be going to help finance the federal government's deficit spending. The government leaves "Special Treasury Notes" in a so-called Trust Fund when it purloins these excess funds, but to see that the trust fund is a fraud, one need only consider the options facing the government whether these "bonds" are in the trust fund or not. In the year 2010 or sooner, by our estimates, the cash flow from payroll taxes will be insufficient to meet the benefits due current retirees. Assuming the government will live up to its obligations (there is good reason to believe it will not, but for the sake of argument we will give it the benefit of the doubt), once the system's cash flow turns negative and the Social Security Administration turns to the national government for help, the government can come up with the necessary funds by: 1.) increasing taxes; 2.) increasing borrowing; 3.) reducing benefits; or 4.) reducing other government spending. Now suppose the Special Treasury Notes are presented to the national government by the Social Security Administration for redemption to make up for the shortfall. The government, in order to raise the funds to redeem the bonds is faced with precisely the same four options as if there were no trust fund at all.

Thus, when the American government officials smugly point to the approximately $2 trillion in accumulated Special Treasury Bonds that are expected to be in the trust fund by 2010 and tell us that this will help finance the system until 2029 and that therefore there is no crisis, they are being disingenuous, to put it kindly. There is no trust fund in the United States and the crisis is at hand, particularly for younger workers who face the prospect of negative rates of return on their payroll taxes over their entire working lives.

Which brings us back to the intuitive notion that a private account will, in fact, do much better than what Social Security promises, not to mention what it will be able to deliver. One of the best ways to see what an incredibly bad investment Social Security is compared to various alternative investment portfolios is to look at the Cato Institute's Social Security Web site at www.socialsecurity.org. That site has an interactive calculator prepared for us by KPMG Peat Marwick which allows the user to assume whatever rates of return on stocks or bonds he projects, what percentage of each asset he'll have in his portfolio, and what the expected inflation rate will be. The opportunities to accumulate significant retirement assets and income, using very conservative assumptions, are clear from the calculator. While the comparison to Social Security won't be meaningful to a French user, the exercise with respect to what it takes to accumulate desired retirement assets is quite enlightening and I would invite you to visit our Social Security Web site.” *

2. The private account would’ve supposedly given a better return on the investment had we already been on partially privatized Social Security:

“To cite just one analysis in the study for workers born in 1950, using prospective rates of return on stocks and bonds that are lower than the actual returns thus far during their working lives, a low income worker can expect $631 per month from Social Security. Had he instead invested his payroll tax in a 50-50 mix of government and corporate bonds, his monthly income would have been $1,069. Had he invested in a stock portfolio of 75 percent large capitalization companies and 25 percent small capitalization companies he would have received a monthly income of $2,419.” *

Supposedly for higher income workers life would be even better:

“For high income workers the results are even more dramatic. Social Security would provide $1,562 a month, a bond portfolio $4,585 a month, and a stock portfolio $9,972 a month -- that is about $120,000 a year. Plus, the investor in the private accounts owns the corpus of the money paid in, which is not the case with Social Security. In other words, the private option is clearly the preferable option.” *




All well and good. One problem: Just as one is not allowed to drive a car without proper training due to safety concerns, one cannot invest in the stock market without proper training for reasons of economic safety. Someone said that we now have a population of near 53 million. What are the odds that in about 20 years, enough of them will be properly checked out on operating a privately invested Social Security account? And what about people who through some misfortune either start working later in life, or must leave their employment earlier, and cannot find a job? I’m not optimistic.

Given the fact that the market does fluctuate, privatization means you are betting your retirement on whether or not you judge the proper time you sell your shares. One day, or two, can make the difference for your whole future. According to the Century Foundation’s Idea Brief: “Twelve Reasons Why Privatizing Social Security Is a Bad Idea” by Greg Anrig and Bernard Wasow:

“Privatization advocates like to stress the appeal of “individual choice” and “personal control,” while assuming in their forecasts that everyone’s accounts will match the overall performance of the stock market. But studies by Yale economist Robert J. Shiller and others have demonstrated that individual investors are far more likely to do worse than the market generally, even excluding the cost of commissions and administrative expenses. Indeed, research by Princeton University economist Burton Malkiel found that even professional money managers over time significantly underperformed indexes of the entire market.

Moreover, a number of surveys show that most people lack the knowledge to make even basic decisions about investing. For example, a Securities and Exchange Commission report synthesizing surveys of investors found that only 14 percent knew the difference between a growth stock and an income stock, and just 38 percent understood that when interest rates rise, bond prices go down. Almost half of all investors believed incorrectly that diversification guarantees that their portfolio won’t suffer if the market drops and 40 percent thought that a mutual fund’s operating costs have no impact on the returns they receive. “ **

In his address, Mr. Crane seems to gloss over that reality:

“Critics, of course, speak of the market risk of a fluctuating stock market. It's worth noting, therefore, that for all 30 year periods in the United States dating back from 1802 until the present, stocks have outperformed bonds 99.5 percent of the time. And overlooked in the discussion of market risk is what seems to me to be the much greater political risk of increased taxes, delayed retirement, and reduced benefits. With a private system, the citizen controls the assets. With a public system, the politicians are in control, and I know of no country where that is not a risk.” *

Once more Mr. Crane, in small doses, we can take all these things!

Now we go to the economic “benefits” of privatization:

“We asked the noted Harvard economist Martin Feldstein to undertake a study for us that would estimate the economic impact of privatization in the United States. Feldstein, who was formerly Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors under President Reagan, concluded that the present value to the U.S. economy of investing the future cash flow of payroll taxes in real assets would be on the order of $10 to $20 trillion. That would mean a permanent, significant boost to economic growth.

I would add that in the world economy of the Twenty-First Century, those nations that choose to adopt a fully funded private retirement scheme are going to be in a much more competitive situation than those that choose to stay with the government-run pay-as-you-go system. It is particularly significant both from the standpoint of geopolitics and the international economy that China is giving serious consideration to adopting a Chilean-like private Social Security system as we meet here today.” *

And what if it reduced national saving? People are not businesses. Family members will not conduct themselves as businesses. Will they feel themselves to be as stable as government does, or in fact – businesses?

Lets go back to the Mssrs. Anrig and Wasow:

“But privatization is actually more likely to reduce than increase national savings. Diamond and Orszag point out that evaluating the overall effect on national savings requires taking into account the likely responses of government, employers, and households. Historically, neither the government nor businesses have changed their spending levels consistently in response to large changes in deficit levels. But households that consider the new accounts to constitute meaningful increases in their retirement wealth might well reduce their other saving. Diamond and Orszag argue, “If anything, our impression is that diverting a portion of the current Social Security surplus into individual accounts could reduce national saving.” That, in turn, would further weaken economic growth and our capacity to pay for the retirement of the baby boomers.”

Maybe these people know your grandmother better than the neocons do.


How will they do the transition? By dealing once again in fallacies:

“In any event, Greenspan made clear that in his view there is no net cost in a transition to a fully funded system. The reason for that being the fact that an unfunded liability is a liability, just as direct national debt is a liability of the government. Whether that liability is implicit or explicit should really not make a difference.”*

What “unfunded liabilities”? Every penny is accounted for. What surplus is left goes immediately to utilities and administration.


“The notion of ‘unfunded liabilities’ in certain programs is based on the arbitrary assumption that certain designated revenue sources should pay for certain classes of government expenditures. The story that Social Security and Medicare should be paid for out of payroll taxes and their trust funds is not a recent creation of critics of those systems. It has been around for decades. But why? Revenues and expenditures are ‘fungible,’ meaning that a dollar is a dollar is a dollar. In fact, today’s Social Security surplus flows right into the pot with other revenues, while a significant portion of Medicare costs already are paid for out of general revenue. The real question is not “will the designated revenues be enough to pay for the designated programs” but ‘will we have enough income to afford to keep the promises we have made?’

There is no question that the nation’s gross domestic product will be sufficient to meet all of our Social Security promises forever, leaving lots of income for increasing the prosperity of the young. In general, the outlook for economic growth is good. Our average income per person in 100 years is likely to be much, much higher than it is today (more than four times as high). Social Security benefits are predicted to rise from about 4.5 percent of our GDP to about 6.6 percent over the next century. Even though such long predictions are very uncertain, this one should leave us sanguine: if incomes in 100 years are only twice their present level, and incomes of the old rise from 4.5 to 6.6 percent of income, that still leaves us with $1.96 for every dollar we have today, after Social Security obligations are taken care of. We can continue to keep our modest Social Security promises, and young families still will be much better off than families are today.” ***

As for the method of transition itself, it is true that it would be more palatable if corporate welfare were cut out, but people most people would have few questions about what else is proposed by Cato:

“From my standpoint, by far the best way of funding the transition to a private system is by cutting government spending. In the U.S. we spend, as an example, more than $70 billion a year on what we call corporate welfare, subsidizing giant corporations at taxpayer expense. Then, too, there are many departments of the national government, ranging from education to commerce to energy, that are simply not a national responsibility in America's federal system of government. Eliminating just one-quarter of the activities the national government should not be engaged in would finance the transition.”*

Now, I have a problem with few of these items in the area of cuts. Energy, education, commerce are not national responsibilities in our federal government? Energy, for one, is a question of geopolitical importance. Education is something that requires guidelines and funded mandates. Commerce requires at the least federal regulation and enforcement, especially in the internet age. Anyway, to continue:

“Second, the national government has many other assets that should be privatized, as was done in Chile to help finance their transition. AMTRAK, the money-losing national rail system should be sold to private investors. The government owns 50 percent of the land west of the Mississippi River and much of that should be sold to private investors who would likely manage it in both a more productive and ecologically sounder manner than do the bureaucrats in Washington, D.C.

Another means of smoothing the transition would be to invest privately only ten percentage points, leaving the remaining 2.4 percent to help fund current retirees. Extending the retirement age by six months a year up to age 70 for those who stay in the system would also provide substantial revenue relief while reflecting the increased longevity of the population.”*


But that 10% could turn out to be very costly to the next generation that goes to work in about 15 years according to the Congressional Budget Office’s “How Pension Financing Affects Returns to Different Generations”:

“To move to a funded system in one generation, either workers have to pay double, some generation must receive no benefits, or some balance of increased payments and reduced benefits must occur. In a simple ex-ample (shown in Table 3), workers could pay both $10 to current retirees and $10 into their own account as the system moves to a funded basis. A more gradual transition could spread the burden over more generations, but the total burden would be the same. In other words, to raise the rate of return for future generations by moving to a funded system, some generations must receive rates of return even lower than they would have gotten under the pay-as-you-go system.” (1)

So there it is. Nothing that the neocons put up makes any sense. Nothing but one thing, someone stands to make money! And that somebody would be entrepreneurs in the investment field. With an entire generation as a market the investment firms will find ways to fleece the elderly again. (That’s you and me in 20 years, for those of you in my generation.)
So finally a one-two punch from The Century Foundation:

“Among the one hundred best stock mutual funds, management fees range from 0.2 percent per year to 1.4 percent of the asset value of an account. The average is near the high end of that range, however, and many mutual funds charge substantially more. Smaller accounts require proportionately larger management fees because many costs such as gathering and mailing out information do not depend on account size. Indeed, most mutual funds actively discourage small accounts by setting a minimum opening deposit of $1,000 to $3,000.

Experience in the United Kingdom offers a warning about what the future could bring regarding management costs. Workers there have been allowed to open private accounts starting in 1988, since which time management fees and marketing costs among financial intermediaries have eaten up an average of 43 percent of the return on investment.”

So there. The small investor is really not worth considering unless he already has a firm foundation that the roulette wheel of funded pension cannot guarantee. But it would be a great market to get into. Any IPO’s for brokerage firms?

* Edward H. Crane “The Case for Privatizing America’s Social Security System” for The Cato Institute.

** Greg Anrig and Bernard Wasow “Twelve Reasons Why Privatizing Social Security Is a Bad Idea” For The Century Foundation

*** Bernard Wasow, “THE ‘Unfunded Liabilities’ Ruse” for The Century Foundation

(1) CBO LONG RANGE FISCAL POLICY BRIEF “How Pension Financing Affects Returns to Different Generations”

The Cato Institute "The Case For Privatizing America's Social Security

The Century Foundation "Twelve Reasons Why Privatizing Social Security Is a Bad Idea"

Social Security Privatization: Eleven Myths

CBO How
Pension Financing Affect Returns to Different Generations - PDF

2004 Economic Report of The President - PDF

Mosul Casualties

Mosul Wounded 3, originally uploaded by Wazdat!.

Does It Hurt Now?

"'What we think is likely, but certainly not certain, is that an individual in an Iraqi military uniform, possibly with a vest-worn explosive device, was inside the facility and detonated the facility,' General Ham said.

An impostor could have stolen a uniform or bought one on the black market. But the general suggested that the killer had exploited a hole in the enlistment screening process for Iraqi troops. Asked whether American forces have adequate intelligence about the Iraqi recruits they train, he said the vetting process 'is sound.'

'But clearly,' the general added, "we have now at least one instance where that was likely not satisfactory.'" The New York Times 12/29/2004 11:39 AM

The madness goes on and on. America traded in a sane ending to the war in Iraq for this – fiasco! It wasn’t enough that Rummy had to show how much he loved our troops by his flippant answers to that young Specialist in Kuwait, now that man’s comrades in Mosul had to be shown how little their lives are worth even when they take their ease. I’d think that the Army would make sure that the mess halls in Camp Marez were safe. The MESS HALLS! Am I to think that no place on base is safe? No barracks, no tent, no mess hall, no hospital, no latrine? No place for respite – in other words.

It seems that some insurgent penetrated camp security with a bomb vest. It could have been someone who was well known to them. Someone who had their confidence or so they speculate. It calls into question so many things. Firstly, did they do enough to assure themselves of the support of the Iraqi people, you know, the ones that they supposedly “liberated”? Secondly doesn’t it follow that if you want to assure yourself of the support of the occupied populace that you look to their security first, that you don’t give away their jobs to foreigners, and that you have enough troops to hold Iraq, not just conquer it? Here’s a “force multiplier” for you: if you come in with enough allies, if you stay on friendly terms with the populace, you won’t have to watch your back as much if they help you. Your force would be literally and virtually overwhelming! You don’t declare “major hostilities” to be over until you’ve secured the nation and sent the right political message! You can’t build the nation if you’re still fighting the war. Instead, the Three Failures Bremer, Franks and Tenet get to hide behind big fat medals while their failures are reaped by those they left behind them.

I’m reminded of a political cartoon I saw once in the Eighties, when the Soviet Union was the villain in the Middle East after invading
Afghanistan. The Soviets made many enemies there too. Two soldiers on a busy street in Kabul looking nervous as they were surrounded by peasants who all looked like Ho Chi Minh!

The analogy was that any one of those peasants could’ve been a guerilla, and the poor Soviet soldiers couldn’t tell one from the other.

And now a similar situation exists in Iraq. They know it was a suicide bomber, because the blast pattern and the pockmarks from the ball bearings indicate it was an inside job. That means that somewhere there was a weakness in the vetting process. Somehow, someone could obtain an Iraqi uniform, weapons, and maybe even the necessary papers to get into the camp so easily. What a surprise! Someone learned to be forger, someone took a bribe, someone paid the bribe, and someone had to angry enough to go into the camp and do the job! What wonders could ever cease in a society of the unemployed! Word is, it was someone who was married only a month before!

Twenty-two men were killed! This wasn’t just one or two at some checkpoint anymore. The same pell-mell thinking that went into prosecuting the war went into the occupation. Do everything on the cheap, and cheap is what you get. But then, why be surprised? Wasn’t it the neocon idea to level Iraq in order to build a “new society” there? And so the same cursory approach that went into undersupplying our men with armor and reinforcements went into training Iraqi security forces. Let’s face it, in an area where people feel resentment toward their occupiers, any security forces you create from the enemy population has to be suspect, either because they are moles who meant to infiltrate the occupier, or more likely were accessible to bribery (easily done in a place where incidentals like power still have to be rationed) or their families could be threatened. A whole lot of effort is going into staying on Square One!

And so what does this mean for the future. There is no security in Iraq! Yet Bush wants to hold an election! Where? Where in those “15 out of 19” precincts can one be held with any safety when even in a city in Kurdistan the people can’t have adequate protection for themselves?

And now a major contractor is pulling out. Contrack International, a company based in Virginia that was supposed to build roads and bridges in Iraq, had a contract worth at least $325 million. The reason for leaving? They could no longer afford their own private security. The cost for the safety of their workers became too prohibitive. That’s the price you pay for not having any allies, and Iraqi ears on the ground to take up the slack!

Now it appears that Mosul could be the new headquarters of the insurgency. And, did I hear correctly, there was still some major fighting in FALLUJAH!? It’s the Square One Circle Dance!


East Hampton Star -The Unfeeling President - By E.L. Doctorow"

Not Just a "Legal Paper" Mr. Limbaugh

Limbaugh the Blind, originally uploaded by Wazdat!.

He Can't See What's In Front Of Him!

So Mr. Limbaugh, lesser known brother to Rush, but no less misguided in his thought is "fed up with the scapegoating of Mr. Gonzales" over the torture issue, or in his words from his article in the Washington Times:

"Why do so many critics jump to the defense of this depraved enemy we're fighting, whether by leaping to the conclusion the Marine in Fallujah "murdered" the enemy soldier who could have been pretending to sleep, or presuming that our government lawyers are anxious to condone the abuse of terrorist prisoners

How about just once giving those in charge of managing our national security and those directly putting their lives on the line the benefit of the doubt?"

Mr Limbaugh seems to take the attitude that so many on the Right seem to take that since our side is the only true and correct side of the conflict, we have the right to win by any means necessary, and that the ends justify the means. so what if we torture the enemy? They attack us first, and - on 9/11 2004, they attacked us most savagely.

I'll tell you "so what" Mr. Limbaugh, and I'll go you one better. I'll tell how our national identity and self-worth are being sold down the tubes by these new "crusaders for democracy", and "guardians of freedom".

You seem to say that when it comes to questionable actions and war crimes, the enemy has no problem committing them, and we have every right to "get to the the line" as long as we don't cross it. I say that when you see the line touch your toe, you've already crossed it.

What the enemy does on the field or off of it is never under our control. You can appeal it, pressure against it, but never change it. It is what we do on our own turf sir, not on anyone elses, that gives us our moment of truth. It's not what the enemy will do with his captives and victims who beg for mercy, or how he will feel, or can he answer for himself. It's what you will do. How will you face the one begging you for mercy? And later..how will you face the Man In The Mirror?

It may be inconvenient for you to face Mr. Limbaugh, but I have to face it. Mr. Gonzales deserves to face his critics because he has been in a position not only to alter our rules of military behavior, he has turned us from being the "good guy" into the villain.

It doesn't matter what the intentions were at the top when the policy was changed. The law of unintended consequences always takes over. And if the policy change is radical and worded vaguely and with what one may construe as precarious implications, the consequences could be devastating. In the right climate, "Agresssive Interrogation" very frequently becomes torture.

Take for example that very memo you mentioned that Jay Bybee sent to Gonzales:

"We conclude that for an act to constitute torture as defined in Section 2340, it must inflict pain that is difficult to endure. Physical pain amounting to torture must be equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death".

Those are some very broad parameters sir. That leaves a big grey hole in the middle where many things can fall in. According to Wikipedia :

"In 1978 in the European Court of Human Rights trial "Ireland v. the United Kingdom" the facts were not in dispute and the court published the following in their judgement:

These methods, sometimes termed "disorientation" or "sensory deprivation" techniques, were not used in any cases other than the fourteen so indicated above. It emerges from the Commission's establishment of the facts that the techniques consisted of:


(a) wall-standing: forcing the detainees to remain for periods of some hours in a "stress position", described by those who underwent it as being "spreadeagled against the wall, with their fingers put high above the head against the wall, the legs spread apart and the feet back, causing them to stand on their toes with the weight of the body mainly on the fingers";


(b) hooding: putting a black or navy coloured bag over the detainees' heads and, at least initially, keeping it there all the time except during interrogation;


(c) subjection to noise: pending their interrogations, holding the detainees in a room where there was a continuous loud and hissing noise;


(d) deprivation of sleep: pending their interrogations, depriving the detainees of sleep;


(e) deprivation of food and drink: subjecting the detainees to a reduced diet during their stay at the centre and pending interrogations.



It refered to the above as the "the five techniques" and ruled:

167. ... Although the five techniques, as applied in combination, undoubtedly amounted to inhuman and degrading treatment, although their object was the extraction of confessions, the naming of others and/or information and although they were used systematically, they did not occasion suffering of the particular intensity and cruelty implied by the word torture as so understood. ...

168. The Court concludes that recourse to the five techniques amounted to a practice of inhuman and degrading treatment, which practice was in breach of [the European Convention on Human Rights] Article 3 (art. 3)."


Avoiding that word "torture", we are left with that grey hole. And where there is a void sir, something likes to fill it.

From the "UNCLASSIFIED FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY USMC ALLEGED DETAINEE ABUSE CASES SINCE 11 SEP 01" list at Abu Ghraib:

"Total as of 8 Jul 04: 10 Substantiated incidents; 11 Unsubstantiated incidents

1 Substantiated: 10 incidents - All 1st MARDIV - 0 OIF I, 2 OIF II
24 suspects; 10 Court-martial convictions - 1 General court-martial, 6 Special Courts-martial; 3 Summary Courts-martial
2 Non-judicial Punishments ( 1 followed by Board of Inquiry & pending discharge)
6 - charges withdrawn or dismissed
6 cases pending:
3 pending General Courts-martial
1 pending Special Court-martial
1 pending p.11
1 pending art 32 investigation
2 Unsubstantiated: 1] incidents; 25 known suspects & unknown number of other suspects (2NJPs fot false official statements alleging abuse).
3 Other; One detainee death investigated with no allegation of abuse.
Five investigations pending."

From the substantiated cases two glare out quite ominously:

"[6] 4th LARBn, 1st
MARDIV, 1 MEF
1 SUBSTANTIATED INCIDENT;
1 SUSPECT

3 Aug 03
3 Aug 03

SUSPECT: XXXX
LOCATION: Al Mumudiyah, Iraq (LSA Dogwood)
ALLEGATION: Mistreated detainee XXX by causing 2nd degree burns/blisters to back of of detainee's hands. Detainee requested to use hand sanitizer following a head call. As the detainee squatted down, a Marine guard suirted alchohol-based sanitizer into hands; excess cleaner formed puddle on floor. As the Marine guard turned to dispose of the empty bottle, XXXX lit a match & threw onto the puddle of hand sanitizer. The liquid ignited, & flames burned the detainee's hands, causing large blisters.

Command
(JAGMAN)

SPCM 5 Apr 04
Guilty of Art 128 assault with likely to produce death or grievous bodily harm.
SENTENCE:
Confinement 90 days,
Red to E-2

Closed

[7] 2nd Bn 2d MAR
1st MARDIV, 1 MEF
(2/2 is based at Camp Lejeune NC with 2d MARDIV

1 SUBSTANTIATED INCIDENT; 5 SUSPECTS

13 Apr 04
15 Apr 04

SUSPECTS: (1) XXXXXXX shocked victim. (2) XXXXXXXX helped PFC Sting operate (3) XXXXXXXXX-escort for victim while he was shocked. (4) XXXXXXXXX-HET NCO, present during incident (5) discussed shocking detainees before

LOCATION: Al Mahmudiya, Iraq (2/2 holding area)

ALLEGATION: XXXXXXX reported he witnessed XXXXXXXX & XXXXX shock an Iraqi detainee with an electric transformer; that XXXXXXX held the wires against the shoulder area of the detainee & that the detainee "danced" as he was shocked. The detainee-victim was released on 14 April & cannot be located.


Command
(vice NCIS)

(1) GCM 14 May 04 Camp Fallujah, Iraq Guilty of assault, cruelty & maltreatment, dereliction, & conspiracy to assault Iraqi detainee.
SENTENCE: 1 yr conf; red E-1 total forf; BCD

(2) SPCM 14 May 04 Camp Fallujah, Iraq Guilty of cruelty & maltreatment, dereliction, False official stmt, orders violation, & conspiracy to commit assault
SENTENCE: 8 mos conf , red E-1, total forf, BCD

(3) Pending SPCM

(4) Pending p11. SNM not in room, ordered Marines to stop when heard commotion & reported it to others.

(5) Pending GCM


(1) & (2) disciplinary action completed

(3) Pending SPCM 8 Jul 04

(4) Pending p11

(5) Pending GCM 24-28 Ju 04"



Yet sir, you continue to treat this matter as if it were only some legalistic matter, worthy only of intellectual endeavor. I found this passage particularly shocking:

"What about the critics' outrage that the memo reportedly said that inflicting moderate or fleeting pain does not necessarily constitute torture? For heaven's sake, this was a legal memo, not some advocacy paper. If the attorneys' research led them to that conclusion, we must not shoot the messengers for delivering their finding."

Sadly. you then proceed to show in your column the kind of immaturity your side has shown more then once when it knows it's position is morally indefensible. You argue that in any case Gonzales's little memo had nothing whatsoever to do with the policy followed at Sarpooza and Abu Ghraib. But there is a "smoking gun". One can say that the President wouldn't have had to approve of torture as defined by Gonzales and Bybee, but according to the January 24 memo from Gonzales to the President, Bush certainly did approve of everything that Gonzales had suggested:

" On January 18, I advised you (the President) that the Department of Justice had issued a formal opinion concluding that the Geneva Convention III on the Treatment of Prisoners of War (GPW) doeas not apply to the with al Qaeda. I also advised you that DOJ's opinion concludes that there are reasonable grounds for you to conclude that GPW does not apply with respect to the conflict with the Taliban. I understand that you decided that GPW does not apply and, accordingly, that al Quaed and Taliban detainees are not prisoners of war under the GPW."

Next, as if to give himself cover in case it all goes wrong, Gonzales advises Bush that could "as a matter of policy, decide to apply the principles of GPW to the conflict with al Qaeda and the Taliban."

Then afterwards he like any other good advisor gives Bush the pros and cons, ( where he excuses the rush from morality to expediency behind the purely legalistic construct that if he doesn't apply the GPW to either of these entities there will be no basis for him to apply it later - he will have set the precedent) he goes ahead and advises against applying the GPW. At this point, because Mr. Gonzales says that GPW III doesn't apply to guerilla armies and revolutionary governments it would be interesting to find how the Nuremberg Trials dealt with German anti-partisan warfare in their proceedings. Certainly anything to do with prisoners and noncombatants was treated as a war crime there.

In any case, the evidence that there was a top-down application of a policy of near torture emanating from the higher echelons, and that Mr. Gonzales knowingly enabled it, is also quite clear at the other end. That senior officers were following that line of thinking is clear in the emails sent by certain operatives in the FBI:

"We did advise each supervisor that went to GITMO to stay in line with Bureau policy and not deviate from that. I went to GITMO with XXXX early on and we discussed the effectiveness XXXXXXXXXXXXXX with the SSA. We (BAU and ITOS1) had also met with General's Dunlevey & Miller explaining our position (Law Enforcement techniques) vs, DoD. Both agreed the Bureau has their way of doing business and DoD has their marching orders from the Sec Def. Although the two techniques differed drastically both Generals believed they had ajob to accomplish. It was our mission to gather critical intelligence and evidence XXXXXXXXXXXXXX in furtherance of FBI cases. In weekly meetings with DOJ we often discussed XXXXXXXXXXX techniques and they were not effective on producing Intel that was reliable. XXXXXXXX (SES) XXXXXXXXXXX(SES)XXXXXXXXXXXXX(now SESXXXXXXXX at the time) and XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX(SES Appointee) all from DOJ Criminal Division attended meetings with FBI. We all agreed XXXXXXXXXXXXXX were going to be an issue in the military commission cases. I know XXXXXXXX brought this to the attention of XXXXXXXXXXXX.

One specific example was XXX. Once the Bureau provide DoD with the findings XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXX they wanted to pursue expeditiously their methods to 'get more out of him' XXX. We were given a so called deadline to use our traditional methods. Once our timeline XXXXXXXXXXXX was up XXX took the reigns. We stepped out of the picture and XXX ran the operation XXXXXXXXXXX FBI did not participate at the direction of myself. XXXXXXXXX and BAU UCXXXXXXX. We would not recieve IRs on the results of the process".

It goes on to state:

"I voiced concerns that the intel produced was nothing more than what FBI got using simple investigative techniques ( following the trail of the detainee in and out of the US compared to the trail ofXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX was providing XXXXX portion of the briefing."

It ends with:

"After allowing XXXXXXXX to produce nothing, I finally voiced my opinion concerning the information. The conversations were somewhat heated. XXXXX agreed with me. XXXXX finally admitted the information was the same info the Bureau obtained. It still did not prevent them from continuing the XXXXXXXX methods'. DOJ was with me at GTMO XXXXXX during the time".

Iraq and Guantanamo are two different places, thousands of miles apart, yet it seems that the same permissive attitude towards control and discipline of detainees is quite evident. That can only stem from examples that were set, and the atmosphere that was created. And that could only come from the top. Mr Gonzales must not be allowed to become Attorney General.

And I would like to conclude with something I consider the most damning evidence of all, proof of the "ends justifies the means" attitude - in your own words Mr. Limbaugh:

"Why do so many critics jump to the defense of this depraved enemy we're fighting, whether by leaping to the conclusion the Marine in Fallujah "murdered" the enemy soldier who could have been pretending to sleep, or presuming that our government lawyers are anxious to condone the abuse of terrorist prisoners?

How about just once giving those in charge of managing our national security and those directly putting their lives on the line the benefit of the doubt?

Does this mean we assume our guys can do no wrong? Of course not. Does it mean we become barbaric like our enemy? Never. But it does mean that those of us out of harm's way ought to appreciate that we're in a brutal war against an unimaginably wicked enemy breaking every conceivable rule. So we need to cut our guys some slack".

Well Mr. Limbaugh, one small problem. Where we treat with our prisoners, we are in control. It's all happening under our watch. Are we al Qaeda now? Do we become our enemy, and justify it because we fight him? Then all we are doing is replacing one executioner with another, and the world will not be better off.



Salon.com "Torture Begins at the Top"

Human Rights First - Documents

A.C.L.U. FOIA Documents"

Medals of Myopia

Bush Bremer Frank, originally uploaded by Wazdat!.

The Self-Important Honor Themselves.

Ye see yon birkie ca'd 'a lord,'
Wha struts, an' stares, an' a' that?
Tho' hundreds worship at his word,
He's but a cuif for a' that.
For a' that, an' a' that,
His ribband, star, an' a' that,
The man o' independent mind,
He looks an' laughs at a' that.*


* Robert Burns "A Man's A Man For A' That"

So Dubya decided to honor his first class stupidity, for he said that it is good. One hundred thousand dead Iraqis didn't attend this noble function. They were busy thinking of all of the interrupted celebrations that they died at, and the ones that they will not be attending. But it's allright for Bremer, Franks, and Tenet. How easy it must be to get these medals. Let's see, why not invade a country? But then I'd want make sure that I had a sufficient amount of men to hold the damn thing with, not just take it! And I'd also make sure that no one from the enemy army goes home unitl he surrenders his weapon, and is properly paroled after at least two years as a POW! God, what a disorganized coward I am! And speak of intelligence, where did Tennant learn the spy trade, the George B. Mcllellan School of Espionage? Did he get the address for the "Reds Under The Beds School of Geopolitics" from a comic book? Let us review just to make sense, just what did these gents do to deserve their honors.

L. Paul Bremer - Chief Civil Administrator of Iraq, whose duties were to: Bring order to the country, ensure the economic stability of Iraq, and introduce democratic reforms into a new Iraqi government. And so, to these ends what does he do? Knowing he doesn't have enough men to continue a protracted war he virtually negotiates a surrender where he disbands the Iraqi Army, and allows the ex-soldiers to keep their arms! And what great economic plan of recovery is in place for the Iraqi people? The one that the neocons sneak in thinking to brainwash shell-shocked civilians into accepting unrestricted, unregulated capitalism on their persons, and international control over their economy. Hail the new economic dumping ground! He fired tens of thousands of government bureaucrats, teachers, laborers, practically the whole infrastructure of Iraq, and farmed out the job of rebuilding Iraq to foreigners! You know, SOMEBODY built those Presidential Palaces, airfields, schools, mosques, bases. You didn't need Haliburton to come over and put together your electrical grid when local boys could do it cheaper.

From Disinfopedia:

"Even among the religious opposition, philosophies and actions differ. Many Sunni Arabs are convinced that America is there to obliterate Iraq's identity and turn it into an economic colony. Some have chosen to confront these alleged U.S. machinations politically. Others have chosen the route of insurgency."

And now Mr. Tenet: From Disinfopedia:

Long before the September 11th terrorist attacks on the United States, Tenet focused on the growing threat of terrorism, particularly from Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda terrorist group, and the nuclear threats from North Korea and Iran. On September 15, 2001, at Camp David, he presented the Worldwide Attack Matrix, an outline of an anti-terrorism campaign in 80 countries. However, the CIA was unable to prevent the attacks and this is seen as a major failure.


Furthermore the search for Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs) in Iraq following the 2003 invasion by US, British and international forces has proved unproductive and no major stockpiles of WMD were found following the occupation of the country. The case of the invading governments for a legitimate war against Iraq had been based largely on the threat of WMDs in the hands of Saddam Hussein, supposedly on the strength of reliable intelligence assessments, including evidence that could not itself be made public. Thus a failure subsequently to find any banned weapons or programs became a considerable embarrassment for Tenet and the CIA.


The resignation of both Tenet and CIA Deputy Director James Pavitt in June 2004 is speculated by some to be directly related to this failure to find the WMDs that the United States used to justify invasion. For example, Admiral Stansfield Turner (retired), director of the CIA under President Carter, said (Boston Herald, June 4, 2004): "I think the president feels he's in enough trouble that he's got to begin to cast some of the blame for the morass that we are in Iraq on to somebody else and this was one subtle way to do it."


According to another report, by veteran investigative journalist Bob Woodward in his book Plan of Attack, Tenet privately lent his personal authority to the intelligence reports about WMDs in Iraq. At a meeting in December 2002 the is said to have assured the President that the evidence against Saddam amounted to a "slam dunk case".

And what about the "yellowcake" forgery?

The documents had long been suspected as frauds by US intelligence at the time of these 2003 presentations. In early 2002, Ambassador Joseph Wilson had been dispatched to Niger to investigate the documents. On February 22, 2002 Wilson reported to the CIA and State Department that the information was "unequivocally wrong" and that the documents had been forged.


On March 7, 2003, only days before the invasion, the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) released results of his analysis of the documents. Reportedly, it took IAEA officials only a matter of hours to determine that these documents were fake. Using little more than a Google search, IAEA experts discovered indications of a crude forgery, such as the use of incorrect names of Niger officials. As a result, the IAEA reported to the U.N. Security Council that the documents were "in fact not authentic."

"Under certain circumstances, the exposure of a covert government agent would violate the Intelligence Identities Protection Act, carrying a maximum sentence of 10 years. The act applies itself to a person who "learns the identify of a covert agent and intentionally discloses any information identifying such covert agent to any individual not authorized to receive classified information, knowing that the information disclosed so identifies such covert agent and that the United States is taking affirmative measures to conceal such covert agent's intelligence relationship to the United States." [2] The Novak column did describe Plame as an "operative", but did not use the description "covert". Novak has stated that the CIA made "a very weak request" that he not name Plame publicly. WSJ.com columnist James Taranto suggests that this indicates the absence of "affirmative measures to conceal" necessary for a violation of the law. [3]


The matter is currently under investigation by the Justice Department and the FBI. Attorney General John Ashcroft recused himself from the investigation in December 2003. U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald currently heads the investigation. Because the Justice Department is a part of the Bush administration, some believe that rapid and effective action is unlikely.


David Corn had predicted that the investigation would die in the CIA -- that George J. Tenet would protect the Bush White House through his purported loyalty to it. Anonymous political weblog Just One Minute (JOM) writes : "Evidently not. One guess - Mr. Tenet, pondering Bush's declining poll numbers and faced with in-house annoyance, decided to do the right thing. One presumes that, with Congress back in town, Mr. Tenet checked with his supporters on both sides of the aisle before proceeding." Both Mark Kleiman and Josh Marshall have made recent comments on the matter, according to JOM."

And General Franks?

How could he calmly accept a plan miuscalculates the amount of troops necessary to hold a country, as well as invade it?

This from Disinfopedia:

"Following Turkey's decision to deny any use of its territory, the U.S. was forced to abandon a planned simultaneous attack from north and south, so the primary bases for the invasion were in Kuwait and other Persian Gulf nations. One result of this was that one of the divisions intended for the invasion was forced to relocate and was unable to take part in the invasion until well into the war. Many observers felt that the U.S. devoted insufficient troops to the invasion, and that this (combined with the failure to occupy cities) put them at a major disadvantage in achieving security and order throughout the country when local support failed to meet expectations."

And again from Wikipedia:

"Looting took place in the days following. It was reported that the National Museum of Iraq was among the looted sites. The assertion that US forces did not guard the museum because they were guarding the Ministry of Oil and Ministry of Interior is apparently true. According to U.S. officials the "reality of the situation on the ground" was that hospitals, water plants, and ministries with vital intelligence needed security more than other sites. There were only enough US troops on the ground to guard a certain number of the many sites that ideally needed protection, and so, apparently, some "hard choices" were made."



Wikipedia - George Tenet


Disinfopedia - Occupation Forces in Iraq


Disinfopedia - Iraqi Insurgency


Wikipedia - Duelfer Report



Wikipedia - 2003 Invasion of Iraq


Wikipedia - Valerie Plame

"You Go To War With The Army You Have"

You Go To War With The Army You Have, originally uploaded by Wazdat!.

Does Rumsfeld Even Have a Conscience?

What am I supposed to think? Here is this man, basically second-in-command to the Commander-in-Chief, who was all up in that about being "patriotic", and how our "brave boys" were there to bring democracy to Iraq, just like a thousand other neocon politicos who thump their chests about how proud they are of "our men and women in Iraq", yet they couldn't even come up with scratch to harden the very Humvees the guys need as personnel carriers. And yet in the face of all that "Rummy" seeks to impress with his "candor." His unfeeling matter-of-factness is chilling. What gets me is the blindness that they went into this thing with. But then isn't that how all disasters begin? "Oh sure! we don't need that many lifeboats on the Titanic. She's 'unsinkable'!" "We don't need to de-ice the Challenger!" They didn't want to pay their way. "You can fight wars on the cheap these days!" After all it ain't the Soviet Union we're fighting right? "Camel jockeys!" Yeah, sure! And the VC during "Tet" were just a bunch of "gooks!" Well GI's, guys and gals, you are passengers on the new Titanic! Men and women as mere commodities! Rummy's cannon fodder!

Just now I'm watching a National Geographic Ultimate Explorer about how female suicide bombers are the new phenomenon in terrorism. An old woman in Palestine is saying how she raised her son to be a suicide killer, and now calls herself "Mother of the Struggle", and I keep thinking how is it that we never seem to understand that just as the terror campaign is as much political and emotional as it is tactical, so must the response be. We keep responding as if this were nothing more than action movie. Send in Will Smith, Harrison Ford, Brad Pitt! Drop a few grenades, some fancy commando moves and voila! Instant justice! Except that the next terrorist is engendered within the heart, the cry for revenge after every one of our actions. You see, at this level it's a matter of friend and family. Watch them suffer, and you will learn hate. See them die and you will learn revenge. Let this happen day-to-day like water, dripping from a faucet, and you will learn terrorism. If that vacuum of hate is not filled with the hope of diplomacy and rebuilding, revenge can become a mortally lethal thing. Sadly then, to some it becomes a way of life. And so in a land like Iraq, you never know where the next recruit for the dark armies of lethal hate will come from. Therefore, there are no front lines. you cannot point to some fortification and say: "There is the enemy!", or "The enemy is down here!" The enemy is in front of you, behind you, and right beside you. And in a country where you are the occupier, and the people hate you, the enemy needs no camouflage. There are no front lines! There are no rear echelons! If you aren't going to employ diplomacy, and politics, any compound, any vehicle any toilet even must therefore be armored!

But the neocons didn't think about the revenge. They never thought to use diplomacy, or hope to reduce the chance of terrorism. They thought that the "Shock and Aw" shell shock would be enough to make the changes into the new Frankenstate they wanted to set up. They didn't dream the the "Shock and Aw" would ware off so soon. So they chose to think they could fight war on the cheap, that they didn't need that many soldiers. Now, two years later we have "stop loss". We commandeer National Guard units, tell old men to get back into uniform! And we violate the laws of decency! Perhaps Rummy won't be satisfied with mistreating prisoners. God! how he must miss "Free Fire Zones!" Our men, in order to survive are forced to improvise at great personal danger. Four thousand wounded so far! And how many hundreds of thousands of Iraqis dead? And the many-headed hydra of terrorism doesn't die if you fight it with weapons alone. You need to show these people a future! Ah but I forget that the neocons have already show the Iraqis the future, and it doesn't include them! And yet, these fools refuse to see the train wreck before them! They still want to win the war on the cheap, without body armor, without adequate protection for our men and women!

And so the Noncholant Man strides forward with temerity! To men who have given their lives and possibly their futures he stands there, and with brazenness he takes little care ot hide, has the nerve to say: "You go to war with the army you have!" What a pep talk! Just the thing a young man who gave his last full measure wants to hear from his grateful leaders! You're on your own boys and girls! Welcome to Khe Sanh!

McCain Attacks Rumsfeld



Rumsfeld the Bungler


Send Rumsfeld to the Battlefields


McCain Voices Lack of Trust in Rumsfeld

Kerik

Kerik
Originally uploaded by Wazdat!.

I don't know what to make of him.



"Some view him as an underdog who beat the odds, as others say his rise was political and cite ex-aides' scandal" says a headline from Newsday. He is most definitely a puzzle. You have a Bernard Kerik for every faction. You either love him, or hate him. You either love him as the jingoistic hero of 9/11 that was "right in the thick of things" according to the New York Post, or you are suspicious of him as Newsday's Ellis Henican is.

The story, if you listen to the right can be fairly maudlin. "Mr. Kerik, 49, grew up without knowing his mother, a tough youth in Paterson, N.J., where he usually cut classes from Eastside High School. He learned years later that his mother was a convicted prostitute, possibly killed by a pimp." says the Washington Times. He dropped out of highschool, but got his equivalency degree before joining the Army. He was shipped off to South Korea where was an MP. There, he met a Korean girl, had an affair from which a child resulted. He left the military to do private security work in Saudi Arabia protecting VIPs from terrorists. Most say that he was a bodyguard for the royal family.

"After a stint supervising a jail in New Jersey," the Times goes on, "he became a New York police officer, starting out walking a beat in Times Square when it was still largely the domain of seedy characters and street hustlers. He was promoted to detective and worked undercover arresting drug dealers. He grew a long ponytail to look the part."

The New York Post fairly beatifies him. "Kerik's bona fides as a cop — and his personal bravery — are beyond question. A former undercover narcotics detective, he received the NYPD's coveted Medal of Valor after a 1991 drug bust in Washington Heights."

People sing praises of Kerik as a director of the New York City Department of Corrections. They say that he decreased inmate violence by 93 percent. The TimesOnline crows about the fact that Kerik's wife is Syrian, a fact that is supposed to appeal to
Arab Americans.

A tae kwan do black belt, Kerik showed what a tough guy he was by defending Bush's record at the RNC convention. He is also praised for attending the funerals of the police officers who died on 9/11.

So, say the loyal Bushies he was picked to train the Iraqi Police. And now Bush wants him to replace Tom Ridge as Homeland Security chief.

Well, there is the other way of looking at this man:

"He's a personal and professional time bomb the Bushies will learn to regret.' says Ellis Henican of Newsday. He goes on: "That's certainly the message that smart law-enforcement professionals in New York were exchanging yesterday, as they shook their heads in disbelief at Kerik's latest career goal.

"He couldn't run the Rikers commissary without getting greedy and making a mess, in a jam," one correction veteran said. "Now he's gonna be in charge of the Department of Homeland Security? Let's just hope the terrorists don't decide to come back."

This former subordinate was referring to just one of many petty scandals that have hung over Kerik's career. When he ran Correction, nearly $1 million of tobacco-company rebates were diverted into an obscure foundation Kerik was president of. This was for cigarettes bought with taxpayer money and then sold at inflated prices to jail inmates. But this rebate money - would kickbacks be a better word? - got spent entirely outside the normal rules for public funds.

No one was criminally charged. But a whole rash of IRS rules were seemingly violated. One board member quit in protest when the foundation treasurer refused to provide him with financial reports. And no one has ever explained where all the money went.

It was a typical Kerik deal. He behaved from start to finish like normal rules didn't apply to him."

As for his work in Iraq, some say that it leaves a lot to be desired. The weekness of the Iraqi police is said by many to be one the most significant problems the the military has, and I may conjecture, could be a significant obstacle to free elections in Iraq. He is accused of placing emphasis on quantity of troops trained rather than quality. According to The Guardian Weekly:

"The obsession with figures disguised a poorly thought-out retraining programme and significant shortfalls in the most basic equipment, including radios, guns, flak jackets and cars. Fewer than half the police had been retrained. Most worryingly, at least a third were deemed so incompetent or reliable that this summer US commanders decided they should simply be sacked and handed a pay-off worth a total of $60m. Recruitment has begun again, much more slowly and this time with longer retraining programmes."

The results of the so-called "training" is that at the beginning of the Fallujah uprising, when the police were supposed to spearhead the counterinsurgency attack, many either ran away, or joined up with the insurgents. In any case, they proved to be ineffective, and the army had to once again take the lead. They have so far proved incapable of defending themselves against suicide attacks, and police stations in Mosul have been overrun by insurgents. Three fourths of the 4000 strong force deserted or joined the insurgents, and the police chief was arrested on suspicion of helping the rebels. Kerick was supposed to have remained in Iraq 6 months, but he left in 4. The the implication of many is that he left a mess. Again to quote the Guardian Weekly: "After the fighting subsided, the US commander in Mosul admitted he was now facing a colossal job repairing the damage with elections less than two months away. "We have the daunting task of rebuilding a legitimate and loyal police force in the city, and that's going to take a long time - and we don't have a long time," said Brigadier General Carter Ham."

But flaws in Kerik's character could be detected earlier before Iraq. He was accused of flaunting his celebrity only a month after 9/11, writing and publishing his life story "The Lost Son", and of playing fast and loose with his position as Police Commissioner. Kerik was accused of using police photographs of the wreckage of the WTC site for his book, and wound mup paying $2,500 on a Conflict of Interest Board finding that he used 3 NYC cops to go to Ohio to investigate details of his mother's background for his book, and that wasn't the only time his attempt to use his popularity for profit clashed with his job. According to Newsday:

"Kerik found himself in the middle of another controversy in early 2002, when his publisher, Judith Regan, lost her cell phone in a Fox television studio. Suspecting theft, Regan contacted the NYPD.

Police officials dispatched a homicide lieutenant and squad, who went on to visit the homes of several Fox employees, said attorney Robert Simels, who represented several of the workers. Calling it an "outrageous abuse of power," Simels filed a complaint with the city conflicts board, but it is unclear whether the board came to a decision. A board official declined to say."

So what is he? The great paragon of virtue and strength that the President has chosen to protect our way of life, and ensure our security? Or is he the sloppy and corrupt weak hook on the gate that could simply be lifted up by the thief to swing the gate wide open - and let bin-Laden in?


Some view him as an underdog who beat the odds, as others say his rise was political and cite ex-aides' scandal



Kerik's life not all an open book



Bernard Kerik: Controversial figure, complex legacy




Give Kerik a chance to secure the nation

Orwell's Minitrue

Zwillinge 2
Originally uploaded by christopfer.

It all seems so simple, lie to the enemy.


Limbaugh & Co. really doesn't get the point. But thank you anyway for the transcript of your December 1 show where you showed me the LA Times article, about the network's fear of losing credibility. Because to my Machiavellian cynicism the credibility of the media is far too valuable to the military liar and thief to be bandied about as carelessly as Dubya has done with Fallujah! Actually credibility is the true propagandist's real ally, and no good storyteller was ever careless with it. Back in World War II people were told the truth more often than they were lied to. Whenever a specific action was required, then at that moment people had the wool pulled over their eyes in order to ensure the success of the mission. They were not lied to constantly, or wastefully, and certainly not as part of social experiments. Fallujah, dear Rush was an example of how not to do it.

In war, when you lie to the people you may lie about the target of a mission to misdirect the eyes of the enemy. But once the outcome of the mission is given, the only concern planners must have is if the outcome would in any way reveal your method of acquiring the intelligence your mission was based on. In WWII upon which you base so much of your arguments, the British allowed the Germans to bomb Coventry to the ground so that they wouldn't give away to them the fact that they broke the Enigma code. As for psyops, the only population you really need to worry about convincing to surrender and cooperate is that of the enemy. What the homefront needs is emotional encouragement and justification. That means telling a version of the truth, yes you can narrow it down to the reasons that justify your war, just make sure you have at least one fact that can stand up to scrutiny please! Has Bush really done his job as far as propaganda at home and abroad are concerned? No. A good propaganda campaign will always convince the home front that "our cause" is just, and that the enemy is evil. It will always ensure that no emotional sympathy for the enemy will arise and there would be a great deal of satisfaction in vanquishing the enemy. On the psyops side the campaign must persuade the enemy's population that "we" are invincible, both in argument and means, and confrontation can only mean defeat.The fight is emotional and cerebral. "We" have the just cause not you. "You" are the criminals, "we" - the victims aroused to war. "We" are to be feared, do not try to maneuver, for "we" will outmaneuver you. Do not try to fool us for "we" will always outsmart you. "We" will outfight you, and leave you homeless.

There are three kinds of propaganda: "White Propaganda", or the kind that comes from an open source, "Gray Propaganda", which pretends to be from a neutral source but actually comes from the enemy, and "Black Propaganda", which pretends to come from a friendly source, but is actually from the enemy. Let me put it more succintly. "White Propaganda", is what you openly tell the enemy yourself, "Gray Propaganda", is when you piggyback your message from a so-called "neutral" source, for an opportunity to A give your side more credibility abroad, B isolate your enemy, and C make your enemy more credulous. "Black Propaganda", is when you try to plant your propaganda by gaining the enemie's trust using a source that the enemy will believe. In all three, the Bush neocon administration failed - miserably.

"White" propaganda is when you are talking to the world. It is you putting your voice to your arguments. Your first duty is to persuade your people that your cause is right. Then you persuade the world! George Bush failed in that. He based his argument for war against Iraq on the flimsiest of arguments that was a longshot to prove, thereby shredding his credibility in the first place. And when his representatives in the UN and Colin Powell shredded their credibility in front of the Security Council, he treated their failure as some kind of ideological success, and went ahead with the war anyway. As for "Gray" propaganda, after alienating just about everybody in the world, where could the Bush administration ever find any "neutral" source to carry water for him anywhere. Our only attempt at "Black" propaganda, Alhurra has no credibility. The Iraqis would no more believe a so-called "Arab" TV network operating from Springfield Illinois, than the British in WWII woould believe the ramblings of "Lord Haw Haw", coming straight from Nazi Berlin.

As for disinformation, was it really wise to tell the enemy 2 weeks in advance where you were going to attack him, and not bluff him as to the real target of your offensive? If you tell him that you are attacking Fallujah, then first attack Aadamiyah! Real disinformation takes advantage of the enemie's fears to misdirect them so they don't see the sucker punch! Again Rush, let's go back to WWII. The Allies used Hitler's fears to fool him into believing the Calais scam, when they were really gunning for Normandy! That's disinformation Rush, and yes we kept it secret, and by the way Eisenhower came down like a ton of bricks on anyone who hinted at what the true target was! I would not go announcing "Hey Zarquawi! we're gunning for Fallujah!" and give him a two week head start!


Rush Limbaugh - Psyops Transcript


LA Times - "PR Meets Psy-Ops in War on Terror"


Dezinformatsiya

The Social Captive, Towing the Line like Calves to the Slaughter

Social Captive
Originally uploaded by Wazdat!.

Censorship


"In Germany they came first for the Communists and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me--and by that time no one was left to speak up". *

* Martin Niemöller 1892-1984.

"Stop complaining," said the farmer,**
"Who told you a calf to be"
Why don't you have wings to fly away
Like the swallow so proud and free?"

How the winds are laughing
They laugh with all their might
Laugh and laugh the whole day through
And half the summer's night.

Dona dona dona dona
Dona dona dona down
Dona dona dona dona
Dona dona dona down

Calves are easily bound and slaughtered
Never knowing the reason why.
But whoever treasures freedom,
Like the swallow must learn to fly

How the winds are laughing..."

** Dona Dona
(Original Yiddish words by Aaron Zeitlin and Shalom Secunda;
English translation by Arthur Kevess and Teddi Schwartz)

I had a dream last night. It was a frightening dream. We were coming home from choosing a bedspread for my bed. To my surprise, there was someone there already who was dressed like a maid folding the old bedspreads into squares. She looked at me with this disdainful look and said: "Your bed must be made according to regulations." A man was standing by her with a long pony tail, like some Hun. Just earlier we had heard on the news that every home in America was required to have a portrait of a certain national hero prominently displayed in the house, and those new not having that portrait could be arrested. This man had a copy of that portrait in his hand. I remember feeling revolted and angry. My mother and I walked up to him, and I asked him indignantly: "Who are you to decide what can go up on my wall?" "I am the block captain." he replied. "And you'd do better not to oppose me, 'cause I can cause you a whole lot of trouble. You've got to show your support, or we'll take you away!", he continued. He gave every indication that he was a member of some secret police, and gave me a glare that would scare Genghis Khan. He hung up the portait. Then he left. My mother was livid. "Let's get rid of this!" she yelled. But I restrained her because I saw the picture morph into one of Josef Stalin! i told her: "Mom we can't do that, or we'll both be taken away!" Last I remembered we were eating supper and Stalin was staring back at me.

So CBS is afraid to put on the commercial of a liberal Christian church protesting the discrimination in this country against gays and lesbians. Here is the exact wording of a letter that CBS sent to the United Church of Christ regarding it's "Night Club" commercial, that shows what it looks like if every church had a bouncer excluding all "undesirable" people (minorities, heretics, Christian and political, etc) and among the people excluded was a man who may have been gay. The commercial concluded that Christ would not have wanted this, and would've included everyone who came:

"CBS/UPN Network policy precludes accepting advertising that touches on and/or takes a position on one side of a current controversial issue of public importance. Because this commercial touches on the exclusion of gay couples and other minority groups by other individuals and organizations, and the fact that the Executive Branch has recently proposed a Constitutional Amendment to define marriage as a union between a man and a woman, this spot is unacceptable for broadcast on the Networks.

While moot, we must advise that CBS/UPN does accept advertising from churches and religious organizations which
deliver secular messages that are beneficial to society in general. Nevertheless, advertising that proselytizes on behalf of any single religion is not acceptable. In our view, this commercial does proselytize."

So now CBS will toe the line. "Advertising that proselytizes on behalf of any single religion is not acceptable" is a very dangerous concept. Why not add: "Advertising that proselytizes on behalf of any single political philosophy is not acceptable"? Why not go on to: "Programming that proselytizes on behalf of any single political philosophy is not acceptable"? So now there are "religiously acceptable" forms of behavior? A Fahrenheit 451 scenario? It looks like it. Perhaps we should all be like sheep, meekly accepting our lot and not say anything "controversial". It's alright to portray "acceptable ideas" like violence, sex, and the mindless "people zoo" called "reality TV", but speak up for one particular thought, take up a position, speak on behalf of a group is now downright "offensive"? What others may call "offensive", I call democracy. If we allow this censorship to continue we will be no more than calves ready for the slaughter. "Dona Dona Don" anyone? How sad it would be if this country, so proudly born to freedom, should fall so low as to become a land fit for serfs and dictators. Our media have become like those calves meekly going to the slaughter, bending low to avoid the lash. Our society may soon follow, and whither democracy then?

You know, that United Churches in Christ spot reminds me of any one of the United Negro College Fund's commercials. Aren't they "proselytizing"? Aren't they speaking out on behalf of a certain group against a social evil? Think about it. What was so controversial about the message the UCC ad portrayed? All it did was portray the bigotted arrogance of some of the so-called "Christian" churches, and that Christ wouldn't have stood for that. It simply said: "This is what we are against, and here is what we are for. If you feel the same way, here is a place for you."

Anyone who wants to protest CBS's actions should go to this link:


People For The American Way petition for United Churches in Christ


United Churches in Christ "Night Club" ad


Fax From CBS to United Churches in Christ given to PFAW