Bush's Strategy....

Bush's Strategy....



"The strategy is to help the Iraqi people achieve their objectives and their dreams.."

- George W. Bush, August 21, 2006

A Year After: Katrina Poverty Ignored - Poor Berated by Some

A Year After: Katrina Poverty Ignored - Poor Berated by Some

I added some links to this excerpt from a Shreveport Times op-ed from a Louisiana minister who has been highly disappointed about the political rhetoric of false promise and the lack of action on poverty.

As the anniversary of Katrina approaches, I wonder what happened to the great debate on poverty in America.

Shortly after the hurricane, politicians on the right, left and in the center were talking about the ugliness of poverty. Even the president stood in New Orleans' Jackson Square and spoke about the deep, persistent poverty in the Gulf Coast region. Promises of action were made. So, what happened since?

Not much. But that shouldn't be surprising. After all, talk is cheap.

We've all seen political opportunism before. The reality is there is more political traction to be gained by playing the politics of terror and politics of religiosity than the politics of helping those in need. Recent elections bear out that there is no political pressure on elected officials or points to be made helping poor people. Too many people believe the poor are either not poor enough or they are poor by choice. Not to mention those who see the poor purely through the prism of race and therefore say, "why bother?" While many Americans were truly generous and briefly remorseful there still are those who saw Katrina as just another opportunity to berate the poor and underprivileged.

The federal poverty level for a family of four is $18,400. However, realistic evidence shows at least double the amount considered poverty is needed for most families to provide basic necessities like adequate food, stable housing and health care. The families who live in a sort of "gray area" between "official" poverty and minimum economic security share many of the material hardships and financial pressures "officially" poor families face. Studies suggest approximately 40 percent of all American children live in low-income households.

That's troubling.

Let's face it, the talk about a new attack on poverty was dead in the political water from the start. While Katrina momentarily increased empathy for the poor, it didn't alter the public attitudes of likely voters toward them. What is unfortunate is that people tend to equate the terms poverty and welfare. While we all saw the horrible depictions of the elderly trapped in the scorching heat without medicine or children trapped on rooftops all some people could think about were welfare checks.

Someday, politicians of all stripes will take poverty seriously. And someday, propagandists will stop framing poverty as an issue of laziness.

That day may come when attitudes change.

- Gregory Hudson, a local minister from Shreveport, La.

DSCC Leader Mark Pryor Betrays democracy and Democrats

DSCC Leader Mark Pryor Betrays democracy and Democrats

In my book, any Democrat who would ignore the Connecticut Democratic primary voters' choice Ned Lamont - like DSCC vice-chairman Mark Pryor who so disrespects real Democrats and trashes traditional democracy - is a blatant betrayer of his own party and of the American way.



Pryor's the same turncoat who sided with the Republican party and the Bush administration in favor of using torture as an interrogation tactic. America wants its values back!

Experts: Bush Foreign Policy A Bigger Security Threat than Iran

Experts: Bush Foreign Policy A Bigger Security Threat than Iran

This is a must-see from Foreign Policy Magazine. Click on each section below to read how more than 100 of America’s top foreign-policy experts rated Bush's War on Terror.

McCain Would Heap More U.S. Troops on Iraq Mess

McCain Would Heap More U.S. Troops on Iraq Mess

On Meet the Press this morning, Senator John McCain rightfully criticized the Bush administration's many Iraq war blunders, but I felt that his failure - and his calculated resistance - to put any responsibility directly with the President of the United States was rationally ludicrous and it made McCain look like Eddie Haskell from the old Leave it to Beaver series.

SEN. MCCAIN: "It’s never been the right strategy as far as I’m concerned, since the beginning when I came back from my first trip to Iraq after every military person, including the British, told me that we didn’t have sufficient troops to control the situation."

Eddie Haskell was a well known insincere brown-noser. McCain talks about Bush like Eddie Haskell used to talk to Ward and June Cleaver. Kiss-up city. He verbally whips Donald Rumsfeld, but he tells us what a wonderful job President Bush is doing. Bah! Who does he think he's kidding? He tells us that there were never enough troops to do the job - as if that's news to us. That water that went under the bridge almost four wasted years ago.

I wondered why McCain would have spoken so highly of Bush at the 2004 RNC convention when he told David Gregory this morning that he had anticipated many problems because of the insufficient number of troops in Iraq.

He was overly critical, in my opinion, of General Peter Pace's recent comments about the state of the Iraq war - seemingly attempting to make General Pace look naive - while McCain defended the Commander in Chief and himself at every step of the Meet the Press interview.

How to insult General Pace, then go wobbly on the reality of civil war and what to do about it:

SEN. McCAIN: General Pace, you said there’s a possibility of the situation in Iraq evolving into civil war. Is that correct?

GEN. PETER PACE: I did say that, yes, sir.

SEN. McCAIN: Did you anticipate this situation a year ago?

GEN. PACE: No, sir.

(End videotape)

MR. GREGORY: Why was that an important question and what did the answer tell you?

SEN. McCAIN: Because many of us anticipated that we would have greater difficulties because of the lack of troops on the ground and the lack of the elected government in Iraq from, from being able to stand up and from the problems with the police that many of us thought that it might—that this deterioration may take place. And we expect our leaders to anticipate things in war, we really do. And so because we don’t anticipate, then you are surprised.

"MR. GREGORY: Should U.S. troops remain in Iraq if they are in the middle of a civil war?

SEN. McCAIN: I think that that’s a very difficult decision because you’d have to, to decide whether we can have an effect on a civil war if it was taking place in Iraq, so I don’t know the answer."

"I’m not sure that it’s turned into a civil war."

McCain's answer is pouring more troops onto a four-year old disaster that has turned to an undeclared (and hotly burning) civil war.

"DAVID GREGORY: ...do you need more U.S. soldiers on the ground now?

SEN. McCAIN: I think so.."

More troops - and from where, you ask? I would have hoped David Gregory would have pinned McCain down on that one - where is he going to get these troops? A draft, perhaps? I really don't think an uneasy public is going to go gently toward that idea. McCain said - with much bravado - that President Bush doesn't pay attention to public opinion. More troops in Mess'o'potamia? Is McCain brown-nosing to get Rumsfeld's job, perhaps? (Who'd want it?)I think John 'Eddie Haskell' McCain had better think this one out again. Ward and June didn't like 'The Beave' and Wally hanging out with Eddie. Like Ward and June, many Americans won't be comfy with a weasly wobbler like John McCain hanging around our Oval Office. His respect for the President is more fake than Eddie's greasy compliments to Mrs. Cleaver.

Real Americans want to bring our troops home and see our leaders call a spade a spade.

Photo/Poem

Adirondack Mountain Pond
photo by Jude Nagurney Camwell

All day we swept the lake,
searched every cove,
North from Camp Maple, south
to Osprey Bay,
Watching when the loud dogs
should drive in deer,

Or, listening to the laughter of
the loon;
Or, in the evening twilight’s
latest red,
Beholding the procession of the
pines;
Or, later yet, beneath a lighted
jack,

In the boat’s bows, a silent night
hunter
Stealing with a paddle to the
feeding grounds
Of the red deer.

- from "The Adirondacs"
by Ralph Waldo Emerson

Adirondack Lily
photo by Jude Nagurney Camwell

Hakuna Macaca

Hakuna Macaca

See Bob Geiger at the Yellow Dog blog for details. ;)

Don't miss Alternet's awesome singalong video!

Disney should sign George Allen on as their newest little slightly-simple-white-supremacist-but-oh-so-good-humored cartoon character.


* See Jeffrey Feldman's comments about Allen at Daily Kos.

John Edwards Supports Ned Lamont in New Haven

John Edwards Supports Ned Lamont in New Haven


photo by Aldon Hynes

Sen. Edwards in Ct with Ned Lamont! - One America blog

Guerrilla Vlogging: Lamont and Edwards in New Haven - mbair/DailyKos.com

JRE and Lamont in New Haven by Zen Blade/OAC blog

Edwards, at Lamont Rally, Says Democrats Must Beat G.O.P. ‘Fearmongering’ - NYT

A Heavyweight Stumps for Lamont - New Haven Democrat

John Edwards and Ned Lamont meet the bloggers - My Left Nutmeg

Lamont Confident He Can Broaden Base - CBS News

Edwards says his vote on Iraq was wrong - Mercury News/APWire

Lamont and Edwards Event Video - Connecticut Local Politics

Edwards Backs Lamont - Shows His Support in New Haven - Connecticut Blog

Mid-week Edition of JRE Buzz (18) - Benny's World

Ct. - Sen Edwards Says Joe Must Go - McJoan/Daily Kos

New at the Ned Lamont Resource Friday - Spazeboy


(see Video: Edwards Speaks to Spazeboy)


COMING UP:

John Edwards and Heath Shuler to address affordable housing in Hendersonville - NC Democratic Party

Turkey an Integral Political Player in Middle East

Turkey an Integral Political Player in Middle East

Turkey and Iran are apparently cooperating in cross-border attacks on Kurdish rebels in Northern Iraq. Turkey is claiming that the U.S. has not done their part in stepping up to the plate and flush out guerrillas linked to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), who have hideouts in Iraq.

Frustrated by the reluctance of the US and the government in Baghdad to crack down on the PKK bases inside Iraq, Turkish generals have hinted they are considering a large-scale military operation across the border. They are said to be sharing intelligence about Kurdish rebel movements with their Iranian counterparts. "We would not hesitate to take every kind of measures when our security is at stake," Abdullah Gul, the Turkish foreign minister, said last week.

The worry for the U.S. would be the destabilization of the Kurds' self-ruled region, one of the only alleged post-invasion "success stories."

The U.S. is responding to Turkey's complaint that U.S. officials haven't spoken clearly or acted aggressively enough on the PKK "terrorist" threat:

Criticized by Ankara for not taking concrete steps against the terror network, the PKK (Kurdish Workers’ Party), the U.S. administration called upon the PKK “to cease its terrorist actions and lay down its arms.”

Turkey is still considering if and how they will contribute to a UN force in Southern Lebanon, expressing solidarity with the Lebanese government and keeping a close eye on Hezbollah - not wishing to be part of any force that could be seen as being against the Lebanese people. Turkish officials say that the stance of Iran, Syria, and Hezbollah towards the UN force will be an important factor in their final decision.

Since the US occupation forces in Iraq as well as the Jordanian government are preventing flights from Iran to use the Iraqi and the Jordanian airspace, the only loophole left for supplying Hezbollah with weapons would be Syria - via Turkey. Turkey is being urged by Israel to take all possible steps to prevent the transfer of arms from Iran to Syria to resupply Hezbollah. The Arab Monitor reports that the Israeli policy of trying to involve Turkey in an embargo against Iran puts Turkish interests under strain as Turkey has good commercial relationships with Iran and depends on Iran for gas and oil supplies.

Turkish pundit Cengiz Candar believes that Turkey's military contribution to any international force would symbolize a robust political comeback to the region. He gives three key reasons why there will be no real danger of a Turkish confrontation with Hezbollah, should Turkey decide to contribute to a UN force.

___________

Related:

Turkey And Iraq Are Inseparable Parts Of The Region, Gul - Turkish Press

'Turkey Could Play Critical Role in Peace Force' - Zaman Daily News

Fundamentalism in U.S. Foreign Policy

Fundamentalism in U.S. Foreign Policy

One thing that is particularly wrong with the direction the Bush administration has taken on foreign policy is that, if our government's leaders do not like what another nation is doing, they refuse to talk to any representative of that nation. There is little to be gained by such an approach.

In his book "Our Endangered Values - America's Moral Crisis," President Jimmy Carter mentions that his next book will cover developments in the Middle East, particularly Israel and Palestine. He talks about a trip he’d arranged to observe the Palestinian elections in 2005, and on that same trip he would have planned to visit Syria, Jordan, and Egypt. He had especially wanted to encourage the peace process between Israel and Palestine. When he notified the State Department and the White House of his plans, the president’s national security advisor called him and said that, because Syria had not been cooperative with certain issues involving the Iraq war, the U.S. policy was to restrict all visits to Damascus. There was what President Carter called a “heated discussion” between the two of them, and the final request was that, on behalf of President Bush, the trip was to be cancelled. A policy of not communicating with potential adversaries is an indication of a fundamentalist policy.

President Carter believes that the political right-wing has been influenced by a religious fundamentalist way of thinking: 'We don't deal with those who don't agree with us'; 'We don't talk with inferiors.' It is clear that a war in Iraq was planned long before George W. Bush was ever elected and that it was a coalition of right wing ideologues who have implemented the strategy that has the underlying premise: "A fundamentalist is never wrong." Religious fundamentalism is characterized by rigidity, domination, and exclusion. They are convinced that they are right and anyone who contradicts them is evil. The fundamentalist feels that they have a unique relationship with God - and that they actually speak for God. When there are serious differences between the U.S. and other nations, we cannot brand those who differ as pariahs or inferiors worthy of despise - yet fundamentalism in foreign policy tends to do just that. It leaves no room for discussing of ideas or for compromise.

The American people must redirect our government’s legal, religious, and political commitments to our long-held and unchanging principles.

As The One Year Anniversaryof Katrina Approaches

As The One Year Anniversary
of Katrina Approaches
Marc H. Morial, President and CEO of the National Urban League doesn't have to use intellectual phrasings or fancy rhetoric to impress upon you what he's learned from Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath:

I could rattle off tomes of statistics about disparity. I could talk about the wealth gap, the job gap, the wage gap and the health gap. I could speak in erudite and intellectual terms about income, health and equality in America. But I don't have to: Katrina did that for me through images of people suffering. It was through reality's lens that Americans witnessed the tragedy not through a full-length movie or cheap sound byte. But the images seen on most Americans' television sets nearly a year ago were not just pictures of my hometown. They represented people in poverty in urban areas all over the nation.

Last September, after seeing the face of poverty that Hurricane Katrina had revealed, I'd said,

A moral wake-up call to America is indicated by these recent events. If we saw the faces of our frightened and needy American brothers and sisters living in the kind of poverty that had trapped them in their city of ruins this week, and if it touched something deep inside of us, I believe that we need to make a commitment to not only call for their imminent basic needs to be met, but to call upon government to take every step possible to help them – and other Americans - to move out of their poverty.

In an article titled Bush's Poverty Talk Is Now All but Silent, the Washington Post's Michael Fletcher pointed out that aiding the poor seems to have been only a brief priority for President Bush after Katrina, and it soon dropped off the Republican radar. It took the GOP only nine months to wait out the disturbing images of New Orleans, and once they felt that the shocking poverty that Bush had paid lip service to after Katrina had faded enough from the national consciousness, they brought back their push for the estate tax repeal and used it as a double-cross against Democrats who wanted to raise the federal minimum wage for the common good.

A year after Katrina, the GAO reports that the Department of Homeland Security and National Disaster Medical System (NDMS) cannot say how they will meet the needs of nursing home residents during evacuations or how the federal government will assist state and local governments with transporting residents and patients from nursing homes and hospitals to NDMS mobilization centers.

Louisiana's state and local governments, already hit hard these past five years by shortfalls in federal funding, have taken the economic brunt of the troubled times on the Gulf Coast. Their problems with the federal government began with the woefully inadequate response to Hurricane Katrina by FEMA, which had been downgraded from a cabinet-level position and folded into the Department of Homeland Security under President Bush. Kevin Drum of Washington Monthly called the four years preceding Hurricane Katrina "four years of deliberate Republican policy and budget choices that favor ideology and partisan loyalty at the expense of operational competence." Last fall, in the face of all of the federal government's post-Katrina failures, U.S. House representative Tom Tancredo (R-Co) had the nerve to say that he didn't trust federal funds for rebuilding New Orleans in the hands of local governments. In light of the Jack Abramoff scandal that subsequently haunted so many Republicans and blew the lid off the hidden corruption in Washington, D.C., Congressman Tancredo's statement now looks even more hypocritical.

Joseph Arthur to Perform on A&E this Sunday

Joseph Arthur to Perform on A&E this Sunday

Joseph Arthur will be appearing on A&E Breakfast with the Arts with KCRW's Nic Harcourt this Sunday (Aug 13th). He'll be performing two songs from his forthcoming album. On the YouTube video below, he's performing Electrical Storm (live), a song off the new Nuclear Daydream CD.

Stirling Newberry's Thoughts On a New Direction

Stirling Newberry's Thoughts On a New Direction

Stirling Newberry has written a thoughtful piece about political vision and direction. Competing visions of how America should progress have split the Democratic party, but if there is one thing we can see, it is that the curtain is falling on the Reagan Democrats of decades past. A single idea of a fundamental social mandate has still not been isolated, and that's why we're seeing Democrats approaching their individual campaigns from so many different angles. Is there a unifying theme through which the Democrats could gather around? Mr. Newberry says that the Iraq war's fiasco has only offered an opening for this wide discussion. We're on our way to a new meaning - a "city of tomorrow."

An Excerpt:

The progress of this pattern - of a different mandate producing a different meaning, and reaching voters through a different medium - is going to dominate the Democratic Party for some time to come, until the decisive political moment arrives, and a singular politician is able to sweep into power a majority of representatives willing to move a very different agenda in government.

It is not clear that 2008 is that year, but it might be. 2004 was not, and could not have been that year, but was, instead, the last gasp of trying to hold on to the Clinton Compromise with Reaganism. Hillary Rodham Clinton might win the nomination, but it will only be by coöpting a movement which, so far, she has attempted to oppose. However, she and her advisors can read the tea leaves and the polls extremely well, and the picture they show is no longer a donkey with an elephant's trunk.

Aish Video of Doctored Photography

Aish Video of Doctored Photography

I wish for Israel to stop its attack of Lebanon, I wish for Hezbollah to stop firing rockets at innocent people in Israel, and I wish for a UN resolution that is fair to both Lebanon and Israel.

I want to see an end to senseless killing of innocent people.

That said, I do think you may want to take a look at this video from Aish.com, exposing the ways professional photos are looking more like an art form than depicting absolute and untainted reality. It doesn't mean death, destruction, and sorrow are not being brought to the door of the Lebanese or innocent Israelis by savage warfare, but professional journalism shouldn't be Photoshop 101 nor should it be deliberate propaganda. Journalists are humans with the capability to sympathize and empathize - just like you and me. Professional journalists should understand, however, that you check that symapthy at the door during your working hours. Cheating only hurts the cause they may sympathize with when they doctor up photos or stories.

On Whose Watch Did 9/11 Happen?

On Whose Watch Did 9/11 Happen?
If they're going to keep telling us to remember 9/11, let's remember it clearly.

The Bush team and their rubber stamp Republican mocking birds need Osama bin Laden tapes and the memory of al-Zarqawi so they can make up cheap talking points to stupidly insult the intelligence of Democrats and to try to scare as many Americans as they can into voting for the Cheney and Bush roadshow of flaming failure.

In the Republican party, they love to keep the horror alive and the hopes dead.

In reality, we are doomed if we keep any of these warring mooks in power because they've looked for trouble (and have gotten it) in Iraq while nobodies in the middle of the UK have blown up the Tube and filled shampoo bottles with flammables. At least the UK and Canada are catching their terrorists with good old-fashioned detective work. We've got reduced civil liberties, burning mosques in an unnecessary Iraqi civil war, worn-out troops, authorized torture of prisoners of war, and a few bad and burned-out soldiers raping a 14-year old girl and killing her family in cold blood.



Before 9/11, nobodies took flying lessons in the American southwest and didn't bother inquiring about the part of the lessons where they'd learn how to land. Bush and his team did a really great job of stopping them on 9/11, didn't they? At least Bush didn't cut and run. He stayed until the job was done. He made sure he went nowhere until My Pet Goat had been read from cover to cover.



Bush turned nobodies into al Qaeda legends and, after sufficiently lying to Americans, went after a country that had nothing whatsover to do with the 9/11 attacks they'd failed to stop. This created future generations of terrorists in Iraq that would likely never have come to pass had it not been for Bush's failed foreign policy.

Are you sick of failure yet?

The only thing more disgusting than the failure is hearing the total losers insulting the political leaders who, like us citizens, see the failures so clearly.

Kevin Smith Talks About the Rolling Roadshow & Clerks II

Kevin Smith Talks About the Rolling Roadshow and Clerks II



Oh, man, this looks like it would've been a blast. Folks in Red Bank, N.J. got a real treat Tuesday night. A great movie on a giant screen backed by the river and a full moon. Aaaah. I love Red Bank - I've has a lot of fun times there and in Asbury Park - sure wish I could've been there for an outdoor showing of Clerks II. Clerks filmmaker Kevin Smith says:

I can't impart this emphatically enough: if you get a chance to attend ANY of the Rolling Roadshow screenings over the next few weeks, GET YER ASS THERE! It's a pretty incredible experience.

Weird highlight: The day before, some fans said they camped outside as early as 3 a.m. to meet and greet Kevin Smith at Jay & Silent Bob's Secret Stash in Red Bank. One fan asked Kevin to sign her butt-cheek.

• VIDEO: Fans talk with Smith (dialup)
• VIDEO: Fans talk with Smith (broadband)

Josh Ritter on Conan O'Brien Friday

Josh Ritter on Conan O'Brien Friday

If you're a Josh Ritter fan like I am, you'll want to know that he's going to be on Conan O'Brien tomorrow night!

Androminos' Questions about the Middle East

Androminos' Questions about the Middle East

How long does the international community think ANY nation has to suffer the kidnapping and murder of its people?

To all who are feeling unsure about what position to take on this, let's just be sure not to sit back and tell ourselves that this age-old problem is something new and that the destruction of innocent lives and displacement of human beings is the right or the moral solution to the back-and-forth violence between state and non-state that has been going on for so long in the territory. One look with an untainted eye will tell you that it's absolutely untrue. How long has there been tribal struggle in the Palestinian region between diverse groups of people? What about Rwanda? Darfur?

Where is a Western leader with moral authority today? The world longs for him. A just God cries out for him (or her). The U.S. will never be a good ally to Israel until the U.S. makes good-faith efforts to stand behind her with an active diplomatic effort for a two-state solution that never sleeps. The past five years have been a disastrous slumber with a wrong-headed approach to protecting Israel on the part of the United States.

What we need is order - a fight for the protection of human rights and a proper prosecution of the rule of law among nations. This isn't some pie-in-the-sky notion. The work of peace and the keeping of order in this world is a tremendously difficult task, yet I am dismayed when I see that President Bush and his administration are only serving to stir up the pot of hatred and distrust amongst the people of the Middle East. You can see proof by the numbers of hard-line extremists being elected in these nations. A moral Western leader who respects and believes in the rule of law would try to guide the world with wisdom, respect for all peoples, and the promise of opportunity and participation for all in the global economy, provided that they are willing to compromise along with the West. Empire is a goal that comes with violence and unjust treatment of the weakest. The goal of Empire must be laid aside if America truly wants to help its ally Israel.

What then is a solution. And I don't just mean to end the current round of fighting. I mean what is the solution to the very real and legitimate problem faced by Israel who is surrounded by combatants and terrorists committed to her destruction?

A new commitment to non-Empire. Allowing Middle Eastern nations to govern themselves rather than hanging an anvil around their necks with the threat of violence and destruction whenever unrest (they call it "terror") occurs in their own respective nations. There will be no healthy Western-friendly democracies born in the Middle East until the people of the Middle East desire it. Let's use of heads. Put a moral thinking cap on. Destroying innocent people is no way for them to desire the rule of monsters that inflict such misery. As the Reagan years approached in the U.S., over thirty years ago, neoconservatism was born and with it came the hope (and determination) that new democracies would spring up in the Middle East. In the meantime, and most hypocritically, evil regimes were embraced by the U.S. government for political gain. The people of this world aren't stupid. They know when a motive is sincere and when it is merely a position taken to gain oppressive power. We embrace Saddam Hussein one day and he's the monster-du-jour the next.

The problem is, neoconservatism went from a left-leaning idea about freedom to a today's dogmatic hard-line right revolution that most of the American people do not desire.

When Ned Lamont beat Joe Lieberman in Connecticut this week, this is what the American people were screaming about!

There must be a change in U.S. foreign policy about which the world will sit up and take notice.

How does one stop the terrorists from attacking? Expecting Israel to go back to the status quo of accepting terrorism against it's people from those along it's borders is hardly a viable solution.

"Accepting" terrorism is one thing. Creating conditions that will ensure a whole new generation of terrorism is totally another. For what is terrorism? It is a tactic used by those who choose to opt out of the international community - those who chose to return to the law of the jungle rather than the international rule of law.

For all intents and purposes, President Bush opted out of the internatiuonal rule of law when he made a pre-emptive strike on Iraq.

Israel has used the excuse that a few kidnapped soldiers is legal reason to destroy the infrastructure of southern Lebanon and displace 25% of the Lebanese population.

The leaders of the U.S. and Israel are going about this in a way that is front-loading the best likelihood of a new World War whose sides will not be lined up as they were in the last two world wars. They call the rebellious and violent tactic used by non-states "the enemy." A tactic is an "enemy" - not a specified state or group of states. Tell me - how do you conquer or vanquish a tactic? How do you "conquer" hatred? Who do you kill? How do you quantify such a win? What will be acheived when that "win" is quantifiable and qualifiable (if it ever could be)?

Let's remember that there were a group of upstarts who caused violence in a civilized place called Concord, Massachusetts well over 200 years ago. They reared up against a great power and used non-traditional and brutal tactics to resist their enemy. After the ragtag rebels caused Great Britain to lose their political ability and will to win, they formed an independent new government and we sit here today calling ourselves the recipients of and the fighters for the symbol of freedom. A nation had been living in the hearts of men and women in Lexington and Concord, but that nation was not yet a part of the world until they made it so. Those colonist rebels in America didn't prey on the innocent, but they were ruthless in battle. Who are we to say that there are not new nations living somewhere in the hearts of some people in the Middle East? Who are we to determine their destiny for them? Who are we to languish in Iraq when the destiny of that nation, in light of freedom, belongs to them? We can't be the world's policeman. No one nation has a right to do that.

There are international forums for political crises. The U.N. is the first one that comes to mind. If they have become an impotent joke to some, it's because the people who have had the most poewer to make it succeed have sabotaged it for the past five years. Without a strong and effective forum with which to iron out international problems, we may as well forget that we are a civilized world and leave the world to savages.

Lieberman Wants to Play Nice With Rubber Stampers While He Allows Our Democracy to Shrivel Up and Die

Lieberman Wants to Play Nice With Rubber Stampers While He Allows Our Democracy to Shrivel Up and Die

Joe Lieberman's still looking for old-school civility and old-time protocol in a world where unprincipled Republicans have taken advantage of every good-faith and civil effort on the part of Congressional Democrats and any other sap who has stood in their way in the name of truth. It would behoove poor old Joe to understand that there's an expiration date on how long you can fool people. Joe's problem is that he's fooling himself. We've watched him hold on to the liferaft of "bipartisanship" long after the mothership had sunk and a sea of rubber-stamping sharks chomped on his legs with talking points and dirty tricks. He was too complacent to realize that, as a representative of the People, it wasn't only his legs being bitten off. It was our legs, too. He's been so numb that he didn't feel the pain while we could only watch and scream in agony at the joke that liferaft of "bipartisanship" had become.

I think David Beckwith is really on to something when, in a post titled McCain & Lieberman to launch "Arrogant Has-Been Party," he writes:

According to New York Times columnist David Brooks,

..the "three major parties in America" are "the Democratic Party, the Republican Party and the McCain-Lieberman Party," and "all were on display Tuesday night."

"The Democratic Party was represented by its rising force -- Ned Lamont on a victory platform with the net roots exulting before him and Al Sharpton smiling just behind," Brooks opines in Thursday's edition of The Times. "The Republican Party was represented by its collapsing old guard -- scandal-tainted Tom DeLay trying to get his name removed from the November ballot."

"And the McCain-Lieberman Party was represented by Joe Lieberman himself, giving a concession speech that explained why polarized primary voters shouldn't be allowed to define the choices in American politics."

Mr. Beckwith goes on to comment:

Moderate Republicans need to realize that the immoderate Republicans are corrupt, jaded, mediocre, hateful, incompetent, bloodthirsty, Mammoniacal, greedy, self-rightous, ego-centric, micranimous, war-profiteering, war-mongering, murderous, liars and thieves. And many of them can't wait for WWIII.

Lieberman once said: "If you want to live like a Republican, you need to vote like a Democrat." I take it he wants to live like a Republican. I guess he is impressed by the corrupt, jaded, mediocre, bloodthirsty, Mammoniacal, greedy, selfish, ego-centric, micranimous, war-profiteering, war-mongering liars and thieves. Who knows. Maybe he was talking about moderate Republicans, but there is a reek of obsolescence among this diminishing sect.

I am also impressed by Mr. Beckwith's latest observations, where he employs his satirical genius about Bush (and his rubber stampers') tactical misleadings. He's got these fear-mongering bastards all figured out.

Why is George hiding in Texas? (Think 9/11) : The week the world ended

Why is George hiding? II

How to Cause the World Not to End

Don't miss Beckwith's special Lieberman close-up photo underneath the headline:
Loserman Paying for Kissing Bush Ass

Lebanon Catch 22 = Death for Innocents and Environment

Lebanon Catch 22 = Death for Innocents and Environment

Lebanon Oil Spill May Rival Exxon Valdez of 1989 - Dania Saadi, Bloomberg News

"In the worst case scenario, and if all the oil contained in the bombed power plant at Jiyyeh leaked into the Mediterranean Sea, the Lebanese oil spill could well rival the Exxon Valdez disaster of 1989," the UN said in an e-mailed statement todayIsraeli jets, which attacked the power plant twice, deterred firemen from putting out the fire at the storage units, which continued for 10 days, Sarraf said in an interview on Aug. 3. [..] The spill, which has polluted around two-thirds of the Lebanese coast and spread into neighboring Syria, may threaten East Mediterranean countries such as Cyprus and Turkey, Lebanon's Environment Minister Yacoub Sarraf has said. [..]

[..] The Israel navy prohibited Lebanese and foreign officials from surveying the damage of the spill from Lebanon's territorial waters, the minister said. The spill has grown into a 3,000-square kilometer area because it absorbed water, Sarraf said.

The Lebanese government is relying on the international community to provide as much as $200 million to clean up Lebanon's territorial waters, the minister said.

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A 'Pretext' War in Lebanon by Robert Parry - Consortium News

Israeli sources indicate that Bush gave Olmert a green light for the [current] conflict at the May 23 summit. The sources said Bush has even encouraged Israel to expand the war by attacking Syria, although Israeli leaders balked at that recommendation because they lacked an immediate justification. [..]

[..] Only days after the Lebanon-Israel conflict began, Washington Post foreign policy analyst Robin Wright wrote that U.S. officials told her that “for the United States, the broader goal is to strangle the axis of Hezbollah, Hamas, Syria and Iran, which the Bush administration believes is pooling resources to change the strategic playing field in the Middle East. …

“Whatever the outrage on the Arab streets, Washington believes it has strong behind-the-scenes support among key Arab leaders also nervous about the populist militants – with a tacit agreement that the timing is right to strike.” [Washington Post, July 16, 2006]

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Has the War on Terrorism Been Good for Iran? an analysis by Michael Scott Moore - Spiegel Online

"Thanks to the aggressive policies of the US and Israel, Iran has become a great regional power."

- Editors of German newspaper Die Tageszeitung, a left-leaning daily

[...] The right-leaning Die Welt seems to agree -- not on Iran, but on the policy of violence. Its lead editorial wonders if all-out war in Lebanon hasn't hurt Israel. Soldiers and generals, the paper writes, don't worry about "collateral damage," even if they lead to humanitarian and political catastrophes. Now the destruction in Lebanon -- "TV networks, mobile phone networks, water, electricity, the Beirut airport: this has all been declared 'Hezbollah's infrastructure'" -- threatens to create enemies in Lebanon of both Israel and the United States. The paper notes that the war has unified religious factions in Lebanon under the national label "Lebanese." "This, of course, was the hope of the West before the Cedar Revolution," which drove out Syrian troops last year. "However, the new (Lebanese) identity orients itself against Israel and the US ... Whether this 'collateral damage' can be fixed will depend on how long the war lasts."

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THE CATCH 22 EFFECT
Israel refuses to leave until the force is in place, and nations won't go in until a cease-fire is in effect.

Arab nations: Israel must pull out by Cameron Simpson - Herald UK

Arab nations demanded Israel pull its troops out of Lebanon as part of any UN resolution to end a war in which 45 people were killed yesterday by Israeli strikes. [..]

Bush's Line of Reasoning Isn't Helping to Ensure a UN Agreement
...Calling upon nations for assistance - nations to whom he forbids Condi Rice to speak - is insane if he thinks those nations will comply after being labeled 'Axis of Evil'. It will surely undermine the UN effort and prolong the violence - and Bush should know this. What is he attempting here? Why does he seem to want this UN effort to fail?

[..]President George W Bush insisted that he wanted the UN resolution as quickly as possible and called on Syria and Iran to rein in Hizbollah. Hizbollah says that it will fight on until Israel stops bombing Lebanon and pulls out around 10,000 troops from the south.

Hezbollah isn't even a party to the UN discussions or decisions, so it's moot whether they agree or not!

Lebanon is the nation that is under attack. This is a lopsided UN referendum on Lebanon's government, of which Hezbollah is only a part. It's destined for failure. Bush's neocon administration are calculating. They have made no silent affair of talking about wanting to attack Syria and perhaps Iran. What better way than to get President Bush to front-load sure failure at the UN?

Meanwhile,
Israel Plans Deeper Push Into Lebanon and Americans press Bush: Talk to Syria. Bush assumes: "Syria knows what we think." Not a good answer - so says the New York Times: "Start talking."

The people of this country and the world have something universal in common, regardless of our respective country of origin. We see the immorality in the senseless killing of innocents on both sides. The irrational expectations of President Bush (a lopsided mess) are beginning to flourish into yet another unsuccessful UN resolution, more senseless death of innocents, more danger to the environment, and more alienation of the Arab and Muslim people.

As a concerned American, I want to see good-faith effort on the part of this President to talk to those he perceives as our "enemies" - not a feel-good chat, but real diplomacy....and to encourage our ally Israel to back off and allow that diplomcy to work. There are age-old hatreds at play in the Middle East - one kidnapped soldier wasn't the lone catalyst - President Bush needs to stop insulting our intelligence. The hatred is irrational, and we certainly don't need an irrational foreign policy to match it! Bush talks a pretty game about freedom. If we're going to survive together, we'd best do every last thing we can possibly do to secure real freedom which can ony come when enough people are left alive to find peace with one another.

Thomas Mann said that war is only a cowardly escape from the problems of peace. If that's true, we have a world dominated by cowards, and I'm disappointed to know that my own President is at the top of the heap of them all. Why? Because he always had the power to show others the way to peace, and he failed, promoting the kind of protracted war that Alexis de Tocqueville assured us would "never fail to endanger the freedom" of our own country.