Monday, February 13, 2011. Chaos and violence continue, more prep meetings
for a national conference, Iraqi women stage a demonstration, Barack needs more
billions for the Iraq War (that hasn't ended), an MIT professor embarrasses on
the public stage (calm down, it's not Noam Chomsky), and more.
They grow 'em dumb at MIT. John Tirman thinks he has something to say at the
Huffington Post but he's just huffing and puffing. He wants you to know
that the Conflict Zone photo exhibit at New York City Fire Museum, ignores Iraqi
suffering. Does it? I don't know. I haven't toured the exhibit. So I won't
offer an opinion on it. John Tirman hasn't toured it either but he saw a few
photos online and that made an 'expert.' MIT grows 'em dumb because it
encourages stupidity, fearless stupidity. In Friday's snapshot we noted four of five
participants in the New York Times' Thursday "Room for Debate"
feature. Tirman notes it as well . . . in order to defend Barack Obama.
Like most worthless whores of the last few years, he trashes the Clinton
administration because he thinks that makes him look like less of a whore and
independent. ("Look, I trashed a Demorat!") No, it doesn't. It's the second
oldest trick in the whore's book. (I believe the first oldest is stealing money
out of john's wallet while the john sleeps.) The most blessed thing about a
second Barack administration would be the absence of Hillary Clinton and the
inability of all these little pricks to continue to blame her for everything he
does. That's not me wishing for a second term for Barack, that's me saying, if
it happens, there's one positive aspect of it right there.
Tirman's just another cheap whore for Barack, unable and unwilling to
address reality. Pretending to give a damn about the dead in Iraq . . . as long
as he can pretend the dying stopped after Bully Boy Bush left the White House.
Since the US-withdrawal from Iraq approximately 500 Iraqis have
been killed across the country. This is the highest death and casualty toll in
the past five years. The recent attacks have mostly occurred in Shiite
neighborhoods and intensified a sectarian tension between Sunnis and Shiites.
This tension flamed up with the recent conflict between Sunni Arab Vice
President Al-Hashimi and Shiite PM Al-Maliki and has turned into a political
crisis. Al-Maliki has accused Al-Hashimi of assisting a terrorist car bombing
supposedly aimed to assassinate Al-Maliki. For that reason an arrest warrant has
been issued against Al-Hashimi after which he fled to Kurdistan. This has
agitated Al-Hashimi and Sunni Arab members of parliament who blame Al-Maliki's
political tendency to dominate power centers, rule extra-constitutionally, and
deny the rights of Sunni federated regions as in the case of
Kurdistan.
Tirman ignores all that. That someone at MIT could be as dishonest as
Tirman is very telling about the decay in US academia. Like a good little whore
for Barack, he wants to distract because if he can't go to "the war is illegal!"
and bash Bush for starting it, he might have to note that continuing an illegal
war is just as wrong -- something Barack did. So he ignores the arguments that
were put forward in the forum. He can't handle the arguments, his mind isn't
equipped for it. And in the process, the idiot allows the right wing to win.
That's not how we engaged on the left, by throwing up a lot a smoke and trying
to distract from the points being made. Tirman is not just dishonest, he's
embarrassing.
Nouri al-Maliki? He huffs, "They are not only upset about the hasty
retreat, but the residual support for Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, whom they
find distasteful." It takes extreme stupidity or whoredom to be responsible for
that sentence. Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and many others are
calling out Nouri al-Maliki. But because some right-wingers and some centrists
also do, Tirman must reflexively take the opposing side? That's academically
and intellectually dishonest.
The dishonesty abounds. We'll take one paragraph as an example and break
it up into bits.
"Putting aside for a moment the fact that the timetable for withdrawal was
set by President Bush,"
He's referring to the SOFA (Status Of Forces Agreement) which extended the
US military occupation of Iraq from 2008 to 2011.
"the impossibility of extending that timeline foiled by the Haditha
massacre (the result of which is Iraq's refusal to sustain U.S. criminal
immunity),"
First, "the impossibility of extending that timeline foiled by . . ." What
the hell is he trying to say? Extending the timeline of the SOFA was an
impossibility that Haditha foiled? If it foiled the impossibility -- pay
attention, MIT -- that would mean the extension wasn't an impossibility.
Regardless of what he's trying to say, the Barack administration did
attempt to extend the SOFA, did attempt to enter into a new agreement and,
according to Michele Flournoy, is now back in negotiations with Iraq for a US
military presence. From the January 30th snapshot:
Like many dabblers, he goes to Haditha for outrage when Haditha was only
one of the outrage and not even the most outrageous to Iraq. There's an Iraqi
on trial in the US. For a crime that is less than what was done to 14-year-old
Abeer and her family (in the US, the accused is accused of rape only -- not
gang-rape and multiple murders). That case is followed in the Iraqi media. The
anger over no one being put to death for the murder of a family of a four, for
the gang-rape of a 14-year-old girl, has not gone away. There's Abu Ghraib,
there's so much. But dabblers go with Haditha. It's a reference they can
sprinkle into their pre-written sermons.
"that Maliki's power was consolidated under Bush,"
In March 2010, Iraq held elections. This was followed by an eight-month
political stalemate because Nouri refused to surrender the post of prime
minister. He never would have been able to bring Iraq to a standstill for eight
months without the backing of the White House and that's President Barack
Obama's White House. Yes, Bully Boy Bush and company installed a thug they
thought would be an easy puppet and push through the oil & gas law they
wanted. No question of that. But Nouri al-Maliki was not the choice of the
Iraqi people in 2010. And Nouri could have been ousted if the process --
outlined in the Constitution -- had been followed. Instead, he was able to hang
onto a post because he had the White House backing. The Erbil Agreement reached
by the political blocs? The US government drafted whole portions of that.
"and that a major promise of Obama's 2008 election was withdrawal from
Iraq."
Was it a major promise in March of 2008 when Samantha Power revealed that
it wasn't a promise? Let's drop back to the March 7, 2008
snapshot:
Stephen Sackur: You said that he'll revisit it [the decision to
pull troops] when he goes to the White House. So what the American public
thinks is a commitment to get combat forces out within sixteen months, isn't a
commitment is it?
Samantha Power: You can't make a commitment in whatever month we're
in now, in March of 2008 about what circumstances are going to be like in
January 2009. We can'te ven tell what Bush is up to in terms of troops pauses
and so forth. He will of course not rely upon some plan that he's crafted as a
presidential candidate or as a US Senator.
The US still hasn't withdrawn from Iraq. Special Ops, the CIA, the FBI,
700 US service members as trainers (according to Tirman's beloved Nouri
al-Maliki), drones and the 17,000 brigade known as the 'diplomatic corps' of the
State Dept is not withdrawal. Barack did lie on the campaign trail in 2008, he
swore one brigade a month and it would start when he was sworn in, the first
thing he would do. And yet, that would have meant everyone out of Iraq in
2010. Barack didn't meet that promise.
"What is more troubling about the right-wing moaning is that they fail to
mention that eight-year war that just ravaged the country. "
What is most troubling about whores for Barack is that they want to pretend
that Iraq can now be ignored because they've got an election to whore for.
Violence is up in Iraq. There's a political crisis in Iraq. You think they're
outraged by Haditha? Did you miss their outrage over the US drones being flown
in their country? (The State Dept says they're controlling the drones but many
believe it's the CIA.)
Whores don't care about people, they just care about a person and they'll
lie for him or her and that's all they'll do, that's all they ever do. They
offer nothing to an honest debate because they hocked honesty at a pawn shop
years ago. If you doubt it, note how many times Tirman tells you what the photo
exhibit means -- the one he's never been to. The one he's seen just a few
photos of online. You try attending a class as a student and giving a critical
evaluation on, for example, Hesse's Steppenwolf after you admit you
haven't read the book and see how that goes over.
To be specific, the Pentagon's brand-new budget request
asks for $2.9 billion for what it calls "Post-Operation NEW DAWN (OND)/Iraq
Activities." That's almost as much money as the Pentagon spends on Darpa, its
mad-science arm. And there are practically no U.S. troops in Iraq.
RT adds, "After 'ending' the war last year, the US
government handed Iraqi operations over to the State Department. Three billion
dollars -- the amount that the DoD wants for a war they aren't waging -- makes
up around one-ninth of the State Department's entire annual budget. In 2012, the
Pentagon had asked for $11 billion to fight the War in Iraq -- which was, at the
time, an actual war." The Defense Dept isn't the only one sticking their greedy
hands out for US taxpayer dollars. Nicole Gauette (Bloomberg News) reports,
"President Barack Obama's budget seeks $8.2 billion in 'extraordinary and
temporary' funding for State Department responsibilities in Iraq, Afghanistan
and Pakistan. The request comes on top of the $43.4 billion proposed for the
'core' budget for the State Department and the U.S. Agency for International
Development, which manages foreign aid. As the military has pulled out of Iraq
and drawn down in Afghanistan, the administration has turned to the State
Department to oversee spending on political, security and economic projects,
such as the $1.8 billion for Iraq police training and military
assistance."
Aren't you glad Barack 'ended' the Iraq War and all those billions of US
taxpayer dollars stopped being spent on it? Oh, that's right, neither of those
things actually happened.
On other elements of the budget, specifically veterans issues, the office
of Senator Patty Murray, Chair of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee, issues
the following.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Monday, February 13, 2012
Contact: Murray Press Office
(202) 224-2834
Senator Murray's Statement on President Obama's VA
Budget
(Washington, D.C.) -- Today, U.S. Senator Patty Murray, Chairman of
the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee and the second-ranking Democrat on the
Senate Budget Committee, issued the following statement on the President's
Fiscal Year 2013 budget request for the Department of Veterans
Affairs.
"This is a budget that provides reassurance for our veterans in an
extremely difficult budget climate. It represents a 15% increase over the VA
budget enacted last year and provides critical help in the areas of mental
health care and getting our veterans back to work. As a major influx of Iraq and
Afghanistan veterans return home seeking care at the VA, there is no question
that the investments this budget makes are sorely needed.
"I will continue to work with the VA on the few concern areas I
have in this budget including in VA construction and maintenance. We must work
to ensure the VA has the facilities to provide the state-of-the-art care our
veterans deserve."
###
Communications Director
U.S. Senator Patty Murray
202-224-2834 - press office
202--224-0228 - direct
Staying on the topic of dollars, CNNMoney reports, "Exxon Mobil is being shut out
of bidding on the next round of oil and gas exploration contracts in Iraq
because of its decision to sign an exploration deal with Kurdistan's regional
government in the northern part of that country." Apparently, they finally got
tired of waiting for a reply to their strongly worded letters -- all these
months later. Back in October, ExxonMobil signed a deal with the Kurdistan
Regional Government. The central government out of Baghdad has been whining ever
since. Whinnd barking but doing nothing. November 27th, Ahmed Rasheed (Reuters) reported that the central
government took 'action,' that the Minister of Oil announced they'd sent
ExxonMobil a letter -- and it wasn't their first letter to the company.
Minister Abdul-Kareem Luaibi was quoted stating, "So far we have sent Exxon
three letters and tomorrow we will send them another confirmation letter seeking
their response." They sent three letters over approximately six weeks and
ExxonMobil never responded to them so the new plan was to send them a letter
asking them why they weren't responding to the previous three letters. He
added, "We have not decided anything yet. We are waiting for their response."
During that time, public threats were made about canceling the contract,
forbidding ExxonMobil from doing business in Iraq and more. This morning, Hassan Hafidh (Wall St. Journal) reported Hussein
al-Shahristani, Deputy Prime Minster for Energy, was declaring that ExxonMobil
might be barred from the round of bidding scheduled to take place in May.
They've whined for months and at least they finally did something. Not anything
important, but something. Exxon Mobil is now barred from an auction that Big
Oil already saw as a flea market and were intent on avoiding. As noted at Third
yesterday:
Business and investment wise, money and business keeps going to the
north. ExxonMobil is already going with the Kurdistan region and Reuters noted,
"Total's chief executive said on Friday he was considering possible investments
in Kurdistan, something which previously prompted the central Iraq government to
bar companies from investing in the south of the country, and added he did not
plan to chase contracts in Baghdad's next licensing round." Tara Patel (Bloomberg News)
notes the company is "Europe's third-largest oil
company" and that the three provinces which make up the Kurdistan Regional
Government are "home to about 40% of the country's 115 billion barrels of
reserves". Carin Hall (Energy Digital)
explains, "Iraq opened up its vast reserves of oil
to foreign investment after the Gulf War, but many find Baghdad's terms too
stringent."
Dow Jones speaks today with KBC Energy
Economics analyst Samuel Ciszuk who explains that the May auction will be for
fixed-fee service contracts as opposed to "industry-standard production sharing
contracts, where the oil company owns a portion of the oil in the ground and can
profit from its sale" -- which may be another reason Big Oil's not excited about
the May auction. Again falling back to Third yesterday:
Friday, Peg Mackey (Reuters) reported
that Iraq is attempting to increase sourthern Iraq oil output by 100,000 barrels
per day next month. This would result from a new floating port, one that
Aswat al-Iraq
reports is supposed to be "one of four
similar projects," according to the Ministry of Oil's Asim Jihad. Nouri
al-Maliki needs something and something to spin because he's not representing
Iraq very well in any manner.And Nouri tried to spin the new
port. Ben Lando and Ali Abu Iraq (Iraq Oil Report)
note that Nouri tried to stage a photo-op yesterday at the port with
assistants handing out flowers and flags right before the cameras started
clicking. But, also on Sunday,
Aswat al-Iraq reported MP Suzan
al-Saad stated that there are problems and demands regarding Basra that must be
addressed: "Some of the demands are for the services sector, as well as the
start in building the Greater Fao Port."
Nouri's hoping to increase his prestige but the reality is there's no
political gridlock in the KRG, they aren't trying to imprison rival politicians,
they sit on an estimated 40% of Iraq's oil and they make efforts at public transparency. By
contrast, the paranoid and unstable Nouri al-Maliki is forever screaming
"Ba'athist" when ordering mass arrests, runs secret prisons, refuses to appoint
a Minister of Defense, a Minister of Interior and a Minister of National
Security though they should have been named (per the Constitution) no later than
December 2010, pays thugs to harass Iraqi citizens who demonstrate in Tahrir
Square, is unable to pass an oil and gas law despite having been installed as
prime minister in 2006 to do just that, and worse.
And at some point, Iraq's going to need to develop other revenues.
Dropping back to the November 21st
snapshot: Sounding alarms over
the focus/reliance on oil is Iraq's Sunni vice president. KUNA
reports, "Iraqi Vice-President Tareq
Al-Hashimi warned on Sunday his country might witness a major financial crisis
if oil prices fall in 2012 to an expected USD 85 per barrel. The annual budget
for Iraq depends entirely on oil sales and imports, Al-Hashimi said during his
participation in the 5th political forum of the Renewal Movement, adding that
next year's budget has been estimated at USD 112 billion." The Voice of Russia adds, "Speaking on Sunday, the minister argued for speedy
economic reconstruction and diversification away from oil and natural
gas."
Any prestige that Nouri might be hoping for would plummet were oil prices
to drop.
Violence hasn't dropped. Reuters notes a Kirkuk sticky bombing
injured a teacher and two other people, a second Kirkuk sticky bombing injured a
police officer and a Muqdadiya sticky bombing injured a Sahwa ("Awakening,"
"Sons Of Iraq"). In addition, Aswat al-Iraq reports Sahwa leader Saad
al-Shamarri and two of his bodyguards were shot dead in Anbar Province (two more
guards were injured) when unknown gunmen attacked their car. Aswat
al-Iraq notes that this was the tenth known attempt on Saad al-Shamarri's
life.
political crisis? The Jordan
Times explains: Today,
the country is deeply divided along sectarian lines. The government of Prime
Minister Nouri Maliki remains hostage to its own ambition to reign unchallenged.
Maliki, a Shiite, has centralised decisive power in himself and is now pursuing
a campaign to stamp out all Sunni challenges to his reign.His orders that saw hundreds of Sunnis belonging to
the now defunct Baathist Party being detained and his push to have the vice
president, Tareg Al Hashim, tried on "terrorism" charges and Saleh Al Mutlaq,
the deputy prime minister, expelled from the Cabinet for criticising him are all
part of that campaign.An arrest
warrant has been issued for Hashimi, and 16 of his bodyguards have been
arrested.Over the weekend, another meet-up for the much
anticipated national conference took place. Since December, President Jalal
Talabani and Speaker of Parliament Osama al-Nujaifi have been calling for a
national conference to address the political crisis. All that has taken place
thus far is a handful of planning sessions. Omar Abdel-Latif (Al Sabaah) reports that Talabani
and al-Nujaifi meet with Nouri and representatives for the National Alliance,
Iraqiya and the Kurdish Alliance. The meeting is supposed to address various
proposals put forward in written format by various political blocs. This prep
meeting will be followed by . . . another prep meeting currently scheduled for
Wednesday. Ayad al-Tamimi (Al Mada) reports that al-Nujaifi
declared of yesterday's meeting that the proposals from Iraqiya and the Kurdish
Alliance were discussed. In Iraqiya's written proposals, they address the issues
of Tareq al-Hashemi and Saleh al-Mutlaq -- issues Nouri's State of Law has
insisted will not be addressed at the national conference. Dar Addustour notes that the issues
are pretty much tabled with agreement from the majority that al-Hashemi and
al-Mutlaq will not be addressed at the national conference. Aswat al-Iraq reports that the Sadrist
bloc is stating that Iraqiya has agreed to withdraw discussions of al-Hashemi
and al-Mutlaq from the national conference. Nevzat Hmedin (Al Mada) focuses on the leader of
the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq's Ammar al-Hakim who is stating that the
paper his bloc (part of the National Alliance and, along with Nouri and Moqtada
al-Sadr, one of the major players in the National Alliance slate) presented
addresses the issues of provincial powers and rights, specifically that it calls
for increased powers for the provincial councils and for the provinces to
receive a larger slice of the national budget. al-Hakim also states that Ninveh
Province council members should end their ongoing boycott of local government.
From the political crisis to the human condition, Naomi Wolf (Al Jazeera)
notes Iraqi film maker Oday Rasheed and his latest film Qarantina which played at the Museum of Modern Art last
month: Now Rasheed reflects on
his country's turn toward religious extremism: he describes a pre-invasion Iraq
in which women were professionals and fairly emancipated, whereas now women wear
headscarves under pressure, "for a peaceful life". His friend, a young Iraqi
actress named Zahra Zubaidi, had to flee the Middle East after having played a
rape victim in Brian de Palma's film Redacted; she has since emigrated to New
York.Constant intimidation by
religious extremists and political factions is the intellectual's fate in Iraq
today. And yet Rasheed refuses to be discreet: "Everything I believe, I believe
in it," he says. "I cannot lie or not answer the
questions."Iraqi women led a protest for their rights and
that was significant. You know it was significant because the New York Times never said a word about
it.
Saturday, Al
Mada reported a group of women demonstrated in Iraq on
Baghdad's Mutanabi Street -- a large number of women from the picture -- to
salute Iraq women and the pioneering Iraqi women of the 20th century feminist
movement. The women noted the widespread discrimination against women (illegal
under the country's Constitution). Dr. Buthaina Sharif made remarks about how
the rights of women are a cause for all men and women to share. Dr. Sharif
saluted Paulina Hassoun who, in 1923, edited Iraq's first feminist magazine
Layla ("On the way to the revival of the
Iraqi woman"). She spoke to Iraq's long history of social progress in the 20th
century and decried the violence aimed at so many women today. (The UN estimates
that one out of five Iraqi women is a victim of domestic violence.) Those
demonstrating had passed a list of recommendations. 1) The Constitution must be followed.2) The government needs to establish a fund for women
-- women who are widows and women whose husbands have left them.3) Publis assistance for the education of girls to
prevent them from being forced to drop out.4) Subsidies for young families which would encourage
marriage and building families.5)
Better housing for women and priority on housing lists.6) Training sessions should be opened to women and job
creation should keep their qualifications in mind.7) Double the amount guaranteed by the ration
card.8) Efforts to discredit women by
sullying their names with false rumors should result in prosecution in
court.9) Freedom and unity is for all
and that includes women.10) Restore
normal life by providing potable water (safe to drink) and
electricity.11) create a Higher
National Committee of women and men from different backgrounds and
ages
Nora Khaled Mahmoud and Mahmoud Raouf
filed a follow up piece for Al
Mada on the demonstration noting that it included
intellectuals and activists and could said to have been prompted by the Minster
for Women's recent remarks that men and women were not equal and her insistance
upon dictating how women dress. The note Iraqi women spoke of women's history
being a continuum of two experiences: Injustice and triumph. Women face
injustice and they triumph over it. They declared that democracy is traveling
around the world and that Iraq must be a good model for it. They noted that,
throughout the women's movement in Iraq, women and men have taken part in the
struggle for equality and that, as early as the 20s and 30s, Iraqi clerics
joined in the demands for equality for all. Women, they insisted, must not lose
their freedom and that this is even more clear when they hear the Minister for
Women publicly declaring she does not believe in equality. While that's her
opinion, the women state, that's not the opinion of alll women and it's not the
opinion of the Constitution. Journalist and feminist Nermin Mufti declared that
civil liberties and personal freedoms are declining in Iraq and that the
Minister for Women should represent the interests of Iraqi women and seek to
claim the rights guaranteed to women, not rob them of their rights little by
little. That protest may kick off this month's protests in Baghdad. Dar Addustour reports that Iraqi
intellectuals are calling for a protest on the first anniversary of protests led
by Iraqi youths in Baghdad's Tahrir Square. This kicked off Friday protests
which do continue. A very small number currently because Nouri al-Maliki's hired
thugs swarm Tahrir Square and shout down Iraqi citizens. | 
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