Remember the meme at the beginning of the War Drum Beating and the easy certain Corporate “No Bid Contracts” in support of the Wars and Occupations: “They’re the only ones in the World who can do the organizing and work needed in support of our Military and the Coalition of Willing!”
Never mind they were connected by the hips to those beating the drums, never mind they were only paper pushers tens of thousands of miles away and sub-contracting out all the work, never mind the many issues of lost billions, shoddy work, bonuses, waste and corruption that almost instantly started coming to light and even with that they were given more, not even handshakes, just here ya go Pallets with Shrink wrapped Blocks of Cash, Millions and Billions, freshly printed and minted!!
Ahmadinejad hailed the vote, saying it was a “great ordeal” but one that pointed “the way to the future.”
“The people of Iran inspired hope for all nations and created a source of pride in the nation and disappointed all the ill wishers,” Ahmadinejad said in his television address. “This election was held at a juncture of history.”
Ahmadinejad The Man Racing Towards Not
The Future But The Middle Ages
Some in Palau are worried about Guantanamo detainees
The laid-back island republic is unaccustomed to geopolitics, and some question why the U.S. is sending them Chinese Muslims. But others say their culture is welcoming to foreigners.
By John M. Glionna
June 14, 2009
Reporting from Koror, Palau — Sipping guava juice under cover from a steamy tropical downpour, Tommy Remengesau Jr. says he’s always considered his Pacific island home a refuge from the troubles of the outside world.
“While the rest of the planet was in conflict, waging its wars, we remained a little piece of paradise,” the former Palauan president said as his pet fruit bat swayed upside down in a nearby cage. “Now, the world’s headaches have come home to roost in Palau.”
This isolated republic of more than 300 scattered islands, set amid a vast stretch of aquamarine ocean 4,500 miles southwest of Hawaii, had its reverie rocked last week when officials here announced that they would accept several Chinese Muslims held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Palau’s decision to offer refuge to more than a dozen ethnic Uighurs once suspected of terrorism was hailed by the Obama administration, which is eager to disperse Guantanamo detainees as part of a plan to close the notorious prison early next year.
Riots erupt in Tehran over ‘stolen’ election
Shock as Ahmadinejad claims victory as rival calls poll ‘dangerous charade’
Ian Black and Saeed Kamali Dehghan in Tehran
guardian.co.uk, Saturday 13 June 2009 22.09 BST
Iran faces political turmoil after hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was confirmed today as the winner of the presidential election and outraged supporters of his chief rival took to the streets to protest against a “dangerous charade” after a record 85% turnout.
Tonight riot police in Tehran confronted thousands of demonstrators shouting “death to dictatorship” amid shock and confusion after the official result backed Ahmadinejad’s claim to have won, made barely an hour after polls closed last night.
The moderate Mir Hossein Mousavi, who had been widely expected to beat the controversial incumbent if there was a high turnout – or at least do well enough to trigger a second round – insisted he was the victor and appealed against the result to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader.
Robert Fisk: Iran erupts as voters back ‘the Democrator’
A smash in the face, a kick in the balls – that’s how police deal with protesters after Iran’s poll kept the hardliners in power
Sunday, 14 June 2009
First the cop screamed abuse at Mir Hossein Mousavi’s supporter, a white-shirted youth with a straggling beard and unkempt hair. Then he smashed his baton into the young man’s face. Then he kicked him viciously in the testicles. It was the same all the way down to Vali Asr Square. Riot police in black rubber body armour and black helmets and black riot sticks, most on foot but followed by a flying column of security men, all on brand new, bright red Honda motorcycles, tearing into the shrieking youths – hundreds of them, running for their lives. They did not accept the results of Iran’s presidential elections. They did not believe that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had won 62.6 per cent of the votes. And they paid the price.
USA
Obama’s Spending Plans May Pose Political Risks
Concern Mounts in White House as 2010 Elections Loom
By Scott Wilson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, June 14, 2009
After enjoying months of towering poll numbers, legislative victories and well-received foreign policy initiatives, the White House has become increasingly concerned that President Obama’s spending plans, which would require $9 trillion in government borrowing over the next decade, could become a political liability that defines the 2010 midterm elections.The concern was reflected in the aggressive response from administration officials to criticism that money from Obama’s stimulus plan is arriving too slowly to help the languishing economy, as well as in the president’s public endorsement of “pay as you go” legislation, which would require Congress to make room for new non-discretionary spending with equivalent cuts to other parts of the budget. Yesterday, Obama also outlined billions of dollars in savings that would be used to pay for his health-care reform proposal.
The title is a reference to a Native American parable — the story exists in various forms. It’s a story that has found significant resonance, particularly lately.
…the article is one I recently posted over on ePluribus Media and DailyKos — it goes on to mention a couple of pieces that comment on the right-wing rhetoric and domestic terrorism that has been constantly egged on by the conservative media and punditry.
I know several folks here are familiar with the parable, and since it was on my mind, I thought it made a good lead-in to the piece. Please check it out and tell me what you think.
This is one slick dude. He pulls off the crime of the century, other than those committed by George W. Bush and company, and has managed to evade an international manhunt for nearly eight years. He’s rich as all get out but lives in caves and safehouses away from the reaches of the most sophisticated military machine ever assembled. That machine has managed to kill many thousands of other “terrorists”, not to mention the collateral damage of killing children, but still can’t find the motherfucker who did this to our country. Considering the U.S. has no problem with killing children as long as it gets some Al Qaeda terrorists, it is surprising that Osama hasn’t been bombed to smithereens.
The 9/11 Commission Report blamed the 9/11 attacks on al Qaeda as led by Osama bin Laden. The U.S. invaded Afghanistan, specifically to gain revenge on the Taliban who supposedly supported al Qaeda in its efforts to annihilate America, and to find bin Laden and his cohorts.
But hey, there’s good news. The CIA, our own bastion of truth and righteousness, says Osama is hiding in Pakistan.
Yep, the rather large bastard is hiding in Pakistan and you better believe it because the CIA is saying so in mainstream media. And they’re after his ass too, sending extra agents to the area. This is exciting. Like reading about the Feds going after Bonnie and Clyde back in the day. When will they catch them, and what will they do?
Strangely, Benizir Bhutto, the former prime minister of Pakistan who was assassinated on December 27, 2007, is on record as saying Mr. bin Laden was murdered.
Now, we’ve been killing civilians in Afghanistan and Pakistan with those drones controlled by gaming maestros on some base in California. Nintendo warfare. All in the name of killing Al Qaeda suspects. We’ve bombed the shit out of them and killed many of those terrorists. Not to mention many more innocent women and children. So I just can’t help but wonder why the CIA hasn’t been able to locate this bin laden terrorist dude, at least enough to throw a remote controlled bomb at him. Come on CIA, what’s up? You’ve had almost eight frigging years.
Oh, who knows, maybe it’s all a scam. Why does the CIA keep saying they think they know where he is? The CIA is expert in propaganda. Whatever they say, especially as leaked to the mainstream media, should be taken with an extra large grain of salt. We know what the CIA did to instigate the Vietnam war. This response in Afghanistan and now Pakistan, justified by 9/11 is now in its eighth year with no end in sight. Trillions of dollars being spent, thousands of innocent lives being ended, hundreds of thousands being displaced and further into poverty. U.S. soldiers being killed. This is like 1969 of the Vietnam war, eight years in, except now the support from Democrats for a Republican war, makes the current antiwar movement look like pansies.
The conflict in Afghanistan is based on the same fear propaganda that was used for the Iraq war, and is being used in many circles for a possible attack on Iran. The same old tactic of a possible nuclear strike, heard since the early days of the Cold War, is being used to pacify the public into accepting American hegemony and feeding of the Military Industrial Complex. If bin Laden isn’t dead, we don’t really care where he is.
This is not getting the job done. The incrementalist bullshit, the bi-partisan compromise with people with bad ideas who hope that America fails just long enough for their own benefit, the whole idea that we can push a little here and a little there in a nine sided chess game to fix the clusterfuck just right.
I am glad Obama is President but the audacity of hope part is over. Right now, I am hoping for a little more audacity.
Though I don’t entirely agree with everything Bill Maher says, I agree with his point. We need drastic reform for health care, our economy, issues regarding the rule of law and the role of the Executive branch that was abused during the previous criminal administration.
A little at a time is not enough.
So, if not now, when?
If we are not going to stand up now to the banks, the insurance companies, the MIC, the status quo, then when?
By criticize Obama when he is wrong we give him a reason to act differently. If we only praise him he has no reason to court our interests.
I think a side effect of the GOP being as far out as they are is that it gives Obama and the Democrats leeway to be just as bad but seem better by comparison. It is like their corruption is less offensive when compared to the lunatic rhetoric of secessionists, fear mongers, torture advocates and “reverse racism” concern trolls.
I think the only way to be heard anymore is to raise hell, or rather, yell louder.
The party is doing everything they possibly can to ensure that you’ll get re-elected. The Republican party.
Speaking of which, speaking of the Republican party, if you can’t shove some real reforms down their throats now, then when?
Barack Obama needs to start putting it on the line in the fights against the banks, the energy companies and the health care industry.
And I couldn’t agree more.
You want change now, or later?
I, for one, will not trade a bird in the hand for two in the bush. Especially not after fighting like hell to get it in the first place.
Or was “Change We Can Believe In!” supposed to be a second term issue?
Dennis Ross is Barack Obama’s special advisor on Iran. Dennis Ross is a pro-Israel hawk. The dude made almost a million bucks last year making speeches to wingnut welfare think tanks. Last year, Ross made more than $100,000.00 for shoveling propaganda on Fox News alone. Ross’s only interest in negotiations with Iran is to get them out of the way quickly in order to neutralize a public clamoring for peaceful negotiations, i.e., “alas, we tried negotiations, but that failed,” so that the US can go “kinetic” and bomb the bejeezuz out of the Iranians.
Widely viewed as a cog in the machine of Israel’s Washington lobby, Ross was not likely to be welcomed in Tehran–and he wasn’t. Iran’s state radio described his appointment as “an apparent contradiction” with Obama’s “announced policy to bring change in United States foreign policy.” Kazem Jalali, a hardline member of the Iranian parliament’s national security committee, joked that it “would have been so much better to pick Ariel Sharon or Ehud Olmert as special envoy to Iran.” More seriously, a former White House official says that Ross has told colleagues that he believes the United States will ultimately have no choice but to attack Iran in response to its nuclear program.
Dennis Ross is a hardcore wingnut to the bone. Dennis Ross pals around with war-mongering wingnuts, like Paul Wolfowitz and Andrew Marshall, and helped Martin Indyk of AIPAC fame launch the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP).
In case you haven’t noticed, there is a Talking Point War, developing around the “validity” of the Public Option.
There is very much at stake in this inevitable War of Words — not least of which is YOUR Future Health, Wealth, and peace of mind.
Of course, the forces of the Status Quo, will do everything within their Financial Power, to convince you that a non-profit “Public Option” in Health Care — is against your best interests!That it is anti-American! … That a Public Option is somehow an “inferior” product. (says who, btw?)
Just don’t buy what their selling, because really it’s someone else’s “best interests” that those Talking Point warriors, really have in mind:
Beware of Big Business’ next “Bait and Switch”!
(Whether it be some amorphous “co-op” idea, or some other shiny object, like promising to finally “play nicely now”.)
In the tense aftermath of Iran’s fiercely contested presidential election between the incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and reform candidate, Mir Hossein Mousavi . . .
according to Iran’s Interior Ministry, the final count from Iran’s presidential election gave 62.6 percent of the vote to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and 33.75 to Mir Hossein Mousavi, “a former prime minister who has become the hero of a youth-driven movement seeking greater liberties.”
Ahmadinejad only got 62 percent of the vote? Those slackers who “counted the votes” for him obviously didn’t count them with enough enthusiasm. Government hacks counting the votes for Saddam Hussein always gave him at least 95 percent of the vote. Government hacks counting the votes for Ferdinand Marcos always gave him at least 98 percent of the vote. Government hacks counting the votes for Idi Amin always gave him at least 150 percent of the votes.
Ahmadinejad only got a feeble 62 percent of the vote, but that was plenty good enough for Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei . . .
who is urging Iranians to unite behind Ahmadinejad. He told the nation that Ahmadinejad’s “landslide win” over reformer Mousavi in Iran’s presidential election was a “divine assessment” and a “real feast”.
BILL MOYERS: Finally, you know by now that in our nation’s capital on Wednesday, an elderly white supremacist and anti-Semite is alleged to have walked into the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum with a rifle and killed a security guard before being brought down himself. 88 years old!
You will know, too, of the recent killing in church of Dr. George Tiller, one of the few doctors in the country still performing late term abortions. It was evidence that violence works. His family has now announced that his Kansas clinic will not be reopened………..Rest Found Here
