Tuesday, January 15, 2019

A little truth from someone who made it to the top


  1. Not a recent development. "Jimmy Carter: The U.S. Is an 'Oligarchy With Unlimited Political Bribery'" by


This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"


Tuesday, January 15, 2019.  Events in Iraq make clear that there is no bravery or independence in the western press -- especially not in the US press.


Liars run all over the world and they tend to cover for each other.  Guess that explains Michael Burke (THE HILL) typing up this:

Former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said in an interview published Monday that his vote in support of the Iraq War "tainted my heart."
Reid told The Nevada Independent that the vote "was a horrible mistake I made."
"It tainted my heart. It was the wrong thing to do. But I was sucked in by General [Colin] Powell and others and I believed them. So I regret that, yes, I do," he said.


Did it taint baby's heart?

Did mean old Colin Powell trick little Harry with his bad old blot?

Oh, how sad.  How very, very sad.

Did little Harry not have parents nor parental figures?  Oh, wait.  Little Harry had Inez and Harry Vincent.  Were they complete failures as parents?  Most parents teach children that when you make a mistake, you make up for it.  But former Senator Harry Reid never did, never even tried to.


Let's drop back to May 29, 2008:




Turning to the US where Nancy Pelosi, Speak of the House of Representatives, launched an attack on the Democratically controlled Senate, blamed them for the continued illegal war, repeated slogans she was questioning only two years ago and much more.  The Barack Obama for President Pelosi's interview had an appalling write up in the San Francisco Chronicle.  That nonsense Pelosi offered was the least important thing about the interview.  (Market based strategies sounds an awful lot like privatizing -- especially when Pelosi brags of speaking to private business.  That's just one aspect of the interview that should have raised alrarms.) 


On US withdrawal (partial) from Iraq, Pelosi declared "it is essential and it will happen and it will happen in my view with a Democratic president and that will begin in a matter of months and that is the optimism" she's feeling.  Let the rest of us know when her feet touch back down to earth.  A November election is nothing to pin all your hopes upon but that's the game Pelosi wants to play. 


Apparently a Democratic president will be able to control that US Senate which keeps letting her down over and over.  She explained to the editorial board and reporters of the San Francisco Chronicle that she's all for withdrawal dates, it's that Senate that keeps insisting on 'goals': "The house keeps passing these bills with deadlines or, to accomodate the Senate sometimes, goals.  We just sent them another one we'll see -- they sent it back without the redeployment language, we'll send something back to them."


However, she wasn't done pinning the blame on the Democratically controlled Senate.  She was queried if the "Democratic Congress had pushed as hard as they could"?  She insisted,

"The House has always voted to have the redeployment of the troops out. . . .  From the House we have always fought but the senate [let's voice trail off into silence]"  I'm not really sure the best way for the Speaker of the House to conduct themselves is to declare war on the Senate semi-privately.  Maybe a war between the two houses of Congress is what it will take to end the illegal war?  If so, Pelosi needs to take her comments to a very public forum which, apparently, this meeting was not since it was not reported on.  She further instead of the Democratically controlled Senate, "they are guarding the president's desk."


It's the sort of thing that might have once fooled people.  Apparently the only fool in the room was Pelosi.  She was questioned: "Why not put withdrawal dates in this bill with the Senate and just stand up to them and say, 'it's got to be this way, we're not going to give in'?"  In stops and starts, Pelosi gave a response that appears below word for word minus a stammer or two.  If you can find more than three complete sentences in the following, wipe your glasses.


Nancy Pelosi: Well they see, that's -- there is a bi-partisan majority for that in the Senate -- Democrats and Republicans alike -- but there aren't sixty votes and so nothing would ever get to the president's desk.  And there just isn't a -- a -- that just won't happen -- it --  this has been the obstacle from day one.  Every -- we've sent now maybe a half  dozen times to the Senate.  They will not.  They will not and I don't think that there is a -- I don't, I don't believe as much as I have opposed this war from the start and have said from the start there is no  intelligence to support the threat that this administration is claiming so it has been a misrepresentation from the start, I know that.  But it is -- I don't think people would want to think, although we're sending the bill with conditions, that the money is supposed to be used for the redeployment of troops out of Iraq, that anybody's going to leave them high and dry.  And that's just really the -- uh - - uh dichotomy -- if that's the word and -- and -- and exists in the mind of the Am -- they don't -- they want 'em out but they -- we can't leave them high and dry.  We're saying this is the way we'll do it.  We'll do it with the conditions that this money is used to bring them home uh to leave some of there to fight al Qaeda, if that's still necessary, to protect our embassy but otherwise -- and that isn't a lot of troops -- but otherwise  they should be coming home if they don't go with these conditions --


Who was Nancy critiquing there?  Harry Reid.  Harry Reid was in charge of the Senate, he was Senate Majority Leader.  


His vote for the war was a big mistake, he whines today.  But when he had the power to do anything about it, to make up for his error, to fix his mistake, he didn't.  Per Nancy Pelosi, the House was doing what it needed to end the war but the Senate wasn't getting it together.  That was the Speaker of the House pointing her finger at the Senate Majority Leader.

Harry Reid remains a joke.  It's too late for him to salvage his image.  And people really need to stop letting him lie.


But it's doubtful the press will ever hold him accountable while he's alive -- he mobbed up long before he entered Congress and the press pretended otherwise for years.

The same press that pretended things were going great in Iraq only eight days ago.  Remember?

While the western press was pretending otherwise, the people of Iraq have been suffering.


For example?  ALSUMARIA reports Basra Operations Command announced yesterday that they will be releasing protesters . . . shortly.  They insist that this is for the "protection" of the activists.  These protesters were demonstrating yesterday.  And "protection" included, apparently, also shooting one protester in the back.  That's at least the fourth time in recent weeks that Basra Operations Command have used "live ammo" on activists.   The third time was this past Friday.

Anti-corruption protesters demanding better services were dispersed by security forces in , Iraq Friday evening. (📷Hussein Faleh/AFP)
 
 
 




Where's the western press?  Oh, that's right, it's "turned corner" time again as they, yet again, attempt to re-sell the ongoing Iraq War which hits the 16 year mark in two months.

Basra protests?  They've been going on since July.  The activists are asking for jobs, basic services, water that doesn't send you to the hospital if you drink it, etc.  It's too complex, apparently, for western reporters to grasp.  They're too busy selling themselves -- TIME magazine included -- as the saviors of the world, risking all to tell the truth.   Well, that's what they're saying.  Reality is far different from their empty lip service.  It's the Iraqi reporters covering the Basra protests who risk all.  As usually happens in 'liberated' Iraq when reporters cover actual events, reporters get arrested.  That's been happening repeatedly in Iraq for the last weeks in an effort to stop press coverage of the protests.

Never doubt that lazy asses in America with press passes have nothing when it comes to ethics or scruples.  They play like the press matters and they're interested in real stories but while Iraqi reporters risk their lives to cover protests, American reporters spend all day playing shocked at whatever they saw on a president's Twitter feed.



Another topic 'brave' reporters in the west keep ignoring?  US troops in Iraq.  As we noted yesterday, their numbers are increasing.

All this desire to report/proclaim "Donald Trump is a liar!"?  It apparently doesn't apply to war.  Because the US officially has a little over 5,200 troops in Iraq but in the last days that number has risen and, in northern Iraq alone, non-western outlets have reported an increase of 20,000.  We were discussing that in yesterday's snapshot -- a discussion corporate America media still can't have.



Informed sources reveal night movements by the US forces # towards some districts and areas of the province of Nineveh north of Iraq.



sts
Informed sources reveal the presence of more than "9000" US troops in "4" military bases deployed in the province of Anbar # - west of Iraq #, after withdrawing from # Syria.





Another story they refuse to cover?  Corruption in Iraq.  Once upon a time (Barack ended it), there was an office that tracked reconstruction in Iraq and waste.  Once upon a time, the US Congress held hearings on waste in Iraq.  These days?  No.

But corruption continues in Iraq.  Billions have been . . . wasted?  No, stolen.  And more money is pouring in.

France commits more than $1 billion to help rebuild Iraq
 
 



Yea!  France is going to toss in a billion!  Yea!  What politician's children are going to get rich this time?  It's not going to help the Iraqi people.  None of the billions have so far helped the Iraqi people.  There's a reason Iraqi is repeatedly cited for corruption in each of Transparency International's annual examinations.  But let's pretend otherwise.


Corruption in became a , bribe and relations lead everything in iraq. Even in non governmental works you find this matter, just a little who take positions by his own qualifications.
 
 


in the public and private sectors carries very high for businesses investing in .
 
 




In case anyone forgot, Hayder al-Abadi promised to end corruption.  He couldn't even win a second term -- let alone end corruption.  Nouri al-Maliki, former prime minister and forever thug, facing protests throughout Iraq while the 'Arab Spring' was taking place in Egypt asked for 100 days to end corruption.  He wasn't going to end corruption, he just wanted the activists to stop protesting.  They stopped and, 100 days later, he announced he'd done nothing.  That's the way it 'works' in 'liberated' Iraq -- where the US installs one puppet after another -- all of them, strangely enough, right?, all of them cowards who fled Iraq and only returned years -- decades -- later when the US-led invasion took Baghdad in 2003.


Teaser for what I hope we discuss tomorrow . . .

Kurdistan Region Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani received France Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian at Erbil International Airport on Monday evening following thee French FM's visit to Baghdad where he met Iraqi officials, including Prime Minister Adil Abdul-Mahdi.
 
 


The following community sites -- plus Jody Watley, DISSIDENT VOICE, BLACK AGENDA REPORT and the ACLU -- updated:



  • Monday, January 14, 2019

    The guilty bread crumbs lead back to Barack

    I hope you've read Ruth's last two posts:


    As always, Ruth's covering important stuff.  And I do agree with her.  This is an active conspiracy by elements of the government to overthrow an election.

    I'm a Green.  I have no reason or desire to support Donald Trump.  But I do believe in fair and free elections and in democracy.

    For me, it appears Barack Obama, in the last gasps of his presidency, weaponized the FBI and created this whole conspiracy to overthrow Donald Trump's presidency.

    As far as I'm concerned, Barack belongs in prison.

    It's really not a surprise.  He never followed the laws.

    He spoke about then-Bradley Manning before the trial -- prejudicial.  He insisted Hillary Clinton did nothing wrong while also insisting that he learned about her e-mail accounts via the media.  A bold face lie.  He knew all along.

    Laws were broken and they lead back to Barack.

    This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"
     
    Monday, January 14, 2019.  As various officials visit Iraq, the US troop presence increases -- and that's where the concern should be.


    King Abdullah II of Jordan visited with Iraqi President Barham Salih in Iraq today.



    Iraq is a country that borders many other nations.  In the north, Iraq shares a border with Turkey, the western border is shared with Syria, the southwestern border with Jordan, the southern border with Saudi Arabia, the southeastern border with Kuwait and the eastern border with Iran.

    ARAB WEEKLY notes it is "the monarch's first trip to Iraq in more than a decade.  It is the latest in a string of top-level visits to Iraq in recent weeks, which kicked off with a surprise Christmas trip by US President Donald Trump."  Mohammed Ebraheem (IRAQI NEWS) adds, "Upon arrival at the airport, King Abdullah was given a formal reception, where he was saluted by the guards of honor and the marching music band played the Jordanian and Iraqi national anthems."  ALSUMARIA notes that the king also met with Prime Minister Adel Abdel-Mahdi.  And it's ALSUMARIA that has been reporting the kingdom of Jordan's denial throughout this month that the king would be visiting Iraq.



    King meets with PM in first visit in decade
    1:02
    171 views
     
     




    While the western media chooses -- for unknown reasons -- to emphasize only the visit with the president of Iraq (the presidency in Iraq is ceremonial, not a position of power), not only did the king visit with the prime minister, he also met with political leader  Ammar al-Hakim.

    His Majesty King Abdullah II meets with Ammar Al Hakim, head of the Iraqi Reform and Reconstruction Alliance, in Baghdad, and stresses the brotherly ties between and# Iraq, and keenness to advance cooperation in various fields
     
     


    In addition to the King of Jordan and the President of the United States, Iraq was visited by US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.  Following Pompeo's visit last week, his Iranian counterpart visited Iraq.  ASIA TIMES reports that Iran's Foreign Minister Javad Zarif was "in Baghdad on Sunday for talks on a wide range of matters, including American sanctions against the Islamic Republic."  RUDAW explains, "Iran and Iraq share a nearly 1,500 kilometre long border and have close trade ties. Iraq depends on its neighbour for natural gas to keep its power grid supplied."

    Judging by Javad's Twitter feed, his own visit was something of a surprise.

    Reminder to host/participants of anti-Iran conference: those who attended last US anti-Iran show are either dead, disgraced, or marginalized. And Iran is stronger than ever. Polish Govt can't wash the shame: while Iran saved Poles in WWII, it now hosts desperate anti-Iran circus.
  • Whenever/wherever US interferes, chaos, repression & resentment follow. The day Iran mimics US clients & 's "human rights models”—be it the Shah or current butchers—to become a “normal" country is the day hell freezes over. Best for the US to just get over loss of Iran.






    ALSUMARIA reports that representatives for Iraq and Iran have reached a tentative agreement regarding border crossings between the two countries.


    They need to, they are neighbors.  The US and Iran are not neighbors.  The governments have long been in opposition to one another.  US Senator Marco Rubio takes offense to a NYT article on John Bolton, US Ambassador to Death and Destruction, tasking the Pentagon with a plan for war on Iran.




    This is an absurd criticism of Amb. Bolton. Shia militias in are proxies of & controlled by . They want to use them to kill our troops but have deniability. Any attack by Shia militias against U.S. should be treated as an attack from Iran.
     
     



    As we noted last night:


    The same is true of the latest on crazy John Bolton.  He asked the Pentagon to prepare an attack plan for Iran.  Why? Because of attacks believed to have been carried out (two attacks) in 2018 on US diplomatic facilities.  Michael Gordon (of THE NEW YORK TIMES) reported repeatedly in the early years of the Iraq War on how the US government felt Iran was behind this or that attack on US troops in Iraq.  You can be sure that plans were drawn up then.  Drawing up plans does not mean war.  Drawing up plans means having a discussion about what the options are.  We can all be guess that Bolton was screaming for war because that is what he tends to do.

    But that plans were drawn up (and not implemented) should really not be cause for gasping.  (A) It's John Bolton who always wants war and, (B) if the US government suspected Iran was behind attacks on US troops, possible responses would have to be explored.

    And possible responses go beyond "WAR! WAR!"  Possible responses can include: pulling US troops out of Iraq, fortifying US bases in Iraq, strong words exchanged between ministers/secretaries of both countries, diplomatic offers/punishments being floated, etc.  There is a huge list of possible responses -- clearly, mine is pull all US troops out of Iraq -- and drawing up a plan for war will always be John Bolton's desired response.  He didn't get his way is the big story that everyone appears to have missed in all the clutch-the-pearls drama.



    If you're too immature to grasp that plans like this -- contingency plans -- are repeatedly drawn up by the US government, I'm sorry for you.  But, while you're on that huffy bike, pedal on over to Actually Do Something Street and maybe start calling for an end to all wars -- an action much more productive than living in a state of eternal panic.

    In other Drama Queen News


    Tomorrow, the Coast Guard will not be paid. While our nation is at war. It’s unconscionable. And terrible for our national security. And another reason and other veterans groups are calling for the President and Congress to now:
     
     






    Oh, the f**king Coast Guard!!!!! Oh, the horror!!!!!

    First off,  "while our nation is at war," we've been at war since 2001.  The wars never end.  And while we're being honest here, the US military really isn't winning any wars, is it?

    Most important,  the military is not better than the rest of America.  Grasp that.  A single-mother going without pay because her civilian job is not resulting in a check due to the shut down is just as important as anyone else.

    Military members are just another part of America.  And we're all supposed to be in this together. It's one thing to advocate for veterans, it's another to pretend that they are the chosen people.

    Meanwhile, in the real world, AL MADA reports that a redeployment of US forces is taking place in Iraq -- with 20,000 moving through Mosul on Saturday.  These apparently would be US forces that have departed Syria.  AL MADA reports that the 20,000 are moving to aerial bases in northern Iraq.  ASHARQ AL-AWSAT reports:

    Iraqi political and parliamentary parties have been working to collect the necessary number of signatures needed to prepare a bill that obligates the Iraqi government to expel foreign troops from the country.

    Meanwhile, the coalitions of each of former Prime Ministers Nouri al-Maliki and Haidar al-Abadi accused each other of bringing in more US troops into Iraq.

    Iraqis have been circulating news of the arrival of American forces at Baghdad airport, a claim denied by the Civil Aviation Authority.

    Karbouli, who is also member of the Iraqi parliament's Security and Defense Committee, told Asharq Al-Awsat that the policy followed by the current government is not transparent when it comes to the events taking place in Iraq, both at the level of the cabinet and the nature of the US-Iranian conflict.

    “It is best to tell the people what is really happening instead of following the policy of hiding facts because that would only aggravate the situation,” he stressed.

    Commenting on the frequent news on the nature of US presence in Iraq, armed groups expert Dr. Hisham al-Hashemi told Asharq Al-Awsat that the American troops will be divided between the Erbil, Sinjar base, North Rummaneh camp base and Ain al-Assad base in addition to the northern area in Ar-Rutba district.

    He explained that among their tasks is keeping the Popular Mobilization Forces away from the region. 



    The debate over US troops and their numbers comes as ALSUMARIA reports MP Wajih Abbas is stating there are more US troops in Iraq than the US government admits to (he pins the number at 9,000).


    If you're in a frenzy over Bolton and contingency plans?  This might be where you start to worry, right here, right now as US troop numbers increase in Iraq.  If you're worried about an attack on Iran, maybe right now is where you call for US troops out of Iraq -- which, again, borders Iran and could be used as a staging platform for war with Iran.  You grasp that, 'resistance' members?  I know it's hard for you because you've embraced war and you're not all that smart.  But those of us on the left who pay attention to issues involving war and peace can tell you, you need a staging platform to carry out a war.  And Iraq?  It would be the perfect staging platform for war on Iran.  So all US troops out now is a call for peace.