Sick of Bush

Who Does the CIA Work For?

2006-08-05T19:21:00.000-04:00

I feel that I have to ask this question periodically because it really isn't clear what the answer is. Here is an organization that has a secret multi-billion dollar annual budget that seems to be largely unaccountable. No one really knows what they are up to, including the President - who, by his own admission, received faulty intelligence prior to the invasion of Iraq. They are stiffing Congress on requirements to report, they operate on a 'need to know' basis so even people in the agency only know a small part of the picture. The head of the agency is a political appointee that may be as transitory as Porter Goss, the incompetent former Congressman who resigned rather than face the music for his involvement with other corrupt Congressmen involved in Department of Defense bribery and contract scandals.

The CIA, supposidly an intelligence gathering and analysis agency, has been consistently wrong about the big picture for half a century. They overestimated the Soviet threat, underestimated the potential for blowback from Islamic militants, focused on fantom threats from 'Communists' in Central and South America while ignoring very real threats to our national security posed by allied intelligence agencies such as Pakistan's ISI which nutured the Taliban (with CIA complicity).

Rather than focus on intelligence gathering and analysis, the CIA has put its major efforts into covert action. Consider, in a 'Democracy' we have an agency of the government engaged in actions that are illegal, unethical, unknown to the public at large and possibly to their elected representatives (including the President). The decision to engage in these actions is based on what? Who sets the policy that guides the secrect actions that result in murder, kidnapping, torture, disruption of economies, elections, and governments? All activities we know the CIA has engaged in over its 50 year history.

Who does the CIA work for? Not me. You? Why do we put up with this? Someone (or something) more powerful than the Congress, the President, or the Courts, must be getting its money's worth. So, who is really in charge here?

This is a question so fundamental and frightening you will NEVER hear it asked in the main stream media.

Bush vs Truth in the Middle East

2006-08-05T18:25:00.000-04:00

SOB gets up in the moring and turns on CNN or MSNBC only to see the scenes of carnage in Lebanon and Israel presented as sob stories with no meaningful political context. Why this is happening - and even WHAT exactly is happening - is very difficult to discern from the montage of violence and dispair pasted together for each news segment. In an effort to present a coherent picture of what is happening there and what it might mean to us, a search for insightful commentary turned up this execellent analysis by Richard Heinberg, author of numerous books and articles about our emerging energy crisis. Because it is one of the few pieces of analysis I have seen that makes sense of this situation I will quote from The Engergy Bulletin at length. It is well worth the read:

At the fifth annual conference of ASPO (the Association for the Study of Peak Oil), held in July in Pisa, Italy, there were many excellent presentations, one of which I will report on at some length below. But the timing of the conference proved ominous. During two weeks of travel in Italy I had only occasional access to the Internet or to other news sources, and heard only sporadic reports on the unfolding crisis in Israel, Gaza, and Lebanon. Back home, I quickly caught up on the events.The situation clearly requires comment, as it has enormous implications both for the world as a whole and for the small but growing community of people involved in preparations for Peak Oil. Mainstream reporting seems to miss much of the context of events and, when discussing the Middle East, the geopolitical struggle for control of energy resources nearly always forms much of that context.Israel / Palestine / Hezbollah / LebanonIt seems useful to start by recounting a timeline of the crisis, but that’s not as easy as it sounds. Where does one start? What incidents should be mentioned or not mentioned? The following is my best effort, but may strike some as incomplete or skewed.In elections held last year, the Palestinian people voted in a Hamas government, which came to power in January. Israel and the US responded by refusing to recognize the new government’s legitimacy; since then, there has been a steady escalation of tensions between Israel and the Palestinian authority. On June 24 Israeli soldiers kidnapped a Palestinian doctor and his brother in Gaza and removed them to some unspecified detention facility. This would not be a particularly noteworthy event, except for the fact that on the following day militants in Gaza—perhaps in retaliation—kidnapped an Israeli soldier.Israel responded with dramatically intensified attacks on Gaza.Then, on July 12, Hezbollah—a political and military Shia Muslim organization based in Lebanon—captured two Israeli soldiers and killed six others. According to the official Israeli version of the story, this occurred during a cross-border raid by Hezbollah into northern Israel. However, early press accounts said that Israel had sent a commando force into southern Lebanon; these commandoes, operating near the village of Aitaa al-Chaab inside Lebanon’s southern territory, were then allegedly engaged by Hezbollah fighters, who struck an Israeli tank. In either case, over the next days and weeks Hezbollah fired hundreds of rockets into Israel, killing dozens and wounding many more, while Israel bombed southern Lebanon, using (according to some reports) chemical weapons and cluster bombs, killing hundreds and destroying roads, bridges, power stations, and other civilian infrastructure.US Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice traveled to Lebanon on July 23, but not to broker a ceasefire; instead she called a ceasefire “premature.” In Washington she had said that Israel should ignore calls for a ceasefire; en route to Beirut she honed the message: while there was an “urgent” need for peace, conditions had to be right. In Beirut Rice explained that those “right” conditions consisted essentially of the satisfaction of Israel’s goals in the conflict; she also called for the creation of “a new Middle East”—a phrase that can inspire little hope or comfort in the inhabitants of the region, given what the US has accomplished in Iraq during the past three years. While no one would say so, it was obvious to nearly everyone that the US was refusing to call for a ceasefire to give Israel time to conclude its operations.On July 26, Israel bombed a UN observer post in Lebanon, killing four. Then, on July 30, Israeli bombs killed 54 civilians (mostly women and children) in Qana, raising such international outrage that Israel felt compelled to suspended most of its bombing campaign for 48 hours.As of this writing, Rice is proposing a ceasefire to be implemented on condition of the banning of arms sales to Hezbollah, the moving of the Lebanese army to the southern region, and the creation of an international force as a backup. There is no mention, in this proposal for a “lasting” peace, of an Israeli pullback from Gaza or the release of hundreds of Lebanese prisoners. Meanwhile, Israel has commenced a large-scale ground offensive that seems likely to continue for at least a couple of weeks.This is more or less what we know—given the differences in the versions being rehearsed by news outlets and government officials. But there is much that is even less clear: Why is this happening now? What are the motives of Israel, Hezbollah, and the US? And in what direction are the events headed? Hezbollah’s initial motive seems principally to have been to gain a couple of Israeli hostages to use as bargaining chips in exchange for Lebanese, Palestinian, and Hezbollah prisoners held in Israel. Hezbollah’s leader, Sheik Hussein Nasrallah, made it perfectly clear months prior to the commencement of the current hostilities that this was the plan. Secondarily, Hezbollah wishes to support the embattled Palestinians in Gaza. There are those who have suggested that Hezbollah was acting at the behest of Iran in order to deflect international attention from that nation’s nuclear research program (more on that below), but this suggestion seems far-fetched.It would be a mistake to probe only Hezbollah’s motives in the conflict while assuming (as most American politicians and news outlets do) that Israel is merely responding self-defensively to a situation imposed upon it. First, there is the legitimate question as to whether Israel provoked the conflict through its own cross-border incursion; then there is an article published in the San Francisco Chronicle on July 21 (“Israel Set War Plan More than a Year Ago,” by Matthew Kalman), detailing how Israel’s campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon was in fact planned months in advance, merely requiring a proximate trigger. If this is the case, then it is Israel’s motives that we should probe first and foremost. According to leftist international affairs commentator Pepe Escobar, in “The Spirit of Resistance” (Asia Times, July 26, www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/HG26Ak02.html),
As far as Lebanon is concerned, Israel wants nothing less than a permanent buffer zone on its northern flank. And if Lebanon turns into an Iraq, even better—although the Lebanese have learned the hard way about sectarianism and won’t “Iraqify” their own country. Beirut will be rebuilt—again, and again the Hariri clan (with its dodgy deals with the US and the Saudis) will plunge Lebanon in further debt purgatory with regard to the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, as the clan did in the previous reconstruction process. There’s also the all-important matter of the waters of the Litani River in southern Lebanon. Israel might as well prepare the terrain now for the eventual annexation of the Litani. Beyond Lebanon, Israel is mostly interested also in Syria. The motive: the all-important pipeline route from Kirkuk, in Iraqi Kurdistan, to Haifa. Enter Israel as a major player in Pipelineistan. So Israel wants to grab water (and territory) from Palestine, water (and territory) from Lebanon, and oil from Iraq. This all has to do with the inevitable—the 21st-century energy wars. While the US is not a direct participant in the conflict, its own aims cannot be ignored. These, according to Escobar, include “cutting off Hezbollah from Lebanese society,” which would in turn “lead to a vulnerable Syria extricating itself from a close relationship with Iran.” In the short term, the United States would like Israel to wipe out Hezbollah, allow the Lebanese government to send its troops to the south of the country, ensure the safety of northern Israel, cut Syria’s influence down to size, and apply greater pressure on Hezbollah-supporting Iran. In the longer term, Washington apparently wants to redraw the political and ideological map of the Middle East in ways set forth in various neoconservative planning documents, regardless of the cost to locals.Currently, between Israel and Hezbollah, it is unclear whose goals are being accomplished more fully—although on balance it would seem that Hezbollah has had the upper hand so far (this view appears to hold across the international political spectrum). Israel’s devastating attacks seem not to have turned Lebanese society against the militant organization; moreover, Hezbollah’s Viet Cong-style guerilla campaign appears to be succeeding, as merely to survive the sustained Israeli atttack can be counted a victory. As Israel’s ground assault continues, that assessment could change.But what are the longer-term implications? Where is all of this headed? It may be impossible to assess the situation merely by reference to the current combatants; we must take into account the other trends in the region and how this conflict may play into them.Iran: Will the US Attack Before November?At the ASPO conference a riveting presentation was delivered by Terence Ward, a writer (Searching for Hassan) who grew up in Iran and is currently a cross-cultural consultant for businesses, foundations, and governments in the Islamic World and the West. Ward believes that a US bombing attack on Tehran is nearly inevitable (a view that I put forward in MuseLetter #155, March 2005, “Onward to Iran”), and that it will have devastating consequences for the region and for the world.He began by reminding the audience that there is no clear proof of an Iranian nuclear weapons program, and that what the US and Israel have pointed to as evidence falls short of what would be needed to publicly justify pre-emptive military action. The central question hanging over the proposals and counter-proposals involving the US, Iran, the UN Security Council, and other interested parties including Russia and China, is this: What if both the US and Iranian presidents seek confrontation and war?Sure enough, on August 1 the US was able to obtain a UN Security Council resolution giving Iran 30 days to end its uranium enrichment program (otherwise permitted by the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty)—which it seems unlikely to do. Events appear to have achieved a relentless, irrational momentum in a direction all too reminiscent of those in the weeks leading up to the 2003 US invasion of Iraq.Why would the US administration want confrontation with Iran? Perhaps that country represents an essential next step, following “regime change” in Iraq, in the project of remaking the Middle East. From a geopolitical point of view, Iran is located at the juncture of the Middle East and Central Asia. Not only are its own reserves of oil and gas considerable, but it controls access to the Persian Gulf. Iran is thus crucial to oil and gas transshipment routes to Europe, Japan, and the rest of the world.Neoconservatives appear to believe that, as soon as the bombing commences, Iranians will rise up en masse to overthrow their humiliated rulers—just as they believed that the Iraqi people would welcome an American effort to completely reshape their country’s economy and political system following the invasion.Ward speculates that Mr. Bush may bomb before the November elections in order to preserve his Republican majority in Congress. However, the US military is already under enormous strain, and would be unable to deal with likely chain reactions following an air attack; and the likely response of the American people is difficult to gauge.Why might the Iranian leaders want confrontation? Ward made the important point that the current Tehran regime is even less popular domestically than is its US counterpart among Americans. This is shown in the remarkable statistic that, according to a report by the Islamic Republic’s Ministry of Culture and Guidance, less than two percent of the population attends Friday prayers regularly. Ahmadinejad, whose support comes almost entirely from the dwindling ranks of religious fundamentalists, is in power only because his opponent in the most recent election rendered himself utterly odious through blatant corruption.Iranian hard-liners believe the US bombing will enrage and unite their people. Lacking a strong popular base, the Tehran regime has seized upon “nuclear nationalism” as a way of gaining legitimacy with the masses—just as Bush and company seized upon the issue of national security following 9/11. Ahmadinejad and his cohorts evidently believe that, in the event of an American attack, the Iranian people will rally behind their government, thus injecting new life into the Islamic revolution. In confronting the US and Israel, the hard-liners also expect to be propelled to the forefront of the radical Muslim world.Iranian exiles, who number roughly two million, generally loathe the current regime and look forward to its collapse, yet fear a conflict with the US, according to Ward. They say the bombing will not only leave the country in ruins, but will play into the hands of the hard-liners.In discussing the likely scope of the air campaign, Ward foresees a bombing lasting two weeks, targeting 1,000 sites including sea ports, missile defense systems, military bases, airports, industries, and 20 nuclear facilities.Iran’s response is not hard to guess. The nation has hundreds of undeclared dock and port facilities along its Persian Gulf coast. The Iranian Navy recently conducted exercises in the Strait of Hormuz, in which a thousand small Iranian boats simulated attacks on American ships. The Strait is the world’s only access point for millions of barrels per day of OPEC oil. The passage of tankers through this narrow waterway would almost certainly be interrupted for days, weeks, and perhaps months if hostilities erupted.An attack on Tehran would also unleash an enormous backlash against the US in Shia areas of Iraq, possibly making the American presence in that country untenable. The Iranians’ capabilities in this regard have not been lost on US military leaders. According to Ward, from American military leaders’ perspective this is a mission from hell. The Pentagon brass are uncertain what targets to attack, because American and European intelligence agencies have found no specific evidence of clandestine activities or hidden facilities. Thus it would be virtually impossible to gain confirmation of the effectiveness of air strikes in eliminating Iran’s nuclear program. Recently, General Pace, head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, apparently forced the White House to agree not to use nuclear weapons in its planned bombing campaign. This rebellion by the military has infuriated the White House. Ward also provided a helpful perspective on the Shia-Sunni divide in Middle East. He noted that the bulk of oil reserves on the planet lie in Shia territory:
The Shia of Saudi Arabia would love to have the same control over their oil revenues as their Shia brothers in Iraq. Long oppressed by the Sunni Wahhabi rulers, these Shia go on pilgrimage to Iran and will react in subtle and overt ways if Iran is attacked. Bahrain is over 95% Shia and has experienced unrest before along the Shia/Sunni divide. Dubai is a large center of Persian-speakers and Iranian influence. Kuwait is also 30% Shia. In Aramco and KOC, the Shia vastly represent the local skilled labor force. An incident like the attempt on the Abqaiq collection stations by al-Qaeda operatives is not out of the question. Ward pointed out that the Saudi and Jordanian monarchies speak openly of a radical “Shia crescent” across the Middle East, and that both ruling families would support a US strike against Iran. The Shia-dominated government of Iraq strikes fear in the hearts of Saudi leaders because they know it emboldens Shias in the Saudi oil-rich Eastern Province of al-Hassa. It is the emergence of Iran as a regional power that is their principal concern, not Israel.Southern Lebanon is Shia majority, and Syria’s Bashar al-Assad is a member of the Alawite Shia sect. The alliance between Hezbollah and the Syrian regime is strong, and Iran has provided monetary and military assistance to Hezbollah for decades. Thus the current conflict in southern Lebanon carries a deep resonance across the region. Ward also notes:
Many Sunnis view the US and Shia cooperation in Iraq as a conspiracy against them—a “Wahhabi containment policy.” The profound conviction among much of the Arab world today, including the Saudi royal family, is that the U.S. plans to do the same to Saudi Arabia that they have engineered in Iraq. Like Iraq, the theory goes, Saudi Arabia would be divided into three parts. The moderate Hashemites of Jordan would regain their historic control of the holy cities of Mecca and Medina; autonomous Saudi Shia would control the oil-laden Eastern Province; and the Wahhabis would be left baking in the sands of the Nejad Desert. Thus the bombing of Iran could trigger wider chaos in the region, provoking not only temporary oil shortages and a global recession, but a wholesale reconfiguration of the Middle East in ways difficult to foresee.Ward offered this helpful insider’s view of Iranian politics:
Iran’s clerical regime includes three pragmatic factional power blocs willing to engage in an opening to the USA: Mehdi Karroubi, Mostapha Moin, and Hashemi Rafsanjani, the Leader of the unelected Guardian Council. They all continue to openly criticize the President, who is increasingly viewed as a loose cannon. His Messianic claims have proved more controversial in Iran itself than in the West. Among the President’s critics, the “dealmaker” Rafsanjani may be a significant figure, for he represents the business class and the unelected clerics. These three factions, in contrast to Ahmedinejad, do not thrive on a siege mentality or on provoking a clash with the West. When hostilities eventually ceased, negotiations between the US and Iran would necessarily ensue. Why not pursue them now and bypass the intervening catastrophe?Ward discussed a recent Trilateral Commission Report—Is There a Plan B?—prepared for the plenary meeting of the Trilateral Commission in Tokyo, which recommended US-Iran negotiations with the goal of creating a Regional Middle East Nuclear Council, which would engage all countries with nuclear weaponry: The United States, Russia, Israel, Iran, China, India, Pakistan, Japan, the UK and France. IAEA inspections would be accelerated, with open, transparent, unrestricted access in all countries. Israel would be provided with a comprehensive security package, and Iran would be offered explicit US security guarantees. Meanwhile the Middle East would be offered a modern Marshall Plan to provide Palestine, Jordan, Tunisia, Morocco, Turkey, Egypt and Algeria access to the WTO and World Bank funding. A regional Middle East Water Council would deal with the region’s most valuable resource. Potential members would include Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Israel, Palestine, and Jordan. Finally, a Middle East Energy Council would deal with the region’s other valuable resources—oil and gas. Regional pipelines, oil security, technology-sharing, and reservoir depletion and monitoring would all be discussed. Such a council would include Saudia Arabia, the United Emirates, Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman, Yemen, Iraq, and Iran. This plan has the potential to avert the looming conflict, but it is handicapped by conventional Western notions about the benefits of association with the World Bank and WTO.Ward’s presentation was remarkable for its depiction of Bush and Ahmadinejad as two sides of the same coin. Both need external conflict to maintain domestic legitimacy, and both are right-wing hard-liners supported by religious fundamentalists; they are also unpopular at home and habitually rely on bravado to boost their image.There are those who maintain that a US attack on Iran is unlikely because the negative consequences for America would be severe and the benefits few or nonexistent. I recently made the acquaintance of an Air Force officer with a high-level security clearance who receives daily classified briefings; while being careful not to divulge secret information, he insisted that no bombing campaign is being seriously contemplated. I can only hope he’s right.Iraq: This Is What Collapse Looks LikeThe war between Israel and Hezbollah in southern Lebanon and the growing hostilities between the US and Iran are of course unfolding in the context of the failed US occupation of Iraq. There, ethnic conflicts are deepening, a de facto civil war rages, and a partition of the country seems likely if not inevitable. Iraqi Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani was recently forced to issue a fatwa denouncing the Israeli assault on southern Lebanon. Even the US-supported Iraqi president had to make statements critical of Israel while in Washington, embarrassing his official hosts. But any other attitude would have been unacceptable to his constituents. So far, the only thing to unite Baghdad’s parliament—consisting of Sunnis, Shias, and Kurds—is condemnation of Israel and the call for a ceasefire.Fiery nationalist Shia leader Muqtada al-Sadr, whose rising influence now rivals that of Sistani, said at a recent Friday sermon in Kufa, “I will continue defending my Shi’ite and Sunni brothers, and I tell them that if we unite, we will defeat Israel without the use of weapons.” Were Muqtada’s Mehdi Army to join with the few thousand Sunni Arab guerrillas currently bedeviling US troops, Iraq would quickly become untenable for the Americans. Mr. Bush has repeatedly announced a “turning point” in the ongoing war—at the end of the invasion, with the capture of Saddam Hussein, with elections, with the formation of a government, and with the killing of reputed al Qaida leader al-Zarqawi. Now he has ordered an additional 5,000 troops to Baghdad to attempt to control the rapidly deteriorating situation there. This is not the sort of turning point he likes talking about.A New Oil Regime in the Middle East?There is considerable danger that the smoke and fire from these three geographic flashpoints—Iraq, Iran, and Lebanon—could converge in a larger regional conflagration. In light of all this potential for apocalyptic mayhem, a discussion of the oil business may seem almost frivolous. But it is important to remember that, historically, the drawing of borders in the Middle East; the establishment of British, French, and later US-backed puppet governments in these faux nations; and the rise of a radical Islamic fundamentalist movement to challenge the Western-backed regimes, have all been fueled by the wealth produced by oil, and by the need for oil on the part of importing countries.For decades there was a petroleum status quo of sorts in the Middle East: the capacity for production exceeded demand, and OPEC worked to restrain exports in order to keep prices from collapsing; meanwhile big producers like Saudi Arabia served as the world’s petroleum bankers, maintaining the solvency of the system. On only one occasion—the embargo of 1973-74—did the swing producers withhold needed oil flows for political reasons, or cause prices to reach levels unacceptable to consumers (the other major post-1970 oil shocks, due to wars or revolutions, were beyond OPEC’s control). Now the status quo is crumbling—not so much for political reasons (though those are certainly imaginable, given the situations outlined above), but for reasons of geology.Questions about the real size of Kuwait’s oil reserves have emerged in the Kuwaiti National Assembly, leading the opposition party to call for production cuts. Remarkably, Kuwait appears to be groping toward implementation of the Oil Depletion Protocol, without ever having heard of it. However, from the standpoint of nations that want to keep the oil flowing so the global industrial party can continue, this is bad news.Even worse news, potentially, comes from Saudi Arabia, where oil flows have shrunk by some 400,000 barrels per day over the past few months, despite astronomic prices. No one knows for sure what is going on. The Saudis themselves say the production cuts are due to lack of demand, but this hardly seems plausible, unless the kingdom is only able to deliver unwanted heavy, sour crude to market—but even in that case, one would expect flows to increase, with a price discount factored in for resource quality. At the same time, the Saudis are hiring just about every spare drilling rig in the world, resulting in a dramatically falling rig count in the Gulf of Mexico—a place that would otherwise be seeing an increasing count, given the fact that Mexico’s giant Cantarell field is in now in steep decline, with dire implications for the nation’s economy. Matthew Simmons (Twilight in the Desert) has been insisting for the past few years that Saudi production is close to peak and that Ghawar, the world’s biggest field, may be in decline. Now many others are speculating that this is the real reason for the falling production figures.What happens next? It depends on the real condition of Ghawar. Perhaps a heroic drilling campaign could result in a temporary bloom in production, lasting perhaps three years, followed by a swift, terminal collapse. On the other hand, it is possible that the field has been so thoroughly exploited already that we are seeing the irreversible, rapid decline. At the ASPO conference a well-connected industry insider who wishes not to be directly quoted told me that his own sources inside Saudi Arabia insist that production from Ghawar is now down to less than three million barrels per day, and that the Saudis are maintaining total production at only slowly dwindling levels by producing other fields at maximum rates. This, if true, would be a bombshell: most estimates give production from Ghawar at 5.5 Mb/d.Disturbing TrajectoryWhile these events in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia are not front-page news, they are in their way every bit as significant as the ongoing violence in Iraq and Lebanon, and the ritualistic war dance of the American and Iranian leaders. The Israel and Lebanon situation seems to be about religion, terrorism, and land; the US-Iran situation seems to be about nuclear proliferation. But if one looks beneath the surface, nearly everything of significance that happens in the Middle East is at least partly about oil. It may be pure coincidence that, just as the world’s biggest oil producers are reaching a historic turning point signaling the end of the energy regime that has held since the end of US production dominance in 1970, a war has erupted between Israel and a militant organization supported by a nation the US plans to attack anyway in order to maintain dominance of world oil supplies going forward. History is full of such coincidences. But coincidence or not, it will be difficult to keep these unfolding realities from rebounding off one another, undermining attempts at a peaceful resolution.Some commentators speculate that we are seeing the slow-motion commencement of World War III (or IV or V, depending on who’s counting). I have no interest in fueling apocalyptic speculations. My strong wish is for a quick and peaceful resolution of the Israeli-Hezbollah-Lebanese conflict, a US stand-down from confrontation with Iran, and a speedy, voluntary US exit from Iraq.In his talk at the ASPO conference, Terence Ward repeatedly said that America’s bombing of Iran would make the work of petroleum depletion analysts easier—presumably because skyrocketing oil prices would force everyone to acknowledge that Peak Oil is a reality. On this point I disagree. If the scenario Ward outlined comes to pass, the public’s attention will be fixated on military developments and casualties, with horrific news footage dominating nearly every moment of every television news broadcast. Oil prices will indeed soar and everyone will feel the economic pain from a crashing global economy—but few will look to geology as an explanation. Instead, they will point to the obvious proximate causes—attacks and counterattacks disrupting oil shipments, with speculators pushing prices even higher than they would otherwise go.We have many reasons to hope that events are not spinning out of control.

Bush in Fantasy Land

2006-07-14T00:24:00.000-04:00

SOB is sitting in an uncomfortable hotel room in Princeton, NJ watching CNN while reviewing paperwork for his nine to five (more like seven to eight) day job. Shrub is saying that the current middle east conflict represents the effort of 'terrorists' who oppose 'the march of peace.' What happened to the 'march of democracy'? Lot's of marching in the Bush scenarios. The truth is that abstractions on the march are totally irrelivant to the situations in question. 'Terrorists' are people who have very specific political objectives that have nothing to do with opposing the 'march' of anything. The singular fact that the Bush administration has NEVER honestly addressed the reason for terrorits activity is a good indication of how dishonest their own position is. We cannot address a situation while pretending that it is something other than it is. Anyone who believes that 'the terrorists' are doing what they are doing because 'they hate our freedoms' are living in a world that is pretty much a fantasyland. Wake up before we all die. There is very little latitude for this kind of nonsense. Those who engage in terrorist activities do so because they have policy objectives they don't think can be met through other paths, but they are not engaged in attacking 'our freedom' (nor, as Bush said today 'the march of peace'????).

We do, indeed, live in a kind of political twilight zone.

Bush As Bad Influence

2006-07-04T00:26:00.000-04:00

The most recent Israeli attack on Gaza is an excellent example of the pathology of contemporary civic responsibility. The Israelis claim to be attacking Gaza in an effort to save a kidnapped IDF soldier, but the method they are employing seems rather strange for such an effort - they are bombing a very broad range of targets - none of which has any particular relationship to the missing soldier. Indeed, the most striking target bombed on the very first day was the main power plant that supports the civilian population of Gaza. This means that a population of over a million will be without power for months (one estimate was six months to restore power). Does anyone really believe that Israel bombed this power plan in order to recover one missing soldier? Subject over a million civilians to darkness, no refrigeration, no air conditioning, and - most important - no fresh water (since the water treatment plants are dependent on electricity to operate)?

This is a case of cowboys and Indians, just like the American West. The Israelis want the Palestinians gone. And they have only two methods to achieve that goal - force them all to leave or kill them - and for decades they have been doing some of both. Just as we did with the native population of this land, so the Israelis have been doing with the Palestinians. They have been herded into ghetto settlements - refugee camps and confined areas surrounded by IDF roadblocks and patrols - and periodically subjected to targeted assassinations, Ariel bombardment, sniper attacks, artillery shelling, and imprisonment without charge or judicial due process. They have been deprived of the ability to make a living, to visit family living in other parts of the county, and to participation in the civic, political, or cultural life of the country. Their land and homes have been stolen, their orchards uprooted, their livelihoods blocked. Sources of water, electrical power, food, and financial aid have been blocked or diverted. Their very mobility has been severely restricted - to the point that simply going to work or visit the hospital can present an impossibly difficult set of hurdles.

Yet in the Western press the image presented is almost constantly of the "terrorist" attacks on innocent Israeli civilians, as if suicide bombings and rocket attacks occurred only because the perpetrators were evil and in thrall to 'Islamofacism' or some such nonsense. The reality is quite different. If one looks at the number of casualties and deaths on both sides, the proportion is almost ten to one - ten dead Palestinians to one Israeli. That something is going on here that is not reported - not acknowledged in the western press - if pretty evident. The major part of the suffering is in the world of the Palestinians, not the Israelis. For example, doesn't it strike people as a bit unfair that a country with the most highly sophisticated war planes and bombs is attacking a people who not only don't have an air force or an ariel defense system - they don't even have an army! Israel is essentially attacking a civilian population with weapons designed to be used against comparable military targets. It is so far beyond shooting fish in a barrel that it should be humiliating in the extreme. And, one would think, generate a great public outcry because of the unfair and barbarous assault on the poor and weak. But it seems the world at large doesn't believe that dropping high explosives on densely populated and defenseless urban environments is anything to be ashamed of. All in a day's work for history's favorites. After all, it's the same pathological blindness that allowed America to inflict "Shock and Awe" on a country with no ability to fight back.

Both Israel and the US will some day pay a heavy price for this arrogant, bullying behavior. And I fear that day is nearer than any of us thinks.

Why Bush is a Terrible President

2006-07-03T20:40:00.000-04:00

In a truly brilliant piece in the current Washington Monthly magazine, Alan Wolfe explains with precise and persuasive logic Why Conservatives Can't Govern:

The collapse of the Bush presidency, in other words, is not just due to Bush's incompetence (although his administration has been incompetent beyond belief). Nor is it a response to the president's principled lack of intellectual curiosity and pitbull refusal to admit mistakes (although those character flaws are certainly real enough). And the orgy of bribery and special-interest dispensation in Congress is not the result of Tom DeLay's ruthlessness, as impressive a bully as he was. This conservative presidency and Congress imploded, not despite their conservatism, but because of it.

Contemporary conservatism is first and foremost about shrinking the size and reach of the federal government. This mission, let us be clear, is an ideological one. It does not emerge out of an attempt to solve real-world problems, such as managing increasing deficits or finding revenue to pay for entitlements built into the structure of federal legislation. It stems, rather, from the libertarian conviction, repeated endlessly by George W. Bush, that the money government collects in order to carry out its business properly belongs to the people themselves. One thought, and one thought only, guided Bush and his Republican allies since they assumed power in the wake of Bush vs. Gore: taxes must be cut, and the more they are cut--especially in ways benefiting the rich--the better.

But like all politicians, conservatives, once in office, find themselves under constant pressure from constituents to use government to improve their lives. This puts conservatives in the awkward position of managing government agencies whose missions--indeed, whose very existence--they believe to be illegitimate. Contemporary conservatism is a walking contradiction. Unable to shrink government but unwilling to improve it, conservatives attempt to split the difference, expanding government for political gain, but always in ways that validate their disregard for the very thing they are expanding. The end result is not just bigger government, but more incompetent government.

"Ideas," a distinguished conservative named Richard Weaver once wrote, "have consequences." Americans have learned something about the consequences of conservative ideas during the Bush years that they never had to confront in the more amiable Reagan period. As a way of governing, conservatism is another name for disaster. And the disasters will continue, year after year, as long as conservatives, whose political tactics are frequently as brilliant as their policy-making is inept, find ways to perpetuate their power.

Saddly, this seems like an inescapable conclusion. We are not guaranteed a better government with Democrats in office, but at least many of them believe that government has a legitimate role to play and that competence and honest efforts at wise policy can have positive consequences. I am a pessimist and have often noted that our best policy intentions have bad and unforeseen consequences. But if one doesn't believe in the enterprise from the outset the negative results are a foregone conclusion.

Bush Buddies vs The Rest of Us

2006-06-29T20:40:00.000-04:00

SOB is watching an interview with Homeland Security Director Michael Chertoff. Where does the Bush administration find such freaks? Of course, if Bush had gotten his original pick we would be in the middle of another juicy scandal today:

Bernard B. Kerik, the former New York City police commissioner, is close to reaching an agreement with prosecutors to plead guilty to having accepted improper gifts totaling tens of thousands of dollars while he was a city official in the late 1990's, two people with information on the plea negotiations said yesterday.

Under the proposed agreement, Mr. Kerik would plead guilty to failing to report accepting roughly $200,000 in renovations to his Bronx apartment — a violation of the city's administrative code. The work, officials have said, was paid for by a New Jersey construction company that the city had long accused of having ties to organized crime.

Mr. Kerik, 50, who accepted the gift when he served as correction commissioner under Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, will not face jail time, but is expected to pay a substantial fine, those with information about the case said. He is also expected to admit having failed to report receiving a loan.

A guilty plea would represent a further fall from grace for a public official whose dazzling ascent in city government took him from the rank of third-grade police detective in 1993, when he served as a volunteer campaign bodyguard and chauffeur for Mr. Giuliani in his mayoral campaign, to becoming the city's police commissioner in 2000, a post he held at the time of the Sept. 11 terror attack.

Mr. Kerik nearly rose higher still, to the rank of cabinet secretary, when President Bush nominated him to head the Department of Homeland Security in December 2004. But he was forced to withdraw a week later, citing possible tax problems involving his family's nanny.

How is it possible that the Bush administration has any credibility with even the small minority of Americans that still bow down to this charade? PEOPLE - this is very BAD theater. Stop applauding. Tinker Bell deserves to expire. Let it go.

Bush vs Nature

2006-06-22T20:15:00.000-04:00

If you haven't seen Al Gore's new film, "An Inconvenient Truth," please do. It is surprisingly engrossing (and entertaining despite it's heavy message). Recently there have been a number of reports supporting Gore's contention that Global Warming is both a serious problem and a result of human activity. Today another report attempts to highlight the importance of human activity in creating climate problems:

Now, in the second major global warming study released today, the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) has found:

Global warming accounted for around half of the extra hurricane-fueling warmth in the waters of the tropical North Atlantic in 2005, while natural cycles were only a minor factor.

… The study contradicts recent claims that natural cycles are responsible for the upturn in Atlantic hurricane activity since 1995. It also adds support to the premise that hurricane seasons will become more active as global temperatures rise.

Some background: Last year, sea-surface temperatures in the tropical Atlantic “were a record 1.7° F above the 1901-1970 average.”

Previous studies had suggested that the more intense hurricane activity was largely due to a 60-to-80-year natural cycle in sea-surface temperatures. But according to the study released today, less than .2° F of the rise was due to this natural cycle. Global warming, on the other hand, caused roughly half (about 0.8° F) of the rise, more than any other factor.

Lest we forget, Bush's official position is that we need to study this some more. Present understaning isn't really "sound science." of course, Dubyah wouldn't know "sound science" if it bit him in the ass - as it seems likely to do (and to all of us).

Bush In Another Bubble

2006-06-22T19:43:00.000-04:00

Just as the previous post pointed out the obvious fact that inflicting death and destruction on the poor and weak in Iraq is no way to win hearts and minds (quite the contrary, in fact) so this post - by a serious conservative - makes it clear that we continue to make the same kind of mistake in Afghanistan:

This Sunday’s sacred ritual of Mass, bagels and tea with the Grumpy Old Men’s Club was rudely disrupted by the headline of the day’s Washington Post: “U.S. Airstrikes Rise In Afghanistan as Fighting Intensifies.” Great, I thought; it’s probably cheaper than funding a recruiting campaign for the Taliban and lots more effective at creating new guerrillas.

Getting into the story just made the picture worse:

As fighting in Afghanistan has intensified over the past three months, the U.S. military has conducted 340 airstrikes there, more than twice the 160 carried out in the much higher-profile war in Iraq, according to data from the Central Command…

The airstrikes appear to have increased in recent days as the United States and its allies have launched counteroffensives against the Taliban in the south and southeast, strafing and bombing a stronghold in Uruzgan province and pounding an area near Khost with 500-pound bombs.

One might add, “The Taliban has expressed its thanks to the U.S. Air Force for greatly increasing its popular support in the bombed areas.”

At present, the bombing is largely tied to the latest Somme-like “Big Push,” Operation Mountain Thrust, in which more than 10,000 U.S.-led troops are trying another failed approach to guerrilla war, the sweep. I have no doubt it would break the Mullah Omar Line, if it existed, which it doesn’t. Even the Brits seem to have drunk the Kool-Aid this time, with the June 19 Washington Times reporting that “British commanders declared for the first time yesterday that their troops were enjoying success in the restive south of Afghanistan after pushing faster than expected into rebel territory.” Should be in Berlin by September, old chap.

Of course, all this is accompanied by claims of many dead Taliban, who are conveniently interchangeable with dead locals who weren’t Taliban. Bombing from the air is the best way to drive up the body count, because you don’t even have to count bodies; you just make estimates based on the claimed effectiveness of your weapons, and feed them to ever-gullible reporters. By the time Operation Mountain Thrust is done thrusting into mountains, we should have killed the Taliban several times over.

Icing this particular cake is a strategic misconception of the nature of the Afghan war that only American generals could swallow. According to the same Post story,

U.S. officials say the activity is a response to an increasingly aggressive Taliban, whose leaders realize that long-term trends are against them as them as the power of the Afghan central government grows.

“I think the Taliban realize they have a window to act,” Army Maj. Gen. Benjamin Freakley, commander of the 22,000 U.S. troops in the country, said in a recent interview. “The enemy is working against a window that he knows is closing.”

Except that the power of the U.S.-created Afghan government is receding, not growing, and the Taliban’s “window” only closes when Christ comes again.

Aaugh! The last time a nation’s civilian and military leadership was this incapable of learning from experience was under the Ching Dynasty.

Perhaps it’s time to offer a short refresher course in Guerrilla War 101:

Air power works against you, not for you. It kills lots of people who weren’t your enemy, recruiting their relatives, friends and fellow tribesmen to become your enemies. In this kind of war, bombers are as useful as 42 cm. siege mortars.

Big, noisy, offensives, launched with lots of warning, achieve nothing. The enemy just goes to ground while you pass on through, and he’s still there when you leave. Big Pushes are the opposite of the “ink blot” strategy, which is the only thing that works, when anything can.

Putting the Big Push together with lots of bombing in Afghanistan’s Pashtun country means we end up fighting most if not all of the Pashtun. In Afghan wars, the Pashtun always win in the end.

Quisling governments fail because they cannot achieve legitimacy.

You need closure, but your guerilla enemy doesn’t. He not only can fight until Doomsday, he intends to do just that—if not you, then someone else.

The bigger the operations you have to undertake, the more surely your enemy is winning.

The June 19 Washington Times also reported that

The ambassador from Afghanistan traveled to America’s heartland to promote his war-torn country as the “heart of Asia” and a good place to do business…

In his region, “all roads lead to Afghanistan,” he said…

Asia doesn’t have any heart, and Afghanistan doesn’t have any roads, not even one we can follow to get out.

Isn't it interesting that you can't find anyone in the mainstream media who is willing to point out these obvious facts? Real conservatives (like real liberals) are not reality-aversive, but the Bush neoconservative crowd seem to be. For them, reality is what they say it is; all PR and no policy. And the corporate press not only allows this, it encourages it.

Another Reason Bush is a Loser

2006-06-05T22:36:00.000-04:00

There are many reasons to believe the war on Iraq is an evil that we will pay for in ways we can only dimmly perceive - it is unnecessary, unjust, illegal, unconstitutional, planned in secret, sold with lies, pursued with unforgivable brutality against those we claimed to help, and corrosive of every value and freedom that Americans have held dear. And there is a fundamental reality that trumps all of Bush's swagger, Cheney's contempt, and Rumsfeld's self satisfied incompetence - the very nature of the conflict itself will defeat us. This from John Robb at Global Guerrillas:

As news of the incident in Haditha filters out, it is becoming increasingly clear that Martin Van Creveld's paradox of modern warfare is in play:

In other words, he who fights against the weak - and the rag-tag Iraqi militias are very weak indeed - and loses, loses. He who fights against the weak and wins also loses. To kill an opponent who is much weaker than yourself is unnecessary and therefore cruel; to let that opponent kill you is unnecessary and therefore foolish. As Vietnam and countless other cases prove, no armed force, however rich, however powerful, however advanced, however well motivated is immune to this dilemma. The end result is always disintegration and defeat...

Such a fundamental lesson that we should have easily learned long ago - if we lived in reality rather than in the Fox News fantasy of Evildoers and Freedom on the March and defending the Sanctity of Marriage against the assault of gay-immigrant-flag burning-liberal-latte-drinkers-from-Frisco. Aren't we ready to wake up from this nightmare?

More Bush vs Reality

2006-05-29T21:57:00.000-04:00

So, where is all the good news from Iraq? Why isn't the MSM reporting all the positve stuff that the neocons so fervently believe in?

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Bombs killed dozens of people in Iraq on Monday, adding to pressure on rival factions in the country's new coalition government to agree on interior and defense ministers who can tackle the relentless violence.

A series of separate attacks claimed at least 47 lives, most of them in the capital Baghdad, police and other officials said.

In the bloodiest incident, a car bomb targeting an Iraqi army patrol killed 12 people, mostly students, in a Sunni Arab area of northern Baghdad, police said. A roadside bomb killed at least eight people in a Shi'ite area in the city's northwest.

Elsewhere, 11 people were killed when a bomb planted on a bus taking laborers to work went off in the town of Khalis in a volatile area 80 km (50 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.

"What wrong had they done?" a middle-aged man said as he inspected the blood-stained bus. He declined to be named.

An Iranian exiled opposition group said the dead were employees traveling to its base in the area.

Noting Iran's foreign minister was in Baghdad last week, the People's Mujahideen Organization pointed the finger at Tehran and also blamed its Shi'ite Islamist allies running Iraq's new government. Iran sees the group as a terrorist organization.

Two British journalists working for U.S. television network CBS were among four people killed when a car bomb struck a U.S. military patrol in Baghdad.

American CBS correspondent Kimberly Dozier was seriously wounded in the attack and six U.S. soldiers were also wounded, CBS and the U.S. military said in separate statements.

An unnamed soldier and an Iraqi civilian working with the military were killed along with the network's London-based cameraman Paul Douglas, 48, and sound man James Brolan, 42.

And of course there are always stories like this:

Sunni Who Aided U.S. Gunned Down in Iraq

The good news just keeps demanding to be heard.

Bush vs Reality: There Is No War on Terror

2006-05-29T21:26:00.000-04:00

SOB has been saying this for years and it is SO good to have one of his favorite blogs affirm his view:

After September 11, 2001, we’ve learned that we can take a punch and move on. We’ve faced far worse threats to our national survival in our history - the Civil War, the War of 1812, World War II to name a few - but we never abandoned our Constitution. Until now.

Terror is an emotion. Emotions are part of human nature and cannot be eradicated. A "War on Terror" is therefore a war on humanity. The Bush administration has exploited the fear and shock of a nation in the wake of a surprising and dramatic act of violence to whip national fear and paranoia into a constant boil. Why?

The evidence suggests the whole point has been to seize power and steal money. We are witnessing a creeping coup in the United States, the overthrow of the idea, promulgated by our founders and by writers like Tom Paine, that the "Law is King:".
. . .
Ann Coulter and other right wing totalitarian cheerleaders like to talk about traitors to America. George Bush and the Republicans have betrayed America, the actual laws of America and the very idea of America. On Memorial Day, as we remember our sons and daughters who have sacrficed their lives in the blistering sands of Iraq, it does their memory due honor to point this out. Noble men and women fallen, their blood cries out for lawful justice.

In each of our minds lies the beginning of our return to freedom, so please, say it after me: "There is no ‘War on Terror.’"

It’s high time for America and Americans to remember our strength. We need not be afraid. When we surrender to fear, we lose our country, we lose our faith in each other, we lose our future and we lose our freedom. The best way to honor the sacrfices of our nation’s men and women killed in battle is to embrace, once again, that precious liberty.

It’s time to be America again.

Right. So whatever happened to the "land of the free, the home of the brave?" Bush keeps talking about how he has to keep us safe when his oath of office requires that he protect and defend the Constitution - not the public. We need to remind him of what his true obligations are. Americans have always been able to defend themselves - as long as their elected representatives were faithful to their own obligations.

Andy Rooney vs Bush

2005-10-06T19:01:00.000-04:00

Every now and then, 60 Minute's Andy Rooney hits a homer:

I'm not really clear how much a billion dollars is but the United States — our United States — is spending $5.6 billion a month fighting this war in Iraq that we never should have gotten into.

We still have 139,000 soldiers in Iraq today.

Almost 2,000 Americans have died there. For what?

Now we have the hurricanes to pay for. One way our government pays for a lot of things is by borrowing from countries like China.

Another way the government is planning to pay for the war and the hurricane damage is by cutting spending for things like Medicare prescriptions, highway construction, farm payments, AMTRAK, National Public Radio and loans to graduate students. Do these sound like the things you'd like to cut back on to pay for Iraq?

I'll tell you where we ought to start saving: on our bloated military establishment.

We're paying for weapons we'll never use.

No other Country spends the kind of money we spend on our military. Last year Japan spent $42 billion. Italy spent $28 billion, Russia spent only $19 billion. The United States spent $455 billion.

We have 8,000 tanks for example. One Abrams tank costs 150 times as much as a Ford station wagon.

We have more than 10,000 nuclear weapons — enough to destroy all of mankind.

We're spending $200 million a year on bullets alone. That's a lot of target practice. We have 1,155,000 enlisted men and women and 225,000 officers. One officer to tell every five enlisted soldier what to do. We have 40,000 colonels alone and 870 generals.

We had a great commander in WWII, Dwight Eisenhower. He became President and on leaving the White House in 1961, he said this: “We must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. …"

Well, Ike was right. That's just what’s happened.

Don't ya hate it when that happens?

Bushco vs Reality

2005-10-05T23:12:00.000-04:00

The Washington Post, in another of its seemingly drug induced takes on the Bush administration, presents an analysis of Bush's latest crony appointment with this headline, Strong Grounding in the Church Could Be a Clue to Miers's Priorities.

Excuse me - "the" church? Did I miss something? Ignoring such trivial differences as Catholic and Protestant, what happened to the Baptists, Methodists, Christian Scientists, Seventh Day Adventists, Lutherans, Episcopalians, Nazarenes, Pentacostals, Unitarians, Congregationalist, Quakers, Menonites, Amish, Shakers, Mormons, Church of Christ, Church of God, Presbyterians, happy Holy Rollers of all persuasians, etc., etc., etc. There is no such thing as the church. If this were the eleventh century perhaps that phrase would make sense. Today one has to ask - what church? What do they believe? Does it make a difference?

Because I can assure you - despite both claiming to be "Christians" - that what a Baptist (Southern or otherwise) believes is not what a Methodist believes. This should be obvious. So why are we given such childish crap as talk about "the" church as if it makes any sense? It doesn't.

Harriet Miers belongs to the Valley View Christian Church of Dallas, TX - one of those independent mega-churches that seems to exist as a unique part of our current fractured world. The head pastor, "Dr." Barry McCarty, has a PhD in Argumentation and Debate, and has been associated with various Baptist and Church of Christ congregations and colleges. What he actually believes now and where he fits on any religious belief continuum is not clear. His church is fundamentalist and conservative - but its website is pretty vague about specific points of doctrine. According to the Post:

At Valley View, pastors preach that abortion is murder, that the Bible is the literal word of God and that homosexuality is a sin -- although they also preach that God loves everybody.

Pretty schizo. This is the church Miers chooses to attend. She was reared a Methodist but was baptised in this church as an adult. So, what does she get here that she didn't get from the Methodist Church? I think we should really care. It is going to make a great difference in our lives if she is confirmed - and I have no wish to be subjected to any more fundamentalist prejudice. This is the Twenty-first Century. Do we really want to relive the Middle Ages?

SOB and Friends vs Bush

2005-09-24T23:51:00.000-04:00

Another day, another rally/march. Will it do any good? Who knows? Certainly for the people who participate it is an uplifting experience. It's always good to be reminded that others share one's own qualms and commitments. Still, it's very much a mixed bag. So many of those who show up at these events are people one would really not want to be associated with, but then again, non of them are as repulsive as Condi, Donald Rumsfeld, or Dick Cheney. I'll break bread with a schizo ex-hippie vegan anarchist any day before I would pretend to normal social relations with the Bush administration neo-con goon squad. The "freaks" who show up to protest at least have some sense of human decency and a concern for others. Whereas empathy is not something that has ever troubled the Bush gang.

Today's protest in DC was interesting on many fronts. The turnout was very good. The police elected to present a much lower profile than normal. The physical site was dramatically expanded to include both the elipse behind the White House as well as a large part of the Washington Monument grounds. But there were problems as well: fences and barracdes at arbitray points made movement in the area difficult, no bathroom facilities were provided (people had to go a half mile over to the mall to the those set up for the National Book Fair), and unexplained delays and cancellations of Amtrack trains from New York threw the schedule way off - since speakers and participants were stuck waiting.

And being a total spoil sport I have to ask, isn't it possible to line up some good speakers? The people who appear at these rallies mostly have no business being in front of an audience. I don't care how significant they may be as an organizer and supporter of good causes, if they don't know how to handle a microphone and deal with an audience they shouldn't be there. It brings everyone down to have someone they don't know shouting unintelligiable words into a feedback suffering mike. With the exception of Jessica Lange, Jessie Jackson, and Cindy Sheehan, most of the speakers were worse than useless. And of course this is all complicated by having two different groups (International ANSWER and United for Peace and Justice)with somewhat differing priorities in charge of the arrangements.

Still, it was good that it happened. Now we just need more of the same on some regualr basis. PRESSURE is required, and it needs to be applied ALL THE TIME.

As the chant goes - "The People, united, will never be defeated." And I believe this is true. But the "people" are not yet united. We're getting there, but not yet.

Bush vs Our Energy Future

2005-09-24T23:20:00.000-04:00

George W. Bush continues to pretend that economic growth and business as usual can be expected in the forseeable future, even as his own advisors tell him otherwise. Matthew Simmons, Texas investment banker and expert on the economics of the oil industry, is a long term Bush advisor and this is what he thinks about our immediate energy future:

Matthew Simmons, Simmons International
Slides from a presentation to World Affairs Council, Houston, Tx.
...
I Believe We Are Now In A Deep Hole
* Spare capacity is over.
* System was too tight in 2004 and only got tighter.
* Adding significant capacity in key bottlenecks takes 5 – 15 years to effect.
* Too much oil and gas production is now in irreversible decline.
* Demand has a resilience not easily hampered by price.
* Stocks got to “just-in-time supply.”

Katrina Was An Energy Tipping Point
* Risk of experiencing finished product shortages over next 6 months is high.
* Risk of forced natural curtailment is high.
* Rig shortage was already real and got far worse by systemic mooring system failures.
* It might be impossible to recreate energy cushion without permanent demand destruction.
* The pain is currently U.S. based: The tightness soon becomes global.
...
Post-Peak Oil Is A Big Deal
* Oil demand growth is insatiable.
* Oil use can never exceed useable supply.
* Working out a peaceful resolution to this pending clash can be done, but will not be easy.
* If issue is ignored and it happens, it becomes a social tipping point.
* It is past time for data reform.
* It is time for a Global Energy Summit.
(13 September 2005)

In other words, the world as we know it is over. What plans are being made to deal with this - other than trying (unsuccessfully) to control other countries that have a lot of oil? Have you heard any of your elected representatives deal with this issue in any way? This is the most important issue of our age and it is virtually invisible except on select web sites and in a couple of honest books that are mostly being ignored. In many ways it is understandable why people want to avoid this issue - there is nothing we can do about it. Still, there is much we could do to ameliorate the consequences of peak oil - but if we don't recognize the problem and actually discuss it, there isn't much chance that we can soften the blow.

At least one community college is actually offering a course in how to respond to the coming petroleum decline:

Course Description

Cheap oil is coming to an end. Within the next decade or two world oil production is likely to reach a peak and then begin an irreversible decline. The end of cheap oil threatens to stall and even reverse economic growth worldwide. It could lead to profound disruptions in our way of life, especially in the areas of transportation and food production.

This course examines the inevitable collision between our growing thirst for oil and the certain decline in its availability in the years to come. What might the consequences for the world economy be? Can we find alternatives to oil before its production begins to decline? What can an individual do to help us make a successful transition to a post-oil economy? Alternative energy, lifestyle changes, conservation and efficiency measures will be discussed.

A much bleaker view can be found at James Howard Kuntlser's website:

Take a good look at America around you now, because when we emerge from the winter of 2005 - 6, we're going to be another country. The reality-oblivious nation of mall hounds, bargain shoppers, happy motorists, Nascar fans, Red State war hawks, and born-again Krispy Kremers is headed into a werewolf-like transformation that will reveal to all the tragic monster we have become.

What we will leave behind is the certainty that we have made the right choices. Was it a good thing to buy a 3,600 square foot house 32 miles outside Minneapolis with an interest-only adjustable rate mortgage -- with natural gas for home heating running at $12 a unit and gasoline over $3 a gallon? Was it the right choice to run three credit cards up to their $5000 limit? Was I chump to think my pension from Acme Airlines would really be there for me? Do I really owe the Middletown Hospital $17,678 for a gall bladder operation that took forty-five minutes? And why did they charge me $238 for a plastic catheter?

All kinds of assumptions about the okay-ness of our recent collective behavior are headed out the window. This naturally beats a straight path to politics, since that is the theater in which our collective choices are dramatized. It really won't take another jolting event like a major hurricane or a terror incident or an H4N5 flu outbreak to take things over the edge -- though it is very likely that something else will happen. George W. Bush, and the party he represents, are headed into full Hooverization mode. After Katrina, nobody will take claims of governmental competence seriously.

The new assumption will be that when shit happens you are on your own. In this remarkable three weeks since New Orleans was shredded, no Democrat has stepped into the vacuum of leadership, either, with a different vision of what we might do now, and who we might become. This is the kind of medium that political maniacs spawn in. Something is out there right now, feeding on the astonishment and grievance of a whipsawed middle class, and it will have a lot more nourishment in the months ahead.

There are two things that the newspapers and TV Cable News outfits are not covering very well. One is that the Port of New Orleans is not functioning, with poor prospects for a quick recovery, and with it will go much of the Midwestern grain harvest. Another thing that has fallen off the radar screen is the damage done to the oil and gas infrastructure around the Gulf Coast, especially the onshore facilities for storing and transporting stuff, and for marshaling the crews and equipment to fix stuff. The US is going to run short of its customary supplies for a long time. The idea that these things will not affect an economy of ceaseless mobility is not realistic.

These serious problems on-the-ground are going to affect the more ephemeral elements floating around in the financial ether: the value of the dollar, the hazard in hedge funds, the credibility of institutions. By October, the hurricane season will be ending and the stock market crash season will be underway. It is hard to imagine that companies like WalMart really believe they will keep their profits up when their customers are paying twice as much as they did a year ago to heat their houses and fill their gas tanks.

Meanwhile, does anybody remember a place called Iraq? A bomb that killed thirty people was reported on page 12 of the Sunday New York Times. That's how important Iraq has become. But, I guess, a nation can hardly pay attention to a bullet in the foot when it has a sucking chest wound.

So, even if it's only half that bad it will be pretty terrible, right? And what is anyone in "power" doing to position us for dealing with this situation - which is happening right now? Look around. We are living in a fantasy land. When the real suffering and dying starts at home - rather than half way around the world - and we are actually living this reality rather than watching other hapless souls suffer in Iraq and Afghanistan while we adjust the Air Conditioning and order a pizza delivery - how are we going to react? What will the political realities be when Americans realize that their "special" place is a fantasy and that they are as vulnerable as anyone else - and even worse, since being deprived of our excess will seem even more painful than being deprived of the little that most people in the world have.

Welcome to the new century. We are not going to like it.

Bush vs Fisk

2005-09-23T00:55:00.000-04:00

In honor of the many freedoms that Bush wants to extend to the rest of the world, the U.S. just refused to admit British journalist Robert Fisk into the country. There's nothing like a clear demonstration of what you really believe in, and George Bush obviously believes in suppressing voices that don't support him. Ain't democracy wonderful? No wonder all those Iraqis are killing each other to get some.

The Public vs Bush

2005-09-23T00:47:00.000-04:00

DC braces for a weekend of anti-war protests. And SOB plans to be there all day.

Grand Theft - Where the Bush Administration Excells

2005-09-20T22:47:00.000-04:00

Cronyism in the Bush administration has recently been highlighted because of the unfortunate performance of campaign fundraiser and former Arabian Horse Association Director Mike Brown as hapless "Director" of FEMA during the Hurricane Katrina crisis. That whole set of circumstances led many otherwise complacent folk to reassess their opinion of Bush and his inner sanctum of compassionate conservative advisors, leading to a sharp decline in support for his policies with a majority of Americans disapproving of his performance in office.

Now a whole new drama is unfolding that seems destined to dramatically highlight the corruption and greed that underlies the Bush administration approach to virtually everything it does. On Monday, David Safavian, head of procurement for the OMB (Office of Management and Budget), was arrested on three felony counts stemming from an investigation into the business practices of Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff:

According to court papers, Mr. Safavian, 38, is accused of lying about assistance that he gave Mr. Abramoff in his earlier work at the General Services Administration, where he was chief of staff from 2002 to 2004, and about an expensive golf trip he took with the lobbyist to Scotland in August 2002.

Mr. Abramoff, a former lobbying partner of Mr. Safavian, was indicted last month in Florida on unrelated federal fraud charges. He is not identified by name in the court papers involving Mr. Safavian's arrest. But "Lobbyist A" in an F.B.I. affidavit could only be Mr. Abramoff based on descriptive details in the documents filed in the Federal District Court here.

The Justice Department said Mr. Safavian had been specifically charged with making false statements to investigators about his efforts at the General Services Administration in 2002 to help Mr. Abramoff acquire two large pieces of government-owned property in the Washington area, including the historic Old Post Office Building on Pennsylvania Avenue.

Mr. Safavian was in charge of a procurement budget of approximately 300 Billion dollars. He was already involved in decision making relating to the costly reconstructino of New Orleans. To make matters much worse, his wife has a questionable role in much of this. By way of Atrios:

Mr. Safavian's wife? Oh, that's Jennifer Safavian. Her job? Chief counsel on oversight and investigations on the House Government Reform Committee.

Their latest job? Heading up the sham Katrina investigation...

Richard Nixon very famously declared "I am not a crook." It seems that before long, no one in the Bush administration will be able to make that claim without expecting gales of laughter.

Bush/ FEMA Incompetence

2005-09-18T10:13:00.000-04:00

Among the many distressing revelations concerning FEMA's weaknesses - despite years recently focusing on major threats - the Miami Sun-Sentinel presents the story of FEMA's extravagent waste:

The handling of aid to victims of Hurricane Katrina is only the latest in a series of missteps and fraud that has plagued this tax-funded government agency.
The Sun-Sentinel took a look at 20 recent disasters and found mismanagement and misallocation abound.

The Washington Post does a followup on FEMA incompetence in the aftermath of hurrican Katrina:

Three weeks after Hurricane Katrina struck, red tape and poor planning have left thousands of evacuees without basic services, according to local and state officials, public policy experts and survivors themselves.

Hundreds of thousands of people from New Orleans and Gulf Coast communities have fled, sometimes to neighboring states and beyond, moving in with friends and family or into shelters, public housing and hotels funded by the Red Cross. With little guidance from federal and state governments -- and no single person or entity in charge of the overall operation -- cities and counties have been left on their own to find survivors homes, schools, jobs and health care. A patchwork of policies has resulted, causing relief agencies to sometimes work at cross-purposes.

And CNN reports that lower level FEMA employees fault their boss's (mostly political appointees) lack of emergency management experience:

As Hurricane Katrina bore down on the Gulf Coast three weeks ago, veteran workers at the Federal Emergency Management Agency braced for an epic disaster.

But their bosses, political appointees with almost no emergency management experience, didn't seem to share the sense of urgency, a FEMA veteran said.

Among the notable "firsts" afforded by Katrina are:

1. an acceptance of responsibilty (sort of) by Bush for FEMA's bad response,

2. an actual resignation (by FEMA Director Brown) as a result of bad performance,

3. and repeated Rovian photo ops to try and recover the Bush myth.

Quite a show, but it doesn't seem to be working. Based on the latest poll numbers it seems that the only support Bush still has is his minimum base - and I suspect that will not hold for long. Maureen Dowd agrees.

Bush Takes Responsibility. NOT!

2005-09-15T19:06:00.000-04:00

Senate Kills Bid for Katrina Commission

Here we go again. With a national disaster still lingering in people's memories and demands for explanations growing, the Republicans first response is to stifle any realistic effort to get honest answers:

WASHINGTON - Senate Republicans on Wednesday scuttled an attempt by Sen. Hillary Clinton to establish an independent, bipartisan panel patterned after the 9/11 Commission to investigate what went wrong with federal, state and local governments' response to Hurricane Katrina.

Bush Ripped Over Failure to Respond to Emergency

2005-09-02T18:41:00.000-04:00

Editorials, Including Those at Conservative Papers, Rip Bush's Hurricane Response:

The devastation wrought by Hurricane Katrina was the first practical test of the new homeland-security arrangements and the second test of President Bush in the face of a national crisis.

The performance of both has been less than stellar so far.

Katrina was a disaster that came with at least two days of warning, and it has been more than four days since the storm struck. Yet on Thursday, refugees still huddled unrescued in the unspeakable misery of the New Orleans Superdome. Patients in hospitals without power and water clung to life in third-world conditions. Untold tragedies lie yet to be discovered in the rural lowlands of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.

And just in case one thinks that all the criticism is misplaced and that Bush is really sincere in his concern, Kevin Drum spells out the true picture:

BUSH AND KATRINA....Echidne of the Snakes reports that on Good Morning America today, George Bush said:

"I don't think anyone anticipated the breach of the levees."

I swear, this is the Bush administration in a microcosm. Everyone was anticipating a breach of the levees before Katrina hit. In fact, Katrina changed course the night before it made landfall and then weakened a bit right at the moment it hit New Orleans. If it had continued along its previous path and hit about 30 miles west as a full Category 5, the levees would have been instantly overrun and possibly breached within hours instead of days.

Does Bush genuinely not know this? Or is he just so comfortable lying about stuff like this that he doesn't give it a second thought? And which is worse?

Yeah, clueless or shameless - which is worse, and does it really matter when the end result - in New Orleans as in Iraq - is so bad?

More Team Bush Scandals

2005-08-28T11:42:00.000-04:00

This from Mark Schmitt of The Decembrist:

Two days ago I suggested that the Abramoff case might be the uber-scandal, rather like the BCCI case in the mid-1990s, tying together all the other threads of corruption and dishonesty of the last few years.

But here's another: Last night I saw that the former publisher of the Chicago Sun-times, F. David Radler, had been indicted on many counts of fraud in the Hollinger/Conrad Black case. Hollinger has owned the Sun-Times since 1994.

Who is the most prominent employee of the Chicago Sun-Times?

That would be Robert Novak.

Who were some people on the board of Hollinger Corp., suspected of abetting the fraud?

The best description of the board: "the roster of independent directors reads like the politically plugged-in guest list at an American Enterprise Institute dinner" There was Henry Kissinger, former Illinois governor James Thompson, and most notably Richard Perle. Perle was a member of the executive committee, profited handsomely himself through a Hollinger investment fund he was put in charge of, and by his own admission exercised very little oversight.

What's the relationship between Robert Novak and Richard Perle?

It's not just that both have proudly worn the nickname, "Prince of Darkness." They are bound by their stock in trade: leaking and receiving leaks of classified information. In 1975, Perle leaked classified information to Novak with the purpose of scuttling the SALT II treaty.

Who is the prosecutor who indicted the former publisher of Novak's paper?

Patrick Fitzgerald.

This just gets better and better.

More Bush Nonsense

2005-08-27T21:00:00.000-04:00

The more George W. Bush speaks the less likely it is that anyone will take him seriously. This week, in response to ongoing problems in Iraq, he said this:

"Like our own nation's founders over two centuries ago, the Iraqis are grappling with difficult issues, such as the role of the federal government. What is important is that Iraqis are now addressing these issues through debate and discussion, not at the barrel of a gun,"

Of course, this is to ignore how many guns are in play in Iraq at the moment, but more importantly, it is to fail to recognize the most significant part of the parallel he is drawing between Iraq today and America after the revolution - in his analogy we would be the British - the occupying country that the locals were fighting against. Why is this so hard to see? Iraq is not free and whatever is going on bears little resemblence to any kind of democratic process.

What it comes down to is that our approved stooges for the various factions are unable to come to any agreement on how to divide the spoils. What we now have is civil war - just cranked up but shortly to be full strength. If we get out now it won't be so bad. If we wait it will be much, much worse. And of course, we are going to wait - because no one in the front ranks of professional politics is willing to be associated with a pullout - even though it is the only option that makes any sense.

Bush Flips Flops Flips Flops Flips . . .

2005-08-17T21:40:00.000-04:00

Via Daily Kos:

Ahh, the good ol' days
by kos
Wed Aug 17th, 2005 at 11:47:32 PDT
Quotes from when Clinton committed troops to Bosnia:

"You can support the troops but not the president."
--Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)

"Well, I just think it's a bad idea. What's going to happen is they're going to be over there for 10, 15, maybe 20 years."
--Joe Scarborough (R-FL)

"Explain to the mothers and fathers of American servicemen that may come home in body bags why their son or daughter have to give up their life?"
--Sean Hannity, Fox News, 4/6/99

"[The] President . . . is once again releasing American military might on a foreign country with an ill-defined objective and no exit strategy. He has yet to tell the Congress how much this operation will cost. And he has not informed our nation's armed forces about how long they will be away from home. These strikes do not make for a sound foreign policy."
--Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA)

"American foreign policy is now one huge big mystery. Simply put, the administration is trying to lead the world with a feel-good foreign policy."
--Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)

"If we are going to commit American troops, we must be certain they have a clear mission, an achievable goal and an exit strategy."
--Karen Hughes, speaking on behalf of George W Bush

"I had doubts about the bombing campaign from the beginning . . I didn't think we had done enough in the diplomatic area."
--Senator Trent Lott (R-MS)

"I cannot support a failed foreign policy. History teaches us that it is often easier to make war than peace. This administration is just learning that lesson right now. The President began this mission with very vague objectives and lots of unanswered questions. A month later, these questions are still unanswered. There are no clarified rules of engagement. There is no timetable. There is no legitimate definition of victory. There is no contingency plan for mission creep. There is no clear funding program. There is no agenda to bolster our over-extended military. There is no explanation defining what vital national interests are at stake. There was no strategic plan for war when the President started this thing, and there still is no plan today"
--Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)

"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is."
--Governor George W. Bush (R-TX)

Funny thing is, we won that war without a single killed in action.

Bolton to Miller: One Bush Whore to Another

2005-08-15T21:12:00.000-04:00

By way of Talking Points Memo:

Bolton stopped by for a jailhouse visit with Judy Miller before heading off to the UN? So says Arianna.

Maybe he had pity on her and dropped by to leak some new info.

This just gets curiouser and curiouser.