congradulations!!
God Bless Iraq
Congratulations! You and all Iraqis have every right to feel very proud of yourselves. You have shown the terrorists, the tyrants, and the rest of the world that you are a brave people ready to die for freedom and democracy--that it means that much to you.
I have prayed many days that this election could be as successful as it has been with no bloodbath and a big turnout. Now after watching late into the night and reading blogs much of the afternoon, I am truly overjoyed for you all.There have been times that tears of joy have streamed down my face reading the many Iraqi blogs. I share your joy today.
This is only the first step along the road to freedom and democracy, but all journeys start with a single step. May God bless this step and each one hereafter.
Mimi
North Carolina
Glad to know you're safe Zeyad......Mabrook....
Very sincere congratulations! I have been in the Washington, DC area recently. There is a polling place there. Iraqis from all over the Atlantic coast drove many hours to get there. They danced in the parking lot, sang songs, cried, cheered, applauded, praised God and thanked America. Very heartwarming. I only wish there had been three times the number of polling stations. There is a large Iraqi community north of Seattle, but no polling place, I don't believe. They drove to Los Angeles to vote!
I wonder how the kings, dictators, mullahs and thugs really feel about this? They will congratulate, but I'll bet they will tighten the screws on their own people.
And the pinheads will continue to blather on, too.
I knew you would vote from Jordan, Zeyad.
Congratulations!
The world will remember this date forever.
Thank you also to the Coalition soldiers and all the Iraqi police and soldiers.
Congratulations to you and all the other Iraqi heros who voted.
What a beautiful historical day!
Hello Zeyad,
Thanks for blogging to us on this special day!
Zeyad said, devised several methods to get rid of the stain. One of these is to paint your fingers with skin lotion before you enter the polling station, wipe your finger clean immediately after voting and before the ink dries, on returning home dip your finger in boiling detergent and rub it repeatedly.
I hoped that people would think of something like that - the indelible ink was a really dumb idea - I was thinking that rubbing petroleum jelly on the skin first would ensure that the ink lifted off pretty easily.
I would be very very cautious about relying on tv reports - they do not show the full picture.
I'm so glad you were able to vote. When I read on your blog that you were leaving Iraq and would be out of country when the vote took place, I didn't quite know what to make of it. I'm so glad that you didn't miss this historic opportunity to chart a better future for your country.
Congratulations, Zeyad!
Congratulations, Zeyad, and glad to hear that you have voted.
Odd, isn't it, that you had to go to Jordan for safety, but you feel nervous about speaking your mind there for fear of ill-intentioned agents.
Good luck.
Zeyad,
It was a wonderful day for Iraq. I'm glad to hear you voted. I also thought you would. Congratulations!
As Churchill might have said, this is not the beginning of the end, but the end of the beginning.
congratulations! We wish you all the best. See, America is there to help you and your people to achive freedom - nothing more and nothing less. This is what all the Iraqi and American solders died for and i think it was worth it.
Rachel, a Brit in London - you couldnt even muster a congratulations - thats really sad.
Congratulations Zeyad.
I am so sorry that you and your family have suffered through these times, and have lost loved ones like your cousin. I am proud of you for speaking your mind and exercising your freedom to say what you think on this blog. I am proud of the Iraqi people for being brave and taking hold of their destiny.
God bless Iraq.
Zeyad,
I didn't believe that you would miss the opportunity to participate in these momentous events, and I'm delighted to hear that you were able to participate from Jordan. The euphoria will wear off, I'm sure, but right now I'm still flying high.
Congratulations again.
I am getting shivers from the news today. Iraqis have shown their mettle to the world and have my enduring respect.
Congratulations! Happy Independence Day!
God bless the Iraqi people and all those who have paid the price for freedom.
Zeyad, on American TV today several people were on TV reading from Iraqi blogs (Jeff Jarvis and Joe Trippi were on MSNBC, Spirit of America was on C-Span). I remember when you first began writing... so I was thinking of you, too, and I am glad you could vote in Jordan. I am happy for Iraq and all Iraqis today, no matter where in the world they are!
Thanks so much for posting!
Congratulations for what? Life for many Iraqis is still worse than it was under Saddam - electricity outages, water failure, ill-equipped hospitals, terrible terrible security situation - and this is two years after the US-led coalition invaded Iraq. The only government that will be allowed to "govern" Iraq will be a puppet, pro-Washington government.
Anyone thinks that the terrorists are going to be disheartened by today's election is deluded. And the US has only itself to thank.
"Anyone thinks that the terrorists are going to be disheartened by today's election is deluded. "
Judging by your reaction, they are going to be downright hysterical. Have you ever heard of a concept called "emotional intelligence"? It's the ability to tune in to the emotions of others and to respond appropriately. Rachel, every single Iraqi blog today is full of joy and wonder. The entire world over, people have seen that Iraqis are made of the purest steel and are united in their admiration for their courage.
Even those who have reservations about the election, even those who recognize that this is the beginning not the end, want to share for one day in this astounding and momentous occasion.
Rachel, give your precious agenda a rest for one day and join the human race, if only briefly.
the people from the evening star have fullfiled the promise to the peoples that began civilization
I must disagree with your Jordanian acquaintance, democracy works best from the ground up instead of the top down. Democracy must be embraced, never imposed. Iraq embraced democracy today.
Congratulations!
I am so ready for the day that my country (Israel) will not be the only Democracy in the Middle East. Free elections are such a giant step in that direction. I hope we both live long enough to drive safely to/from Baghdad from/to Tel Aviv, as ordinary tourists.
It's very moving.
Congratulations from California!
Never forget, freedom must be defended, because many people inside and outside of Iraq are plotting to destroy your democracy. As we say, freedom is not free.
Congratulations! I salute the bravery and determination of the Iraqi people! Today is a wonderful day!
Rachel, give your precious agenda a rest for one day and join the human race, if only briefly.
But, Bridget, Rachel can't do that. Rejoicing with the Iraqis would put her "precious agenda" in danger.
I've seen it before - I knew lefties who were quite sourfaced when the Berlin Wall came down.
Fortunately, I don't think the Iraqis are paying too much attention to the Rachels of this world.
Congratulations Zeyad,
I'm so glad that you both managed to vote on this historic day AND found the time to tell us about it.
The terrorists must be very disheartened that so many Iraqis ignored their vicious threats. And what a morale boost for the Iraqi security forces, who successfully protected their people's right to vote. Could this be the turning point? Let's hope so.
God bless Iraq. Allah, Yahweh, Buddha, whoever, I don't care. God Bless Iraq. And god bless the Iraqis. Except for the bastards trying to kill other Iraqis for deciding who their own leaders will be. Screw them.
There are still members of the KKK here in America: thirty years after the civil rights movement essentially won the public argument. We can't get rid of these people, we can only deprive them of power. I wish the same wasn't true in Iraq, but I fear that it is and you will have them with you for a long time. But they can be defeated, and only by resistance, such as you are offering. So god bless you.
Congratulations to you Zeyad and your family on this historic day.
It seems that Iraqis surprised even themselves with the high turnout. Though its likely there will continue to be insurgent attacks, it should be less likely now that Iraq will sink into a civil war. This high turnout at least highlighted the values of freedom and democracy that unite Iraqis, regardless of how the votes fall out.
I bet there will be even longer lines to sign up for the IP/ING now. With this vote, Iraqis are now in control of the government, and I have a hard time imagining that it will ever be the other way around again.
Zeyad - congratulations today was truly historic. Tell Nabil that his blog was featured today on MSNBC by Jeff Jarvis. He may have featured your blog also - but I didn't watch him all day so I'm not sure.
Long live Iraq!
You are a beacon to the world. Congratulations.
"Hold your head up high, Remember that you are Iraqi."
If you are an Iraqi, You Have a Damn Good Reason to hold your head UP High
Today. Aw-sum, Just an Aw-sum Day!
Congratulations, Zeyad.
It's a wonderful, beautiful, inspiring, exciting, promising day!!
A'ash al Iraq!
More congratulations to the people of Iraq who who were brave enough to go vote today. If democracy is what you want, you have America's support. For the people of Iraq, a better day is coming. It's clear to the world now that Iraqis have chosen to assert themselves and take their own destiny in their hands. Every American looks forward to the day when we can bring our troops home and leave Iraq entirely to the Iraqis. Then our two countries will deal with each other as equals in trade and cultural exchange. Your freedom is worth fighting for. The Baathists and islamist fanatics are in the minority. Keep fighting and you'll win.
Thanks for your previous post. I am glad to hear that amidst the chaos there was a breathe of hope today.
Admiring you and your people from afar. Congratulations!
Christie G.
I hope you don't mind I linked you on my sidebar. I hope to follow your writings. Christie
The truth begins to emerge: Any Iraqis who did not vote lost their food rations! Here is the proof.
It is also reported that Iraqi police, Iraqi National Guard, and American troops went door-to-door in many parts of Iraq. Any people who did not show the purple mark of submission were driven out of their houses at gunpoint and forced to the polls.
May this tiny step forward be rewarded by positive action to unite the Iraqi people.
Saddam's iron fist was necessary to keep the minority Sunnis, Baathists, et al, wealthier than the oppressed minorities.
I also view this as the end of the beginning.
I also believe there was either incompetent management by the US Administration, or it was deliberately creating instability, to the detriment of Iraqis, and even its own troops. I believe a big part of the mission was to keep educated, skilled Iraqis unemployed, while US contractors took their jobs, and thus fuelled the insurgency. I believe that the US military's control of the fuel, and the gas and kerosene shortages, have caused the rage and misery.
There is no excuse for the collapse of security, order and infrastructure, given the time that the Pentagon spent planning the invasion, not to mention its claims in the NY Times that it had an elaborate plan for the occupation after March 2003. Turns out that 'intelligence' is whatever they choose to make up as an excuse after the situation, since there is no accountability for failure...
I'll be watching closely for a Sunni 'statement' of how they will participate in Iraq's governance, as well as those commando operations in Iran and Syria.
BTW, Congratulations, it's been a while (since 1954)--let us all pray that Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld see through and fix what they broke...so the good and courageous people of Iraq and their children do not have to suffer any more. It's not as if the USA can suffer any more in its transparently selfish image internationally...our citizens are now nobly ponying up tsunami relief, while Bush had to be nudged by his PR people that his first offer of $15 million is less than Roger Clemens makes to pitch a baseball, while Norway is sending $500 million or so in public funds, without a second thought...
I'm glad you got to vote. I hope this is not just one good day, but the beginning of many better days.
Purple & orange are the colors of the year. (The fingers look, purple, not blue to me.)
You know, I think we should actually copy this here in the U.S., so people could vote away from their assigned precinct if they had to but no one could vote twice.
Congradulations!
The courage of the Iraqi people leaves me speechless...
Zeyad,
I want to extend my congratulations to you, your family, and the Iraqi people who went out to vote with admirable courage. Praise the Lord!! In Christ alone, there is freedom and peace. The prayers of many for Voting Day in Iraq and the mass embrace of freedom in Iraq has been answered. It gives many of us around the world (including myself)joy to see and know democracy and freedom is being embraced.
Christy, California
This guy is vermin - http://raedinthemiddle.blogspot.com/.
I bet he was cheering on, if not providing outright support to, the scum that tried their best to kill and mame the innocent men and women who bravely went to the polls today.
I don't understand that sort of evil - I guess I just don't have it in me.
I know the insurgents won't give up and it will not be easy to form a new Iraq. And I have to say that some of our government's bad decisions in the aftermath of the invasion have made things so very much more difficult for you. But the vote is a start! God bless you and your family and your country; many people the world over, of many religions, are praying for the success of a new peaceful and decent government in Iraq. You and your countrymen are in my prayers daily.
And to you naysayers, bush lied and Rachel, get a grip! I wasn't too keen on the idea of the war either, but can't you be happy for those people seen on TV celebrating, dancing, and weeping that they were able to vote? Just remember, it's not about you, ok?
Marty from Virginia, USA
What a proud day for Iraqis! I was in AWE watching the BRAVEST AND COURAGEOUS Iraqis going to vote today. A zillion blessings to you and your country.
RAchet the Brit...
Check yourself into a hospital. You are truly sick. I mean, nobody digs an alcoholic self destructor.
You need meds.
I laugh my ass off everytime you post. You, in London Town dare to tell an Iraqi what his first vote means or doesn't mean? What he should believe about his country and this time when he is living there and living it?
You're delusional, babe. Seriously, do your keepers know you get on the computer?
Zeyad...
Heartfelt and sincere congratulations!
Whatever the road leads to, I know you will be strong and keep pushing forward as you have ever shown us on your blog.
Enjoy this moment. Breath the taste of freedom and cry your tears of joy.
tomorrow is soon enough to worry about people like the Brit.
Hi Friends: The Iraqi election was awesome. I have been brought to tears many times this week-end, hearing the stories of the Iraqis, watching them vote and celebrate and dance. It has been great. Keep up the good work !! God bless all freedom-loving Iraqis, our brave U.S. military forces and our brave allies. May this be just the first of many triumphs for the Iraqi people. Inshallah. Best wishes from Texas. Kathy L.
congratulations, Zeyad, and may peace and prosperity closely follow this election!
It's great that so many participated in such a show of non-violent defiance of the terrorists in Iraq.
Iraqis showed themselves to be a remarkable people this weekend. To see a nation of people who have endured so much for so long still have their pride, love for their country, and inspiring courage moved me.
Hopefully it will be sooner than later, but there is no doubt that Iraqis will make their country in spite of everybody else.
Congratulations Zeyad! A world looks on in awe at a proud nation and it's people.
Zeyad,
I am glad you voted. I wasn't sure by waht you wrote about going to Jordan. By my name, you know that America and GWB will not leave you alone. God bless Iraqi's who voted and our brave American men & women. LET FREEDOM RING!
Zeyad! Was so elated for you and all Iraq. Glad you voted, and you're right the first seed has been planted, now Let Iraq Flourish!
Congratulations Zeyad, this is the best day for Iraq. All the best to you!
There's another candle lit for all those who lost their lives in this monumental struggle.
Congratulations, Zeyad! What a wonderful day!
Do you realize that the percentage of Iraqis who voted is greater even than the record turnout for the U.S. elections in 2004? And nobody was shooting at us!
Congratulations as well, Zeyad!
Now let's see the results...
I hope the life of you and your people will be better from now on (?).
Zeyad!!!
It was a great day for Iraqis. It's been a long journey. I hope the day comes when everyone can talk even more freely about such matters everywhere, and people don't have to be afraid of showing that they voted.
You were the first Iraqi blogger I found. Thanks so much for showing us what it's been like, the good and the bad (we remember...).
From your post, and to paraphrase another time,
We Are All Iraqis Now.
i wonder if any of the israelis eligible to vote ended up voting...
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spa...ges/
533488.html
Zeyad,
Today represents the reason I've supported the war. This is a huge step toward the goal. Iraqis should be proud. Eight million, under the threat of death, stood up together. Be very proud.
After the ugliness of your cousin's murder. I understand you may have mixed emotions about Americans. I hope you can see that we, as a group, are as appalled by the tragedies and as proud of the successes. I'm not a war supporter because of patriotism, although I'm a proud American. I'm a war supporter because I'm a fellow human. My best wishes to you, your family and Iraq on this great day.
Zeyad,
I'm really glad you voted.
I am very happy for you and your fellow Iraqis. It is gratifing to see people come to realize they can control their own desitny. However, no system is perfect and I am certian many changes will take place befor your country settles on the system that works best for them. Your countrymen must always be vigilant against those who would enslave them for freedom is hard won but easily lost.
Welcome to the free world! May you find peace and prosperity under the flame of Iraqi liberty.
The courage Iraqis showed today was inspiring!
The IP should now stop suspicious characters and make them dip their finger in the ink. If enough of the bad guys get marked, the rest will be safe.
Congratulations Zehad, you are a credit to your country and the wider community of man. I have followed your blog since you first started it and have passed it on widely.
Freedom for Iraq and her people, you have all proven that you can do it and we are so very proud of you all.
Annie from Australia
This is a very nice day for Iraq, and really for freedom loving people everywhere. I stayed up almost all night watching it. Only a true cynic could not be moved by what I saw.
Head Up High, I am
Brave my people made me proud.
Zyad
Arne
Saturday I wrote to an Iraqi friend in the US the following:
It is Saturday PM in Bangkok where I am now and there is no election booth that I can vote in. What I see on TV made me so unhappy for myself for not taking part of this momentous time for not just my country but the entire history of mankind. For what I see on TV made me feel silly for making jocks about this event. I must admit that my human anxiety and my revolutionary sentiment that I had during my youth have electrified me and made feel to wish that I am in Baghdad in the centre of the event to go out in the street to dance and cherish the moment that those coward bastard of the past, the backward and evil forces of darkness, the Islamist, Wahabis, Bathist and the like, want to colour with the blood of the wonderful people of Iraq. I felt I wouldn’t care and would give a damn if I die for expressing my freedom that defined me as a human. It is not the patriotic feeling that is moving in me but the feeling of a free man that is making me angry. Good on Sistani the man who made it as a faithful call to vote and called upon all Muslim to go to the ballet to cast their votes. Excuse my sentiment for feeling guilty at this great moment of history that I am not involved in. I can’t wait for tomorrow to find out that the brave people Iraq are going out to be free. I hope the majority of them now feeling like me to brave it out early Sunday morning to show that the voice of freedom is stronger than the sound of the bullets.
I have to say that, apart from the moron Bush Lied, whom I think may actually be a failed comedian Rachel is the most pathetic excuse for a thoughtful, decent person I have run across in a ling time. Not a word of anything positive, it seems as though she wastes her life crawling in the muck to find anything about which to be a shriveled worm of a human being.
Tho the Italian and I have fired sharp barbs, I never have thought that he was anything but sincerely looking for the best (deluded and in error as he is). Rachel, on the other hand, sifts everything looking minutely for the least wrong or offense, then runs with it. Truth, facts and reality are irrelevant. As I have said before, she eagerly wished for death, destruction, blood in the streets.
How very loathsome!
The rest of the Arab world is sooooo jealous.
For proof, just look at Al Jazeera's coverage of the day. They just can't stand it.
You and all Iraqis have made your election a wonderful thing. Stand together and work together for a good government.
Democracy can be a gigantic pain, but it's the best system going. I hope the terrorist murderers got the message, but some are sickos, and others are too sure they're right to even think about being fallible.
Congratulation Zeyad!!!
I was sure you will vote and you did.
Long live Iraq
ela from Canada
I went to a concert with a bunch of friends. After the bands got into a few songs I spotted this hot girl. I introduced myself and we started talking. We started making out and feeling each other up.
I was hard instantly and I decided to unzip myself, and allow my cock to peek out of the top of my zipper. I reached under her skirt again as the crowd pushed and felt her bare ass cheek. While I felt under her skirt, I noticed that she had no panties.
I positioned my cock directly behind her pussy and lifted her skirt slightly as I put the zipper flap of my pants in her ass crack, and pushed forward with the crowd. She didn't turn around as I ground my body against her.
I lowered my body and the bare head of my cock touched her between her cheeks, and she didn't even flinch. I reached forward and slipped a finger in her pussy from behind and she spread her legs slightly.
I unzipped all the way and slipped my cock between her legs from behind. I rubbed my bare cock the length of the outside of her pussy. She was shaved ,smooth and incredibly wet.
I slipped my cock into her wetness and pumped slowly with the crowd pushing against me. I came quickly, slipped out of her pussy, and zipped up, worked my way back through the crowd and left. What a concert!
!
Congratulations. People living in freedom have forgotten its value. Thank you for reminding us.
Thanks for letting us know! I am very happy for you, your family and country!
Zeyad, I'm so glad you voted in Amman today. I thought the turnout there would be huge, as I heard that a lot of families were going there for the duration.
This has been a historic and wonderful day for freedom loving people worldwide and a blow to the Wahabbi/Leftist coalition of the world who are gnashing their teeth in dismay and disbelief. They are filled with such hate that they have to make up conspiracy theories about food rations.
Tell us all, Zeyad, did they threaten you with food deprivation to get you to vote?
Also tell us how you like Jordan as a country as compared to home? I see you are a little worried about their Mukabarat...So free speech is not encouraged there?
I went to a concert with a bunch of friends. After the bands got into a few songs I spotted this hot girl. I introduced myself and we started talking. We started making out and feeling each other up.
I was hard instantly and I decided to unzip myself, and allow my cock to peek out of the top of my zipper. I reached under her skirt again as the crowd pushed and felt her bare ass cheek. While I felt under her skirt, I noticed that she had no panties.
I positioned my cock directly behind her pussy and lifted her skirt slightly as I put the zipper flap of my pants in her ass crack, and pushed forward with the crowd. She didn't turn around as I ground my body against her.
I lowered my body and the bare head of my cock touched her between her cheeks, and she didn't even flinch. I reached forward and slipped a finger in her pussy from behind and she spread her legs slightly.
I unzipped all the way and slipped my cock between her legs from behind. I rubbed my bare cock the length of the outside of her pussy. She was shaved ,smooth and incredibly wet.
I slipped my cock into her wetness and pumped slowly with the crowd pushing against me. I came quickly, slipped out of her pussy, and zipped up, worked my way back through the crowd and left. What a concert!
!
Funny how positive things affect the slimers, isn't it?
That election cost me a lot of sleep last night, even worse than all the previous nights watching for developments. Sunni sectarians are probably feeling very sorry for themselves about now. Just like Rachael.
Congratulations from Michigan! A moving and awe-inspiring day.
niggers dont know how to vote
Rickvid in Seattle said, [Rachel] eagerly wished for death, destruction, blood in the streets.
Not true - my heart is broken by what the Iraqis have suffered over the past 37 years, and including the past two years. Your US military, however, did actually bring death and destruction to Iraq; and your Halliburton etc continue to plunder her oil revenue, and Monsanto plans to mortgage Iraq's agriculture future prosperity. I cede to none in my admiration of the courage of Iraqis; may God bless every Iraqi, from the oldest to the youngest, and deliver them from their oppressors.
The more CNN and Bushites crow and posture, the more bitter and terrible the insurgent backlash is likely to be.
Bobby - Virginia, USA said, We Are All Iraqis Now.
Huh? When was your house reduced to rubble by invaders' bombs? How many of your relatives have been raided at night by foreign soldiers in full body armour, unable to speak your language? Where are your desecrated holy places? You have electricity 24/7, cheap petrol, security - don't belittle the Iraqis' achievements with your fatuous, stupid comments.
Rachel,
I was hoping you would answer my question from the previous thread about where you got the 4.8% turnout figure.
Best regards
PeteS, I thought I had. I was including exiles. Eg, in the UK - ISTR - only 1/5 of those eligible to vote actually registered to vote. If they didn't register, they couldn't vote.
'Once the joy of the moment has passed, I have only fear'
For a nation that has been so traumatised, whose infrastructure and social fabric has been wrecked by a quarter century of tyranny, war, invasion and economic blockade, burying the past was never going to be easy.
Yesterday's election in Iraq should have been a defining moment. For two generations of Iraqis, casting a democratic ballot presented a fitting way to end the cruelty and dictatorship of the Saddam Hussein years. Many in the west will instinctively judge the credibility of Iraq's election by the extent to which it met democratic standards: what was voter turnout like - particularly in Sunni areas - and did the level of violence and bloodshed undermine the process? But Iraqis will judge this election by another standard: does it have a practical and political use in resolving the crisis in the country, and fast?
... a 20-year-old engineering student from Baghdad, talked about one of the most under-reported aspects of life in Iraq - the epidemic of kidnappings of middle-class Iraqis.
Iraq is still a place of fear for its people. And it is full of fears for the British and US governments, too - the fear that the insurgency will increase in intensity; the fear that Iran will extend its influence in the country; the fear that Shia domination of the government will lead to civil conflict; fear that that the troops will be there for years.
This will be a defining year in Iraq, and a long and painful one for the Iraqi people.
Yes, it is great that the Iraqis have the opportunity to cast a vote and to have some say in who makes up a puppet government (do you REALLY think that the US will say 'OK' if a new Government says 'Actually - we would like you to leave now...'; but what the people would like MORE than this is:
-An electricity supply that operates for more than 2 hours a day
-A reliable water supply
-Reasonable security to go about their lives without the risk of being killed or harassed
-The prospect of being able to be educated, qualified and to work
-Freedom to practise their religion in freedom and without fear
I am no supporter of Saddam, but all of these things were in place in his regime; and if the US wants any sort of popular support or legitimacy from the international community, then they had damned well better make sure that they are in place soon! They have had TWO YEARS to sort this out. There are no excuses left.
AND this sort of thing is not going to help their image.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/progr...n_4/
4216853.stm
It is theft and embezzlement, and there has been a lot of it about.
I am not trying to belittle the courage of Iraqis who turned out to vote. I am proud of them. But if the US think that they have produced a model arab state, then they are sorely wrong. They have produced a powder keg that is likely to go off in their face, where no such powder keg previously existed.
a rumor voiced by Abed that Iraqis who don't vote will have their monthly food rations taken away.
Whether or not true, this intimidating rumour has not been denied by either the Iraqi interim government or the US occupiers, and may dramatically have affected the vote. I am concerned by reports that some people may have put blank ballot papers in the ballot box, so that they won't have their food rations withdrawn. I would like assurance that these blank ballot papers are not completed later, during the count, in favour of the US' preferred candidate(s). This is the sort of thing that the international observers should take care of but God knows where they are or how much "observing" they are doing.
Sorry. As my link didn't work, here is the story I was referring to. It's from the BBC- hardly a mouthpiece of the insurgents... And it makes uncomfortable reading for Mr Paul Bremer...
Iraq reconstruction funds missing
The missing $8.8bn is more than 40% of Iraq's oil revenues
Almost $9bn (£4.7bn) of Iraqi oil revenue is missing from a fund set up to reconstruct the country.
The BBC's File On 4 programme has learnt that out of over $20bn raised in oil revenues during US-led rule, the use of $8.8bn is unaccounted for.
In one case, auditors say the key to a safe holding millions of dollars was kept in an open backpack in an office.
"There was insufficient internal control to assure that money was spent for the benefit of the Iraqis, as the UN Security Council resolution mandated," said the auditors' chief of staff, Ms Ginger Cruz.
"We contend that since the CPA was in control and did have a responsibility to be an effective steward of those monies, that it was to be expected that there was more supervision of what happened to that money," she said.
Even allowing for the chaos in the aftermath of war, the auditors still believe the management of the money should have been a great deal tighter.
An earlier auditors' report from last year revealed evidence of wholesale carelessness with large amounts of cash.
On one occasion, $1.4bn had to be transported to a bank in three helicopters, as it weighed 14 tons, but no deposit slip was obtained when it was paid in.
The CPA has also come under attack for failing to prevent widespread fraud.
One US company is accused of massively inflating its profits by setting up sham companies to send fake invoices which the coalition paid.
Others are alleged to have demanded dubious commissions which then came out of Iraqi funds.
Even some Coalition officials are said to have openly demanded bribes of up to $300,000 in cash.
File On 4 reporter Gerry Northam explained: "Many Iraqis are angry at the way the Coalition handled funds, particularly the money from their own oil, and especially where inexplicable amounts ended up in the hands of foreign businesses."
Claude Hankes-Drielsma, a former British advisor to the Iraqi Governing Council, which worked alongside the Coalition, said the lack of control of funds was a further blow to the United States.
"It is most unfortunate, given that the liberation of Iraq was a great achievement. It was recognised as such by the Iraqi people, but the subsequent handling of events was a disaster.
"It was such a key moment and a great opportunity was lost by the way it was handled."
In response to the report, the former head of the coalition, Ambassador Paul Bremer, said the auditors had failed to understand the context in which the Authority was operating.
Western accounting standards could not be applied in the midst of a war, he said.
Listen to this edition of File On 4 on BBC Radio 4 on T
@Rachel
I was including exiles. Eg, in the UK - ISTR - only 1/5 of those eligible to vote actually registered to vote. If they didn't register, they couldn't vote.
There were 1.2 million expatriate Iraqis eligible to vote, equal to about 8.5% of the 14 million registered Iraqis at home. If the turnout in Iraq was 60% (the low end of the estimates, I believe), and not a single expatriate registered or voted, it could not have affected the overall turnout by more than 60% of 8.5%, i.e. 5%.
Your figure of 4.8% total turnout implies that the expatriate vote dragged the overall total down by 55% ... an impossibility even if nobody voted. However, expatriates did vote in spite of serious logistical difficulties.
Congratulations with probably one of the first real democratic elections ever held in arabic country.
I admire the courage of the Iraqi people who proved to be very tough against the threat of terror.
It also says like in Afghanistan that even people with a long traumatic history of oppression and violence are willing to take a stand for freedom and democracy.
The longing for democracy is universal.
you have all the reason to be proud.
There will be many difficulties ahead on the path to a better society, but this tremendous achievement must help.
Iraq plunged into new democratic water and it was able to swim at least the first (very important) miles.
By the way some statistics from the Dutchled provence of al muthanna:
people who voted: at least 70 but more likely 80 or 90 percent.
(Some of them walked a long way through the desert to reach the polling stations).
violent incidents: zero.
It just couldn't be better.
"This is the sort of thing that the international observers should take care of but God knows where they are or how much "observing" they are doing."
One knows things are going well when Rachel's bitchin’ ‘bout how little she knows.
Rachel, a twit in London wrote:
"I am concerned by reports that some people may have put blank ballot papers in the ballot box"
And which reports are these, O wise one?
"I would like assurance that these blank ballot papers are not completed later"
The integrity of the Iraqi elections will be safeguarded by the Iraqi electoral commission, whose members risked their lives to ensure a free vote. Who the hell are you to demand assurances? You may be desperate for any snippet of nonsense that will invalidate this election, but the Iraqi people will judge it for themselves.
"Who the hell are you to demand assurances?" Finally, Rachel, someone has gotten down to the heart of the matter. You don't count, and neither do I. So continue your illegal war, anti-americanism drivel all you want, but Iraqis have spoken quite clearly to the world, and you ought to have the grace as a human being to accept their will even though it doesn't fit with your warped world view.
There is nothing left for you, Rachel. Iraq is going to be OK even though it will take some time. Iraqis proved that yesterday to the whole world; so have some of the courage and dignity Iraqis showed and walk away.
Congratulations!
I would just like to comfort the pessimists on the Board with the idea that the low-quality, dodgy procedure or American/Iranian puppitude of the people who have just been voted in is secondary to the established right to get rid of them and to improve the political system peacefully. I don't think there is a democracy in existence that hasn't had its share of dodgy elections or dodgy politicians, but it is at least a system that carries within it the seeds of its own improvement.
The big issue for Iraqi society is whether a large, prosperous middle class in tandem with the rule of law will arise. These are the conditions that enable what success democracy has enjoyed.
Ali asks me who the hell I am to demand assurances. Ali, reflect a moment: to borrow a sentiment rather over-used by the Americans posting to Iraqi blogs - some of my countrymen have died in order to depose your former dictator and, now, to safeguard your elections. My taxes pay their salaries, help equip them. I am not asking for your gratitude; but, although I did not (and do not) wish them to join them US illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq, I am not prepared to overlook my countrymen's sacrifices.
Which Ali are you, by the way?
Second part of answer to Ali (who asks which reports are these). I have just posted this, as a new "thread" on the Radio 4, international news, message board. (Posting as stormypetrel.)
On his blog [Raed in the Middle], Raed Jarrar relays a report from his brother, Khalid, of a rumour - which, to my knowledge, has not been denied by either the interim government or the US - that "if you didn't go to vote, the government will cut your monthly food rations ...." Poor Iraqi families are dependent upon food rations, so they cannot afford to take the risk of disbelieving the rumour.
'"I will go and drop a blank ballot, I just want my family's food rations", a friend of my brother Khalid told him a couple of days ago in Baghdad.'
To me, given the context, this is entirely credible. So I would like copper-bottomed assurance from the authorities - where ARE the international observers, by the way? - that blank ballot forms will not be subsequently completed, during the counting, in favour of the US' preferred candidate(s). Who is accountable enough to give this assurance?
The Iraqi electoral commission is appointed by the US occupiers. Need I say more?
I wish Zeyad had more time to weigh in on a lot of political comments by all of us foreigners who come here and tell everyone just how it is in his country even though many couldn't even pick Iraq out on a map.
Zeyad doesn't have the time because he's busy building his country. Most of us are busy not contributing to our own societies. Our own countries could use all this supposed knowledge to do positive things for our own countries, but doing that would be too hard. Iraqis on the other hand are all working hard on their country while we all sit on our butts letting our own go to crap.
Zeyad , kifak ? Go check ur email
Rachel, the time has come for you to enter the dustbin of history. Take care not to bump your head as you crawl in, and please don't neglect to close the lid.
"PeteS, I thought I had. I was including exiles. Eg, in the UK - ISTR - only 1/5 of those eligible to vote actually registered to vote. If they didn't register, they couldn't vote.
Rachel, a Brit in London"
And how is this different from any other democracy? England, France, America, the list goes on and on.
119 nations out of 191 now have some type of representative government. Read 'wm and weep, twit.
You and the other Democrats against democracy are just shit out of luck. Iraq will settle down over the next year, when the Constitution is voted on there will be 80 to 90% turnout and nobody will have to step over human body parts to vote. What will you do then? Start supporting the Mullahs in Iran? Look around, I'm sure there is a mass murderer somewhere that needs your help. Better hurry. Freedom is on the march!
Rachel,
All of Iraq celebrates. All the world celebrates. You however must see a conspiracy in everything. Al-Sistani forced the early vote. The party he backs is looking to win a substantial majority. Yet you claim the Iraqis were forced to vote for a puppet government.
Perhaps you would like to tell Iraq that Sistani is noting but a US stooge.
In fact, if you are willing, I will buy you a plane ticket so you can walk through Baghdad proclaiming this....
Rachel,
Isn't it amazing that none of the Iraqi bloggers know nothing of this 'food ration cutting'. You quote some guy who doesn't even directly know anyone in Iraq. At best, he is giving third-hand knowledge.
Yet, in your mind, he is more credible than our Iraqi bloggers.
Grow up.
The Iraqi ambassador to the Netherlands stated this weekend in a nationwide newspaper interview that he is very much disappointed by the lack of support for the new democratic Iraq from western leftwing groups:"the left (once promotors of worldwide communism) doesn't believe in change anymore they've become reactionaries: the whole world must stay as it is now with all the dictators and massmurderers alike.
They call it "international law": every tyrant is allowed to murder and rape his own people, only if china/ russia or france agree totally something may be done about it.
That's not international law: that's in almost all cases a free game for massmurderers (you just have to stick to your own people).
They went after 1989 from hard belief in stalinistic changes to not believing in positive changes at all.
They desperately hope Iraq will fail just to prove their point.
It's extremely cynical and racist as a matter of fact.
It's here were they align with arab nationalists.
The ambassador was surprised that he got more support from rightwing christian religious groups for Iraqi freedom than from his former allies "the liberal elite".
Iraq yesterday proved they not only want democratic change but deserve every bit of it and our total support as well.
The truth about what really happened in the "elections" is begining to emerge. What a surprise.
Read it carefully, sheep. This is the authorized story from Bushitler's Zionist masters.
Impeach Bushitler!
Bring the Troops Home Now!
Power to the People!
Congratulations and Best Wishes!
We now enter the hardest part of Iraq's journey to freedom. The Rachels of the world see that Lovers of freedom and the human experience won't be stopped by lies, propaganda, bullets and bombs. So their logical next step is to co-opt the process. Destroy it from within, so to speak. Democracies are very susceptible to FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt) tactics.
"In questions of power, then, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution."
--Thomas Jefferson
Iraq needs a STRONG constitution. The smaller the document, the stronger. The US Constitution is 2 pages long. It lists the powers of the Congress, which is why it's such a short document. Any power not listed, belongs to the citizens. That is what makes the US constitution so powerful. compare it to the proposed EU constitution, which is 3500 pages long and guaranteed to produce Tryanny.
Congratulations Iraq! You are healing. The strength of your people's convictions (and the bravery demonstrated by your voters) will heal well beyond your borders. I am proud to be an American who has supported this process and proud beyond words for our soldiers and allies who have sacrificed everything for freedom. Who knows ... maybe even Rachel will find room to secretly celebrate. Perhaps she'll shave her armpits/legs or something along those happy lines ?
Rotsmell;
Prove you are not Queen of the Space Unicorns.
"has not been denied by" is a way of saying that the stupid rations rumour isn't worth the breath or paper needed to respond to it.
HH;
The BBC is hardly an insurgent mouthpiece? Opinions differ, I assure you.
Hi,
Like most people I watched the election with baited breath, and was releived that everything I believed, based on plain logic, was true. I've lived through amazing times -
- the Berlin Wall falling, despite assurances from the Rachels of this world (a large number of whom seem to work for our Channel 4 it seems..ho hum)
- the election in Afghanistan (despite assurances etc etc etc ho hum)
- a first election in Iraq (despite assurances etc etc ho hum).
What is most amazing is that we are seeing in a right wing prez of the USA the kinda stuff us liberal activists wanted 30yrs ago. After the collapse of the stalemate with the USSR (thanks Ronald ..who would have thought I'd be saying that now, because back then when Reagan pushed the Soviets to economic collapse I just didn't get it at all) the West did nothing for years to address the dodgy deals we had made during that time (thanks Bill...not!) I think my fellow liberals have gone senile if they don't see it.
You cannot bemoan dictaterships & also whinge when someone does something about it eh! (And perhaps lets now put the 'stalking horse' of the wmd issue in its context now shall we - THAT was always the excuse for the real agenda all along).
But I guess thats the problem isn't it, some people would rather choke than admit what has happened - despite everything horrible so far - is A GOOD THING & the prospects for the middle east may suddenly be much brighter.
How about the influence of a prosperous democracy in Iraq....would I be ambitous in suggesting that means goodnight Saudi Arabia/Iran without a shot being fired..?
And if Bush pulls off an Israeli/Palestinian deal too, I can see Rachel checking into a looney bin to escape the dreadful truth...!?
Good luck to the Iraqis. Hope the pressure comes off the Sunni so they can play a part (as an aside, am interested to know what the commentators that rubbished Bush's post war actions - ie NOT picking Sunni replacements for Saddam like Powell wanted - are feeling like today..?)
A very small step on a long long road.
I'd like to endorse what John in the Netherlands said.
And Zeyad, I think you have been very brave over these times, more than I might have been in your position. When its all over, & safe, you deserve to be honoured.
Mike ( a Brit nothing like Rachel....)
Asha al Iraq Asha al Iraq, Asha Al Iraq
Congratulations to the inspiring people of Iraq.
Congratulations,
Now the hard work begins. Clearing out the insurgents, unifying Iraq and securing the blessings of your liberty.
I second most of the positive comments above.
Thirty six, or more, Iraqis were martyred in their cause(s) on Election Day. Yet, these killings were part of a great military defeat for the insurgents. Millions of Iraqis voted, set up and ran the election process, and guarded the election AND survived. Thousands of polling places were dispersed around Iraq. There were millions of targets and the Iraqi and MLF security forces had to try to guard them all. The insurgents had the initiative: they could choose in secret on which targets to concentrate. They threatened the worst and THEY FLOPPED.
Unfortunately, that was only one day. The war will continue.
Many people have questioned the extent to which the election will erode (mostly Sunni Arab) Iraqi political support for the insurgency. Perhaps such reservations are justified.
I hope that the election will, instead, raise the morale of those Iraqis who have always opposed the insurgents and that it will invigorate their efforts against the insurgency.
The American left is, even now, promoting the "pull out" agenda, and seeing conspiracies everywhere. To some bloggers this whole election did not even happen, but is a staged event completely. Actors for the cameras. Wow.
The Rachels of the world, yet again, shove sticks into their eyes so they simply cannot see the plain truth. "I choose to be blind rather than see something I do not agree with."
Iraqis have braved so much, and to have pathetic losers like Teddy (hic) Kennedy and John (I have committed war crimes) Kerry casting such aspersions on them is truely swine cast shit before pearls, to twist the metaphor.
Good on Iraq; the tyrants of the middle east and their fat comfortable western supporters tremble, and wet their pants.
Rachel writes:
"The Iraqi electoral commission is appointed by the US occupiers. Need I say more?"
Another one of your brazen lies. If this were true, do you really think that over 100 political lists, from every shade of opinion, including monarchists, Islamists and Communists, would have participated?
The Iraqi Electoral Commission are brave, decent Iraqis who have risked, and in many cases sacrificed, their lives to give Iraqis the opportunity to vote in a free election. You are a sick, sick person to accuse these heroes of being US stooges.
Do you ever say anything that doesn't read like propaganda for Zarqawi? You share his views about the election being a fraud, about the Iraqis participating being American stooges. Do you disgree with him about anything?
All respect to those who voted Zeyad.......it is a great surprise and a pleasant one to see that so many people want to choose for themselves.........I am very pleased Iraq had a National Day when people could vote with their feet............it will give a sense of solidarity and maybe it will give people some sense of 'ownership'.........it is the first step on a long road........but it as the man said the longest journey begins with a single step
For a nation that has been so traumatised, whose infrastructure and social fabric has been wrecked by a quarter century of tyranny, war, invasion and economic blockade, burying the past was never going to be easy.
Yes Zimbabwe is such a mess.....
-- "One should start from the 'Head' down, not the other way around".--
I could argue that point.
Rachel writes:
"Ali asks me who the hell I am to demand assurances. Ali, reflect a moment: to borrow a sentiment rather over-used by the Americans posting to Iraqi blogs - some of my countrymen have died in order to depose your former dictator and, now, to safeguard your elections. My taxes pay their salaries, help equip them. I am not asking for your gratitude; but, although I did not (and do not) wish them to join them US illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq, I am not prepared to overlook my countrymen's sacrifices."
Don't bother to answer her Ali. She is now totally incoherent. If the Brits are participating in an "illegal invasion and occupation" as she claims, no British person has any right to assurances about the conduct of the election in Iraq. In fact, we should simply withdraw our troops and pay reparations.
As a Brit, I'm proud of ALL the multinational forces who have made this election possible, whether British, American, Italian, Polish or Ukranian. And I'm proud of our PM who made the decision to participate. Tony Blair, perhaps, has a right to ask questions about the election. Not Rachel, the traitor, who stabs our boys in the back at every opportunity by spouting propaganda for the Iraqi insurgents.
Homer, your latest remarks about me are defamatory, demonstrably untrue and actionable. If I ever find out who you are, I might just sue you.
Rachel, where do you see the right to sue in your much heralded Koran?
You run true to form every time. Now threatening a lawsuit for expressing an opinion. In America, opinions are not actionable, they are protected. What a true twit you are.
Anonymous (01.31.05 - 9:15 am) said, Isn't it amazing that none of the Iraqi bloggers know nothing of this 'food ration cutting'.
You've only just arrived, haven't you? You haven't back-filled in on your knowledge of Iraqi blogs. Riverbend refers to the food ration-intimidation, for instance.
You quote some guy who doesn't even directly know anyone in Iraq. At best, he is giving third-hand knowledge.
Oh ignorant anonymous, Raed Jarrar is one of the Family in Baghdad (Jarrar) blog.
I win.
Rickvid in Seattle: Homer says that he is "from London". Therefore the law of England and Wales applies. And here an opinion - if defamatory - certainly counts as slander/libel and is therefore actionable.
You Americans should get some education.
Rachel,
Iraq elections proceed well.
You lose.
Congratulations Zeyad! I'm so very happy for all of you. The voter turnout is awe-inspiring...especially under these circumstances. Just compare this to the turnout in some of the Western democracies where people care too little to invest the couple of minutes required to cast a vote... I hope your countrymen and -women will continue to feel passionately about this for a long time
"what the people would like MORE than this is:
-An electricity supply that operates for more than 2 hours a day
-A reliable water supply
-Reasonable security to go about their lives without the risk of being killed or harassed"
These are all security problems, and they can be settled only by an elected government which will build up the training and equipment of the security forces. It is up to the Iraqi voters to select the government they think will do this best. Their judgement is likely to be better than anybody else's.
I'm sure these problems were at the front of their minds when deciding which party to vote for.
the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) headed by warlord Masoud Barzani has prevented voting by Assyrian (also known as Chaldean and Syriac) Christians of the Nineveh Plain in northern Iraq.
According to a series of reports from inside Iraq, the KDP effectively blocked the delivery of ballot boxes to six major Assyrian towns and villages in the Plains around Mosul including Baghdeda, Bartilla, Karemlesh, Shekhan, Ain Sifne and Bahzan. ... The resulting unavailability of ballot boxes affected up to 100,000 Assyrian voters and tens of thousands of Yezidis, Shabak, and Turkman voters. The outright denial of voting rights to Assyrians and other non-Kurdish minorities culminates several months of intimidation, beatings, beheadings, burnings, and mutilations of Assyrian Christians in the Nineveh Plain
Free and fair election? - I think not. Hey President Shrub, what do you think about Christians being prevented from voting? Silly me, how could I forget: you don't care a button for Christians unless they happen to be American.
Angry Assyrian Americans have begun to ask what the US administration's response will be to this attack on democracy in Iraq. Assyrian Americans make up 85-90% of all Iraqi Americans. Due to disproportionate persecution, nearly half of all Iraqi Assyrians live outside the country. One enraged activist noted "Assyrians have been the most fervent proponents of secular democracy and pluralism in Iraq."
Actually, we may find that Shrub doesn't even care about American Christians, if they are also Iraqi. Not white, you see.
"If I were an insurgent I would be really bitterly disappointed at what happened yesterday," a U.S. diplomat said.
"I certainly wouldn't conclude I should surrender. I would conclude that I have to show I'm still a player.
"The Zarqawis and the wannabe Zarqawis are all about violence and all about chaos. They enjoy what they do and they're good at it," he said.
Stringent security measures on election day, when millions of voters shrugged off their fears and streamed to the polls, foiled the insurgents' most deadly weapon -- huge truck and car bombs -- by banning traffic.
But now that ban has been lifted, the insurgents are likely to try to stage a spectacular and bloody reprisal against Iraqis who ignored their threats of a polling day bloodbath.
Despite the security lockdown on Sunday, the militants killed 35 people, mainly with pedestrian suicide bombers attacking polling queues.
"The fact that they can organize 10 suicide bombers to strike in a four-hour period shows their huge capacity. No one should underestimate their ability," said Mustafa Alani, security expert at the Dubai-based Gulf Research Center.
Iraq's former U.S. governor, Paul Bremer hailed the election as a big success but said he expected more violence.
Zeyad, please take care. One election does not a democracy make.
Riverbend is the eldest daughter of a Saddam-appointed ambassador, and a high ranking Ba'athist, to a western country during the eighties.
Raed Jarrar is the eldest son of a Palestinian refugee who was driven out of the Gulf after Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, and granted asylum in Iraq by Saddam's regime.
Both persons do not count in this historic day and will instead make it to the dustbin of history.
Insider from Baghdad - you are Shia, I take it?
Threatening a libel suit. Impressive rhetorical device, that. Should the threatened person need representation, let me know. That would be a fun case to handle.
One wonders how she spends her time when not angrily banging her fists or head against the newspaper spread over her table, cat hair flying with each mighty blow, as she reads through crimson eyes about this event, worrying with every word that the [insert catchy First Form insult to the coalition forces from dusty posters saved from latest protest march] may be validated in any way.
Congratulations to those who voted. Regardless of one's politics, it was an incredibly brave act.
No I am a Sunni from the Zayuna district in Baghdad, originally from Mosul, and I personally know both the people I have mentioned.
And pray what does my sectarian/religious affiliation have to do with my information? Or is that how things work in your country? So you are Muslim, I take it Rachel?
I have noticed that Rachel likes to prey upon religious differences to try to stir emotions... i.e. CHRISTIANS can't vote in Iraq... dosn't this make you angry? Add the other incidents that people have brought up and I come to one conclusion:
She sounds like a very angry individual.
Rachel, please drop the religous overtones. Trying to stir hatred of one group against the other is unconscionable.
Zeyad,
The Iraqi people have humbled the free world, and lit the flame of hope for all those still living in the darkness of tyranny and oppression. I have not been so deeply moved since the fall of the Berlin Wall. This was a great day for Iraq, for Freedom, and for the world. Congratulations to you and to all the brave people of Iraq yearning to build a better life.
Deep regards,
Homer, your latest remarks about me are defamatory, demonstrably untrue and actionable. If I ever find out who you are, I might just sue you.
Rachel, a Brit in London | Email | Homepage | 01.31.05 - 11:59 am | #
You can't without suing Zeyad ........do check your legal position before you expound dearie
You Americans should get some education.
Rachel, a Brit in London |
Racist comment Rachel based on generalisations............not a good little Guardian Reader are we today ?
Elections are a first step to democracy (but a very important one).
The further framework is complicated and needs a lot of negociations between the groups that gained power but the rewards are (though sometimes only visible in the long run) immense.
Dictatorships are simpler in structure but also in the end much more unstable and ineffective.
If a democracy is set up the right way it will be (eventually) like a solid rock and it's citizens will live in freedom and prosperity.
It now depends on the moderation and rationality of especially the shias and kurds.
Will they give a hand to moderate sunni's while at the same time crushing down effectively the terrorists.
By the way: the sunni's that didn't vote get new chances to participate later this year with voting for the constitution and a definitive parliament.
That's the beauty of (a well functioning) democracy: if your guy doesn't do his job right, you just vote for the other guy next time.
Like this in the long run only politicians and political deeds that serves the people in the right way will survive. That's why we in the west could make that much progress through the ages.
We got the best political selection-procedures.
Because the democratic system is invented to serve the people not the other way around.
Therefore the law of England and Wales applies. And here an opinion - if defamatory - certainly counts as slander/libel and is therefore actionable.
You Americans should get some education.
Rachel, a Brit in London | Email | Homepage | 01.31.05 - 12:09 pm | #
http://www.hmso.gov.uk/acts/acts...996/
1996031.htm
http://www.swarb.co.uk/index.shtml
I hope your countrymen and -women will continue to feel passionately about this for a long time
GM from Germany | Email | Homepage | 01.31.05 - 12:21 pm | #
Sonnenschein ist zurueckgekehrt....... feel passionately about Toi aussi GM ?
Congratulations to Zeyad and to all Iraqis who supported the elections and voted! And special congratulations to the brave poll workers.
Democracy isn't easy. Both winners and losers have to believe in the system enough to accept the outcome. (Something that a certain party in the USA seems to have momentarily forgotten...) It will take a few weeks to determine the results of the election. People will need time to get used to the new way of thinking. I hope that both the winners and losers will be gracious and put the interests of the whole country first.
Now and always, Zeyad, you have enthusiastic best wishes from at least one friendly American in California.
GM..........
Edel & Starck, oder Thomas Heinze mit Nina Kronjäger ???
"The fact that they can organize 10 suicide bombers to strike in a four-hour period shows their huge capacity. No one should underestimate their ability," said Mustafa Alani, security expert at the Dubai-based Gulf Research Center.
Yes Rachel and one of them seems to have had Downs Syndrome.........now wasn't that caring of his handlers ?
"Threatening a libel suit. Impressive rhetorical device, that. Should the threatened person need representation, let me know. That would be a fun case to handle."
Thanks MF!!! If it ever got to Court you would find it one of your easier cases, given that the plaintiff has posted umpteen messages giving aid and comfort to the enemies of the United Kingdom.
BTW, the recent poster Ali is a friend of mine, of Iranian extraction, who used my computer at work to get in a couple of messages. He is not Ali of 'Free Iraqi' fame.
http://crymeariverii.blogspot.com/
Rachel, you dim bulb, I know you are both from Merry Old England, you twit. I was pointing up a contrast. Perhaps you are familiar with the First Amendment to our Constitution regarding freedom of speech. (You all certainly have no regard for the second amendment's intent or action, I understand.) Opinions are not slanderous or libelous. Such a numbskull.
Picture of Rachels On The Street
http://littlegreenfootballs.com/..._Spain&
only=yes
Now that the voting is over and has gone very well with minimal violence, especially compared to the bellowing threats of the pig vomit terrorits and the trembling fears of thier useful idiot western supporters, with high voter turnout, despite the lies of some posters here and the constant drumbeat of doom and gloom of the fat assed western media, I wonder how many of the folks who boycotted these "rigged, puppet, phoney" elections and did not get a voice in will come out and try to insist that they be included?
Hey, the rules are made by those who show up. The Johnny come latelies can just eat dust until the next elections.
Rick, pathetic isn't it? These cankers on the ass of humanity still believe that democracy and freedon are the problems.
A refutation of the thugs and the Rachels who support them: http://www.coxandforkum.com/
Why though the terrorists promised rivers of blood they only could kill around 40 people. (Let me be clear 40 too many and they all deserve a statue as true "martyrs of freedom" but it's nothing compared to what the islamic fascists promised).
I think it is because:
1 Real effective cooperation between foreign and iraqi troops combined with clearing crucial area's from cars and with it the (most deadly) carbombs.
2 the inability of the terrorists to organise and orchestrate large concentrated bombing campaigns.
It seems that in this last thing the retaking of fallujah in november played a big part in this: This city was one gigantic stockpile of weapons/bombs and not to underestimate (baathist/al qaida) organisationcapabilities.
If fallujah wasn't reconquered it would have been in my opinion at least 400 or even maybe 4000 killed.
I hope that crucial parts of this very succesfull security operation can be transferred to daily Iraqilife: like checking all cars that want to enter big Iraqi cities.
The kurds seem to do that already where possible to prevent terror intrusions in their territory.
With succesfull security operation I meant how it went yesterday not the attack on fallujah. That was an unique (though necessary) case.
Let's hope it stays that way and no other Iraqi city will be ever that invested with terror.
Lessons learned from yesterday can help to reach that goal.
Zeyad
congradulation on the vote
alan
"Now and always, Zeyad, you have enthusiastic best wishes from at least one friendly American in California."
Greetings, Mary in LA - that makes two of us, at least!
I think Rachel is a masochist, here for the sole purpose of goading the rest here into heaping derision upon her. Whatever she needs to say to upset people is exactly what she does say. I say give here what she wants - whatever floats her boat, as they say...
When the sun rises today, things may look the same, but it is a new Iraq.
A way to deal with Rachel: simply substitute "my absentee/ineffective father" for every reference she makes to a beneficial governing body (America, Bush, military allies in Iraq, Iraqi voters) and you will have the psychological motivator for her pathetic bids for attention/validation. Rachel ought to know that today, even in North Korea, Marxism is practically nonexistent, but she doesn't. Oh well. I declare a personal moratorium on Rachel. She's a drag on an otherwise happy occasion.
The courage of the Iraqi people is awe inspiring. Congratulations and best wishes.
Jon
New Jersey
Gratz Zeyad, may the future of the iraq be bright. I have doubts, but i hope the sunni will integrate in the peace process.
"Homer, your latest remarks about me are defamatory, demonstrably untrue and actionable. If I ever find out who you are, I might just sue you.
Rachel, a Brit in London"
You're an idiot Rachel. So sue me!
In ANY jurisdiction's civil laws, in order to sue for slander or libel, the plaintive must show at LEAST intent to damage a person's reputation, if not actual damage. Since you go by the nom de plume RACHEL, no one knows your actual identity (e.g. it is impossible to damage the reputation of an unknown person).
Perhaps you should obtain an education yourself, and spare us your uncontrolled and racist accusations.
Zeyad,
I'm so very happy for you. It's been a rough road over the last year and I pray all will be well for you in 2005.Take very good care of yourself and perhaps we'll all meet at a Baghdad Cafe in 2010!
Solicitor in London re the following
http://www.nswscl.org.au/journal.../57/
Potter.html
Richard Potter is a partner with Phillips Fox in Sydney, specialising in defamation and media law.
"On its own, abuse is not defamatory as no one actually thinks less of a person simply because they have been abused. However, accusations can be levelled at a person which may well be defamatory, fuelled by the anger created by the troll's destructive intentions. "
Whereas I would have thought that Rachel's abusive remarks would make her case hard to win, and her claims that accusing others of being fascists or liars etc might be considered defamatory, I was concerned by the quote from the above paper. Am certainly coming across others who abuse as Rachel does and then threaten legal action. One argues that he has notified the webmaster and is commencing action. As Potter points out it would be extremely difficult to "find" the correspondent and Potter agrees? with it is Rick? who says that it would have to be Zeyad.
if you have time solicitor it would be useful if you or other solicitors would be able to assist us with advice as to how to protect Zeyad. On the other hand would'nt like anything that made his postion more problematic.
nevertheless there is no doubt that trolls have a common agenda and a common method. Paranoid I know but the emerging similarity in appraoch to legal action is unnerving.
Rachel:
Please do not let these hateful sheep intimidate you. They are pitiful little creatures who attempt to win the approval of their masters by attacking anyone who refuses to join them in their self-imposed slavery.
There are many of us who truly care for humanity and work relentlessly to get the truth out to the masses. Never think that we have no effect. Day by day, it becomes harder for the Bushes, Blairs, and their satraps to deny reality. Already the truth about this "election" circus is becoming known.
Courage, Rachel! There are many who respect your efforts and silently cheer you on. WE SHALL OVERCOME!
Oh, Bush Lied, if only your encouragement of that twittering moron were silent! But you probably cannot tell the difference as the entire world is full of your voice, not to mention ego.
Pathetic.
Bless you for your kind words, Bush Lied.
Thinking ahead: if in the coming days and weeks, it were to become apparent that the US cannot after all claim the Iraqi election as the "success" they first thought - eg if a significant proportion of the ballots cast were either blank or spoiled - then my guess is that the US will set one community against another. That is their "style", their "track record". I think that the US might support the Shia in a pogrom of Sunni. They would have to do this covertly - like the US covertly supported Saddam during the Iran-Iraq war - because of all the Sunni-governed countries surrounding Iraq.
I hope that I am wrong.
Ros, you are a pompous, self-important, mischievous witch. The idea that Zeyad needs any protection from me is completely ludicrous.
Worrying further solicitor, as the various forms and sectors of the blogosphere evolve big powerful nodes are emerging. there are of course many thousands of small sites, part time office in the spare room in the house so to speak. I see these Iraqi sites for example, as like this, very limited resources and run by people who have many other important time consuming activities in their lives. So while there are blocking options none are that effective I gather, other than registering their correspondents and vetting comments before posting. I think that being forced to do that would probably close these sites down or at least end the comments aspect, thereby seriously reducing their reach and influence. And what is very different about these one man band Iraqi sites is their reach and influence despite their relative low cost etc. Iraq the Model is currently certainly being targetted by those who opposes their view. As the importance and prominence of the site grows then the opposition to it becomes more organised and sophisticated.
There is certainly a growing usage of legal means by western "civil society organisations" to achieve their agendas, either by finding new meanings in national law or by appeals to "international law" or international tribunals.
Maybe my thoughts are a bit of a reach, but nevertheless it concerns me that there are these forces coming into play. It would be a tragedy if this outburst of anarchic and truly global chatter across the world was pulled into the control of the usual establishment forces, where money decided who had a voice, and the voices of individuals were silenced by the likes of Rachel, even though that may not be what she intends. Indeed what would Rachel do if she succeeded.
"Homer, your latest remarks about me are defamatory, demonstrably untrue and actionable. If I ever find out who you are, I might just sue you."
The problem is rachel is that you would have to sue Zeyad. or the ISP. So if it was a throw away threat say so, don't leave the threat sitting there. Consider what you are saying. it is certainly your intent to threaten argument with you into silence.
Sigh - a little knowledge is a terribly annyoing thing.
Two initial problems with the silly threat:
1.Vis-a-vis "Homer":
Unless "Rachel" has an identifiable proprietary interest in her pseudonymous existence, she cannot sue for defamation. Think about it - the raison d'etre of any defamation suit is recovery for damages to reputation caused by false statements. No UK court (or American, as far as I know) has ever found that an anonymous person (who isn't Mark Twain or George Sand) has a reputation to damage. Yet more intriguing is the fact that the counterargument - that the proposed plaintiff does indeed have an "online" reputation gained by previous postings - makes the question of damages somewhat hilarious. From what I can glean, she is not held in high regard in this little community, evidence that would be highly relevant to a determination of damages. In other words, this is silly, bordering on malicious due to its frivolity.
2. Vis-a-vis Zeyad:
a. UK law provides a rather solid defense to defamation for those who have no control over the messages posted to a news medium site such as "Healing Iraq". Factor in the web service that hosts the site, and we are looking at a zero chance of collecting a farthing, dime or dinar.
b. Try serving him with papers. Just try. Then I might have some measure of respect for the potential plaintiff.
There are so many other problems with this silly concept that cannot be addressed (thankfully) in this medium. My professional advice? Relax and have a good laugh at the pitiful and hypocritical attempt to stifle conversation.
Insider from Baghdad, prepare to do some explaining to Riverbend.
Oh, yes - one more thing I had wanted to mention. Unlike the US, in most cases in the UK, loser pays costs. Let's leave aside the mirthful possibilities that having our little plaintiff legally tagged a "loser" affords. This wonderful little tool is designed to prevent this type of frivolity, and thus is the reason many would be happy to defend against it. It's easy money.
"That is their "style", their "track record". I think that the US might support the Shia in a pogrom of Sunni."
You know nothing about our "track record". And your musings that a significant proportion of the ballots may be "blank or spoiled" are delusional rantings. Allegations that Iraqis would risk their lives to stand in line to post blank ballots is the apex of wishful thinking by your ilk. Those looking for anything that might cause the Iraqis to be drug back into the horror of oppression. You desire to chortle with malicious glee over any perceived obstruction of the newly-emerging democracy in Iraq.
You have an illness that can't be cured. Something in your nature should be horrified by reading your own posts.
MF - a solicitor in London: my advice to you is, don't go there. My brother is a partner in an international law firm in London; several of my friends and/or relatiaves are either barristers or partners in City law firms. I have an IQ of 147, and I was not born yesterday.
You sound like a loser in a down-at-heel practice in an impoverished borough touting for business. Back off, punk.
Courage, Rachel! There are many who respect your efforts and silently cheer you on. WE SHALL OVERCOME!
Bush Lied | Email | Homepage | 01.31.05 - 3:42 pm | #
I am so glad you wrote this.........I think it is essential that you continue your satirical postings..........Rachel needs to know that she is not alone in her hallucinatory world......that there are two of you is proof enough that the aberration is real
"You sound like a loser in a down-at-heel practice in an impoverished borough touting for business. Back off, punk.
Rachel, a Brit in London "
Then you should know better.
And if there was a legal platform for suing for libel/slander in these forums, you would have just proclaimed yourself the defendant with these defamatory statements.
Your brother must be proud. Living off the family dole are we? That's alright - I have a deluded sibling like that, too. It's not uncommon to have a high-achieving sibling care for one who has not, shall we say, done well for herself.
Godfrey v Demon Internet Limited
The Court held that ISPs that knowingly carry defamatory material and fail to remove it on request are liable as publishers. Demon could not avail itself of the innocent publication defence provided by the Defamation Act as it was put on notice of the posting. Demon appealed this decision and argued that Godfrey himself deliberately posted the inflammatory statements with a view to launching a vexatious defamation action against it. Demon claimed that this constituted flaming and provoked others to trade insults which Godfrey then claimed were defamatory. The action was settled for an undisclosed sum. Since August 2002, section 1 of the Defamation Act must be read subject to the Electronic Commerce (EU Directive) Regulations 2002. These Regulations are complex as they distinguish between an ISP acting as a mere conduit, and other more involved actions of an ISP such as caching and hosting. The Regulations grant immunity to ISPs who do not have actual knowledge of facts or circumstances from which illegal activity or information is apparent...
Thank you solicitor, you are reassuring. I recognise that my grasp of the above is limted, but it tells me 2 things, that the ISP's will fight, but on the other hand they settled. They can afford to do that. if some of our clever trolls get rolling then the Zeyad's can't afford to settle. I do not hide so i for example would not be lost in the ether of the web.
And I am conscious that I do along with many of us put fingers into action without making sure that my brain is engaged when provoked.
Votes for food.
Interpress Service News Agency
MF - a solicitor in London said, Living off the family dole are we? That's alright - I have a deluded sibling like that, too. It's not uncommon to have a high-achieving sibling care for one who has not, shall we say, done well for herself.
I have supported myself by working all my adult life, and I am still completely self-supporting. I don't believe that you are a solicitor at all - you are so "mouthy".
"Votes for food.
Interpress Service News Agency
Rachel, a Brit in London"
So we may presume these self-same "food-voters" were so happy to know they were going to get their ration of food next month, that they danced in the streets and cried at the poll boxes like Sam Hammorabi and other Iraqi bloggers have posted on their blogs?
http://hammorabi.blogspot.com/
Tammy, you are talking twaddle again.
With all due respect MF, no insult intended; Rachel, I've never known a "solicitor" that wasn't "mouthy".
"Tammy, you are talking twaddle again.
Rachel, a Brit in London "
I will of course have to engage a solicitor due to your defamatory statement.
MF- may I retain your services?
I appear to have touched a raw nerve. By the by, living off the dole does not make you "self-supporting."
Mouthy? That hurt. Going to send big brother after the London partner now? And most of us are in international firms now, so find another way to make this partner tremble.
I feel so small now, but this is too much fun.
Congratulations Zeyad on a successful election day. I have to say, it does make one proud. May things continue in the same vein.
And remember, people, don't feed the trolls! That's the only way to make them go away.
Below is a statement from Sam of "Hammorabi" blog fame:
"All of you know that the situation in Iraq was not that any one like to carry out an election in it though we have done it in a civilised way.
The election was to say big NO to the terrorists and bigger YES for freedom and democracy but even bigger YES for peace and tolerance.
We got bad electrical power, poor water supplies, deteriorating sewage system, and all other services are rooting but we never felt as powerful and strong as now with the democracy and freedom."
Rachel are you telling us that you have sought legal advice from your brother re your ability to sue someone/anyone. What was his advice?
And further no offence to solicitor but the claim I have friends and relatives who are lawyers. There are a lot of solicitors these days. Well my daughter and both my nephews and vast numbers of their friends. And yes many are in International firms. my daughter is a criminal psychologist as well, could be useful if I was to resort to people are being mean to me, what can I threaten them with.
Rachel:
Please don't be upset by the squeeking of these powerless mice. Remember that they are members of a small minority and that they know it.
The great majority of the world's people, including those in the UK, oppose the conquest of Iraq and the other actions of Bushitler, his henchmen, and their Zionist overlords.
Remember also that the majority of Americans oppose the actions of their unelected rulers. The elections of 2000 and 2004 were riddled with fraud, and the people know it.
It is higjly unlikely that Bushitler will serve out his current term without being impeached. Once he is removed from office, he should be turned over to the United Nations war crimes tribunal to answer for his crimes.
We will not be silenced by the threats of Crusaders and Zionists. Brave and highly respected Americans are speaking out every day (for example, Edward Kennedy, John Kerry, Howard Dean, Noam Chomsky, Juan Cole, and many, many others).
Impeach Bushitler!
Bring the Troops Home Now!
POWER TO THE PEOPLE!
Ros - you are correct, sir - you cannot swing a dead cat in London (or the states, as my American partners tell me) without hitting an attorney at an "international" law firm. By way of explanation only, I loved the "I'm really really smart and I'm gonna to tell my big brother on you" line. It is very successful at the Old Bailey.
raven - you are correct, sir, and have shamed me appropriately. Great day for democracy and the rule of law.
Bush Lied, I am not in the least bit upset by the neocon vermin who (to paraphrase Raed Jarrar) think that Iraqis are romantic insensible people who ask nothing more of life than to vote. Iraqis are entitled to electricity, reliable water supplies, well-equipped hospitals, to be in charge of their own country and oil, and to be able to leave the house with the reasonable expectation of being able to return home alive. And the US occupiers are preventing all of that.
I do expect to see Bush, Blair, Rumsfeld, et al on trial for war crimes. In our lifetime.
Seriously Rachel
We have to talk.
After distillation, what is produced from the essence of all your arguments is one thing: that the world should hate America. An unqualified hatred, I might add.
Are you really unable to see that most intelligent people are multi-dimensional in their grasp of concepts. Therefore, a successful dogmatic "philosophy" must appeal, even pseudomorphically, to the logical mind by varying the "temperature" of it's principles.
You're wasting your talent and sabotaging your own admirable efforts by adhering to a monochromatic mantra such as : Hate America, right or wrong.
Qualifications and gradations are required in order to fool the masses into believing you have an agenda worth following. Say for example:
Hate America when it usurps the rights of others.
In this instance, you would then persuade your potential devotees by affecting a congratulatory stance towards Iraqis on the definitive expression of their freedom: a popular vote. Then later, when the morons had been lulled into your deceitful web, you hit them with the full measure of your apocalyptic hatred for the US and they already be sufficiently manipulated into following you.
MF - I am not on the dole, pillock. I earn my own living. I am afraid that I perceive your atrophied narcissism as an tedious distraction from what this blog and comments section is really about. Hereon in, I am going to ignore you.
Here is a quotation from an e-mail sent to Sam and quoted by him on "Hammarabi":
"I must admit. I am one of the "Liberals" here in America that do not really like George W. Bush. I think Bush gave us false reasons for invading Iraq and we were against this war because of all the instability and violence it has caused. BUT - for
right now, I am very happy that things are improving for you all over there and I am glad you think of America as a friend. I wish you all the very best my friend and hope that freedom will continue to blossom for all Iraqis.
Joe"
A potential devotee cannot resist this approach Rachel. You really must try it...I guarantee it will turn things around for you!
Rachel is almost getting comical in her hysterical rantings. Pogrom, indeed. This is right up there with comparing the situation on Baghdad to Leningrad - pure delusion. But, since pogroms are usually associated with czarist era mass murders of Russian Jews, maybe it is actually wishful thinking on her disgusting part, nicht wahr, Reichsfuhrer Rachel, you little nazi scum.
Speaking taddle? And this pronouncement from a real twat!
What a wonderful day!! I was nearly in tears as I watched Iraqi's dancing in the streets. I hope that this is a sign of better days to come for you country.
James in Colorado, USA
You are right Solicitor shouldn't be sucked in. but I am titillated by the thought of your narcissism shrinking through lack of nutrition. or the fact that your posts cause boredom. Constant rhetoric about the bad bad Yanks accompanied by the same conspiracy theories spouted again and again , with adjustments to fit the latest rant. Exciting stuff.
Latest reports I hear are that the Un is still very impressed by the turnout and are still estimating between 60 and 75%. The left is trotting out yes but look how many voted in Vietnam and who they voted for. but they didn't get democracy so there. Not an example I would trot out, because it emphasises the betrayal of the Vietnamese people as a result of the pressure from the Us haters and communist fellow tavellers. and the governments that allowed themselves to be intimidated. I have great confidence that Bush won't do that. Won't effect the rhetoric though. No doubt we will have a shift from the Yanks will never leave, they are liars, to the Yanks will leave and abandon the Iraqis, they are liars.
Heard about your blog on The BBC newsnaight programme, and dropped by to wish you the future you wish for yourselves, in sha'allah
I believe I recall seeing the "fingers in the ear while muttering lalalala" rhetorical device invoked in a recent matter. Unfortunately, the litigant ceased using said defense when court-ordered medication was initiated.
If your little foray into pettifoggery has ended as a result of my thoroughly enjoying myself, narcissistically of course (said narcissism, coincidentally, is inflated, not deflated), then I have contributed to the greater good and consider this a day doubly well spent. Cheers
I would agree rachel that when you are starving freedom is essentially non existent. But to dimiss the views of Iraqis that they can suffer the infrastructure problems because they now have freedom is to suggest they are fools. I can workout that for them with freedom comes the opportunity to provide these higher level needs for themselves. So Raed start working for that rather than covertly supporting the destruction of Iraqi services thus being able to argue see things are really bad you haven't got them
I doubt that a Marsh Arab would find your sudden interest in the need for electricity and water as a demonstration of concern. Does anyone know how the attempts to restore the marshlands is going? Very difficult I understand but I have heard Iraqi and US environmental scientists confident that it was possible though was very difficult and would take along time. There was also the view unfortunately that the draining of the marshlands was also the destruction of the Marsh arabs culture and that therefore this act of genocide (to save argument it was acompanied by vigorous murder of the Marsh Arabs as well) had indeed succeeded.
The pogrom that my servant Rachel spoke about has begun!
"In southern Iraq, U.S. troops opened fire on detainees rioting Monday at the Camp Bucca prison facility, killing four people, the U.S. command said. The unrest broke out during a search for contraband and quickly spread. After warnings and non-lethal methods failed to halt it, "lethal force was used," the military said."
All these innocents were murdered by the infidels and all they did was hide weapons and try to kill the invaders with them! All the martyrs were women, pregnant women, actually, pregnant orphaned women who husbands were martyred by the Zionists! The American occupying army is made up entirely of Jews and Zionist elements! There is not a single American in Iraq, only Israeli agents, Zionists and Jews who kill only pregnant orphaned widows and children!
Death to (your name, group or affiliation here)!
@Rachel:
I have an IQ of 147
Then could you explain once again how you calculated that the total election turnout was 4.8% (revised upwards from 0.48%) in the light of the electoral commission estimates I posted earlier?
Zounds,
Who knew there were that many pregnant, orphaned, widows and children in Iraq? Rachel must be right, I'm revising my whole outlook. Now as an American filled with self-loathing, am I required to off myself to avenge these self-same martyrs? This all gets so confusing. Methinks this calls for a hasty post to Dear Abby!!
Bush Lied says:
"Brave and highly respected Americans are speaking out every day (for example, Edward Kennedy..."
I'm sorry, but I cannot stop laughing at this.
I know your type, your mental maturity stopped at the age of 16. You go to protests for things you don't understand, only for the chance to throw rocks through store-front windows. You ardently believe all conspiracies laid out before you, even when they lack evidence. You hate "the establishment" and "the man." Your favorite band is probably Rage Against the Machine.
Furthermore, your belief that Bush will be impeached is delusional at best. Bush hasn't lied under oath; he hasn't been implicated in obstruction of justice and abuse of power; and he hasn't violated "The Tenure of Office Act" (that was Andrew Johnson, a president from before the time of television, the internet, and "Action Alerts" I'll forgive you if you weren't aware of his impeachment) You're set up for a severe disappointment if you're holding out on a Bush impeachment for anything already done.
You also mention Bush being elected by fraud. You may have a point about 2000, but suggesting the 2004 election was fraudulent just shows how detached from reality you really are. If you can show me credible evidence from factual, legitimate sources that election fraud occurred (and no, long lines in poor Ohio neighborhoods don't cut it.) I will think of your statements as nothing more then you being a sore loser. Also, I'm no Bush supporter, I haven't agreed with a single policy of his in five years, so don't bother writing me of as a right winger. I write to you supporting truth and rational thinking, not a politician.
I suppose that's all. If you care to put the bong down and stop fretting about the Zionist conspiracy, please do join us in reality. It's a nice place, and we'd love to have you back some time.
Ros, you are a pompous, self-important, mischievous witch.
My, my, projecting a bit, Rachel?
I do expect to see Bush, Blair, Rumsfeld, et al on trial for war crimes. In our lifetime.
Since we live on Planet Earth and not Moonbeam Number 9, that is unlikely. However, I do expect that Rachel and Bush Lied will choke to death on their own hatred and bile one day. Such continual nastiness and spleen is not good for the blood pressure, dear.
Again, Zayed, congratulations on your elections.
I would also like to thank our British allies, particularly MF-a soliciter in London, whose posts in this thread have been terribly entertaining, although he is not as funny as Rachel.
You guys are killing me. I love when RAchel posts and MF was funny as hell.
MF and Tammy, you are my new heroes.
By the way, Rachel's numbers about 1.1 million registered voters is so wrong I can't even believe she had the gall to post it anywhere (and she's posted in about 5 times that I can tell around the internet).
Let's be clear. 1.1 million "registerers" is actually the number of people who went to the registration office and either UPDATED their information or were ADDED on the FOOD RATIONING rolls left over from the UN FOOD FOR OIL program that was used to create the base of the REGISTERED VOTERS.
In other words, if they were on the FOOD FOR OIL rolls (that was appx 14 mil people before the 1.1 new or updated voters) then they were eligible to vote by simply providing identification and proving who they were against these rolls.
As a matter of fact, there were at least a few hundred (possibly as many as a thousand) people that were *gasp* disenfranchised from the voting process because they were not on the rolls for the FFO (they apparently didn't get the word about going to register or had not previously received cards) and they staged a mini protest showing their IDs as "Iraqis" the press.
If Rachel was as smart as she says she is, she would have actually picked up this story and ran with it about voter disenfranchisement. At least it would have had a modicum of truth in it and could have been supported.
Unfortunately, Rachel's job in the local pet store or shoe store or whatever it is she ended up working at to "support" herself, must not allow her time to associate in the real world.
Of course, this is the "woman" who insisted several weeks ago that the voters registratioon cards (food ration coupons) were being sold for $400 on the black market.
Now, how would these poor Iraqis get their food if they sold their coupons? Seriously, how would they be forced into voting for food and then not be able to vote for lack of said coupon based on your conspiracy?
Of course, the conspiracy is based on the fact that people were asked to update said "food ration" rolls in order to be validated for voting in the first place.
I know logic just confuses Rachel, but I'd thought I'd try it. LOL
PS..if you want to sue me, my email is on the bar below this message.
LOL
@Kat
Let's be clear. 1.1 million "registerers" is actually the number of people who went to the registration office and either UPDATED their information or were ADDED on the FOOD RATIONING rolls...
Ok. That much is clear. But, according to Rachel's calculations, 67% of 1.1 million is 67,000 which represents only 0.48% of the eligible electorate. Now, overlooking the factor of 10 error (we've all done that at some stage, haven't we?) ... where did the 67% come from? ... I guess that's the median of the 60-75% turnout estimates. For those estimates, you would presumably watch or read the news. Now, the following was typical of the news headlines I saw on Sunday... "Millions of Iraqis defy insurgents to vote" (from a local paper). The Washington Post and CNN both had the word "Millions" in the headlines on their websites by early Sunday. So I was just curious as to how Rachel arrived at a number in the 10's or 100's of thousands using a percentage she must have gotten from a news site, without noticing the discrepancy between her figures and theirs.
Zayed,
Congratulations to the heroic and brave Iraqi's who voted!
History will record the sacrifices and hardships of all involved in a DEMOCRATIC IRAQ and place your generation as the forefathers of Iraqi freedom. I am glad to have witnessed it. Write down your memories and pass them on.
As to the negative commentators, they cannot see the bigger picture, or have no knowlegde of their own country's history in the fight to democracy.
The best advice I saw recently on another blog...."Scroll the Trolls". (My apologies, I cannot remeber the source....)
I might add "Forgive" & Scroll the Trolls. Many developmentaly challenged individuals have IQs above 140 and need help.
Oh, yes. The other thing was that Rachel's figures (even after multiplication by 10) implied only 20 voters per polling station in a five to ten hour period. You didn't even have to read the news to see the discrepancy ... you only needed to look at the pictures. (Unless 95% of Iraqis who risked life and limb did so only to dance in the street).
Yes! Yes! Yes for the Infidels!! It's good to be a heretic! They just think they have all the answers.
BWHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
Way to go Iraq!
You guys are seriously funny! This comment sections get better and better all the time!
"MF and Tammy, you are my new heroes."
The feeling is mutual Kat.
Love to all Iraqis! You are very beautiful people!
Dang,
Rachel, like I told you last night, give it a rest woman. You are getting your a** handed to you at every turn. I don't know about your IQ, but that emotional intelligence (EQ) I told you about? I think you are operating in negative territory on that one.
Bridget,
.
.
.
.
.when are you going to fuck me? 
""It is higjly unlikely that Bushitler will serve out his current term without being impeached. Once he is removed from office, he should be turned over to the United Nations war crimes tribunal to answer for his crimes.""
There would be about 53,000,000 people locked and loaded ready to shoot the motherf**kers who try a stunt like that.
Just so you know, rachel's comments can be found on Democratic Underground or vice-versa.
She either's starts out the to get her daily fuzzy warm sweater affirmations or she cuts and pastes all her favourite leftie loonie's rants here there and everywhere, kinda like rat droppings you'll know them when you see them!
And you know the more she posts the more she sounds just like this crazy women who worked in our office! Well turns out this wacko was stealing from the company! There was also a rash of small change missing from various people's desks, so everyone was careful to lock up everything!
Perhaps we could lock up Rat the Brit!
Rachel do you work? Since you're on here and other Iraqi sites non-stop I'm wondering if it indeed is true that you're living on the dole, or your big brother's allowance, bitter and resentful that Americans are doing the right thing. Is that how you lost your last job, didn't go along with work requirements, like shut up and do your work?
Nice collection of juvenile sex obsessed trolls that follow you around, like flies to shit!
The Iraqi's are the visionary leaders of the Middle East. Thank you for your courage and brillance! The IP's were fabulous by the way. And seeing the old people being carried to the polls to vote, just made me cry. What courage!
BITE THE BIG BLUE FINGER
@Rachel:
I have an IQ of 147 >/i>
What do you do with it ?
Bush Lied,
You said ""Brave and highly respected Americans are speaking out every day (for example, Edward Kennedy..."
LOL...If you only knew how his older brother (our departed president) rolls over in the grave every time teddy speaks, you would understand that Teddy is neither brave (although some would say that while plastered, he might pass as brave) nor highly respected by most. He is just about ready for the funny farm and no, his rants do not attract any but the far left fringe of society in these United States. He is a has-been and a drunk and a disgrace to the United States Senate and the sooner he retires, the better. Now Zell Miller...there is a brave Senator who has spoken up...read his speech on why we need to stay the course...
http://www.hillsdale.edu/newimpr...mis/
default.htm
THAT speech is something to stand besides. Just as the vast majority of us Americans stand side by side with the Iraqis who had the courage to vote. They are my heros. Kennedy is but a joke.
This is the truth. Deal with it.
Impeach Bushitler!
Bring the Troops Home Now!
Power to the People!
Rachel,
You crack me up! You said "This is the sort of thing that the international observers should take care of but God knows where they are or how much "observing" they are doing.
Rachel, a Brit in London "
God knows and sees all, Rachel, and that includes the fact that he is watching you as well. He wants the Iraqi people to be free and to be away from the likes of Zarqawi (who is driven by Satan himself)...so you see, the prayers of millions of us in the US have been answered...God DID give the Iraqi people courage to go to the polls and cast their ballots for a say in their new government. It was God's will. So when you start trying to twist God's watchful eye about (as if there were any major problems with the voting and the observers), God knows where you live and he doesn't want you misrepresenting him. So enough of your drivel. God hates a liar and thats what you do (even though you probably believe your lies). We want an end to the tyranny in Iraq (the ex-baathists who kill so many and the foreign Arabs who come to blow themselves up for some warped sense of heaven) and we want the Iraqi people to have good imput into their new government. So lets see who the new government asks to leave Iraq...Our troops or Zarqawi? Hmmm...care to wager a bet?
Rachel do you work? Since you're on here and other Iraqi sites non-stop I'm wondering if it indeed is true that you're living on the dole,
I think this is Rachel's "Work" - you cannot "live on the dole" it simply does not pay enough.
Rachel probably freelances which is why she fills out Self-Assessment tax forms......I do hope her arithmetic errors work to the Exchequer's advantage
>The pogrom
Uh, what an ugly word.
>that my servant Rachel spoke about has begun!
Master I still think that a female servant is devouring my respect for you.
>"In southern Iraq, U.S. troops opened fire on detainees rioting Monday at the Camp Bucca prison facility, killing four people, the U.S. command said.
I would not listen to much to the words of that organisation, sometimes they lie about stuff, you know.
>The unrest broke out during a search for contraband and quickly spread.
What were they expecting to find? I mean, haden't they searched the detainees several times before? I dont think these people are that sloppy.
>After warnings and non-lethal methods failed to halt it, "lethal force was used," the military said."
Lehtal force was used, what an brilliant euphemism. The US_army is not killing people anymore, the US-army is just using lethal force.
>All these innocents were murdered by the infidels and all they did was hide weapons and try to kill the invaders with them!
Deetanies with weapons? Crude. Uhm, the south, must be Sadrs men then? Btw, fyi, they were not trying to kill the americans, they were just preparing to use lethal force against the invaders.
>All the martyrs were women, pregnant women, actually, pregnant orphaned women who husbands were martyred by the Zionists!
As always.
>The American occupying army is made up entirely of Jews and Zionist elements!
Maybe thats why this army is so damn good.
>There is not a single American in Iraq
You sound like an iraqi information minister, what was it's name, Sahaf?
>only Israeli agents, Zionists and Jews who kill only pregnant orphaned widows and children!
They get some of us insurgents from time to time to, i have to admitt that master.
>Death to (your name, group or affiliation here)!
Hm, still sending out the standard letter are we? I's getting lame, couldn't we change it a bit, please Master Osama crank it up a notch.
"The Baghdad meteorological office confirms that the weather was clear with only moderate winds and no sandstorms at the time of the crash."
"The bad news is that the Iraqi people have gained the ability to shoot down our aircraft. The US, having lost control of the use of the roads in Iraq, resorted (as they did in Veitnam) to trying to run the war from the air. "
According to people who have been jailed by both Saddam and the US, the US torturers are much, MUCH worse.
"And while we are at it, Iran actually gassed the Kurds, according to a study by the US Army War College."
Oh Rachel Oh rachel, up until now you were just a fellow traveller.
Now you are so unintelligent.
Resorted to running the war in the air. The most terrifiying thing about the US is that if it ever lets go it can destroy most of the world. Resorted to the air, it's not just that they have global hawks/ predators UAV (interstingly unmanned is politically incorrect) they are very close to just sending up whole platforms of unmanned planes. They can see the world and no one can stop them. They can make the decision to utterly destroy an enemy and there is nothing that any body can do. China has no hope. If the US decided to destroy China then it would be over. As one of our left wing politicians said, if North Korea is ever foolish enough to fire a nuclear weapon at the US or her friends, within hours North Korea, all of North Korea, would be a nuclear puddle. In all of us there is the hope that America remains benevolent. There has never been a military power like the US. It's naval air force is the second biggest in the world. The US militarily exceeds the rest of the world combined. And you may try to kid yourself but it is not just in hard technology that they command.
You are stupid beyond belief.
How could you offer support to people who argue that the monstrosity of Saddam was less than the US. Tell me about the people who have been in US Iraqi prisons and have had their children tortured in front of them. Tell me about the children who have been in Us Iraqi prisons and had their mothers heads cut off in front of them. Tell me about the people who have been put through shredding machines in US Iraqi prisons. tell me about the people who were taken from Us Iraqi prisons and buried alive together in multiple thousands.
You are not an alternative view you are just utterly stupid.
I hope Iraqi's can transcend their (justified)election-euphoria in a working together spirit.
Because though the image in the third world of the west is often of people only living for themselves the reality is we combine stark individualism with a very strong teamplayer mentality.
You cannot have a flourishing society without people working together.
the manco in almost all third world countries is the everybody against everybody-mentality which is crippling development on all levels.
This means one needs sometimes to compromise personal party-preferences to benefit the well being of the nation as a whole.
It's best defined by the Dutch proverb: to jump over your own shadow.
It would be great if in the coming months there will grow a bond between all pro democracy Iraqi's and divisions will less and less be between shia/kurd/assyrian/turkmen/sunni etc.lines but between those who are pro and anti-democracy.
Between people who want to deal with each other on a civil basis against those who are using guns and bombs to get their way: it's the only difference that must really counts as a matter of fact.
This can help to gain basic trust between all (rational) Iraqi's: if you know the (unknown) other one at least is pro democracy he or she though being different is basically on your side.
So first questions no longer ask about ethnic/sectarian backgrounds but about a willingness to democracy.
Unity is strength/ division is weakness: This doesn't mean there are no differences anymore but that you agree on the rules of the game.
If the Iraqi's of good will recognise and support each other crossing ethnic/religious lines your combined force will crush the terrorists in a new york minute.
It will soon appear to be key for a better Iraq.
Charles Kennedy: British troops must now prepare to leave Iraq
The British presence was undermined from the start by the way we chose to go to war
01 February 2005
It has been tempting to pre-judge the Iraq elections - to declare that they are neither "free nor fair" by comparing them with the kind of election we are used to. For those of us who opposed the war from the outset, there is a gnawing sense of outrage at the loss of life, the instability and the violence now endemic in Iraq. That should not lead us to an unbalanced approach to either the elections themselves or where we go from here.
The truth is that it will be a week before we can see whether this vote has delivered a representative constitutional body and it will be some months before we can judge whether the mandate handed to the new Iraqi Government will be respected or lasting. But, right now, I believe that we can and should applaud the bravery of those citizens who went out to vote and the paramount issue is how best we can help the Iraqi people to move forward.
Of course, no one should be under any illusions. The insurgents won't lay down their arms just because of this vote. The spectre of civil war still hangs over the nation, and Iraq has become a crucible of militant terrorism. ... It may well be that there would still be a need for the international community to help provide Iraq's security beyond that time, but a more suitable answer than a continuation of the occupation by coalition forces would be a proper UN military presence - ideally drawing particularly on troops from predominantly Muslim countries.
... This is not a strategy for cutting and running. It is an acceptance that the British presence in Iraq - despite much good work that our soldiers have done - was undermined from the start by the way we chose to go to war. And it is an acceptance that Iraq will not find the long-term stability and security it requires while British troops remain.
To those trying to goad me into revealing more about my personal circumstances. I would not be so impertinent as to ask you what you do to earn your living, so I am not going to tell you any more about what I do. I work. I am not subsidised by anyone. I do not receive an allowance of any sort from anyone.
Get over it.
From that link provided by Bush Lied:
Rather than admit that the invasion of Iraq is a "Charlie Foxtrot", Bush and his pro-war advisors will continue to pour your money and your children into Iraq, because they have to stay in Iraq in order to move on to the invasion of Iran. And the justifications for invading Iran are, well, the same ones they used for Iraq, weapons of mass destruction, support for terror, yadda yadda yadda... The nation will slide more firmly into unpayable debt at the rate of $5 billion a month, to fight a war whose real purpose is being hidden from the American people whose money and children are being spent so profligately. Bush can't even keep the smirk off of his face any more. He knows he is lying. He knows you know he is lying. And he knows there isn't anything you will do about it. Most people don't have the courage to stand up to a corrupt war machine until after it is their own child lying in that box, and of course by then it is way too late. ... The people the US invaded are getting better at killing our kids, who were sent off to invade Iraq for, well, we don't really know, do we? They are angry, and rightly so. The people of Iraq know they did not do any of the things Bush claimed they did to justify the war. Our troops know it too. Our kids KNOW they are the villains, and they have to fight that awareness while they fight the Iraqi people, the climate, and the lack of supplies. The war cannot be won because all the stated goals have been exposed as deceptions. And your kids are stuck there, dying, not because they can win, but because thay are just "placeholders", holding open the door to the invasion of Iran.
And, of course, making millions for Halliburton, KBR, Negroponte etc etc.
Charles Kennedy sober is as farcical as Charles Kennedy in his natural state. A professional politico from the age of 23......he is not really up to the standard of his predecessor.
Champagne Charley represents a few sheep-farmers on the islands at the very north of Scotland; he is not a serious figure and well-suited to displaying the colour of his party whenever the need for resolve is called for.............
http://www.charleskennedy.org.uk/
http://www.libdems.org.uk/
And, of course, making millions for Halliburton, KBR, Negroponte etc etc.
Rachel, a Brit in London | Email | Homepage | 02.01.05 - 7:33 am | #
only millions ? Surely billions
BTW Rachel.........KBR is a subsidiary of Halliburton just as London Electricity is a subsidiary of Electricite de France, and EdF is a subsidiary of the French Government
Defense Minister Hazem Shaalan said Iraq would only ask U.S. and other forces to leave when the country's own troops were capable of taking on insurgents.
"We don't want to have foreign troops in our country, but at the same time we believe that these forces should stay for some time until we are able to control the borders and establish a new modern army and we have efficient intelligence," Shaalan told reporters. "At that time ... we'll ask them to leave."
Mister Shalaan is saying the right thing: foreign troops need to stay untill Iraq is strong enough to take care of it's own business. That will take time (years): enough Iraqi's (especially sunni's) need to believe in their new democracy and feel protected by it.
At the same time Iraq must be able to withstand local outside interference from all sides: turkey/syria and iran especially who all want influence in Iraq and neither of them deserve it because their intentions are purely their own interests and not the needs of Iraq.
If the iraqi police/army is superior/ well fed and equiped (read: can (almost) match western standards in anyway) then the west can withdraw though a 25.000/50.000 men will in my opinion still for a very long time be necessary to keep the evil neighbours from even thinking they have a chance in gaining Iraqi power.
A lot of liberal westerners are pushing troopwithdrawing not to the benefit of Iraq but hoping the misery afterwards will bring Bush down at least psychologically.
The disgusting debts of too much western leftwingers are very deep: To wish suffering for Iraq out of hate for a president. How do you sleep at night thinking in such things?
I once called myself leftwing and though I am still according to american standards (I believe in a social kind of capitalism with care for poor people)I am very ashamed and angered by the blatant nihilistic approach the left is taking on Iraq: it's never about the local people: it's always about america and Bush.
They're obsessed with the "wrongdoings" of this last remaining superpower.
I just want Iraq to become as free and rich as we are.
They have the potential to be even richer as us if the oilmoney is used in a clever and honest way.
It will be a double blessing not only for the Iraqi people itself but also for us because a real prosperous Iraq will fasten the end of islamic fascism with decades.
It will prove once and for all arab democracy is not only possible but the only way to national happiness and bloom.
That's why they are so fanatically violent in iraq: they know what's at stake there, I wish more westerners did also. they need our total commitment.
Iraq is key in the battle on terror.
(alpha and omega).
Rachel,
I used to think your rantings were incoherent, and your logic flawed. I owe you an apology. You have talked about folks not being able to vote, and I did not believe you. Now, I see the error of my ways. Recently, I saw this article in the Washington Post, and realized that if this one man is unable to vote, oh how many more noble men must not have been able to either. The link: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6893925/
Pleae read it, neocon scum, and realized that Rachel was indeed right about this election. Please forgive me, Rachel.
Well Great Britain had 41% who did not cast a vote in 2001, and it seems like 50% may note vote in the next election..........41% was the lowest turnout since 1918 and that was the year that the voter-base expanded dramatically as women >30 were allowed to vote and all men over 21 years....................so Great ritain really looks sick at the beginning of the 21st Century...........
Maybe if the UN came to run the trains and the Post Office things would improve........but Blair was elected leader by 15% Labour Party members; and Labour was elected a Government by just 24% eligible voters.............76% did not vote for them
Congratulations! Those brave Iraqi's who voted set a wonderful example for us all to follow. You all earn my respect more and more every day. I truly hope that US & Arab relations will one day be strong.
My heart goes out to all those that were killed while trying to vote. I would hope that these innocent victims would be consider martyrs. Somehow, I doubt I would ever see such a statement on Al Jazeera... but perhaps once day.
You have all earned my deepest respect!
I am so happy for the Iraqis. For a moment I wished I was Iraqi just to feel the satification so many of you did on that day. Good luck.
Gracious Greetings and Peace be upon you, your family and your people...
I hope to see a day when not only is Iraq democractic, but that Saudi Arabia and Jordan's governments will find democracy (perhaps akin to England which still has it's royal family) and that even Iran will find itself in the hands of it's people.
I wish we were doing more for you. I wish we had power, fuel, safety, etc. for you. I will promise you that I will try to encourage my nation (U.S.) not to depart until we've achieved those goals for your land.
Peace.....and blessings.
- Jason "The Saj"
Democracy....
The illusion of the mass, that allows them to think they are not ruled by the self proclaimed elite.
Democracy is the control-tool of the New World Order.
Bush almost said this himself.
THINK !
Please think!
Understand that you dont have a choice, Bush and the rest of the self proclaimed elite has already chosen for you.
Just think i bit about it.
God save Iraq.
Eric, you are so right! That's it, down with Amerika! No votes, no notes! Saddam Saddam he's our man, if he can't vote, noone can!
Ah, more from Lt. S who is actually out with the Iraqis south of Baghdad, not sitting on his ass in the Green Zone hotels interviewing journalists who interviewed journalists, etc etc etc.
The Iraqi police arrested three knuckleheads who just could not keep low. The morons got into a car and drove around threatening people at polling places. Dimbulbs!
People were in line to vote when a hero of Allah walked up and blew himself and some others up. The peole dived for cover. Then, they helped clean up the dead, civilians volunteered to take the places of poll workers who had been martyred (these are true martyrs), and the people again lined up and stepped over the blood and remaining body parts to continue to vote.
Arab media were “covering” the vote. They were making chiding comments on the whole process. Of course, they have no freedom to comment on their own government; no criticism of the Emirs of Bahrain or Qatar; no comments on Mubarak or Assad. So, one Iraqi, who was dancing in the streets for joy with so many others, started scolding a Bahraini reporter “Go tell the Emir that an Iraqi voted for freedom before a Bahraini did!” Hey, a little international reproof is okay.
So, the Rachels and Bush Lieds and such vermin are being swept away by the tide of history. They may believe that Arabs and Muslims are unworthy and incapable of aspiring to liberty and freedom, but obviously the Iraqis are proving them wrong. They are a piffle, just a pimple on a pig’s ass. They, the Ted (hic!) Kennedys, John (this is a sham) Kerrys, Michael (urp!) Moores and Rachel (gotta find the shit or I'll just die!) a Git in London types of the world are just plain wrong, yet again, and demonstrably so. Imperfect as things are, they are better with life liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Seemingly, something they do not know about.
Speaking of elections, the gubernatorial election here in Far West Ukraine, or Washingkraine, is still in dispute. (I guess we could learn from Iraq here in the People's Republic of King - we'll keep finding votes until our candidate wins - County.) It seems that we now know that the Total Twit, Rachel Corey, who died protecting terrorists and homicide bombers in Gaza, has come back to life! At any rate, she absentee voted this last time around! Wow!
The tide is flowing
Liberty calls
I hear freedom’s echo
In tyrants’ dark halls
Tremble in fear
Awaiting your doom
Swept like dirt
From an opened tomb
Finally, some quotes from the President on staying the course:
Let it be clear--and this is a judgment which the Members of the Congress must finally make--let it be clear that I am asking the Congress and the country to accept a firm commitment to a new course of action, a course which will last for many years and carry very heavy costs…If we are to go only half way, or reduce our sights in the face of difficulty, in my judgment it would be better not to go at all.
Rickvid
You should turn off the fanatism, and try to understand the situation.
Soren, spend less time on the Stroget and more time reading about the real heros of freedom. You can find some in the Resistance Museum. King Christian X was a true hero of freedom.
Buck up, boy. It isn't all Illuminati, Freemasons and secret decoder rings.
Fanatism? Ya'lost me there, boy! Fanatic for liberty? Yep. Sorrowful mope, dour and resigned? Nope.
Kat, you just slay me with your wit and precise analysis.
I recommend Kat's homepage for photos that the BBC, Guardian, Rachels and Bush Lieds and Sorens would prefer you not see. After all, it might make some think that mere Arabs and Muslims are heroic and brave and do want liberty.
Rickvid ya sound like Bush.
If i´ll buck up, will you then promise to make some independent thinking?
TICKLER
File on 4
20:00-20:40 GMT
BBC Radio 4 [See programme entry in alphabetical listing: there will be a "Listen" icon there when the programme is broadcast]
Gerry Northam investigates allegations that much of Iraq's oil wealth has been squandered by incompetence and corruption during the current occupation.
Eg wages paid to "8,000" security guards at one ministry - yet there appear to have been actually only 600.
Those critics who, having opposed the war, reflexively opposed the elections as well, will note the irony of curfews, banned car use and repeated security checks imposed by armed forces in the name of liberty. This election was indeed unique, and far from perfect. When security is moot, so is the question of whether real power is being handed to the winner. For security reasons there were no candidates' names or faces on the ballot papers; only a list of more than 100 parties, among which none-too-transparent negotiations are already under way to form a Shia-dominated coalition that must not only draft a new constitition before a referendum in October, but also run the country until fresh elections when that constitition comes into force two months later.
Yet Iraq's voters have unequivocally put their faith in the representative assembly that will choose successors to Mr Allawi's interim government. That assembly's responsibilities can hardly be overstated. Nor can the new government's challenges, chief among them winning the support of moderate Sunnis whether or not they voted. Attacks by the Sunni-dominated insurgency will doubtless continue, but it can and must be marginalised by ensuring legitimate Sunni intrests are adequately represented in government. The alternative of powersharing by larger Shia and Kurdish blocs at the expense of the Sunnis could still lead to full-blown civil war.
History has yet to rule on the net effect on global security of ousting Saddam Hussein. But this much is clear: The election would not have happened were he still in power. It gave cause for celebration in most of Iraq, and should do so everywhere.
The US really is not in a position to teach/preach democracy.
BREAKING NEWS: Report on Election Irregularities Refutes Exit Poll "Explanation"
Problems found in nearly every post election investigation, all of which favored the re-election of the President, include: voting machine shortages; ballots counted in secret; lost, discarded, and improperly rejected registration forms and absentee ballots; touch-screen machines that registered “Bush” when voters pressed “Kerry”; precincts in which turnout was suspiciously high, including many which had more votes recorded than registered voters;
precincts in which the reported turnout was suspiciously low; and high
rates of “spoiled” ballots and under-votes in which no choice for president was recorded.
Your President does not have a mandate.
http://www.eyes-and-ears.co.uk/u...ls.asp?
ident=37
Gerry Northam
History chose Iraq to be the first arab democracy: both a burden and a privilege: I believe once we will knew why.
This new democratic Iraq is in many ways a new house that needs acclimatisation by it's inhabitants
Uniting symbols pointing out the sacrifices made by the Iraqi pioneers of freedom can help in achieving that at a faster pace.
my proposal: a sober statue with the names of all the soldiers/policemen and even voters who died in the name of freedom for example on the place where in 2003 the statue of saddam went down.
That is if people can reach the statue easy. If the traffic is too heavy then another place is better.
They are the true heroes putting themselves on the line for the sake of the nation: they deserve enduring recognition and fame as inspiring examples of the right fighting spirit.
Your President does not have a mandate.
Rachel, a Brit in London | Email | Homepage | 02.01.05 - 12:45 pm | #
Oh I don't know Rachel......how nice it is to have Bush back in the White House...if only the 22nd Amendment were to be revoked...........
Kerry ? even George Soros regrets backing him........ you are such a cartoon Rachel
This is the sort of thing that can happen, where it is too dangerous for the media to travel around. Found on another forum:
According to reporter Dahr Jamail, the BBC images [by razorwire] of Iraqis described there as "Iraqis queued to vote in the former rebel stronghold of Falluja" actually show Fallujans queing at the main Fallujan checkpoint for the seaching and "processing" they must endure to access what remains of their homes.
Pass it on.
History chose Iraq to be the first arab democracy:
Lebanon next.......
actually show Fallujans queing at the main Fallujan checkpoint for the seaching and "processing" they must endure to access what remains of their homes.
What there are still Fallujans ? I thought they all disappeared in Jenin !
Yes Rachel......an unbiased source
I was born and raised in Houston, Texas and attended college at Texas A&M University where I majored in Speech Communications. After graduating, I moved to Colorado, then Utah, then Washington State where I worked for awhile on a Masters in English Literature. Funds ran out, so I took a job working in an air monitoring laboratory on Johnston Island, a US territory in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. We monitored the air at a chemical demilitarization plant that incinerated 6% of the chemical weapons (now obsolete) of the military.
While there I traveled around the world on my breaks from the monotonous job. The perspective and experiences I gained from my travels opened my mind and heart to the world-seeing the unearned and unfair privilege we in the US had struck me whilst traveling to so many developing countries like Indonesia and Palau, then later Nepal.
I had a calling to move to Alaska to climb Denali. I moved there in 1996, climbed Denali the next summer, and have stayed ever since. There I worked as a mountain guide during summers, as well as assisting in rescues with the park service. My life there for 5 years centered primarily on climbing and being in the mountains. Climbing found me traveling to Mexico, Pakistan, Chile and Argentina.
One of the largest influences on me was a job I took in the climbing off-season which was working as a personal assistant for my dear friend Duane French, who experiences quadriplegia. I saw the efforts he went to just to exist, and how government policy directly affected his life. Here I was awakened politically. Our daily discussions of policy and political parties got my wheels turning, pulling me out of the classic American comfort-zone of apathy and ignorance.
Then of course watching the stealing of the presidency in 2000 by the Bush regime shocked me further into action, followed by the military response to 9/11, then of course the selling of the Iraq invasion. During the media sell job, I could take no more and knew that this was an information war. I had done some freelance writing for various magazines and continued this by writing in our alternative weekly rag in Anchorage.
Do you pester your MP as well with all this obsessional-neurosis ....or just your GP ?
There are predictions Iraq will be democratic but in a hampered way like Russia or Brazil.
Both countries suffer heavily from corruption and in both cases it is crippling the evolvement of a decent civil society.
Corruption often hinders the development of new democratic institutions and it's legitimacy amongst the population.
Maybe Iraq can put up a special department of anti-corruption who 24 hours a day will be checking and persecuting corruption on all levels from the policeman taking bribes till ministers stealing oilrevenues to sell on the black market.
If people are seeing honesty and fairness in their institutions they will be encouraged to play their part in a better Iraq.
Behaviour can be contagious and copied especially from the top down so an effort to be as transparant as possible must be made by the new Iraqi governing structures.
Zeyad,
as you see here the fanatical 'War on Terror' loonies haven't understood the meaning of these first post-Saddam Iraqi elections.
If the results are not rigged, the winners (and Allawi won't be one of them) will have as a first task to heal Iraq & to work for national reconciliation & a national agreement, reaching out to the patriot sectors of the Iraqi resistance and confining the US troops to their camps as a first step in their staged withdrawal.
Your Bushist commentors do not seem to have perceived that these elections mean (thanks be to God) that the 'kicking butt' times are over for Iraq.
No responsible Iraqi national Government, such as the one born out of these elections, would pursue a 'war on terror' against a considerable part of the Iraqi population, or let the foreign occupiers 'in contact' anymore with the Iraqi population (raiding houses, shooting civilians at checkpoints, drowning them into rivers, throwing 500 pounds bombs from the air on Iraqi cities and villages, torturing and shooting prisoners). So your new Government will thank the US a lot, and organise a timetable for the withdrawal of their troops (leaving possibly some 20,000 of them up to the end of the electoral process as an ultimate safeguard against coups), and the release of political prisoners.
The al-Qaidists will then disappear into thin air (or go back to Saudi Arabia).
Wishing all the best to Iraq,
Talking about corruption: I have read that the reason chalabi really fell from grace was that he took the archives from the mukhabarat and used it to blackmail other politicians.
I only have one source for this but apart from whether it's true or not that's exactly the kind of thing one needs to clamp down in the new Iraq.
A new totally independant anti-corruption department could play a part in this (people can for example anonymous give information about governmental crimes and misdemeanors and be certain they won't get hanged for it, on the contrary, people who unveil unjust behaviour will be rewarded).
Can't we bomb Italy? It looks like we missed a few last time.
Can't we bomb Italy? It looks like we missed a few last time.
Anonymous | 02.01.05 - 1:55 pm | #
Anonymous:
All in good time. The genocidal leprecaun killers of Ireland are next on the list.
Timetables for withdrawing foreign troops would be extremely stupid because it's saying to the terrorists: we are now suffocating you but that will stop right then and then.
So the islamists just have to wait till all western troops are out and begin again with renewed vigour their animal games while the local forces lose their backing both in military power and psychologically: don't underestimate the mental factor in this battle.
The only real certainty Iraqi forces have at the moment is the backing of a mighty american army the rest is new and unknown territory.
There is a huge difference in being just canonfodder like under saddam and a highly effective modern soldier whose life counts for something.
The terrorists must be kept totally uncertain about when the american hammer is leaving and in between Iraqi forces needs to get stronger and stronger and stronger also by building confidence in the new institutions.
Soldiers are only effective when they trust in the goals they fight for and the commanders that lead them: That's why the peshmerga's are the best Iraqi fighters at the moment: their succesfull autonomy gained them by experience routine/ confidence and efficiency.
Patience and perseverance is needed in this hour of the struggle.
If there aren't any terror attacks for let's say one and a half year and the Iraqi political process runs smoothly then slowly without too much publicity america can carefully pull back but 25.000/50.000 will even then be necessary for at least a generation.
Nothing wrong that: germany became a sovereign free blooming prosperous nation with till recently 80.000 american soldiers in enormous camps.
(by the way to the benefit of the local economy lately there were protests against withdrawal in some german villages and towns completely depending on american spendings).
South korea and japan idem also became sophisticated beautiful countries with large contigents of american troops.
So after getting utterly smacked down on her idiotic harebrained diatribes about the Iraqi election, the Git in the slime oozes on the produce the usual lies about the American elections.
Haaaaa! What a total vile wretch! Unfathomable, despicable, wicked, debased, degraded villainy.
All in good time. The genocidal leprecaun killers of Ireland are next on the list.
Brave words. I've heard them before, from thousands of species across thousands of worlds, since long before you were created. But, now they are all Borg... er... now they are all Paddies and Micks.
Fools... fools... the Kennedy clan was only a Trojan horse. Bush is our new Paddy in the White House. Ok, admittedly he's from dubious stock (the invader Strongbow and the traitor Mac Mhurchadha), but we have a knack for assimilating people of that ilk... you may call us the Borg-orrah.
Ah..
Rickvid.!! My freind! I see you changed your style.
Last time my post to you was:
[
Rickvid ya sound like Bush.
If i´ll buck up, will you then promise to make some independent thinking?
]
You can of course answer if you like, even though i see you now aspire to even more fanatic burps than what i have seen before.
For those of you who are tired of Rickvids rants and dont know any other iraq bloggers than zeyad, try
http://dahrjamailiraq.com/weblog/
Nice to read different blogs and different opinions from Iraq.
Thats why i read zeyad too.
Blair was elected leader by 15% Labour Party members; and Labour was elected a Government by just 24% eligible voters.............76% did not vote for them
Strong government or representative government... your choice. Tories and Labour both bitch about this when in opposition... so where's the new PR system? Funny how they both lose interest once they are in a position to do something about it.
PeteS. I agree with you.
The Vietnam turnout was good as well
No amount of spin can conceal Iraqis' hostility to US occupation
On September 4 1967 the New York Times published an upbeat story on presidential elections held by the South Vietnamese puppet regime at the height of the Vietnam war. Under the heading "US encouraged by Vietnam vote: Officials cite 83% turnout despite Vietcong terror", the paper reported that the Americans had been "surprised and heartened" by the size of the turnout "despite a Vietcong terrorist campaign to disrupt the voting". ... The echoes of this weekend's propaganda about Iraq's elections are so close as to be uncanny.
CONTINUED
With the past few days' avalanche of spin, you could be forgiven for thinking that on January 30 2005 the US-led occupation of Iraq ended and the people won their freedom and democratic rights. ... How you could square the words democracy, free and fair with the brutal reality of occupation, martial law, a US-appointed election commission and secret candidates has rarely been allowed to get in the way of the hype.
The second layer of spin has been designed to convince us that an overwhelming majority of Iraqis participated. The initial claim of 72% having voted was quickly downgraded to 57% of those registered to vote. So what percentage of the adult population is registered to vote? ... In fact, as UN sources confirm, there has been no registration or published list of electors - all we are told is that about 14 million people were entitled to vote.
CONTINUED
George Bush and Tony Blair made heroic speeches on Sunday implying that Iraqis had voted to approve the occupation. ... The facts on the ground, including the construction of massive military bases in Iraq, indicate that the US is digging in to install and back a long-term puppet regime. For this reason, the US-led presence will continue, with all that entails in terms of bloodshed and destruction.
Zarqawi-style sectarian violence is not only condemned by Iraqis across the political spectrum, including supporters of the resistance, but is widely seen as having had a blind eye turned to it by the occupation authorities. Such attitudes are dismissed by outsiders, but the record of John Negroponte, the US ambassador in Baghdad, of backing terror gangs in central America in the 80s has fuelled these fears,
CONTINUED
An honest analysis of the social and political map of Iraq reveals that Iraqis are increasingly united in their determination to end the occupation. Whether they participated in or boycotted Sunday's exercise, this political bond will soon reassert itself - just as it did in Vietnam - despite tactical differences, and despite the US-led occupation's attempts to dominate Iraqis by inflaming sectarian and ethnic divisions.
Audit reveals abuse of $9bn works funds
Suzanne Goldenberg in Washington
Tuesday February 1, 2005
The Guardian
An official US audit provided evidence yesterday of widespread corruption in postwar Iraq, finding that America's occupation authority failed to keep track of nearly $9bn (£4.8bn) in reconstruction funds.
The scathing report by Stuart Bowen Jr, the inspector general for reconstruction, said that while the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) was careful to monitor the spending of US taxpayers' money in Iraq, it failed to provide proper oversight of projects paid for with Iraq's own funds.
The critique added to warnings from US and international auditors about weak financial controls in Iraq, and growing evidence of cronyism and fraud.
Proof positive that
Bush is a papist
Bush is a Fenian
Bush is a bogtrotter
The new George Bush nickel ...
Reverse side and Obverse side
... plus the secret original design they wouldn't let you see!!!
Bush insists on flying Fenian tricolour in White House and hands bowls of shamrock to bemused visiting dignitaries.
Poor wee Rachel seems to post as she thinks, in bitty little staccato brain farts.
"An official US audit provided evidence yesterday of widespread corruption in postwar Iraq, finding that America's occupation authority failed to keep track of nearly $9bn (£4.8bn) in reconstruction funds."
So even if this were true Rachel (which it isn't) what the hell do you care? It's our money and we can do whatever we want with it.
WHO WON the Iraqi elections? The formal counting won't be over for days. But the result's already clear. Iraq won.
And who lost? Well, a full list would take up all this site, but, for starters, I would say that the people who seemed a little glum yesterday morning include rachael, Saddam Hussein, Robin Cook, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, George Galloway, Osama bin Laden, Douglas Hurd, Bashar al-Assad, Menzies Campbell, Jacques Chirac, BBC News and Current Affairs, Robert Fisk and Sean Penn.
On Sunday Iraq enjoyed freedom. And enjoy seems to be the mot juste. Iraqis celebrated their chance to vote, revelled in it, embraced it. But for Robin, George, Douglas, Menzies, Jacques, Sean, Rachael and those who joined them in opposition to the Iraq war there can't be any great cause for celebration, can there? For none of this happened in their name!
Soren, had enough grun bottles today? I am not quite getting your little brain farts, either.
Son, ya just get all brain-froze up on your little penninsula (or island), eh?
Keep your posts to a reasonable number Rachel or we'll start lobbying Zeyad to ban you again. We've been overly tolerant of your obsession and it's time to rein yourself in.
Tammy, Kev, my dears, recall the mantra:
Lalalala, Bush lied
Lalalala, Amerika is evil
Lalalala, bile and venom
Lalalala, my mind is made up
Lalalala, to hell with facts
Lalalala, Lalalala, Lalalala
Well Kev, if Bush and Blair had followed the advice of Robin Cook, Lord Hurd of Westwell and Menzies Campbell, there would be no elections, no acts of astonishing bravery from Iraqi citizens determined to vote, no hope at all of a democratic and free future, however distant that may seem at the moment.
Instead, Saddam would now be entrenched in power with sanctions lifted and the freedom to use his oil revenues to fund his plan for a renewed and expanded WMD programme.
The al-Qaidists will then disappear into thin air (or go back to Saudi Arabia).
That'll be really helpful !!!! At least they can't do any damage to oil supplies there eh Italian !
Ok, admittedly he's from dubious stock (the invader Strongbow and the traitor Mac Mhurchadha)
Amusing letter in The Guardian the other day showing that geometrically extrapolating back 25 or 32 generations would exceed the population of Ireland making isolating any one family from the gene pool a bit dubious
Strong government or representative government... your choice. Tories and Labour both bitch about this when in opposition... so where's the new PR system? Funny how they both lose interest once they are in a position to do something about it.
PeteS | Email | Homepage | 02.01.05 - 2:44 pm | #
PR is crap....they use it in Northern Ireland to rig the ballot.......no PeteS but having constituencies the same size might start.......it takes 25.000 votes to elect Labour MP; but 40.000-100.000 to elect a Conservative...........and Charles Kennedy has a very small population - is it 12.000 or so ?
No need for PR - just one-man-one-vote in equal size constituencies
Well Kev, if Bush and Blair had followed the advice of Robin Cook, Lord Hurd of Westwell and Menzies Campbell,
Douglas Hurd, formerly of NatWest involved with Milosevic in privatising Serbian assets......also tied into various Arab banks.......the man who refused to aid Bosnia when the Serbs were ethnic-cleansing..........................Mr Trustworthy..........
Menzies Campbell - rent a quote QC..........and Robin cook the man who abandoned The Queen on a State Visit to India to fly home to his Secretary/Mistress..............the man depicted by his scornful wife (now ex-) as being in love with a whisky-bottle
"Problems found in nearly every post election investigation, all of which favored the re-election of the President, include: voting machine shortages; ballots counted in secret; lost, discarded, and improperly rejected registration forms and absentee ballots; touch-screen machines that registered “Bush” when voters pressed “Kerry”; precincts in which turnout was suspiciously high, including many which had more votes recorded than registered voters;
precincts in which the reported turnout was suspiciously low; and high
rates of “spoiled” ballots and under-votes in which no choice for president was recorded."
Again Rachel, what the hell do you care? It wasn't your election. Moreover, it's complete crap. No irregularities were determined in any significant number and I can tell at least one bogus complaint from above. On a touch screen vote, the name appears when touched, but it isn't entered until the voter presses the enter button. So even if Bush's name appears on the touch screen by mistake, the voter can cancel the vote and re-enter the name. Sounds like you're amassing an entire library of fraudulant "facts" Rachel.
Tammy said, It's our money and we can do whatever we want with it.
Do try to keep up, Tammy. It wasn't American money - it was money that already belonged to Iraq - the Americans just happened to find it in Saddam's palaces. And instead of spending it on ensuring a reliable electricity and water supply, say, the US occupiers spent it in all directions around without keeping ANY accounts.
I would not care if it was your money but it wasn't. Your country stole it from Iraq.
All construction funding came from the US government coffers Rachel. None of Saddam's money has yet been spent on Iraqi reconstruction contracts because of legal issues regarding ownership. The only money that has currently been spent in Iraq is that authorized by the US congress.
Do try to keep up Rachel.
You're a moron Rachel.
Thanks for the blog Zeyad. I will continue to read your site with interest. However my infrequent excursions into comment will end.
This has become Rachel's blog site. She prowls through the web looking for proof of her hate. I foolishly have followed up on her suggested reading. Rachel exercises no critical judgement as to the source or the content of material she finds.
Finds some corruption, well that’s a new one, she finds a missing ballot box, unbelievable. She declares the US incapable of winning a punch up so they have to fight from the air, wow The US is capable now of never having to put troops on the ground if they wished to fight and win that way, and are very close to not even having to put pilots in the air. But Rachel has no idea.
Never ending conspiracy theories and distortions repeated over and over.
However as a troll she is very successful. She distracts and angers. She has no sense that she is hogging this site and treating Zeyad as a means to her end, sharing the views of RACHEL with the world. She has no sense that it is Zeyad's efforts and intellect and success that give her a window to others. I am beginning to suspect that she doesn't even read Zeyad, just straight to the comments to do battle with the demons in her life given human form in the other participants and friends of Zeyad.
As I started thanks Zeyad will continue to read you with interest and gratitude. I apologise to the rest of you and myself for being distracted by the madness and hate and pain of this woman.
But I will not be controlled by her anymore
As it is said Rachel, get a life.
Don't leave Ros. We need you as an alternate voice from the Brits. I've enjoyed reading your posts immensely and you and Rick are providing the voice of reason to what would otherwise be just demented blather from Rachel.
...having constituencies the same size might start.......it takes 25.000 votes to elect Labour MP; but 40.000-100.000 to elect a Conservative...........and Charles Kennedy has a very small population - is it 12.000 or so ? No need for PR - just one-man-one-vote in equal size constituencies
Well boo hoo. First past the post would be perfect except... except...
Well, except that the Boundary Commissions set up by the House of Commons (Redistribution of Seats) Act 1944 never worked, and the standard it set up (that single-member constituencies would not deviate by more than 25% from the electoral quota) was abandoned in 1947 at the request of the English Boundary Commission. Forget about gerrymandering ... this was due to practical problems.
No need for PR - just one-man-one-vote in equal size constituencies
Fifty-eight years of trying to balance the constituencies (actually more, but lets not quibble) ... is there maybe a lesson to learn here? What you are trying to achieve is proportionality is it not? ... you are just going about it in a demonstrably failed way.
PR is crap....they use it in Northern Ireland to rig the ballot
Rubbish as usual. (Lets not even go into the history of British boundary commissions and Northern Ireland).
The single transferrable vote version of proportional representation guarantees to the maximum extent possible that your vote is used to elect your "most preferred" candidate. It can also be used to vote against your least preferred candidate ... unlike first past the post where a protest vote is a wasted vote. PR allows your single vote to be distributed among multiple candidates if your first choice does not need all of your vote... your whole vote is used.
People who don't use PR/STV usually don't understand it... but I'll give you the benefit of the doubt.
Washington Post article:
"For the first 14 months of the occupation, officials of the Coalition Provisional Authority provided little detailed information about the Iraqi money, from oil sales and other sources, that it spent on reconstruction contracts. They have said that it was used for the benefit of the Iraqi people and that most of the contracts paid from Iraqi money went to Iraqi companies."
The money that DID come from Iraq's CPA did not come from Saddam's accounts, but from Iraqi oil sales. And as the article from the Washington Post states, Iraqi money granted for projects by the Iraqi authorities has gone to Iraqi companies.
Rachael, will you pack it in, you are embarrassing us Brit's. Do us a favour and have a look at BBC's ceefax....page 110, will ya..When you have read it, will you then please piss off, you are so boring with your pathetic attempts of debating.....read kev's post above....have you noticed that the people on kev's list has shut the fuck up, except you!
Rachel,
There's nothing left for you to do.
The US election is our business, not yours.
The elections in Iraq are under UN guidelines and supervision, so go complain to them. If you feel the US has stolen Iraq's money, tell the UN to put it on their list of investigations right after the oil for food report.
Otherwise, Iraq is a soverign state with duly elected representatives all sanctioned nice and legal like by your marvelous UN; there is no need for insurgency unless they and you want to overthrow an elected government. So take a hike. Iraqis will tell the world what they want. It ought to be obvious they can speak and stand up for themselves. Go join a knitting club.
Sorry Tammy, that was very self indulgent of me. I do know however that to argue with Rachel is like the saying, "punching sponge rubber' No rebuttal is acknowledged, the same venom is repacked and trotted out again. I note from her presence everywhere that she will move it to another post or wait until there are some new voices and shout it again.
I keep telling myself to observe the scroll the trolls message. And I have no problem with others trying to have a go. But the woman's ego dominates, solipsism writ large. So Tammy I do get value from the others and appreciate the information and thoughts that they share. I will however show some self control and never speak of Rachel again or any matter she raises. I will view the voluminous tripe as a blank space that just has to be scrolled past. It would be nice if some clever soul out there could write something that increased the ability of us commenters to manage the flow of information that we get. Say that I could at my own computer have an agent that allows me to say show all except. Anybody got a clue? Techcentral has a comments setup where the comments respond directly to a particular comment. It lists them and the name of the contributor, so you can just click on the commenter and the comment that you want to read. So Rachel and you just select the next one. It also emails you to tell you that a comment has been posted in response to you. Again Rachel, delete rather than follow up. It means too that there is some control of the discussion, in that Rachel's use of this site to discuss her obsessions would die. She could post it but it can be ignored, just not seen. The others can just continue their correspondence about the issues that they choose and that the blogger has introduced. No mad conspiracy theories. Unfortuantely it is very slow and loses the spontaneity of this site and therefore the rapid dissemination of information that occurs.
So back to can anyone improve the haloscan so that we have some control over our interaction with others. It would help with those sick cyberstalkers as well.
"An official US audit provided evidence yesterday of widespread corruption in postwar Iraq, finding that America's occupation authority failed to keep track of nearly $9bn (£4.8bn) in reconstruction funds."
The CPA is an IRAQI authority Rachel. It is not the "AMERICAN" authority. If the CPA does not do a good job in it's accounting, that's their affair, not ours. We can offer our help, but ultimately the Iraqis are free to make their own gains, and their own mistakes.
That's always an option Ros. It was done on Hammorabi's once. But I'm glad to know you're not leaving us. I would sorely miss you and Rick.
Zeyad
congradulations on mention on BBC last night, if you manage ot read this far down + well done on elections
alan
Congratulations and it is great to hear from you.
Stay safe!
"The CPA is an IRAQI authority Rachel. It is not the "AMERICAN" authority. If the CPA does not do a good job in it's accounting, that's their affair, not ours. We can offer our help, but ultimately the Iraqis are free to make their own gains, and their own mistakes".
If I'm not mistaken, CPA stood for 'Coalition Provisional Authority', led by Gauleiter Bremer...
I.e., the US.
Not the Iraqis, at all!
Rachel is not a true Brit-she is a Baathist and her boyfriend is an insurgent. She likes to frighten the Iraqis by saying so many negative things about Iraq, the US etc. Do not believe a thing she spews. She is just sorry she lost her sugar daddy Saddam.
@John - Netherlands, 02.01.05 - 2:17 pm.
First, I'm quite puzzled on why you do not wonder at all about what the opinion on the matter of our host Zeyad might be.
Second, what you call 'the Islamists' (forgetting that al-Sistani, Sadr & Co., the winners of the elections, are Islamist as well)are probably (I'm trying to understand what you said) the Wahabi al-Qaidists. In Iraq they are between 1,500 and 5,000 at the very most, foreigners included, and nobody likes or support them, since in their cynical disregard for the lives of Iraqi civilians they are no better than the US forces. If the cover they use not to be exterminated by the Iraqi resistance itself, namely, the very oppressive presence of the US occupation troops, were blown, they would have no chances at all, anyway.
Third, you write "Soldiers are only effective when they trust in the goals they fight for and the commanders that lead them". Yes, precisely, that's why the present-day ING (called by most Iraqis 'the un-National Guard') was up to now so ineffective; they very well knew that up to the day an elected Government takes control they have no legitimacy at all; nobody is very keen to die as the cannon-fodder of foreign occupiers, namely, the Americans.
Fourth, you write "Patience and perseverance is needed in this hour of the struggle. If there aren't any terror attacks for let's say one and a half year and the Iraqi political process runs smoothly then slowly without too much publicity america can carefully pull back but 25.000/50.000 will even then be necessary for at least a generation". Tell that to the Iraqis, most of whom voted for parties promising to end the US occupation as soon as possible! The Iraqis had more than enough of a struggle in these past forty years, don't you think? And instead of fighting their countrymen who didn't vote, possibly they should strive for national reconciliation and start rebuilding & healing Iraq... The 'struggle' in Iraq has now to cease. And the best way to start doing it is, precisely, to send the US occupiers home.
@Ros
Glad to see you are staying. I actually meant to comment earlier on your post of 01.31.05 - 4:07 pm ... I think you made some very good points about the merits and drawbacks of this sort of blog. Especially, you pointed out its fragility and susceptibility to interference. I wonder if that is the nature of the beast ... after all, if you were to discover a blog whose author posted information of interest to would-be insurgents and bombers you might consider it your duty to disrupt it... regardless of the negative attention you would draw to yourself. Consider how various Americans saw it as a duty to carry out a denial of service attack on english.aljazeera.net when it first went live. Perhaps some see it as an Allah-given duty to do the same here.
Regarding your post of 02.01.05 - 5:24 pm ... one minor observation is that people often seem effectively incapable of "scrolling the trolls"... the funniest phenomenon is the inability to resist the "I'm ignoring you now" message. However, the main point is that whatever about modifying the haloscan software to "personalise" your blog-reading experience -- which would require co-operation from haloscan -- it sounds like a relatively straightforward proposition to provide such filtering from another web or desktop-based application. The comment format here is relatively easily parsable ... I wrote stuff months ago to automatically download all of Zeyad's comments sections (also those of Alaa, the Mesopotamian) and perform various statistical analyses of comment patterns, e.g. most prolific commenters by frequency and comment size etc. Identifying and filtering out "unwanted" comments based on coarse criteria would probably not be too difficult. For instance, a function to "display blogger's latest post plus associated comments less those written by people I don't want to read" would probably take a half hour to write. However, as you pointed out in yours of 01.28.05 - 7:25 am, there are more appropriate ways to eliminate problem commenters but which, unfortunately place more administrative burden upon the blog writer.
An Italian,
Did you see Ali Fadhil's predictions? He doesn't think Allawi will be elected either.
The Unified Coalition List: 30-35%
Allawi's list: 20-25%
Itihad Al Sha'ab (the communist party): 10-15%
The Kurdish Alliance: 10-15%
Al Yawir: 4-5%
Al Pachachi: 2-3%
Other Kurdish parties, Turkmen and other minorities: 4-5%
Small democratic parties: 4-5%
Individuals and others: 1-2%
Ali thinks the front runner is Hussein Al Shahristani, a nuclear sientist from the Unified Alliance. That name is ringing a bell with me. It seems like his name was brought forward for some position before. I wish I could remember.
"If I'm not mistaken, CPA stood for 'Coalition Provisional Authority', led by Gauleiter Bremer...
I.e., the US.
Not the Iraqis, at all!"
As I recall, the CPA (members elected by Iraqis) was turned over to the Iraqis in the middle of 2004 and has been governed by the Iraqis since then.
Awesome. Congratulations. Thanks. I linked your post:
Life More Abundant: The Elections - In the Words of Iraq
Hello
see my recent 3 posts.
my blog=http://iraqidoctor.blogspot.com
"Consider how various Americans saw it as a duty to carry out a denial of service attack on english.aljazeera.net when it first went live. Perhaps some see it as an Allah-given duty to do the same here."
You really are a horse's ass aren't you Pete?
I would maintain that very few of us "Amerikans" on Zeyad's blog have any inclination to deny aljazeerah's operations on the net, and don't have any inclination to deny same to anyone with an an objective mind.
We do, however, have an objection to those that have a concentrated desire to propogate a hatred for Americans world-wide AND for those abetting anti-american factions throughout the world.
Excuse us for being a little sensitive, but we don't really like having our innocents blown to bits on a calm September day, or in the middle of Baghdad where the people sworn to protect our country are busy, instead, trying to protect Iraqi citizens from fatal harm.
But as Ireland is prennially neutral, and that translates into the fact everyone else in the world has the duty to protect your ass from harm, (chiefly the Brits), I suppose you can afford to appear condescending and surrepticiously judgmental.
I've been musing about what sort of mental calculus must be occupying the minds of the Iraqi insurgents post election. Unlike Zarqawi and his merry band of psychopaths, those ex Baathists probably have family and friends who are sporting purple thumbs. It is probably dawning on some of them that they cannot defeat the force that is the determined courage of millions of Iraqis. I know I'm incurably optimistic, but I am staying alert for evidence that they are laying down their arms and rejoining civil society.
Congratulations to you and all Iraq. Whatever the future this is a victory for all decent men and women from the people of Iraq.
Thanks!
@Bridget, 02.01.05 - 8:58, 9:02 & 10:04 pm.
Yes, I read Alì Fadhil's predictions. I wonder in which list two of the Fadhil brothers were candidates (either Allawi's or al-Yawer's, I'd bet). They didn't tell their readers (or the Iraqi voters, at that).
As for al-Shahristani, the US (& the UN Brahimi) in June wanted to have him either as President or PM of the 'Interim Government', but he refused.
As for the Iraqi insurgents (not the crazy al-Qaidists, who'll move out of Iraq pronto), if the new Government declares that it wants to solve the situation in political terms (as opposed to Allawi's sabre-rattling & to Bush's 'bring them on') and in an inclusive way, and if it arranges for the Coalition troops to start withdrawing (getting out of the cities & stopping any patrols as a first step), then I think the insurgency will end. Apart from a few Saddam fanatics (who are surely a risible minority in the resistance), provided that there are guarantees that the occupation is going to end, that the prisoners are released & compensation paid to the killed & maimed by the US, and that there will be political space for them in a democratic Iraq, the bulk of the insurgents may well take part in the next electoral appointments.
@Tammy, 02.01.05 - 9:03 pm.
"As I recall, the CPA (members elected by Iraqis) was turned over to the Iraqis in the middle of 2004 and has been governed by the Iraqis since then".
No, Tammy, you are dead WRONG (& it doesn't surprise me one bit, from the Web encounters we had earlier on)!
As its very name says (to everybody but you), the Coalition Provisional Authority, led by Bremer, was a US thing (with one or two Brits as window-dressing). It ruled Iraq May 2003 to June 2004, then it was dissolved. It had no Iraqi members; neither its members were elected by ANY Iraqi. The $9 million of 'displaced' funds have to do with the CPA, NOT with any Iraqi.
So your post was quite stupid & misinformed.
Zeyad,
Congratulations to you and all Iraqis on the election turnout.
Quite often, over the past several months, I have read your blog and noticed that you seemed pessimistic regarding the chances of Iraq achieving democracy.
But this post of yours, in the aftermath of the election, is all positive. I hope your optimism continues and that this optimism is well-founded.
An Italian,
Regarding the billions of dollars "unaccounted for" in Iraq.....
I listened to an interview of Paul Bremer yesterday. He explained that he did not spend this money using the normal safeguards because it would have caused long delays in appropriating the money and that such delays would have had a terrible impact on Iraq's economy, already "flat on its back," as Bremer noted.
Bremer also said that he wanted Iraqis to spend the money instead of having Americans spend it all, even if the result might be less "accountablity" to the American taxpayer.
You can make up your own mind on this, of course. Some people are determined to take an anti-American attitude towards everything.
@PeteS,
"You really are a horse's ass aren't you Pete?", & "I suppose you can afford to appear condescending and surrepticiously [=surreptitiously] judgmental" (Tammy, 02.01.05 - 9:49 pm).
Do not get angry with poor Tammy; you should know by now that she is just a Baboon (yes, I know, in the Emerald Island baboons are to be found only in zoos, and haven't got Internet access!).
I believe the Fadhil brothers had their own list of 12 names, with Ali being at the top of the list and Mohammed second. If they ever joined anyone else's list, they never said so. I had the sense that Ali has tried to distance himself from Allawi a bit, so I would be surprised to learn that he had joined Allawi's list. However, I would be very pleased to learn that one or both of them had done so and been placed highly enough to obtain a seat.
Sistani will be pulling many of the strings of the new government, and he strikes me as a brilliant man with the potential to be a great statesman. If he is the man I think he is, many of the steps you describe are going to take place because they are the things that should happen, not because the insurgents demand it. I don't know why you seem to think that most Americans would object to an inclusive new government and an orderly and sensible end to the occupation, one that insure Iraq is able to defend against both internal enemies and external.
@Mark, 02.01.05 - 11:10 pm.
"You can make up your own mind on this, of course. Some people are determined to take an anti-American attitude towards everything".
I haven't 'made my mind up' on this matter at all (neither did I comment on it).
I was just answering to some rather gross factual inaccuracy (the CPA being... 'Iraqi'! LOL!) that an American Bushist (an exceptionally stupid one, I have to admit) brought forward in order to attack another poster (& the poor idiotic thing had the cheek to reiterate it!).
George F. Will wrote:
"Isn't it pretty to think so?" Those concluding words of Hemingway's "The Sun Also Rises," a novel of postwar disillusion, became a generation's verbal shrug, expressing weary melancholy after a war waged to make the world safe for democracy. Eighty years on, there of course remain reasons for wondering whether Iraq's stride toward popular sovereignty will lead to a durable and admirable democracy. But it is a humbling privilege for the rest of us to share the planet with the defiant Iraqis who campaigned and voted, and the coalition's superb warriors who made voting possible.
@Bridget, 02.01.05 - 11:20 pm.
From what one could possibly surmise from an ITM post after the 'Alì split' in late December, their 12 candidates list was withdrawn due to negotiations to include some of their candidates (which ones I do not know, but they said they were different from those on the Website) in a bigger list. The results of such negotiations were not revealed. Hope your friends will clear up the mystery, one day.
You write, "I don't know why you seem to think that most Americans would object to an inclusive new government and an orderly and sensible end to the occupation".
Of course I don't think that of 'most Americans', but of the present American Administration. If (according to the PNAC project, and to reality on the ground) they want to keep 12 to 14 permanent bases in Iraq (they are building them), and to attack other ME countries (Iran, Syria, Lebanon, you name them - from what they themselves are saying) using Iraq as a launching pad, any sort of really democratic 'inclusive Government' in Iraq, with no US occupation, would be unwelcome by now.
Much better a long-lasting insurgency or civil war (better if sectarian, with the Sunnis against the Shias), with the US military 'helping the democratic Govt.' of their choice, Vietnam-like, 'staying the course'. To that end even the usage of 'death squads' & false flag operations could be countenanced (we saw the beginnings of it - and the personalities of both Allawi & Negroponte are not exactly reassuring on this point).
I do truly hope I am mistaken.
Those concluding words of Hemingway's "The Sun Also Rises," a novel of postwar disillusion, became a generation's verbal shrug, expressing weary melancholy after a war waged to make the world safe for democracy.
Oh, nonsense. Hemingway's pessimism was a pose adopted from Joseph Conrad - the most influential English novelist of the period before WWI. Hemingway had fun during the war, and most of the 'lost generation' writers didn't even fight.
George Will pretends to greater erudition than he possesses.
An Italian,
You need to lay off the spy novels for a while.
Relax for a moment and realize that the United States, along with its coalition allies like Great Britain and other nations, toppled one of the world's most brutal dictators and has assisted the Iraqi people in developing democracy in Iraq.
For this the Bush administration ought to be praised, not scorned, in my opinion.
Perhaps you think Saddam should still be in power?
Italian,
"June 2004, then it was dissolved. It had no Iraqi members; neither its members were elected by ANY Iraqi'
The fund misuse brought up by Rachel today has been directly linked to the Iraqi iterim government under IRAQI control, not BREMER's control. The US turned over control to the interim government in mid-2004. The contracts in question were granted by the IRAQI interim government. All contracts using US funds have been coordinated under full US auditing practices and disclosures. The only funds now in question were directly under Iraqi control.
Shows you how wrong you can be doesn't it Italian. Incidentally. You forgot to change your nom de plume Italian from "little pervert" to Italian.
I suspected that was you playing your little game all along. Perhaps you should write for Penthouse magazine when you're not being playing at being spiritual advisor at a local California Mosque.
"I was just answering to some rather gross factual inaccuracy (the CPA being... 'Iraqi'! LOL!) that an American Bushist (an exceptionally stupid one, I have to admit) brought forward in order to attack another poster (& the poor idiotic thing had the cheek to reiterate it!)."
The CPA sure as hell weren't American Italian. They were IRAQI! Born and bred. They were intially appointed by the Coalition from IRAQI citizens and IRAQI ex-patriates. I'd call that Iraqi myself, but what are you trying to hide?
And I'd leave off the "baboon" comment. You've been using it as Not-Anonymous, and several other personalities. It IDs you as Jeff from New York said, "like DNA".
Also Italian/Amer
I'm not a Bushist. I'm an unaffliated voter with tendencies to vote Democratic.
@All.
Could somebody (of any faction) please disabuse this lame & rotten troll Tammy ("You've been using it as Not-Anonymous, and several other personalities") once & for all, in the name of truth & decency?
And, by the way, childish scumbag & lying baboon Tammy, "The CPA [Coalition Provisional Authority] sure as hell weren't American Italian. They were IRAQI! Born and bred". Ooooh yeah!
How can anybody be lying so openly & absurdly?
Only a Troll.
Strange, though, that this rather illiterate Troll Tammy shows up & targets me when I cross some 'red line' of things some 'people' wouldn't like to be said & read... Like when I passed on the 'outing' of that other not so innocent troll Jeffrey Schuster, or when I talked about the Italian military in Nasiryia, or when I mentioned the US 'dirty tricks' in Vietnam & Italy (and, now, in Iraq). As this I wrote just above, addressed to another poster: "Much better a long-lasting insurgency or civil war (better if sectarian, with the Sunnis against the Shias), with the US military 'helping the democratic Govt.' of their choice, Vietnam-like, 'staying the course'. To that end even the usage of 'death squads' & false flag operations could be countenanced (we saw the beginnings of it - and the personalities of both Allawi & Negroponte are not exactly reassuring on this point)".
I submit this to Zeyad's attention. Maybe establishing some form of e-mail registration for this comments page wouldn't be so wrong, after all...
People who don't use PR/STV usually don't understand it... but I'll give you the benefit of the doubt.
PeteS | Email | Homepage | 02.01.05 - 4:41 pm | #
Unfortunately PeteS I understand the voting systems, and the d'Hondt Formula......I just find it strange that the United Kingdom has different voting systems in different parts....Mitterand changed the system in France to PR and then back to FPTP to gain party adcvantage..........why Scotland has 72 MPs is unclear, and why why the UK has 661 MPs is unclear with 33% of them on the Government payroll.............Scotland is the most over-represented part of these islands with higher per capita public spending than even Northern Ireland.................................PR means List.....List means the Party chooses the candidates
childish scumbag & lying baboon Tammy
"An Italian" calls people monkeys, baboons, niggers, and all sorts of delightful terms........he/she/it constantly hurls abuse.....it is reminiscent of those Blackshirts/Brownshirts of the past..........using such terminology is indicative of the mental state of this individual........clearly if a suitably extremist ideological party came along An Italian would be there throwing rocks and abusing anyone who did not agree totally with 'The Way'.............
Zeyad in case you are reading my comment which i doubt of :P
I've changed my blog name
"An Italian" calls people monkeys, baboons, niggers, and all sorts of delightful terms"
and furthermore has the cheek to call other posters "trolls", demanding that Zeyad take action against them. The spirit of 'Il Duce' lives on!
For some light relief, have a look at this article written by an "expert" on Afghanistan in October 2001.
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/p...-
102273,00.html
Apparently, the war in Afghanistan was doomed to failure because the Afghan mujahadeen would rally round the Taleban to defeat the US and its Northern Alliance stooges. Is this not similar to some of the pro-insurgency propaganda being spouted by 'Il Duce' and others? Fortunately, the Iraqi people have rallied to the ballot boxes rather than the insurgents. They are also supporting their brave soldiers, who
are growing in numbers and effectiveness every day because of the first-class training they are getting from their US and British allies.
oh rachel stuff it will you ? As an Iraqi I am sick and tired of reading your comments. Iraq does not need the likes of you to advocate for our cause. I am not gonna bother commenting more on your silly posts cause I see the people here are doing a fine job of it already. Just wanted to tell to all those binladin-anti-war- saddam apologists - jazeera loving - suicidal terrorists : LEAVE MY COUNTRY ALONE !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Congradulations to Iraq and it's first step into the democratic era after so long.
I see the standard nay-sayers have made thier regular appearance and neeped into the ultrasonic about Bushitlerhallibutonnegroponteirancontratwoallbeefp
attiesspecialsaucelettucecheese and other such drivel. Get a mit and catch a clue: No one is listening to you at this point. Nor do you deserve to be listened to, since you 'agruement' is retreaded arguments from thirty to fourty years ago.
It is my hope that we hold the line and help Iraq stabilize itself. There are many in the world who do not want Iraq to succeed. Some are next door neighbors. Some live in New York and the EU. Treat them as what they are and things will be far clearer.
To a Finer World.
we'll have a proper gander later, when the dust dies down!
Not only is that picture not of a real black American human being (but of a toy soldier doll) - cf very clear images on the Raed in the Middle blog, judge for yourself - the hoax appears to have been mounted by someone who cannot read or write Arabic. Someone has pointed out, on Raed's blog earlier today: "look at the writing in the back it is drawn not written the whole thing is a hoax from somebody that doesn't read or write in Arabic!!!"
Another comment says, "The whole thing is just a hoax perpetrated by
deceitful Americans ... To try to get Arab media to fall for the hoax and
publish details as if it was a true story, thus allowing the American
demons to label Arab media as sources of false information ... To try to
drum up interest in the toy itself as doubtless thousands of them remain in
American warehouses as the slump in recruitment to U.S. armed forces in
America's black communities meant that 'little black Uncle Sam
cannon-fodder dolls' were not selling like the proverbial hot cakes over
the kafir's Christmas season. ... To try to make the American public not
care if their soldiers are captured or killed as most Americans are so dumb
they will now probably dismiss any further real accounts of their soldiers' deaths or capture as hoaxes too." And,
"To inadvertently reveal to anyone who reads between the lines that the
so-called messages allegedly emanating from so-called 'terrorist groups' in
Iraq posted on that website are most likely the products of American
intelligence sources too. 'American intelligence' is like that - stupid."
Sounds plausible. Of course, the hoaxer might have been trying to make a fool of the US media.
Sorry, that anonymous at 4:42 was me.
thank you for posting our thoughts. i have so little faith in what i see reported on the news it is good to hear it from a party that is involved. reading your thoughts moved me to tears. i am hopeful that things will start to get better.
d-
an american in baghdad
Tammy, the CPA was headed up by Bremer. Please check your facts, instead of wriggling and twisting. Honestly, you are shamefully sloppy and irresponsible.
Ambassador L. Paul Bremer, III was named Presidential Envoy to Iraq on May 6, 2003 and in this capacity is the Administrator of the Coalition Provisional Authority.
Tammy, focus:
"The Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) is the name of the temporary governing body which has been designated by the United Nations as the lawful government of Iraq until such time as Iraq is politically and socially stable enough to assume its sovereignty. The CPA has been the government of Iraq since the overthrow of the brutal dictatorship of Saddam Hussein and his deeply corrupt Baath Regime in April of 2003.
In addition to protecting Iraqi territorial integrity and working to provide security to the Iraqi people, the CPA has committed itself to rebuilding all aspects of Iraqi Infrastructure so that, upon turnover to the first democratically elected government Iraq has ever known, that government will assume authority over a country ready, both internally and externally, to function economically, provide basic services to its citizens, provide for its own defense, and to play a responsible role in the international community of nations.
The Authority is a coalition of many Nations from all over the world, encompassing every major religion and ethnic group. It is led by the United States and the United Kingdom. A list of the nations which are part of this multi-national coalition of states which have undertaken to play a role in the financial, material and military assistance of Iraq is available here.
According to the Agreement of November 15th, 2003 between the CPA and the Iraqi Governing Council, by June 30, 2004 the new transitional administration will be recognized by the Coalition, and will assume full sovereign powers for governing Iraq. Upon this transfer, the CPA will dissolve." [My emboldening - see, Tammy, CPA was not handed over the the Iraqis to run.]
Note also, the US doesn't mind roping in the UN when this suits her aims - see above, temporary governing body which has been designated by the United Nations.
Americans finest in overkill mode again.
Anger as American troops kill four inmates in jail riot
American troops killed four detainees and injured six others to quell a riot in a prison camp in British-controlled southern Iraq.
The deaths, on the day the elections were held, drew an angry response from the Iraqi interim government who demanded the troops should be put on trial if they were found to have used excessive force.
The US authorities said the soldiers had used "lethal force" on the inmates corralled into compounds, surrounded by razor wire, at Camp Bucca after failing to quell rioting. They also admitted that no American soldiers had been seriously injured by stones thrown by the inmates and the disturbance had lasted just 45 minutes before the decision was taken to open fire.
Bakhtiar Amin, the Human Rights minister, said he has sent a delegation to the camp in southern Iraq to investigate. "If we are convinced there was no justification for the degree of force used then we want them to be tried," he said. "If there is a mistake, then those in charge should be brought to account."
British military officers said that they were "disturbed" by the Americans resorting to live rounds so quickly, but claimed they were in no position to intervene. Camp Bucca, near Umm Qasar, holds 5,300 prisoners - more than Abu Ghraib jail in Baghdad - some of whom have been detained for more than a year without trial.
There have been repeated allegations of abuse at the prison, which had not attracted the publicity generated by the cases at Abu Ghraib. On at least one occasion in the past British soldiers have complained that Americans had shot prisoners held in "cages".
... Allegations of abuse at Camp Bucca have been made by detainees and military personnel. One prisoner, Hossam Shaltout, a Canadian citizen and US resident, said inmates were regularly beaten and humiliated - stripped naked and made to simulate sexual acts. In a compensation claim filed by his US lawyer, Mr Shaltout said guards had placed scorpions on his bound body. He alleged that Military Police Master Sergeant Lisa Girman had punched him and kneed him in the groin after he went on a hunger strike.
Withdrawal of american troops is absolutely no solution because the enemy they fight is fighting not only the infidel americans but just about everybody who is not a completely deranged or miserably misled hardcore sunni.
That means if the americans leave the terrorists will attack the rest of Iraq even more than they are already doing now.
That's one reason another reason is that also goodwilling Iraqi's must learn to deal with each other's wishes on a democratic basis: that's a totally new concept for the islamic world in general and the arab world in particular and they need a mighty supervisor to prevent them for unnecessary mistakes like sjiites pushing a religious agenda and the kurds pushing independance too much.
Also secular Iraqi's deserve their "right to party" in the new Iraq.
That's the core question: How get every Iraqi enough for themselves without hampering the rights of others too much.
Iraqi democracy is (pretty literally) a newborn baby that needs nurturing for a long time to grow up to a sensible rational adult.
You don't leave a beautiful but extremely vulnerable baby to itself, especially after a very painful difficult pregnancy of almost 2 years.
It would be criminal neglect in my opinion.
As with humans the next few years will decide to what kind of adult Iraqi democracy will grow up which not only depends on america but even more on Iraqi's themselves:
I said it earlier: are they able to jump over their own shadow.
They showed tremendous courage in voting: I hope they show the same courage in compromise when necessary.
If everybody wants his way without taking care of others nobody gets his way (besides a few in control desperately oppressing calls for more justice).
The culture of everybody against everybody combined with a stifling sectarian group pressure must change in working together when needed combined with lot's of room for unique individualism.
Not the tribe you belong to must define your indentity but the life you chose.
It's often put aside as too western: I think it's deep down the best way for all humankind.
And because basically everybody is the same it can be reached by all people when they really really want it.
It requires lot's of sacrifices in the beginning but many many rewards in the end.
John - Netherlands: I don't know why you underestimate the Iraqis' own ability to deal with the terrorism. If the US pull out - and they MUST - then Muslims will be dealing with Muslims; the US presence is a destabilising factor. As our new Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, Sir Ian Blair, has said: it is communities that fight terrorism, and the police are there to back them up.
The US presence in Iraq is a "honeypot" for would-be martyrs. Apart from costing the US billions of dollars and the lives of thousands of their sons and daughters.
Rachel, a Brit in London can be reached at
Western Way
Thamesmead
London
SE28 OEB
Tel: 020 8331 4400
Fax: 020 8331 4401
http://www.hmprisonservice.gov.u...%2C15%2C254%
2C0
Visiting information for Belmarsh can be seen below.
Social Visits
Saturdays: 09:00 to 11:00 (Ordinary and VP prisoners)
Mon - Fri: 14:00 to 16:00 (Wednesday VPs only)
Weekends and Bank Holidays: 14:00 to 15:45
Additional Information:
Visits must be prebooked at least 24 hours in advance. To book a visit please call 020 8331 4768. Ramand prisoners are entitled to 2 visits per week. Convicted prisoners can have 2 visiting orders per month. A visiting order must be received before booking a visit to a convicted prisoner. Up to 3 adults may visit a prisoner at one time (plus children). Please arrive 30 minutes before the visit time.
Official Visits:
Mon to Fri (except Bank Holidays): 09:15 to 11:30 and 14:00 to 16:15. Evening sessions are limited to Counsel Visits from 17:15 to 18:45.
Booking Information
Social Visits:
Booking number: 020 8331 4768.
Open Mon to Fri: 8.00 - 16:30
Sat: 8:30 - 15:45
Sun: 13:00 - 16:00
Closed lunchtimes.
Legal Visits:
Booking number: 020 8331 4768
Open Mon to Fri: 8.00 - 16:30
Closed lunchtimes.
Visitor Centre
Belmarsh have a visitor centre with facilities that can be used before or after a visit. These include a refreshment bar, childrens play area, toilets and baby changing area. The staff and volunteers will be happy to help with questions you may have.
How to get there:
* The nearest stations are Woolwich Arsenal and Plumstead. Catch a bus from Woolwich Arsenal station to the prison, or walk from Plumstead station.
* From Woolwich Arsenal Station catch the 244 bus to the prison. The bus stops are situated directly outside the exit from the railway station
* Approach from M25 Dartford Bridge/Tunnel:
o Heading South - over Bridge: Take first slip road immediately after tolls, (NB head for 4 left hand tolls when coming over the bridge). Signposted A206. First exit at roundabout and come over the motorway. Then to * (below):
o Heading North - towards tunnel: Take last exit (Junction 1) before tunnel signposted A206 Crayford/Erith. Then to * (below):
+ *: Roundabout over M25 - signposted A206 Crayford/ Erith. University Way.
+ Roundabout end of University Way/ dual carriageway signposted A206 Crayford / Erith.
+ Into Bexley / single carriageway / roundabout.
+ 4th exit signposted Erith A206 Crayford/Erith
Roundabout end dual carriageway
+ 2nd exit signposed Woolwich/ Thamesmead A206
+ Roundabout 2nd exit signposted A2016 Thamesmead, Plumstead, Woolwich
+ Series of roundabouts signposted A2016 Thamesmead, Plumstead, Woolwich
+ Dual carriagew
Rachel in The Guardian
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/h...03702%
2C00.html
John - Netherlands: I don't know why you underestimate the Iraqis' own ability to deal with the terrorism. If the US pull out - and they MUST - then Muslims will be dealing with Muslims; the US presence is a destabilising factor.
The Iraqi President said yesterday that US troops (and other members of the coalition) should stay.
Iraq's diplomat to the United Kingdom was on the show BBC Newsnight two evenings ago and said that American troops are not a luxury at this point, they are a must.
Rachel,
Don't you get it?
America has the most powerful military in the entire world and Iraq needs America's help to defeat the vicious terrorists.
No wonder Iraq's president doesn't agree with you.
But you don't give a fig about the Iraqi people, do you?
You wanted Saddam to remain in power.
http://www.drudgereport.com/
Is this for real ? They kidnapped GI Joe and threatened him in a video ?
How about we sure Rachel for plagarism. I mean, she lifts entire articles from other sources without permission. This is illegal in the UK too, is it not?
Rachel,
you are very wrong about thinking the terrorists only fight americans: they hate and want to destroy everybody that isn't a hardline sunni.
They probably hate kurds and sjiites even more than americans and jews. The last ones get at least some "respect" (better awe) because of their might and military power.
They fear the day Iraqi sjiites and kurds will be strong enough to crush them. Then their cause will be lost forever. Especially if the sjiites and kurds are smart enough to get the moderate sunni's on their side.
They are arab fascists and even your fierce anti-americanism wouldn't help you if you would be in their hands.
Remember the (rather anti-american) british woman who did only peaceful good things for Iraq:It didn't make a difference at all: they slaughtered her anyway.
The BBC website is publishing the election diaries of several Iraqis and a US soldier. The election day entry of Lt Bryan Suits indicates that some Iraqis are grateful to the US for the sacrifices its soldiers have made on their behalf. Check out the link below.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middl...ast/
4225889.stm
Homer from London. I have been reading Lt Bryan Suits' entries for some months, whenever the BBC does one of the Iraq diary things. His rather complacent reports do not "chime" with most other accounts.
Anonymous, at 02.02.05 - 7:56 am, is probably Rick, because he appears to be fixated upon HMP Belmarsh. Anyone turning up there - or ringing them - looking for me is going to look like a deranged nincompoop.
Parallels with 1984 (the book by George Orwell)
Someone has at last done the legwork for this (and the rest of us a favour) - cf the Democratic Underground forums - in the US/Iraq context.
* Forced suppression of sexual desires = abstinence only education [but contrast with sexual torture by US guards at Abu Ghraib etc, see "double think", below]
* War with Eastasia/Eurasia = War on terror
* hanging of records = changing of reasons for war on Iraq
* Double think = war is peace, invasion and occupation is liberation, etc.
* Thoughtcrime = branding anyone not toting party line as "unpatriotic"
* Room 101 = Abu Gharib/Gitmo/Camp Bucca
* Newspeak = the simplicity and narrow range of vocabulary used to tout gov't programs
* [US] Government lies about how it has increased literacy rate, living conditions, and economic conditions.
* Outer Party = lower Republican party members - useful idiots
* Proles = the rest - poor, immigrants
* Government surveillanace = Patriot Act
* Goldstein = bin Laden or al Zarqawi
Pass it on.
Correction of typo:
//* hanging of records = changing of reasons for war on Iraq//
* Changing of records = changing of reasons for war on Iraq
Rachel,
history seems to have passed you by.
I am not sorry for that.
G*d bless Iraq!
* Goldstein = bin Laden or al Zarqawi
Hey neat - Bin Laden is Jewish so is Zarqawi..........!!!
Poor old Eric Blair he thought "Goldstein" was Lev Bronstein aka Trotsky............but for Rachel he is Bin Laden/Zarqawi............maybe Osama believes in Zion ?
@Italian
"You really are a horse's ass aren't you Pete?", & "I suppose you can afford to appear condescending and surrepticiously [=surreptitiously] judgmental" (Tammy, 02.01.05 - 9:49 pm).
Do not get angry with poor Tammy; you should know by now that she is just a Baboon (yes, I know, in the Emerald Island baboons are to be found only in zoos, and haven't got Internet access!).
I've no intention of getting angry. In fact I've no intention of doing anything at all, seing as how:
a) My comment was addressed directly to someone else
b) Tammy so completely and utterly missed my point that I couldn't even being to address her comment. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that she simply made pretty much the same point as I did, choosing to assume that my version was made in a condescending and judgmental way. I think she, not I, needs to deal with that.
Anyway, Italian, it would take more than one sensitive American accusing me of anti-Americanism to make me anti-American (if you get my drift) ... or even anti-Tammy. Since Americans are so fond of reminding us Europeans how evilly anti-American we are, it should also be obvious that those of us who haven't gone with the cultural flow are also less likely attribute one rash deed or comment to a national character defect.
Rachel, you little shitass, I know Bryan and his reports do, indeed "chime" (odd word to use but then maybe a Britism) with the reports of people who are actually out there with the people.
BBC edits his reports quite a bit, tho.
Suits is very clear - the true heroes are the Iraqis and the men and women who have fought to bring liberty. They are ecstatic, happy to be liberated, despise the terrorists and especially their fat and comfortable western supporters.
The true gutless cowards are the pissants like yourself, Italian, Susan, Bush Lied and similar dogshit slime who are being swept away. All your pathetic vomiting commentary becomes ever more putrid in the glaring light of the elections. Since you are demonstrably a supporter of the terrorists and clearly desired that thousands of Iraqis would have died trying to vote, you and your pathetic pals can just sit and stink up the atmosphere until you fade away.
Does anything at all good happen in your life?
"I have been reading Lt Bryan Suits' entries for some months, whenever the BBC does one of the Iraq diary things. His rather complacent reports do not "chime" with most other accounts."
Always a conspiracy, isn't it Rachel? By the way "1984" does have some loose parallels to what's going on now, but it has much more in common with the Stalin-era Soviet Union. Especially considering that's basically what Orwell was writing about. I'm sure you would have loved Stalin, he was about as paranoid and hate-filled as you seem to be, and he was anti-American to boot!
Well, maybe some light is dawning on at least one dunderhead, but not on another:
“In his Jan. 26 article, published in more than 20 newspapers, including the Toronto Globe and Mail, Mr. Soros said he agrees with Mr. Bush's goal to spread democracy around the world, "and [I] have devoted the past 15 years and several billion dollars of my fortune to attaining it," but accused the president of "Orwellian doublespeak."
"Mr. Bush is right to assert that repressive regimes can no longer hide behind a cloak of sovereignty," wrote Mr. Soros, 74, who made his fortune as an international currency trader. "But intervention in other states' internal affairs must be legitimate."
There has been no comment since the Iraq elections from Mr. Moore, the Academy Award-winning filmmaker who characterized the Iraqi insurgents as "Minutemen," and predicted "they will win."
Of course, Soros made his load destroying economies of small nations and Moore got his load from Hagen Daz and lies, but sometimes even crooks like these get a bit of a clue.
http://www.washtimes.com/nationa...23527-
1015r.htm
Poor old Eric Blair he thought "Goldstein" was Lev Bronstein aka Trotsky............but for Rachel he is Bin Laden/Zarqawi............maybe Osama believes in Zion ?
Rick, you've given me this image of Zarqawi singing "By the Rivers of Babylon".
Come to think of it, he probably does weep when he remembers Zion.
Stalin, he was about as paranoid and hate-filled as you seem to be, and he was anti-American to boot!
Nick | Email | Homepage | 02.02.05 - 11:24 am | #
But if you read Khrushchev's memoirs you will find Stalin was partial to cowboy movies, whereas Hitler liked "Tales of a Bengal Lancer"................hard to imagine what they talked about when they supposedly met in that railway carriage in Poland..............
...Stalin was partial to cowboy movies, whereas Hitler liked "Tales of a Bengal Lancer"................hard to imagine what they talked about...
Sacred Cow Herding?
Mister Soros idea of legitimacy is asking one dictatorship like china if we are allowed to dethrone another one like saddam's.
That's no law, that's mob-rule.
Found this through the Democratic Underground forum, published today:
After the Election
The Future of Iraq and the US Occupation
By NOAM CHOMSKY
It begins,
Let's just imagine what the policies might be of an independent Iraq, independent, sovereign Iraq, let's say more or less democratic, what are the policies likely to be?
Well there's going to be a Shiite majority, so they'll have some significant influence over policy. The first thing they'll do is reestablish relations with Iran. Now they don't particularly like Iran, but they don't want to go to war with them so they'll move toward what was happening already even under Saddam, that is, restoring some sort of friendly relations with Iran.
That's the last thing the United States wants. It has worked very hard to try to isolate Iran. The next thing that might happen is that a Shiite-controlled, more or less democratic Iraq might stir up feelings in the Shiite areas of Saudi Arabia, which happen to be right nearby and which happen to be where all the oil is. So you might find what in Washington must be the ultimate nightmarea Shiite region which controls most of the world's oil and is independent. Furthermore, it is very likely that an independent, sovereign Iraq would try to take its natural place as a leading state in the Arab world, maybe the leading state. And you know that's something that goes back to biblical times.
What does that mean? Well it means rearming, first of all. They have to confront the regional enemy. Now the regional enemy, overpowering enemy, is Israel. .. the business press the last couple of days probably reflects the thinking in Washington and London: "Uh well, okay, we'll let them have a government, but we're not going to pay any attention to what they say." In fact the Pentagon announced at the same time two days ago: we're keeping 120,000 troops there into at least 2007, even if they call for withdrawal tomorrow. ... We just have to do it because we have to accomplish our mission of bringing democracy to Iraq. If they have an elected government that doesn't understand that, well, what can we do with these dumb Arabs, you know? Actually that's very common because look, after all, the U.S. has overthrown democracy after democracy, ... If you look back at the military journals in the late Sixties, they were writing about how we gotta get this army out of here or the army's going to collapsemuch like the head of the Army reserves said two or three days ago. He said this is becoming a broken force.
The rest is worth reading, too.
Here is a brilliant analysis of the phoney "elections" in Iraq. The whole exercise was a carefully stage-managed charade, and few people actually voted other than those who were forced to the polls or threatened by loss of their food rations. THE WHOLE THING WAS A SHAM!
Now Bushitler and his Zionist masters will move on to their next campaign to conquer the Middle East for Israel.
Impeach Bushitler!
Bring the Troops Home Now!
Power to the People!
Once you've read Noam Chomsky on Politics you've lost all interest in linguistics
Bush Lied | Email | Homepage | 02.02.05 - 1:31 pm | #
You are such a wag........truly satirical
Democratic Underground. How typical. Their motto might be:
"If it is Amerika, if it is Bush, if it is Republican, if it is moderate Democrat, if it is not totally whacked out left, if it looks at facts and reality, then it is pure evil; now, what is the question, point or issue?"
This is like reading the Völkischer Beobachter to get news on the European situation and the Jewish Question.
But then, you knew that, didn't you Reichsfuhrer Rachel?
What a lugnut.
Bush Lied,
Power to the People! I think the Iraqis did that. But for slime like you, that does not count, does it?
Nice to chew on your own colon, is it?
changing of reasons for war on Iraq
Actually, many of the supporters of the war on Iraq gave several good reasons to toppling Saddam:
(1) The lack of liberal democracies in the Arab world. President Bush made a speech to the American Enterprise Institute talking about how Iraqis are fully capable of running their own affairs in an electoral system.
(2) Oil for dictators versus oil for millions of people. This is related to point (1). But when the Left says "No blood for oil," they are neglecting to mention that Middle Eastern dictators get much of their money from oil sales and much of the oil revenue is used to maintain their fascist ideology.
(3) Terrorism: The ring leader of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing was an Iraqi who fled to Saddam's Iraq after the attack and Saddam refused to turn him over to the Clinton administration. Also, Zarqawi was in Saddam's Iraq prior to the 2003 Iraq war.
(4) WMD: It was the conventional wisdom of the world that Saddam was a WMD threat because of his prior behavior.
PeteS,
One good argument against proportional representation in an electoral system is this example:
If 20 percent of a nation's population adheres to an extremist ideology a political party advancing that ideology is likely to earn 20 percent of the parliament.
But a "winner take all" system forces political parties to pander to voters who don't share all of their views on issues. This encourages a spirit of compromise before a parliament is even seated.
@Mark, 02.02.05 - 8:05 am.
You wrote: "The Iraqi President said yesterday that US troops (and other members of the coalition) should stay".
My mindless fanatic, of what relevance is what the -unelected- ludicrous 'Iraqi President' al-Yawer, now severely punished by the Iraqi voters, says? Or what his even more ludicrous partner, the Minister al-Shaalan (to most Iraqis, on a par with 'Comical Alì'), says?
Do wonder what al-Sistani will say, instead.
Baghdad Blogger - Video Reports from Iraq
Salam Pax's film to be showcased at the International Film Festival in Rotterdam this month.
n the film Pax takes viewers into the homes of Muslim women and a packed liquor store where customers hoard beer and spirits ahead of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
He gauges the opinions of ordinary Iraqis struggling to survive. On a day trip, he visited monumental and now deserted architectural landmarks, erected by Saddam Hussein, which were previously out of bounds for the public.
@Homer from London, 02.02.05 - 2:38 am.
You wrote that 'An Italian' "furthermore has the cheek to call other posters 'trolls', demanding that Zeyad take action against them. The spirit of 'Il Duce' lives on!".
Now, man, I use to read your comments to other blogs, & their content made me doubt your intellectual honesty. Now it's quite patent that you are dishonest & a liar. What is that 'Tammy' in your opinion, other than a troll? Go & read PeteS' post above.
Some, instead, who should have known better, called 'Rachel' a troll, above. Whatever one might think about her debating skills, it is quite obvious that she is NO troll (she has had even e-mail correspondance with Zeyad himself, if I'm not mistaken, so for sure she's less of a troll than you & me).
Mark,
That's an interesting perspective, but it doesn't cut it for me. It is too easy to turn the tables and argue that if only 20% of a population have an enlightened ideology, they equally have no chance of representation in government. Setting aside for a moment the issue of who holds what ideology, you are simply arguing in favour of the tyranny of the majority.
Coming back to the issue of extremist ideology, there are two problems with your idea:
a) who gets to decide what constitutes an extremist ideology?... under your definition the answer is obvious: the majority. It is a different matter if the ideology in question is incompatible with democracy and fundamental human rights... but then the minority party are unlikely to be part of the democratic process at all since they would be operating illegally.
b) refusing to allow a minority any representation in government effectively excludes them from meaningful political dialogue. This may persuade them that they are justified in resorting to extreme (and illegal) measures to make their voices heard.
Your point that a "winner take all" system forces parties to compromise is limited. They must compromise only in order to get elected... they certainly do not have to compromise in the day to day operation of government once they win their landslide victory. In other words, they must make promises but may not deliver. (That is, admittedly, only a short-term recipe for success, but political vision often looks only as far as the next poll).
Proportional representation in government forces compromise. Political parties are rarely so homogenous that there is no variety of thinking on particular issues. The voter in a PR system can actually choose the composition of the goverment according to his or her policy preferences by selecting candidates from multiple parties. A "winner takes all" system is also a "one size fits all" system, since if there is no party that matches your politics your only choice is the "closest fit" rather than the best mixture.
In the winner take all system the winning party just is having a free game in politics after the elctions, because once the victor you don't have to deal with other parties and interests anymore, especially minority interests are too often neglected.
Even minorities within parties that "cannot" flee to the other side (like christians in the republican party) can be more or less neglected after the elections.
Didn't Bush denied a national ban on gaymarriage after his election.
"bait and switch" is the term for it I think.
in the proportional system in most cases you need to compromise with other parties.
In practice you get a lot of middle ground policies with every apart voice it's own representation.
That's why they did it in Iraq: apart from the case the sjiite alliance get's 51% they always have to make deals with the kurds and the secular ones.
Every vote counts so it doesn't matter if you as a secular person are living in a religious district.
In the winner take all when you are a minority vote your vote is pretty much useless: like being a democrat in texas or republican in new york.
You can as well go on a picknick on election-day cause your vote is thrown in the garbage anyway.
Only in so called battleground-states everybody needs to go to the polls to be able to make a difference.
The votes from the secular Iraqi's living in holy cities like najaf or kerbala deserved to be counted even if there is a religious majority around them.
Every vote should count and then the proportional system is the best.
To avoid too many little parties one can put a minimum required votes let's say 5% for a seat but only if there's an unworkable ammount of them.
In my country a meditationparty and last time a pro-animal party almost got one seat.
But in practice the most votes go to the 3 or 4 biggest and most rational parties.
I wondered when the anti-US posters were going to start quoting Noam Chomsky, a man who described the US liberation of Afghanistan as a “silent genocide”, having decades earlier denied the real genocide committed by Pol Pot in Cambodia. Chomsky is simply a marxist liar with a pathological hatred of America. The following site gives a lot a material debunking Chomsky.
http://plaza.ufl.edu/slasher/
ant...antichomsky.htm
As for his comments about Iraq, he is simply talking crap, as usual. It is perfectly possible for a country to have cordial relations with Iran without being anti-American. A case in point is Afghanistan, whose very pro-American president recently visited Iran.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world...ast/
1838368.stm
Finally, the plan to keep US troops in Iraq until 2007 is obviously contingent on the agreement of the Iraqi government. President Bush has publicly stated that US forces with withdraw if asked to by the Iraqi government. Such provision is also made in the UN mandate for the multinational forces in Iraq.
@John - Netherlands, 02.02.05 - 8:32 am.
"Remember the (rather anti-american) british woman who did only peaceful good things for Iraq:It didn't make a difference at all: they slaughtered her anyway".
Some cheek you have, John! How can you be sure it was al-Qaidist terrorists who killed Margaret Hassan? All the indications point instead into another direction (some 'counter-gangs' possibly run by Allawi's friends). Even the 'al-Zarqawi' al-Qaidist group indeed demanded that she be released unharmed, contrary to what you write.
Rachel:
I disagree with what you say about 95% of the time. Sometimes I even find it outrageous. I'm sure you'd have me pegged as a "fascist" and a "warmonger."
But I want to say that I greatly admire your ability to take it on the chin and come back, and back, and back. I can find a lot of critical things to say to you, but I think--on those grounds at least--you deserve a "Hats Off!" So, Hats Off! to you, Rachel.
May you "See The Light" one day, but--whether or no--long may you prosper! If ever I have a blog, I'm going to invite you to come and give me hell.
Jeff
I wondered when the anti-US posters were going to start quoting Noam Chomsky
On which point, the "quotation" might have been limited to a hyperlink rather than a lengthy excerpt so that those who prefer to scroll past anything with the word Chomsky in it could do so at high speed.
... even "Bush Lied" observes that etiquette!
'Il Duce' spluttered:
"Now it's quite patent that you are dishonest & a liar. What is that 'Tammy' in your opinion, other than a troll? Go & read PeteS' post above."
(i) I offered no opinion on whether 'Tammy' was a 'troll'. I simply pointed out the hypocrisy of someone like you calling her one.
(ii) Since you admit that the designation 'troll' is a matter of opinion, it is not logically possible to be lying when expressing such as opinion.
@Italian,
You've got to admit -- Homer from L has a point (about that hypocrisy thing).
Its bizarre, but I've got to agree with Jeff ... Rachel is just about the most consistently courteous person around here. If only we could have less of the long quotes and more personal opinion, however deluded.
PeteS "If 20 percent of a nation's population adheres to an extremist ideology a political party advancing that ideology is likely to earn 20 percent of the parliament." Mark is inaccurate....few systems are so proportional and most use a hurdle - the German system uses a combination of PR and FPTP - with a 5% hurdle to block extremists........
Mark once a party gets 20% it is hard to consider it "extremist"......the LibDems are not so bad..........the real issue about PR is that it uses a Party List....so as long as Nutcase #.1 is top of the List he is bound to be elected and you have no choice of candidates within the Party List
Even the 'al-Zarqawi' al-Qaidist group indeed demanded that she be released unharmed, contrary to what you write.
An Italian. | Email | Homepage | 02.02.05 - 2:55 pm | #
and how do we know that for certain ?
@PeteS (02.02.05 - 2:41 pm) & John - Netherlands (02.02.05 - 2:48 pm).
I'm 100 % in agreement with your arguments in favour of proportional representation.
In post-WW2 Europe the PR system worked on the whole very well.
I'd add to your arguments that in such a system all voters are able to feel that they are represented. Such is not the case with the 'first past the post' system: theoretically if in a country adopting it there were 20 parties, and each of them were to get about the same percentage of votes in all constituencies (i.e., about 5 %), it is possible -theoretically again- that the party getting a fraction more than the others could get a two-thirds majority in Parliament with only something more than 5 % of the votes (so representing only one out of 20 of the voters). It actually happened several times, both in Britain & in the US, that the party that got in had in fact a minority of the popular vote.
And, yes, in a PR system 'extremist' parties are compelled to make daily compromises in Parliament, which considerably dilutes, over time, their 'extremism'.
That's why the PR system (the most radical one, with a single constituency for the whole country & lists without preferences) chosen for the elections of the first Iraqi Constituent Assembly is the best that could have been chosen (both in terms of representation & of compromises to be done).
8 vs 8,000,000
8 knuckleheaded murder bombers; 8,000,000 voters.
Big failure, this sham vote.
LOL!
@Rick, 02.02.05 - 3:16 pm.
"'Even the 'al-Zarqawi' al-Qaidist group indeed demanded that she be released unharmed, contrary to what you write.' 'and how do we know that for certain?'"
We know because the 'al-Zarqawi' group released an official statement, veryfied like the others by the same group were.
@PeteS, 02.02.05 - 3:14 pm.
"You've got to admit -- Homer from L has a point (about that hypocrisy thing)".
Yes I do (at least on the logical level). But there are matters of substance to be considered as well...
"I've got to agree with Jeff ... Rachel is just about the most consistently courteous person around here. If only we could have less of the long quotes and more personal opinion, however deluded".
On this I agree with you one hundred percent (I do feel that Rachel would gain a lot by abandoning her long quotes).
In the winner take all system the winning party just is having a free game in politics after the elctions, because once the victor you don't have to deal with other parties and interests anymore, especially minority interests are too often neglected.
Sorry John, it does not work that way. You get coalitions under FPTP as Britain shows - 1915-22, 1931-1940, 1940-1945 and a pseudo-coalition Lib-Lab 1974-1979..........
Israel goes so Coalition mad with its PR system that there is hardly an opposition in Parliament; and the Grand Coalition in Germany with CDU/CSU/SPD 1966-69 led directly to the Baader-Meinhof Terrorism.
http://www.janda.org/c24/Reading...ll/
Farrell2.htm
http://www.electoral-
reform.org....westminster.htm
We know because the 'al-Zarqawi' group released an official statement, veryfied like the others by the same group were.
An Italian. | Email | Homepage | 02.02.05 - 3:23 pm | #
Yes and he's a reputable man of honour whose word is his bond...(ha ha).....the kind of man you seem to admire Italian .......never heard you say anything derogatory about him.......
In post-WW2 Europe the PR system worked on the whole very well.
Where has it worked well ? Don't say Italy or we cabn all fall about laughing.
the real issue about PR is that it uses a Party List....
Rick, unless I am misunderstanding you, you are confusing PR with one its specific forms, the List System.
Now, I've got to admit, that until I read this link>, I didn't realise how common the List System was. However, here in Ireland the Single Transferable Vote system (also used by Malta) is mandated by the constitution.
I can very easily vote (and have done in the past) for a party candidate, while voting against his party colleague (Nutcase #1, as you say). Under STV you allocate exactly that fraction of your vote to your preferred candidate that he/she needs to get elected... in other words if Candidate A exceeds the electoral quota by 33%, implying that he/she only actually needed three quarters of your vote, then the other quarter of your vote is given to your next preference, Candidate B. If Candidate B is elected and you still have some fraction of your vote, it is given to your next preference, and so on. If Candidate B is not elected, all of your remaining quarter vote is given to your third preference and so on. Even if you only care about Candidate A, you are wise to fill in all preferences, thereby effectively voting against your last preference.
Voila... maximum choice and no nutcases. (In practise some simplifications involving statistical sampling of excess votes is used to avoid having to track all those fractional votes, but the divergence from "perfect PR/STV" is slight).
All this said... it is easy to point to examples where proportional representation does not work well. I would argue that this is a sign of a divided society, not just an ineffective government. A society that has no unity of vision, or that is sufficiently polarised, or has any significant percentage of nutcases cannot function. (... as you and I well know, Rick).
Ros, you are a pompous, self-important, mischievous witch, or in a previous post pea brain Ros. now I have to apologise for calling Rachel utterly stupid, but most of the time I addressed what she said not who she was.
Honestly, you are shamefully sloppy and irresponsible, Rachel speaking of Tammy so I am not all that concerned that I may be violating Rachel’s standards.
I am not discussing Rachel however I am interested in your and Jeff's understanding of courtesy.
I don't think it is courteous to be a racist, and Rachel's generalising and stereotyping of Americans is nothing but racism.
The implications that corruption is something that Americans are big on, that killing is something that Americans are big on, crystallised in that long diatribe about 1984 and the US. It is not possible however convenient a tool to separate the US people from those who they choose to govern for them. The Rachel’s are racists and as such badly undermine the moral standing of their own position.
If I were to select an unfailingly courteous I would nominate John from the Netherlands. He doesn't get stuck in polemics he responds to what others say and he tries to do so in a courteous way.
Poor little Rachel, and I have to say it boys, she doesn't need your support and she doesn't deserve it.You are judging courtesy merely by the robustness of the language. And you are patronising the other correspondents on this post. A little more concern for Bridget and Tammy re this thing that keeps appearing though would be nice.
Reminds me of the intellectuals in this country who use long words obscure terms unknown references and a patronising tone to explain why the Australian public is racist, selfish, incapable of exercising their vote responsibly and we need a new political system to compensate for their inability to learn from and obey their betters.
Shut up you fucks in response allows them to say see what we mean.
This is an interesting quirk of Ros: telling people what they should think and be. Hey, Ros, let people make up their own minds. And why do you call the men you disagree with "boys"?
Dear An Italian, - On this I agree with you one hundred percent (I do feel that Rachel would gain a lot by abandoning her long quotes). - your wish is my command. I'll try to remember to be good.
Jeff, 02.02.05 - 2:59 pm. Erm, thanks, I think.
Ros, you're right (about courtesy being more than robustness of language) and I thought about that point before I commented. Nevertheless, if one racist tells you that people of blue skin are inferior because the gene for blueness is part of a haplotype block with the gene for intelligence, while the next racist tells you to f*ck off you blue bastard ... which one is likely to be worth the effort to try to reason with? Case in point, made in all humility ... two years ago I would have counted myself as virulently anti-war, and unconsciously I believe, was somewhat anti-American (there's a lot of propaganda out there after all). A large part of my change of mind was down to interaction on this blog ... foremost among them being with Lee C. as it happens. Now there were quite a few people who were less than generous about my relatively innocent presuppositions. I think its fair to say that, at least in my case, I tend to react to reasoned argument better than to rants. You can be right, and still be a wanker. You can also be wrong, and still deserve the same respect you accord to others. (And by the way, I am certainly not making any claims for my own pathetic style).
Oh, those terrible infidels! The tyrant Bush will give his State of the Union address tonight. He will tell all lies, of course!
But, those unbelievers! They really know how to rub it in! Those who support this evil election carried out by the occupiers and sons of harlots and apostates and stuff, they are really nasty people. Some of them will dip their unbelieving fingers into purple ink and hold up their vile fingers during the evil Bush’s speech!
Talk about giving me the finger! Hoo, I’ll have to beat a few women, order a martyrdom operation or two against a few pre-schools, rape a goat and have a little boy brought into the cave just to get over it.
Oh, Rachel, where are you when I need you!
because once the victor you don't have to deal with other parties and interests anymore, especially minority interests are too often neglected. Can’t agree John. Because on eof the fundamentals of democracy is that you are only the victor for a limited time. Here in Australia 3 years, and despite the urgings of our politicians Australians firmly rejected an extension in a referendum. We will wear the sub optimal outcome of short periods of government for the protection it gives us. And just as once they are elected they are in theory without constraints from the public for that period so are the individual polis. Any way Europe is slowly but surely handing over government to the bureaucrats of the EU. I note also that the Un is very keen on the idea that representative democracy as is the political system within the great democracies has had it’s day and it is now time for the participative democracy of the world as identified by and presented as policy by the NGOs. Help.
Mark your winner take all one is of interest to me. I used to be involved in industrial relations and in Australia that meant that all parties had a proportional presence in negotiations and that included every union, and that meant a cast of thousands. Achieving compromise was very difficult and the Arbitrators would try and come up with compromises that essentially meant that the status quo reigned and nothing changed or improved or reduced conflict because no one was happy.. The Japanese have a system where the Arbitrator chooses one of the scenarios put before the court and this drives considerable negotiation and compromise before, as the danger is he will take the "other'.
In Australia we have both systems at our federal level. But the government is formed by the lower house. As we have proportional representation in the senate then small parties pull seats. And up until the last election they had held the balance of power for many years. They told us and themselves that as they had pulled the under ten percent of the primary vote that we had all agreed that we wanted them to say what happened. No we didn't 90 % of us wanted them to go away. Because of the temptation to thwart the government the other major party would reject legislation with these parties which are by their very powerlessness reactionary. But of course we would then have elections and, the public chose one position, it does work, political parties do try very hard to work out what the public will vote for. In fact a problem for us is that marginal vote so counted that special interest groups have a far greater say than is politically appropriate. Indeed of course this applies to all, some pundits point to the Muslim vote in Europe it’s size and it’s monolithic nature and its distortion of European policy.
"Because on eof the fundamentals of democracy is that you are only the victor for a limited time."
Exactly... that's one of the reasons why lots of countries see such regular change of government. Political parties sacrifice long term vision for short term electoral gain and broken promises (the "after all we can't do anything unless we're in power" syndrome). Meanwhile, public amnesia absolves the current opposition for their failures when last in government and rockets them to success again.
PeteS I don't think when being condemned for your ethnic group and that is what the people of the US are with gusto and pride, then a constant diet of condemnation, for which no explanation or rebuttal is accepted does lead people to wonder whether it is their genes or their culture that is being denigrated. Indded it makes no difference, Sunnis are murdering Shias for their ideas not their genes. I think Tammy for example has reacted with remarkable constraint to a very discouteous discourse from a very discourteous person and as I said I am not inclined to see sweet generous and thinking Rachel. Rachel does not afford others respect, certainly not the other women.But if that is how you boys want to see it, so be it.
Osama % Co! LOL!
Ros,
When I speak about my own country then I can say little parties never hinder big party-coalitions.
The lesser important chamber mostly check laws according to the constitution.
I think in a proportional system people have a broader political menu they can chose from:
In Holland one can chose
almost communist (small)
pro green/environment (small)
centre leftwing (big)
centre rightwing (christian) (big)
liberal lefwting (small)
liberal rightwing (big)
"very" rightwing christian (very only in issues like abortion/gays/prostitution, socio-economically they are often compassionate) (small)
But in all political systems people must be willing to work together as a first condition.
Ros, I don't consider Rachel to be racist, because the American people are not a race, nor are we an ethnic group. I'm also not saying that her comments painting all Americans with the same brush are very courteous ones. I wonder if she realizes that if you took the average cockney speaking Brit from MiddleofNowhere, England, they would be no more intelligent then the backwoods hick from Alabama type that she apparently sees as representing all that is America.
An Italian isn't innocent of this either, as he has posted many times about how he sees Americans as primates, nothing more then baboons (I'm sure the residents of inner cities all across this country would love for you to say something like this to their face, by the way)
Their comments about the stupidity, arrogance and jingoism of the American people reek of the pot calling the kettle black in lieu of their own comments.
Yes it would appear that elected governments sacrifice long term vision for short term electoral gain, the lure of the numbers in the ballot box is so distracting. Interestingly the current government of Autralia is being criticised by the left as they realise that the current Prime Minister now our second longest serving in our history has been achieving a long term agenda by increments and the ability to read the electorate and respond. All the time they were saying that he was an evil, unintelligent and uncaring short man the Australian public was saying, you are doing what we want, though possibly some what miffed at being told that their stupidity wasn't clear to them as it was to the left.
grumblings aside, that is what democracy can do well, change in response to circumstances against I assume a benevolent dictator who can run with the long term vision thing. But to state the bleeding obvious what ever it's shortcomings the democratic form of government delivers the best possible for us within an imperfect world.
As our stupid evil PM said the joy of democracy is that we do have changes of government by the decision of the people and it is done without revoluiotn or bloodshed and in an orderly manner. may the Iraqis have the chance to do so, whatever form their democracy takes. Personally I suspect that the faults of democracy are quite acceptable to them considering their experience of the alternative.
Homer, you son of vileness, you infidel, thank you for your kind note.
My dear servant, a wretched unbeleiver Amerikan congressman, Dennis Kucinich tells the truth that there are only two things that make an election legitimate (not that any are because it is against Islam to be free or to vote): media and international monitors. Voters don't count, only media and monitors.
Where was Micheal Moore? I ask you? He should have been here to cover the election and lend it credibility, oh my golly gosh, yes, just like that wonderful, and TRUE!, documentary he did. And where was Jimmy Carter? No monitors! No Carter!
God love Dennis, before He throws the infidel into the flames of the pit!
Eeeyahhhhh!
Oliver Kamm, London Times columnnist and Labour Party member, has written about the Iraqi elections in his blog. Many of his previous postings are worth reading as well.
http://www.oliverkamm.typepad.com/
Nick as an australian I live in a society who along with the other Anglo societies in the world I would agree are very mixed in race and religion and cultural backgrounds. But when does one becaome an ethnic group, At some point in history an ethnic group was a collection of other ethnic groups that coalesce allowing for an ethnic group to emerge. Sorry very clumsy. That the Us is so radically different to most socieities now and in the past in that the specifics of the backgrounds and ideas of its people are constantly growing and changing does not I believe mean that they are not an ethnic group, just a radically different kind.
terrorists choose to try and kill Australians because we are Australins, I don't think that their view is that we carry an Australian passport, rather that we are imbued with certain ideas and practices that are common to us all. That we are an ethnic group of some sort.
What Saddam did or did not do - often with our backing - cannot justify what the West does when it has that same power. America and Britain have reduced Iraq to chaos, for which Sunday's election is a significant but meagre compensation. But those now elected will acquire real authority only if they are not tainted as puppets of a foreign occupation. The Iraqis will re-build their wrecked country according to their own lights. We have already shown that we cannot do it for them. They will start, however messily, the sooner we leave.
At present there is only one country which has a coherent strategy for Iraq. That country is Iran. Is that to be our legacy?
Otocon, you are so right.
Why, my neighbor describes the relative peace of her country, the nice life her father made for them under trying circumstances. Only a few issues like a police roundup of suspects once in a while, an occasional scream from the prison. But mostly peaceful - go along to get along. Just close your eyes to something upsetting if it does not concern you directly.
Then, of course, it all went to hell in a hand basket. The Americans and British invaded and peace evaporated.
Bombings, battles, disappearances. Confusion and death all around. Terror. What would become of them?
Food and medicine were scarce. People died who would have lived if only the invaders had stayed away and minded their own damned business!
But, no, they had to bring war.
Damn those two nations’ leaders for it.
Roosevelt and Churchill should have left France alone!
"What Saddam did or did not do - often with our backing - cannot justify what the West does when it has that same power. America and Britain have reduced Iraq to chaos, for which Sunday's election is a significant but meagre compensation. But those now elected will acquire real authority only if they are not tainted as puppets of a foreign occupation. The Iraqis will re-build their wrecked country according to their own lights. We have already shown that we cannot do it for them. They will start, however messily, the sooner we leave.
At present there is only one country which has a coherent strategy for Iraq. That country is Iran. Is that to be our legacy?"
Unless you an Iraqi, these opinions are irrelevant. The elected government of Iraq will decide how their country should be re-built and when the multinational forces will leave. As to whether democracy is a 'meagre compensation' for the war that brought it about, that is a judgement that Iraqis can make for themselves. I suspect that people who have lived under a dictatorship have a rather different perspective to those to take freedom and democracy for granted.
@Ros - "Sunnis are murdering Shias for their ideas not their genes". I totally disagree. A minority of Sunnis are murdering or directing others to do so for their own evil and selfish gain. The rest are doing it because someone told them to and they don't have the wit to think for themselves. Which is not to denigrate them for their gullibility - we're all easily led by those with whom we have a "natural" affinity (clan, tribe, nation etc.), no matter what we would like to think. A prejudice-free human is a mythical creature.
A partial antidote to being "used" by others is a half-decent education and a healthy dose of cynicism. This cuts both ways - posters on both sides of the "debate" here (me included) have swallowed whole swathes of propaganda ... they should not be surprised when it turns out to be unpalatable to the "other side". As much as Rachel needs to check the affiliations of some of her frightening sources, the "America brought democracy to Europe" crowd need a reality tweak too.
"I am not inclined to see sweet generous and thinking Rachel" ... probably a good call; me neither. "Rachel does not afford others respect, certainly not the other women. But if that is how you boys want to see it, so be it"... hmmm not sure I appreciate the gender-centric implications of that, however that healthy dose of cynicism tells me that nom de plume is at best an unreliable guide to gender in this forum. Anyway, I am also not inclined to see Rachel as a rabid murdering thug (or words used here in the past to that effect), rather an extraordinarily misguided Christian pacifist. It detracts from the moral force of the argument unless you save allegations of being a rabid murdering thug for people who are fairly obviously rabid murdering thugs.
I am inclined to agree with Nick that anti-Americanism as seen in Europe cannot be "racism"... primarily because you would have to then count a significant proportion of Americans as anti-American racists. I swear to Christ that the next American (especially a comedian) that comes to MY country and apologises for their redneck president and their rightwing hicks and how all those votes in Ohio were stolen is going to go home with their presumptuous leftwing ass in a sling. I would also like a break from this "Europeans all hate us" crap (which an American at the next table to me in a restaurant recently felt compelled to point out.... it was OK though, they just wanted to apologise for the redneck president and the hicks and the votes in Ohio). Europeans don't all hate you. Your leftwing/rightwing (delete as appropriate) neighbour hates you. Sort your shit out at home before you worry about Europe. Anyway, there I am ranting ... see how easy it is. Anyway, my point is that we are all, for whatever reason, experiencing an extreme divergence of the political poles whether in Europe, Australia or the U.S.
p.s. agree with all your points about democracy.
For those of you who don't know our Prime Minister is John Howard and he is actually 5' 10" tall. he does however have a very short neck without the accompanying build of a rugby league or grid iron player. the left early in the piece tried to diminish him by calling him little Johhny Howard. To their regret I suspect the bit that stuck was Johhny Howard expressed with affection by Australins.
Gor those who are interested Tim Blair has posted the Daily Mirrors front page on the Iraqi election. To be sure I don't quite know whether this is real or a spoof, but it is entertaining. Would be interested to know if it is real. Is the Daily Mirror the paper that was violently opposed to the Iraq war and had a problem with publishing fake photos?
http://timblair.net/
Ps could someone tell me where to go to make it a live link please? Thanks
Rick, 02.02.05 - 3:39 pm.
"'In post-WW2 Europe the PR system worked on the whole very well'.
'Where has it worked well ? Don't say Italy or we can all fall about laughing'."
Yes, Rick, I would point to (among others) precisely the Italian experience of Proportional Representation (List system with preferences inside the list you voted).
It was established at the Constituent Assembly elections of June 1946, and then kept up to 1992.
What was the first most obvious benefit?
That it helped to prevent a most bloody civil war between the Right & the Left in Italy (on 1944-49 Greek lines). And that's what Iraq greatly needs now, as well.
Apart from that, the system proved to be exceptionally stable. Practically the very same coalition of parties ruled from 1947 to 1992 (with some enlargments & changes from the Sixties). Yes, the Government would be 'changed' (actually just reshuffled) every year or so, but the coalition stayed the same.
So a coalition of centre-right parties (the Christian Democrats, the Social Democrats, the Republicans & the Liberals - these last actually Tories despite the name) governed in the Cold War (very cold) years 1947-63, but since to pass any law they had to have the approval of the parliamentary opposition (the two Marxist parties, the Communist and the Socialist), it was a power-sharing rule by Parliament (whatever their respective propagandas might say).
A remarkable stable system, and it prevented civil war (no little achievement).
If you feel like 'falling about laughing', suit yourself.
@PeteS, 02.02.05 - 3:44 pm.
In Europe not just Ireland and Malta, but Belgium and Luxembourg have used the PR/STV system since WW2.
PeteS,
You raise interesting points about the "winner take all" versus "proportional representation" system.
I believe the basic problem with proportional representation is that it doesn't force the individual voter to compromise with oneself.
Here's what I mean......
What if every voter in an election decided to vote for him or herself?
Each voter could plausibly argue that they are voting for the person whom they agree with the most. But such a result would not accomplish much in terms of governance.
At least a "winner take all" (or first past the post, if you prefer) system determines winners and losers.
In the United States, even the winner doesn't have absolute power because we have a United States Senate, a United States House of Representatives and a Presidency.
he does however have a very short neck
Why didn't the left make the Rocky Horror Picture Show connection. Or did they?
PeteS the gender reference is partly because their is an interesting gender aspect to the blogging sphere. I find that these Iraqi sites are one of the few that has a good balance. I have even here however been called dearie and given instructions to shall we say learn and not be emotional. I was particularly irritated with Tech Central for that, basically told by one to go away and read philosophy of science and various scientific papers and then come back and try and join in with the big boys. Foreign Affairs Journal discusses the gender bias in the blogosphere and the dominance of middle class white males. Add to that the fact that a lot of rhe horror about Islamism relates to the treatmant of women and their stautus, not to forget the gusto with which western left males choose to believe without question the whore like behaviour of American servicewomen. Our just returned innocent argues that an American service women squatted over his face and dripped menstrual blood into his face. It has been shouted as proof of the iniquity of the US but it is to me putting a spotlight on the dark souls of many western men and their desire to have proved what jezebels or emotional cripples women are. I am not suggesting in any way that you are the slightest bit inclined like that but I am of the view that gender is a very important aspect of this battle for hearts and souls and it is the case that those protecting rachel are identifying themselves as male. And your reprimands on her behalf are at the expense of the other women. So that is all.
As for anti-Americanism in Europe they may not all hate the US , certainly german business was at pains to make that clear. However it is very disconcerting to discover that 1 in 5 Germans for example believe that Bush and Mossad were responsible for the twin towers, from what in theory is a very well educated populous. The photo of the Pentagon was what persuaded them,
PeteS,
Regarding your rant, I think the big difference between Europe and the United States is ideology.
The US is more libertarian on economic issues than most of Europe and the US has a different perspective regarding the use of military force than most of Europe.
Obviously, this comment is a generalization. There are some Europeans who support lower taxes and less social spending and a more forceful military posture.
@Mark
What if every voter in an election decided to vote for him or herself?
In PR you don't just vote for one person. Just in case you didn't get elected, you would be wise to vote for the person next closest to you in views.
I believe the basic problem with proportional representation is that it doesn't force the individual voter to compromise with oneself.
On the contrary, PR is all about making rational compromises about who you will accept as the least-worst option assuming you can't have your most-best option. "Winner takes all" means that you either vote with the majority or you might as well not vote at all. That's hardly a compromise.
@Ros, 02.02.05 - 5:05 pm (and preceeding).
Now, my opinionated Aussie, it is quite obvious that you are new to this comments page. How could anybody state (in good conscience) something like "I think Tammy for example has reacted with remarkable constraint to a very discouteous discourse from a very discourteous person"???. If you had read all the preceeding posts by this 'Tammy' in earlier comments pages, you would now that the thing pops in just to disrupt any debate, without ever contributing anything (see for instance her/his CPA oh so intelligent & truthful commentary above). And you wouldn't be so discourteous as to mix Bridget up with this 'Tammy'.
Apart from that (but for the same reason - that you are new to this comments page), you took issue with me because I wrote that you were 'speaking through your a**e' while calling me an anti-semite. Now, any reader of these comments pages knows that it would be rather difficult for me to be an anti-semite (especially of the 'anti-Jewish' variety), for genetic reasons, if not for others. And, of course, you were practising the cheap ploy of equating being opposed to a set of policies of the Israeli State (those heralded by Likhud, based on the Fascist ideology of Jabotinsky) with being an 'anti-semite', which is truly a cheap trick.
So, please, Aussie friend, be a bit less opinionated...
PeteS,
"Winner takes all" means that you either vote with the majority or you might as well not vote at all. That's hardly a compromise.
Actually, that ignores the compromises that voters have to make in a "winner take all" system.
Every election people on the far right (like me) have to decide whether they are willing to vote for a mushy Republican like George W. Bush. Lots of right-wingers were upset with Bush for allowing social spending to grow rapidly under his watch.
But many right-wingers compromised and voted for him anyway.
Similarly, many on the far left were upset with John Kerry for voting for the Iraq war. But many of them voted for Kerry instead of Ralph Nader, because they decided that they liked Kerry better than Bush.
Both major American political parties, the Democrats and the Republicans, represent a diverse population.
@Ros ... "I have even here however been called dearie" -- off-topic but you remind me that Iraqi males that have posted here not infrequently address other males as "dear". I wonder is it one of those quirks of translation that something in Arabic most closely resembles this English word. Anyone know?
"the gender bias in the blogosphere and the dominance of middle class white males" ... I have always assumed that is the natural result of Internet usage being led by the middle class geeks who work for the I.T. companies who traditionally had the easiest access. As the net seeps into everyday life as naturally as the phone, that distinction is almost gone.
"I am of the view that gender is a very important aspect of this battle for hearts and souls" - no doubt correct.
"it is the case that those protecting rachel are identifying themselves as male. And your reprimands on her behalf are at the expense of the other women. So that is all." - Rachel happened to be the case at hand. I would be equally vociferous about "stalin" or "An Italian" (although the latter mightn't be quite so "courteous" under the narrow definition discussed earlier 
). Let's be clear -- I think Rachel is so far out on the fringe she's about to fall off the edge.
"it is very disconcerting to discover that 1 in 5 Germans for example believe that Bush and Mossad were responsible for the twin towers" -- I know people who find it disconcerting that half of all Americans believe God created man pretty much in his present form within the last several thousand years. I'm not sure I trust polls like that -- not that they are inaccurate but there are different way people internalise those "beliefs"
I think that many of you are missing the defining difference between the American representative republic form of government and the European parliamentary system. That difference is separation of powers in the American system that acts as a very strong inhibitor of "runaway" government. If you were to read the American Constitution (all 2 pages of it) you would stand in awe of the framers.
PeteS,
One interview with an Iraqi voter demonstrates what I mean.
An Iraqi voter was asked if he voted. He said, "Yes. I voted for the Kurds."
I would argue that ethnic and religious voting is more likely to happen when every minority group need not worry if their party gets only 15 or 20 percent of the vote.
But in a winner take all system, a Kurd might vote for a moderate Sunni Arab or a moderate Shia Arab. To do otherwise might be described as "throwing one's vote away."
Realist,
You are quite right.
The way the American framers attempted to protect minority rights was to use bi-cameralism (two legislative houses), federalism (dual soveriegnty with both states and nation soverign in certain areas), and a specific limits on government power (example: "Congress shall make no law......")
I think that is a better way of building in minority rights than proportional representation.
Elections should have winners and losers. And the ambitions of the winners should be restrained by the ambitions of other election day winners (i.e. US House, US Senate, US President, Governor, State Senate, State House).
Was the Iraq Election like Vietnam 1967? Or America 1864?
....the critics may want to consider the following remarks made in the wake of another closely watched election:
"The overwhelming majority received… and the quiet with which the election went off, will prove a terrible damper to the rebels. It will be worth more than a victory in the field both in its effects on the rebels and in its influence abroad."
"We cannot have free government without elections, and if the rebellion could force us to forego or postpone a national election, it might fairly claim to have already conquered and ruined us."
These statements were uttered more than 140 years ago by General Ulysses S. Grant and Abraham Lincoln respectively after the latter was re-elected president in 1864 while the United States was deeply divided.
@Mark, 02.02.05 - 7:21 pm.
I do not think that what you say about 'winner takes all' electoral systems is correct. Actually experience shows that under that system interest lobbies inside the two main parties (especially in the US case) or little parties (where a 'winner takes all' system compells to create two big coalitions) are able to exert an undue influence on the selection of candidates and on the results.
In Italy, for instance, we passed from a PR/List system to a mixed system (one third of the representatives chosen by PR, but the other two thirds by 'winner takes all') in the early Nineties.
It does not work. While before a small party having a tantrum with its ruling coalition in Parliament would in most cases just lead to a reshuffle in Government, now small parties (often of the most extreme variety, like the racist Northern League, or the anti-clerical Radicals, or three different small Communist & Green parties of the extreme left; or based on clientele/ tribes, like some minor centre parties in the South) are able, out of all proportion to their size & possible electoral support, to impose the candidates they want to the two coalitions by blackmail (either this, or we'll ask our supporters not to vote - we'll present our own distinct candidate in that constituency, making you lose the seat - we'll join the other coalition), and to disrupt & block the work of the Government.
And the 'winner takes all' systems compells most voters either to vote for somebody they do not like - believe - agree with, just in order not to let the candidate of the 'Others' in, or to just stay at home (look at the US experience).
“Terrorists choose to try and kill Australians because we are Australins, I don't think that their view is that we carry an Australian passport, rather that we are imbued with certain ideas and practices that are common to us all. That we are an ethnic group of some sort." Ros | Email | Homepage | 02.02.05 - 5:40 pm |
All the points you made were good ones (I only quoted the above one to try to keep this short) However, it seems more fitting, to me at least, to describe these “certain ideas and practices…” as the Australian culture, rather then the Australian ethnicity. Your question as to when one becomes an ethnicity kind of makes the “culture” label a moot point. Perhaps it’s somewhere in the proverbial middle ground of what we’re both saying. The ideas and practices of a nation, combined with the mixing and assimilation of various races and religions, spawns an ethnic group within the borders of that respective country, separate from it’s original parts. Kind of reminds me of the original sole national motto of the U.S. (before the fear of “godless communism” took over in the 50’s and it was changed to “In God We Trust”) “E Pluribus Unum” meaning “From many, one.”
@Mark - your Iraqi voting example is very relevant. Had that Iraqi not been able to choose a Kurd as his representative he might not be willing to participate in a democracy at all. Given the situation in Iraq as it stands, only a small number of middle-class secular Sunnis and Shi'ites are likely to prefer to identify themselves as "secular" first, and Sunni or Shia second. Everyone else will vote along ethnic/sectarian lines.
Regarding the American constitution ... I have of course read it, along with plenty of stuff on the philosophies of the framers. In addition, every month I have occasion to read a small amount of stuff about U.S. constitutional law. Interesting, inspired in many ways. Minority rights are protected through a balance of powers as you say (not an approach that could work everywhere, though).
While I entirely prefer the U.S. 2-pager to the European doorstopper, there are downsides. Usurpation of powers by the American courts has occurred through narrow and idiosyncratic interpretations of the constitution. Look at the way the anti-establishment provisions are being abused as a prime example! No constitution is immune from erosion over time. (Maybe that's what the Euronuts were thinking about their megaconstitution... plenty of scope for erosion and there'll still be plenty left!).
Pets need dental care, too, and this February an increasing number of pet owners are taking the initiative of in-home care. According to the American Pet Products Manufacturers Association (APPMA), 15 percent of dog owners get veterinarian dental care for their dogs, 5 percent more than in 1998, while 28 percent of all dog owners own a toothbrush for their dogs.
Taken from http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/050124/245091_1.html
I recently visited this website talking about dog products and find the information very helpful.
PeteS,
I see your point about a Kurd not being willing to participate if he could vote for "one of his own" under a winner take all system.
But here's what I would propose.....
Break down the Iraqi nation into smaller political units (I think they already have 18 provinces).
A winner take all system by province (or smaller political unit) would allow Northern Kurds to have a Kurd represent them. Same for Sunni Arabs in the center of Iraq.
I would also recommend a bi-cameral or even tri-cameral legislature and would have one or more of the legislative chambers elect the executive (prime minister).
The advantage of having some "Kurdish disticts" and some "Sunni Arab districts" would be that you would likely see Kurds running against Kurds and Sunni Arabs running against Sunni Arabs.
Then the ethnic issue would be almost irrevevant.
Minority groups in those districts could vote for a candidate who reaches out to them.
Candidates would have to balance their voters' desires for ethnic solidarity against the need to appeal to minority groups.
In the United States, the Democrats an Republicans grovel for Hispanic votes! That's a good thing.
Nick:
The motto "In God we trust" somewhat predates the advent of Godless Communism (but not the Godless Brits):
O thus be it ever when free-men shall stand
Between their lov'd home and the war's desolation;
Blest with vict'ry and peace, may the heav'n-rescued land
Praise the Pow'r that hath made and preserv'd us a nation!
Then conquer we must, for our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: “In God is our trust!”
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!
Realist:
I was referring more to it being used as one of the official national mottos, which was in the 1950's. I know it was used on money as far back as the late 19th century, and was a common motto, but not official. It also appeared in the third or fourth verse (can never remember) of "The Star Spangled Banner" as you point out. I've always found it ironic that a poem written during a war with the British was put to the tune of a British pub song to create our national anthem.
Mark,
You tangentially bring up a point worth discussion. The Iraqi election, being an expression of liberty, is a small baby step toward developing a true Iraqi government. We hope, of course, that that government will be a democratic form. However, it will take time for a renewed Iraqi culture to form itself and emerge.
That fellow voted “for the Kurds.” In the nineteenth century, people often voted largely around the needs of their state; in fact Robert E. Lee, who was offered command of the Union army, disagreed with the idea of secession, but refused to fight against Virginia.
It was not long ago that we in America had trepidation about voting for a Catholic! And voting an Italian or Pole into high office was questionable. Negroes, of course, were utterly unthinkable outside a few minor spots. Women were rare in elected office.
Now, we have had a Jew run for the VP spot. We have had two black Secretaries of State in a row, the current one a woman.
In time, an Iraqi national identity will emerge. It will likely not be the same as most western states, but may be more like Switzerland with a number of distinct cultural subgroups but some common form that binds them together.
Now they have the chance, despite the terrorists, murderers, stumbles by the liberation forces, and the pro-terrorist supporters in the west. Inshallah!
Interesting article. I am curious as to what Iraqis think of the calculations.
Fuzzy Moral Math (Iraq Casualty Analysis)
journalist (Greg Sheridan) in an Australian paper today told us a story. It was about Massoud Barzani and our Prime Minister in Baghdad last year for ANZAC Day. ANZAC Day is our greatest public holiday. We honour those servicemen and women who fought and died for Australians. Many march including Vietnamese Australians who fought in Vietnam. But the greatest pride we have in this day is the event that it celebrates and which we think describes best what it is to be an Australian.
Anzac is about Gallipoli.
Barzani was apparently excited to meet Howard but a bit baffled by Anzac Day. He quizzed an Australian official who did his best. However the story goes, Barzani was nonetheless still so confused by the inscrutable Australianness of Anzac day that when he met Howard he asked him outright: how can you celebrate being defeated militarily by the Turks. Despite Howard’s attempts he remained baffled. You voluntarily celebrate being beaten by the Turks? They hammered the hell out of us. Wogs cleaning up the British Empire. Many of them died also.
We don’t just celebrate at home, tens of thousands of young Australians go to Lone Pine to celebrate Anzac day to the bemusement and affection of the Turks, despite the fact that the security problems are a tremendous worry for them. The celebration last year was preceded by warnings of danger from the Australian government but still they turned up.
We don’t just honour the Turks on Anzac day. We have a boulevard flowing from our Australian War Memorial and along the road are 2 lines of memorials to the many actions in which Australians fought and died. On of them is to Ataturk and The Turks. Sorry my pommy mates, but we don’t blame the dreadful slaughter of our young men on the Turks. We blame the English. The Turks we honour.
The journalist goes on to say; obviously Australian democracy viewed from Kurdish eyes is a fathomless veil of occidental mystery. His point, when and if Iraqi democracy emerges it is going to look pretty strange to us too. He says that the world has no experience of Shi’ite Arab democracies ( as distinct from Persian Shi’ite governments) in the middle East and we need to keep an open mind.
The Iraqi day to celebrate should not and will not be the day that Baghdad fell. It might be the day that Iraqis went out to vote in the face of great danger. I would particularly celebrate those Sunnis for whom it was so difficult. It is not my place to say what should be important to Iraqis. But Sunday the 30th of January will always be a very important day to me.
DPH,
So you're telling us, by way of Logic Times, that we have failed to kill more than 61,000 Iraqis.
Who over at the Pentagon is not doing their job? Boxer, Kerry, Kennedy, and Pelossi must investigate this inexcusable incompetance! What are we spending all this money for?
My gawd! The shame!
Brian K:
I never thought of it that way! We best get busy.
Actually PeteS I know who called me dearie and much to my regret he is an Australian who goes by the calling of Wadard. He also went off his tree about the filthy American servicewomen so he may be an abberration. it was an article in Foreign Ploicy, my apology, that discussed the modes emerging and the importance of linking and the almost total dominace of white professional males. and that the gap was widening.
Thanks Italian, I have noticed that you don't like Tammy. Also opinionated is a reasonable call, but probably a little the pot calling the kettle black. I was also unaware that there was some sort of hierarchy due to seniority, and the need to have established credentials before getting seriously into it. you are quite right cheap ploys as forms of argument are used very often in blogging.
Zeyad,
I'm so happy about the vote. What courage the Iraqis showed! You are our inspiration.
I hope you get to see the speech tonight by Bush and see all the purple fingers of the congressmen and women!
Ros, do you still want to find out how to make live links?
Practically the very same coalition of parties ruled from 1947 to 1992 (with some enlargments & changes from the Sixties). Yes, the Government would be 'changed' (actually just reshuffled) every year or so, but the coalition stayed the same.
Yes but that required men like Andreotti, and constant help from the CIA to prop up the system.......just like Japan......one ruling elite - ie same personalities for decades in power........the system was unable to prevent extra-parliamentary terrorism............and was riddled with corruption and pork barrel
yes please Bridget.
@Rick, 02.03.05 - 12:59 am.
A part of what you say is for once on the whole correct. About the CIA, though, I wouldn't be so sure that they were 'propping up' the system in the years from 1968. Things like disseminating bombs around and killing civilians in false-flag operations, using as their arm the secret Masonic lodge P2, having some right-winger friends in the police forces of the State plotting putschs, provoking, in fact, 'extra-parliamentary terrorism', doesn't sound much like 'propping up' the Italian State.
I hope, for the sake of the Iraqis, that they won't try to 'prop up' the future Iraqi democracy in the same way.
@Ros, 02.03.05 - 12:41 am.
Ok, peace made. As for anti-semitism in Europe, it is indeed of both varieties, anti-Jewish AND anti-Arab. Like this excerpt from an article published today on the French Govt. wanting to ban the Nazi groups shows (http://www.guardian.co.uk/france/story/
0,11882,1404500,00.html):
"According to the intelligence service report, supporters of France's extreme right fall into various categories: skinheads, ultra-nationalists, white supremacists, neo-Nazis and hooligans. Their attacks are no longer aimed mostly at Jews but at a new 'worst common enemy': Muslims and Arabs on French soil."
The elections were a sham. Check out this transcript of Judy Miller on Hardball
=========
Matthews: Wait a minute. When you say—Judy, when you say administration, do you mean the alliance party leadership or Allawi over there, the current prime minister? Who are you talking about?
Miller: We are talking about the administration officials who have been reaching out to …
Matthews: You mean Americans? [Italics in the MSNBC transcript.]
Miller: ... [Ayatollah] Sistani's—yes, American officials who have been reaching out to Sistani's party. Because Dr. Chalabi is on that list.
Matthews: So where—so we have an election over there. And the same day we're holding an election, the same week, we are plotting which ministries to give to Chalabi, the guy who talked us into the war in the first place.
Miller: No, no. There were expressions. There was apparently an effort to determine whether or not he would be interested in assuming a certain portfolio.
Matthews: Why are we in the business of deciding or even negotiating cabinet ministries in a foreign government?
Miller: No. Well, you know, Chris, first of all, this is just one report. But I think what is very clear, according to people I talked to today, is that they have been attempting to mend fences with him. Now understanding that as a tent [phonetic transcription] on that Sistani list, the Shia list, he will be an important person in Iraq. And I think that there will have to be a lot of rethinking on the part of the Americans with whom they want to deal.
Matthews: … the idea that the man who won his country back through the vice president's office, Ahmed Chalabi, finds his way now through all this electoral process to end up as oil minister or finance minister, as you say, interior minister—and I think he has higher ambitions than that—makes the electoral process come down to the guy who started the war, ends up winning the war, irregardless of how people vote over there.
doesn't sound much like 'propping up' the Italian State.
No it was not because they weren't doing that - look at the Symington Commission........they were instead bankrolling the Christian Democrats..........to stop the Communists in Turin being as big a problem as they could have been..........not many European Communist leaders in the West have car factories and cities named after them in the USSR
from an article published today on the French Govt. wanting to ban the Nazi groups shows
Typical Guardian.......the French problem is that the French State deported thousands from Drancy to Death using SNCF trains and the files are restricted and SNCF has never made a clean breast like the Reichsbahn. Germany is way ahead in cleansing its soul compared to France.
The French Government has a powder keg with such a large population of N African Muslims
making up a huge proportion of those
Yes Italian I haven't forgotten though the details are slippery that German neo-Nazi’s set a immigrant camp I think it was, on fire and killed those people because they were Muslim or not Christian I guess, who knows what excuse.
Unfortunately in Australia despite the attacks on Muslims it is our Jewish schools and the Israeli Embassy for example that are the main concern for our security forces. There is a real concern that they will be attacked. However much the chattering classes may not wish to face it, just as in Europe, it is Jewish institutions that come under attack far more often that Muslim ones.
I am assuming that you are Jewish from your comments. Sorry if I am wrong but you have opened the floodgates. If it makes you feel a little less bemused by my attitude my father was a second generation German of non-Jewish background in Australia and he hated anti-Semitism with a passion. For him it was the measure of human bestiality. And being of German descent had its racist price for him right up until he died.
I could speak of our "Melbourne Club", Jews and Governor Generals. I could speak of some of our academics organising boycotts against all Israeli academics. This is not objecting to Likud this is accusing good men and women of the Jewish faith of being monsters.
The Jews have been attacked and abused by the Christian west for well over 1500 years. They have been forced to become moneylenders for western trade and then condemned and killed for it. A prominent journalist in this country argues that Zionists!! ( let me assure you she means JEWS) control our media and money and arranged for the Liberals to be re-elected, and then says but some of my best friends are Jews why do you call me anti-Semitic.
A people who have been abused by both Christians and Muslims for most of written European/Middle East history they are a little paranoid. To say that they should take more chances may be something that you are entitled to say; my Christian society has been using it to hurt them forever. Do you know the book Ivanhoe by Sir Water Scott.
And as an atheist I find them the most tolerant, non-hierarchical and certainly non-proselytising of religions. Child abuse is seemingly rampant amongst the powerful in religion in this country. The religion that doesn't ever get accused, Judaism. Muslim misbehaviour is not addressed for a range of reasons.
You make it clear that you think one must always speak out. Well so do I and go near anti-Semitism and I must. So sorry and sorry that you excited me.
And I did read the EU report that stated that the group most attacked was jews. I do recall the German Foreign Minister saying if they didn't wear their little skull caps then people wouldn't hurt them and I do remember the French Foreign Minister saying that his foreign policy wasn't going to be influenced by shitty jews.
hey italian I have just realised that your objection to me putting Bridget and Tammy in the same basket related to the cyber pervert, not about courtesy. I may assume that was a mistake of yours, not a belief that Tammy deserved it.
Tammy keep up the battle by the way. just had to insert that nitpicking
In pictures: Baghdad blast wall art
Very moving. All credit to Iraqis and their friends, and no credit to the US occupiers.
Steve Bell on the State of the Union
An interview with an Iraqi who, because he went back for something in his office, survived a suicide/car bomb explosion that killed 8 people in Baghdad. (This is an open-access version of the article published on the Independent newspaper today.)
The suicide bomber came in mid-afternoon. The few survivors who saw the pale-faced man described him as red-haired with a long beard. "He asked some of the people at the gate if they would be kind enough to move their cars so he could park," Abu Ali says.
"He was very polite. He was driving a Caprice. Then people noticed that he was parking in a way that wouldn't let him drive away." The one memory all of them had was that the bearded man was playing music and religious recitations on his cassette player. "In one sense," Abu Ali remarks, "he was already dead."
I am assuming that you are Jewish from your comments. Sorry if I am wrong but you have opened the floodgates. If it makes you feel a little less bemused by my attitude my father was a second generation German of non-Jewish background in Australia and he hated anti-Semitism with a passion. For him it was the measure of human bestiality. And being of German descent had its racist price for him right up until he died.
Don't fret - Himmler's deputy Statthalter Reinhard Heydrich, and Robert Ley head of the Labour Front were both part-Jewish; as was supposedly Milch, Head of the Luftwaffe. It is a myth that the Nazis were 100% anti-Jewish.......they had some favoured sons to provide the exception that proves the rule.
Not to worry
He was driving a Caprice.
The old style was much nicer than the new one.......amazingly quiet engine and not badly priced..............
Yes PeterS - I know that STV keeps the constituency link...AV was the system favoured in the Speaker's Conference 1931...............but basically the List System is what the EU dumped us with for the Euro Elections and it is a farce.
I have no problem with PR at local government level, but even Helmut Schmidt in Germany reckons their system has made it impossible to take the corrective steps he first proposed in 1976 to counter the projections for German bankruptcy........and Genscher's FDP just changed sides and put Kohl in power............now it is the B90/Greens or FDP that have the power and in the case of the SPD they have to get PDS votes or form a coalition with the Communists as pre-1926.
Very moving. All credit to Iraqis and their friends, and no credit to the US occupiers.
Rachel, a Brit in London |02.03.05 - 5:24 am | #
Rachel:
Thank you for not blaming the US for the hideous grafitti that defaces much of Baghdad. Rest assured that work crews (chain gangs) of political prisoners will, when properly motivated, make short work of the problem.
PeteS,
Here's some of what Frenchman Jean-Francious Revel wrote about relations between Europe and America in his book Anti-Americanism:
Within some democratic countries, a subset of the population, some political parties and the majority of intellectualls, were prone to adhere to Communism, or at least support similar ideas. For this crowd, anti-Americanism was rational, since America was identified with capitalism, and capitalism with evil. What was less rational was their wholesale swallowing of the most flagrant and stupid lies about American society and foreign policy, and their careful spurning of accurate knowledge of the Communist systems.
Anti-Americanism:
Le Defi Americain ?
What they are not telling you about the election
“We asked the Americans for supplies,” Dr. Aisha tells me later when we exit the room, “But they didn’t help us any. How can we continue like this? When an American private is badly wounded they fly him to Germany or America. Here we have high ranking police officers and Iraqi soldiers who are brought to this dirty hospital with no specialists!”
Yeah and when they fly a wonded British soldier he is dumped in Selly Oak, Birmingham with no visits from military leaders of politicians........doesn't it make you cry Rachel.......do you ever think of them in that hospital in Selly Oak ?
So proud of all the Iraqis that had the courage to stand up to the terrorist and cast their vote! Congratulations!
Rachel, even for you these last few comments are pretty disjointed and, well, frankly, indicate that you may be hitting the Boddingtons a bit too much.
All credit to Iraqi artists, fine. No credit to the Americans? About what? That we, what, don't have art critics over there writing Sunday supplement blather that noone can possibly make sense of?
And that a "high ranking" Iraqi does not get the hospital flight that a US private gets, well, what are you saying - that the bigiwg should get good treatment and a mere private should get shit on? Oh, I see - again, the problem is not the killers you support, but that Iraqis dare to try to put into practice the benefits of liberty. So typical.
Is you whole life nothing but bile, vinegar and gall?
indicate that you may be hitting the Boddingtons a bit too much.
I doubt it is Boddingtons........more likely alcopops or Cinzano
The State of The Union address and that Iraqi woman with the blue finger.
I am faint with shock. Safia Taleb Al-Souhail's family left Iraq in 1968. Until now, it looked like just a puke-making stunt - flying in an Iraqi woman with a blue finger and getting her tangled up in the dog tags of the dead soldier son of an American woman, whom she was "spontaneously" embracing - but this is far worse. Google on her name and on the phrase, "Our family fled from Iraq after the Ba’ath coup d’etat". Eg Women for a Free Iraq She is a sort of one-woman Iraq The Model, but based in the US.
Safia does not represent the brave Iraqis who actually voted in Iraq. Gross, disgusting misrepresentation.
ros, copy and paste the following to a word document:
< a href="">
once you've finished pasting, delete the space in front of the first "a".
When you want to make a live link, copy the URL of the site and paste it inside the quotation marks. Be sure not to inadvertently include extra spaces in front or behind the URL when you cut and paste.
In between these symbols >< type the words you want displayed. For example, in Rachel's post of 1:29, the words "Women for a Free Iraq" would be typed. Once again, be sure there are no extra spaces.
Copy and paste the result into haloscan.
When I first tried to learn this from Brian H., I practised on an old thread until I got it right.
I also made a template by copying and pasting the < a href=""> over and over again. Too lazy to memorize how to type it.
That was me.
I’ve got something to get off my mind about the little pervert post of 11:57. As many of the commenters here know, we have been subjected to some nasty comments by what Ros terms a cyberpervert. Normally I ignore that sort of thing, but the post of 11:57 bothers me tremendously.
It begins with a rephrasing of another commenter’s post, done in italics. This was followed by a rather literate and erudite observation. The observation included the use of a hyphen with a space fore and aft. (Conrad – the)
It was signed little pervert, a signature previously used by our cyberpervert .
I was able to ignore the little pervert when I thought it was some nasty little boy having fun. I am having difficulty with this post because it mimics the style of at least 3 regulars here…PeteS, Rick, and Rachel . I sincerely hope that none of you has done this, and although you certainly don’t owe me any explanations, I’d like to hear from you that you didn’t do it.
The post I refer to reads as follows, although the first paragraph is in italics, something that I don’t know how to do.
Those concluding words of Hemingway's "The Sun Also Rises," a novel of postwar disillusion, became a generation's verbal shrug, expressing weary melancholy after a war waged to make the world safe for democracy.
Oh, nonsense. Hemingway's pessimism was a pose adopted from Joseph Conrad - the most influential English novelist of the period before WWI. Hemingway had fun during the war, and most of the 'lost generation' writers didn't even fight.
George Will pretends to greater erudition than he possesses.
little pervert | Email | Homepage | 02.01.05 - 11:57 pm | #
Bridget you left out the closing tag. Unfortunately I don't know how to escape the following properly for haloscan so that you see exactly what you should type (as opposed to what you will see once you've posted your comment), but here's my attempt:
You want to create a hyperlink like this:
Women for Iraq
... you type ...
< a href="http://www.womenforiraq.org/safiaalsouhail.php">Women for Iraq
... minus the space between '
PeteS, the closing tag is
Dang, here it is again:
< a href="http://www.womenforiraq.org/safiaalsouhail.php">Women for Iraq< / a>
Drop the space after the first open-angle-bracket and the last two spaces before the final close-angle-bracket
<
Sorry, Haloscan deleted that. I'll try again. The closing tag is (without the asterisks)
**
Bother - but in the meantime, PeteS, you got it.
Aha. Think I just figured out how to show you exactly:
<a href="http://www.womenforiraq.org/
safiaalsouhail.php">Women for Iraq</a>
That should be it.
Is it possible that Bush's speech-writers have made a fool of him? Was it that they just could not resist including, "Three days ago in Baghdad, Safia was finally able to vote for the leaders of her country" before producing her? Call me cynical but how likely is it that Safia voted in Baghdad? She would have had to be flown into Iraq at the US tax-payers' expense, protected and transported everywhere by the US Marines: at the very least, we would have had pictures - there would have been a "photo opportunity". Don't tell me, when this story gets reported in the international media (instead of just on web fora), someone will remember where he put the pictures?
I am having difficulty with this post because it mimics the style of at least 3 regulars here PeteS, Rick, and Rachel .
Bridget, like you say - no explanations owed, but I have no problem responding to this. I have posted as three names here:
me, PeteS ... my real name in the real world, e-mail address available on request ...
Spelling Bee - because the world needs to know that "lose" and "loose" are two separate verbs;there is no 'd' in "congratulations"; and it's not spelled "Isreal" just because you pronounce it that way...
and Cursor Paludis because those allegations of leprechaun genocide were so hilarious I couldn't resist, but wanted to keep that banter separate from regular posts.
To my memory I have never used any other handle. As a papist bogtrotter I see it as my duty to swear a bit and drink a lot, but the little pervert style is way beyond a line I would ever ever cross. I also know squat about Hemingway or Conrad because to my shame I have read close to zero works of fiction in the last 20 years and am thus a literary peasant.
"Tammy, the CPA was headed up by Bremer. Please check your facts, instead of wriggling and twisting. Honestly, you are shamefully sloppy and irresponsible"
Everyone knows it was headed by Bremer idiot, that's why among intelligent people that fact is not even worth mentioning it's simply understood. So it doesn't surprise me any that you were the one that mentioned it Rachel!
Italian,
"With 15 of 26 Iraqi government ministries already under Iraqi control, Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) spokesman Dan Senor says the remaining 11 will be transferred by week's end.
"Today I can announce that by the end of this week, all remaining ministries will be turned over to the Iraqi ministers," said Senor during a June 21 press briefing in Baghdad. "So by this time next week, every single minister will have control of their respective ministry," he added.
Senor further noted that more than 1.3 million Iraqis work for the national government, "and by the end of this week, all of them will be reporting to Iraqi supervisors and Iraqi ministers."
The CPA was working in conjunction with the Iraqi Ministries thoughout their operations and much of the work was done by Iraqis and Iraqi expatriates. The middle and lower tier functional bodies consisted primarily of IRAQIS. Before the deadline for the CPA dissolution and emergence of the itermim government, virtually ALL the ministries and government operations were under IRAQI control. Just because you have some American oversite, does NOT make it an entirely AMERICAN operation! You can try to say that metal tank filled with water is tank of metal, but that is deceptive. It is a tank of WATER.
Bridget, 02.03.05 - 2:26 pm . Not guilty. I hardly ever use single quotes, except within double quotes. And I've forgotten all the Hemingway I've read.
PeteS,
Sorry I jumped on you, Bridget has quite correctly called me on it.
I know PeteS is not little pervert Bridget, it's just not like him.
It's not like Rick or Rachel either. It could be that we just have a narrower active troll on board, but our old friend Ibn is still a possible suspect as it was his habit to degenerate into a little name-calling beast whenever the mood struck him. It's more to the nature of Italian but we can't totally rule out a sniper troll.
I know it isn't you either Rachel. Despite our disagreements, I do believe you to be an upstanding person, even though we are "standing up" on opposite sides.
Oh, dear, here's someone else who - like Hemingway - had "fun" in the war.
According to an NBC-affiliated website, a US general in charge of troops in Iraq has said he derived pleasure from partaking in fighting and killing people.
Speaking at a panel discussion on Tuesday, Lt-Gen James Mattis, responsible for Camp Pendleton's 1st Marine Division in Iraq, said he had fun shooting Afghan men who he claimed beat women for five years.
"You know, guys like that ain't got no manhood left anyway. So, it's a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them," he said to clapping from the panel's audience.
America, Hell will freeze over before your country undoes the damage that has been done by your representatives in Iraq these past two years. I don't yet hate Americans but I can understand why millions do.
This is an interesting interview with the last ambassador to the UN of Saddam Hussein's government.
"Anyway, Italian, it would take more than one sensitive American accusing me of anti-Americanism to make me anti-American (if you get my drift) ... or even anti-Tammy. Since Americans are so fond of reminding us Europeans how evilly anti-American we are, it should also be obvious that those of us who haven't gone with the cultural flow are also less likely attribute one rash deed or comment to a national character defect"
I am sorry Pete, but somedays (weeks) we just get so awfully tired of it all. If Rachel or Italian would just once, in 25 posts, point out something positive, we would likely take some of their real and justifiable criticisms in stride. Most of us anyway. But this constant unrelenting hatred towards Americans does make us strike out and sometimes with a barrage of retorts intended just to try to hold back the tsunami of unreasoned hatred.
And here she is, the blue-fingered so-called Iraqi woman who no more represents the brave Iraqi (men and) women who voted last Sunday than I do. [The post at 3 Feb 05 03:41]
America, y'all been had.
Tammy, all my attacks are entirely reasoned, and no one will be more positive than I as soon as America gets out of Iraq.
Why can't you Americans see that Bush is mortgaging your children's futures, pouring your pensions and the lives of your sons and daughters into Iraq - for what? You may say that Iraqis can't do it on their own - well, how do you know - why don't you give them a chance?
"America, Hell will freeze over before your country undoes the damage that has been done by your representatives in Iraq these past two years. I don't yet hate Americans but I can understand why millions do."
And this kind of comment doesn't serve. America hating has been going on since before the Revolutionary War when the Brits looked on us as their poor, undeserving relatives and with as much distaste.
Stereotypes abound and not much has been done in those 300 odd centuries to overcome unfortunate sterotypes. We still have them in the US to some degree, and I dislike it when American's trot them out to rile the Brits, French or "wogs".
I don't expect all sterotypes to evaporate overnight, but these discussions are illuminating to the degree in which they give us a multi-faceted view of standard-issue misrepresentations.
I learn more each time I come because of small parts of the puzzle each commenter seems to contribute.
I just wish that some of the more strident commenters would stop sifting over their bag of ideas, seeming to pick out all the very ones that would give a truer more representative picture of a situation and leaving only those that give an almost video-game virtual unreality to some very complex and interdependent realities.
>and Cursor Paludis
Hm, did not know green glass before, do not know that either. Who or what was Cursor Paludis? Google is not very helpfull ...
Presumably, US troops are still not being treated for leishmaniasis (the incubation period is up to six months, so thousands could have the disease without yet knowing it).
... if it is of the visceral variety, then long-term organ damage can result if the disease remains untreated. Those men [and women, of course] most at risk will probably be servicemen who quit the army after returning home since they will not have regular medical checkups as a result.
The best drug for treating Leishmaniasis is called Pentosam, registered in Britain since 1978. This drug, which is based on the heavy metal, antimony, is not registered in the United States.
I wonder if they know that the sandfly does not fly higher than 3 metres. I seem to remember reading that somewhere, quite recently: hence the reason why people sleep on the first floor, not ground floor, where possible.
Rachel,
"Tammy, all my attacks are entirely reasoned, and no one will be more positive than I as soon as America gets out of Iraq."
And the very fact that you stated your point in this way invalidates it. No one's "attacks" are entirely reasoned. Not yours and not mine. They have an emotional base which by definition is impulsive and not reasoned.
Thoughts and discussions are "reasoned". So is taking a proposed action and analyzing it for it's immediate and long-term reactions.
We cannot say..."Get out of Iraq" unless the newly-elected government selects that course of action. They will evaluate the short-term versus the long-term benefits of such an action. We have to assume that they will be speaking (by endowment of a popular vote) for the Iraqi majority. If their evaluations lead them to decide that the good outweighs the bad of the occupational forces remaining. We cannot, with any rationalization of conscience, disavow that obligation. If their evaluation leads them to conclude that the occupational forces are a detriment, then it is our obligation to leave.
I am not sure that I follow every part of this argument but each American ought to be - instead of asleep at the wheel - trying to work out for him/herself what the truth is.
On 9/11, after the Pentagon attack, the video cameras and tapes at a nearby CITGO, the Sheraton Hotel along I-395 and Virginia DOT cameras were all confiscated by the FBI and they have yet to disclose any of the contents that were recorded by those cameras. Those cameras would have recorded what came in to hit the Pentagon and if viewed by the public, all the world would know that it was not a Boeing 757, American Airlines Flight 77, as we were told. ... The post-attack cleanup at the Pentagon shed some light on the fact that it was not a 757, ... There was one credible witness found that saw "a two-engine jet airplane, the engines were under the wings." That is a visual description of a 737, 757, or 767, but it is also a description of an A-3 Skywarrior.
Now that Bush cannot find any WMD he likes to point to the "mass graves" without elaborating that about three of every five of those 500,000 dead Iraqis got into those mass graves when George H.W. Bush urged the Shiites and Kurds to rise up in 1991-1992 against Saddam and Bush 41 stood idly by while 300,000 or so of the 500,000 "excuse graves" were being filled, and now George W. points to them as a good reason for the invasion of Iraq.
Tammy, tell me, was the US attack on Iraq reasoned or not reasoned?
The US Government increased its “total liabilities and net responsibilities” by $11 trillion from 2003 to 2004, to a total of $45.892 trillion. Just think of the interest payments!
Apparently, according to some of your fellow countrymen, this is part of the current US administration's plan for an "ownership society": bankrupt the country, take away all social programmes.
Road to Ruin
Financial Report of the US Government (see page 11)
"we are not going to give an artificial timeline which will only embolden the terrorists who just have to wait their time out"
Mr. Bush his words yesterday about Iraqi troop withdrawal which could have been mine.
Only when Iraq is stable enough and the terror crushed then (partial) withdrawal can be an option.
We are building a house of democracy in Iraq: the foundation is about halfway let alone the walls and roof.
When the roof once made appeared to stormproof then another chapter can be entered.
Stalin:
You asked about the evil "Cursor Paludis". He is a holocaust denier who refuses to acknowledge the slaughter of the inoffensive leprecauns by his violent, drunken ancestors. The green blood of millions of dead leprecauns calls out for vengence.
There are credible rumors of the survival of a small community of leprecauns in the Amazonian jungle, and it appears that the Leprecaun Liberation Front (LLF) is emerging as a significant force. In fact, as Rachel has noted, it may have been a leprecaun attack on the Pentagon rather than the crash of a commercial airliner. (Remember, there are seven times as many Americans of Irish ancestry than there are people in Ireland. In fact, there have been several US Presidents of Irish descent, although most of them were respectable Protestants rather than Papist bogtrotters. The US is therefore a prime target of the LLF.)
Beware the Green Jihad!
Rachel, the Neptune guys at Democratic Underground tell you all this? Now, let's see, the video of the 757 going into the Pentagon that was taken across the helo pad is not sufficient, is it? No, a Whale is what did all that damage. Just like there were no Jews in the towers and, hell, the live shots of the aircraft hitting them were probably also faked by the incompetent US government that is also so competent that it can pull off these detailed conspiracies.
And if, that is a big IF, 3 of 5 bodies in the mass graves are the result of the Shia uprising, I guess that lets Saddam off the hook, eh?
Or, wait, why did we not support the uprising? Maybe it was because "world opinion," the Arab street and the UN would have disapproved and H.W. was not the focused sort that his son is? W has stood tall and done just what he said he would.
Now, as for Safia Taleb Al-Souhail, you distort the facts, as usual, by implying that her family left Iraq in 1968 and somehow that is significant. Her father was murdered in Beirut in 1994. She has been an advocate of Iraqi freedom as an exile for decades. Is this a problem? Except for your cross-eyed hatred and blinding venom, do you have any evidence that she did not return to Baghdad to vote? Is it impossible that she was flown here for just the reason of being at the SotU address? And the reference you cite from the Democratic Underground is just pathetic. The Iraqis gave you and your terrorist supporting pals the finger on Sunday.
The broom continues to sweep you onto the ash heap.
And your disgusting disparaging of the meeting of the two and the exchange of dog tags is yet again evidence that you lack any compassion or human feeling.
Rachel, a Brit in London -
America is going to get you! ARRRRRRRR! We are a giant monster and we are after you ARRRRRRRGGH!!!
I am having difficulty with this post because it mimics the style of at least 3 regulars here…PeteS, Rick, and Rachel . I sincerely hope that none of you has done this, and although you certainly don’t owe me any explanations, I’d like to hear from you that you didn’t do it.
Rest assured Bridget I may be sarcastic, but I don't write the comments that cause you distress and will not
"The US Government increased its “total liabilities and net responsibilities” by $11 trillion from 2003 to 2004, to a total of $45.892 trillion. Just think of the interest payments!"
So you are not an economist Rachel ? You really should learn something about Stocks and Flows, and maybe you will learn that those interest payments provide the pensions for lots of bondholders............had Gordon Brown been less of a twerp he could have financed his projects with Gilts and kept the pension funds afloat instead of using PFI and taxing private pension funds so he sent them bust
You really should consider that since 1990 67% global economic growth has been due to the US and the trade deficits run by the Us have allowed the world economy to avoid another 1930s.........if the US introduces another Smoot-Hawley however, then watch Germany sink beneath the waves and China too.
You should be more concerned about the 7 million without work in Germany and the $150 billion a year in interest payments Germany is borrowing to pay.......the country that funds the EU is collapsing
"Tammy, tell me, was the US attack on Iraq reasoned or not reasoned?"
The ONE thing that I've learned in coming to these blogs is that we're all a victim of our own perspective. Just like how different the level of water at the bottom of a glass looks whether you are standing above it, or croached below it.
It all depends on what "horrifies" you most. And that's different for every individual. There's no universal standard for that.
What horrified the Fadhil brothers was being held in invisible chains by the threat of Saddam's security police and oppressive policies. The thought of the destruction, pain and death of war horrified them much less. To them, curtailment of freedom was the monster they couldn't slay and broke their dreams at night. Hence, they are pro-war and found the necessity of it reason enough.
For you, it appears the horror of war or of institutionalized violence on a large scale or (perhaps?) "institutionalization" of any is the crimson dragon. So for you, war is never a reasoned response.
For me, as usual, I'm in the middle. I tend to believe that the action of going to war is inherently unreasoned, but that the consequences, if they prove beneficial over the long-term can be sufficient to negate the initial lack of reason. In my own mind, that ultimate weighing of positive outcome versus negative consequences is a measure you can only take over time.
If I were to weigh that prematurely, I would at this point say the war was unwise. But I'm ever mindful of the fact that if, in 5 or 10 years time, if the Iraqis prove to be happier and more peaceful than they are now, then the balance will shift and the war will become a wise action. Just as the measure of electro-impulses is actually the average of electrical spikes measured over a length of time, never just taken at just one second in time. So I think history either wears the cloak of respectability or becomes ignominious over time.
because to my shame I have read close to zero works of fiction in the last 20 years and am thus a literary peasant.
PeteS | Email | Homepage | 02.03.05 - 3:04 pm | #
Bridget,
As I'm sure you are aware, the most notorious misogynist who posts on the Iraqi blogs is the despicible "Lee C.". His predeliction for verbally attacking female posters is well known. He may well not be the "Little Pervert", but he is well known to troll under assumed names and it is obvious that he has severe psychosexual problems.
Just a suggestion - I have no proof.
because to my shame I have read close to zero works of fiction in the last 20 years and am thus a literary peasant.
PeteS | Email | Homepage | 02.03.05 - 3:04 pm | #
Is this the same as literally a peasant ??
"The US is therefore a prime target of the LLF.)
Beware the Green Jihad!"
Suffering Jesus! How many jihads do we have to crush at one time?
"Just a suggestion - I have no proof"
You can say that twice and mean it.
Lee is as far away from that kind of activity as anyone can name. You really should give this a rest FOAD. It's a non-productive activity.
Lee doesn't hate women and in fact, as far as I can measure, having never met the man, favors women over men. And as we have e-mailed each other occasionally over matters which usually include his spending his time trying to overcome my grotesque computer-illiteracy, I would say he is in most cases actually extremely tolerant of women.
Moreover, since those computer problems of mine necessitated my giving Lee my personal e-mail address, he has ready access to it at any time. Should he have had the proclivity to indulge in dark fantasies, he might well have made use of it before now. Instead of becoming a juvenile, auto-erotic gnat on Zeyad's blog.
"Road to Ruin
Financial Report of the US Government (see page 11)
Rachel, a Brit in London | Email | Homepage | 02.03.05 - 4:32 pm | # "
Rachel learn to read accounts. These are pseudo GAAP accounts and the PV of liabilities crystallised at 2004 would show the whole of Europe to be insolvent.
The UK has a deficit on public sector pension funds greater than the entire National Debt......around $1500 000 000 000. Italy is insolvent, France, Germany and Spain, Italy etc.
You cannot crystallise liabilities over 75 years and set them against Cash balances when you fund on a PAYG basis.......why not add tax revenues over the next 75 years to balance the liabilities ?
Is this the same as literally a peasant ??
C'mon Rick... don't make me take down the dictionary again.
Main Entry: literally
Pronunciation: 'li-t&-r&-lE, 'li-tr&-lE, 'li-t&r-lE
Function: adverb
1 : in a literal sense or manner : ACTUALLY (took the remark literally) (was literally insane)
2 : in effect : VIRTUALLY (will literally turn the world upside down to combat cruelty or injustice -- Norman Cousins)
Main Entry: literary
Pronunciation: 'li-t&-"rer-E
Function: adjective
1 a : of, relating to, or having the characteristics of humane learning or literature b : BOOKISH c : of or relating to books
2 a : WELL-READ b : of or relating to authors or scholars or to their professions
- literarily /"li-t&-'rer-&-lE/ adverb
- literariness /'li-t&-"rer-E-n&s/ noun
@Stalin: Cursor - Latin for runner, Paludis - genitive case of Latin Palus, a bog or marsh. Therefore Cursor Paludis - a bogtrotter.
@Tammy: Sorry I jumped on you. Thank you Tammy. I believe I owe you an apology too.
"Apparently, according to some of your fellow countrymen, this is part of the current US administration's plan for an "ownership society": bankrupt the country, take away all social programmes."
And really Rachel, even as comments about the War in Iraq seem appropriate, as it's a fairly universal subject, I really think what American's do or "do without" regarding their own economy doesn't concern anyone BUT Americans.
PeteS,
One more point regarding the proportional representation versus first past the post argument......
In my home state of Colorado a group of activists gathered enough signatures to place an amendment to the Colorado state constitution on the the November 2004 ballot. The amendment would have required that Colorado's 9 electoral votes (we have 2 US Senators and 7 US House members) be allocated based on proportional representation. Currently, all of Colorado's electoral votes are awarded to the highest vote getter in the Presidential race. (Bush beat Kerry 52 percent to 47 percent in November 2004 in Colorado).
--- continued ---
--- continued ---
The argument in favor of the amendment was that it would motivate Coloradans to vote, despite the fact that Colorado has usually voted for Republican presidential candidates. The argument is that a Colorado Democrat would see that his or her vote could have determined whether Bush received 5 or 6 electoral votes and Kerry received 3 or 4 electoral votes.
Our Republican governor, Bill Owens, argued against the amendment because he believed that proportional representation applied to Colorado's electoral votes would reduce Colorado's influence because no Presidential candidate would pursue the "extra" electoral vote.
The amendment was defeated by the voters as Bush won Colorado's 9 evs and Colorado elected a Hispanic Democrat to the United States Senate.
Rick, I fear your resorting to facts, reality and tutorials is lost on the wee lass. Not nearly enough bile in it.
And speaking of elections, contrary to the opines of some here and in the lefty cess pool, W did win and handily at that.
Though I am still researching it, apparently a mere 30,000 more votes would have given him 3 additional state wins. Close, but no cigar. Still, damned close and 3 more states would have been up there in landslide country.
Greetings Zeyad! All the best to you in the years to come on the long hard road, it is people such as yourself that will make Iraq a great country. I think you should include a link to the New York Times in your news section, it is the paper of record.
Tammy, keep up the good work.
Rachel, you are an ignorant slut.
Warmest regards,
Tom
"Our Republican governor, Bill Owens, argued against the amendment because he believed that proportional representation applied to Colorado's electoral votes would reduce Colorado's influence because no Presidential candidate would pursue the "extra" electoral vote."
I read about that in USAToday. Wasn't it also voted down because of the potential loss of Federal funds that attended it?
To expand on Rickvid Rachel. Safia's father was Sheikh al-Suhail a renowned Iraqi opposition leader and chief of the Bani Tamin tribe who was assasinated in Beirut on 14 th April 1994 by 4 Iraqi diplomats acting on the direct orders of Saddam These assasinations didn't come out of the blue their would have been attempted bribery, then threats and often if they could rape of female family members.
Safia was appointed as Egyptian Ambassador by the interim government She was born and lived in Lebanon, where her mother comes from. She became politically active after her father was assassinated She is married to Bakhtyar Amin, Kurdish political activist and founder of Iraqi Democracy Institute in the US, who is now Minister for Human Rights.
She is a renowned human rights activist.
"who no more represents the brave Iraqi (men and) women who voted last Sunday than I do"
Perhaps you could be a little more discrimating about what you read in democratic Underground. And perhaps an apolgy to Safia.
Thanks bridget, and PeteS and Rachel for the link business.
Ros,
Rachel no more represents the brave Iraqi anything any more than my dogs do. Except they have far more character and demonstrated courage than does the Git.
Amerikan Army are killer drunks!
(Names changed, tho NONE are innocent!)
THURSTON COUNTY - A 25-year-old Fort Lewis soldier driving the wrong direction on Highway 101 collided head-on with another car early Thursday, killing that other driver.
Washington State Patrol Trooper Sam Spade said investigators believe the driver of the wrong-way car, A. Drunk Killer, was under the influence of alcohol. … Killer … was treated at an Olympia hospital for injuries sustained in the crash, then released ….
(Edited for content I want you to believe.)
Tammy,
Wasn't it also voted down because of the potential loss of Federal funds that attended it?
There was no direct connection between a loss of Federal funds and the proposed state amendment. Governor Owens and others (including Democrats) argued that the likely result would be a loss of influence in the presidential election, thus, a loss of federal funds.
Rickvid in Seattle,
I believe Bush was breathtakingly close to winning in New Hampshire (4 electoral votes) and Wisconsin (10 electoral votes).
Like Tammy, I have been in touch with Lee C. by email for some time. He's no misogynist, and I don't think he's particularly literary either, being more concerned with politics, history, patriotism and such.
Paludius >Paulus >bogtrotter >Slang- Used as a disparaging term for a person of Irish birth or descent
Interessting. Frankly Pete Essemus i would have never figured that out - even after i had to spend seven hard shool years with that tricky lingua latina. Ablativus absolutus, participium coniunctum, gerundium, gerundivum, Gallia omnia divisa est in partes tres ... oh i'm shivering again.
I again recommend the Cox and Forkum new blog, http://www.coxandforkum.com/ for a great comment on the democrat's reaction to the election, and to W's clear intent regarding terror sponsoring states.
Frankly Pete Essemus i would have never figured that out
After seven years of Latin? Shame on you stalinus minimus. I never learned a word if it... everything I know came from the etymologies in the dictionary I keep having to look up to correct Rick's English. Amicus Cursoribus Paludum ("friend of bogtrotter") really showed me up, although he had a geographical advantage.
From Instapundit:
"Safia al-Souhail was a special guest of the First Family last night at the State of the Union Address. According to al-Souhail, the man who murdered her father on Saddam's behalf just happens to be one of the businessman who made millions off of the Oil-for-Food scam. Al-Souhail even says that the assassin received the oil vouchers as a reward for his work."
http://www.pwcglobal.com/Extweb/
...0256C7C003769BE
Rachel....your use of US Government statistics on page 11 show the reason why British Final Salary Pension Funds are dead.........and are being closed to run-off funds...............it is the application of the dreaded FRS 17.
Your use of "mortgage" is funny. Every parent "mortgages" his child's future.....if you add the total sum owed on a mortgage incl interest (as US Truth in Lending documents do) and set them against cash balances at hand.....children must starve so parents can pay off the mortgage that day.......that is the logic on FRS 17....to pay off all debts without matching incomes yet accruing
http://www.accountingweb.co.uk/n.../832/
83160.html
This should be required reading for you Rachel to understand page 11
http://www.wga.gov.uk/pages/
2sec...2section3b.html
41. Since submitting the 2000 Memorandum, the Treasury has consulted the FRAB in reaching its conclusions about how FRS17 Retirement Benefits should be applied to the public sector........................................46. The Treasury reported in the 2000 Memorandum that an inter-departmental working group had been established to consider the development of GAAP-based accounting policies for social security benefit expenditure.
http://www.wga.gov.uk/pages/faq.html
There has been a general, if gradual, move in recent years towards an increased emphasis on transparency and accountability in budgetary and fiscal decision making processes overseas. New Zealand, Australia, Canada, Sweden, Iceland and the USA are all producing WGA in some form..........All liabilities which meet the detailed criteria for establishing a balance sheet provision set out in Financial Reporting Standard 12 will need to be provided for in order to allow WGA to present a true and fair view of the Government’s finances. Under the Standard provisions should only be recognised when an entity has a current obligation as a result of a past event that will require settlement and can be reliably estimated.
http://www.fool.com/news/
comment...ary030625bm.htm
The URL above Rachel will help you see that GM is also bankrupt and cannot therefore rescue Fiat SpA which is losing £500m each year and is insolvent.
Since the pension liabilities of GM plus its retirees health benefits are a contingent liability which if crystallised would give GM a negative net worth; plus the balance sheet of GMAC the #.2 borrower in the US after the Us Government, would sink the Balance Sheet if consolidated...........you can now see that both Public Sector and Private Sector Pensions are insolvent..........which is why you can never retire but much work till you die...........
This is Reality today........everywhere not just in the USA but much worse in Germany, Japan, Italy than in the USA
Condi Rice just declared war on Iran. Same language (as before invading Iraq), different Muslim nation.
Switch on CNN, American suckers.
Condi Rice just declared war on Iran. Same language (as before invading Iraq), different Muslim nation.
Switch on CNN, American suckers.
Rachel, a Brit in London | 02.04.05 - 5:53 am |
Darn! And she doesn't even look Jewish!
Two Iraqi films made after the liberation are highlighting the Dutch Roterdam filmfestival at the moment.
Here's a (roughly translated)very interesting article about them which just this morning was published in a national Dutch newspaper:
THERE'S ALSO DAILY LIFE GOING ON IN IRAQ
If it's depending on the Rotterdam filmfestival Baghdad is not only a political but also a cultural flashpoint.
The first Iraq fiction movie after 2003 "underexposure" made it's worldpremier yesterday in Rotterdam.
Director is Oday Raheed.
A film in which he weaves three stories together in his own words "like an Iraqi quentin tarentino"
Because of problems with visa he couldn't be there but Salam Pax was able to attend the festival.
Salam became an internet-celebrity before an during the siege of Baghdad because of his candid and witty internetdiary.
He got lot's of fans worrying about his safety and his actual existence.
(his safety appeared indeed to be in danger in those days: he discoverd later saddam's secret service had an eye on him/ if he knew that then he would immediately have stopped the project/ the invasion probably saved his life John - N.).
In Rotterdam he proved to be a living person: a charming thirty something, speaking eloquently english but less extravagant than in his diaries.
Salam went from internet to TV and his video-diaries are shown on BBC newsnight. In Rotterdam they are showing a fascinating compilation of them.
"People forget that in warzones people still live their daily lifes.
Western media create a distorted one sided view: if there only are men running around with bombs in baghdad while the whole city lays in ruins.
In reality the overall majority is just trying to attend their "ordinary" lifes how difficult it is sometimes".
The video-diaries of salam are offering the marvelous perpective of an ordinary man in baghdad (that is to say one man (Salam himself) who is openly gay likes alcohol and western music and hardly see a mosque from the inside).
Not that he is that extra-ordinary: Pax hopes on at least 20% secular votes in last sunday's election.
In between he is also portraying strictly religious people/ the rational groceryman on the corner and the pilgrims hurting themselves on a shiite festivity.
Just like a real professional reporter the studied architect is getting interesting reactions from people and is he jumping into dangerous situations like the siege of najaf (al sadr's failed attempt to grab power John - N.).
"That was real scary by the way, I wouldn't do that again"
As an Iraqi he can go to places where no western journalist can go.
"The western media are forced to hotel-journalism because for them it's indeed too dangerous to go on the street.
Especially because of that I want to go on with my reports to show there's more to Iraq then the umptiest
explosion".
"I have studied your culture for years, so it's about time you are getting more k
"I have studied your culture for years, so it's about time you are getting more knowledge about my culture"
ice denies Iran threat
4 February 2005
Condoleezza Rice today said that a military attack on Iran was 'not on the agenda' as she spoke in London at the beginning of a whirlwind European tour.
http://www.thisislondon.com/news...?source=PA&
ct=5
Condi Rice just declared war on Iran. Same language (as before invading Iraq), different Muslim nation.
Switch on CNN, American suckers.
Rachel, a Brit in London | Email | Homepage | 02.04.05 - 5:53 am |
Stranger to Truth Rachel
Rachel is either a) a compulsive liar and degenerate racist
b) a fantasist Islamophile
Either way she makes generic remarks antipathetic towards Americans which give the impression of a racist xenophobe
25 May 2002. Donald Rumsfeld, the U.S. Defense Secretary, said at a Pentagon briefing that he had no plans to invade Iraq or anywhere else ...
On 25 May 2002, the media on both sides of the Atlantic (eg the Washington Post on 24 May, and the Times in the UK on 25 May) reported Donald Rumsfeld (US Defense Secretary) saying at a Pentagon briefing that he had no plans to invade Iraq. The day before that, President Bush had assured reporters in Berlin that he had no invasion plans on his desk.
Two months later, the NY Times leaked invasion plans, and Rumsfeld ordered an investigation. Less than a year later, the US invaded Iraq.
Today, 4 February 2005 (reported on the BBC web site and elsewhere), Condoleezza Rice (President Bush's new Secretary of State) has "insisted that attacking Iran is not on America's agenda 'at this point in time'". So the invasion is "on", isn't it: we just don't yet know the date.
The cost of invading Iran will bankrupt the USA, in more ways than one.
The cost of invading Iran will bankrupt the USA, in more ways than one.
Rachel, a Brit in London | Email | Homepage | 02.04.05 - 7:51 am | #
Who cares about Iran ? The rotten regime is collapsing from within......the USA did not need to invade the USSR to bring it down.......Reagan did that and Europeans attacked him for disturbing the status-quo.
Iran will collapse from within it just needs abit of pressure and it will fold and the mullahs will go.
I am so pleased Rumsfeld did not announce to the media that Iraq was to be invaded........how professional......so unlike Clinton......at last grown-ups in government !
"insisted that attacking Iran is not on America's agenda 'at this point in time'". So the invasion is "on", isn't it: we just don't yet know the date.
Pity you are a dim bulb Rachel....go read up on Plan Orange.....that was preparing for a joint attack on the USA in 1923 by the combined navies of Japan and the British Empire..........it was why the Treaty of Washington was used to break the Anglo-Japanese Alliance of 1902.
Every nation has contingency plans......thankfully.
I don´t think Rachel exists. I think it is a Baathist or Wahhabi propaganda operation.
By the way what happened to al sadr: he seemed to have disappeared in the mist, or is he just hiding deep down on some partylist.
(up till now) the attempt to thwarten his "lust for power" appeared to have worked out fine due to the coordinated american/sistani cooperation.
If Sistani stays this intelligent rational and moderate even after his faction gained governmental power (people often change after getting power over others especially when they didn't have it before and in most cases not for the better)then he deserves an important place in the pantheon of "archfathers of Iraqi democracy".
Tammy wrote:
"The CPA was working in conjunction with the Iraqi Ministries thoughout their operations and much of the work was done by Iraqis and Iraqi expatriates. The middle and lower tier functional bodies consisted primarily of IRAQIS. Before the deadline for the CPA dissolution and emergence of the itermim government, virtually ALL the ministries and government operations were under IRAQI control. Just because you have some American oversite, does NOT make it an entirely AMERICAN operation! You can try to say that metal tank filled with water is tank of metal, but that is deceptive. It is a tank of WATER."
Thanks for this infomation, Tammy. I hope all those who called you silly names will read and learn.
History may look back on George Bush's first state of the union speech of his second term as the moment when a bold president turned the corner in Iraq and worked a political miracle by transforming social security into part of his ownership society. Then again, history may look back on his speech as the moment when a brash president over-reached by exaggerating his ability to spread freedom around the world, and by attacking the most revered creation of the New Deal.
There are reasons not to bet against Mr Bush. During his first term he passed a big tax cut, a major education reform and a huge expansion of Medicare. But history has more examples of presidents failing greatly than achieving greatly.
Rick,
The article in the link below explains the motivations of the hate-America left. I wouldn't call it xenophobia, as much as rage inspired by the triump of free-market democracy against socialism, for which they blame America. They hate America for destroying their dreams.
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Arti...le.asp?
ID=14268
Only a small minority of Brits hate America, and this is really a cover for their hatred of Britain and Western civilisation. British hatred of America is really a form of self-hatred.
In his speech, Mr Bush urged Saudi Arabia to "expand the role of its people in determining their future". Egypt - the largest recient of US aid outside Israel - might "show the way toward democracy". But there was no suggestion that either would face any negative consequences if they did not. Perhaps the President had them in mind when he explained that democracy was an "ultimate" rather than an immediate American goal. If that signals a cooling of his world-changing zeal and the more "consensual" approach Tony Blair says he now expects from Washington, that might be good news.
It bears repeating that democracy and freedom are fine things - the motherhood and apple pie of international discourse; except for those, as Mr Bush reminded us, like the "terrorist Zarqawi", unknown a short time ago but now the odious enemy of us all thanks to the way that Iraq and the "war on terror" have morphed into one titanic struggle. But how they are to be achieved, at what cost, and by whom, remain as controversial as they were before Saddam Hussein fell. Many Arabs and Europeans will still suspect American motives as well as questioning the wisdom of deploying "Jeffersonian tanks" to bring democracy along with liberation to "outposts of tyranny".
That the President, so single-mindedly ambitious in the greater Middle East, found nothing to say about China, Russia, Africa or Latin America is worrying. But Mr Bush did repeat his commitment to an independent, democratic Palestinian state. If he were to really achieve that and thus help, in his own elouent words "to eliminate the conditions that feed radicalism and ideologies of murder", the judgment of history would be a lot kinder than it looks like being right now.
Homer, good article. I think, though, that one could say that the loony left and the ridiculous right both have a common enemy - sensibility and reality.
Both live in fantasy worlds where everything is at peace and harmony as long as everyone remains under control and follows all the rules. A bit 1984ish, unlike Rachel's dim comment above.
The real danger, in my view, is from the left. For decades, it has been the right that has been portrayed as the all-controlling white-wing state (see "The Handmaid's Tale). However, the left are the real goose steppers.
Look at the ascendancy of "political correctness." The term itself is Bolshevist. It disdains personal liberty, opting instead for a fantasy world of mind and attitude control.
Recently I suffered a family death. A female coworker gave me a hug, saying how sorry she was for my loss. Then she jumped back, all embarrassed and apologized, asking me if it was okay to do that. Well, what kind of society is the left creating where a sympathy hug is in any way equated with sexual harassment or some such?
The left hate personal liberty while they extol the virtues of tolerance and free thought. Except for things they dislike, then, bang, watch your ass as they will get the diversity PC police and the law after you.
Sieg Heil, comrade.
Rachel, you two bit Git,
We Americans actually do have a plan to invade Britain. We have a plan to invade Israel. Likewise Mexico, Canada, Iceland, France (oh, who wants it!). But we have no plan to invade any of them. See the difference through your fog-bound pea brain?
We did not have plans to invade Grenada. We did invade Grenada, and it was pretty dicey for a day or so.
Does this sink in at all?
Do we have plans for invading Iran if we must? Of course. Did we have plans for invading Iraq before early 2003? Most certainly.
In April of 2002 did we plan to invade Iraq? No. Had Saddam stopped the 12-year long war that he kept on the boil, had he actually allowed weapons inspections freely and openly, had he lived up to the things to which he agreed in 1991, he would likely still be sitting fat and happy in one of the palaces he starved and killed children to obtain.
Do you have a plan for retirement? (If you have anything but green slime between your ears you do.) Do you plan to retire? If you are under 60, you probably do not.
Am I getting through at all here?
Iraqi's talking about the election afthermath:
A lot of healthy common sense: if they are representive for the whole of Iraq, then Iraq can be booming/ burstling and thriving within 5 years.
Some quotes:
"Things have been very quiet in Baghdad this week, everything has been much better since the elections. Things seem to be more secure. I wouldn't say it's back to normal but better all the same".
I watched Bush's speech on Wednesday. I was happy that he mentioned Iran and Syria. They should stop putting their nose into everything that goes on in Iraq. They should take care of their own problems"
"Here, in a Shia dominated city, Sunnis voted in massive numbers. This is very pleasing because it proves that the religious divide is not as deep as people believe, and the boycott called by Sunni organisations was ignored - at least here in Basra"
"Baghdad is choked with the endless blocks of newly purchased cars. The businesses on Karrada Street are bustling and the nightlife is vibrant. Families walk late at night to a popular ice-cream shop and indulge their children with the creamy local ice-cream"
This is the best about the essence of all human endavour: the way children are raised:
"I see a good future in Iraq in five years' time, a good future for my children. They will be, to some extent, defined by what I as a father teach them. I want to make them to grow up open-minded. I tell them to be constructive, not destructive. I want them to do the best for themselves, but also for their country"
Here is a link:
It's from the BBC website
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_de...log/
default.stm
"Recently I suffered a family death. A female coworker gave me a hug, saying how sorry she was for my loss. Then she jumped back, all embarrassed and apologized, asking me if it was okay to do that. Well, what kind of society is the left creating where a sympathy hug is in any way equated with sexual harassment or some such? "
Rick, this is very disappointing. No man I know would object to a sympathy hug from a female friend, let alone consider it to be sexual harassment. Hasn't President Bush hugged Condaleeza Rice in public a few times? If someone gave Rachel a good hug do you think she might ease up on her jihad?
Maybe poor wee lass suffered cold affection as a child and this has resulted in everything being cruel and evil in her world view.
If someone gave Rachel a good hug do you think she might ease up on her jihad?
Homer from London | Email | Homepage | 02.04.05 - 1:19 pm | #
Only if it was a Bear Hug
After a while it almost gets too hard to read some of the stuff out here in the blogosphere. Rachel’s earlier argument that it was not a 757 maybe an A-3 Skywarrior, or as the VonDaniken like article that she reccommends to us also suggests, THE MISSILE. Why on earth would she run with it.
Rachel claims to have an IQ of 147. Yet she doesn’t recognises the article as one of just stringing together a large number of facts and propostions none of which actually support each other and many which are just untrue. Much of the conspiracy stuff about cameras and wings and fire heat and the walls of the Pentagon etc have been dealt with by competent people. But that they have to do so is very depressing.
For Rachel’s theory to have any substance the conspiracy theory needs to prove that Flight 77 never took off even though it was a regular flight. The personnel that were involved in loading that plane and the 58 passengers and crew had to be part of the big lie. And the air traffic controllers that were tracking it. Barbara Ashcroft had to be part of the lie, or her husband has to have made up the phone calls that he received from her on that flight reporting the hijacking and that they had box cutters. Also for Barbara or her husband to have invented the hijack and weapons they had to have foreknowledge that the other hijacks were going to occur and that the weapon of choice would have to be box cutters. All of those people have to be now hiding somewhere, perhaps with Elvis, or all their families and friends have to be part of the big lie.
As the Rachel’s of this world spew their hate filled stories do they ever spare a thought for what happened to those people on that flight. The agony of John Ashcroft doesn’t bear thinking about, particularly as Barbara’s phone went dead, before the crash, what happened to her. So his wife dies in terror as did the others on that flight, with all left to grieve for them and it is all treated as a big lie.
Rachel never requires of herself that she try and work out anything. If it allows for hate then the story is welcome, though it is actually very hard to work out why the Yanks would have pretended a different plane crashed. The missile claim is mcuh easier to understand, that makes the Yanks the most duplicitious and murderous of peoples anywhere. Reason may never intrude, nor compassion nor empathy. Where is flight 77 Rachel?
Such indifference to the truth and hate for Americans is very worrying in the context of the Iraqi involvement with the US sought or not. There appears to be little doubt that their sacrifice is not too high a price for the hate mongers if only the US can be humiliated.
It is tiring to be confronted again and again with this barbarity.
Ros:
Olson, not Ashcroft.
Ros, that would be Barbara Olsen, wife of Solicitor-General, Theodore Olson.
There are all sorts of Neptune guy websites out there that take understandably jumbled early reaports, point out inconsistencies or unclear issues and proclaim that the whole thing is a lie, a coverup, a gummint conspercy and the like.
Clear, logical thought is not acceptable, and human feeling is anathema to the Rachels of the world.
Yeah, sorry Realist, bad slip up.
Thanks
Just as an example of the bizarre crap that the Rachels of the world tout as “proof” of nefarious deeds, check this goofball out:
http://tinyurl.com/4uq5k
Calling the whole Barbara Olsen story the “mother of all lies” that got the ball rolling, this moron, Joe Viallis, spends the bulk of his 2500+ word diatribe saying the whole story of 9/11 is a lie, and precious little actually supporting that view.
He rails about the phony stories of Arab hijackers (they never existed) and box cutters (untrue) and even the hoax about phone calls from any of the airplanes (they were not possible). Not only are his “facts” contrived, but his technical knowledge is totally wrong.
He immediately lets us know that the “conspiracy” is an ongoing situation, just like “the corrupt and premature Lee Harvey Oswald story in 1963…”
His political agenda, too, is evident right away. “Without this little white lie there would have been no Arab Hijackers, no Osama Bin Laden directing operations from afar, and no “War on Terror” in Afghanistan and occupied Palestine.” Ah, the Jews, again.
But, oddly, this was not a US Gummint conspiracy, rather “the little white lie was solely the work of members of the media. Only they had access, and only they had the methods and means.” Well! Maybe this guy is actually part of the ridiculous right, not the loony left?
He further goes on and on about hard turns on the airplane preventing anyone from reaching a seat phone. I guess if the plane pulled hard g’s the whole way, maybe, but as that was not the case, well….
And that the plane flying fast and low would prevent its phone signals from reaching the transfer stations. Hmmm. Let’s see, electromagnetic signals traveling at the speed of light are, what, distorted by the thundering 600 or so mile per hour speed of an aircraft. And we all know that a mere few hundred to a few thousand feet are too low for signals to work.
Well, you get the picture. The poor wee lass and her kind do not.
"Such indifference to the truth and hate for Americans is very worrying in the context of the Iraqi involvement with the US sought or not. There appears to be little doubt that their sacrifice is not too high a price for the hate mongers if only the US can be humiliated. It is tiring to be confronted again and again with this barbarity."
I am not quite as worried as you, Ros, because the internet is a tailor-made vehicle for fanatics and fantasists. The experience of Aghanistan shows that anti-American fantasies cannot compete with the every day experiences of refugees returning home, women gaining their freedom, people voting in elections, and a growing economy. The Iraqi people learned one thing on 30th January: the Americans weren't lying when they said they wanted to see democracy in Iraq.
The state of the union speech....is almost certainly going to be remerbered for his call to stay the course in Iraq and change the course of social security. On both counts, Mr Bush fudged the most critical points....everyone has already agreed that the turnout for last weekend's election was very encouraging.... but his speech was yet another feel-good paean to freedom and democracy that did little to show the American people an exit strategy for US troops, or to show the Iraqis what we expect from them next....On the domestic front, Mr Bush talked a lot...about social security wihout ever saying much beyond the fact he wants to see it privatised - a word the president no longer uses because polls showed that the American people reacted badly to the concept....The hostile....reaction from parts of his audience suggested the problems he will have when the programme comes to Congress.
In autumn 2003, President Bush gave a speech in Manila, comparing Iraq to the Philippines, which was occupied by the US for 48 years. Today, 100 years after the US first colonised it, the Philippines is a disaster area; it controls none of its resources, even gold. Bush said that the Philippines should be seen as the model for a new democratic Iraq. Of course, Bush himself is unlikely to have understood the dismal precedent he was envisaging but his speech-writers (eg Cheney or Rove) probably did. What does historical record tell us about Bush's "Philippine Model"? Many thousands of Filipinos -- combatants and non-combatants -- were slaughtered by US military forces to teach Filipinos the US meaning of freedom.
The independent Philippines was also subordinated to the United States economically. The Philippine government was prohibited from changing the value of its currency without the approval of the U.S. president and U.S. investors were given special investment rights in the Philippines.
Bush is the useful idiot.
The privatising of social security argument is a funny one to hear as an Australian from a less laisez faire nation than the US. We have had compulsory superranuation for about 15 years now, and it was introduced by a left wing government. That is we have to put away the dollars for our retirement over the period of our working lives. And these funds are not managed by the government. They set the regulations,
Though the unions were hopeful of controlling the funds initially thus controlling investment in Australia, the fact is we now have to manage our money and make the decsions and take the risks ourselves.
Ah rachel is back but not to apologise for having the hide to compare herself to a brave and remarkable woman. Where is flight 77 Rachel?
Did aliens take it, or is it in a cavern somewher in a mountain in the US? Or have they cunningly painted it grey and hidden it amongst the thousands of USAF planes lined up in the plane cemetery in the desert? Help us, must be some one with a theory out there that you have read.
Some objective historical facts about the Philiipines can be found the followwing BBC website. American colonial rule lasted from 1902-1946 and was comparatively enlightened.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/
hist...ilippines.shtml
A bloc dominated by candidates from Iraq's Shi'ite majority has won two-thirds of the votes counted so far in general elections, according to numbers released Friday.
With 3.3 million votes in from mainly Shi'ite provinces, the United Iraqi Alliance forged by top Shi'ite cleric Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani has polled 2.2 million or 67 percent, way ahead of their nearest rival, the group led by interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi.
Allawi's Iraqi List has 17.5 percent and the Kurds, who are expected to make a strong showing, have so far scored far fewer votes, with none of the results from the three Kurdish-dominated provinces counted.
Bush will never accept a Sistani-government but he has painted himself into a corner, if this is the people's choice.
Homer, you cannot actually have read that story on the BBC web site.
After the [WWII] war, the Philippines gained its independence, but it was still deep in Washington's pocket. The Americans retained the legal rights to large parts of the local economy, and exercised great influence on local politics. It is widely believed that the corrupt rule of Ferdinand Marcos was sustained by the loyal support of President Reagan and President Bush Sr.
How enlightened is that? You have just made my point for me.
Lurching from pillar to post, bashing her pointy little pate again and again, proven wrong over and over, shown to be a distorted, perverse and lying slug, the wee lass cannot see clearly enough to confess her errors, lies, distortions, hatred or venom.
I find it not surprising that the wee lass would rail against anything American, true, in perspective, in context or not.
What would she like to happen to her version of right wingers who "oppress" women and keep them down? Eh? Maybe a good shot between the eyes?
Yet, when US General Mattis "said he had fun shooting Afghan men who he claimed beat women for five years," the wee lass pitches a hissy fit.
"Claims" beat women? Ah, so, the Talliban beating women who showed ankle, taking sticks to women who were out in public without a male family member or husband escort, who forbade women to even go to a doctor, these guys the wee lass supports!
"You know, guys like that ain't got no manhood left anyway. So, it's a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them."
Yes, actually, it is.
As always, the poor wee lass has her brains addled by her hatred. Now that she has grubbed up another little bone to worry, so many others having been smacked out of her vile drooling maw by truth and facts, she continues her perverse habit of flitting like a gnat from topic to topic.
I guess she never heard of the Huks? No? Well. The very BBC article she touts is very clear: though the American policy in the Philippines was brutal, the two nations became and remain very close.
The brutality was in response, in part, to the vicious murders of Americans by the Islamic (even then) and communist guerillas.
I cannot justify the actions of that time, nor will I be so grotesque as to use the past to besmirch an entire nation any more than I would use the Amritsar massacres to say the wee lass supports mass murders of brown people; she is very clear on her desires for that out of her own pen, as it were.
Rachel:
A Brit condemning America for colonialism in one single country. How precious. Remember Botswana, Cameroon, Gambia, The Gold Coast, Egypt, Kenya, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Swaziland, Sudan, Uganda, many areas in the West Indies, Bhutan, British New Guinea, Burma, Hong Cong, India, Iraq, Kuwait, Malaysia, Palestine, Nepal, Qatar, Singapore, the modern day UAE, Cyprus, Gibraltar, Malta, Australia, Fiji, Solomon Islands?
You may notice these are in alphabetical order in their regions. I had to look them up as I couldn’t possibly think of all of these off the top of my head. That’s not a complete list by the way, I left out many minor countries. Once again Rachel pot, kettle, black.
BTW, where’s Flight 77?
Rachel writes:
"You have just made my point for me."
The only point is on your head. My statement referred to the colonial period from 1902-46, about which the website states:
The Americans proved to be comparatively benevolent overlords, instituting extensive education and introducing limited democracy and civil rights. And naturally, they made English the official language. Many Filipinos came to admire the US: they wanted to be American Boys, or "Amboys."
I sort of gave up on this thread of comments when it went to "games in Latin", and the porno-troll. So, I'd missed the it where "FOAD/Realist", had accused me of actually being the porno troll. Just in case it matters: I'll make a formal denial.
The porno-troll ain't me, and I don't use any aliases. And that guy ain't neither subtle nor imaginative; he has neither flare nor style; quite simply he's totally crass, completely non-erotic, and I'm taking that comparison as a personal insult and quite frankly I resent it.)
So, F.O.A.D. "FOAD"
(And, for what it's worth, "FOAD" is the "Realist"; is "Bush Lied" is "Christian Crusader", is "Legion", et al., etc., ad nauseum, ad damnum; he is "Sybil", the multi-troll. He made a mistake once on Hammorabi's blog and included the troll personae's idiosyncratic closing tags, and I caught it; I rather doubt he's forgotten that, although it may have gone generally unnoticed--ya'll have to check the source code to find them, but they're there. He's also done it above in a couple of places. Seems he's forgetting when to use those and when not to; oughta lay off the bottle when he's trolling I'd reckon; help him keep these things straight.)
Sucker ate my cookie again!
'Twas me "FOAD" accused.
Flight 77 was diverted to Amazonia, where it was turned over to the Leprecaun Liberation Front. The female passengers have been retained as breeding stock. (Remember, there are no female leprecauns.) The male passengers were eaten.
Beware the Green Jihad!
A Brit condemning America for colonialism in one single country. How precious. Remember Botswana, Cameroon, Gambia, The Gold Coast, Egypt, Kenya, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Swaziland, Sudan, Uganda, many areas in the West Indies, Bhutan, British New Guinea, Burma, Hong Cong, India, Iraq, Kuwait, Malaysia, Palestine, Nepal, Qatar, Singapore, the modern day UAE, Cyprus, Gibraltar, Malta, Australia, Fiji, Solomon Islands?
Nick - Cameroun was French - Botswana did not exist.........you forgot Canada and that place between Canada and Mexico
Rachel forgot to mention who owned the Philippines before the US acquired it.........she also forgot to discuss Norway being a Swedish colony or Greenland as a colony of Denmark
Nick Botswana = Bechuanaland,
You forgot Northern and Southern Rhodesia; Calais, Hannover, Heligoland, Ceylon, New Zealand, .............nothing wrong with Colonialism - Africa would probably be a much wealthier Continent if the British still ran them..........
I cannot justify the actions of that time,
Rickvid in Seattle
What a strange notion........you have no more to do with historical events than you have with Rachel's conception
Italy for the Etruscans!
Flight 77 was secretly landed on Titan by the supposed Huygens lander. Did you notice those photos "from Titan" looked awfully earthlike? There are no photos from Titan. They are from a secret research area in northwest Texas, a small town called Aroy, near Rogers City on Dale Creek. A high flying aircraft, a bit of Photoshop, and viola, "Titan."
The fake shots of airplanes crashing into the World Trade Towers prove how easily people can be duped. No one actually saw the airplanes "hit" the towers. The first airplane was filmed only by a "French" video crew - they were actually Israelis. The second hit was a very near miss covered by the planted explosives that actually blew up the tower.
The air flights were secretly diverted to the Aroy area and the passengers killed. The airplanes were launched on the Space Shuttle Challenger with enhanced engines to fly them to Titan where no one will ever find them. Then the "Challenger" was "accidentally" lost later. Remember, one of the crew was --- Israeli!
None dare call it lunacy or conspiracy.
Israel for the Canaanites!
http://campus.northpark.edu/
hist...enMassacre.html
Be much better Rachel to concentrate on Turkish Crimes Against Humanity....
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Arm...menian_Genocide
http://www.armeniangenocide.cjb.net/
About 1.5 million Armenians were massacred by the Turkish soldiers and gangster. The world turned its head while a nation was being exterminated. Their memories will serve as a reminder of what prejudice can do if not confronted. During the Armenian genocide, the true Armenian heroes and heroines gave their lives to save Armenia and its people. Thus Armenia survived and it survives still!
To this day Turkey denies the Armenian genocide but history cannot be hidden or rewritten. Our mission is to inform the world about this tragedy. The issue bares no prejudice against the Turkish people or government, but the Armenian genocide needs to recognized by the world population.
Rick,
By that I mean create a logical and reasoned justification for actions. I can, for example, justify why the Americans tossed the Brit tossers in the first place, but not why we, rather my national ancestors, went so far overboard fighting a vicious enemy far away in a wretched malarial cesspool of tropical islands that were horribly difficult to fight in 15 years later.
ConspiracyBuster:
Are you then insinuating that leprecauns are Jewish, or worse, Italian? Your disgusting and inflamatory remarks have been duely noted and added to your dossier. After the Green Caliphate has been established, you may anticipate being turned over to the secular arm.
Beware the Green Jihad!
So, the Shiite tickets have a big lead in the Iraqi elections. Yet more "proof" that the elections were "rigged" to elect "puppets" for the US.
Of course, never mind that the Shiites in question are a bit on the Iranian side and it has nothing to do with a fair sized part of the Sunni population deciding to sit things out.
Those wiley Amerikans.
So now the obviously deranged Lee C. slithers onto the scene under his original name, hurling abuse at the legion of his imagined tormenters. Apparently everyone who displeases him is, in his tortured mind, a manifestation of some "ubertroll" who relentlessly pursues and persecutes him.
One can only conclude that he is haunted by his past. It seems more likely than ever that Lee C. is the woman-hating "porno troll". It is also possible that he is in fact "Rachel the Brit". Think about it.
Regarding President Bush's state of the union speech:
President Bush was correct, in my opinion, to give his listeners a vision of a world without tyranny, a world where all people would be ruled by governments accountable, by ballot, to the people they serve.
Depending on one's definition of liberal democracy (universal franchise, no slavery) one could argue that liberal democracies have never waged war against each other.
One common criticism of Bush's "end to tyranny" speech is that it is utopian. Could be, but the same was said about President Reagan's Evil Empire speech and his Mr. Gorbochav, Tear down that wall speech in 1987.
To correct and clarify.....
I doubt many accused President Reagan of being utopian when he gave his Evil Empire speech. But I do believe he was accused of being reckless and self-righteous.
But political leaders of liberal democracies should view the political system that charges them with political power as superior to that of dictatorship and we shouldn't be view our preference for liberal democracy as ethnocentric.
Instead we would be better to view liberal democracy as "Western in its origin but universal in its application."
That quote is from Dinesh D'Souza, by the way.
You seem to be runnin’ a little low on imagination too there "FOAD". Repeating stuff you've done before; you need new stuff; that ain't sold yet. (Next trick is you go "Anonymous" and agree with yourself, yes? We all rememeber that one, don't we?)
“Nick - Cameroun was French - Botswana did not exist.........you forgot Canada and that place between Canada and Mexico”
I got that information from wikipedia.org , as I said, I couldn’t possibly think of them all of the top of my head. They had Cameroon on the list, either it belonged to the French, and then English, or they are mistaken, and I apologize for posting incorrect information. Botswana was formerly known as Bechuanaland so it’s the same thing as far as I’m concerned. I also left out Canada and the ‘States as those are both fairly obvious ones, although so are Australia and India, maybe it’s my American ethnocentrism kicking in 
. The others I skipped over and/or didn’t notice.
Cameroun is still francophone
I can, for example, justify why the Americans tossed the Brit tossers in the first place
sorry Rickvid, do not understand.....if you mean why did Johnny Reb fight the British it is incomprehensible; and then to turn on each other and fight a civil war, but in between try to attack Canada and have to have a capital city burned before the Treaty of Ghent restored reason..............I think it shows what happens when local elites start to push their own agenda..........still, Whitworths don't need to arm the Confederacy now, and Texas does not need the support of the Crown to keep its independence as it did pre-1846.
Remember Rickvid....the Us acquired its most valuable state through purchase not war - Alaska - just think if Putin had that oil too - or if Brezhnev had put missiles there rather than the ones K put in cuba !
From another forum.
John Manyon (ITN, UK) on the recent Iraq "election":
"it's disturbing quite frankly because it's very difficult to see how these elections can live up to international standards in terms of dispassionate supervision and policing of the polls. There are no international observers out there for the same reason that there are very few journalists out there. And the journalists that are, I suppose, one has to say either courageous or mad enough to get in their cars and try to do something are only going to see a small fraction of what is going on. I mean, we've got a situation in Mosul, for example, where American troops, we now discover because the Iraqi employees of the election organization have deserted en masse, it's American soldiers who will be transporting the ballot boxes around when they are full of votes. This is really very far from ideal, and if it were happening in any other country - I mean, one could mention Ukraine, for example - there would be a wild chorus of international protest."
If Sistani's party comes to power - serves the US right.
Lee C is not me.
Winner - in a strong field of candidates - of the "Summarise the SOTU" competition, on the Democratic Underground.
"Follow me down the yellow brick road and we will be happy and rich. God says follow me. If you don't follow me, fuck you."
Or: Bullshit in Wonderland
With friends like the US, who (the British government) needs enemies?
At the press conference in the ornate Locarno Room of the Foreign Office, [Condoleeza Rice] continued to praise her British hosts. "We deeply value the close relationship between our two countries, and, of course, we share so much, but we, of course, share a global agenda as well, and we stand together on the war on terror."
Such emphasis on the "special relationship" could be counterproductive for Labour in the run-up to an election in which the Iraq war will be an issue.
Mr Straw's [British Foreign Secretary] grin was in danger of becoming a rictus when she went on to criticise in undiplomatic language the Iranian government, whom Mr Straw has courted. Having described on the flight from Washington to London the Iranian government as "loathed" and run by "unelected mullahs", she went on to ridicule their elections.
One of the very many things that Bush doesn't understand is that having a "heart-warming personal story" (Rice's background) is not sufficient qualification for representing your country and using disastrously undiplomatic language about Muslim countries. Europeans are far more suspicious of ostentatious emotion than Americans are. And, as of yesterday (if not before), Rice is finished as far as the Muslim world is concerned. She will never ever be taken seriously again. American "diplomacy" is catastophically amateur and short-sighted.
If Sistani's party comes to power - serves the US right.
Rachel, a Brit in London |
It is an Election Rachel to serve the voters of Iraq not to please the USA.....though of course that would be an ideal situation.
So you do not like Shia Muslims Rachel......not your flavour ?
Europeans are far more suspicious of ostentatious emotion than Americans are.
Untrue....a) there are NO "Europeans"....the genus does not exist.
You are far more emotive and ostentatious in your visceral anti-Americanism than any other poster.
The Green/Peacenik crowd are sentimentalists to the core and devoid of rationality
The Locarno Room of the Foreign Office,
What an unfortunate reminder of the Treaty of Locarno........how could they be so ridiculous ?
Such emphasis on the "special relationship" could be counterproductive for Labour in the run-up to an election
Being "Labour" is a bigger liability considering the mess around us domestically
Try seeing a few things through Western Eyes Rachel........your views are so ethnocentric.......and not at all Western
This is rather gripping. Written in November 2003, by Chalmers Johnson, President of the Japan Policy Research Institute (California).
Four sorrows, it seems to me, are certain to be visited on the United States. Their cumulative effect guarantees that the U.S. will cease to resemble the country outlined in the Constitution of 1787. First, there will be a state of perpetual war, leading to more terrorism against Americans wherever they may be and a spreading reliance on nuclear weapons among smaller nations as they try to ward off the imperial juggernaut. Second is a loss of democracy and Constitutional rights as the presidency eclipses Congress and is itself transformed from a co-equal "executive branch" of government into a military junta. Third is the replacement of truth by propaganda, disinformation, and the glorification of war, power, and the military legions. Lastly, there is bankruptcy, as the United States pours its economic resources into ever more grandiose military projects and shortchanges the education, health, and safety of its citizens. All I have space for here is to touch briefly on three of these: endless war, the loss of Constitutional liberties, and financial ruin.
The four horsemen of the Apocalypse? We are at the start of the fourth sorrow, aren't we?
He taught for thirty years, 1962-1992, at the Berkeley and San Diego campuses of the University of California and held endowed chairs in Asian politics at both of them. At Berkeley he served as chairman of the Center for Chinese Studies and as chairman of the Department of Political Science. His B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. degrees in economics and political science are all from the University of California, Berkeley.
Berkeley ???????
Yes, in another article, Chalmers Johnson mentions your new Secretary of State (scroll down the page),
When it comes to ignoring accurate CIA intelligence, the preeminent example in the Bush administration was National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice's indifference to al-Qaeda and her failure to ensure that the president read and understood the explicit warnings of an imminent surprise attack that the agency delivered to her.
The CIA has had its head planted firmly in its behind for decades, ever since the Church commission. The Left has always accused the CIA of supporting dictatorships in Central and South America. Today they are upset that America is toppling dictatorships.
Murderer Rice, get out of our country
And another.
Pictures - of young Turkish demonstrators today outside the U.S. Embassy in Ankara, Turkey - you won't see on American tv?
Time to start buying euros. If you are American, that is.
Don't know what Rick's problem is with the Treaty of Locarno
'The Great War ended in November 1918. The Great Peace did not begin until Oct. 1925.'
Letter from Lord Balfour to Austen Chamberlain, 16 December, 1925
The spirit of Locarno, subsequently celebrated in the formal signing of the Conference treaties in London, became synonymous with international cooperation and the pursuit of what a former British Prime Minister, David Lloyd George, described as the 'general appeasement of Europe'-a term then understood as applying, not to the buying off of would-be aggressors with territorial and other concessions, but to the removal of potential sources of conflict through negotiation and the promotion of peaceful change. Of the Treaty of Mutual Guarantee, the diplomatic instrument with which the Conference is chiefly associated, the historian A.J.P. Taylor aptly observed: 'Its signature ended the first World War; its repudiation eleven years later marked the prelude to the second.'
Because Rachel Rick knows that negotiating in Locarno and signing treaties in London did not do a great deal - Rapallo was a critical factor - nand Locarno gave Germany security in the West without defining the eastern border which is why Hitler invaded Poland........it was the failure to define Germany's eastern border that allowed Von Seeckt and Voroshilov to plot the destruction of the Versailles Settlement from 1919 onwards............and Locarno required Italy under Mussolini and Britain to guarantee the Franco-German border........which encouraged Belgium to prevent British and French troops from meeting German forces in Belgium rather than France in 1940
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loc...ki/
Locarno_Pact
The principal treaty concluded at Locarno was that between Germany, France, Belgium, Britain, and Italy, under which the first three signatories undertook not to attack each other, with the latter two acting as guarantors. In the event of aggression by any of the first three states against another, all other parties to the treaty were to assist the country under attack.
Germany also signed arbitration conventions with France and Belgium and arbitration treaties with Poland and Czechoslovakia, undertaking to refer disputes to an arbitral tribunal or to the Permanent Court of International Justice.
France signed two further treaties with Poland and Czechoslovakia respectively, pledging mutual assistance in the event of conflict with Germany. These essentially reaffirmed existing treaties of alliance concluded by France with Poland on 19 February 1921 and with Czecholsovakia on 25 January 1924.
These treaties with Poland and Czechoslovakia are the ones France tried to get out of in 1938 and which made them drag Chamberlain to Munich........with Britain and Italy protecting France in the West she was able to make alliances in the East, and Czechoslovakia was guaranteed by France and secondarily by the USSR.......but Britain was guarantor of France against Germany..........just as in 1914 France hsd alliances with Russia and Britain was roped in to protect France in the West
Austen Chamberlain won the Nobel Peace Prize.........a sure kiss of death.......his half-brother Neville had to try to hold Locarno together by negotiating with Hitler, but ultimately to go to war with Italy and Germany.
Stresemann - who was engaged in secret joint military agreements with the USSR - training Luftwaffe pilots, building tanks, testing poison gas inside the USSR - now had Germany rehabilitated and Britain guaranteeing its western border against France and Belgium invading the Ruhr as in 1923...........this gave Germany security to focus on breaking Poland and working with Russia to circumvent Versailles
Time to start buying euros. If you are American, that is.
Rachel, a Brit in London | Email | Homepage | 02.05.05 - 1:55 pm | #
Yes - buy Euros and break the European economy. Make the Dollar weak so European exports collapse and more jobs move to China........super idea.
A strong Euro makes those dole lines longer and a weak Dollar makes China super-competitive.
Rachel is NOT an economist
http://condoleezzariceonline.blo...e.blogspot.com/
Protesters held a number of small demonstrations criticizing Rice and U.S. policy in Iraq throughout the country Saturday, including one attended by dozens of leftists outside the U.S. Embassy in Ankara.
http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/eu...e.ap/
index.html
>Make the Dollar weak so European exports collapse ...
Realy? Wouldn't a weak Dollar make european produkts make much cheaper for americans and therefore increase exports?
ups, maybe one make to much ...
Soviet Foreign Commissar Georgii V.Chicherin encouraged Stresemann not to sign the Locarno Treaties. Soviet Russia believed that Britain was the greatest threat and feared that Germany would, by signing these treaties, come under British control. Lenin considered the League of Nations to be an anti-Soviet alliance whose purpose was to instigate a kind of holy war against Soviet Russia. Chicherin agreed with this. In reality, Britain had no interest in Eastern Europe, let alone domination of Soviet Russia. In fact, Britain signed the Locarno Treaties as a way of avoiding a French alliance.
Britain's European policy seemed clear enough in the West. Lenin, Chicherin and Stalin all were convinced that Britain was enemy number one. They insisted that, not only was Britain very interested in Eastern Europe, but intended to use the Baltics as a stagging ground for a Soviet invasion. This belief was not completely without merit as Britain had done just that during Russia's civil war. To this day, Russia is very nervous about any Western encroachment along its eastern borders. It has strongly protested the possible inclusion of the Baltics in NATO, an organization dominated by Britain and the U.S.
In September of 1926, almost a year after the Locarno Treaties, Soviet Russia and Germany signed the Treaty of Berlin. Both nations agreed to remain neutral if the other was attacked by another nation or nations. This neutrality included any form of aggression be it military or economic. The treaty was part of Stresemann's efforts to create diplomatic balance for Germany between the Soviet Union and the West. This won him the Nobel Peace Prize in 1926. The treaty did not stop the secret Soviet - German military development collaboration which Stresemann was fully aware of.........On the military scene, German pilots were trained in Russia. These pilots would later become part of Hitler's Luftwaffe. The Germans and Soviets conducted joint tank and gas warfare experiments and built prototypes for submarines and fighter aircraft. By training in the Soviet Union and collaborating with the Soviets on arms development, Germany was able to maneuver around the fifth part of the Treaty of Versailles..
http://216.197.126.127/article.c....cfm?
Number=599
>Make the Dollar weak so European exports collapse ...
Realy? Wouldn't a weak Dollar make european produkts make much cheaper for americans and therefore increase exports?
stalin | Email | Homepage | 02.05.05 - 2:51 pm | #
No a weak dollar would mean Americans spend more dollars to buy goods priced in Euros......or if Europe prices exports in Euros, then wages would need to be cut in Europe to maintain the Dollar price as European companies faced Asian competitors selling to the US
Rick is making one fatal assumption. That Americans will have ANY dollars to spend. The Asians are not Europe's competitors for American custom, if there is no American "market".
President Bush and Mr Blair deserve some respect for keeping their nerve in fraught circumstances. Their critics should give them credit for the military and political calls they have made correctly. And doing so would help the critics understand why it is wrong to be dogmatic about an exit date. Look at the Arab-Israeli situation. It is clear that this US Administration was right to distance itself from Yassir Arafat and insist on a new interlocutor. There are now hopeful signs that Mr Bush realises that the time for standing back diplomatically has gone. His new Secretary of State's forthcoming visit to meet Ariel Sharon and Mr Abbas suggests that the diplomatic pace is quickening. Movement over the Arab-Israeli conflict would increase the readiness of the world to rethink attitudes to the Iraq conflict and change the situation there materially.
Then there is Iran. Mr Bush appears ready to search for a diplomatic solution to the problem of Tehran's quest for nuclear weapons. It appears he will wait to see if German, British and French diplomacy can succeed. This three-nation effort needs reinforcing by Russian diplomacy. Iran's nuclear aspirations will not easily be closed down, but a successful transition to a democratic government in Iraq is the best possible way of encouraging civil society in Iran to assert people power.
And there is Syria. It is possible that at last that country will recognise the need to change its foreign policy towards the Shia majority in Iraq.
Yet while these developments could all help, it will be the Iraqi people who will have to make the big compromises among themselves. Do Cook, Hurd, Campbell, et al, really know how relationships between the Shia majority and the Kurds will work out under the threat of continued Sunni-dominated insurgency? Are they really sure that telling them when we will exit will help that process?
I hope, perhaps too optimistically, that the Shia and Kurdish leaders will come together to reassure the Sunni Arabs and develop a federal structure on which a stable Iraq can be built. If they do compromise I will be reasonably confident that the insurgency will be defeated.
To anticipate the way the next few months will go is difficult. Establishing an assembly for Iraq is likely to change the atmosphere, for good or ill. We will, in all likelihood, then be grappling with a different set of circumstances and problems. Surely then the best advice is to listen and learn more to avoid too much prescription. Above all let us not attempt to pick an exit before we are better able to see Iraq's future.
Rachel.... Rick is making one fatal assumption. That Americans will have ANY dollars to spend
Rick knows that only Federal Reserve Banks PRINT Dollars.......
Your anti-Americanism makes you increasingly ridiculous.......truly risible.......you really have a very limited knowledge.......did you get a decent education ?
Rachel:
Why would the savage American imperialists need dollars? Surely they could simply take whatever they want at gunpoint.
The big advantage of having Rachel around is that the likes of Rick respond. Thanks Rick I am learning a lot.
The disadvantage is that our time is wasted with a constant haranguing of unreason. First and foremost we are faced with an absolute refusal to revise in the light of criticism. We are bored to death with constant “fact gathering” Always it is a grab bag of evidence. There is the searching for mysteries and the appeal to myths and the illegitimate argument from spurious similarity. There is false cause and false dilemmas. The Rachel persona is a case study in itself for the classic case of unreason.
The defence of Rachel offered is that everybody’s entitled to their own opinion. But many have argued otherwise.
W K Clifford. “It is wrong always, to believe anything on insufficient evidence”
Thomas Huxley, “It is wrong for a man to say he is certain of the objective truth of any proposition unless he can produce evidence which logically justifies that certainty
Brand Blanshard. “That where great human goods and ills are involved, the distortion of belief from any sort of avoidable cause is immoral, and the more immoral the greater the stakes.”
Clifford “ Every time we let ourselves believe for unworthy reasons, we weaken our powers of self-control of doubting, of judicially and fairly weighing of evidence. We all suffer severely enough from the maintenance and support of false beliefs and the fatally wrong actions which they lead to…But a greater and wider evil arises when the credulous character is maintained and supported, when a habit of believing for unworthy reasons is fostered and made permanent”
Rachel is beyond hope, but she damages us all, she has the most unworthy of reasons, for whatever reason she indulges her self in an orgy of Hate of the US and it’s peoples. The anger she provokes in the rest of us damages our ability to reason and thus puts at risk the ethics of our belief.
Copenhagen - About 1 500 people demonstrated in Copenhagen on Saturday against the US-led occupation of Iraq and called for the withdrawal of Denmark's 525 troops deployed there.
At the protest rally, held three days before Denmark goes to the polls in a general election expected to return the centre-right coalition government to power, demonstrators waved US flags featuring skulls-and-crossbones instead of stars, and banners reading "No More War" and "Bring the Troops Home". ... According to a poll published last week, 69% of Danes think that the war in Iraq has made the world a less safe place and increased the threat of terrorism.
And they are not wrong.
Ros said, The anger she provokes in the rest of us damages our ability to reason and thus puts at risk the ethics of our belief.
Pull yourself together, woman, and take responsibility for yourself: is your grasp on your reasoning so feeble, your ethics so shallow?
Does Rachel's irrational monomania not fairly reek of Lee C.'s abusive rants? Note also that "Rachel" slipped at one point above and used the very un-British "y'all" construct characteristic of Lee C.'s pretentious and semiliterate screeds.
It begins to look more and more like "Rachel" and "Lee C." are one and the same.
The international media reported how Iraqis defied terror to cast their votes last weekend. The irony is that while the voters did so, hundreds of the 7,200 or so candidates to the constituent Iraqi assembly did not dare make their candidacy public for fear of repercussions from terrorists keen on derailing the fledgling democratic process.
Official election figures indicated that 107 political entities competed for the 275-seat national assembly. The contenders represented 73 political parties, 25 independent contenders and 9 major political coalitions. Yet a significant proportion of the predominantly Sunni political parties boycotted the elections. Otherwise the number of candidates would have increased to close to 10,000.
... With parties having names easy to confuse, it was not clear how easily it was for average Iraqis to distinguish their political positions, or the viable political choices they offered.
One thing was certain, however; hardly any of the parties' names had the word "Arab" in it. Also absent were the terms "socialist" or "social." While this was a reaction to the despotic reign of the Baath, it also had important implications for the way Iraqis are thinking. The fact that most party names contained terms such as "Iraqi," "national," "Islamic," "free," "democratic," or "independent," reflected the politically introverted mood prevailing in the country.
Again an absolute refusal to revise in the light of criticism.
Have you found flight 77 yet Rachel.
My second visit to this commentary affords yet more opportunities for mirth. Lord, what fun.
Recalling Mr. Emerson's caution against foolish consistency and little minds, our heroine sallies forth anew and resplendent in off-colour hair, "Sonic Youth" t-shirt covered in cat dander, and multiple piercings to continue her self-appointed brief to convince our American cousins (and anyone else) that they bear the Mark of the Beast. Fresh from suckling at the teat of the family dole, our questing Quixote - sans helmet and be-donkeyed Panza (unless you include the tin-foil hat and numerous pets named Sancho) will not be denied and shall not falter, lest the Yanks forget their innate villainy.
Why anyone would want to be rid of this entertainment is beyond my ken. The tele, most legitimate theater, and football (the one with a pitch, not a gridiron) is so dreary and pedestrian lately. Unlike those tired media, our heroine ALWAYS delivers.
Some appear, however, to fail to take our failed barristrix in the proper vein. Fret not, I say. You all are aware, I trust, that there are some who cannot be converted or swayed from what Orwell termed "shitty little orthodoxies" (except those who cannot be converted or swayed from said orthodoxies - they continue to proselytize with unflagging fervor). Silencing their screeches is pointless at best (certainly in fora such as these). The symposia on (alas) the sizeable portion of the unbalanced British and American left that she provides to all of you is not to be missed.
Cheers
All too true MF, but the challenge to strengthen my reasoning and convert my ethics from shallow to deep challenges
So rachel what is that post re using the term Iraqi by the parties mean?
Have you found flight 77 yet Rachel.
No, not to worry, as a recognition of your unflagging fervour I hereby name you as the honourable and deserving recipient of the Von Daniken award for unreason on the blogosphere. Your often quoted authority Democratic Undergroan gives you some real competition but I think the award is yours.
Von Daniken - very good indeed.
MF,
It is an amusing spectacle indeed. A poke here and a prod there produces the most exquisite paroxysms. Please, she’s all yours. I will fetch some popcorn.
Before we all choke on our popcorn, what would Rachel, the twit Brit, do if Bush ordered an invasion of Saudi Arabia, gave the Shia Muslims human rights and allowed women to drive cars?
Then she would really be rereading her Noam Chomsky books at all hours of the day and night.
We are soooo happy for you - and feel your joy, your pride. Better days will be certainly coming (even if not overnight) and you will have more than earned it. This was an important memorable step, to be celebrated. My heartfelt congratulations and prayers to you and your brave countrymen.
The volume of responses means a lot. Do you feel that you are not alone?
Rachel, at least you could have just slithered away in shame and silence... Don't you have any decency? You showed your true core.
69% of Danes think that the war in Iraq has made the world a less safe place and increased the threat of terrorism.
And they are not wrong.
Rachel, a Brit in London | Email | Homepage | 02.05.05 - 5:25 pm | #
I think they would say the same thing about 1939-45.......the world was much more "stable" with the first 6 years Hitler if office than the second 6 years when war ravaged Europe.......ergo Chamberlain was right to offer Germany a £1 billion loan and free trade area with Britain........and Hitler would have been right to accept it.........
You see Rachel, you know exactly which policy you would have backed in 1938
and you know the funny thing........that war brought the "Bolshevik Menance" into the heart of Europe, to Berlin........Lenin's dream........and as Goebbels wrote in his diary, there would be two powers in the world.......the USSR and USA having devoured the British Empire................now Rachel you see how destabilising that war was..........and then a Cold War for 45 years which ended with the collapse of the Stalinist System.............
The world is dynamic not static......both below the surface with its tectonic plates, and above the surface with human wants and needs.........
Rarely can such a stylish entrance have been achieved by a girl from Birmingham (Alabama). But Condoleezza Rice blew through the Foreign Office(UK) last week she made poor Jack Straw look sadly municipal: while Condi toyed with the future of Iran, Jack looked like he couldn't get to grips with pest control.. Thank God David Blunkett, with his weakness for powerful American ladies, was under house arrest in his grace and favour house.
If diplomacy is being sent abroad to lie for your country, America has a skilful practitioner: Rice came to the UK to sell the unsellable - George W Bush - and did brisk trade. Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney have gifts, but unlikeability is not first among them.
With Jackie O hairstyle and easy smile, Rice at least hinted that America is listening. Sure, under the hairspray she is as tough as they come. But Bush's row with Europe sprang as much from an inability to strike the right tone as from an inability to strike the right dictator; Condi the coquette has learnt that lesson.
It is most heartening to see democracy developing in Iraq with a large turnout for the election. How shameful that many of us here can't even bother to vote.
One also wonders why Tony Blair, who has put so much effort, huge amounts of our money and many of our soldiers' lives into getting this democracy for Iraq, should be so enthusiastically giving away our own democracy to Brussels?
Jane,
Would the Brussels democracy (I assume you mean the EU) be one accountable to European voters? Would Europeans be able to "throw the bums out" (as we say in the United States) if they are unsatisfied with the leadership?
It sounds like Great Britain isn't giving up democracy, just joining a larger one.
Jane,
Would the Brussels democracy (I assume you mean the EU) be one accountable to European voters? Would Europeans be able to "throw the bums out" (as we say in the United States) if they are unsatisfied with the leadership?
Actually Mark - NO ! The Executive is not elected; the Judges of the European Court were all former Civil Servants in Justice Departments; only the Executive (Commission) can initiate laws; "Regulations" pass directly into national law, national parliaments cannot block them or debate them.
If the USA Canada, Mexico and Brazil formed an American Economic Zone and issued Regulations and Directives to Congress to enact into US Law you would be happy. If Brazil could demand extradition of a US Citizen through Ameri-Just (cf EuroJust) and you were arrested and sent to Cuiaba without a US Court having any say you would be happy ?
If Mark, the Federal Government now wanted a central database of all voters, all medical records, all bank accounts, all drivers' licences and all cross-referenced by any police force in the Americas - you would not object ?
These measures are taking place right now in Britain as part of a European Program.
If a journalist discovered corruption in the Executive in DC would you expect the police to rain his home, seize his computers, freeze his bank accounts and seize his passport and accuse him of defamation ? This has happened to a Stern reporter in Brussels.
If the US Government had its financials qualified over a ten year period you would be delighted ?
If the US proposed merging with Pakistan and giving Pakistan population-weighted seats in a new US-Pakistan Congress you would not object.........just that is being proposed with Turkey for Europe.......to have the largest voting bloc to legislate in Europe as a poor Muslim country with the largest population.
Rick,
It sounds like the main objection to a powerful European Union is not so much that it is non-democratic (unaccountable to the people in Europe), but that the Eureopean Union pretends to be a nation when it is not.
Or am I wrong on the first point too? The European Union officials are not accountable (directly or indirectly) to the people of Europe.
In the United States, federal judges are appointed for life by the President and confirmed by the United States Senate. That's an example of indirect accountablity.
Let me point out that I am undecided about the EU and am a citizen of the United States.
Rick,
I can understand why some British people would oppose British membership in the EU if the EU is attempting to be a nation and the result is that Great Britain would become a province (or, to use American terminology, a state.
Michael Cosyns is a co-host of the Down East Blog and frequently comments on web pages like Iraq the Model, Healing Iraq and the Mesopotamian.
Michael supports the EU because he wants Europe to act more like a nation, but he opposes Turkey's entrance into the EU, as you do.
Why don't you visit Michael at the Down East Blog and let us Americanos read as you two debate the EU?
Mark - the Commission is NOT elected and is NOT accountable........Jean Monnet intended the system to be supra-democratic and not accountable.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Ins..._European_Union
http://euabc.com/index.phtml?word_id=242
http://euabc.com/index.phtml?page_id=202
http://www.curia.eu.int/en/
http://www.curia.eu.int/en/insti...r/
index_cje.htm
Read the link above and see who these Judges are.......
Mark - i know the US system inside-out.......the system in Europe is more akin to the structure of the Soviet system with the Commission being the Politburo
Rick,
Then you've got to visit the Down East Blog and debate Michael.
Michael's from Belgium, by the way. Did I mention that?
Mark....try
http://www.eureferendum.blogspot.com./
Rick,
I'll try it. Visit my web site if you have time. It's a joint web site with 3 other bloggers. You might even want to join so as to give a non-American point of view to the blogging effort.
That is, if your schedule isn't too busy.
Hello
see my recent posts.
my blog=http://iraqidoctor.blogspot.com" target
Hello
see my recent posts.
my blog=http://iraqidoctor.blogspot.com"
It just gets worse.
Unqualified US medics carried out amputations at Abu Ghraib: report
Unqualified US military medics stationed at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison carried out amputations, recycled used chest tubes and lacked medical supplies to treat the overcrowded jail's inmates after the fall of Baghdad, according to a report.
The Time magazine report, to hit newsstands Monday, also said that a medic was ordered, by one account, to cover up a homicide inside the jail.
Terrible world Rachel.......ever thought of going into a nunnery ?
No doctors but doctors concurring to restraint. And this proves?
Medics performed amputations to save lives, should have left them to die. And this proves?
Rachel instructs Omar on the Koran. Omar points out she is not quoting from the Koran rather some writer's fantasy. Does Rachel revise in the light of this criticism. NEVER. And this proves, Rachel hates Yanks more than she cares for the truth. And Iraqis don't mean much to her either.
Again a grab bag of facts, long live Von Daniken.
Rachel where is flight 77??
Military rules death a homicide. Witness instructed not to discus while investigation on. News report to say that cover up of homicide, according to one report.Enough for Rachel, Rachel distorts public information to create another mystery.
The mystery of flight 77. Where is flight 77
You're wasting your time there Ros, I believe perhaps under the mistaken impression that Rachel believes her own stuff.
She does not.
It's enough that she finds lies to post and places to cite. She's well aware she often posts outright lies. She does it knowingly and intentionally; it's not that she's fanatical and mistaken (as the first does not necessarily imply the second). She is often not mistaken; those are most often intentional falsehoods.
Ros, Ros, Ros, oh righteous & sweet feminist from Down Under.
If I do remember correctly, you praised the American 'liberation' of Afghanistan for its bringing about 'women's liberation' as well.
Did you ever (I wonder, ever!) care to look at the Website of the 'Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan' (http://www.rawa.org), the only homegrown Afghan feminist organisation (with a nearly two decades old history) there?
Its founder (a woman) was killed by some brand of the then ruling official 'Commies' in the late Eighties.
Do go there, please, and read their archives from the oldest past up to now. Hard, I know, but maybe intelligent...
So, Ros, where is 'women's freedom' in Ahmehwican 'liberated' Afghanistan? (since you sooooo very sisterly pester Rachel with your silly questions).
Ros, where is 'women's freedom' in US 'liberated' Afghanistan?
Ros, where is 'women's freedom' in US 'liberated' Afghanistan?
Ros, where is 'women's freedom' in US 'liberated' Afghanistan?
Be sure, my lovely 'feminist' Ros, that if you keep your silly act on any longer I will keep repeating this question to you, over & over (at least up to the time Zeyad bans me).
So, Ros, where is 'women's freedom' in US 'liberated' Afghanistan?
@Mark, 02.06.05 - 11:41 am, and following.
Oh, I know, mighty Mark, that you are a recently popped up American genius, one of the best that nation ('the gweahtest nation on earth') can offer to the world, on the wake of these most meaningful Iraqi elections (let's wait a second, silly fanatics, just in order to see in what sense 'meaningful').
So, coming out of the blue, you brilliantly invite our resident human barnacle Rick: "Michael Cosyns is a co-host of the Down East Blog and frequently comments on web pages like Iraq the Model, Healing Iraq and the Mesopotamian".
Now that most noble of men, Michael Cosyns, the best specimen of the Aryan Race (LOL!), in case you ignore it (Bushists seem to ignore a lot of things: maybe it's because of 'American intelligence', LOL!!!) is a member of the Vlaams Block, a Flemish party founded in 1977 by veterans of the - volunteer - Flemish Waffen SS Division, banned last November by the Belgian Supreme Court for being a racist party (what a surprise, indeed!), therein compelled to rename.
Since Uncle Adolf has been dead for the past sixty years, his cause needs new recruits to carry on the struggle against those 'inferior races', like those evil Semites, Arabs & Jews. Such a fearless 'Aryan Fighter' is our Flemish hero M.C.
Being a most intelligent & informed Bushist American, Mark, you seem to be oblivious to the fact that Zeyad (whose patience is, not just toward you apes & ape-supporters, but even towards the likes of me, very great indeed) at the end had no choice but to ban this racist scumbag Michael Cosyns last November, because he had greatly overstepped the mark (Zeyad's November archive is still here, in case you wonder).
So you see that maybe the suspicions of many outside the US, that the Bushist (or Neo-Con) plans for world domination reek of something older indeed, something a bit... how to say... Fascist or Nazi, always get some casual confirmation...
It appears that the infamous Lee C. just can't stop himself from heaping abuse on another defenseless woman, in this case Rachel the Brit. How much longer will people put up with the recurring outrages from this cowardly bully? Please join with other sane and decent commenters to demand that Lee C. be banned from defacing the Iraqi blogs by his terrorist apologetics and sexist drivel.
@Ros, 02.06.05 - 4:27 pm.
"Again [=Against] a grab bag of facts, long live Von Daniken".
Ros, where is 'women's liberation' in US run Afghanistan??
@FOAD (or maybe Jeffrey Schuster - Astoria, NY), 02.06.05 - 8:04 pm,
why you do not FO to your pathetic blog, And - just - Die (like you wrote in your last pathetic post there)?
For sure everybody respects Lee C. (albeit a loony) much more than they respect you.
This if cool, when the Realist is presented with the dilemma of whether to adopt the "Christian" persona and screw around with Rachel, or adopt FOAD and screw around with me, he drops messing with Rachel in favor of being "FOAD" and getting a shot in at me.
I not only have my own personal troll (an honor usually reserved for bloggers and blogs, and yet here I get one of my own), but I even trump Rachel whom he's been stalking for a much longer time.
So, screw you Rachel; I win!
This is fairly described as "cool", when the Realist is presented with the dilemma of whether to adopt the "Christian" persona and screw around with Rachel, or adopt the FOAD persona and screw around with me, he passes up messing with Rachel in favor of being "FOAD" and getting a shot in at me.
I not only have my own personal troll (an honor usually reserved for bloggers and blogs, and yet here I get one of my own), but I even trump Rachel whom he's been stalking for a much longer time.
So, screw you Rachel; I win!
Shouldn't have double posted; it didn't even connect the first time. But, apparently it did double post.
S'okay. I win! I can write that twice and be okay with the double post; apologies to the rest of ya'll, but I'm not really feelin’ humble here now.
If the US proposed merging with Pakistan and giving Pakistan population-weighted seats in a new US-Pakistan Congress you would not object.........just that is being proposed with Turkey for Europe.......to have the largest voting bloc to legislate in Europe as a poor Muslim country with the largest population.
No part of EU enlargement has been without its risks ... Turkey will be no different. Its probably high time that the EU and Britain took another risk ... and decide if its time to part company. It seems reasonable at this stage to ask Britons if they wish to remain as part of a union which, it is only fair to say, is more than what it originally set out to be. Unlike other countries, Britain has not held referenda on the ratification of all the major EU treaties, so the populace has had no direct say in the changes. Leaving the EU, but remaining part of the EEA, would leave Britain much closer to what it signed up for in the seventies. The other members should be prepared to say regretfully but sincerely, "so long and thanks for all the cash".
Hey Rachel your Communist party didn't have a very stong showing in the Iraqi election. How do you like that you slut?
I guess the Iraqi people don't want true freedom then, lol.
A morning's visit during espresso brings me by to see if I've been threatened with suit. No? What does it take to be threatened with a frivolous suit around here by my fellow Londoner?
Tut tut. Such shameful and allegedly uncharacteristic cowardice by our heroine.
Till this evening.
Cheers
An Italian,
You don't know who you are foolin' with.
Though I am an American by birth, born in Southern California, I am, by ancestry, half-Irish and half-Italian.
So, when you throw mud at us Americanos, just know that you are really throwing mud at yourself.
And weren't the Italians (the real ones) part of the coalition in Iraq? Aren't you supporting your Prime Minister?
PeteS,
At this point, I would recommend that our British friends say "No thanks" to the upcoming referendum.
And I don't think that the other member nations really want to have a nation in their EU that doesn't really want to be there.
But, wait!! South Carolina didn't really want to be in the United States way back in 1861. So, maybe the rest of the EU would like to have Great Britain, even if it were kicking and screaming all the while.
PeteS,
Let me correct myself.....
I think South Carolina announced its supposed departure from the United States in 1860, immediately after Abraham Lincoln won the November 1860 Presidential election (by winning all of the free states except for New Jersey and losing every slave state).
What's my point?
Well, I want to know if the European Union is a perpetual union, once you are in you can't get out? Or does it have a clause that says, "You may be relieved of this union upon giving 12 months notice."
That's a fair question, isn't it?
An Italian wrote,
Since Uncle Adolf has been dead for the past sixty years, his cause needs new recruits to carry on the struggle against those 'inferior races', like those evil Semites, Arabs & Jews.
Actually Michael Cosyns is a huge supporter of Israel and is very pro-American, in part because he is grateful that America helped liberate his nation of Belgium twice.
So, I think your analysis of Michael Cosyns has much depth to it.
But besides that, your a genius.
PeteS Its probably high time that the EU and Britain took another risk ... and decide if its time to part company.
Greenland did to preserve its fishing grounds.......Norway refused ........I think you are right......Britain should withdraw.....Germany can finance the whole thing itself......they are a big frightened at the cost of Turkey....
Alternative - let in Turkey but Russia and Ukraine too
Well, I want to know if the European Union is a perpetual union, once you are in you can't get out? Or does it have a clause that says, "You may be relieved of this union upon giving 12 months notice."
You are thinking of the 1936 Soviet Constitution.........no the EU "Treaty-Constitution" requires permission of all the other states before a member is permitted to exit; further any Direction from the Commission can only be blocked not overturned by a majority in I think 2/3 of national parliaments.......which is the opposite of the US system of constitutional change.
In Peru the EU has already started opening legations without any legal basis for doing so. The European Court is implementing the Charter on Fundamental Rights though it is a component of the Constitution which has not been ratified.
There is much Extra-Legal activity within the EU organs.
Since Uncle Adolf has been dead for the past sixty years,
So Italian you were related after all ?
Was it through Eva Braun you trace your family connection or through the idiot Schickelgruber line ?
If I do remember correctly, you praised the American 'liberation' of Afghanistan for its bringing about 'women's liberation' as well.
Nah Italian you don't remember correctly. Don't know who but wasn't me.
Homer did make a refernce to women's freedom in Iraq in a post directly after one of mine. Would that do?
Trouble is liberate is not a word I use. Though at a different site I did, along with others, express my disgust at the Taliban for beating women as whores for showing ankle and widows being forced to stay intheir homes with their children and starve.
however will give it a go.
Afghanistan on line
During the rule of the Taliban (1996 - 2001), women were treated worse than in any other time or by any other society. They were forbidden to work, leave the house without a male escort, not allowed to seek medical help from a male doctor, and forced to cover
themselves from head to toe, even covering their eyes. Women who were doctors and teachers before, suddenly were forced to be beggars and even prostitutes in order to feed their families.
Since the fall of the Taliban in late 2001, many would agree that the political and cultural position of Afghan women has improved substantially. The recently adopted Afghan constitution states that "the citizens of Afghanistan - whether man or woman- have equal rights and duties before the law". So far, women have been allowed to return back to work, the government no longer forces them to wear the all covering burqa, and they even have been appointed to prominent positions in the government. Despite all these changes many challenges still remain. The repression of women is still prevalent in rural areas where many families still restrict their own mothers, daughters, wives and sisters from participation in public life. They are still forced into marriages and denied a basic education. Numerous school for girls have been burned down and little girls have even been poisoned to death for daring to go to school.
RAWA
But there are a few signs of change. For the first time in the country's history there is a Ministry for Women's Affairs, Kabul's first women-run radio station was launched this week and there is even a women's fitness club.
Last month saw the opening of Afghanistan's first job centre for women. Business has been slow. Since the fall of the Taliban, only 2-3% of women have returned to work. Another obstacle for the job centre is finding qualified women -- after years of being banned from education, 90% of Afghan women are illiterate.
Not good but definitely better.
So my turn, Italian do you know where flight 77 is.
In the two years since the invasion of Afghanistan by the United States and the fall of the Taliban, the political and cultural position of Afghan women has improved, said Micheline Centlivres-Demont, a professor of anthropology at the University of Neuchatel in Switzerland
President Hamid Karzai recently announced twenty-seven ministers that will serve in his new Cabinet, including three women. The only female presidential candidate to run in Afghanistan's first post-Taliban elections, Dr. Masooda Jalal, was named the Minister of Women's Affairs.
Sediqa Balkhi, the second woman named to serve in the Karzai Cabinet, will be the Minister of Martyrs and Disabled.
The Youth Affairs Ministry was created to address the issues and problems confronted by Afghan youth who have lived through years of war. This new ministry will be led by Amina Afzali,
And of course women in Afghanistan voted for the very first time ever.
As they say the Italians say, Rome wasn't built in a day.
Now where is the evidence to support your argument please.
When Saddam Hussein was in power, all that "ordinary" Iraqis had to do was to pretend they liked him. They got food, electricity, water, jobs, a place to live, education etc .
Today, in US-"controlled" Baghdad, barbers are now being assassinated, by extremists "accusing them of violating a strict reading of Islamic teachings that say men should keep their beards long".
Tell me again, how the US occupation has improved life for Iraqis?
When Saddam Hussein was in power, all that "ordinary" Iraqis had to do was to pretend they liked him. They got food, electricity, water, jobs, a place to live, education etc .
Sounds just like Stalinist Russia......but it was showing just how much you liked the Boss that proved so difficult.........yes even animals in a zoo get free food but if they bite the zoo-keeper life gets very tough.
Do you Rachel get food, electricity, water, jobs, a place to live, education etc where you are ?
Or do the doctors give you lots of injections as well ?
The Abu Ghraib Scandal You Don't Know
Republican America will never be forgiven for this.
Republican America will never be forgiven for this.
Wrong Rachel.........The American Republic and the Republicans in America are quite content for misfits like yourself to rant and rail........just don't damage the upholstered wallpaper.
Our heroine wishes for Saddam's return on behalf of our host. With him in mind, one wonders how she was "reasoned into" this wonderful little poster-line? Using such rigorous logic as a beacon unto the dark wilderness of American illogic, one can assume from this that if, say, Nick Griffin were to place her inside a cell, force her to read nothing but nationalist pulp (maybe Kipling three times a day), given three bowls of chips daily, and kept reasonably heated, cooled, and lit, then she would acquiesce, all the while thanking old Nick for the service (I would also hope he threw in forced hygiene, but I don't want to so radically alter the hypo).
I believe "Homer" may actually have hard evidence to support his earlier claims about her fealty to her homeland now. Hmmm.
Cheers
Interesting Idea you have, mark, about how a democracy works... Who supports the prime minister (who by the way is not the first person I would think of, speking of honest people), is "the real one", the other are "made in China" I guess?
Regards
Sorry, I don't get quotes to work, I was referring to following message of Mark: Mark | Email | Homepage | 02.06.05 - 11:57 pm |
>When Saddam Hussein was in power, all that "ordinary" Iraqis had to do was to pretend they liked him. They got food, electricity, water, jobs, a place to live, education etc .
>Sounds just like Stalinist Russia...
Rick, i asume you read Solschenizin or Robert Conquest or General Gorbatov, so you have to know that better. The "fun" part about stalinist russia and the jeshowtshina was that the love to Stalin did not even matter that much. Many honest Stalinists went to Kolyma just because the GPU plan needed fivehundert more english spys for that month.
I would think that pretending the love to Saddam worked in general, but not all the time. Perhaps Kusai liked to have your house, maybe Udai liked to have your wife ...
Yes Stalin - I have read them all - I think Karlo Stajner's book "7000 Days in Siberia" is one of the very best
http://www.alibris.com/search/se...tches=8&
qsort=r
and the film "So Weit die Fuessen Tragen"
http://www.wintersonnenwende.com...n/
0557sowe.html
but your point is exact.
Damn damn damn. Those rotten Amerikans are at it again, bringing waring sides together. Abbas and Sharon, who'd a thought it? Blast the little negro girl and that Texas cowboy, too!
Poor wee lass - what distorted "facts" will she use to decry this bit of good news.
Let's see, Italian, women in Afghanistan. They are still in a relatively backward culture in many places, by our lights, but it is their culture. If the vollage tradition is to wear a burka, it is their tradition. Would you have us hoorible Amerikans force them into mini-skirts?
But where is government policy, now? No longer does the government enforce policy to beat women with sticks for being out in public without a male relative; nor do they force women to stay home sick while a male relative goes to the doctor for them and describes their ailments; nor are women denied schooling; nor are they denied the vote; on and on. Yep, I can see how things were better under the Taliban.
Yet another dipshit sitting fat, happy and free while decrying the freedom of others.
When Saddam Hussein was in power, all that "ordinary" Iraqis had to do was to pretend they liked him. They got food, electricity, water, jobs, a place to live, education etc ... Tell me again, how the US occupation has improved life for Iraqis?
Rachel - you profess some brand of Christianity, don't you? When did food, electricity etc. equate to having "life to the full"? Should Iraqis have been content to live by bread alone? Are you?
I think you are right......Britain should withdraw [from the EU].....
Not quite what I said, Rick. Britain should hold a referendum on the matter... we started out by complaining about a democratic deficit
... people should get to choose!
I LOVE TO TELL PEOPLE HERE IN FRANCE WHERE I HAVE BEEN LIVING FOR 23 YEARS -----
I TOLD YOU SO : IRAQUIS WANT FREEDOM TOO. IT IS NOT BECAUSE THEY ARE MUSLIM THAT THEY DO NOT UNDERSTAND THAT THEIR DREAMS, THEIR GOALS, THEIR CHILDREN'S FUTURE DEPEND ON COOPERATIVE DEMOCRACY TO FREE THEM FROM DICTATORSHIP !!!!
LOVE LIVE FREE IRAQ !!!!
PeteS,
Let's not concede the economic argument either. As I understand it, Iraqis are doing better today than under Saddam, excepting Saddam's preferred clan.
Should Iraqis have been content to live by bread alone? Are you?
That's an excellent point.
In America, at least, one could argue that the "right of center" believes in negative rights and the "left of center" believes in positive rights.
Negative rights are things that government can't do to you (force you to go to church, prevent you from publishing a newsletter).
Positive rights are things that government gives you (education, food, health care).
Mark that is old material and is actually Utilitarianism - I think it was T H Green in the C19th who had the "negative freedom" "positive freedom" dichotomy.............but it is actually like that old story of the professor asking his students to choose.........
in a room is a table with two people, each with a choice.......on the table is a case containing $20 million and also a gun............the professor claimed to be astounded how many of his students went for the money
I don't think there's anything wrong with "positive rights", as long as it is accepted that there are natural rights (the self-evident and inalienable ones in the U.S. scheme of things) that are antecedent to any positive rights, and a natural law antecedent to positive law. The trouble is that it is very hard to make a purely secular argument for this. But Rachel should have no problem with "natural rights", coming from her Christian perspective.
@Mark, 02.06.05 - 11:57 pm.
"And weren't the Italians (the real ones) part of the coalition in Iraq? Aren't you supporting your Prime Minister?"
No need for me to answer to your drivel (showing what is your idea of 'democracy', BTW), since Luigi (02.07.05 - 8:45 am) did it more than brilliantly already.
@Mark, 02.06.05 - 11:57 pm.
"Though I am an American by birth, born in Southern California, I am, by ancestry, half-Irish and half-Italian".
Well, genius Mark, we know that all Americans (apart from the Native Americans) had ancestors who came from other places.
So what?
When reminded of some Irish-Americans, in Ireland they use to say: "'Tis a pity that when their ancestors went over they left their brains THIS side of the ocean..."
I do not know if in Southern Italy (whence the ancestors of the Italo-Americans came) they say the same... but I suspect they do.
@Mark, 02.07.05 - 12:23 am.
"Actually Michael Cosyns is a huge supporter of Israel and is very pro-American".
Oh Ahmehwican genius, that's precisely what I was saying. The man is a racist and he is a member of a Neo-Nazi party recently banned by the Belgian Supreme Court (whence his soubriquet 'the Outlaw'): can you deny it? No.
How is it that a Nazi today supports Israel & the US?
As I was implying, precisely because, differently from sixty years ago, Nazis find in the US (& Israel) of today something they very much like and recognise as their own...
Such as been the bitter divide over Iraq that it is has come to be regarded as virtual treason for anyone in the pro-war lobby even to hint that WMD, not human rights, was the principal assertion made for military intervention. Many of my friends have simply forgotten about this, insisting that the struggle was about human rights from the very start and the fact that Saddam Hussein fooled us into assuming that he had an advanced programme of biological, chemical and nuclear weapons fully excuses the intelligence community and their polital masters for flawed analysis.
This will not do. An honest hawk should admit that the failure over WMD in Iraq is a political catastrophe of the highest order. It has made future pre-emtive strikes against dangerous regimes virtually impossible. If Mr Bush were to address Congress tomorrow and claim that action must be taken against North Korea because of new data gathered by the CIA, he would be laughed at. If Tony Blair were to stand up in the House of Commons and give warning that Iran should be dealt with because of the reports compiled by MI6, he would be howled down. Indeed, we have today reached a point where, when the UKs Home Secretary indentifies a small number of militants as a threat who, on the basis of intelligence, must be kept under house arrest, people scoff at him. The secret service was once thought of as James Bond. It has become Carrying on Spying.
The day after his re-election Mr Bush intoned: "This is not a time for gloating, it is a time for leadership." The same should apply after the Iraqi votes are tallied. That leadership will be a hard ordeal. It will not be made any easier by gloating.
@Ros, 02.07.05 - 3:51-4:04 am
"Nah Italian you don't remember correctly. Don't know who but wasn't me".
I'm very sorry, Ros, you are right; seems I didn't do my homework properly... you win. I apologise.
"So my turn, Italian do you know where flight 77 is".
It crashed into the Pentagon, as a video shown that very day on BBC showed; but what happened that day is anyway about impossible on the part of '19 hijiackers' from the caves of Afghanistan, none of whom a pilot (&, since there is no evidence at all they actually boarded those planes, & none of their body parts was found at the Pentagon & in Pennsylvania, it seems maybe they were 'teleported', like in 'Star Trek' - the whole 911 saga is a very believable story, indeed!).
Have a look (& Rachel as well) at this Website (possibly the best on the whole affair): http://911research.wtc7.net/
Rachel, where did you get your 'I have an IQ of 147' number? You do realize those online sites and 'test your IQ' books give *everyone* a 147?
Well an honest liberal will of course go back to the UN site and reread Security Council resolutions as well as President Bush's address to the council many moons before the war. They will then, of course, have to admit it is all there; unless they can't read or have an adgenda or bias they would like to push.
Fortunately no intelligence info is needed in the case of Iran - Hassan Rohani of Iran's Supreme National Security Council is publicly thumbing his nose at the West over uranium enrichment. Interestingly, the U.S. wants this one referred to the U.N. Security Council. Did I miss something happening to make everything cosy again at the U.N.?
Rachel, where did you get your 'I have an IQ of 147' number? You do realize those online sites and 'test your IQ' books give *everyone* a 147?
If the 147 was instead a high break at snooker... now that would be impressive.
Rocket Rachel rivals Rocket Ronnie ... could make a good London sports headline.
Opposition to intervention in Iraq was based on clear principles and anyone of goodwill will naturally hope that the election there augurs well for that country. However, for others to claim that troops must stay until "the job is done" requires much more definition.
Whereas in every engagement (except Suez) from 1914 to 1991 the casus belli was clear and recieved national support, in 2003 it was shown to be false. Instability in the Middle East, anti-Western sentiment, religious tensions and terrorism have probably been exacerbated by the coalition action and an indefinite military occupation will not solve the problem, and the failure to have an exit strategy remains one of the most serious charges against our Prime Minister, Otocon.
ChrisB, my IQ was first tested when I was in my mid-teens, at an independent girls' boarding school in England.
I am smart - get over it.
Have some difficulties with the Time expose. We are advised that at times there were up to 7000. Then that there were 800 to 900 new detainees a day to be dealt with. Either AG was filled up in a period of 9 days or it resembled a train station with people coming and going constantly.
The tether argument. The tether use, declared as "a case of a medically condoned practice degenerating into abuse" cleverly put. It is a medically condoned practice, and the prisoners were abused by the sickos with leather straps. But by juxtaposing those two uses of the use of leather straps it leaves in place the notion that the doctors condoned the use of straps around the neck. While Time carefully avoids saying so, nevertheless for the haters that is what they choose to see. Well done Time and the ethical doctors who wrote the report.
As for leather straps they are used in this country to restrain the mentally ill. Indeed they are used on even older persons suffering from dementia.
Shortage of surgeons, unfortunately a growing problem for all nations. Australia has moved to give nurses "practitioner" rights in order to try and alleviate the shortage of medical personnel. Our rural areas are lucky to see a surgeon.
One has to assume that the ethical doctors position was that US servicemen should have been a lower priority than the Iraqi prisoners, or else they and their caring colleagues needed to join the reserves and get their little butts over their and operate.
Indeed there is an element of only doctors can do very strongly in this expose. Whatever the real problems identified there is certainly a case of shouting very loudly to give the accusations, substance.
An Italian | 02.07.05 - 2:09 pm | , that site
http://911research.wtc7.net
is inaccessible at the moment.
...is inaccessible at the moment.
Seems OK now Rachel. Maybe you are banned. In the meantime, here is some new and outrageous abuse.
The psychologist who guestimated 5%had mental illnesses. Psychologists do not diagnose mental illness, that is the purvey of psychiatrists (and possibly they are just a whisper away from being witchdoctors), Psychologists consider human behaviour and what makes people behave in the manner they do. They are about trying to modify that behaviour.
24 hours with a broken foot untreated. We have them lying on barouches in hospital emergencies for well over 24 hours untreated. There is a system called triage that the reporter acts as if he has never heard of. Once again an ignorant reporter telling a story as it best suits his belief system with no regard for actually informing himself.
That 9-11 "research" site goes on and on ad nauseum with the same old lies, distortions and nostrums regarding the events of the time. Good grief; only the brain dead would hold that up as a legit source.
Ros, facts and reality are irrelevant when everyone wants to be Woodward and Bernstein.
Check out the cartoon at Cox & Forkum about that paragon of journalistic morality Eason Jordan. Pretty funny, if he was not so pathertic and in charge of CNN.
To go through that document would be pointless because any one who believes it has abandoned reason as a modus operandi. I will however say that if I recall rightly, the pilots had their eyes taken out by the box cutters. They possibly were just a little incapacitiated. Passengers on the planes did however phone.
Consider that if even some of those propositions are obviously untrue, then the whole document loses its veracity. are you happy Rachel/Italian with the claims made there. Why would you choose to believe unsubstantiated claims about the engineering aspects of the twin towers when there has been considerable work done on analysis of the collapse of the towers by not just individual engineers of standing but reported in professional engineering journals. Important to the engineers because they need to build to protect against such a failing again. Are we to believe that the worlds engineering professionals are also part of a giant conspiracy to cover the murder of their own citizens by the US with the help of the Israelis. You can't have missed the usual Israel knew bit again.
This is there was no holocaust approach again. And you can't see it.
This is a collection of nonsense presented to the gullible to persuade them to buy a book.
On the big day, the operatives may have worked in a single "war room" with a big screen to keep them on the same page. Calls (except to strangers) would be kept brief so that the callers could report details of the flight but not get into personal conversation that might alert family members to the fraud. Calls that went poorly (like the one to Mark Bingham's mother) would not be repeated.
Have neither Rachel or Italian heard of the inference to the best explanation. This elaborate complicated conspiracy theory with one untrue proposition after another fails just from that denial of logic alone.
Hm, i have at least seen a movie related to Soweit die ... But Stajner is absolutly new to me. Thanks for the link i'll check for a german version. To bad that some of the books related to the stalinist aera are only rarly published like Koestlers "Sonnenfinsternis". The book was quite easy to find in a library here in Berlin, but to actualy buy a copy was rather difficult. One of my favorits is a selfbiographie by GPU member Walther Kritwitzki who managed to escape to america and tell his story but "committed suicide" in New York soon after ...
Whereas in every engagement (except Suez) from 1914 to 1991 the casus belli was clear and received national support,
Nice line but wholly untrue........
Stalin - if you have the Net you can go to alibris or abebooks.de and find things.......yes it is true most are published in English....and the UK pyblishes more titles than the US even.
The film So Weit Die Fuessen was superb...I watched it on ZDF I think and bought the DVD. I heard a Polish guy did the same thing and made it to India......one of those deported in 1939.
Karlo Stajner was at Norilsk...the amazing thing is that between his arrest in 1936 and his release in 1956...his wife waited......
You might want to read the book by Bronyslaw Mlynarski "The 79th Survivor" - he was Artur Rubinstein's brother-in-law and was one of 79 not murdered at Katyn.......he spent his time in the camps after the USSR invaded Poland on 17 Sept 1939.......very interesting book..............another which is in German is Salomon W Slowes "Der Weg Nach Katyn"
There used to be interesing book sales outside Humboldt University at weekends....are there still ?
>There used to be interesing book sales outside Humboldt University at weekends....are there still ?
Hey my alma mater! Yes they are. I once found the memoirs of Paul Schmidt (von Ribbentrops translator) from 1949 there. And there is a wide and somehow very cheap offer of classic english/american books too. I for example loved R.L. Stevensons "Kidnapped" since i was a kid, it was amazing to read the original.
PeteS, I've been able to access that site, now. Don't be silly, I am not the sort of person that *that* site would ban, am I?
This site that is recommended. We are led to a range of “experts “, eg Jim Hoffman, (claimed to be computer software engineer and research scientist) Professor AK Dewdney, (emeritus standing at 2 universities which clearly require him to completely disassociate them from his stories) or Don Paul (musician) G. W. Longspaugh (aerospace engineer, but can’t check his actual credentials) All I can find on Hoffman is that he writes conspiracy theory books is a key note speaker at conspiracy theory conferences and if the CV I found is correct is B.S. in Marketing with a Minor in Psychology: Eastern Illinois University • December 1990 GPA: 3.16 of 4.0. Certified Netware Engineer • August 1994
Hoffman was an expert witness at a great “public jury” on who were the real bombers out of the following
The roles of ten Leading Suspects: Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, financier David Rockefeller, Blackstone
Group Chairman Peter G. Peterson, NORAD General Ralph Eberhardt, then-Brigadier General Montague Winfield, former FEMA Director Joe Allbaugh, developer Larry Silverstein, former Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, and reporter Judith Miller on, before, and afer 9/11/01 will be examined.
Interestingly Hoffman uses a FEMA study to support his case. I think what he is doing is saying, don’t have explanation for actual physics of twin tower collapse, therefore it is not true that planes did it. Like Von Daniken, we don’t know how the the Egyptians built the pyramids so it must have been aliens from outer space. Hard to believe that he is a scientist.
To get a sense of Dewdney, this is what he concludes re telephone calls. If the September 11 attacks were planned and executed as a combined clandestine operation between Mossad and some US agencies such as the CIA and NSA (with God knows what involvement by the Joint Chiefs and the White House), it can be reliably inferred that other attacks blamed on Al Qaida are also fakes or ‘dirty tricks’ in CIA parlance. These would include the bombing of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania on August 7, 1998, as well as the attack on the USS Cole on October 12, 2000, in the port of Aden, Yemen.
Small group of suspect “scientists” who reference themselves as proof of their theories and clearly make a living out of them.
Don't be silly, I am not the sort of person that *that* site would ban, am I?
Rachel - sorry, just joking... I am sure they are delighted to have you among their readership.
Here's how I see it... the authors of that site see nothing wrong with this version of the "Holmesian maxim" -- once you have demonstrated the impossibility of the official 9/11 story, then [insert your favourite implausible conspiracy theory here] must be true.
@Ros, 02.07.05 - 6:24 pm.
Some engineers I know who read that site said that the collapse of the Twin Towers on 9/11 is fishy indeed.
Apart from that, how could ANY phone calls from mobiles be made by an airplane? The Olson call (not by mobile) was easily debunked: it never happened.
And the manoeuvres two of the planes (the Pentagon one and the second on the WTC) made are just impossible to do, unless one is a very very good fighter pilot (and it was the first time ever they were made with such planes), like Mubarak commented in his first reaction; none of the alleged hijackers was a pilot of any sort.
And the identities of at least nine of the alleged hijackers were stolen from people still alive or dead years before; so who were they?
Anyway the whole 9/11 matter is a bit OT here.
Zeyad,
read the latest editorial by Justin Raimondo (http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=4740).
He mentions the murder of your cousin Zaytun as an example.
R***, you d***;
pls do not post those d!!! long strings (urls and the like) which bust the Word Wrap. Use tinyurl.com or learn this for live links:
<a href="url goes here"> title goes here</a>
Jane wrote, Instability in the Middle East, anti-Western sentiment, religious tensions and terrorism have probably been exacerbated by the coalition action....
Instability in the Middle East
Instability isn't always a bad thing. During the 1989-1995 period, the Soviet Union suffered from instability. But this represented the end of the cold war and the beginning of freedom within the Soviet Empire.
anti-Western sentiment
Anti-Western sentiment existed prior to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. In the aftermath of Operation Iraqi Freedom many Iraqis are beginning to believe that when America talks democracy they back it up and allow elections to be held in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Brian H -- when are you going to upgrade that monitor (all two inches of it).
Among the "anomalies" we are asked to consider are:
Mohammed Atta allegedly barely caught Flight 11, a key flight in the event that he was supposedly planning for years
... and later...
There is no hard evidence that any of the alleged hijackers were on any of the doomed flights.
Yep. I can see the anomaly right there, alright.
Another "anomaly":
The alleged hijackers partied at topless bars and drank alcohol, despite being portrayed as fundamentalist Muslims, for whom such behavior would be surprising
From an Observer article on Mohammed Atta:
In the minds of all but the most cynical or sadistic terrorists, there has to be an element of wilful schizophrenia - a readiness to murder people in the name of humanity.
So, having a beer is "anomalous" why?...
Otocon wrote, Such as been the bitter divide over Iraq that it is has come to be regarded as virtual treason for anyone in the pro-war lobby even to hint that WMD, not human rights, was the principal assertion made for military intervention.
We all remember that WMD was the primary justification for invading Iraq. Now that we found out that Saddam's WMD program was not what it appeared to be there has been increased criticism over the war.
That's understandable. But as we retrospectively total up the pros and cons of Operation Iraqi Freedom, we can't ignore the human costs and human benefits.
If Operation Iraqi Freedom was a mistake, it was the best mistake the United States, Great Britain, Australia and other nations have ever made. This "mistake" might result in the first democracy in the Middle East with the exception of Israel.
PeteS,
There's nothing in the rule book that says that terrorist who kill in the name of Islam have to be good Muslims.
One of the reasons why Islamist extremists are so opposed to the Western world is because they know that the West is a tempter, more so than a conqueror.
Ironcially, the Islamist extremists remind me of Nietzsche......
State is the name of the coldest of all cold monsters. Coldly it tells them lies too; and this lie crawls out of its mouth: "I, the state, am the people." This is a lie! It was creators who created peoples and hung a faith and a love over them: thus they served life.
It is annihilators who set traps for the many and call them "state": they hang a sword and a hundred appetities over them......" ---- Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra
On the contrary Mark, either:
a) terrorists who kill in the name of Islam have to be very bad Muslims.
or
b) Muslims have to be very bad people.
...I don't believe b).
PeteS,
I agree with you on that.
To clarify my views on this......
I was listening to a political pundit a few weeks ago who quoted a Jewish man who survived a Nazi concentration camp.
This Jewish man was asked by a reporter if his experience in the Nazi concentration camp made him believe that the German people were evil people.
The Jewish man replied, "No. There are only two categories of people in the world: the decent and the indecent."
I believe that there are decent and indecent Muslims. And my answer to "Who qualifies as a Muslim?" is "Anyone who professes to be a Muslim."
Even Irshad Manji, a lesbian, is a Muslim, in my opinion, because she claims to be one.
italian re some engineers. Perhaps you would like to direct them to the following.
Prof Eagar materials engineering and engineering systems MIT
example from Prof Eager
"The correct answer is, there's no other way for them to go but down. They're too big. With anything that massive -- each of the World Trade Center towers weighed half a million tons -- there's nothing that can exert a big enough force to push it sideways"
An engineer I know speculated that Osama and co weren't as good engineers as they thought they were, that they hit so high because they were trying to push the buildings over.
further info from Eager
The airplane impact with damage to the columns.
The ensuing fire with loss of steel strength and distortion
There are plenty more like the above. I would be interested to know why you would believe a source like Hoffman but deny structural engineers like Eager, who have the added advantage of vast amounts of supporting work from other engineers
Rachel, the London twit, has posted over 100 comments here. I guess the only way she can get anyone to read her male bovine excrement is to take over somebody else's blog. Write her own blog? And have to come up with constructive ideas, rather than merely attack others? Not wired into her cortex.
Perhaps Rachel can look back into her years in kindergarten and review the years 1997-2000........she will find George Bush's programme was isolationist, withdrawal from Kosovo, Bosnia, not to be involved in nation-building, not to intervene as Clinton did.....everywhere.......
The Project New American Century was to prevent isolationism and show how the Us had to shape the primeval soup left after the collapse of the USSR before China made its own empire in Asia.
That Bin Laden had plotted an attack on the WTC to punish Clinton is clear but it took so long for his henchmen to get their act together Clinton had retired.......and they made Bush reverse course and focus on an immediate threat.
Or do you also think FDR inspired Pearl Harbour and the Japanese had no intention of attacking Hawaii ?
The American rout in Iraq has begun. We must hope that all the troops can escape before they are trapped and slaughtered. This is the American Stalingrad.
It is now clear that the Iraqi people will establish an Islamic state. They will be governed in accord with the precepts of Sharia and will formally join the global jihad against the Crusaders and Zionists.
The United States stands alone and is hated by the entire world. We must hope that sufficient amends can be made to allow innocent Americans to escape the coming retribution. It is essential that Bushitler, his henchmen, and their Zionist masters be arrested and turned over to the World Court for judgement and punishment for their crimes against humanity.
Impeach Bushitler!
Bring the Troops Home Now!
Power to the People!
Thanks for the reminder Michael O. I visited your site. Having got generous about the tsunami I will now do something about donating to Iraqi charities. Not however the western NGOs.
And yes it is interesting how some use this site as theirs. It is their lack of joy and hope and empathy that really bothers me. I do not see all who disagree that way however.
Rick you remind that one of the disconcerting aspects of the current western hysteria about Islamist terrorism is that not that Bush created it, rather the hatred and murder of the US and it's citizens has been happening and documented well before Bush and Iraq, (obviously Sep 11). I read Kagan saying don't forget that their planning is very long term. I also wonder about reports that al-Quaeda activity is greater in Europe than it is currently in the US. And the monster murderer of children telling the world via the BBC that after he has killed a few more Russians he intends killing Europeans. I sincerely hope he fails.
strange view I know but at least if they get busy somewhere else they may leave the Iraqis alone, have they not suffered enough.
We must hope that all the troops can escape before they are trapped and slaughtered. This is the American Stalingrad.
Hysterically funny.........why don't you stop reading comics and start looking at geography. Maybe you could look at a map and see where Volgograd is, and maybe you could look at El Alamein and where that is, and when you can connect disparate thoughts in your addled brain you can see just how meaningless your hyperbolic histrionics are.
Can anyone explain paypal to me please?
Bush lied, ridiculous to say it, but nevertheless,wrong the whole world does not hate the US. Amazing site re pull out. gets even better when it's home site informs us that it was explosives that brought down the twin towers. see my reference above for some info from structural engineers rather than charlatans.
It really is a waste of time to keep going over the events of 11 September, 2001. All except the wilfully blind now acknowledge that the attacks were a "false flag" operation run by the Mossad and US government agencies. If any Arabs or Muslims were involved, it was as "fall guys", not as active participants.
Here is a brief summary of undeniable facts about 9-11. Draw your own conclusions.
Impeach Bushitler!
Bring the Troops Home Now!
Power to the People!
Why we keep getting Islam wrong
Fraud and corruption
Forget the UN. The US occupation regime helped itself to $8.8 bn of mostly Iraqi money in just 14 months
I think that the US should repay this, immediately.
Forget the UN
Sense at last Rachel.......
Why we keep getting Islam wrong
Proud Infidel | Email | Homepage | 02.08.05 - 4:43 am | #
That's one hell of an ugly article.
Remarkable:
the once battered city of fallujah got one of the highest voter turn outs in the sunni triangle. They even got short of ballot papers:
rebuilding in fallujah
Why we keep getting Islam wrong
Proud Infidel | Email | Homepage | 02.08.05 - 4:43 am | #
That's one hell of an ugly article.
PeteS | Email | Homepage | 02.08.05 - 6:23 am | #
Why so ?
Myself, I'm still looking for repayment to the U.S. from Europe for our WWII expenses. I won't even mention the $200 billion for Iraq (oh, I forgot; we went there to steal the oil).
The link is to a *column* in the Guardian; obviously not enough even tenuous facts to publish as an article, even for the leftist rag.
Myself, I'm still looking for repayment to the U.S. from Europe for our WWII expenses
Really, and what would those be ? I think you will find Great Britain paid its loans to the US - US gives Britain another loan of $5 billion
(Reduced to $160 million over 50 years)
Britain is not happy. It has lost 1/3 of its national wealth whilst the US has become richer.
Britain has lost 40% of its export market, 30% of its merchant shipping and $17 billion in foreign investments. What Britain has lost, the US has gained.
http://www.3denglish.com/
3Dbritu...itushistory.htm
http://history.acusd.edu/gen/
WW2...ralityacts.html
1939
Sept 1 - Poland invaded by Germany
Sept. 3 - British liner Athenia sunk - 28 of 112 killed were Americans
Sept. 5 - FDR invoked 1937 Neutrality Law after England and France declare war
Sept 17 Poland invaded by USSR
Nov. 4 - FDR signed revision bill
no loans to belligerents
"The report was drawn up on behalf of the interim Iraqi government in preparation for a possible legal action against those who may have illicitly profited under Saddam. The Iraqis hired the London-based accountants KPMG and lawyers Freshfields to advise on future action."
"The report says oil was given to key countries: “The regime gave priority to Russia, China and France. This was because they were permanent members of, and hence had the ability to influence decisions made by, the UN Security Council. The regime . . . allocated ‘private oil’ to individuals or political parties that sympathised in some way with the regime.”
Sunday Times
It would seem that Boutros Ghali had his fingers in the pot as well. Washington Post.
You are right for once Rachel, forget the UN or at least don't give it any money.
On the other hand (from that interesting article from John)
Recognizing the need to infuse cash into an economy, the Marines took over in mid-January, handing out $6.4 million to 32,219 heads of households over six days. as an example. Bad people still are they Rachel.
There have been reports throughout the American presence of military commanders saying nothing can happen with this bureaucratic redtape, there is a need now and getting on and providing money and resources. How much of this "corruption" is actually not following the rules. The auditors would suggest that this is an issue. I wonder why the Rachel's would not want the Iraqis to be helped. It is not an inherent dislike of corruption. The UN can go on stealing until hell freezes over it would seem. So it must be again, get the Yanks and damm the Iraqis.
Thanks for the link Bush Lied. It was hysterical. The thought of 5 Mossad agents dancing on a van, with their spare box cutters and $4,700 stuffed in a sock. Wonderful stuff.
And anonymous, is he/she frightened that Mossad would come dancing up to his/her door, accompanied by the Israeli Symphony Orchestra no doubt. Well at least we know that anonymous isn't Jim Hoffman, he's out there making a good living out of this stuff.
Keep up the good work Bush Lied.
That's one hell of an ugly article.
PeteS | Email | Homepage | 02.08.05 - 6:23 am | #
Why so ?
Rick | Email | Homepage | 02.08.05 - 7:07 am |
Because it's one-eyed rubbish motivated by racism. V amateur rhetorical smoke and mirrors too. Starts off with some facts to pretend it's serious then offers a very one sided analysis, try:
"no one else can get along with Moslems"- sounds just like 1930's Nazis talking about jews.
"a religion that looks remarkably like the St. Valentine's Day Massacre" - just how does that compare with centuries of Christian anti-semitism?
"lent itself well to fanaticism, terrorism, mass murder, oppression" - unlike any other religion of course, try the last twenty centuries of European Christian history.
Follows this up with a bit of flag waving to make it clear for slower members of the audience where the writers sympathies lie, then completes with a load of fear-mongering tosh:
"one reason for the decline of the West"- excuse me?
"After the Second World War, we told ourselves that the danger was over" - except for those Soviets and their nukes
I think the best line is "Today, the UN is trying to make deterrence obsolete." Tell me, what is the difference between WMD and deterrence?
It would be laughable if it wasn't for the fact that history is full of stupid people absorbing this sort of hatred and acting upon it.
@Rick
Why so ?
Came back to answer this, but found that Whistlin Bob probably answered it better than I would have. The article is a morass of half-truths, misleading analogies and non sequiturs. It implicitly blames situations in which genocide was committed against Muslims on those same Muslims... the equivalent of blaming Jews for the Holocaust.
I am troubled that you would ask "why so?". Do you have a different opinion?
"a religion that looks remarkably like the St. Valentine's Day Massacre" - just how does that compare with centuries of Christian anti-semitism?
Clarify
I am troubled that you would ask "why so?". Do you have a different opinion?
PeteS | Email | Homepage | 02.08.05 - 5:30 pm | #
I read assertion after assertion without anyone articulating. Decline of the West is a book by Oswald Spengler written c. 1900 .......the issues you refer to are predicated on a book by Houston Stewart Chamberlain in England a little earlier.
Sam Huntingdon's thesis is interesting......how many have read his book ?
I merely feel the original response you gave PeteS to be rather like Victorians covering piano legs.......it said nothing but invited people to read the article to understand your response. What would a "Beautiful" article have looked like if that was "ugly" ? Any thoughts ?
What would a "Beautiful" article have looked like if that was "ugly" ? Any thoughts ?
In a country where Salman Rushdie's book was burned in a British city notwithstanding Heinrich Heine's warning........and the police stood idly by..........or where Abu Hamza could preach hatred of Jews and Christians and Americans on a London street protected by Metropolitan Police Officers at a cost of £900.000...........and face no charges.............I am just surprised that we get hissy fits over comments like the ones in that article...............
Maybe we should have much more open discussion and the children can cover their ears.......but it is nothing to do with 1930s Germany and it is time to get rid of that rubbish...........that was to do with Bebel's SPD like Lenin's Bolsheviki being largely Jewish in membership; and the split in 1926 between SPD and USPD which merged into the KPD.
Pete S, Bridget, etc.,
Here's the real deal:
<a href="url here"> title or caption here</a>
Just copy it by hand or into a little file or into permanent storage in ClipMate if you have that utility.
Or learn it.
Or write it in magic marker across the top of your monitor frame.
german insults
just testing
I merely feel the original response you gave PeteS to be rather like Victorians covering piano legs.
I thought that was something to do with prudishness ... not sure how that relates to anything I said.
...it said nothing but invited people to read the article to understand your response.
Good.
What would a "Beautiful" article have looked like if that was "ugly" ? Any thoughts ?
Don't know if that question is rhetorical. It doesn't make sense in any case, as if the opposite of "ugly racism" is "beautiful racism" etc. As I said, "ugly" referred to (for instance) the implicit assertion that Muslims caused their own genocide in (for instance) Bosnia.
In a country where ... [etc.] ... I am just surprised that we get hissy fits over comments like the ones in that article
A bit disjointed there Rick ... the article is American, nothing to do with your particular British experience. Regardless of that, extrapolating from the particular goings on of a particular group of British Muslims to any general statement about the nature of Islam is frought with danger, I hope you would agree. At the very least one might reasonably demand some supporting evidence for such tendentious statements, of the sort notably missing from that article. Hissy fits are completely appropriate in this case just as they are when, for instance, Muslims make similarly general statements about Jews - claiming justification from the particular experience of Palestinian Muslims.
How can this not be entirely obvious?
Simply this PeteS - let them have an open discussion and say what they want. Had Croatia not been broken out of Yugoslavia by Germany and Tudjman not cleansed 220.000 Croatian-Serbs from Krajina into Bosnia, I doubt the problems would have arisen. If you try to remove carrots from mixed vegetables you get an awful mess........so Bosnia's problem was caused by Croatia which made it seek independence....it was after all equilibrium between Croatia and Serbia that kept Yugoslavia together.
The West having agreed to let Croatia ethnically-cleanse Serbs from Krajina then stood by as Bosnia exploded.........
Having made this mess it them got conned into Kosovo by the KLA and now that mess is brewing nicely ready to boil over.
I am a bit tired of this term "racism"....Rachel attacks Americans wholesale.....but why should we ban her for "racism".....it is her viewpoint.
The comments of Mary McAleese about Northern Ireland were racist and anti-Semitic; but really they were just infantile.......she is a fool and we can recognise that......but ban her, why ?
Time for a bit of robust free speech maybe instead of whispers. When you sit in a cafe in the GDR and a guy leans over the table in a huddle to whisper things you know he fears Stasi agents..........it is just like the Thought Police here - people whisper - they don't discuss
lekker boeiend, watch this: http://easymoney.ea.funpic.org/
Simply this PeteS - let them have an open discussion and say what they want.
Who is "they" in this context?
Had Croatia not been broken out of Yugoslavia by Germany and Tudjman... etc. etc.
What has any of this to do with the assertion that Bosnian Muslims were responsible for their own genocide in Srebenica?
I am a bit tired of this term "racism"....Rachel attacks Americans wholesale.....but why should we ban her for "racism".....it is her viewpoint.
Exactly. Let one person have their viewpoint, and let another have theirs including the viewpoint that the first is a racist.
The comments of Mary McAleese about Northern Ireland were racist and anti-Semitic; but really they were just infantile.......she is a fool and we can recognise that......but ban her, why ?
Ban her from what? You are rambling.
Time for a bit of robust free speech maybe instead of whispers.
Yes. That's exactly what Rachel's conspiracy sites are engaged in. Its up to each of us to decide what is intelligently informed free speech, and what is ignorant rubbish.
Who is "they" in this context?
In this context they is shorthand for Everyman.........
Mary McAleese showed herself unfit for the office she holds....don't "ban her" let her resign
Well PeteS one of the problems at Srebenica is that the fighting forces of the Bosnian Muslims were using the UN protection zone as a safe haven from which to engage Bosnian Serb forces......it is not unusual for Un zones to be used this way by combattants which undermines their status under Geneva Conventions..............................the fact that Bosnian Serb forces then used artillery and massacre in retaliation is a war crime breach of those same conventions.......................whether one side is wholly innocent I would not like to say, however it is unwise for combattants to bring civilians into danger...........and the small Dutch protection force was inadequate to the task and under the control of the Dutch Government to avoid conflict which was wrong, both morally and militarily....they should have fought.
Brendan Miniter writes: ......the forward-looking component of President Bush's foreign policy--liberating oppressed people through constant pressure (diplomatic at first) on tyrannical regimes--will continue to be opposed by France and Germany, among other nations. Old Europe isn't able to muster the military might to be much more than a symbol of unity in this struggle anyway. Besides, it's much easier to enjoy the peaceful world the U.S. creates, than it is to fight to secure that peace. In economics, this is called the free-rider problem--old Europe is taking advantage of America's success while avoiding risk.
In confronting Iran and Syria or pressing for democracy in Egypt or Saudi Arabia, President Bush can expect little support from either France or Germany. But when American policies begin to succeed, when the U.S. leads the world to greener pastures ahead, we can expect all the wayward cows to return.
Pete S;
Monitor is 17". Broken wrap means even the full width isn't enough for each line of type. Why do newspapes use columns? It's readability, capice?
Tom Goeller writes: "Is Bush nevertheless right with his vision?" the commentator Jan Ross of the German weekly Die Zeit asked recently. It's an almost heretial question in today's Germany. One should feel "some shame", Ross told his readers, referring to the "long lines of Iraqis" who showed the guts to vote at the end of January. Shame, because the German media were as dead wrong with their pre-election analysis of voting in Iraq as they were with the presidential campaign in the US. The general German line on the Iraq election was: it's too early, too dangerous and anyhow not suitable for the Iraqi people because they are Arabs and don't want democracy.
one of the problems at Srebenica is that the fighting forces of the Bosnian Muslims were using the UN protection zone as a safe haven
I'm familiar with the history. Are we getting a little sidetracked here? The point under discussion was the assertion that Islam (not Bosnian Muslims, or Serbs or Croats or the UN) was/is responsible for the situation in Bosnia.
Monitor is 17".
I have no problems with word wrap on a 15" laptop screen. At 1024 x 768 resolution I can shrink the comments window to about 5/8 screen width before there's a horizontal scrollbar. Howabout you maximise those postage stamp-sized windows of yours.
Mary McAleese showed herself unfit for the office she holds....don't "ban her" let her resign
If I'm correct in my assumptions about which comments of hers you're referring to, then I would say the problem with them was their general nature, not that they are not true in specific cases ... exactly the same problem as with that article.
the problem with them was their general nature
The problem is that she is a Barrister, and should use language precisely; the position she holds is president of Ireland; the comment she made was to compare Catholics in Northern Ireland with Jews in Nazi Germany......
Anti-Semitism that existed for decades had been built upon by the Nazis, she said.
“They gave to their children an irrational hatred of Jews in the same way that people in Northern Ireland transmitted to their children an irrational hatred of Catholics, in the same way that people give to their children an outrageous and irrational hatred of those who are of different colour and all of those things.”
presumably as a Catholic brought up in the North she rises above such things ?
http://www.irlgov.ie/aras/
mornin...ing_ireland.htm
the comment she made was to compare Catholics in Northern Ireland with Jews in Nazi Germany
No, she compared parents in Northern Ireland who transmit an irrational hatred of Catholics to their children to Nazi antisemites who transmitted a hatred of Jews to theirs. I'm interested in why you think that is antisemitic?
Her mistake seems to have been to choose hatred of Catholics as her example (she did say it was an example), rather than to generalise or to refer to both Catholics and Protestants. Anyone who thinks that such irrational hatred does not exist in the North is not in touch with the situation there. Equally, anyone who generalises that Northern Irish people are sectarian bigots is making the same mistake as that article.
"Yes. That's exactly what Rachel's conspiracy sites are engaged in. Its up to each of us to decide what is intelligently informed free speech, and what is ignorant rubbish."
Exactly, and it tires everyone out trying to parse these conspiracy sites. Always ambiguous like most of Juan Cole's articles. It's like the old saying: you can't prove a thing doesn't exist, you can only prove when it does.
Exactly, and it tires everyone out trying to parse these conspiracy sites.
Personally I don't try. That's why I prefer the link rather than the extensive quotes (which I think Rachel agreed to abide by). If its "Democratic Underground" or something of its ilk, I just scroll by. I'm not offended that Rachel posts them (ok, I admit I don't have the same national sensitivities, but the same would apply for instance to Rick trying to get a rise out of the bogtrotter by making a totally irrelevant reference to McAleese) ... everyone gets to say what they want - some of the comments are too stupid to merit consideration (yes, some of mine too). That's ok by me. Just my opinion.
http://www.irlgov.ie/aras/
mornin...ing_ireland.htm
Well PeteS...if I were going to attend an event outside Oswiecim in Poland to commemorate the Red Army liberating what was it...their fourth Concentration Camp - starting with Sobibor ? I think I might watch my loose tongue when interviewed.
To make any anology between N Ireland and the crematoria at Birkenau is distasteful. I don't think many Protestants or Catholics in northern or southern Ireland were gassed or cremated.
The interviewer drew attention to de Valera signing the condolence book on Hitler's death; and of James Joyce pointing out that Jews were refused access to Ireland.
One might have thought the Catholic Church and Anti-Semitism were the cause of that. It seemed so strange to turn what was supposed to be the uniqueness of Auschwitz to serve a political end in Northern Ireland unless trying to relativise what happened in Auschwitz-Birkenau, Sobibor, Treblinka, Mauthausen, Theresienstadt etc
I think whatever point she wished to make should not have been made in this context.......another time maybe
Despite all the ducking and weaving by a relatively few on this comments page (the elections were a sham, uh, Bush cheated in Ohio, um, 9/11 is a lie, er, there were no Arab hijackers, ahhhh, the towers collapse is “fishy,” but but but the Summis were robbed, doh, the new gummint is a US puppet, uhhhhherrrr, the new gummint is an Iranian puppet, dddddd, the Neptune space aliens are running the White House), well, after all the lies, distortions, evasions, spittle, venom, cross-eyed hatred, after all that, it comes down to this:
Iraqis turned out in amazing numbers and voted. Imperfect as it was, it happened and was done well. Hey, here in Washington State (Far West Ukraine) we have all sorts of true, demonstrable, verified problems that put our current governor into office and the same morons who bitch about Florida 2000 and Ohio 2004 say, “Problems? What problems?”
Of course, some pure jerks opine that without monitors and media, the Iraqi election was phony, as if democracy is defined by having monitors and media around and no other way.
The bottom line is that these elections are the end of the beginning of liberty spreading into the last redoubt of tyranny. Here is why it is the death knell of the tyrants and the many in the world, and on this blog, who support them.
http://tinyurl.com/46w6t
The pea brains will, of course, read this and dismiss the courage portrayed; the gutless and cowardly see all things as being as ignominious as they are.
To make any anology between N Ireland and the crematoria at Birkenau is distasteful... I don't think many Protestants or Catholics in northern or southern Ireland were gassed or cremated.
Nice rhetoric but pure fabrication.
If anyone is intrested in viewing a pathetic excuse for an adult conversation about Iraq, visit http://iraqthemodel.blogspot.com/
Make sure you don't upset the equilibrium of the select group of teens! You've been warned.
PeteS;
Apparently the problem is with HoloScan's use of old IE-specific coding, which does not conform to the current CSS. IE breaks the link into chunks; Firefox, Mozilla, Opera, and other modern browsers do not.
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Here is a list of the political alliances receiving the most votes in Iraq (news - web sites)'s Jan. 30 national elections:
AP Photo
The United Iraqi Alliance (Shiite alliance backed by Shiite Muslim clergy): 4,075,295
The Kurdistan Alliance (coalition of two main Kurdish factions): 2,175,551
The Iraqi List (headed by interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi): 1,168,943
Iraqis (headed by interim Iraqi President Ghazi al-Yawer): 150,680
The Turkomen Iraqi Front (represents the countries ethnic Turks): 93,480
National Independent Elites and Cadres Party: 69,938
The Communist Party: 69,920
The Islamic Kurdish Society: 60,592
The Islamic Labor Movement in Iraq: 43,205
The National Democratic Alliance: 36,795
National Rafidain List (Assyrian Christians): 36,255
The Reconciliation and Liberation Entity: 30,796
Iraqi Islamic Party (main Sunni group headed by Mohsen Abdel-Hamid): 21,342
Assembly of Independent Democrats (headed by Sunni elder statesman Adnan Pachachi): 12,728
National Democratic Party (headed by Naseer Kamel al-Chaderchi, Sunni lawyer and member of the former Iraqi Governing Council): 1,603
Total votes: 8,550,571
Invalid votes: 94,305
Ros,
"I wonder why the Rachel's would not want the Iraqis to be helped. It is not an inherent dislike of corruption. The UN can go on stealing until hell freezes over it would seem. So it must be again, get the Yanks and damm the Iraqis.'
Again you are right on point Ros. As near as we can tell, it's a personal vendetta with Rachel. Some Ugly-American ghost from her past that she's unable to forgive. She uses this forum to strike at the amorphic beast that we Americans are. T'would serve her well to let her bitterness dissolve into a mystical acceptance of the disappointments of life.
Homer...are you there? Very good posts from you.
Congratualtions, Zeyad! Keep up the good work with the blogging.
May God/Ala/Buddha/ whatever your faith find a way to help all people in all countries.
Iraq seems a little extreme to me. Especially in this advanced / enlightened age we live in.
I don't like to see bloodshed of any race of people. People... live in peace.
I really hope the people of Iraq find peace. God bless Iraq!
rachels boyfriend is from norway
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