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Afghanistan
Five killed in Taliban ambush of Afghan troops
Two Afghan government soldiers and three suspected Taliban rebels were killed when rebels ambushed a patrol in the south of the country. The governor of Uruzgan province Jan Mohammad Khan said the clash took place when Taliban forces fired rockets at an Afghan patrol in Gizab district, some 85 km (50 miles) north of the provincial capital Tarin Kot. He said Afghan forces returned fire, killing three suspected Taliban rebels and wounding three others. Taliban fled the area after the ambush and no one was arrested.
Yet another pinprick attack. The only thing surprising about it is the consistent degree of ineptitude the Talibs/Hezbis show.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt || 04/23/2003 01:16 pm || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


Afghan president to give 'most wanted' list to Pakistan
Afghan President Hamid Karzai said Wednesday he would give Pakistan a list of ``most-wanted'' Taliban to be arrested and tried for crimes against the Afghan people. Afghanistan has given some names but the government will give a more specific list of names that 'we consider to be criminals of war against the Afghan people ... and we want them arrested,' Karzai told a small group of foreign journalists in Islamabad before returning to Afghanistan. It is extremely important for both Afghanistan and Pakistan to strategically address the question of extremism and terrorism in the interest of the people of the two countries, Karzai said.
Guess we'll see if anything more comes of this than the similar list India presented a year and a half ago.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt || 04/23/2003 01:11 pm || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "The Talibs will burn at the gates of Pakland" said the Iraqi Pak Information Minister.
Posted by: rg117 || 04/23/2003 13:50 Comments || Top||

#2  "playing cards" work best
Posted by: Mustang || 04/23/2003 14:33 Comments || Top||

#3  Speaking of playing cards, what about turning Thugburg personalities into a set?
Posted by: A || 04/23/2003 15:41 Comments || Top||

#4  Wouldn't that be fun? We're up to about eight decks now, and I've been kicking myself because it's updated so sporadically... Wouldn't it be fun running down pictures?
Posted by: Fred || 04/23/2003 20:20 Comments || Top||

#5  Why bother with this? I don't think for one minute that Pakistan is really going to seek out and arrest any of those on the Wanted Taliban list. If anything, it identifies without any doubt the ones that Pakistan WON'T track down.
Posted by: Bomb-a-rama || 04/23/2003 23:32 Comments || Top||

#6  Bar,serves 2 purpose's
1)diplomatically tells Perv.,Karzi is tired of the crap.
2)Sends message"This is who we want""do something or we will".
Posted by: raptor || 04/24/2003 6:59 Comments || Top||


Cable TV returns to Kabul
Cable television has been switched back on in the Afghan capital Kabul months after it was banned for being obscene and un-Islamic. Popular Western and Indian music, movie and sports channels have begun broadcasting again after President Hamid Karzai's cabinet passed a law allowing them to go back on air. They were forbidden from broadcasting in January by the country's Chief Justice Mawlavi Fazl Hadi Shinwari, who said there had been complaints about "half-naked singers and obscene scenes from movies".
Yeah, baby! Let's get some MTV going — run a few Spring Break tapes.
The new law is seen as a victory for President Karzai in the struggle between pro-Western and raving rabid nutjob conservative Islamic elements in the country. Mohammad Nasir Raastin, the owner of one cable firm, said he resumed broadcasting last week. "The information minister has assured us that the law has been passed and it will be announced through the media soon after technical clearance by the justice ministry," he said. Kabul cable TV proved popular following the fall of the Taleban, showing a dozen channels, mainly Western and Indian music, news and movies. "The programmes allow us to understand what is going on in the world. I like them," said a student, Habiba, 18. But her classmate, Kamila, said: "This is really Western influence. It should be stopped. It will damage our culture and religion."
"Don't be such a stick in the mud, Kamila."
"You're just jealous because my boyfriend can recite the entire Qu'ran!"
"And you're jealous because my boyfriend knows all 57 positions in the Kama-Sutra!"
"Why, I'd, I'd ... [faint]"

In January, Shinwari explained the ban by saying: "We are Afghans, we are Muslims, we have Islamic laws and values in our country."
"And ya can't have jihad without them, by Allah!"
Cable TV is broadcast to about 7,000 mostly middle-class subscribers in Kabul. Services in the cities of Jalalabad and Herat were also banned. Television was completely banned by the former Taleban rulers, as were many other forms of entertainment. State television is now run by the Northern Alliance and does not show women singers.
Time for a little hack, I think. Wonder if you can get the E network into their feed?
Posted by: Steve White || 04/23/2003 01:14 am || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "mainly Western and Indian music, news and movies. "

see its not just about western influence, but about Hindu influence - pre-Islam afghan was buddhist - not Hindu, but within Indian cultural sphere. New "pop" culture post-Taliban was not Western, but "bollywood" Indian music, posters of Indian film starts etc. That has the harder line islamists worried (and the Pakis?)
Posted by: liberalhawk || 04/23/2003 8:36 Comments || Top||

#2  Now playing: "Mullahas Gone Wild"...
Posted by: mojo || 04/23/2003 9:59 Comments || Top||

#3  Now playing: "Mullahas Gone Wild"...

"Flash us your ankles, flash us your ankles!" ;)
Posted by: Baba Yaga || 04/23/2003 13:00 Comments || Top||

#4  Wait'll they see "Biker Mullahs from Hell" in the wee hours...
Posted by: Fred || 04/23/2003 13:19 Comments || Top||

#5  It's not western influence they are worried about. It's those darn infidel news programs! How can they program their people to hate infidels if they see on TV that they have a good time? I can't wait to 'Mullahs Gone Wild III: Above the Knee!' .
Posted by: Cyber Sarge || 04/23/2003 14:33 Comments || Top||

#6  You've got hollywood, you've got bollywood, now you have TalibWood?
Posted by: rg117 || 04/23/2003 14:34 Comments || Top||

#7  TalibWood is an oxymoron and so are the Talib(an)
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 04/23/2003 15:19 Comments || Top||

#8  "You've got hollywood, you've got bollywood, now you have TalibWood?"

Uhh...don't forget Lollywood.
Posted by: Arthur Fleischman || 04/23/2003 17:16 Comments || Top||

#9  "Uhh...don't forget Lollywood"

True

Fatima to Mohammed:"Oh my brave mujahadeen, is that an RPG down your pants or are you just happy to see my burqa outline"
Posted by: rg117 || 04/23/2003 18:03 Comments || Top||

#10  just as long as the women keep going to school... does Kamila realise why she is now allowed in school???
Posted by: anon1 || 04/23/2003 21:30 Comments || Top||


Arabia
Annan hopeful fate of missing Kuwaitis will be resolved
IRNA -- United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan has voiced hope in a new report to the Security Council that the fate of Kuwaiti and third-country nationals missing since Iraq's invasion of Kuwait in 1990 will now be solved quickly after the end of the current conflict in Iraq. The secretary general notes that since his last report there had been some reason to hope for progress in the early months of 2003, including five meetings of the technical subcommittee between Iraq and Kuwait but 'regrettably no concrete results have been achieved'. These meetings were interrupted by the outbreak of conflict on March 20, but Annan adds: "It is hoped that the question of the repatriation or return of all Kuwaiti and third-country nationals or their remains will be resumed as soon as military activities cease, and that the mandate given to the High-level Coordinator will be implemented in full."
We probably don't need a UN coordinator now, high-level or otherwise. The Americans and Kuwaitis can look for the records themselves...
The Coordinator Yuli Vorontsov of the Russian Federation, visited Baghdad in January pursuant to his mandate under Resolution 1284 of 1999 on the repatriation issue. The report notes that at the subcommittee meetings Iraq promised to present information at subsequent meetings. But it says that after the fourth meeting, the last one Vorontsov attended, 'the coordinator stated that the constructive approach to the disarmament issues, as exemplified by the destruction of Al Samoud missiles, matched by the same attitude on the humanitarian issues'. Iraq began destroying its Al Samoud missiles before the outbreak of hostilities when ordered to do so by UN arms inspectors, who declared them prohibited weapons because they exceeded the 150-kilometer limit imposed by Security Council resolutions.
So why didn't the UN inspectors tell them to produce their records on the missing Kuwaitis?
Posted by: Fred Pruitt || 04/23/2003 08:26 pm || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  What about Capt. Scott Speicher?
Posted by: Bomb-a-rama || 04/23/2003 23:29 Comments || Top||


Britain
Intelligence experts claim Daily Telegraph find likely to be authentic
Most intelligence experts claimed yesterday that the documents obtained by the Daily Telegraph are probably the real thing.
And it couldn't have happened to a nicer Stalinist!
However, eyebrows were raised at the fact that they were unearthed with relative ease by a reporter for a British broadsheet which would naturally be critical of George Galloway.
Say, ya don't suppose that the feared CIA/MI6/KGB/Mossad/UNCLE/SMERSH/SPECTRE had anything to do with this, do ya?
The Telegraph's correspondent, David Blair, says he found the papers as he and his translator searched the first floor of the Iraqi foreign ministry on Saturday. Mr Blair says the translator "happened upon an orange box file" labelled "Britain" in Arabic.
I'm beginning to think that I should like, sight unseen, all Brits named 'Blair'.
The reporter, a 30-year-old Oxford graduate whose previous postings for the Telegraph include Zimbabwe and Islamabad, says he then "happened upon" a letter from Mr Galloway nominating Fawaz Zureikat as his representative in Baghdad on matters concerning the Mariam Appeal, the fundraising scam effort launched by Mr Galloway to fly an Iraqi girl to Britain for medical treatment. There is no reason to doubt that the letter, on House of Commons notepaper, is genuine and in itself it is not controversial for an MP to consort with Saddam. Mr Galloway admits writing such a letter.
Setting up his plausible deniability for later.
Much more interesting, and potentially damaging to Mr Galloway, is a second document which purports to be from the head of the Iraqi intelligence — whose signature is regrettably conveniently illegible — to Saddam Hussein detailing financial arrangements the MP allegedly had with the regime. Elements of the letter yesterday troubled some experts in Arabic and the Iraq regime. They expressed surprise that its heading included the name of the organisation — Iraqi Intelligence Service (IRIS) — in English, together with a rather amateurish logo showing an eye. They were also surprised at the letter's elaborate border, though some suggested this may contain hidden messages.
"George, pick Shalalabad in the fourth race at Picadilly."
However, there was little doubt that the letter was written by a natural Arabic speaker. So was it chance that Mr Blair found the documents?
Almost as much of a chance as me boinking Christina Aguilera.
He seemed to express some surprise at his find in his report. "Why the contents of the room with the box files survived is a mystery. Its walls are blackened by fire or smoke, yet most of the folders are intact."
Man, the document forgers at SPECTRE are good.
When asked on the BBC's Breakfast Show if the papers could be forged, he said the idea that someone would have planted them on the "off chance" a journalist would find them and translate them was "virtually inconceivable".
Just like my boinking, well, you know.
He also denied the timing of his find was odd, pointing out that anyone who wanted to was free to walk into government ministries and take whatever they wanted, including documents.
"I was really upset, too, because I heard they had some new fax machines, and when I got there they was all looted!"
And if the documents were planted, who stood to benefit? Mr Galloway has been the strongest looney critic of the UK and US during the war. Conspiracy theorists might try to argue that as work to rebuild Iraq begins, destroying Mr Galloway's credibility would remove one strong wanker nutjob dissenting voice. A number of prominent leftwing MPs, including Michael Foot, former leader of the Labour Party, have been the subject of smears, encouraged directly or indirectly by the security and intelligence agencies, including false claims they were Soviet agents.
Some of which turned out to be true, correct?
Other correspondents in Baghdad were taking the find at face value, seeing Mr Blair as an industrious and credible journalist who had simply "struck lucky". Many have begun to go through papers at various government ministries and not been so fortunate. But even if the documents are genuine, it must be remembered that the information they contain may be false.
The Guardian is reaching, really reaching, to help an old friend.
Middlemen or Iraqi intelligence officers might have used Mr Galloway as an excuse to pocket the money for them selves. A classic scam by intelligence officers is to explain the need for money by pointing to the demands of an innocent third party. In truth, the full story of the Galloway documents may not be known for many years.
Or until the libel trial starts.
Posted by: Steve White || 04/23/2003 12:33 am || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  ah yassss the truth will not be known for many , many years... not until everyone has forgotten all about Iraq, and the Left's job as Saddam's Little Helper in the West.

Not until everybody is safely back to hating america and blaming Bush for the 'atrocity' of Iraq, can we come clean about the fact that Sammy was paying our hero Galloway.
Posted by: anon1 || 04/23/2003 1:12 Comments || Top||

#2  Galloway is a complete asshole and these documents are going to fry his ass. He's beloved by the Guardian, but he's not going to get away with this.

Galloway has been in trouble before over money and lavishness...maybe he was getting a little short.

Wonder how many Swiss bank accounts he has?
Posted by: R. McLeod || 04/23/2003 1:46 Comments || Top||

#3  There will be lots of collateral damage from all those files that authoritarian regimes so love.

I am happy the Galloway is one of the first - he is a contemptable slimeball who has got away with his money-grabbing crap for far too long.

Also on the collateral damage list is the UN's oil-for-palaces program, then France, Russia, Arafat! I love it!
Posted by: Phil B || 04/23/2003 2:50 Comments || Top||

#4  Raking the Galloway muck, the Telegraph's Opinions staff expound on Galloway's Gall this morning. It's worth a read.
Posted by: Bulldog || 04/23/2003 4:01 Comments || Top||

#5  great link, Bulldog, excellent article. The British media is without peer, I love it. They are like a pack of pitbulls. nothing gets beyond them. Sounds plausible, I guess it's true after all!
Posted by: anon1 || 04/23/2003 5:15 Comments || Top||

#6  "CIA/MI6/KGB/Mossad/UNCLE/SMERSH/SPECTRE "
Don't forget U.N.C.L.E & T.H.R.U.S.H.
Posted by: raptor || 04/23/2003 6:11 Comments || Top||

#7  Once in a great while, the big wheel turns...

Sweeeeeet.
Posted by: PD || 04/23/2003 6:33 Comments || Top||

#8  anon1, Don't know it you read this too, but more Telegraph Galloway-bashing can be found here.

"...Under the tutelage of Galloway, Dundee - that austere and generally depressed city on the north shore of the Tay - twinned itself with Nablus on the West Bank of the Jordan. It was an unlikely union that saw the PLO flag flying over the Gothic splendour of Dundee's municipal buildings, but it quickly took on a farcical air when, as part of the twinning ceremony, the Mayor of Nablus was presented with a crate of whisky and a kilt by the Scottish delegation. What use a strictly teetotal Muslim, both of whose legs had been blown away in a terrorist explosion, would have had for whisky and kilts was never made clear..."
Posted by: Bulldog || 04/23/2003 7:20 Comments || Top||

#9  telegraph also uncovered links from Iraq to Ugandan terrorists. DT doing a better job than the CIA??
Posted by: liberalhawk || 04/23/2003 8:45 Comments || Top||

#10  Gorgeous George does seem to have his ass in a wringer, right enough.

English treason law doesn't require an "overt act" like the American version. See ya Georgie...

Oh, and increase the S.M.E.R.S.H budget next year, Smithers...
Posted by: mojo || 04/23/2003 10:04 Comments || Top||

#11  CIA doesn't publish what it finds. Somewhere in Langley there are a number of fellows snickering and chortling and rubbing their hands this very moment...
Posted by: Fred || 04/23/2003 10:04 Comments || Top||

#12  Sorry, Georgie Porgie, you've been found out. Send a postcard from Antenora.
Posted by: KP || 04/23/2003 10:14 Comments || Top||

#13  Maybe Georgie has already taken the Chunnel train and is setting up his flat on the Left Bank? I can NEVER forgive or forget his vitiriolic anti-American column of Sept. 12, 2001. The man is beyond contempt and his actions - if found to be true - are grounds for the enforcement of England's treason laws.
Posted by: ColoradoConservative || 04/23/2003 11:39 Comments || Top||

#14  ColoradoConservative: What was that column? An "I'm glad they're dead?" A "Reward the terrorists?"
Posted by: KP || 04/23/2003 11:48 Comments || Top||

#15  However, eyebrows were raised at the fact that they were unearthed with relative ease by a reporter for a British broadsheet which would naturally be critical of George Galloway.


The Telegraph's correspondent, David Blair, says he found the papers as he and his translator searched the first floor of the Iraqi foreign ministry on Saturday. Mr Blair says the translator "happened upon an orange box file" labelled "Britain" in Arabic.


Well duh. To think that a box labeled "Britain" in Arabic wouldn't naturally attract the attention of a Pom and his translator is......?
Posted by: Bomb-a-rama || 04/23/2003 12:04 Comments || Top||

#16  Let's make double sure that Britain's vaunted "taxman" becomes fully aware of all those financial arrangements and compensation involving Mr. Gallway.

That should do the trick - talk about "pit bulls!"
Posted by: Larry || 04/23/2003 12:13 Comments || Top||

#17 
Galloway's column was called "Reaping the Whirlwind" and was published in The Guardian 9big surprise, huh?). Go to today's "Best of the Web" column by James Taranto. http://www.opinionjournal.com/best/

Also, update on Georgie's whereabouts. Per the Sun tabloid, he's holed up in his bungalow in Portugal.
Posted by: ColoradoConservative || 04/23/2003 12:13 Comments || Top||

#18  So, he blamed our desire to free the enslavèd lands and bring tyrants to justice for 9/11. Jerk.

Well, now this creep has had his true colors unearthed. Bet Blix couln't have unearthed that, now could he.
Posted by: KP || 04/23/2003 14:18 Comments || Top||

#19  I wonder if anybody is sitting next to him in the benches these days. Did they all get up and move away, Georgie? Awwwww....
Posted by: mojo || 04/23/2003 15:52 Comments || Top||

#20  Indeed, it is certainly true that the Soviets funded the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, and that many of the leading lefties in the UK, then and now, were affiliated with the CND. Now, some of them were just useful idiots, but surely some of the CND people were essentially Soviet agents.
Posted by: John Thacker || 04/23/2003 16:26 Comments || Top||

#21  "CIA/MI6/KGB/Mossad/UNCLE/SMERSH/SPECTRE"--
You left out K.A.O.S. and K.O.N.T.R.O.L. Get Smart!
Posted by: J. G. Jackson || 04/23/2003 16:47 Comments || Top||

#22  Meanwhile, in India..."He is a great friend of Pakistan. He has received the top award Hilal-e-Qaid-e-Azam. But the Pakistani government did not pay him," they said, shrugging off claims that Galloway was seen handing out signed receipts for cheques of 60,000 pounds on behalf of the National Lobby on Kashmir.
Posted by: Pink & Fluffy || 04/23/2003 23:49 Comments || Top||


Europe
Villepin: We are still a US ally
IRNA -- French Minister of Foreign Affairs Dominique de Villepin said at a press conference in Amman on Wednesday night, referring to his country's differences of opinion on Iraq crisis, "We are still the United States' friend and ally."
Yep. Still feels all friendly and allied from the end, too. (He agreed, politely... )
On the current situation in Iraq, he said, "We think about the future of that country, and believe serious steps should be taken to reconstruct the political and economic structure of Iraq now." The French foreign minister added, "international efforts need to be made in order to witness appropriate reconstruction and rapid advancement of Iraq." Referring to the need to establish a democratic political system in Iraq as soon as possible, he said, "The Iraqi nation trusts the Iraqi citizens, since they are from among themselves, and can feel the problems with which their nation is entangled."
Did that make any sense? I thought not...
Posted by: Fred Pruitt || 04/23/2003 09:50 pm || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Dominique de Villepin (who is a man)...
Posted by: Brian || 04/23/2003 22:04 Comments || Top||

#2  THANK GOD the French are still with us -- now I can sleep at night.
Posted by: Nero || 04/23/2003 22:14 Comments || Top||

#3  Ah, shaddup, Senator!

(this concludes today's portion of Kerry Bashing)
Posted by: Raj || 04/23/2003 22:20 Comments || Top||


France’s Headscarf Problem
How should a western democracy
accommodate Islam
? | 23 April 2003

The French Minister of the Interior, Nicolas Sarkozy, is the first man for a long time to hold that post who has shown the courage and determination to confront France’s growing social problems. He has put policemen back on the beat; he is testing drivers of crashed cars for the presence of cannabis in their urine. But he made a rod with which to beat his own back in creating the Union of French Islamic Organizations as an intermediary between French Muslims and the French government.

He hoped that moderates would control the new group, but instead it has given extremists a platform from which to voice their demands. Last weekend, he brought down the extremists’ ire by re-opening the question of the wearing of the headscarf by Muslim girls and women in a speech to the new Islamic union.

The fundamentalists booed Sarkozy, though a smattering of the women in the audience applauded when he remarked that the law required that photographs for the compulsory identity card should be taken bareheaded: that is to say, without a headscarf. He was implicitly asserting the supremacy of the law of the state over any religious custom.

The Conseil d’Etat had not long before ruled that the wearing of headscarves by Muslim girls at school was legal (it had previously been banned), provided that it gave rise to no conflict. This, of course, was asking for the circle to be squared: and conflict over headscarves duly started up again in several schools almost at once. But, in a spirit completely contrary to the Conseil d’Etat’s ruling, Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin announced his intention of prohibiting by law the wearing of the headscarf in the exercise of any public function. He did so in name of the difference between the public and the private sphere, and of the secularism of the state.

The wearing of the headscarf has clearly become a matter of the deepest symbolic significance in France, a matter over which it is not impossible to see hundreds or even thousands eventually being killed. What might appear to an outsider as a trivial disagreement is actually one of great philosophical importance—a fact that both parties to the disagreement instinctively understand.

Some of the women who attended the meeting of the Union of French Islamic Organizations (not, presumably, those who applauded Sarkozy) have sent a letter to the prime minister, saying that they are both fully Islamic and fully French citizens, and that they will take their case to the European Court of Human Rights, if he persists in his planned legislation. In other words, they intend to hoist western society by its own petard.

The Agence France Presse reports that scarf partisans are duplicitously using a double tactic and a double language to impose their views on Muslim women—their ultimate goal being the destruction of the liberal-democratic state itself. On the one hand, they appeal in public to the doctrine of universal human rights, which are observed only in states such as France; on the other, in private, they use the traditional male dominance of their culture—including the threat of violence—to impose their views on others in the name of Holy Writ. After all, in some giant housing projects surrounding Paris and other French cities, young Muslim women who dress in western clothing are deemed to be fair game, inviting—indeed, asking for—rape by gangs of Muslim youths. In such circumstances, it is impossible to know whether the adoption of Islamic dress by women in western society is ever truly voluntary, and so long as such behavior persists, the presumption must be against it being so.

In short, Islamic extremists use secularism to impose theocracy: a tactic that calls to mind that of the communists of old, who appealed to freedom of speech with the long-term aim of extinguishing it altogether. The parallel is all the more exact, because just as Moscow financed the communists, the Saudis finance many of the Muslim extremists.

France’s headscarf problem illustrates the limited ability of abstract principle to decide practical political questions. There are good abstract arguments, appealing to human rights on both sides, for allowing and disallowing the wearing of the headscarf. But the question can only be decided sensibly based on the study of social realities.

In Britain, for example, there was (for a very short time) a problem about Sikh men who wanted to join the public service and yet continue to wear their turbans. Officials solved the problem very quickly: they designed turbans that fitted in—very smartly, in the event—with various uniforms and modes of dress. No one felt, or feels, intimidated or threatened in the slightest by this concession to a religious custom.

The same cannot be said of the appearance on our streets of Muslim women so completely covered that even their eyes are hardly visible through the slit in their headdress. The reason for the difference in reaction rests not on abstract principle but on concrete social context. The women who appear in such costume are often subject to forced marriage, and no one can tell whether they wear Islamic costume from choice or through brute intimidation. Moreover, they are members of a religion with a strong aggressive, proselytizing, and imperialistic streak—a religion that ultimately recognizes nothing but itself, not even the secular state, as a source of authority.

There is clearly an urgency to the settlement of the scarf question in France: and let us hope for France’s sake that Sarkozy, Raffarin, and Luc Ferry (the Minister of Education) are familiar with those wise lines of Kipling:

And we’ve proved it again and again,
That if once you have paid the Dane-geld
You never get rid of the Dane
.
I say maybe 5, 6 years tops before France is completely under Shari'a laws.

*Originally, I found this at LGF, hattipped to Brenda.

Posted by: Celissa || 04/23/2003 02:08 pm || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "Moreover, they are members of a religion with a strong aggressive, proselytizing, and imperialistic streak—a religion that ultimately recognizes nothing but itself, not even the secular state, as a source of authority. "

IE its ok for sikhs to wear turbans and jews to weap kippot, but not for muslims to wear muslim headdress cause - well - theyre muslims. And islam aint really a religion, but a political viewpoint. And those guys who call themselves muslims and claim to disagree with that political viewpoint are either lying, or are not really muslims.

I didnt take this one on in LGF - but here we're on saner ground. If anyone rapes of forces someone into marriage they should be punished for that - period. Which is indeed the law in the United States of America, where I live.

Posted by: liberalhawk || 04/23/2003 14:22 Comments || Top||

#2  He hoped that moderates would control the new group, but instead it has given extremists a platform from which to voice their demands.

Moderate Muslims...HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA...
Posted by: tu3031 || 04/23/2003 14:22 Comments || Top||

#3  IE its ok for sikhs to wear turbans and jews to weap kippot, but not for muslims to wear muslim headdress cause - well - theyre muslims.

I think what he's talking about is the refusal of Muslims to alter their "beliefs" to assimilate and adhere to French law. France is going to end up in "Human Rights Court" because Islamic women want to wear veils for their ID cards. That's ridiculous.
Viewpoints on Islam vary. You are free to hold yours. I base my views on the Qur'an, the translated sermons I've read and continue to read, and the actions of Muslims around the globe. Fundamentalism is true Islam. Refusal to believe that doesn't make it any less true.
Posted by: Celissa || 04/23/2003 14:39 Comments || Top||

#4  if scarves must be removed for security/ID purposes thats one thing. The paragraph i quoted makes no mention of id's or security concerns - again


" No one felt, or feels, intimidated or threatened in the slightest by this concession to a religious custom.

The same cannot be said of the appearance on our streets of Muslim women so completely covered that even their eyes are hardly visible through the slit in their headdress. The reason for the difference in reaction rests not on abstract principle but on concrete social context."

the social context he then describes is not a reference to ID or security issues, but the content of Islam (as he understands it)
Posted by: liberalhawk || 04/23/2003 14:46 Comments || Top||

#5  "Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin announced his intention of prohibiting by law the wearing of the headscarf in the exercise of any public function. He did so in name of the difference between the public and the private sphere, and of the secularism of the state. "

IE not just about ID's but at any public function. And not in the name of security, but in the name of the secularism of the state. And there are some people who get bent out of shape at liberals for not wanting creches placed on public property - but think that defending the secular character of the state requires telling individuals how to dress.

Posted by: liberalhawk || 04/23/2003 14:50 Comments || Top||

#6  celissa - have you noted - in France the muslims live in ghettos, rampage in anti-semitic demos, and are a problem for French foreign policy. While here in the good old USA our muslims are more integrated, are mainly loyal, and are not the kind of issue they are in France? Granted their numbers are fewer and their origins different, but do you think our American approach to pluralism and positive assimilation just might have something to with it? Maybe the French arent the model for absorbing immigrants?
Posted by: liberalhawk || 04/23/2003 14:54 Comments || Top||

#7  Liberalhawk what are you talking about? The issue that Sarkozy specifically brought up WAS the headscarves. The article itself is directed at what happens when when there is a cultural tradition conflict with that of a society's rules and regulations.

The fundamentalists booed Sarkozy, though a smattering of the women in the audience applauded when he remarked that the law required that photographs for the compulsory identity card should be taken bareheaded: that is to say, without a headscarf

In the case of the ID card, well its kinda moot to have an ID card if theres no way to identify the person via the card isnt it? (Namely the headscarves involved are meant to cover up the entire face except the eyes)
Posted by: Valentine || 04/23/2003 15:10 Comments || Top||

#8  val - very simple - you remove the headscarf when you check ID (for example at airport checkin, or checkin to a govt building or public event then they can put the headscarf back on. The law Raffarin proposed would have banned all wearing of headscarves at all public events - and not for security, but for secularism.

I mean its one thing to make a boy take off his kippa to check for headlice - another thing to ban it at all public events.
Posted by: liberalhawk || 04/23/2003 15:24 Comments || Top||

#9  "But, in a spirit completely contrary to the Conseil d’Etat’s ruling, Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin announced his intention of prohibiting by law the wearing of the headscarf in the exercise of any public function. He did so in name of the difference between the public and the private sphere, and of the secularism of the state."


France has big issues with its Muslim population, mostly because it has put the Muslims in enclaves which are now thoroughly out of its control, which isn't good for the people living in those enclaves or for the French as a whole. That's what leads to the gang rapes and other issues. Headscarves have nothing to do with that, and banning them isn't going to fix it. If headscarves are banned in public places, the gangs will still rape the women who aren't wearing them. I agree with liberalhawk. You take off the scarf when it is necessary for identification purposes, but otherwise the state has no business being concerned with it. They should concentrate on securing the safety of the residents of their ghettos rather than dictating fashion.
Posted by: Kathy || 04/23/2003 15:43 Comments || Top||

#10  Meanwhile, in Turkey...
Posted by: Pink & Fluffy || 04/23/2003 16:50 Comments || Top||

#11  I look at it as an act similar to banning gang colors and insignia.
Posted by: someone || 04/23/2003 16:57 Comments || Top||

#12  It is high time for the Western Democracies to declare that that it is a cultural imperative to achieve energy indepence. And then we may have to resort to Cultural Apparthied. As coldly brutal as that sounds it does not mean death camps or any of the racist policies of the former RAS. Quite simply the Isalmic World for the Muslims, The Subcontinent for the Hindus, East Asia for the Buhdists, Taoists and Sinto. Europe, North America and South America for the cultures that dominate them now. Sub-Saharan Africa is a tougher call due to influences of both European and Islamic colonizers over the centuries. But I doubt that such a world would ever come to be due to the fact that Islam feels it is destined to be the World on day. And a rather poor screwed up world too. I may be ignorant of them but what major accomplishments has the Islamic world brought to the planet in the last 500 years
Posted by: Someone who did NOT vote for William Proxmire || 04/23/2003 17:11 Comments || Top||

#13  The Scarves vs. the ID Card Issue is the first of many confrontations in France. The Mullah's et.al will milk this one for all it is worth. The French will eventually cave in because the M's will push it for all its worth and, well, is the govt going to use riot police to enforce this one? Then another issue will come up, etc. etc. This is just the beginning of, well, basically jihad or the gradual takeover of France by Islam.
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 04/23/2003 21:26 Comments || Top||

#14  Ok,Celissia.
But where do you stand?
Should it be the woman's choice?
Or should it be forced(under threat of violence or otherwise)by a women's husband and Sharia?
And Womens Rights in general?
Posted by: raptor || 04/24/2003 7:24 Comments || Top||


Al-Qaeda plot targets Australia
TURKEY has warned that al-Qaeda terrorists are plotting to assassinate Australian government officials, in a security alert issued on the eve of Anzac Day ceremonies in Gallipoli. Treasurer Peter Costello is due to arrive today in the town of Canakkale in northwest Turkey to represent Australia at the dawn and Lone Pine services on Friday. The website of the Turkish newspaper Zaman (www.zaman.com) reports the Turkish Government's Security General Directorate issued two terror alerts to its provincial security units, warning that 35 specially trained terrorists had entered Turkey from northern Iraq.
Not saying this article doesn't tell the truth, but I'm leery of that last sentence. This may just be another attempt by Turkey to find a reason to "deploy peacekeepers" to northern Iraq.
It reports al-Qaeda terrorists have planned suicide bombings or timed explosions by the end of the month. Targets of the terrorist activities will be business centres, airports, humanitarian aid establishments and logistic depots in Turkey, the US, England, Israel, Spain and Australia, the newspaper reports. One of the alerts also warned assassinations would be plotted against the officials of these countries.
That would be the Dire Revenge™ of Tawhid (Zarqawi's organization) for effectively wiping out Ansar al-Islam, I'd guess...
Australia's ambassador to Turkey, Jonathan Philp, said yesterday he was aware of the reports. "We're in close consultation with Turkish authorities, who have been extremely co-operative," Mr Philp said. "We don't comment on the detail specifics of security. The latest travel advice reflects all the intelligence available to us and our assessment of it." Australian Army chief Lieutenant-General Peter Leahy and MPs Cameron Thompson (Liberal member for Blair) and Jill Hall (Labor member for Shortland) will join Mr Costello at the Anzac ceremonies, which attracted 15,000 Australian and New Zealand pilgrims last year. Travel agencies are expecting half the crowd this year because thousands of travellers have cancelled their bookings due to fears of terrorism, SARS and the conflict in neighbouring Iraq.
But 7500 could still provide a good pile of victims...
The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade is warning Australians to exercise a high degree of caution in Turkey, especially in areas frequented by foreigners such as bars, hotels, shopping areas and public transport. Australian Federal Police officers will be flown in to help Turkish paramilitary police secure the remote Gallipoli site, which is a national park. The US Government advised Americans to leave Turkey in a travel alert issued over the Easter break.
Posted by: Old Patriot || 04/23/2003 10:06 am || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Turkish intentions aside, the information seems to fit with what we already know about al-Qaeda activity in the Kurdish areas of Iraq and Ansar al-Islam. If I remember correctly, the group has previously used Turkish smuggling routes to transfer recruits from the Middle East and Europe to Chechnya.

In addition, keep in mind that al-Qaeda holds the modern Turkish republic as being responsible for the downfall of the caliphate by Attaturk as well as their taking part in peacekeeping operations in Afghanistan.

Also, I believe the Turks have their own homegrown Islamist terrorists, the Turkish Hezbollah. Anybody here no whether or not they operate under al-Qaeda's aegis?
Posted by: Dan Darling || 04/23/2003 11:00 Comments || Top||

#2  If bona fide terrorists are found, I say kill them on the spot.
Posted by: Bomb-a-rama || 04/23/2003 11:57 Comments || Top||

#3  I don't think Turkish Hezbollah's associated with al-Qaeda. There were suspicions that it was helped into existence by elements within the Turkish government as a counterweight to the Kurdish nationalists. Huseyin Velioglu, the group's founder and leader, was a sadist who videotaped around fifty torture-murders. He was bumped off by a sniper in a raid in 1997 but the tradition was set, and seems to continue. I haven't heard much about them lately, and I suspect they're either defunct or seriously damaged.
Posted by: Fred || 04/23/2003 14:18 Comments || Top||

#4  Ah, Bomb-a-rama, the 9MM solution
Posted by: Someone who did NOT vote for William Proxmire || 04/23/2003 23:05 Comments || Top||


Iraq
Steyn on Mesopotamia
Oooh. Mark Steyn, in high dudgeon...
Likewise, whatever the innovations in writing, law, agriculture and village life once pioneered by previous owners of the lot, modern Iraq has squandered them: Writing? Banned. Agriculture? We drained the marshes. Village life? Do what we say or we'll kill you. Law? You gotta be kidding. Mesopotamia may be "the cradle of civilization," but civilization learned to walk and talk and graduated to long pants in Greece and Rome and London and North America and Australia and India and Japan and St. Lucia and Papua New Guinea, and what was once the cradle became, in the last four decades, the toilet of civilization -- a place incapable of inventing the industrial shredder but anxious to import them for the purpose of feeding human beings into.
Couldn't have ranted it better myself. Except for the part about writing. He obviously forgets Zabibah and the King...
Posted by: Fred Pruitt || 04/23/2003 09:57 pm || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


Former Iraq military intelligence chief surrenders to U.S.
American forces in Iraq captured four top officials of Saddam Hussein's former government Wednesday, including the air defense force commander and the former head of military intelligence. The highest-ranking official in the group is Muzahim Sa'b Hassan al-Tikriti, who headed Iraq's air defenses under Saddam. He was No. 10 on the U.S. list of the top 55 most wanted officials from Saddam's regime.
Chief of air defense usually isn't an offense that ends up getting a guy's neck stretched. Wonder why he was so high on the list?
Gen. Zuhayr Talib Abd al-Sattar al-Naqib, the former head of the Directorate of Military Intelligence, surrendered to U.S. troops Wednesday. The directorate monitored the loyalty of Iraq's regular army, provided security at Iraqi military facilities and collected intelligence on military forces opposing Iraq. The Pentagon official said Naqib's American equivalent would be the head of the Defense Intelligence Agency. Naqib was No. 21 on the 55 most wanted list and was the seven of hearts in the deck of cards produced by the U.S. military with pictures of Saddam's associates. Naqib was a professional soldier who rose through the ranks of the Iraqi army. The military intelligence directorate he headed was separate from the Iraqi Mukhabarat, which gathered strategic intelligence and conducted covert operations aimed at maintaining government authority. The 56-year-old Naqib told The Los Angeles Times in an interview before his surrender that he had no apologies for his involvement in Saddam's government. He also made it clear that he had not always agreed with the Iraqi leader. However, he had shared Saddam's Pan-Arabist ideas and had hope that Iraq and its military could be the force for creating an Arab nation, the Times report said.
He's a good candidate for having his neck lengthened...
Also captured Wednesday was Muhammad Mahdi al-Salih, the former Iraqi trade minister and No. 48 on the most wanted list.
Not much detail on him. Guess he's chopped liver...
Also Wednesday, allied special operations troops captured a Mukhabarat officer formerly in charge of American operations, a senior U.S. official said. Jim Wilkinson, director of strategic communications for U.S. Central Command, identified the prisoner as Salim Said Khalaf al-Jumayli. He was not among the 55 most wanted. Al-Jumayli is suspected of having knowledge of Iraqi intelligence activities in the United States, including names of people spying for Iraq, Wilkinson said in a statement from Doha, Qatar.
This guy's punishment may take the form of dozens, maybe hundreds of U.S. intel officers standing around him, pointing the finger and laughing uproariously. Mukhabarat might have been very effective at home, but outside the Arab world it leant new dimensions to the world "ineptitude." I think that's a function of picking people for loyalty, rather than for competence.
He offered no details about how the Iraqi was captured but said there was one Iraqi casualty during the operation. No Americans were hurt, he said.
Four more down, three from the "deck".
Posted by: Old Patriot || 04/23/2003 06:06 pm || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Might be too late to do this, but we could have played "Rantburg poker." We'd deal the deck out, look at the cards, maybe trade a couple around, and when you're happy with your hand, you'd wait for the varmints to be hauled in -- first one with all five cards in his hand captured wins!

Fred, this might help pay the bandwidth bill, particularly if we say one-eyed Jacks are wild, and ...
Posted by: Steve White || 04/23/2003 18:35 Comments || Top||


Baghdad’s Self-Proclaimed Government Pledges to Pay Salaries
From AP – Edited for length
Baghdad's self-proclaimed rulers said Wednesday they will use Iraqi government funds to pay all state employees their salaries this month — with a 1,000-percent raise — and took credit for progress in getting power, water and hospitals back up and running. They also claimed the U.S. Army recognizes their authority, meets with them daily and even drove them from Kuwait to Baghdad in American military vehicles. The United States said it doesn't even know who they are.
Uhhh... Have we been introduced?
Jay Garner, a retired U.S. general, is charged with restoring services in Iraq while an interim government is formed. But Mohammed Mohsen al-Zubaidi, a former Iraqi exile, seemed to be getting ahead of those plans, consolidating his claim to Baghdad's governorship — and over the entire country, taking funds from national government coffers for his own embryonic administration. At a town hall-style meeting Wednesday, al-Zubaidi promised government employees they would be paid on April 30, and that their salaries would be increased tenfold. He said the funds would come from a Finance Ministry account at the Iraqi National Bank. "We are working as a team with the Americans. We have a meeting with them every day," he said. He said his team met with U.S. Army civil affairs officers as well as military commanders, and the meetings were held without news media present at U.S. insistence.
"Open the hole, Mahmoud. It's time for today's meeting with the Merkins."
"Hokay, boss."
"You guys come come out of there right now! We ain't foolin' around out here!"
"Yes, yes, effendi! We're only trying to help. We won't be long!"
"You comin' out?"
"Not yet!"
"You guys are gonna be in big trouble! We're warnin' you!"
"Thank you for meeting with us today, effendi!"
The U.S. government has consistently denied having any dealings with al-Zubaidi or his administration. Barbara Bodine, the U.S. coordinator for central Iraq, said Monday: "We don't really know much about him except that he's declared himself mayor. We don't recognize him."
"He just blew in from Iran and set up shop!"
Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks, deputy operations director for the U.S. Central Command in Qatar, said last week that al-Zubaidi was "an emerging leader and deserves some attention." But he said "until full processes are in place ... that is not a recognized mayor of Baghdad." But whether real or imagined, al-Zubaidi's ties to Iraq's de-facto U.S. rulers appears to be serving him well. Al-Zubaidi acted as if he was Iraq's ruler, appealing for law and order and promising to solve problems. He bragged about the electricity, water and hospitals slowly coming back online, although it was unclear what, if anything, he had to do with the progress.
"I had much to do with it, very much! I have been encouraging it every day!"
"I know you are suffering. I am one of you," he said. "You have been patient under a dictatorship for 35 years. Express yourselves! Be active! Love one another!"
"Vote for me!"
But in an indication of how difficult his job will be — if he manages to hold onto it — people gathered in the auditorium showed little unity.
     "All of us are suffering!" one man yelled.
     "We need everything - flour, electricity, gasoline!" screamed another.
     One woman in a black chador stood and appealed to al-Zubaidi to help her with a different problem: "My TV is broken!" she called. "You are talking about sewage, water and electricity, but who will fix my television?"
I swear that last line isn’t mine – I kinda wish it was!
"Madame, your TV ain't busted. The electricity's off!"
Posted by: Tadderly || 04/23/2003 02:01 pm || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Nice scam - but I am already supreme emperor of baghdad. This Al-zubaidi carpetbagger is a pretender to my throne, and I meet daily with Americans and discuss Iraqs' problems and solutions with them (on rantburg) and I promise a 5000% raise payable...uh...soon, yeah, that's the ticket. So apparently I have a better claim than he does, hmmm?
Posted by: Frank G || 04/23/2003 14:14 Comments || Top||

#2  Here's your chance, Fred: send al-Zubaidi your bandwidth bill. He'll pay it and give you 1000% back :-)
Posted by: Steve White || 04/23/2003 14:46 Comments || Top||

#3  KNEEL before Zod!
Posted by: mojo || 04/23/2003 16:01 Comments || Top||

#4  I think I saw something on CNN while channel-flicking that said that al-Zubaidi was using money looted from one of the banks, but that the Americans were now preventing this.

No doubt more news will come out on this, but it looks to be a good story: rob a bank and become mayor of Baghdad.
Posted by: A || 04/23/2003 16:10 Comments || Top||

#5  Anyone want to take bets on how long he "serves" before he's either shot or hanged? Somehow I don't see the people of Baghdad backing this bucket of hog slop.
Posted by: Old Patriot || 04/23/2003 18:22 Comments || Top||

#6  Kurds to the north of us
Shiites to the south of us
Ba'athists to the west of us
Carpetbaggers to the east of us
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 04/23/2003 19:01 Comments || Top||

#7  Guy needs an eviction notice,deliviered by 3ID.
Posted by: raptor || 04/24/2003 8:37 Comments || Top||


Oil Flows Again From Iraqi Fields
AP provides this synopsis of the day's news...
  • Oil from Iraq's southern fields began flowing through pipelines Wednesday for the first time since the war, and power at last was restored to parts of Baghdad. The south oil fields had been among the first installations secured when U.S. and British forces launched the ground war March 20. Coalition forces, aided by Iraqi oil workers, Wednesday fired up a gas-oil separation plant that sent oil to a pumping station and storage tank outside the southern city of Basra. "Our focus in restoring the oil is to give the biggest benefit to the Iraqi people," said Brig. Gen. Robert Crear, the top U.S. official charged with getting Iraq's oil production up and running. He said the southern Rumeila oil field, one of Iraq's largest, could be producing up to 1.1 million barrels a day in six to 15 weeks. The country's northern oil fields around Kirkuk remain out of production; when they are reopened, Crear said Iraq could move toward its prewar production of 2.8 million barrels a day, and provide crucial revenue for reconstruction.

  • In the holy cities of Karbala and Najaf, Wednesday was the climax of an emotional pilgrimage — peaceful so far — that has drawn an estimated 1 million Shiite Muslims. With Saddam Hussein's regime toppled, it was the first time since the 1970s that Iraq's Shiite majority could participate freely in the march to the cities' shrines. Thousands of the pilgrims took part in an anti- American demonstration Wednesday. Among the banners were some that read, "No to America, no to Israel, yes to Islam."
    Demonstration by "thousands", from a pilgrimage of "up to a million" doesn't sound too daunting. Seems that not ALL Shiites are under the control of the Imams yet. We need to separate those that are from the mainstream, and work with the people that are happy we're there, and that they're free.
    We might also point out that all these people have the time to demonstrate — they don't appear to have jobs. Having an economy in which two out of three households aren't dependent on the gummint for food will bring down the level of participation in such frivolities. You know what they say about the Devil and idle hands. These are early-on problems, as predictable as looting (greater than expected) and revenge killings (fewer than expected, unless we've missed something).

  • American investigators were trying to figure out how hundreds of millions of U.S. dollars — possibly genuine, perhaps counterfeit — ended up in Iraq despite economic sanctions in place since 1990. The latest stash — $112 million — was found by Army civil affairs soldiers inside seven dog kennels (My emphasis - OP) in a wealthy neighborhood where top regime officials once lived, the Los Angeles Times reported Wednesday. The Times and the New York Post said four soldiers were under investigation in the alleged theft of about $900,000 of a huge stash of dollars found earlier in the same neighborhood. Some of the cash has been stumbled upon almost by accident.

  • The intensive nationwide search by U.S. teams for banned weapons of mass destruction has yet to turn up conclusive evidence of chemical or biological weapons. Six Iraqi scientists working at Baghdad research institutions told The Associated Press they were ordered to destroy some bacteria and equipment and hide more in their homes before visits from U.N. weapons inspectors in the months leading up to the war. All the scientists said they were involved in civilian research projects and all said they knew of no programs for weapons of mass destruction. It was not clear why their materials, ostensibly for nonmilitary research, were ordered destroyed.
    Nope, we don't know nuthin' 'bout no illegal programs, not us! We're just hapless folks workin' on a cure for the common cold.
    But their accounts indicate the Saddam's regime may have had advance knowledge of at least some of the inspectors' visits, as the United States suspected, and that the regime was concerned about any material that could raise the suspicion of U.N. experts.

  • A grim legacy of Saddam's regime was being dug out of shallow graves on the grounds of Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison, where several bodies have been found buried face down, hands bound behind their backs and gunshot wounds to the head. "At least now we know they are dead, thanks be to God," said Saad al-Niami, an army colonel. "Our families can get rest now." Saddam's secret services used the prison as a detention center, said Gen. Hossam Hussein, commander of guards there. He said it was built for 800 prisoners, but held 1,200. Relatives said countless men were executed there during the final days of Saddam's teetering regime.

  • The mood was dramatically different in a lucky batch of Baghdad neighborhoods - about one-fifth of the city — where power was restored for the first time in three weeks. Baghdad residents and the U.S. military have listed power as the capital's key need — to deter looting and help get a municipal administration back in operation.

  • In Karbala and Najaf, huge throngs of Shiite pilgrims continued their observances. Some flailed their backs and inflicted cuts on their heads as they marched to the beat of drums. Among the anti-American demonstrators was Khudayer Abbas Musawi, a 25-year-old engineering student. "America came here not to free the Iraqi people but for oil," he said.
    Wonder how one of Nancy Peloski's constituents got back to Iraq so fast! Actually, this is probably the line the Iranian backed Shiite Imams are taking to increase their following, hoping to institute an Islamic autocracy.
    Such sentiment was not unanimous. Said Kathem Jasim Mohammed, a 50- year-old vendor,: "I want to thank Mr. Bush for breaking the prison Iraq was in." After midday prayers, the crowds began to diminish, although many pilgrims were expected to remain for observances Thursday in Karbala — site of the 7th-century martyrdom of Hussein, a grandson of the Prophet Muhammad. Shiites were long suppressed by Saddam's ruling Sunni minority. Since Saddam fell, Shiites have been setting up local administrations, and religious leaders have emerged as key sources of political power.
    I don't say we should come down hard on these leaders, but we need to keep a very careful eye on them. The last thing we need to have happen is to end one dictatorship and have an Islamic regime take its place.
    We do need to come down hard on their gunnies, though, and when we have an interim regime in place we have to keep pressure on them to clean the political vitriol out of the sermons.

  • Jay Garner, the retired U.S. general overseeing the postwar reconstruction, arrived Wednesday in Irbil, the administrative capital of Iraq's Kurdish region. It was Garner's second day in the region, where he has extensive contacts stemming from his direction of a U.S. military mission to protect Kurds who fled their homes when Saddam put down an uprising following the 1991 Gulf War. Asked at a news conference how soon life in Iraq could return to a semblance of normalcy, Garner said "Everything has to be done in a secure environment... security is getting better every day. In a very short order you'll see a change in the attitudes and the will of the people themselves," he added.
    Since he has experience in doing the same thing in the Kurdish territories, likely he knows what he's talking about. Kurdistan's a lot more successful than any UN-guided regime I can think of off the top of my head...

  • British Defense Secretary Geoff Hoon toured the southern port city of Umm Qasr — becoming the highest-ranking British or U.S. politician to visit Iraq since the war. He shook hands with port workers and petted Buster a sniffer dog who has discovered several arms and drugs caches. Hoon said U.S. and British forces had not given up looking for Saddam, and speculated that the deposed leader was still in Iraq. "In the end, we don't know, but in my best judgment, he is," Hoon said.
Posted by: Old Patriot || 04/23/2003 10:06 am || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "The mood was dramatically different in a lucky batch of Baghdad neighborhoods - about one-fifth of the city - where power was restored for the first time in three weeks. Baghdad residents and the U.S. military have listed power as the capital's key need - to deter looting and help get a municipal administration back in operation. "

Wapo had good article this AM on power coming on - this has been made more difficult because previous regime allowed no maps of electrical system - security secret!!!! NPR reports Karbala also has power, local council of professionals operating under auspices of clerics. BBC OTOH reports lack of power and water in Nasiriyah, fear of cholera. Someone reported a local doctor taking control in Diwaniyah under US auspices. Umm Qasr has power, water, security, food coming in - port still limited to small vessels, problems with power and water distribution at port (difficulty repairing non-standard items) locals employed at port - but this must expand to increase employment. restoration of oil industry also providing jobs -together with Baghdad refinery should alleviate gasoline shortage that is impacting price of food in Baghdad.

Multiple political parties establishing offices in Baghdad, INC, both Kurdish parties, Communists, others. Kurds printing newspaper in Baghdad.

Self-proclaimed governor in Baghdad, "not our guy" says Bodine, but apparently met with local Marine officers. And what are his relations to Shiite Clerics in east baghdad? Political situation in Baghdad unclear.
Posted by: liberalhawk || 04/23/2003 10:41 Comments || Top||

#2  Fred, I deleted all the follow-on junk before I posted, but it seems to have slipped back into the final article. Can you do something about this? I hate to add too much to your bandwidth problem.
Posted by: Old Patriot || 04/23/2003 11:08 Comments || Top||

#3  Among the banners were some that read, "No to America, no to Israel, yes to Islam."

What is it with these Islamist dumbasses? WTF does Israel have to do directly with Iraq being released from the jaws of Saddam Hussein?
Posted by: Bomb-a-rama || 04/23/2003 12:12 Comments || Top||

#4  B-A-R---Israel is used as the projection of everything bad for these nutcases. They never look in the mirror and examine themselves. Like Fred sez, they are not wired to code. And there are millllllllllllllllioooooooooooons of em'. Got to go after the mouthpieces and give em a calm day.
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 04/23/2003 12:43 Comments || Top||


Timing Is Everything--Michael Ledeen on winning Shiite support
Ledeen has a good insight into the hidden hand of Iran among the Shiites in Iraq.
The military battle to destroy the Baathist regime of Saddam Hussein has virtually ended. Now the political battle for the freedom of the Iraqi people ensues, and it may be over very quickly, to our surprise and shame.
I tend to think not, but go ahead...
We have a very narrow window in Iraq to win the support of the Shiite community, which constitutes a majority of the Iraqi people. If we do not manage that in the next month or two, the radical Iranian regime will almost certainly succeed in its ambitious and, thus far, brilliantly managed campaign to mobilize the Iraqi Shiites to discredit the Coalition victory, demand an immediate American withdrawal, and insist on “international” — that is, U.N. and European — supervision of the country. That would leave Iran with a free hand in Iraq, strengthen the regime in Tehran to our detriment, and give a second wind to the terror network. Our victory, as the old saying goes, would turn to ashes in our mouths.
Aye, lads. 'Twar back in olden times, back in December, when I pointed out the obvious:
A greater worry to me than Jund al-Islam is SCIRI itself. I'm sure that the Medes and the Persians have every intention of trying to snatch the Iraqi bone from between the American teeth at the first opportunity when Sammy's gone. Wonder if they'll be the ones to provide the causus belli to slap Iran?
.So you read it here first, probably. But that doesn't mean I thought of it first — if Bush, Rice, et al, aren't five steps ahead of me then they're being overpaid. Dealing with the Iraqi ayatollahs is going to be tricky, I suppose, but I doubt greatly we're going to give them the right to establish a theocracy.
Some of our leaders seemed surprised to discover that both Iran and Syria were sending thousands of terrorists into Iraq to attack Coalition forces, but there was no reason for surprise. Both Bashar Assad in Damascus and Ali Khamenei and his fanatical allies in Tehran had publicly announced that America would sink into a Vietnam-like quagmire in Iraq, and the long delay between the end of the Afghan campaign and the onset of the liberation of Iraq enabled the Iranians and Syrians to plan their moves to best assure this outcome. The Syrians have been caught red-handed, opening their border with Iraq to terrorists moving East and weapons and Baathist hierarchs fleeing West. As usual, the Iranians have taken pains to cover their tracks. Even so, there is plenty of reliable information about their operations. In the middle of the war, for example, many Iraqi leaders — reportedly more than a hundred in all — made it by bus across the border to Iran, were escorted onto a commercial aircraft, and were flown to a safe haven in the Sudan.
I didn't hear about that one, but I suppose it could be true. But SAIRI remains the ayatollahs' catspaw. That's basically the Hakim family and their al-Badr brigade. All al-Badr did in the war was hold a parade and there's nothing to indicate it would be any challenge to dismantle. I suppose there's some reason for the U.S. to allow armed gunnies to run around for awhile, but we should be disarming the sonsabitches soon...
But the true audacity of Tehran lies in their political moves. The Iranians have infiltrated more than a hundred highly trained Arab mullahs from Qom and other Iranian religious centers into Iraq, especially to Najaf and Karbala, the holy cities of the Shiite faith. They are poisoning the minds of the (largely uneducated) Iraqi mobs with a simple slogan, repeated five times a day in the mosques: “America did it for the Jews and for the oil.” They are also distributing cash to the Iraqis.
It'll be the province of the interim Iraqi government to crack down on political vitriol passing as sermons in the mosques. We could maybe enact regulations, but the enforcement would be a nightmare and the propaganda value to the Medes and Persians — infidels dictating to honest Muslims what they can say — would be awful. But Talabani or Chalabi or whomever could get away with it.
Just as they did against the shah, the Iranian Shiite leaders intend to build a mass following, leading to an insurrection against us. Look carefully at the banners carried by the Shiite demonstrators. They are very clean and well produced, with slogans in both Arabic (for the Iraqis) and English (for Western media). That is the Iranian regime at work, one of the most brilliant and patient intelligence organizations in the region. The slogans chanted by the mobs in Baghdad are Iranian slogans, calls for an Islamic state. It may seem fanciful to suggest that our liberation of Iraq could be transformed into a pro-Iranian regime applying sharia law, but after all just last year our negotiators permitted the creation of an Islamic Republic in Afghanistan.
I'm hoping that's a lesson we learned well. Recent statements on the subject by Powell and Rumsfeld suggest we're not going to let it happen...
The Iranians will combine this political strategy with terrorist acts and assassinations, as in the case of the very charismatic Ayatollah Khoei in Najaf. He was a real threat to them, because of his personality and his solid pro-Western views. So they killed him, and they are planning to kill others of his ilk, along with as many Coalition soldiers as they can murder. Thousands of Iranian-backed terrorists have been sent to Iraq, from Hezbollah killers to the remnants of al Qaeda, from Islamic Jihadists to top Iranian Revolutionary Guards fighters.
It wasn't hard to anticipate them doing that. The Arabs were hollering about it and beating their chests loudly enough. Syria's being slapped around diplomatically right now, and Iran should soon start receiving messages pointing out their "unfriendly acts." The Syrians made the mistake of actually sending people to make war on us, while the Medes and the Persians have been professing neutrality. If they abandon that neutrality, there will be consequences.
We have not taken suitable precautions against the infiltration of suicide bombers and terrorists. The Associated Press reported on April 19th that — there wasn’t a single U.S. military checkpoint Friday along the length of the 50-mile road from the eastern city of Kut to the (Iranian) border — Iranian border guards roamed freely to the Iraqi side, acting as if they were in charge of the area and quickly asking reporters to leave.
That should be a temporary condition. There are only so many troops available. And ultimately it'll be the Iraqis who guard their own border and send the Iranians packing.
We cannot defeat this strategy militarily without a level of violence against civilians that would redound against us; we have to use their methods to defeat them. Our best strategy consists of two programs, one defensive and one offensive. The first is to support pro-Western, pro-democracy mullahs in Najaf and Karbala. They have sent a message to me (roughly two dozen of them), offering to help us in exchange for physical protection and money to give as charity to followers. Most Iraqi people do not like the Iranians, but only their own religious leaders can credibly expose the Iranian operation. They will not believe our radio or television broadcasts, or speeches from American generals, but they will listen to their own religious leaders. Similarly, it is next to impossible for us to identify the Iranian-backed terrorists, but the Iraqi Shiites can do it, once they are convinced that their real salvation lies with us. That is why the battle for the minds of the Iraqi Shiites is so crucial.
That's a statement of the obvious. We're going to have to forge alliances with the Shiite clergy. Okay.
The second program is to support the anti-regime forces inside Iran. That insane regime is now very frightened, both of us and of their own people. The ayatollahs know that the Iranian people long to be free, and the regime has intensified its repression during the run-up to the war. There are several pro-democracy groups in Iran (student and teacher organizations, trade unions, workers? group, especially in the oil and textile sectors) that can organize an insurrection in Tehran and other major cities. They need money (a fraction of what was squandered in the CIA’s failed program to induce an insurrection in Basra), satellite phones, laptop computers, and the like. At the same time, we should support the pro-American Persian language radio and TV stations in Los Angeles, that are the principal source of information for most educated Iranians.
Agreed. I think that when the ayatollahs are eventually thrown out it will be by the Iranians. But along with the phones and computers, I'd suggest we also start shipping in arms and ammunition and explosives and recruiting psychopaths. It will not be a bloodless revolution, and probably not even relatively bloodless.
A thoughtful Turkish general once remarked that the trouble with allying with the United States is that “you never know when the Americans are going to turn around and stab themselves in the back.” We have won a dazzling military battle, but victory in the war against terrorism is suddenly in peril. We can certainly win, but we are up against a desperate enemy with great skill and cunning, and the cynical ruthlessness that comes from an ancient civilization that has survived countless invaders and occupiers over many millennia. We’d better take them seriously.
Posted by: kgb || 04/23/2003 06:03 am || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Sounds like Ledeen has a good handle on the Iranians - and I very much favor the attack mode as well as the defend mode. We SHOULD be doing everything in our power to help the Iranian people. And if cold cash is what sings in revealing the Iranian mullahs for their craven use of the Iraqi Shiites for Iranian gain, shit, we've certainly wasted boatloads on idiot plans with lesser chance and appeal.
Posted by: PD || 04/23/2003 6:25 Comments || Top||

#2  To hell with respect for Iraqian democratic choice. The Shiite majority would win, and then oppress Christians, Turks, Kurds, Persians, Jews, etc. A secular constitution has to be imposed on the country, and if Iranian backed clerics get in the way, then they should be shot. How about some respect for minorities and Coalition troops, instead of Bush-Powell' "faith based" constitutionalism? Americans didn't spend $20,000,000,000 to deliver another province to the Islamofascists in Iran.
Posted by: Anonon || 04/23/2003 8:47 Comments || Top||

#3  "The Iranians will combine this political strategy with terrorist acts and assassinations, as in the case of the very charismatic Ayatollah Khoi in Najaf"

I hope one thing our people in Iraq are doing is fully investigating this assasination. Proof of it would be a very powerful stick to wave at Iran, and if they dont cooperate would have a profound effect on Iraqi Shiite politics.
Posted by: liberalhawk || 04/23/2003 9:26 Comments || Top||

#4  Ledeen's perspectives have been on the mark since I've been reading him. Let's hope GWB and company aren't going to take Iranian pot-stirring without reciprocal actions. I'd say once the Iranian powers-that-be know that we're willing to respond in kind, then things will get better in the South.
Posted by: Michael || 04/23/2003 9:31 Comments || Top||

#5  To hell with respect for Iraqian democratic choice. The Shiite majority would win, and then oppress Christians, Turks, Kurds, Persians, Jews, etc. A secular constitution has to be imposed on the country, and if Iranian backed clerics get in the way, then they should be shot.

We cannot win by imposing a constitution on Iraq. All we can do is force the various sides to keep talking until a compromise is worked out that will protect the rights of ALL Iraqis. That includes the Sunnis, Christians, the Kurds, the Turkomens, the Shiites, and whoever else lives in Iraq. That's going to take some very skilled maneuvering, and tons of hard work. Such a job cannot be done "in a matter of months". I think Rumsfeld made an ass of himself with his statements the last few days, and needs to be told by George to "sit down and shut up for a few weeks".

Bush is also going to have to clamp down on State, which is doing far too much to undermine what Bush is trying to do in Iraq. Otherwise, the entire operation is going to degenerate into a fiasco.
Posted by: Old Patriot || 04/23/2003 9:52 Comments || Top||

#6  This guy's got it right. The Shiites in the South want us out so Iran can walk in militarily and take over.
Posted by: Ptah || 04/23/2003 10:22 Comments || Top||

#7  'The Shiites'? The Iranian mullahs can't even win an election in Iran -- what makes you think they would in Iraq?
Posted by: someone || 04/23/2003 11:15 Comments || Top||

#8  Because Iraq is not Iran. Iran has had all this time under the mullahs' thumbs to see what it was all about. The Shiites in Iraq are only at the beginning.
Posted by: Bomb-a-rama || 04/23/2003 12:16 Comments || Top||

#9  We can not let the Shite Fundies take control.It would mean the slaughter of those that aren't Shite.I would say it's time to start cracking down,start disarming the Fundies.Use Iraqi police,with ample support.
Close the border with Iran,search every vehicle.Any weapons or large amounts of cash arrest occupants.Any vehicles found carrying vitrolic anti-American banners,phamplets,etc. send the occupants walikng back to Iran.
If worst comes to worst,break-up Iraq into 2 seperate states:Southern Iraqi Shite State.
Free Iraqi State.
Make the border the old no-fly zone.
It is a pretty safe bet the Kurds and Sunnis will not welcome a Shite controlled Iraq.Isolate the S.I.S.S.and let them stew in thier goo.
Cut off U.S.aid(let the Iranians rebuild SISS,and throw massive aid and support to F.I.S.
Posted by: raptor || 04/24/2003 9:03 Comments || Top||


Priceless stolen artifacts located !
Hammurabi relic discovered

A spokman for the FBI's Cultural Heritage Recovery Team announced today the dramatic find of a major Iraqi historical relic, "We've been investigating this large, criminal art theft ring for some time now" he said, "and stumbled upon this find in a huge warehouse of stolen art very near the banks of the river Seine. Important historical pieces like this are very rare, belong to the people of the world, and should be returned to it's country of origin as soon as possible".

Dating back almost 4,000 years the huge, black, stone monolith is inscribed with an image of the Mesapotamian King, Hammurabi, and the text of his laws. Considered to be one of the very first examples of a written system of justice, Hammurabi's 'Code' is considered priceless by many historians.

Working closely with French officials, the FBI hopes for a speedy return of this cultural treasure to it's proper homeland.

French President, Jacques Chirac, could not be reached for comment.

http://www.duhaime.org/Law_museum/hamm1.htm
Posted by: Showme || 04/23/2003 02:43 am || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  The above posting looks bogus. The lawyer whose website has been linked may be the victim of a sick hoax. As of this writing, it doesn't appear there's been any "find" of stolen Mesopotamian antiquities, let alone the famed Hammurabi piece. Fred, feel free to delete my comment (plus the above post, if you wish) if I am correct and this is a hoax. Otherwise, my apologies.

From WaPo:

The Disappearing Treasure of Iraq
Experts Keep Watch for Looted Artifacts

By Roger Atwood
Special to The Washington Post
Wednesday, April 23, 2003; Page C01

Nearly two weeks after looters rampaged through Iraq's National Museum of Antiquities, stealing thousands of artifacts dating from the dawn of civilization, art dealers and law enforcement people around the world are asking the same question.

Where's the loot?

Despite scattered rumors of artifacts turning up from Tehran to Paris, not a single one of the 90,000 or 120,000 or 170,000 plundered artifacts -- no one knows for sure how many -- is known to have been offered for sale anywhere in the world. And investigators and legitimate art dealers think they know why.

If not still stashed in Baghdad, the pieces are already trickling out of the country in trucks and suitcases, headed for a shadowy world of high-end, high-risk collectors of such loot who fancy themselves art connoisseurs and get a charge from owning forbidden objects. . .

snip
Posted by: Ninevah || 04/23/2003 4:13 Comments || Top||

#2  Heard a report some artifacts found at Chicago airport.
FBI waiting for confimation and list of inventory.
Posted by: raptor || 04/23/2003 6:24 Comments || Top||

#3  Of course it's a hoax. This is obviously a pretty hilarious "Scrappleface" or "Onion"-style satire, especially with the "Jacques Chirac could not be reached for comment" line at the end. One might also point out that entire portions, including the walls, of the ancient cities of Babylon and Nineva can be seen in Berlin's Pergemon Museum. We should probably be looking into this looting case as well.
Posted by: JTE || 04/23/2003 7:45 Comments || Top||

#4  Obviously you have never been at the UN headquarter in New York. That's where that piece of art is exposed... a "gift from the Iraqi people".
Posted by: True German Ally || 04/23/2003 8:36 Comments || Top||

#5  TGA - you sure for that particular piece - I was at the Univ of Pennsylvania Archaeology museum a few weeks ago, and in addition to original pieces they had a cast-copy of the Code of Hammurabi, original at the Louvre in Paris. I assume thats what the hoax is about - but I dont know how many stelae of the Code are in the West, nor do i remember what the one I say looked like (well aside from a lot of cuneiform, of course)
Posted by: liberalhawk || 04/23/2003 8:50 Comments || Top||

#6  Has anyone checked George Galloway's flat yet?
Posted by: Raj || 04/23/2003 9:27 Comments || Top||

#7  This is indeed at the Louvre. The post is satire. And good satire at that!
Posted by: Denny || 04/23/2003 13:01 Comments || Top||


Southeast Asia
Security Tight as Bashir Tried for Treason
A frail but bloodthirsty Muslim cleric suspected of leading a violent Southeast Asian Islamic network went on trial for treason on Wednesday in Indonesia's highest-profile case since the Bali bombings that prompted a crackdown on militants. Security was tight as supporters of the bearded Abu Bakar Bashir, 64, packed the large hall where he is being tried shouting "Allahu Akbar (God is greatest)" as he entered.
"Lookee here, Mahmoud, make sure you get a good mob out there and have 'em holler real loud. If they don't holler loud, the jurors won't get the message, y'know? Ain't nobody gonna be scared if they're well-behaved."
Bashir was wearing a white brassiere cup Muslim cap, shawl and a white shirt. Some supporters were all in white and others in black with such slogans as "Mujahidin" and "I am proud to be the defender of Sharia Islam (Islamic law)" written on their clothes.
And don't forget "I like cutting people's heads off!"
No posters were allowed inside the hall at the Meteorology and Geophysics Agency where the trial is being held to accommodate the hundreds of spectators. Outside, two police water cannon were at the ready, scores of police were on hand and spectators were searched before entering the court compound and again before entering the trial hall. The trial is a test for the government of secular-minded President Megawati Sukarnoputri as she walks a tightrope between a tough position against terror and persuading the nation's Muslim masses that that effort does not target Islam.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt || 04/23/2003 01:29 pm || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


Police arrest Bashir’s alleged replacement as JI leader
Indonesian police say they have arrested the man who succeeded Abu Bakar Bashir as leader of the Jemaah Islamiyah terror network. "Earlier today we have arrested someone who you might not be too familiar with, but he has been identified as Abu Rusdan," national detective chief Erwin Mappaseng told reporters. "Abu Rusdan, according to information from Nasir Abbas and several other people, is the current emir (leader) of Jemaah Islamiyah, the successor of Abu Bakar Bashir."
And what a paragon of leadership Abu Rusdan is...
Mappaseng said Rusdan took over the regional network, which is blamed for the Bali blasts last October and a string of other bombings, when Bashir was arrested last October 20. Muslim cleric Bashir went on trial earlier Wednesday for treason. He is accused of waging a jihad (holy war) to topple the government and set up an Islamic state.
Yes, because Lord knows the answer to hyperinflation, a collapsing economy and an utterly degenerate body politic is...Islam.
Posted by: Brian || 04/23/2003 07:02 am || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


Judge in Khmer Rouge Leader Case Killed
A Cambodian judge who last year sentenced a notorious Khmer Rouge commander to life imprisonment was killed by gunmen Wednesday, police said. Two unidentified men on a motorcycle pulled alongside Judge Sok Setha Mony's car at an intersection in the capital and opened fire, said Heng Pov, deputy police commissioner of Phnom Penh. Witnesses reported hearing five shots.
That sounds pretty dead.
It sounds like downtown Karachi, too. Wonder if the shooters were Paks?
Sok Setha Mony had on Dec. 23, 2002 sentenced Sam Bith to life in prison for masterminding the 1994 abduction and murder of three Western tourists. Sam Bith, who has appealed the verdict, was a former provincial chief for the Khmer Rouge, the genocidal communist regime that turned Cambodia into ``the killing fields'' during late 1970s.
"I wuz framed! Framed, I tell ya!"
"An' besides, all the witnesses are dead!"
He is one of the highest-ranking Khmer Rouge officials to be tried in court. However, no Khmer Rouge leader has been brought to justice over the 1970s genocide. The Cambodian government reached agreement with the United Nations last month to hold an internationally assisted genocide tribunal for surviving Khmer Rouge leaders.
So now they can start bumping off UN judges...
The motive for Sok Setha Mony's killing was not immediately known. Analysts said it was premature to draw a link between the killing and Khmer Rouge sympathizers, since Sok Setha Mony's work could have antagonized many others as well.
Honest judge in a corrupt land? Naaah, can't imagine who'd be upset!
Still, the killing sends a ``very serious negative message'' to the already weak judicial system in Cambodia, said Kek Galabru, the founder of a human rights group, Licadho. ``It reinforces the lack of respect for the judiciary. What happened (today) sends a message to other judges, and those other judges will be scared and afraid to do their work,'' she said.
To the contrary, it reinforces a profound respect for the judiciary — the people who did it are scared that a good judge can break them. So they acted first.
Sok Setha Mony's body was taken to a morgue where his colleagues from the Phnom Penh Municipal Court went to pay respects before holding a Buddhist ceremony at his work place. Sok Setha Mony, 42, became well known after presiding over the high-profile case of Sam Bith, whom he described in his verdict as the ``the real mastermind'' behind ``the vicious acts committed against innocent civilians.'' He had found Sam Bith guilty of conspiring to kill Australian David Wilson, Briton Mark Slater and Frenchman Jean-Michel Braquet in 1994, years after the Khmer Rouge lost power and operated as a guerrilla group.
Only 3 of how many thousands Bith killed himself?
Posted by: Steve White || 04/23/2003 12:59 am || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


Middle East
Arafat, Abu Mazen agree on government
IRNA -- Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat and his Prime Minister designate Mahmoud Abbas, also known as Abu Mazen, have reached an agreement on the composition of the next Palestinian government, ending one of the severest internal political crisis. The agreement was apparently effected by Egyptian Intelligence chief Omar Suleiman who convinced both Arafat and Abu Mazen to overcome their differences over who will assume the interior portfolio post in the new government. Palestinian sources said Arafat and Abu Mazen agreed that Abu Mazen would also act as the interior minister of the PA government.
So Yasser got his way, Dahlan's out, and Abbas is going to figurehead it...
The Palestinian legislative council is expected to convene early next week to ratify the Abu Mazen government. The United States said it would publish the quartet blueprint for peace in the Middle East know as the roadmap right after the ratification of the PA government.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt || 04/23/2003 09:49 pm || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


Syria-Lebanon
Nasrallah: beginning of countdown for ending US presence
IRNA -- Secretary General of Lebanese Hizbullah Seyed Hassan Nasrallah said on Tuesday that the unprecedented glorious observance of Arbaein rituals in Karbala this year would click the start of the negative countdown for ending US presence in Iraq, and in the whole Middle East region.
That was the procession where people were whacking themselves on the heads with swords. Important safety tip: That doesn't make you smarter...
Nasrallah who was speaking on Tuesday night at a commemoration service to mark the 40th day after the martyrdom anniversary of Imam Hussain in the south of Lebanon, compared the glorious observance of the Arbaein rituals in Iraq this year, with that of the 1982 in Lebanon. "In 1982, too, the Lebanese nation's wide participation in Arbaein rituals clicked the beginning of the strong resistance against the racist-Zionists' presence in Lebanon," said Nasrallah.
Ummm... Yeah. That musta been what dunnit...
Referring to the horrendous developments of the past few weeks in the Middle East, and particularly in Iraq, the Hizbullah Secretary General emphasized, "the Bush administration had initially aimed at turning its war in Iraq into a war between the world Christians and the Islamic world. But that satanic plan failed thanks to the wise stand adopted by the Pope, as well as the alertness of the Islamic Alims." Nasrallah said, "another dreadful US objective in starting a war against Iraq was flickering the flames of an internal crisis among the region's Muslim nations." He added, "Some circles helped Bush in achieving that goal, by emphasizing over the mosaic combination of the Iraqi population, but that plot, too, failed thanks to the alertness and timely moves on thepart of the Iraqi Shia leaders and nation."
God forbid the mosaic combination of the Iraqi population should take precedence over Iranian-backed Shia plans for domination...
Warning the regional nations that the US and Israel are together trying to imply the idea in the hearts and minds of the regional nations that they are incapable of resisting in the face of the US will, Nasrallah said, "The Americans tell a big lie about fighting to establish democracy and to safeguard freedoms in Iraq. They are actually after securing other goals there, and everyone knows it too well to be denied by them." Nasrallah added that the Iraqi nation had no longer [sic] been relieved of a nightmare called Saddam, that the Iraqis found themselves in the middle of a more horrendous nightmare, called the US occupation.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt || 04/23/2003 09:35 pm || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Fred: It wasn't until I read this and saw the insta-protests in Karbala that I realized that the Shiites are better Leninists than the Bolsheviks ever were. Vladimir Illich much be smiling in his mausoleum at the thought of such brite pupils. It's going to be a long war.
Posted by: 11A5S || 04/23/2003 23:06 Comments || Top||


Iran
Iranian actress given 74 lashes for kissing man on stage
IRNA -- Iranian actress Gohar Kheirandish, who had once kissed a male filmmaker on a public podium, has been sentenced to 74 lashes but the punishment will remain suspended, press said Tuesday. The punishment was issued by a court in the central desert city of Yazd, where Kheirandish, in her 50s, had kissed Ali Zamani on the forehead and shook his hand in November while receiving a prize at a ceremony.
The brazen hussy! Oh, Ethel! My pills!
She had later been quoted as saying that her gesture, which angered some people for being un-Islamic, was a spontaneuos show of maternal affection. The young director was a student of her late husband. A street protest was organized in the city and some media lambasted the pair, accusing them of harming Islam.
Good Gawd, yes! A kiss on the forehead and a handshake? Next thing to being naked and rutting in the streets!
Kheirandish also apologized for the foul-up, winning herself a suspended flogging. Under the Islamic Sharia law, implemented in Iran since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, unrelated mature males and females are banned from physical contact outside marriage.
Except for hookers, with judicial dispensation. Personally, I think they're just kinky. All of them...
Posted by: Fred Pruitt || 04/23/2003 08:58 pm || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  This is the type of story that turns up in the interest section - lighthearted enough - of western newspapers.
My the natives, aren't they quaint.

But if you suggest that perhaps this is an aspect of their culture that should change in the 21st century, if you suggest that Iranian women are just as entitled to equal rights as American or Australian women, just watch the Left scurry.

Cultural relativists everywhere will denounce you as 'racist' 'cultural imperialists' etc yadda yadda yadda.

IMHO we need an international army of women to go into Soddie and Pakland and Iran and every other gawdforsaken Islamist hellhole and exact some dire revenge TM on the Mullahs: it's the only language they understand.
Posted by: anon1 || 04/23/2003 21:22 Comments || Top||

#2  Cultural relativists everywhere will denounce you as 'racist' 'cultural imperialists' etc yadda yadda yadda.

Don't forget 'ethnocentrically biased'.
Posted by: Raj || 04/23/2003 22:22 Comments || Top||

#3  Any culture that dooms half of it's adult population to virtual slavery, well you can figure out the rest.
Posted by: Someone who did NOT vote for William Proxmire || 04/23/2003 22:30 Comments || Top||

#4  File under "L" for "Length backwards religious shitheels will go to so they can smoke the hookah late on Sunday, not shave, have sex with underage women, and more or less avoid modernity entirely."
Posted by: Nero || 04/23/2003 22:32 Comments || Top||


International
Putin proposes creation of UN-led anti-terror system
From Xinhuanet, Somewhat EFL
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday proposed the establishment of an international system to combat terrorism in which the United Nations should play the key role. In his message to an international conference of intelligence agents and law-enforcement leaders, Putin called upon the international community to "create an effective system of international security which would provide reliable protection from terrorism and extremism," and "the United Nations should play the key role in this system," Interfax reported.
Ummm... Is this the United Nations Command for Law and Enforcement (U.N.C.L.E.)? I watched that show a time or two. It was pretty forgettable...
Putin noted that "it is extremely important" to ensure effective cooperation among law-enforcement agencies of different countries, "especially in information exchanges and efforts to undermine the financial base behind terrorism." A total of 60 delegations from 43 countries, including the Commonwealth of Independent States, the Group of Eight industrialized nations, NATO, the European Union and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, are attending the conference that opened in Moscow on Wednesday.
The problem with these multipolar things is that the ownership rests jointly with the member states, who look out for their own interests. I'd not be happy letting Syria maintain the database on Islamic Jihad, or Iran keep track of Hezbollah.
They are discussing ways of perfecting cooperation in curbing the funding of terrorism and improving information exchanges in line with UN Security Council Resolution No. 1373, passed in 2001. "Our planet is too small, while the level of scientific and technological achievements is so high that one or several states on their own cannot protect themselves from current threats, given terrorists' possible access to weapons of mass destruction," the message said. Moscow attaches "enormous importance to international efforts to create a global system for resisting terrorist threats."
Nice idea, in theory. But remember that the OIC can't even agree on a definition of terrorism, since they can't come up with something that excludes Paleostine, Kashmir, and Chechnya...
"We are convinced that the UN must play the key role in coordinating anti-terrorist operations," Putin was quoted as saying. The Russian president noted that "the UN can guarantee that the mechanisms of combating terrorism will not damage the interests of individual countries, or the rights and liberties of their citizens."
I read a Clancy book in which the plot was terribly similar 
 NO THANKYEW.
Posted by: Tadderly || 04/23/2003 04:53 pm || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Gak! Given the ... inclinations... of the UN, the first (and only) effort of this organization would be to invade Israel, and turn it into yet another Islamicfascist dictatorship.
Posted by: snellenr || 04/23/2003 17:21 Comments || Top||

#2  Had the Russians done the U.S. job in Iraq Baghdad would look like Grosny now. Nyet spassiba.
Posted by: True German Ally || 04/23/2003 17:38 Comments || Top||

#3  The only thing that this looney idea will produce is a profit for Moscow hotels and caterers.
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 04/23/2003 17:44 Comments || Top||

#4  Holding my nose, I posit that this President Putin would like nothing better than to have a response team in position to occupy US strategic sites. We need an entirely new International body, where the price of membership includes metrics of valuation to include audits of home country local and national electoral results, human rights and minority rights guarantees, criminal back ground checks of all sitting diplomats, pledges of record to not suppress any religious minority or ethnic minority group residing as citizens of any member country.Open annual audits of all programs with the intent to discover waste fraud and abuse of power and fiduciary responsibility.
All members should have signed Pledges against electoral laws which discrimate against any citizen without regard to race, creed, sex or ethnic origin.

We need a New N, not the old N with expanded powers. The values of our constitution must never be subverted by politcal fiat such as this broadly defined platform despite its cover motive of anti terrorism.
Posted by: AnonymousLy yours || 04/23/2003 17:49 Comments || Top||

#5  While Putin's motives are very suspect, and the Russians are militarily incompetent, his analysis of the situation is correct. Two very unstable countries have nukes. You don't even have to steal a deadly virus anymore, you can just make it from reagents. Anyone (which in practice means everyone) who can make organophosphate fertilizers can make nerve gas. As 9/11 proved there are many parts of our existing infrastructure that can be used as weapons of mass destruction.

A simple solution to these threats exists: turn the planet into one big police state. My gut tells me that this is Putin's vision. I also suspect that it is a vision that a lot of EUnuchs share. The challenge is how to prevent WMD attacks in the future while holding onto our freedoms. When cities start being lost, the people are going to scream for Augustus Caesar. Augustus isn't such a bad deal. He lets the Senate debate, as long as it doesn't pass any real laws. Property rights are respected. Taxes are fair. The problem is that inevitably after Augustus comes Tiberias, then Caligula, etc., ad infinitum.

Putin is the only world leader who has so far painted an accurate picture of the threat (so familiar to readers here). His solution and the solution of his allies like Chirac and Joschka Fischer is ultimately statist and sterile. I have been very frustrated that no Western leader, aside from Berlusconi, has had the courage to state what Putin has. How do we mobilize the free world to fight when their leaders won't address the core issues and instead chose to dance around the unpleasant realities. The one criticism of the Left that rankles the most is the only one that is true. No one in the administration has succinctly identified the core mission of this war. Whether it be from fear of offending Muslim sensibilities or fear of frightening the American electorate, no one in the Bush administration simply stated that our goal is to eliminate failed states, societies and cultures so that they can no longer threaten civilization -- to end the zero-sum game that has been the central meme of so much of the world since the first "god-king" ascended the first throne so many millenia ago.
Posted by: 11A5S || 04/23/2003 19:22 Comments || Top||

#6  EUnuchs, 11A5S?

Actually the EU just a couple days ago sponsored a resolution against human rights violations in Russia, that the US refused to co-sponsor. And given the support by the US of the "police states" in Pakistan and Uzbekistan just because the governments there are supposedly helping you fight terrorism, I don't think there's any sense to attack the *EU* of having such a terrible vision, and not attack the US of the same thing...
Posted by: Aris Katsaris || 04/23/2003 19:50 Comments || Top||

#7  Aris: So would it be better to let the mad mullahs take over in Pakistan and start sharing their nuclear bombs with their cronies? Sometimes you have to choose between the lesser of two evils.

I always find it funny how so many Europeans accuse Americans of being so short-sighted and clueless for consorting with repressive regimes. Yet so many of the police states we've sponsored end up being prosperous democracies. Korea, Greece, Turkey, Chile, Panama, Taiwan. Sometimes it takes us forty years or so, but we usually get there. Do ya think that maybe we actually have a plan and institutions to effect that change? Institutions that have been around for the last 50 years or so? The sophisticated Euros are too blind to see. Yet every one of those institutions operates overtly.

I'm not accusing either the Euros or Russians of wanting a totalitarian police state. My analogy, if you remember, was Augustus Caesar and his rather mellow form of police state. You start with Augustus, you end up with Caligula with his informers, summary executions, and madness.

While I appreciate European efforts to bring peace and human rights through resolutions, what I remember is a picture of a Dutch soldier outside Srbrenica. He's crying. Do you know why? Because his commander just told the Serbs he would not interfere with them while they rounded up the Muslims in the town. Some things, Aris, you have to be ready to die for. I don't know if anyone in continental Europe is willing to die for anything anymore. They certainly weren't in Yugoslavia. So you all keep on passing resolutions. We'll keep liberating prisoners from the dungeons of the Mukhabarat with Yankee blood and treasure. In the end, we'll see who frees more. Good night.
Posted by: 11A5S || 04/23/2003 22:58 Comments || Top||

#8  Well this is nice. Proposing yet another task for the UN to screw up.
Posted by: Bomb-a-rama || 04/23/2003 23:23 Comments || Top||


Home Front
Kerry suffers White House aide taunt: "He looks French"
(EFL - via drudge)
Responding to a taunt by the White House that he ``looks French,'' U.S. Sen. John F. Kerry yesterday brushed off the political insult — saying it's part of an expected barrage of Republican attacks on his character.
Actually the White House itself didn't taunt him, an anonymous aide did. The stupidest thing is that he (and his nutty wife) even responded
``It means the White House has started the politics of personal destruction,'' Kerry said of the comment by an unnamed Bush adviser.
That's personal destruction?? *laughing* with skin that thin it's amazing he can stand without bleeding
A New York Times report quoted Republican officials and Bush advisers yesterday saying that Kerry's presidential campaign wouldn't play well out of New England because of his ``haughty air'' and Boston upbringing. ``He looks French,'' said one Bush adviser, handing the Massachusetts Democrat what is probably the ultimate postwar political putdown. Kerry, after an Earth Day campaign stop in Roxbury, said he didn't believe the comment was an attack on his patriotism, adding: ``It's funny. I laughed about it.''
Then his nutty wife Theresa evaded her minders and got off some good responses. Bet his sphincter puckered on these published remarks -
Minutes after Kerry sped off to a campaign speech in New Hampshire, his wife, Teresa Heinz Kerry, compared the Bush comment to an insult by ``kids in the playground.''
"Nanny nanny boo-boo! Y'stuck yer foot in doo-doo!"
``They'll probably say he's French, he's Jewish . . . he's a monkey,'' Heinz Kerry said of her husband, whose Jewish roots recently became a campaign issue. ``I just find it sad.'' She added: ``They (White House officials) probably don't even speak French.''
"Like us cultured people do..."
Oooohhh that hurt, Mrs H-K
Republican National Committee spokesman Dan Ronayne yesterday would not respond to the remarks by Kerry and his wife.
Just a taste for how high a level the next campaigns' gonna be...God help us
Posted by: Frank G || 04/23/2003 02:34 pm || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  oops - that was me that posted this trite piece....just couldn't resist something so stupid and venal
Posted by: Frank G || 04/23/2003 14:44 Comments || Top||

#2  by the way, notice in the next to last paragraph it's now a "Bush comment"?
Posted by: Frank G || 04/23/2003 15:29 Comments || Top||

#3  I have proof Kerry's French. I'll post the link in a few hours.
Posted by: Raj || 04/23/2003 15:33 Comments || Top||

#4  Example of irony: Kerry says he may dip into his wife's "fortune" to fend off the "special interests" that will fund Bush in 2004. Where did she get it all? From a Republican capitalist robber barron blue-blood. What will Dems say about that?

Another: she's originally a Portugese citizen who was born and raised in colonial Mozambique or Angola before their independence in 1976. In other words, she owes all of her wealth and position to the advantages she had while growing up on a plantation overseeing the colonized (Portugese were supposed to be bastard colonialists) and to the two senators she married.

I'm waiting for Kerry to use her as an example of why we need affirmative action/diversity quotas since he can point to her as exhibit #1 as someone who hasn't worked for anything she's gotten. Remember how Bush was pilloried for his dad's Yale connections?

Also she supposedly speaks French, just like JFK does, so her comments are pretty snooty and arrogant. White House, hire me and I'll test his/her French.
Posted by: Michael || 04/23/2003 15:33 Comments || Top||

#5  Kerry's a monkey? Has Mrs. Heinz Kerry been snorting some 57 catsup? However, now that she has mentioned it he does have the somewhat haughty detached air of a Capuchin.
Posted by: ColoradoConservative || 04/23/2003 15:44 Comments || Top||

#6  So, Kerry is married to an African American? That should help him.
Posted by: Chuck || 04/23/2003 15:49 Comments || Top||

#7  Brace yourself, Fred. You're really going to need bandwidth for the 2004 election!
Posted by: Tom || 04/23/2003 17:29 Comments || Top||

#8  Just what this country needs a whiney-ass liberal victimcrat. He should pick Sharpton as a running mate, they would make a great pair. Funny how a Demoncrat can say/do anything against the President but if it comes back it’s Whaa whaa whaa! I can’t wait until next year, Bush is going to smoke em! BTW HE DOES COME OFF AS FRENCH!
Posted by: Cyber Sarge || 04/23/2003 18:22 Comments || Top||

#9  Lemmie see, Fred's sympathy meter is in the shop....where in the hell did I put that micro violin?
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 04/23/2003 19:04 Comments || Top||

#10  Kerry and DeVillepin, separated at birth.
Posted by: Raj || 04/23/2003 20:58 Comments || Top||

#11  Brace yourself, Fred. You're really going to need bandwidth for the 2004 election!

I hope to heck we're on our own server before then!
Posted by: Fred || 04/23/2003 22:03 Comments || Top||


East/Subsaharan Africa
Bush denies sanctions against Sudan
US President George W. Bush denied sanctions for Sudan saying the Sudan government and Sudan Peoples Liberation Movement were seriously engaged in talks, a press report said on Wednesday. "I have informed the Congress on talks between the Sudan government and Sudan Peoples Liberation Movement," said Bush in an statement stressing for continuation of talks to resolve problems.
The continuous round of talks is interrupted only by a continuous series of violations by both sides...
Posted by: Fred Pruitt || 04/23/2003 01:18 pm || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  The talks, dubbed the "entropy reduction plenary sessions" produced nothing but hot air so far, in an area already plentiful in hot air.
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 04/23/2003 13:28 Comments || Top||


Home Front
Gingrich on Powell
State and Defense Department bickering over who should direct U.S. foreign policy, particularly the Iraq reconstruction effort, has one former lawmaker demanding the diplomatic corps get a major overhaul. "The last seven months have involved six months of diplomatic failure and one month of military success. The first days after military victory indicate the pattern of diplomatic failure is beginning once again and threatens to undo the effects of military victory," Newt Gingrich told an audience at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank.
He gets to the point in the next paragraph.
Much of Gingrich's rhetoric was aimed at the Near East Bureau of the State Department. Among the complaints, Gingrich blasted Powell for planning a trip to Syria, working with Russia, the European Union and the United Nations on a Middle East peace road map, and focusing on prewar weapons inspections rather than regime change. Gingrich said approving Hans Blix as chief U.N. weapons inspector was a mistake made "even though he was clearly opposed to war and determined to buy time and find excuses for Saddam Hussein."
All this is sharpshooting the minutiae of the diplo process. Powell in Syria may cast the image of us affording a tin-hat dictatorship more importance than it deserves, but it also sends our highest-ranking diplomat to underscore what our position is. Bashar can't say that he misunderstood some deputy assistant undersecretary after he's talked to the boss. The relationship with Russia is a temporary bobble. I think Dick Morris did as much to repair the relationship as anyone when he gave an interview to Izvestie that was headlined "Russia simply made a mistake." He held out the prospect of the "Big Three" from Yalta being reconstituted — and pointed out that two out of three had been on board. Russia's not a superpower anymore, but it's a fledgling great power. Once it's economic growing pains are behind it, it's going to take off. (You read it here first: "Russia as economic miracle.")
Gingrich spared no criticism over Powell's planned trip to Syria, saying that the secretary going to meet "with a terrorist-supporting, secret police-wielding dictator is ludicrous... Without bold, dramatic change at the State Department, the United States will soon find itself on the defensive everywhere except militarily. In the long run, that is a very dangerous position for the world's leading democracy to be in."
Read up on Clausewitz: War's diplomacy by other means. The diplomacy goes on all the time. And then read up on Jomini: for maximum effect, force should be concentrated at the enemy's weakest points. Most of diplomacy consists of reconnaissance.
At his regular briefing Tuesday, White House spokesman Ari Fleischer called the diplomatic efforts at the United Nations an important process that paved the way for the military action. Fleischer added that Powell was merely following President Bush's orders. "This is a process that the president decided on in his speech to the United Nations in September, and the fact of the matter is the State Department and Secretary Powell did an excellent job at ushering through that process," Fleischer said.
I think the diplomatic options was one line of attack that we tried, and it didn't work, but it provided us with certain advantages — like knowing who our real friends are, and giving those who aren't the opportunity to shoot themselves in the foot (or in the case of France, in the mouth)...
Behind the scenes, a senior administration official called Gingrich's comments out of line.
Does Newty have a book coming out soon, or something?
"Newt stepped in it. He served the country very well when he was happily retired," the official said.
I almost forgot that I kinda liked Newt. Now I know why I forgot.
I still like him, but we've all been wrong at one time or another, and in some cases spectacularly wrong.
Posted by: Mike N. || 04/23/2003 10:57 am || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I never liked Newt before but I may be starting to like him now. At least his positions regarding Syria and the State Department are dead on target. Powell and Bush would be well advised to consider his comments.
Posted by: Scooter McGruder || 04/23/2003 11:36 Comments || Top||

#2  Bravo to Newt! No doubt he's frying a bigger fish (or carrying someone else's water or abusing some other metaphor), but these things ought to be said!

Our Department of State has been bought and paid for by the Saudi's for years! (sometimes it's described as clientitus -- I prefer to believe in baser motives). It's hatred of Chalabi is legendary and can only be explained by the Saudi's fear of the man. If Chalabi brings a breath of freedom and effective self government to Iraq, the house of Saud is doomed! (as the semi-fair Jeananne would say). [Would a pessimist describe her as "slightly scuzzy"]. I digress.

State needs to be shaken up. I'm just not sure what Newt's game is. A shot against Powell in 2008? Plans to replace Powell with Rice in 2004? I dunno
Posted by: Norman Rogers || 04/23/2003 11:42 Comments || Top||

#3  Surprised that you've not noted Charles Krauthammer's part in the AEI session. An excellent duo (Charles & Newt) - they did a truly superb job.

That behind-the-scenes "senior administration official" was a State Dept. staffer. Of course that crew would take the anti-Newt/Krauthammer position. But the State Dept. has been systematically dancing and working to its own "we know better than everyone" tune for far too long.

Too bad that you now now know why you forgot that you kinda liked Newt.
Posted by: Larry || 04/23/2003 12:03 Comments || Top||

#4  "Too bad that you now know why you forgot that you kinda liked Newt."
Larry, Dammit! Don't do that! You're gonna make me pee my pants.
Thanks a pantload I might say.
Allow me to explain that a little. I like what Newt is saying, and much of what he has said in the past. It's just that I don't like him enough to keep him at the front of short memory.
Posted by: Mike N. || 04/23/2003 12:34 Comments || Top||

#5  All we need is the old black-sheep has-been to come out and start criticizing he administration.
His ego is colossal. Doesn't he know when to stay out of things???

Hey Newt - you blew your chance. SHUT IT!

Posted by: matinum || 04/23/2003 12:35 Comments || Top||

#6  I hate bloody grandstanding, especially by congressmen or ex-congressmen. Anybody with half a brain can see the purpose of Powell's visit to Damascus. It is just like his visit to Perv in Pakistan before the Afghan war. You want to send the big message, you send the big guy. These grandstanders remind me of a line in the movie "Murphy's War" when the barge owner says to Murphy something like, "I'm a little man and you're a little man. The difference is is that I know it."
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 04/23/2003 12:36 Comments || Top||

#7  I disagree with you, AP. This isn't about Powell, it's about the far-left, Harvard School of International Relations dominiated State Department. State has, and pushes, its own agenda, regardless of who's in the White House. The current situation isn't the first time they've backed the wrong team - they have a habit of it. I think what Gingrich is saying is that Powell needs to let the bureaucracy know who's boss, and if some people don't accept that, they need to get their resume up to date.

I worked in Washington for a year back in the early 1980's. I worked at NPIC, the CIA's imagery intelligence center (Army, Navy, and Air Force also have a section, along with the Defense Intelligence Agency). State had their own intelligence center. We were constantly trying to clean up the mess from inaccurate, often downright misleading reports from State. This isn't anything new - it's been going on since about 1935. It's about time someone did something to put an end to the crap.
Posted by: Old Patriot || 04/23/2003 14:01 Comments || Top||

#8  Old Patriot is right: compare Rumsfeld at the Pentagon to Powell at State. Until we hear squeals of pain from Foggy Bottom bureaucrats (probably expressed as the diplo-equivalent of "he arrogantly didn't send enough troops!") we know Powell's not doing his institutional job, no matter what his personal accomplishments.
Posted by: someone || 04/23/2003 14:25 Comments || Top||

#9  I took the latest Foreign Service Written Exam on 4-12. I'll find out in July if I passed. If I did, I'll have the "oral assessment" in October probably. That, at least, was the process in 2002 when I did pass the FSWE, but not the oral. If I had passed that, I would have waited 3-6 months for a spot to open up. It seems to be a bit too long of a process if America is trying to get good people into the Dept. to promote the country's interests.

Showing my age, I took the FSWE in 1978 (didn't pass) when a senior in college. THAT was equivalent to an ACT/SAT type experience. Lots of questions on culture, math, reading. If you have done one of those tests, you know what I'm talking about. The current FSWE's have been so dumbed down, it should not be a challenge to most smart Rantburg types to pass; or my son, for example, who is a well-read high school senior.

The oral assessment really hasn't changed that much over the years based on info from friends of mine who went through the process in the 1980's. Maybe this is where State should look at tweaking its system. I was asked, for example, at the end of the day if I had any questions concerning the oral, and when I did, (I just wanted to know the areas where I could improve),I was told that question could not be answered since it would put me at an advantage if I ever had the oral assessment again. Huh?

The culture within Foggy Bottom, I think, promotes not rocking the boat, "stability", in other words. Stability often becomes "stagnation". This creeps into State's love for coddling the Saudis, Egyptian, etc. OTOH, diplomats have to be "agents of change" according to State/USAID literature. A contradiction.

The stress on State's website is that its Foreign Service Officers need to look like America. Fine, I'm against lilly-white institutions, too. But why dumb down the test to ensure a pool of good candidates? This is not a slap at minorities State is trying to hire, but I thought State's mission was to promote the US interests abroad and we need the best to accomplish that, not just those who might be qualified. Find the brilliant ones instead.

There are a lot of good people at State; you just have to wonder if they're too worried about promotions/careers and making sure that personnel numbers/quotas add up for self-preservation purposes. They need to understand that the world has changed in the last 18 months and the current accepted PC paradigms that are part and parcel of State have to go. Tough people with a soft side would fit the bill. Hard to find, but they're out there.

If this review of the hiring process is part of what Gingrich had in mind, OK. Otherwise, Powell's being burned by the French has made Colin an Axil of Weasel opponent. Remember, he knows what a chain of command structure is and he works for GWB. It's up to the president to direct him/State.

Posted by: Michael || 04/23/2003 14:47 Comments || Top||

#10  Somewhat OT, but being a fan of Powells, I recall an interview when he first came into the State Department, one of the cultural issues he addressed was working hours; he said something to the effect of "... don't bother coming and working long weekend hours just to impress me, because you won't find me here. A well rounded effective employee should be able to have a life and a family outside of this job, or they are in the wrong line of work."
I wonder if any readers know if this is still true, (post 9-11) and could comment what is the similar culture at the 5 sided building under Rumsfeld. Wondering if the Pentagon workers consider the State Department workers slackers?
Posted by: Capsu78 || 04/23/2003 15:19 Comments || Top||

#11  They rang in the Newtster because nobody in the administration wanted to be seen as beating up on Powell. Newt doesn't care, he'll savage ANYBODY...

Secretary Powell should've cleaned house on his own, quietly, when he was appointed. Now they have to bring in the exterminator to get rid of the cockroaches.
Posted by: mojo || 04/23/2003 15:59 Comments || Top||


Beg-a-thon, day two...
I was very gratified by the response I got to my begging yesterday. We're about 2/3 of the way there. So if you haven't kicked in, and you've got it, please hit the button.

I think I've decided to go with server cohosting, but it's going to take me a week or two to build the machine and set everything up. We'll probably be down for an hour or two when the changeover occurs, but we shouldn't have any problems like this again in the future. I hope.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt || 04/23/2003 09:48 am || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Wait, but what about the liquor store?

;)
Posted by: someone || 04/23/2003 10:20 Comments || Top||

#2  Wait, but what about the liquor store?

Makes me think of Jake and Elrod talking to the sisters in Blues Brothers: Five grand? No problem, sister, we can knock off a half-dozen banks and get that!

Fred, how well can you scat the blues? :-)
Posted by: Steve White || 04/23/2003 10:55 Comments || Top||

#3  No Paypal button that I can see.

Must be a sign, I guess, huh? ;)

Can you add a text-only link?
Posted by: mojo || 04/23/2003 11:57 Comments || Top||

#4  It's small but it is there, just above the "search" box at the top right.
Posted by: Anonymous || 04/23/2003 12:39 Comments || Top||

#5  I just made a contribution... I'd be lost without my daily dose of Rantburg!
Posted by: Scooter McGruder || 04/23/2003 12:43 Comments || Top||

#6  Isn't this actually called Blegging?
Posted by: Frank G || 04/23/2003 15:08 Comments || Top||

#7  Did Murat contribute yet?
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 04/23/2003 15:18 Comments || Top||

#8  Not yet. And he probably should. You guys taking turns punting him into the rafters for page after page is prob'ly what used up all the bandwidth!
Posted by: Fred || 04/23/2003 15:21 Comments || Top||

#9  Another good reason why trolls shouldn't be fed, even your favorite ones.
Posted by: John Phares || 04/23/2003 17:50 Comments || Top||


Home Front
You’ve Been Had
The Charleston Post and Courier has graciously admitted that it made a mistake its coverage of the recent protest at the Augusta Golf tournament. A man who held up a sign at Martha Burk which said "Make me dinner" did not supply his real name, but instead spelled out his name as "Heywood Jablome." The protester is really an Atlanta radio host with a different name. But the South Carolina reporter isn't the only journalist to fall for this trick. A May 1, 2001 business story in the New York Post looked into the new trend of putting cafes in investment firm offices; the story reported the skepticism of "Heywood Jablome, 41, a Manhattan real estate agent." This brings back memories of the day in high school when the attendance administrator puzzled over an attendence slip reporting the absence of student whose name she did not recognize: "Jack Mehoff? Jack Mehoff? Who is Jack Mehoff?" People who enjoy reading book reviews by Paige Turner and military commentary by Warren Peace will find a good list of silly names at psacake
Posted by: Bent Pyramid || 04/23/2003 06:56 am || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I just read a great article in the paper today about bird migrations by Robbin Droppings.
Posted by: Yosemite Sam || 04/23/2003 8:59 Comments || Top||

#2  Was his buddy Dick Hertz from Holden with him?
Posted by: tu3031 || 04/23/2003 10:15 Comments || Top||

#3  tu301 - I'm not sure - maybe Dr. Richard Head was with him
Posted by: Yosemite Sam || 04/23/2003 10:51 Comments || Top||

#4  This article was written by David Kopel and posted at NRO's "The Corner". Why isn't he given proper attribution for this. The reader is left with the mistaken impression that the poster authored it. How are items posted to this forum suppose to work?
Posted by: ColoradoConservative || 04/23/2003 11:42 Comments || Top||

#5  ColoradoConservative: If you click on the title of the article (not at the top of the page, but within the article itself), if the poster has correctly linked the title, it should take you to the original site. This title's link does indeed take you to NRO's "The Corner".
I know, everyone, I know, I have no room to talk when it comes to "correctly linking" anything - but I'm getting better. *grin*
Posted by: Tadderly || 04/23/2003 11:55 Comments || Top||

#6  I used Haywood Jablomee in Usenet postings many years ago. It's still priceless.
Posted by: Bomb-a-rama || 04/23/2003 12:06 Comments || Top||

#7  Tadderly: In case you don't already know, click on the time link below the post to get the proper URL to plug into any external referring link.
Posted by: Bomb-a-rama || 04/23/2003 12:08 Comments || Top||

#8  Neat!! (Excuse me, is my neophyte showing?) Thanks, Bomb-a-rama!
Posted by: Tadderly || 04/23/2003 13:45 Comments || Top||

#9  Here is the link to 99X in Atlanta, where Haywood Jablome works that has more detail and sound bites.
Posted by: Denny || 04/23/2003 14:03 Comments || Top||


International
US signals action against France
Le payback sucks, non? EFR
United States Secretary of State Colin Powell has said France will suffer consequences for having opposed the US over the war with Iraq. Speaking on a television programme, Mr Powell said the US had to review its relationship with France following its promise to veto any United Nations Security Council resolution authorising war against Iraq. News of Mr Powell's comments came after the French ambassador to the United Nations, in an unexpected move, proposed the immediate suspension of UN sanctions against Iraq. The United States has been pressing for the sanctions to be lifted now that US-led forces have ousted Saddam Hussein's regime.

"It's over and we have to take a look at the relationship," Mr Powell said of ties with France, according to a transcript of an interview on the Charlie Rose Show provided by the State Department. "We have to look at all aspects of our relationship with France in light of this." Asked if there were consequences for having opposed the US, Mr Powell replied "yes" but did not elaborate. Senior US officials are reported to have debated tough measures against France at a high-level meeting on Monday. One US official was quoted as saying: "They are trying to find ways to create alternative mechanisms for dealing with the French, or rather without them, and not just at Nato, but more broadly." US diplomats had earlier welcomed France's initiative on sanctions, described by the BBC's UN correspondent Greg Barrow as a significant shift in its position.

The French ambassador, Jean-Marc de la Sabliere, said the sanctions issue was linked by past Security Council resolutions to a certification of Iraqi disarmament. "So meanwhile, we could suspend the sanctions and adjust the oil-for-food [programme] with an idea of its phasing out," he told reporters, following a briefing by UN chief weapons inspector Hans Blix. Mr de la Sabliere spoke of the need for new arrangements so that UN inspectors could work alongside US forces to finish the job of certifying whether Iraq is free of banned weapons. France had earlier insisted that UN inspectors alone had the authority to hunt for weapons of mass destruction (WMD). Since the war the US has deployed its own teams to look for banned weapons, which it cited as the key reason for launching war, but so far none are reported to have been found.

Like France, Russia also indicated its readiness to consider a gradual suspension of sanctions pending a final future decision that Iraq has relinquished all WMD.
Sounds like the Weasels are beginning to sober up. Look forward the the hangover from hell, rodents!
Posted by: Anonymous || 04/23/2003 03:12 am || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Er, heh. Ahem. Before anyone else points it out, weasels ain't rodents. They're mustelids. That's all for today's Biology 101.
Posted by: Bulldog || 04/23/2003 3:32 Comments || Top||

#2  Note that the Froggies are not suggesting the elimination of the sanctions - just to merely SUSPEND them...

While we move on ahead, sans the UfuckingN, France, Germany, Belgium, Turkey, and the Russkies can admire themselves and their grand baggage in History's rear-view mirror.

I piss in their general direction...
Posted by: PD || 04/23/2003 6:29 Comments || Top||

#3  I saw the show last night. It wasn't so much that Powell didn't specify what Franco-American relations would be in the future, as much as the immediacy of his "Yes" to Charlie's question. No hesitation. Jacques, Dominique, ecoutiez-vous? I think Charlie was a bit taken aback, decided no more elaboration was needed, and then moved onto another topic. Wow. Chirac/Da vile pin have really pissed him off.
Posted by: Michael || 04/23/2003 7:58 Comments || Top||

#4  The French are so corrupt that you should know better than to think they will have some sort of awakening! I think this explanation seems a bit more in character. http://quasipundit.blogspot.com/2003_04_20_quasipundit_archive.html#93096484

UNITED NATIONS, April 22 -- France today proposed the immediate suspension of all civilian U.N. trade sanctions against Iraq but insisted that the 13-year-old embargo could not be formally lifted until U.N. inspectors certified Iraq's disarmament...The French initiative, which caught U.S. officials by surprise, reflected mounting concern by Paris that it could be viewed as preventing Iraqis from reviving their economy as they emerge from more than a decade of sanctions.

The proposal would achieve a key French objective by guaranteeing international control over Iraq's oil revenue until an internationally recognized Iraqi government is in power... France still wants to keep the sales of Iraqi oil, and the revenue from those sales, under "international [read: UN] control", while at the same time allowing foreign investment & export financing. Nevermind that Iraq might be better off selling her own oil, investing the proceeds in rebuilding herself and financing her own exports.
Posted by: becky || 04/23/2003 8:52 Comments || Top||

#5  Michael: Yes. Timing is everything.

I'm against suspending the sanctions, especially if there is a time limit and automatic re-imposition: It gives France too much power to re-impose them, chilling any potential long-term business contracts and relationships deemed necessary by the new Iraqi Government as essential to getting a good deal. No sane business will ink a contract with that kind of sword hanging over the other party...
Posted by: Ptah || 04/23/2003 8:54 Comments || Top||

#6  The worst thing the United States can do to France is to ignore her completely. That means limit diplomatic exchange to a Charge d'affairs, rather than an ambassador (HUGE slap in the face), ignoring France's role in any international treaties or agreements, cutting off any aid to France, working through NATO channels that exclude the French, discourage trade (but do not IMPOSE SANCTIONS), and "suggest" alternate tourist visitations for US citizens. France has been "in our faces" trying to prove it's still relevant in the modern world. The one thing that will hurt the most is to be ignored.

We should do the same thing to the United Nations, as well. It, too, is no longer relevant. It has proved itself to be merely the toy of those with immense egos and little substance.
Posted by: Old Patriot || 04/23/2003 9:42 Comments || Top||

#7  I like it the way this is deveoping, even though I know it's going to change later as we move to the outer limits of official attention span.

It's so nice to see that Powell sat down and asked himself, "Why do we have to please them?" Joe Biden and his buddies might call us "bullies" for it, but the obligation always seemed to me to go both ways, even if the practice didn't.

Arab Street™, you're next.
Posted by: Fred || 04/23/2003 10:11 Comments || Top||

#8  Chiraq always goes for the "big" headlines and plays to the world press, and, he hopes, "world opinion" (whatever that is). I can see that GW has a definite course of action and goals, and that does NOT include France. No headlines, no foaming, just a few significant phrases dropped here and there. As was said in an earlier post some days ago, France will either be on the train, standing at the station, or under the train, but the train is leaving the station. GW's pattern of decision making, statements, and action play over and over again, but Chiraq just does not get it.
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 04/23/2003 10:26 Comments || Top||

#9  If I had my way, I'd like to see a WWII vet accompany the U.S. diplomats everytime they go to France. Preferably someone who was at Normandy. I surely would love to see/hear a Sunday morning interview with someone in the White Hizouse saying that they like Australian wine. Maybe A U.S. Diplo, flanked by WWII vets could visit France on Bastille day, to "officially" inform them about the demotion to Charge D'Affairs.
If none of the above happened, I would still be happy if we just aired some of their Ivory Coast laundry. Not, just going to the press and saying "France, Bad! Lookit!" But, maybe the Bush administration could start an Ivory Cost Peace Initiative. I think that would be a fine FU.
Posted by: Mike N. || 04/23/2003 10:32 Comments || Top||

#10  BD:" Before anyone else points it out, weasels ain't rodents. They're mustelids."

Yeah. Like somebody was going to. ;)
Posted by: mojo || 04/23/2003 14:20 Comments || Top||

#11  I knew I didn't like Mustelids, I just could never figure out why. Thanks for clearing that up for me.
Posted by: Mike N. || 04/23/2003 15:17 Comments || Top||

#12  I had a weasel get into my house up north years ago. Couldn't get him out. Finally shot him with a .22 pistol under the washing machine. Hit him in the musk gland, stunk up the house. Messy. Which brings me to the metaphoric point: it is nasty business purging oneself of weasels....
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 04/23/2003 15:44 Comments || Top||

#13  Mojo, I only pointed that out 'cos I'm (supposed) to be a biologist. Not a taxonomist mind you, but that's no excuse. It was early in the morning. I don't want to take up more of Fred's reserves on frivolity, but I can't help sharing some interesting info I noticed in the link I posted above - three varieties of weasel are the Siberian, Least and Yellow-bellied. Hmmm...

Mike, mustelids tend to be a bad bunch, and all should be approached with caution, or avoided altogether. Amphibians, on the other hand: only avoid the two-legged variety.

Paul - thanks for warning! It's corroborated by the link: "Mustelids have well-developed anal glands, which are particularly potent weapons..."
Posted by: Bulldog || 04/23/2003 16:01 Comments || Top||

#14  I still think we should invoke the Monroe Doctrine and kick them out of the Western Hemisphere. The South Pacific too.
Posted by: Ned || 04/23/2003 17:24 Comments || Top||

#15  I still think we should invoke the Monroe Doctrine and kick them out of the Western Hemisphere. The South Pacific too.

I think that's stretching a point of law. That's three-quarters of the planet.

Jeez, Ned, lose your parking space to a weasel, or what? It's not like they're after an independent Mustelistan Republic.

If you could explain the purpose of sanctions to a mustelid, they'd have lifted 'em two weeks ago... what's the point after the rodents are gone?
Posted by: Mark IV || 04/23/2003 22:43 Comments || Top||

#16  Damn, Alaska, why didn't you just live trap him and then close the hole that let him get in?

If I didn't have to crush the first coackroach that got through my household defense system yesterday, and you didn't write such good posts, you'd be on my list.
Posted by: becky || 04/24/2003 11:52 Comments || Top||


Korea
North Korea nuclear talks begin
Delegations from the United States, North Korea and China have started discussions on North Korea's nuclear ambitions. Wednesday's talks, the first since the nuclear crisis in the North began last October, started with a working breakfast between the US and the Chinese before the discussions in Beijing got under way in earnest.
Good thing they didn't invite the Nkors to the breakfast — they'd eaten the napkins and the flowers in the table setting.
The three-day talks are being led by the US Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian affairs, James Kelly, and the deputy director general of North Korea's American Affairs Bureau, Li Gun. Mr Kelly made no comment as he left his hotel for the discussions, at the Diaoyutai State Guest House, the walled garden compound where China receives visiting dignitaries.
Kelly's been the special representative for North Korea. He's the one they spilled the nuke "secret" to back in October...
In a related move that reflects the tension between the US and North Korea, 10 North Korean fighter jets began a training exercise, South's Defence Ministry said on Wednesday. They were monitoring US and Russian surveillance planes, the South Koreans said.
Where did the NKors find the fuel for a gaggle of MiG-15's?
The Beijing meeting represents a breakthrough in a dangerous six-month impasse over the North's nuclear programme. But analysts warned that negotiations were likely to be difficult, with the US and North Korea appearing to approach the talks from hard bargaining positions. North Korea has warned in recent days that it was ready to reprocess its spent nuclear fuel rods and thereby face extinction, while US General Leon LaPorte, commander of the 37,000 US troops based in South Korea, said on Tuesday that the North "poses many threats to global stability". The US-South Korean alliance "provides the military force that deters North Korean aggression and it stands ready to defeat any external provocation", he added.
A rough translation of that is: "These guys make gruesome faces and utter horrendous threats, and they hold great parades, but they're Iraq, only with kimchi."
The US wants to persuade North Korea to close down its nuclear programmes, while the North wants assurances the US will not attack.
You do your part, and we'll do ours.
A BBC correspondent says that who takes part in the talks has been a sticking point in itself. North Korea describes China's role as simply that of host, while the US, in an attempt to internationalise the issue, insists Beijing is a full party. On Friday it appeared that the meeting itself could be in doubt, after North Korea's state news agency announced that Pyongyang was already reprocessing the spent fuel rods — the step necessary to produce weapons-grade plutonium. That statement was amended on Monday to read that the North was "successfully going forward to reprocess" the 8,000 rods.
Oh. Well. That's different, then...
This new statement appears to fit with Western and Asian intelligence assessments that the reprocessing plant at Yongbyon is not yet operational. The last time James Kelly held talks with a North Korean delegation, he accused them pursuing a clandestine nuclear weapons programme, sparking the crisis in October.
I'm sure the NKors are happy to see him again. Nice move by GWB, sending the same man who blew the whistle.
Posted by: Steve White || 04/23/2003 01:08 am || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Man I hope this guy Kelly is about 6'8
Posted by: Shipman || 04/23/2003 9:29 Comments || Top||

#2  US General Leon LaPorte, commander of the 37,000 US troops based in South Korea, said on Tuesday that the North "poses many threats to global stability". The US-South Korean alliance "provides the military force that deters North Korean aggression and it stands ready to defeat any external provocation", he added.


*holds up card* 7.8. Points removed for being too short a program from an extremly promising candidate. Another four, five sentences, and "Army Based Policy" man would be sweating profusely.
Posted by: Ptah || 04/23/2003 11:24 Comments || Top||

#3  Truth be told, I'm still not entirely sure why the hell we're talking to them. For once, I agree with the North Korean press; these are not multilateral talks, these are precisely the direct US-DPRK talks Pyongyang has wanted all along. I just don't see a reason why the US is rushing into talks; we're not the ones eating tree bark (well, most of us, anyhow). North Korea needs these talk much more than we do, and letting them dictate who's in and who's out leaves me with a REALLY bad taste in my mouth. Of course, Seoul hasn't been particularly helpful in this regard. They need Alec Baldwin to go down to their Foreign Ministry and deliver his "Glengarry Glenross" pep talk. It takes "brass b*lls" to deal with Pyongyang, and for some reason beyond my limited comprehension, South Korea seems to lack'em. With an economy 25 times the size of the North's, you'd think they'd be a little more assertive.
Posted by: The Marmot || 04/23/2003 14:03 Comments || Top||

#4  A question: Can they eat air waves?

Talk is one thing, actually delivering something is something else.
Posted by: Ptah || 04/23/2003 15:18 Comments || Top||


Latin America
Fox Pledges Mexican Cooperation With U.S.
President Vicente Fox pledged cooperation with the United States in the fight against terrorism Tuesday, saying that differences over Iraq have not damaged the two countries' relationship.
Uh-huh.
"Nope. Nope. It's jest a scratch, ma'am..." [thud!]
In a meeting with foreign correspondents, Fox said Interior Minister Santiago Creel will meet with U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge this week to discuss border security. Fox said he instructed Creel to offer ``full cooperation and to express Mexico's willingness to fight terrorism.''
That will help, but we're still going to remember.
The Mexican president has always claimed a close friendship with President Bush, but he saw that relationship deteriorate after Mexico refused to back the U.S. decision to go to war. ``Mexico had a different opinion in the way the possession of weapons of mass destruction or chemical weapons could have been resolved,'' Fox said. ``But our bilateral relationship is very intense, and I think we can keep on building on it and narrowing the differences we had.'' He sent ``warm greetings'' to Bush, but acknowledged he had not had any recent telephone contact with him.
You might call Jacques and ask him about this.
Or Gerhard. He put on this phony Spanish accent, and claimed he was Aznar...
Fox said Mexico, which is presiding over the U.N. Security Council, will work to strengthen and give the council full credibility while seeking to ``reunite countries that during the conflict had conflicting positions.''
"Really. You can pay attention to the UNSC now. It's not like it was before..."
Fox said the first years of the North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA, have produced considerable benefits for its three partners — Mexico, the United States and Canada. ``But none of us is satisfied,'' he added. ``We want more development and more trade.''
"But no Taco Bells, okay? That stuff's like eatin' candy or somethin'. It'll give you a stomache ache..."
Fox said Mexico's vote against Cuba in the U.N. Human Rights Commission was consistent with Mexico's position in recent years. Regarding the summary trial and execution of three Cubans accused of hijacking a boat, Fox said Mexico did not make judgments on a country's internal affairs and added that he personally opposes the death penalty
At least Fox isn't Chiraq.
Posted by: Steve White || 04/23/2003 12:56 am || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "Demasiado poco, demasiado tarde..." Thanks for nothing amigo.
Posted by: ----------<<<<- || 04/23/2003 7:29 Comments || Top||

#2  "Fox said Mexico, which is presiding over the U.N. Security Council, will work to strengthen and give the council full credibility ..."

Uh ... this should have been done BEFORE we went in to Iraq. Too late buddy.
Posted by: Samma-lamma || 04/23/2003 8:52 Comments || Top||

#3  "At least Fox isn't Chiraq."

No he isnt, and we never got to see how he would have voted at the UNSC - one of the benefits of NOT calling a vote on the 2nd/18th res was to avoid putting nations like Mexico on the spot, and allowing all blame to fall on the French and Russians(but mainly the French). If we want to continue to punish/isolate the French, it makes sense to reach out to everyone else who wants to get back into our good graces, such as Mexico and Germany. Punishing countries is a dangerous course in international relations - if we're going to do it, lets at least decide who most needs to be punished (IE France) and focus on them alone.
Posted by: liberalhawk || 04/23/2003 9:23 Comments || Top||

#4  Fox is talking one story, and doing another. His controvertial "dual citizenship" proposal, his refusal to help stem the tide of illegal immigrants across the Mexican border, his troops' violation of the US border on numerous occasions, the issuance of documentation to illegal immigrants by Mexican consulates, and the interference by Mexican consular officials in the legal activities of the United States are the actions of someone OTHER than a staunch friend of the United States. Fox needs the same cold shoulder we're giving Chirac until he stops trying to regain control of former Spanish territory in the US by indirect means.
Posted by: Old Patriot || 04/23/2003 10:02 Comments || Top||

#5  The only good thing about Fox's arrogance -- and liberalhawk, you're being coy about "we never got to see how he would have voted": we surely know, even if we didn't make him do it -- is that he's scuttled any possibility of loosening our southern border (via "amnesty" or otherwise).
Posted by: someone || 04/23/2003 11:24 Comments || Top||

#6  President Vicente Fox pledged cooperation with the United States in the fight against terrorism Tuesday, saying that differences over Iraq have not damaged the two countries' relationship.

Bullshit. I'd be more than overjoyed to see a substantial uptick in the number of Mexican illegal aliens deported, and an increase in Border Patrol staffing and interdiction. Up yours, Presidente Fox.
Posted by: Bomb-a-rama || 04/23/2003 12:21 Comments || Top||



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Wed 2003-04-23
  North Korea nuclear talks begin
Tue 2003-04-22
  Yasser scuttles cabinet talks
Mon 2003-04-21
  Garner in Baghdad
Sun 2003-04-20
  US arrests sixth Saddam aide
Sat 2003-04-19
  Iraqi cash find valued at $650 Million
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  Ceasefire With MKO
Wed 2003-04-16
  Lebanese government resigns
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Sun 2003-04-13
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