Jim Baker’s dance of the seven veils

20 thoughts on “Jim Baker’s dance of the seven veils”

1. Helena
   For an understanding of why Afghanistan is important perhaps this book and the comments might help.
   http://www.amazon.co.uk/New-Great-Game-Blood-Central/dp/1843541211/sr=1-1/qid=1161447898/ref=sr_1_1/026-7338986-0146862?ie=UTF8&s=books
   They are all part of the Pipelineistan problem.
   The trick is to find a route out of Kazakhstan that doesnt cross Russian, Iranian, or Chinese territory.
   General Richards utterances are important too. Having fought the Irish for twenty years he knows you cant defeat a guerrilla enemy if they can leg it over the frontier.
   So he has been talking about the Pakistanis and their live and let live arrangement in their tribal areas.
   http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-2393838,00.html
   Difficult to invade Pakistan. They have nuclear missiles.
   But the Russians had 500,000 troops in Afghanistan and casualty figures are estimated at between 3% and 10% dead.
   I wonder how many are planned for the Spring offensive?

2. I thought the most interesting point about Julian Borger’s article was that it was written from Washington, and not from Baghdad. That is, it in no way reflects reality, only what goes on in the fevered minds within the Beltway.
   For example, he favours the solution of partition. It has been occurring to me these last few days that in fact partition might not work out as a solution for the US, although it is certain that there are some in Washington who have been pushing for partition for a long time, and probably their views are being represented in Borger’s remarks.
   Would partition in fact lighten US military commitments? Supposing partition means three separate states, Shi’a, Sunni and Kurds, with whatever frontiers, is the US then going to withdraw from one or more of those states? Leave the Kurds to be attacked by the Turks? Leave the Sunnis to continue to launch attacks outside their frontier? Will al-Sadr then cooperate with an American garrison in Shi’istan? My personal reaction to all those questions is that the US problem will scarcely have changed at all. They either stay in occupation, and try to control things, or they leave.

3. I think all this talk before the release of the ISG report is a deliberate, very welland used as GWB propaganda machine as if looks the final solutions, ultimate solutions from a man he is very experienced like James Baker, very honest, Bush family friend he take care of US interest and should be listen to his assessments.
   The fact is ISG well selected and well used to the degree looks there are no one or no group in US or even military commanders are capable to tell what are the solutions for this miserable Iraq case.
   Just reminder JB was already pointed back in Dec 2003 “When President Bush appointed former Secretary of State James Baker III as his envoy on Iraq’s debt on, he called Baker’s job “a noble mission.” At the time, there was widespread concern about whether Baker’s extensive business dealings in the Middle East would.”
   http://www.thenation.com/doc/20041101/klein
   “Here’s the exchange as White House Press spokesman Tony Snow described it:”
   “Q So he [Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki] is concerned about talk of a timetable for withdrawal, or any specific –
   “MR. SNOW: It’s not — no, no, no, it’s not a timetable for withdrawal. The way it was portrayed is, we’re giving them two months, or we’ll go for somebody else. This was a timetable for his government, not for withdrawal. So thank you for positing that.
   “Q Tony, is this stuff that came out of the [Senator John] Warner visit or –
   “MR. SNOW: No, I think it’s — the answer is I’m not entirely sure, but I believe it refers to the report that said — that there was a rumor that there were going to be attempts to replace him if certain things didn’t happen in two months. And the President said the rumors are not true; we support you.
   “Q The President initiated the call?
   “MR. SNOW: Yes.
   “Q So what was the level of concern that caused the President to pick up the phone?
   “MR. SNOW: It’s not a level of concern. Here you have the central front in the war on terror, which the President has been talking about, and he’s made it clear that he wants to consult with the Prime Minister regularly.”
   http://www.tomdispatch.com/index.mhtml?pid=130805
   James Baker?
   Connecting the Dots:
   He says the government shouldn’t overreact to corporate scandals. He watched the September 11 attacks at the Ritz-Carlton with the Bin Laden family. He’s defending the Saudi’s against a trillion-dollar lawsuit brought forth by the September 11 families. He led the campaigns of the last four Republican presidents. Now he’s been chosen as Bush’s personal envoy in charge of restructuring Iraq’s $132 billion in debt. Some say he’s the most powerful lawyer in the world. He may be one of the busiest. Who is he?
   • He’s the Senior Counsel for The Carlyle Group, a company that invests pension funds in defense and telecommunications companies around the world. The Carlyle Group is the nation’s 10th largest defense contractor, with extensive ties to Enron, Global Crossing, Arthur Andersen, the Saudi Royal Family, and the Bin Ladens.
   • Through his law firm, Baker & Botts, he is also working to assist American oil companies in the Caspian Region. This work right now involves a pipeline to be built through Afghanistan, a pipeline that Texas oil companies were negotiating with the Taliban to build before 9-11.
   Is this the same James A. Baker working for the Department of Justice as the Counsel for Intelligence Policy at the time of the September 11 attacks? “The Office serves as adviser to the Attorney General and various client agencies, including the Central Intelligence Agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the Defense and State Departments, concerning questions of law, regulation, and guidelines as well as the legality of domestic and overseas intelligence operations.” http://www.usdoj.gov/oipr/
   • The judge who decided not to freeze the assests of Enron executives in January later recused herself from the case because she was a former employee of Baker & Botts, because of her ties to George Bush and the fact that she had been an Enron stockholder.
   • Baker & Botts was Enron’s counsel when they merged with Enron Power and Pipeline in 1997.
   • Robert W. Jordan, another founding member, is now the Ambassador to Saudi Arabia.
   • Baker & Botts is currently defending the CEO of Rite-Aid, indicted for conspiracy and fraud.
   • Two of Baker and Botts’s specialties are Corporate Crisis and White Collar Criminal Defense

4. Did you read this in 2003?
   Any one read Anne Garrels book “Naked in Baghdad” there is no secrets in all what happening from that date till now.
   Any one on the ground in Baghdad or in Iraq he knew what the future will be to US occupation, in fact GB, and Blair insisting on “until ‘job is done'” what job they talking about? what should be done?
   Is’t domocracy”Nah
   Is’t it prospering Iraq, reconstructed, one nation? Nah
   It’s destroying State of Iraqi, partitioning the state, handed to /ruled by these ruthless warlords and ugly fanatic religious figures, so on so forth. this is “‘job is done'”
   This is Israeli wishful, this what exactly we thought from this war which is lunched upon lies, look to N Korea danger or Iran now, its far more dangerous and concerned to US than Iraq in 2003 when Saddam was under very restricted sanction, powerless the most weak one of the three nations of “Axis of Evil”
   Look to this who flee the country now and why?
   “Iraq’s central bank anticipated economic progress in 2006, but violent attacks have crippled the banking sector. Robberies are common, and many banking executives have now fled the country.”
   http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6358688
   Anne Garrels
   Q: What are you anticipating as you return to Baghdad for another reporting assignment?
   A: I think the postwar situation is really more dangerous in some ways than it was during the war. As the Iraqis predicted, it is a chaotic situation. Even those Iraqis who might have supported the ouster of Saddam Hussein predicted all along that there’d continue to be opposition to the Americans, that there would be Saddam loyalists, that the society would fracture along religious and tribal lines, which it has done. Even Iraqis who hated Saddam said sort of grudgingly that the country needs a strong man to keep it together. As the American troops came in, one Iraqi who did not support Saddam looked at me and said, “the Americans are going to have to exert control, and we will resent them every step of the way.” And that apparent contradiction is exactly what we’re seeing.

5. Indeed, No.5 “Iraqi Strongman” (a possible plan to replace PM Maliki with a strongman)
   perhaps a Sunni thug, but one who’s a secularist, distrusted by al-Qaeda, promoter of Iraqi nationalism and, armed by the West, responsible for 200,000 Iranian deaths in the 1980s war of attrition with Mullah-run Iran…one who is not going to worry about The Marquess of Queensberry rules when it comes to ensuring internal security…one who is untroubled by modernism when it comes to developing the economy or expanding the role of women…

6. In 2004 Sinan Antoon released a documentary film entitled “About Baghdad.” The film was produced in Baghdad during the summer of 2003, when Sinan returned to visit the home he fled back in 1991 after Saddam cracked down on post-war critics and rebel factions.
   During his 2003 filming in Baghdad (at a time when the city’s streets were relatively safe…”the calm before the storm”) Sinan and camera crew adopted a free-wheeling approach to interviewing people on the street, in their homes, and at offices. It is a film well worth purchasing online from Arab Film Distribution or Amazon.
   There are many poignant scenes in “About Baghdad.” The professional class (doctors, engineers) speaks in hushed tones about the growing radicalism of religious politics. I remember one man, as I recall he was a professor or college administrator standing on campus. He says to Sinan that the Iraqis dealing with the Americans in Baghdad are “all those who speak with loud voices … soon there will be no room for people like me who speak quietly.”
   The reason I bring this up is your comment about James Baker’s group listing “Strongman” as one of America’s future options for restoring stability in Iraq. The one scene from Sinan’s movie that has always stuck with me is a street scene where many Iraqi men are crowded around the camera, all shouting to express their political views. One man who is particularly stressed and angered after listening to the others, stands tall and bellows: “the student has departed, the teacher/master is now with us.” And then he walks away.
   This comment seemed to capture the general consensus view of Iraqis in the summer of 2003. America, the “teacher/master,” had coddled the “student” dictator of Iraq as long as he was useful, and then it set the trap to remove him when the time arrived.
   After the fall of Saddam, I think most of Iraq’s competing political parties (whether Shia or Sunni) behaved the way they did because they wanted to forestall America placing another “Strongman” in power. Iyad Allawi was clearly intended to be America’s replacement for Saddam. Ahmed Chalabi was just a stooge for neocon ideologues; and he was also a person more interested in financial gain.
   Allawi’s intended “Strongman” role was clear to Ayatollah Sistani and his Shia majority group; and it was certainly clear to the apocalyptic Sadrists and the unemployed Sunni Bathists. Behind the scenes Sistani tried to maneuver around America’s plan, such as when he told his Shia followers to refuse the early US caucus proposal and insist on direct popular elections.
   The turmoil over the last three years results from all this political maneuvering. But “the master” is still present, and the “master” is no doubt still looking for his local strongman.
   As usual, Helena, your reporting is 100% on target. The Hasbaristo gang that haunts this website is shameless. The way they deny how consistently wrong they have been about events in the Middle East amounts to self-negation. But of course they would deny this too. And so, we can only find ways to laugh.

7. This whole James Baker pre-election leaking extravaganza reminds me of the notorious Henry “Peace is at hand” Kissinger successfully hoodwinking the American electorate into voting for Richard Nixon who, once safely re-elected, launched the horrendous Christmas carpetbombing of Hanoi in late 1972. “The bastards are going to be bombed this time like they’ve never been bombed before,” the frustrated Nixon privately raged while publicly promising peace.
   I remember having these very same thoughts when George W. Bush suspended the razing of Fallujah until after his election in 2004. Then the Marines went in and devasted the city. So what should we suppose will happen to Iraq if James Baker helps George W. Bush and the Republicans get past this year’s election on an implied (but not actually promulgated) promise of a “change of course” (or curse) somewhere later down the line? Anyway, I composed a poem about all this pre-election slight-of-hand stuff a couple of years ago and just thought I’d reiterate my forebodings (“strongman,” anyone?) here.
   “Flowers for Fallujah”
   As I’ve said in the past and keep saying
   I have sat through this movie before.
   Why, I even was cast as an extra
   Before being shown the door.
   And I’ve tried to remember those lessons
   That I purchased with so much pain
   And not see America do once more
   What I now see it doing again.
   As the siege of a city begins to take shape
   And the killing in earnest begins
   I remember those times when the darkness closed `round
   And men started repenting their sins.
   Now a President’s dove in and broken his neck
   Jumping head first into a dry pool
   And with horrified onlookers gazing in dread
   He continues to snarl, spit, and drool.
   “I will never get run out of town,” he exclaims
   Having entered at no one’s request.
   And having been asked once politely to leave
   He behaves like an ill-tempered guest.
   “Since I broke it, I own it,” he says of Iraq.
   But Iraq’s not some gift he can give.
   It’s a country with people who like to pretend
   That they know best how they want to live.
   See, our President thinks like a pottery shill
   And supposes that broken means owned.
   But the people he’s broken don’t like it that much
   And suggest that he just go get stoned.
   Like those freeloading days back in college
   When cheering meant parties and dope.
   And nothing but brain cells got wasted and killed
   And a people could still keep their hope.
   “But I will not feel doubt,” he exclaims to himself
   And his mirror reflects his resolve.
   “I will stand firm,” he says as his knees start to quake
   And his “courage” begins to dissolve.
   See, he’ll never admit that he made a mistake
   And change policy once it’s gone bad.
   He would rather be wrong and keep talking with “God”
   Than be right and go talk to his dad.
   `Cause his dad ain’t got strength like “the Lord,” don’t you know
   And he only consults with the best
   Like those voices at night that advise him to dream
   And leave governing up to the rest.
   And George Tenet told Dubya about the “slam dunk”
   Which in basketball terms means “a cinch.”
   Like whenever the FBI measures a mile
   And the CIA calls it an inch.
   So those weapons we heard of that meant us such harm
   Didn’t really exist in the fog.
   Just because he hung “vicious beast” signs on his gate
   Doesn’t mean that Saddam had a dog.
   Yes, our spies sure know how to keep hidden
   All the stuff that nobody should know
   So they stamp it TOP SECRET and file it away
   In a place where nobody can go.
   Thus we keep seeing trees and not forests
   And we keep seeing forests, not trees
   While the young GI sprawls in the dust of Iraq
   With his guts spilling over his knees
   And the young GI dies when her tin car explodes
   As she drives through a city in strife
   Leaving only her unit and family to grieve
   At the loss of another young life.
   Still, the man in the White House he struts and he frets
   With his hour on the stage nearly done.
   To this idiot player the tale signifies
   That the sound and the fury are one.
   “We are here, `cause we’re here, `cause we’re here, `cause we’re here,”
   Goes the slogan from Vietnam days.
   And we surely can’t leave, because leaving would mean
   That we’d found our way out of the maze.
   Now, the Lord of all Love told young Dubya to smite,
   So the boy smote Saddam on the head
   But those ingrate Iraqis they smote Dubya back
   And now thousands of GIs are dead.
   The returns they diminish so quickly
   When a billion or more you must pay
   To destroy what the “bad guy” rebuilds in an hour
   And makes use of the following day.
   Like we learned in Vietnam – as some of us did,
   How the debt into billions it runs
   `Till the good folks at home have to give up their butter
   Or else begin eating their guns.
   Then the choices arise that no one wants to face
   Because somebody’s ox will get gored.
   Politicians, you see, hate to give up their own
   When they’d rather be looting your hoard.
   So the tax cuts go draining the money away
   `Till the last dollar’s taken to flight.
   Once again it’s the rich ones who’ve started a war
   And then run off to let the poor fight.
   And Tom Ridge goes on flashing those color alerts
   While the public works mowing the lawn.
   “What, another attack of the `credible’ type?
   You mean `credulous,’ don’t you?” they yawn.
   But the voters can rest in their comfort and ease
   And continue like sheep in their flocks.
   While the young GI dies in the dirt of Iraq
   And comes home in a flag-covered box.
   See, the “enemy” lives in that hell of a place
   And, in fact, it is all that he owns
   So he’ll fight there and die there as long as he must
   `Till the last flesh has left the last bones.
   You can pound all the buildings to rubble.
   You can kill all that can’t run away.
   You can kill and keep killing and then kill some more,
   But the hunger for freedom will stay.
   In America freedom means bondage.
   In America fools run the show.
   In America no one knows what the words mean
   When the word-magic says, “stop” means “go.”
   And the Newspeak keeps pouring from out of the mouths
   Of the spokesmen for nation and town.
   Until sov’reign means slav’ry and choosing means chains
   And swimming means freedom to drown.
   So then keep them in darkness and feed them on shit
   If you wish for your mushrooms to grow
   And so shoveling shit’s now the plan of the day
   In America: last place to know.
   But the Truth will come `round in the fullness of time
   Like the rough slouching beast at the door.
   Who keeps knocking and knocking and won’t go away
   `Till you’ve fed it your children, and more.
   But the children don’t matter, because as we know
   The word “children” means “their kids” not ours.
   So the “Draft” doesn’t scare us because it means “them”
   And not us — so let’s just tend our flowers.
   Michael Murry, “The Misfortune Teller,” Copyright 2005

8. As usual, Helena, your reporting is 100% on target. The Hasbaristo gang that haunts this website is shameless. The way they deny how consistently wrong they have been about events in the Middle East amounts to self-negation.
   Say what? I have been right every time and demanding accountability from others predictions, including Helena. I even teased Upharsin/Tupharsin into a bet for a dinner. I won and I cannot find Upharsin on this board to arrange payment…
   Haunt is a bit harsh, I am here to share my opinions and remind myself how strongly and irrationally my enemies hate me.

9. Pollsters like myself advanced the science of public opinion surveys by drawing on statistical theories used in the physical sciences.
   When predicting the likelihood of observable and repeatable test results, scientists learned that in the case of small decimal points the percentage of predictable results could be rounded up (or down) to the largest whole number.
   Thus, for instance, the numerical percentage 99.99% can confidently be rounded up to 100%. In other words the 0.01% statistical difference is negligible and not worth reporting.
   To insist that small decimal points have any real significance is merely to distract oneself from a larger, more essential truth.
   Among scientists of the world 99.99% agree that those who insist on noting the small decimal point are individuals who have nothing better to do with their time. Thus we can confidently say that 100% of the world scientists hold this same view.

10. How interesting to hear from George Gallup, the famed predictor of Los Angeles Democratic Mayor Tom Bradley’s gubernatorial “victory” over Republican State Senator George Deukmejian.
    I will never forget the night of that election for California’s Governor because as the evening wore on and the vote tabulations started coming in, veteral pollster George Gallup kept assuring his television audience that Tom Bradley would win based on statistical results from exit polls taken at Orange County voting venues, despite the fact that the actual margin of votes in favor of Deukmejian — the eventual winner — kept increasing by the hour. George Gallup’s statistics never did pan out that night. Why not?
    Well, as one who grew up in the same house with Orange County’s only two other Democrats, I could have told Mr. Gallup that Republican voters in that arch-conserative bastion would never on any day of their reactionary lives vote for (1) a black man, (2) a Democrat, or (3) a major of Sodom and Gomorrah — sometimes otherwise known as Los Angeles. That they would lie to exit pollsters and say otherwise (so as not to advertise their notorious and legendary bigotry) should not have fooled even the most novice of political/social “scientists.” On this particular night, the “scientist,” Mr. George Gallup, appeared strangely innocent of the computer acronym GIGO: Garbage In, Garbage Out. On this particular night, Mr. George Gallup, like that other great statistician of the Vietnam War, Robert McNamara, knew everything about meaningless numbers that any fool would ever want to know — just nothing about the truth. No rounding up or down required.
    Additionally, I see no point to Mr. Gallup’s comments about vanishingly small numbers like 0.01% variance from other fantastic numbers like 99.99%, since most statistical inference deals with margins of error normally in the 3-5% range at best. As a practical matter, any surveys attempting a level of precision like 0.01% would require sample sizes so huge as to prove totally unworkable. In any event, as Charles Sanders Peirce pointed out back in the nineteenth century, we can never achieve 100% certainty about anything. Most reputable scientists and statisticians know this. Therefore, Mr. Gallup’s comments about “rounding up” to 100% amount to the same thing as “rounding up” to an impossibility. Who in their right mind would even bother babbling about such nonsense?
    Apropos of America’s present predicament in Iraq, however, all attempts at statistical inference — however well intentioned or professionally conducted — pale into insignificance next to the obvious truth that America knows or understands practically nothing of importance about Iraq or its people, however one wants to “quantify” our ignorance. In the end, as historian Barbara Tuchman said about America’s failed intervention in China (before America’s failed intervention in Vietnam), Iraq will “go her own way as if the Americans had never come.”
    Rounded up or down, bogus statistical estimations of what we Americans do not and cannot know amount to nothing more than a metric of our own misunderstanding.

11. Very interesting posts from all; especially commenters like Frank al Irlandi & Salah (ie. connecting the dots).
    It reminds one that Baker has oil written all over himself. It was his group, after all, that produced STRATEGIC ENERGY POLICY: CHALLENGES FOR THE 21ST CENTURY that expressed the following a full six months prior to the 9-11 attacks:

    … a trend toward anti-Americanism could affect [Middle Eastern] regional leaders’ abilities to cooperate with the U.S. in the energy area. The resulting tight markets have increased U.S. and global vulnerability to disruption and provided adversaries undue potential influence over the price of oil. Iraq has become a key “swing” producer, posing a difficult situation for the U.S. government.

12. Guys
    Just as we managed to concentrate on getting out of Iraq while Afghanistan is closed due to snow and the Chinese have persuaded the North Koreans not let off another bang, this has come out of the woodwork.
    http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/EB1A2C3D-AFD2-4D4F-8730-E5DFBF7F40F2.htm
    The Israeli Air Force has decided to play chicken with the French SAM batteries.
    The UN disputes the excuse that is given by the Israelis for the overflights.
    Eid Mubarak to all.

13. Perhaps a Sunni thug,…… rules when it comes to ensuring internal security…one who is untroubled by modernism when it comes to developing the economy or expanding the role of women…” Posted by: Truesdell at October 21, 2006 04:14 PM
    First he is not Sunni not Shiite he is infidels?
    Simply if he is Muslim all the words you said should not for him.
    Its looks that US thugs have passed our thug in his skills of thefts and frauds but they failed miserably in his skill of ensuring internal security, modernism, developing the economy or expanding the role of women.
    The supper US Thug “Ali Baba” is

    Last month the Iraqi Governing Council questioned why the American occupation authority had issued a $20 million contract to buy new revolvers and Kalashnikov rifles for the Iraqi police when the United States military was confiscating tens of thousands of weapons every month from Saddam Hussein’s abandoned arsenals.

    On Wednesday the Iraqi council, in a testy exchange with the occupation administrator, L. Paul Bremer III, challenged an American decision to spend $1.2 billion to train 35,000 Iraqi police officers in Jordan when such training could be done in Iraq for a fraction of the cost. Germany and France have offered to provide such training free.

    “Ambassador Bremer is one of the world’s leading experts on crisis management, terrorism and homeland security.
    Hahahaaaaa, yes “world’s leading experts” in frauds and thefts Supper thug with 174,000 small thugs left behind in Iraq…..
    BTW, This is a year ago what more celar and bold massage you need to understand YOU SHOULD BE OUT OF IRAQ…….
    “The Iraq Quagmire”
    A January 2005 Zogby poll found that 82% of Sunnis and 69% of Shiites favor
    U.S. withdrawal either immediately or after an elected government is in place. Any
    chance for peace and stability in the Middle East, as well as security at home, must
    start with an end to the U.S. occupation and the return home of U.S. troops. How
    that withdrawal is done will be our legacy. What we propose is that that legacy be
    based upon giving the Iraqis true control over their political, economic and security
    conditions. That means that withdrawal of troops and ending the occupation of Iraq
    isn’t the last step—it is only the first, and necessary, step in a long commitment the
    U.S. will have to this country.”
    As one US put in his report:
    “ if we fail to change course, the blood will be on our hands. And that, I?m afraid, is the greatest crime of all.”

14. International Monetary Fund to estimate the war’s overall effect on the Iraqi economy. His calculations are a work in progress, but what he has found so far is sobering: the cost amounts to a cut of at least 40 percent in Iraq’s national income.
    While Professor Rowat’s calculations represent just one economist’s efforts to wrestle with extremely limited data, his work may encourage others to follow. Assessing the war’s economic cost for Iraq, of course, doesn’t provide an answer to whether the war is worthwhile in the long run. But it does provide a clue.
    http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/22/business/yourmoney/22view.html

15. Very interesting writing and thoughts by Scott Sullivan , he stated this:
    “civil war is the wrong term for what is going on in Iraq. Iraq is experiencing a proxy war between Iran’s supporters and Iran’s adversaries including Saudi Arabia, among others.”
    Indeed this is what happening in Iraq right now.
    This are what we “Iraqis” saying about ugly Mullah and their dirty works in Iraq.
    The resent response for Mecca Agreement among Iraqis, first response came from Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah the tail of the dog in Tehran, today Iran welcomed the agreement supporting peace between Muslims, covering up the crimes and dirty works, Iraqi’s blood still not dry in here hands from the crimes and killing done under name of Islam and through their gangs in Iraq.
    Then Scott Sullivan finished his article by saying:
    “In short, if Secretary Rumsfeld is guilty of anything in Iraq, it is for not confronting Ambassador Khalilzad and the State Department on the issue of Iran. If President Bush wants to signal a change in US policy in Iraq, he should replace Ambassador Khalilzad.”

16. 
    “civil war is the wrong term for what is going on in Iraq. Iraq is experiencing a proxy war between Iran’s supporters and Iran’s adversaries including Saudi Arabia, among others.”
    Salah, you are absolutely right. And the same violence is carried by muslim immigrants into Europe. Last November Helena’s minions decried my characterization of the Paris Intifada. Read on and jusge who was right and where is the accountability of our opinions:
    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061022/ap_on_re_eu/france_suburban_violence
    French police face ‘permanent intifada’
    EPINAY-SUR-SEINE, France – On a routine call, three unwitting police officers fell into a trap. A car darted out to block their path, and dozens of hooded youths surged out of the darkness to attack them with stones, bats and tear gas before fleeing. One officer was hospitalized, and no arrests made.
    …
    “Many youths, many arsonists, many vandals behind the violence do it to cries of ‘Allah Akbar’ (God is Great) when our police cars are stoned,” he said in an interview.
    …
    Distrust and tension thrive. Rumors have flown around some housing projects that police are hoping to use the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which ends this week, to round up known troublemakers, on the basis that fasting all day will have made the youths weaker and easier to catch.

17. “I am here to share my opinions and remind myself how strongly and irrationally my enemies hate me”
    Dvd, David, Davis, JES, Vadim, and other aliases:
    Reminding yourself of your own enemies = An irrational paranoia
    You and the other Hasbaristos who are so thrilled about the coming “clash of civilizations” desperately need help.
    Your last posting from Epinay-Sur-Seine makes no sense in the context of this posting about Iraq.

18. عيد الفطر .. عيدان في العراق
    أعلن ديوان الوقف السني إن غدا الاثنين هو اول ايام عيد الفطر للسنة العرب في العراق. وقال الديوان في بيان إن الهيئة العيا لمراقبة هلال شهر شوال اجتمعت مساء التاسع والعشرين من شهر رمضان لمراقبة هلال شهر شوال .. ولعدم ثبوت رؤية الهلال بالوجه الشرعي يكون الاحد مكملا لعدة شهر رمضان ويكون يوم الاثنين اول ايام عيد الفطر.
    ومن جانبه قال مسؤول في مكتب المرجع الديني الاعلى للشيعة في العراق الشيد علي السيستاني اليوم ان المرجع امر بمراقبة هلال شهر شوال اليوم الاثنين وفي حالة ثبوت الرؤيا فان اول ايام العيد سيكون الثلاثاء وبعدمه سيكون العيد يوم الاربعاء.
    http://tareekalshaab.blogspot.com/index.html
    Two Eid in Iraq!!
    This Asistani playing game or in fact the Iranian in Iraq for long time not now but their Tongs becoming longer they came out from their caves to demonstrate fragmentations Iraqi society in name of Islam whom they don’t believe in Islam’s very basic principles of Islam faith.
    I recall old days when those Mullah spreading massage in that time in all Eids, or Ramadan, “we will be two days after the government” (mean central government in Baghdad), here we go the old devil new born in new Iraq.
    BTW, Asistani sent a letter to Mecca meeting welcoming the gathering but back home the Devil playing his game…

19. Hey Sd,
    My post shows the global nature of the fight. Is it OK for muslims to whine and blow up about grievances everywhere but it is not OK to identify them as part of the Iraq violence? The humiliation of the Arab male is what prevents a peaceful and rational outcome in the middle east.
    Anyway, yesterday it was France, today the mofos are threatening Italy. It is OK to bend over once a year for a physical, but Europe is bending over on a daily basis.
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6078392.stm
    An Italian politician will be given police protection following comments she made about the Islamic veil on television.
    The MP, Daniela Santanche, from the right wing National Alliance, said the veil was not required by the Koran.
    She was labelled an infidel by an imam appearing on the same programme and there are now fears for her safety.

20. Dvd-
    Take a look at your own words:
    “…the global nature of the fight…muslims to whine and blow…humiliation of the Arab male…the mofos are threatening Italy…OK to bend over…the Islamic veil…right wing National Alliance…the Koran…labelled an infidel…there are now fears…”
    Like I said, you desperately need help. Your mind/spirit is to your own words like your body is to your dietary intake. You clearly have been pumping your brain with beaucoup de garbage.
    Get some help soon before you cause more harm to everyone around you. It seems you spend far too much time sitting in the eye-damaging glow of your computer screen.
    Long ago Asian physicians understood that the light green color of tree leaves in a midday sun have a healing effect both on the eye lens and the brain.
    Take some time to sit in nature and meditate. You would do the entire human species a great deal of help.

Comments are closed.