Huh?

     I have a post to write, but check this quote out from today's Bush speech.

Freedom is the destiny of every man, woman and child on Earth.

     Is Bush planning to open the prisons?  Freedom must have some super-secret definition for people on death row, or for those numerous people who die in US custory at home or abroad.

Tidbits

MISSING from the internet

• One of the best pre-2001 speeches on terrorism was by John P. O'Neill.  It used to be at this url 'http://www.NationalStrategy.com/speakers/oneill.html'.  It is nowhere anymore on the net, except in an abridged form which removes all mention to american christian terrorists.  Thanks to the Wayback Machine (which uses archive.org) I found the speech, and will keep it available here.  NOTE: This is not the douchebag who wrote the sleazy book, the guy who debated John Kerry in June, 1971, and simply repeated the government propaganda.  John P. O'Neill was probably the closest thing America had to James Bond.

Regular Stuff

• America is Iran bashing again, and, again, there is no basis in fact.  You might have read a story, like this one from the UK's Telegraph or the NY Times about this "warhead" program.  Mr Jeffrey Lewis over at ArmsControlWonk helps shred the case in a thorough manner, here.  Long story short, there is a huge difference between a "re-entry vehicle" and a warhead.  In an e-mail discussion the author of the NY Times peice quotes the START treaty for his definition of "re-entry vehicle" and then ignores the fact that, under START rules, only warheads count for anything.  Only warheads count under START, the Iran laptop (which might even be fake) discusses no nuclear issues at all and is just about re-entry vehicles (according to all accounts), but the NY times and numerous other <expletive deleted> newspapers put the word "WARHEAD" in the headline. 
  I think they are a bunch of "war heads."
• Did anyone realize that Pajama's Media, far from being innovative, appears to be a combinationg of Huffington Post and name your own right blog review here?  Anyone want to bet that some law Professor isn't the one _really_ reading all those blog entries?
• Have any of you been to Dr Khadduri's blog?  The link has been in my blogroll for a while.  He is an Iraqi nuclear scientist who defected in 1998.  If you read the comments in this post you can see he has upgraded the template of his blog, following my directions. 
• My mapping software has been reworked.  What it does is, very accurately, is depict poll numbers on a state by state basis, and can animate them for a time-lapse view.  It should not be too much trouble to expand it to a nationwide county map.  That's a "yay" for me, since the original script was a bit messy.  The technical term is refactoring and it means that it is now in a shape that makes it far easier to manage.  For instance, if someone wanted to describe a new input format, or output map, I should be able to oblige. 

And the News

• Palestinians have the right to open the Gaza/Egypt border, and do so.  The Albany, NY Times-Union has a nice picture. 
• Sidney Jones of the International Crisis Group (a sort of cabal, Wes Clark is part of it) was kicked out of Indonesia, according to the Guardian.  ICG is fairly OK, but they are not particularly forthright.  A tiny Swedish outfit names Transnational.org discusses this group at length.  The shorter version is that it is a bit of a conspiracy, and they especially liked US action in Kosovo.
• According to the blog of recent commenter M., the Jazeera staff have a new blog called Don't Bomb Us.
• I didn't quote the Washington Post ombudsman before, but she's got the best quote on Bob Woodward's version of ethics and attachment to truth, from the Boston Herald

  Howell wrote that Woodward had committed a "deeply serious sin ... the kind that can get even a very good reporter in the doghouse for a very long time."
  
  "He has to operate under the rules that govern the rest of the staff -- even if he's rich and famous," she wrote.

  
  I simply suspect that Woodward is making this story up now, so wasn't acting unethically before.  His book will look shoddier and crappier the more obvious it becomes he was just a war cheerleader.

The Enemy, the Caliphate, The Lie

     Richard Perle, Frank Gaffney, and a host of less well known terror-war-pundits say that the enemy, the terrorists, the evil ones are trying to establish a Caliphate, a new Islamic Theocratic state across the Muslim world. 

     Now, it is a fact that some people want this.  Some people in the English speaking world want the same thing.  In America they call themselves Dominionists, and they want the Bible to be the ultimate law of the land, ahead of the Constitution.  Other people do not want that, but they do want the Bible to be used, wherever possible to influence the law and dictate social norms.  These theocratically minded Christians don't actually support Dominionists, but they are likely more sympathetic to them than to a vocal supporter of a strict separation of Church and State. 

     Conflating "the enemy" with the Caliphists, the Islamic Dominionists, is like confusing the political born-again christians in America, a numerous and powerful faction, with the Dominionists, a fringe group with no (?open?) federal officials elected.  It is fraud.  It is the new lynchpin of the argument of Richard Perle and Frank Gaffney and other so-called neo-conservatives.  It is fraud. 

     In fact, 100s of millions of Muslims and Arabs are angry at America in particular, and the West in general, for a variety of reasons.  100s of millions of muslims and arabs see a problem in Israel.  100s of millions of muslims and arabs see a problem in Iraq.  100s of millions of people see a problem with the way the powerful governments of the world deal with tyrants.  I suspect that a muslim or arab who sees these things as problems is going to be more sympathetic to those who do battle against the West, with words or worse, than those who would kiss and chat and do business. 

     Do Caliphists exist?  Certainly they do, as certainly as do Dominionists.  But are they the main problem?  They aren't a major or powerful or serious faction.

No Discrepancies, Move Along, Nothing To See Here, Folks

• Bush to bomb downtown Doha?
  • Unnamed White House official says "We are not going to dignify something so outlandish with a response" according to the BBC.
  • Lord Goldsmith, the Attorney General of the United Kingdom, says "publication of a document that has been unlawfully disclosed by a Crown servant could be in breach of Section 5 of the Official Secrets Act" and the editor of the Daily Mirror says "We made No 10 fully aware of the intention to publish and were given 'no comment' officially or unofficially.  Suddenly 24 hours later we are threatened under Section 5" according to the Times of London.

Three Cheers for War Racketeers

     Gimme some power / to defeat / the en'mies I name

     Gimme some money / to enrich / the very same

     My name is Chee-knee / I'm the VP / I run the show

     I'm quite snarly / And I don't let / Dub-a-ya know

     I'm the war rackeeter / a war racketeer

     Gimme a Cheer

     Gimme a Cheer (chorus to fade)

1. Cheney was a founding member of PNAC, which argued that Iraq could not be trusted because it was dead set on starting WMD (a total falsehood).
2. Cheney was CEO of Halliburton, which owned 51% of Dresser-Rand, which did business with Iraq (49% of a second company that did the same)
3. If anything, Saddam in Iraq was using oil revenue to develop his weapons programs
4. Dresser Rand also happened to be accepting Oil for Food Kickbacks

A Couple Reasons

     There are a couple reasons to treat with circumspection the new Bill O'Reilly and Florida pushed legislation to increase penalties on sexual offenders against children.

     One, which I personally told my State Representative who serves on the relevant Committee, was told to me by a close friend.  If the penalty for 2nd degree murder is less than these new penalties (actually reduced in Florida, but don't let fuckwit O'Reilly get in the way of the facts) then the molester has every incentive to KILL THE CHILD after their criminal act.

     The second is based on the ideas presented here.  Read it and know that this was the longest, most expensive criminal trial in American history.

Beat the Last Throes Rush

     November 29th, 2005 will be the six month anniversary of Vice President's comments on Larry King Live that the insurgency is in its last throes (covered here by DailyKos).

     Let's be generous for a moment and suggest that he wasn't simply knowingly lying, and that he wasn't simply attempting to deceive us.  Surely even Stalwart Republicans can agree that either of those activities are wrong.  The only remaining conclusion is that he is, in fact, clueless about how things are going in Iraq.  A couple other facts, beyond the graph below.  The total number of insurgents killed or captured is now 53,000.  The Pentagon has usually said there were under 20,000 insurgents total.  I guess that means we've killed or captured them all two and a half times now.  These facts, and the below graph, comes from the Brookings Institute's Iraq Index, current as of today.

The Jazeera on the bombing of the Jazeera

     I don't know whether or not the leaked memo concerning Bush talking with Blair about bombing the Jazeera headquarters building in downtown Doha, Qatar(Ghutter) is real or not, but it looks likely.  Here is the Jazeera itself covering the story.

     Other bombings of buildings of the Jazeera include

• 2001, Downtown Kabul, deaths result
• 2002, Kabul offices totally destroyed
• 2003, Downtown Baghdad offices bombed, deaths result

Sharon Attempts to Undermine Language

     By leaving Likud, Ariel Sharon has put in motion a sequence of events that can't help but eventually undermining the word "Likudnik".  Luckily, Benjamin Natanyahu is likely to take over, so the word will still fit. 

     By the way, as a result of reforms in the Israel "Constitution" in the early 1990s, the Prime Minister is directly elected.  Here is The Australian with the news about Sharon and 14 of 40 Likud MKs splitting.

     Bloody Judean People's Front.  Splitters!

Tip to James Bamford!

     I've asked several times, where does this al-Hadeiri come from?  Can we bring him up on charges of treason in America.  In Iraq?  This was a garbage human who lied and said he personally had worked on secret underground bio-chem labs inside Iraq.  He, like Chalabi and anyone else who knowingly lied or knowingly kept themselves ignorant, should be in jail.  They are traitors, along with the people who knowingly helped them along.  This was not, it should be clear, about oral sex.

     So, it looks like James Bamford, author of the relatively dry "The Puzzle Palace" and the great "Body of Secrets" (both about the NSA and spying) has information published in Rolling Stone about al-Hadeiri which brings a lot to light to the situation.

     Importantly, the CIA knew al-Hadeiri was lying from the start.  Not less importantly, the Executive branch paid someone to advertise his claims.  Treason, I'm afraid, is any number of things, including these acts.

---

     UPDATE: Also from ThinkProgress, this time from their comments sections, someone has posted a link to the Rendon Group's response.  I see quite clearly that it is carefully avoiding saying some things, and flat out denying things that it was never accused of, but for sake of completeness, here you go.

Cheney's Head So Full Of Shit It Explodes!

     Bush to pick new Vice President soon.  Large fight over who gets to be in charge of committee (wink wink) to pick the new Veep. 

     No, really, Cheney asks two questions of all people who might want a "sudden" withdrawal of troops. 
Question One:
Would you want al-Zawahiri, Abu Musab Zarqawi and Usama bin-Laden in charge of Iraq?
Answer One:
Is he for real?  There are many factions which might take over in Iraq if the US leaves.  Most likely, the Iranian-sympathetic factions in charge now would stay in charge.  If not, perhaps a Sunni dictator, or, just maybe, they would continue having elections and have the current style of government they do.  This was an easy question, since no one in Iraq is going to vote for Usama bin-Laden, and he wasn't even on the ballot, and he fucking doesn't have the wherewithal to take over.

Question Two:
Would you want Iraq ruled by men (yes, he says "men") intent on the destruction of America?
Answer Two:
I think the answer here is the same as above. 

     So, if that's Cheney's big problem is how to answer those questions, would anyone want to forward these answers to him?

What Gives, People?

     If my logs are to be believed, 100s of people have been going to my "Solution to the Problem of International Terrorism" page in the last couple weeks alone, but I've gotten no comments and no e-mail.

     What am I to think?

Less Good News

     Did someone say we've won in Afghanistan?  Here are some (perhaps surprising) facts from Afghanistan as gleaned from the Brookings Institute's Afghanistan Index.  This document changes regularly, and I am relying the current version as of today.

• Deaths from Militant Related Violence
  

  2004	850
  2005	1200+

• Non-Afghan Troops in Afghanistan
  

  	Total	US only
  Sept 2002	12,500	7,800
  Sept 2003	14,800	9,800
  Sept 2004	26,000	18,000
  Sept 2005	32,400	20,000

• People in Need of Food Aid
  

  2003	20%
  2004	37%

     Their GDP is growing, but I bet the opium multiplier effect has a lot to do with it.  The government took their eyes off the ball. 

New Book Review

     "Five Days in Philadelphia: The Amazing 'We Want Willkie!' Convention of 1940 and How It Freed FDR to Save the Western World", Perseus Books, 2005.

     The finest thing that can be said about the book is that although I knew how both the republican convention and presidential elections of 1940 turned out, the convention (especially) made for compelling reading.  I say this especially since we no longer have conventions like that.

     I was forced to ask myself if this was a good thing or not.  I'd have to say that in the short term, the answer is no.  The freedom of the state delegates meant, at least in 1940, that there was no chance of a victor on the first ballot, and a wide number of candidates to consider.  It was the job of the delegates to consider, and the job of the voters to choose wise delegates.

     Another amazing thing, hard to remember, was that Hitler was simultaneously invading many countries _during_ the convention of 1940.  France signed its official surrender papers.  Many prominent republicans had no interest in the war, the standard excuse being the chronological proximity with the "War to End All Wars" (a chemical weapon war).  President Hoover, who seems to have been making a comeback, was saying that Hitler had basically won, and what America needed was a man who could do business with Hitler, and who hadn't alienated him.

     Another fine feature of the book is that the author, as a young teenager, was present in 1940. 

     I really have no knowledge of any other books about conventions, but you could do a lot worse than read this book to get the feel for them.

You Weren't?

     I was watching the Miami Book Festival on C-SPAN 2 and John Ralston Saul talked about one of his books and then was interviewed.  Saul is the husband of the last Queen-appointed (can you believe Canada is so backwards?) Governor-General of Canada and has an Order of Canada.

     The finest anti-free trade speech I've ever seen.

     Amazing.