Saturday, November 08, 2008

A soldier dies in Baghdad, treaty still iffy

Today the US military announced:

A Multi-National Division -- Baghdad Soldier died of wounds and two Soldiers were wounded in a blast in northern Baghdad Nov. 8. The Soldiers were wounded when the vehicle they were traveling in was struck by an improvised explosive device at approximately noon. The Soldiers were quickly transported to the medical facility; however, one Soldier later succumbed to the wounds. The Soldiers' names are being withheld pending notification of next of kin. The names of the service members are announced through the U.S. Department of Defense Official Website at http://www.defenselink.mil/ . The announcements are made on the Website no earlier than 24 hours after notification of the service member's primary next of kin.

The announcement brings the total number of US service members killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war to 4193 and to three for the month of November thus far.

And that's the full announcement -- included for the factually challenged who e-mail whenever DoD makes a death announcement (and names the dead) despite M-NF never announcing the death. As outlined above, DoD is supposed to announce the name. The death is supposed to be announced via M-NF.

The treaty masquerading as a Status Of Forces Agreement remains in the news. Liz Sly's "U.S. ultimatum spooks Iraq" (Chicago Tribune) explains:

The Iraqi government is coming around to the view that it would be better to sign a security deal with the Bush administration than to wait to strike a deal with President-elect Barack Obama, spurred in part by fresh U.S. concessions as well as threats by the U.S. to suspend all operations in Iraq if there is no deal by the end of the year, according to Iraqi officials.
The political mood began to shift more than a week ago, before Obama's election victory, after the U.S. delivered a stiff warning that if there is no deal by the end of the year, the U.S. military will be forced to suspend all its operations in Iraq, including the provision of many services such as air-traffic control as well as campaigns against the insurgency.
That appears to have given government officials pause, said Mahmoud Othman, a Kurdish legislator. "The Iraqi government realizes they still need the Americans," he said. "They still cannot survive on their own."

Ken Fireman and Daniel Williams (Bloomberg News) file a report maintaining that Iraq may decide to wait (until after Barack Obama is sworn in?) because al-Maliki's spokesperson Ali al-Dabbagh stated on Iraqi television Friday more meet ups between the US and Iraq were required on the treaty. It is unlikely (though not impossible) that Iraq will wait until after December 31st to enter into some form of agreement.

In the New York Times, Katherine Zoepf's "Followers of Shiite Cleric Reject Iraq Security Pact" also covers the treaty and includes:

In his Friday sermon in Sadr City, Mr. Battat mocked offers by Massoud Barzani, president of the Kurdistan Regional Government, to accept more American troops in Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq if the pact was not signed.
"This isn't constitutional, Mr. Barzani," Mr. Battat said. "You can take the Americans any time if you want them."



The following community sites have updated since Friday morning:

Rebecca's Sex and Politics and Screeds and Attitude;
Betty's Thomas Friedman Is a Great Man;
Cedric's Cedric's Big Mix;
Kat's Kat's Korner;
Mike's Mikey Likes It!;
Elaine's Like Maria Said Paz;
Wally's The Daily Jot;
Trina's Trina's Kitchen;
Ruth's Ruth's Report;
Marcia's SICKOFITRADLZ;
and Stan's Oh Boy It Never Ends

The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.



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Friday, November 07, 2008

Iraq snapshot

Friday, November 7, 2008.  Chaos and violence continue, the US military announces another death, the pathetic voices of the left continue cooing while stronger voices from the left speak to realities, Talabani makes an announcement, and more.
 
Tuesday a presidential election was held in the US.  It could have been about something but that would have required actual issues.  Instead it was stroke, fondle and feather-kiss Barack by All Things Media Big and Small while real candidates were shut out of the coverage -- by all outlets and Amy Goodman a crappy once a month nod to Ralph or Cynthia didn't mean s**t when every day you swung that tired ass under the street lamp once more for Barack.  In 2004, we heard "never again."  Never again would we allow the movement to end the illegal war to be derailed by a presidential campaign.   That got tossed aside and ripped to shreds, now didn't it?
 
 
Let's move over to Loony Tune Stephen Zune who lied in a 2008 article, never corrected it and, before you knew it, all the simple minded were running with (Dahr Jamail, come on down!).  No, Hillary did not visit Iraq only once.  "Dr." Zunes, correct your lying mouth.  He, of course, refused to.  And he's back to lie some more at ZNet: "Obama's honest and prescient understanding of Iraq prior to the invasion gives hope that as president he will be less inclined to engage in such acts of reckless militarism."  Apparently Zunes is back on the meds that regulate his intense mood swings (sadly, the meds do nothing for his delusions). The 2002 speech was an embarrassment and nothing for the peace movement to praise.  There's been some question about that speech so let's put Zuney to the side for a moment.  The speech did take place.  It is recorded.  On video.  The reaction from the crowd is the only reason Team Barack had to lie and claim that the speech didn't exist.  The crowd wasn't applauding, they weren't cheering.  It was a meek and embarrassing speech (delivered to a sparse crowd, it should be noted).  When Barack finished there wasn't even polite applause.  But Zuney liked it and, if you're off your meds, you may as well.
 
Loony Tunes Zunes goes on to argue that if the War Hawk Barack isn't a dove, so what, because "he owes his nomination -- and therefore his election -- to those who opposed the invasion of Iraq".  Yeah, try collecting on that, Stephen.  Hey, remember Stephen Zunes' snit-fit at Barack a few months back?  When Barack picked Joe Biden as his running mate?  The Joe Biden who supported the illegal war?  But Loony wants you to believe that Barack's indebted to the 'anti-war' 'movement.'  (That would be the same Barack who punked Iraq Veterans Against the War in Denver -- they were protesting and getting attention, he sent out a Texan known for lying -- one who even lied for W. -- out to trick them and they fell for it and gave the media a lot of statements about how groovy Barack was.  As soon as the protest ended so did Barack's 'promise' to them.)  Zunes uses phrases like "surely Barack is aware of this" and what's really hilarious is that someone who whored his ass for Barack as hard Stephen did has to guess as to what Barack is and isn't aware of. But a debt is owed, Zunes maintains, and pressure will be applied!  In the real world, Mickey Z points out:
 
 

While the savvy strategist/activists of the Left harbor their delusions of grandeur about their ability to sway the Prince of Hope, here's a tiny bit what they--and all of us--have allowed to happen without exerting our "influence": epidemics of preventable diseases; the poisoning of our air, water, and food (including mother's breast milk); global warming, climate change, animal and plant extinctions, disappearing honeybees, destruction of the rain forest, topsoil depletion, etc.; one-third of Americans either uninsured or underinsured in terms of health care; 61% of corporations do not even pay taxes; presidential lies, electoral fraud, limited debates, etc.; the largest prison population on the planet; corporate control of public land, airwaves, and pensions; overt infringement of our civil liberties; bloated defense budget, unilateral military interventions, war crimes committed in our name, legalization of torture, blah, blah, blah...  

Before you know it, the US government will start spying on American citizens and detaining prisoners without charges while allowing corporations to ravage the earth in pursuit of profit, wiping out entire eco-systems in the process.  Oops . . . sorry: they're already doing all that and the mighty Left is fighting back by supporting Obama?   

Everywhere I went on Election Day, I was asked by friend and stranger alike: "Did you vote?" Once the polling booths closed, I could be 100% certain I'd not be asked another politically motivated question by such people for another four years. No one would be rushing up to me and demanding to know if I was planning to do anything about, say, FISA, the death penalty, the PATRIOT Act, homelessness, or factory farming. The election is over. Obama has won. For 99% of the Left, that means their work is done until 2012. It's time to gloat and reap all the rewards, right?   

My prediction: The only pressure that will be consistently exerted by those on the Left will be the pressure of their soft butts on their couch cushions as they sit back to smugly watch Jon Stewart, Keith Olbermann, Stephen Colbert, and Bill Maher.

 
Zunes can never stick to the facts and, having a word count, has to resort frequently to falsehoods.  Which is how you end up with his claim that the likes of Susan Rice (she works herself into a war frenzy at the drop of a hat) and Our Modern Day Carrie Nations Samantha Power (Sammy, get the axe!) are "innovative and enlightened members of the foreign policy establishment".  Keep dreaming and keep lying Zunes.  If you told the truth at this late date, your head might fall out. For reality on the likes of Sammy Power, see John R. MacArthur's "Pro-War Liberals Frozen in the Headlights" (Common Dreams).  Or maybe you want to refer to  Howard Zinn on Power's "myopia":

She believes that "there is a moral difference between setting out to destroy as many civilians as possible and killing civilians unintentionally and reluctantly in pursuit of a military objective." Of course, there's a difference, but is there a "moral" difference? That is, can you say one action is more reprehensible than the other?  In countless news briefings, Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney, responding to reporters' questions about civilian deaths in bombing, would say those deaths were "unintentional" or "inadvertent" or "accidental," as if that disposed of the problem. In the Vietnam War, the massive deaths of civilians by bombing were justified in the same way by Lyndon Johnson, Hubert Humphrey, Richard Nixon and various generals.
 
 Or maybe you'd prefer Edward S. Herman (ZNet) explaining Power's belief system?

She believes that "there is a moral difference between setting out to destroy as many civilians as possible and killing civilians unintentionally and reluctantly in pursuit of a military objective." Of course, there's a difference, but is there a "moral" difference? That is, can you say one action is more reprehensible than the other?
In countless news briefings, Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney, responding to reporters' questions about civilian deaths in bombing, would say those deaths were "unintentional" or "inadvertent" or "accidental," as if that disposed of the problem. In the Vietnam War, the massive deaths of civilians by bombing were justified in the same way by Lyndon Johnson, Hubert Humphrey, Richard Nixon and various generals.
 
No, it doesn't sound very enlightened but then Stephen Zunes is the Minute Rice 'Scholar' of the campus set.  Here's Noam Chomsky (via ZNet) explaining the basics re: Sammy Power, "I don't think, incidentally, that it would be fair to criticize Power for her extraordinary services to state violence and terror. I am sure she is a decent and honorable person, and sincerely believes that she really is condemning the US leadership and political culture. From a desk at the Carr Center for Human Rights at the Kennedy School at Harvard, that's doubtless how it looks."
 
 
Let's spread the joy and turn to the Pathetic Dave Lindorff who writes (at CounterPunch), "And don't tell me 'Good, we should have all voted for Ralph Nader.'  The political left in the US is a pathetic joke."  Some parts of it are.  Such as Dave Lindorff.  Dave Lindorff is a PATHETIC JOKE.  He will die one because he made himself one.  In February, Third noted a Barack supporter and his IDIOTIC reasons for supporting Barack:
 
I think it is ridiculous not to acknowledge that a black candidate at this level is fundamentally different from all white candidates who have come before or who are now competing. the more so a black candidate who has risked jail by doing drugs, and who has relatives TODAY living in the Third World (Kenya).
 
The person making a PATHETIC FOOL of himself?  That's Dave Lindorff.   Yes, Dave Lindorff supported Barack because he was "a black candidate who has risked jail by doing drugs".  It doesn't get anymore pathetic than that.  Davey-Boy thought Barack was fighting the brave fight, just, no doubt, as Amy Winehouse does on the streets of London today.  The same 'civil rights' battle that River Phoenix gave his life for, Dave?
 
Dave Lindorff is an idiot, he is pathetic and he has proven that In These Times had good reason to end their relationship with him over his 'curious' assertions.  We stood by Crazy Ass back then.  We walked away after he made a frothy-mouthed fool of himself in February.  You can't go home again, Crazy Ass.  This is the world and bed you made, live with it.  Pablo Ouziel (Dissident Voice) tracks the continued disengration of left 'voices':
 
 
The new era of voting for the lesser of the two evils has penetrated the core of America's critical intellectual community, and some of the biggest voices for change have endorsed Obama. In effect, what has taken place is the union between those opposed to imperial ideology and those endorsing it. Although this serious event has gone largely unnoticed, American intellectuals will need to reflect on its consequences seriously if they are to contribute to the building of a stable future for humanity as a whole, and in particular to mending the tarnished corrupt fabric of American society.  
One American intellectual, James Petras, has been able to identify the direct social consequences of such a paradigm shift and prior to the elections has publicly expressed his views in an article titled "The Elections and the Responsibility of the Intellectual to Speak Truth to Power: Twelve Reasons to Reject Obama and Support Nader/McKinney."
As the title of the article clearly states, Petras voices the reasons why intellectuals have the responsibility of voting against Obama just like they should vote against McCain. In regards to those intellectuals who have endorsed Obama he says: 
They are what C. Wright Mills called 'crackpot realists', abdicating their responsibility as critical intellectuals. In purporting to support the 'lesser evil' they are promoting the 'greater evil': The continuation of four more years of deepening recession, colonial wars and popular alienation.   
After listening last night to Obama's first speech after his victory, a victory he said was of the people, what Petras is saying seems disturbingly accurate when looked at through the prism of critical discourse analysis. One can look back now to the presidency of George W. Bush and listen to his rhetoric. What has been his message throughout the last 8 years? When Obama's core messages are compared to Bush's, it becomes apparent that the coming presidential plans are not too different to current presidential policies.  
Even more disturbing, is the fact that when Bush spoke throughout his presidency there was always a slight cynical reaction by the majority of the public, as most of the surveys have shown time and time again. However, last night the cynicism seemed to have vanished and the hope of a new American century was reborn with full force, to the clapping thunder and joyous splendour of the reborn American people. With every word uttered by Obama one could see how the empire was not gone, Bush almost killed it, now Obama the symbol of hope, together with all the American people in unity, are going to reconstruct their country and the world, restabilising America's faltering hegemony.
 
All of the above effects the illegal war.  The defocusing on what mattered, the hijacking of the peace movement result in the illegal war being prolonged.  The decisions Barack will be making (and receiving excuses on from Panhandle Media) will prolong the Iraq War. All of the appointments will say something (usually, "Empire! Empire! Empire!").  We'd planned to be dark after this day so you can see some of the above as raided from what would have been the year-in-review but it's also true that some topics we'll ignore.  Rahm Emanuel is now Barack's Chief of Staff.  I know Rahm.  If he makes a real ass out of himself, we'll call him out here or have a laugh over it, otherwise we'll ignore him.  (You can think back to the way Joe Biden was covered here after he became the v.p. nominee.)  You can go elsewhere community wide for negative criticism of Rahm (Rebecca doesn't like him) and we can highlight that here (or other trusted voices from outside the community) but unless Rahm makes a real ass out of himself on a particular day, I'm not going to be weighing in on him here. (And no compliments or defense unless he's the target of a pile-on.)  Example, Joshua Frank (Dissident Voice) offers, "For starters, Emanuel is a shameless neoliberal with close ties to the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC), even co-authoring a strategy book with DLC president Bruce Reed." Tariq Ali (CounterPunch) opines, "The same day that Spain denied the son of Osama Bin Laden political asylum, Obama appointed the son of an Irgun terrorist as his Chief of Staff.  Osama's son declared that he did not agree with his father's actions or opinions.  Rahm Israel Emmanuel is an Israel-firster, a pro-war DLC hack and bully."
 
Meanwhile the Whig Standard editorializes today that Barack should use "soft power" and argue Barack "should start by reaffirming his greatness by demonstrating to the world the 'enduring power of our ideals.'  He should start by reaffirming his campaign pledge to stand is in U.S.-occupied Iraq where Assyrians -- an ancient Christian people indigenous to northern Iraq -- are the victims of a jihadist campaign of ethnic cleansing.  The U.S. must accept some blame for this crisis.  By deposing Iraiq dictator Saddam Hussein, the U.S. unwittingly unleashed sectarian forces that are bent on destroying religious pluralism in Iraq."  Meanwhile the National Council of Churches in Australia issues an alert and calls for their country to take in more Iraqi reufgees and to provide more funds for external and internal Iraqi refugees.  They note:
 
Violence and persecution against minority groups in Iraq continues, including communities of Christians which have been in existence for over 1500 years. The Assyrian Church of the East, as one of the Churches most affected, has mobilised itself worldwide to call attention to the crisis, and seek help where help can be found. Other Churches under extreme duress are the Syrian Orthodox, Coptic Orthodox, Armenian Apostolic, and Chaldean.   

Prior to 2003, 4% of Iraq's population was Christian. Yet 40% of Iraq's 2.2 million refugees are Christian, which indicates the seriousness and disproportionate degree of violence and persecution to which Iraqi Christians are being exposed. "No one has been untouched by grief either by personal loss or to see their country torn apart by violence," said Bishop Mar Meelis Zaia, Australian head of the Assyrian Church of the East. According to Church sources this exodus is the result of a campaign of violence, murder, terrorism, threats, and intimidation targeted at the Christian minority.   

Attacks have escalated since September, when the electoral law was changed to remove the system of quotas that ensured minority groups representation on provincial councils. The result of government investigations and the arrest of about 12 people in relation to the latest wave of attacks are being awaited.  

The international Assyrian Christian community is raising money to help. Local parishes are collecting money to help the Assyrian Church of the East Relief Organisation (ACERO) provide aid for people in the city of Mosul, where the recent escalation of attacks has been most severe. In the long run the hope of those fleeing the country is for a self-governing administrative region within Iraq.  
 
The Journal of Turkish Weekly reports that Chaldean-Assryian Council chair Jamil Zito declaring, "Iraq's Christians were hoping that various political factions would accept the UN Mission in Iraq proposal".  Iraq may hold provincial elections in January (or not).  Article 50 provided for religious minority representation.  Article 50 was stripped out of the bill before Parliament passed it.  A compromise was proposed this week which Iraqi Christians find insulting.  Earlier this week, Sam Dagher and Mohammed al-Obaidi (New York Times) explained that Christians would get one seat each on Baghdad, Basra and Nineveh council
while Yazidis would get one seat on Nineveh for a total of 4 seats combined while Article 50 guaranteed the religious minorities 13 seats and the UN proposed 12 (the United Nations proposal came after Article 50 was deleted).  Today Waleed Ibrahim, Tim Cocks and Philippa Fletcher (Reuters) report that the office of Iraqi President Jalal Talabani issued a statement yesterday about his meet up with Christians, "They expressed worries about the negative impact of the law passed in parliament, which they said gives them a small number of seats and does not protect their rights.  They asked the [presidency] council to reject this law.  The president showed full support to Christian and other minorities (and) . . . promised he will not sign any law that could deprive any Iraqi group of their rights."  If you thought that or the treaty might have resulted in questions at the White House today you missed Tony Fratto's and the press' embarrassing performances. 
 
The treaty?  Leila Fadel, Nancy A. Youssef and Warren P. Strobel (McClatchy Newspapers) report, "Many Iraqi officials are now calling the status-of-forces accord, or SOFA, 'the withdrawal agreement,' possibly as a way of marketing it to a wary public."  Ernesto Londono, Mary Beth Sheridan and Karen DeYoung (Washington Post) quote government spokesperson Ali al-Dabbagh, "Iraqis would like to know and see a fixed date" and that the US has to be prepared for more negotiatings while the US Embassy maintains (as does the US State Dept) that what Iraq has been given is the "final text."   Daniel Williams (Bloomberg News) adds that Hoshyar Zebari, the country's foreign minister, has stated that the treaty will be finalized with "the current administration."  AFP reports that al-Sadr follower Sheikh Sattar al-Batat, "Every Iraqi should read this agreement and decide for himself whether he agrees or disagree with it. . . . No one in his right mind can accept this agreement, so how can we?"  NYT's Katherine Zoepf (for the paper's other holding, International Herald Tribune) quotes al-Batat declaring, "We will continue to condemn the Iraqi-American pact because it will legislate the American presence in Iraq. Sadr City has lost 4,300 martyrs since the invasion, so how could we accept this agreement? We say no to the Iraqi government if it wishes to sign anything." And Alissa J. Rubin (New York Times) notes that Sunnis are also nervous over the treaty and Rubin also notes, "The Iraqi government, made up of exiles who were able to rise to power only as a result of the American invasion, has been looking for a way to support the pact without appearing to be kowtowing to Americans."
 
Turning to some of today's reported violence . . .
 
Bombings?
  
Sahar Issa (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a Baghdad roadside bombing killed Haider Hassoon (an Iraqi refugee who'd just reclaimed his home) and left six people wounded, a Baghdad sticky bombing that claimed 2 lives and left seven people injured and a Diyala Province roadside bombing targeting "Awakening" Council members -- two were killed, five more wounded.
 
 
Today the US military announced: "A Coalition force Soldier died in a non-combat related incident Nov. 6 in Kirkuk province. The name of the deceased is being withheld pending notification of next of kin and release by the Department of Defense. The incident is still under investigation." The announcement brings the number of US service members killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war to 4191.
 
Public radio note, Monday on WBAI (2:00 pm EST), Cat Radio Cafe features: "Writer/performer Danny Hoch on Taking Over, his hip-hop infused play about New York gentrification; and Coney Island documentarian Charles Denson, photographer Claude Samton, and PS 225/ Shell Bank JHS/Abraham Lincoln HS graduate Sheila Samton on The Puffin Room's multi-media celebration of Coney Island Maybe. Hosted by Janet Coleman and David Dozer." And TV note, Sunday on CBS' 60 Minutes Steve Kroft explores president-elect Barack's "brain trust," Scott Pelley explores the final destinations for discarded cell phones, monitors, etc and Morley Safer speaks with pioneer Ted Turner.
 
Community member Stan started his own site yesterday entitled Oh Boy It Never Ends. He's still playing around with it and has so far offered "Good for Nader" and "Stan 411" and "Robin Morgan". Also posting yesterday, Mike's "Joshua Frank, Murphy, Cocktail Weinie Norman" covers the strong and the pathetic, Marcia's "A lot including my cousin is blogging!" is a grab bag post on a multitude of topics, Ruth's "McKinney results, Doug Ireland" continues Ruth's following of election results, Kat's "Pathetic Green Party" explores the planned uselessness of a political party, Cedric's "And she smells like urine" and Wally's "THIS JUST IN! TINA FEY'S A SKANK!" (joint-post) pulls a Jim and assigns Ava and I an article (joking, it falls under the topic we're already covering) and Rebecca's "gail collins is an idiot" covers the embarrassment of Collins. On the Green Party, Kimberly and Ian Wilder (On The Wilder Side) are advocating for action and not waiting around until Januray 2012 to start figuring out what to do:

What next for the national Green Party? Let's send Malik Rahim to Congress
The Green Party has a golden opportunity to elect a Congressperson next month. Let's work together, in this lull after the election, to focus on a powerful strategy and a winnable race.
It has created such interesting timing, that the election for Congress, District 2, in Louisiana was changed to December 6, 2008. And, we have one of our strongest Green Party candidates running in that race. In the vacuum of the November elections being over, this is a chance for green throughout the country to focus their energy in one place, on one candidate, who has the qualifications, resume and charisma to win.
Malik Rahim has credentials. He was a member of the Black Panther Party. He was a founder of Common Ground, an organization dedicated to supporting poor and working class people in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. Malik's story has been in a variety of national media outlets. And, Malik's work after Hurrican Katrina is a story in Amy Goodman's book, "Standing Up To The Madness." Malike gave one of the most compelling and inspiring speeches at the Green Party National Convention in Chicago this summer. (Video of his speech is: here.)


 

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US military announces another death

Today the US military announced: "A Coalition force Soldier died in a non-combat related incident Nov. 6 in Kirkuk province. The name of the deceased is being withheld pending notification of next of kin and release by the Department of Defense. The incident is still under investigation." The announcement brings the number of US service members killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war to 4191.

Meanwhile Brian Bennett's "Will Obama Have to Adjust His Timetable on Iraq?" (Time magazine):

Senior U.S. military officials will likely advise Barack Obama to adjust his campaign pledge to withdraw all U.S. combat troops from Iraq by mid-2010. While promising a 16-month timetable for getting all U.S. fighting forces out, Obama repeatedly insisted on what he calls a "responsible" withdrawal. Pulling nearly all U.S. troops and equipment out of Iraq in 16 months is "physically impossible," says a top officer involved in briefing the President-elect on U.S. operations in Iraq. That schedule would create a bottleneck of equipment and troops in the south of Iraq and Kuwait where brigades repair, clean and load vehicles and weapons for the trip home, said the official. Others say U.S. could conceivably pull out on that time scale, although that would require leaving more equipment behind. A more important concern that, officers believe the security gains in Iraq would be put at risk if troops were withdrawn before the Iraqi security forces are in a position to protect their own communities and borders.

Adjust his position? He told CNN he'd do just that on June 5th. It's not a promise, it never was. Remember Tom Hayden's meltdown July 4th when he grasped that? (In fairness to Tom, at least he finally made it an issue. Even after he did that, others pretended not to notice, the way they had all along.) From Third's "Letters to An Old Sell Out: Iraq" (July 6, 2008):

In "Obama's Position on Iraq Could Put His Candidacy at Risk" (Aging Socialite's Cat Litterbox), Tom Hayden declared last week:



The most shocking aspect of Samantha Powers' forced resignation earlier this year was not that she called Hillary Clinton a "monster" off-camera, but that she flatly stated that Obama would review his whole position on Iraq once becoming president. Again, no one in the media or rival campaigns questioned whether this assertion by Powers was true. Since Obama credited Powers with helping for months in writing his book, The Audacity of Hope, her comments on his inner thinking should have been pounced upon by the pundits.



No one questioned it, Tom-Tom? Check The Washington Post's archives. It wasn't that the media refused to challenge it (or that this site refused to challenge it, check our archives) it's that the Barack 'movement' (a fringe group of largely White eggheads in Panhandle Media) refused to even mention it! Did Jeremy Schaill rip Barack a new one? No. Did Amy Goodman immediately report it on Democracy Someday!? Hell no.


hayden


But let's back up. Tom-Tom's shocked (!). Elaine and C.I. know very well you've lived a life estranged from the truth; however, that doesn't give you the right to lie. Samantha Power made the news cycle on March 7th (a Friday). You can refer to that day's "Iraq Snapshot." In fact, we are referencing that at length (and overruling C.I. on it):



Meanwhile, it was not a good day to be Our Modern Day Carrie Nations or, as Samantha Power prefers to be called, "the humanitarian War Hawk." Last night, The Scotsman was making news with Power's insults of US Senator Hillary Clinton and "the poor" in America and, generally, just flashing that foul mouth everyone knows about but generally ignores. The morning started with Sammy Power expressing 'sorrow.' She wasn't sorry and we're not going to play around with this story. Here's reality, the press was lining up this morning the stories on this and talking to one another (as they are prone to do) for background examples of other times Sammy Power has personally (and destructively) insulted Hillary Clinton. When it was obvious that those stories would come out if she stayed with the campaign she 'resigned.' At The New Statesman, she was flaunting her War Hawk nature in an interview (as well as that foul mouth). [Personal note: I'm sure I could match Sammy swear word for swear word, but I wasn't planning on becoming Secretary of State.] Lynn Sweet (Chicago Sun-Times) was one of the first out of the gate noting that Sammy Power "resigned as a foreign policy advisor to Sen. Barack Obama" this afternoon. Her calling Hillary a "monster" did matter, it was off sides -- both for a future Secretary of State as well as for a professor at Harvard. It's a shame Obama still lacks the leadership to take control of his campaign -- that would have required firing Power. Instead she resigned indicating that he's unable to run a campaign as well as unable to tell the truth. Power -- who also went to work for Obama in 2005 when he was first elected to the US Senate (November 2004) -- also had to deal with the BBC interview she'd given. Barack Obama has not promised to pull ALL troops out of Iraq in 16 months. He has promised the American people that "combat" troops would be removed. But promises, promises (as Dionne Warwick once sang) . . .

Stephen Sackur: You said that he'll revisit it [the decision to pull troops] when he goes to the White House. So what the American public thinks is a commitment to get combat forces out within sixteen months, isn't a commitment is it?

Samantha Power: You can't make a commitment in whatever month we're in now, in March of 2008 about what circumstances are going to be like in January 2009. We can't even tell what Bush is up to in terms of troops pauses and so forth. He will of course not rely upon some plan that he's crafted as a presidential candidate or as a US Senator.

Which would mean Mr. Pretty Speeches has been lying to the American people. (Add the "AGAIN!")

Her rise was swift, her fall even faster. Our Modern Day Carrie Nations took part in the "Bring the troops home and send them to Darfur" nonsense. [For more on that nutso crowd, see Julie Hollar's "The Humanitarian Tempatation" (Extra!).] Despite presenting herself recently as against the Iraq War from the start, the public record has never backed that up. But it is true that she wanted wars in Africa and was selling them under "humanitarian" guise. "Stop the killing!" she cried but if she really wanted to stop the killing, she might have tried to speak out against the ongoing genocide in Iraq (which has also produced the largest refugee crisis in the world). She didn't care about that. Probably because it demonstrates that sending armed forces in is not an answer. Again, if Barack Obama had any leadership abilities, he would have announced today that he fired his longterm advisor. He did not, she resigned. (She foolishly doesn't grasp that this is her Alexander Haig moment and there is no comeback.) Power was not a campaigner, she was a high level, longterm foreign policy advisor being groomed to be the next Secretary of State. As Krissah Williams (Washington Post) notes, Senator Clinton's response to Power's BBC interview was to note Power's agreement that Obama's pledge to have "combat" troops out in 16 months was never more than a "best-case scenario". Hillary Clinton: "Senator Obama has made his speech opposing Iraq in 2002 and the war in Iraq the core of his campaign, which makes these comments especially troubling. While Senator Obama campaigns on his [pledge] to end the war, his top advisers tell people abroad that he will not rely on his own plan should he become president. This is the latest example of promising the American people one thing on the campaign trail and telling people in other countries another. You saw this with NAFTA as well."



The Clinton camp didn't call it out Tom-Tom?

March 8th, one day after the news broke, the Clinton campaign issued "MEMO: Obama's Iraq Plan: Just Words:"

Once again, it looks like Senator Obama is telling voters one thing while his campaign says those words should not be mistaken for serious action. After months of speeches from Senator Obama promising a hard end date to the Iraq war, his top foreign policy adviser that counseled his campaign during that period is on the record saying that Senator Obama will 'not rely on some plan that he's crafted as a presidential candidate or a U.S. Senator. Voters already have serious questions about whether Senator Obama is ready to be Commander-in-Chief. Now there are questions about whether he's seriou about the Iraq plan he's discussed for the last year on the campaign trail.
Senator Obama has made hard end dates about Iraq a centerpiece of his campaign and has repeatedly attacked Senator Clinton for not being clear about her intentions with regard to troop withdrawal.
It turns out those attacks and speeches were just words. And if you can't trust Senator Obama's words, what's left?



Want to try lying again, Tom-Tom? They immediately sprung into action. (And that one release wasn't all they did. We'll note at least one more thing but they hit on it. It was the failure of our 'left' media -- Goodman, et al -- to cover the story that kept it from getting traction.)

Where was Panhandle Media? Tom-Tom, we know where you were. C.I. outlined it in the same snapshot:



Meanwhile Tom Hayden again offers Barack advice from the heart, from love. At Common Dreams, Hayden feels that, "The only policy difference favoring Obama that goes straight to the issue of 'experience' is Iraq. It no longer is enough that Obama opposed the war five years ago, especially if it appears that there are no differences between the candidates now. For whatever reason, Obama has allowed Clinton to appear to take an identical stand on the war. Is that true? Or is it time for Obama to issue a further clarification of his position separating him from both Clinton and McCain? The peace movement and media can play a role here." Tom then asks, "Does Clinton propose a timetable for withdrawing combat troops, like Obama does?" Apparently Tom missed Sammy's interview -- Obama has no proposal. As Sammy notes, things change, who can say? Should we expect Hayden's endorsement of Hillary anytime soon? Or will he again plan to 'represent' the peace movement by covering for the 'anti-war' candidate -- one whose own foreign policy advisor (she was that when she gave the interview) informs is saying words he'd not planning to live up to?



The Washington Post was blogging it (they would also do an article on it), the Clinton campaign was issuing a statement (they would later issue this release), Boston Globe offered Peter Canellos' "Comments raise questions about Obama, his advisers" and where was Panhandle Media? Covering for Barack.

You did. So did John Nichols. C.I. called out John Nichols nonsense on Saturday March 8th (the day after Power's remarks were known) when Johnny Five-Cents was lamenting "Samantha Power and the Danger of Gotcha Politics." Not only did John Nichols cover for Samantha Power (his post at The Nation is labeled "03/07/2008 @ 11:28 pm" meaning his article went up that Friday hours and hours after the "Iraq snapshot" calling out Power did -- isn't Johnny Five-Cents supposed to be a 'journalist'?), so did you. You want to show up on July 4th and blame the lack of attention to this story on the MSM when The Washington Post was blogging about it as the story broke, when they would go on to do a print report on it and yet Panhandle Media couldn't even be bothered with it?

Like Nichols, they were all lying. Davey D would go on to lament -- on KPFA's The Morning Show -- that Samantha "Powers" (it helps to know the name of the person you're broken up about, Davey) had left the campaign for (he said) calling Hillary a "monster." But let's stay with The Nation where Tom-Tom sits on the board. It never got into The Nation and he damn well knows that. Not on March 7th, not on March 8th. March 20th, Eric Alterman would feel the need to weigh in Power's leaving the campaign in "The Ritual Sacrifice of Samantha Power" and though he would note "monster" and "NAFTA," he never said a DAMN word about the BBC interview that entered the press cycle March 7th. He didn't say one DAMN word. It didn't stop there. Michael Massing's "The Power Conundrum" (published online May 22nd and in the June 9th issue of The Nation) found time to recount the "monster" remark which was rather strange since he was reviewing Power's book on the UN involvement in the Iraq War. Wouldn't the better thing to have referenced when reviewing a book on Iraq have been Power's remarks on Barack's so-called "promise"?


June 12th, John Nichols was back on the scene ["Students for Hillary, er, McCain (or McKinney)" -- what a wit and joy he must be for the others at the SciFi conventions] quoting a missive that referred to the "monster" incident. No need on his part to enlarge the topic and note Power's interview to the BBC.



March 12th -- five days after the Power remarks were in the news -- FIVE DAYS AFTER -- Air Berman was offering "It's Okay to be Intemperate!" (at The Nation's blog Campaign '08) and yet again recounting Samantha Power's 'unjust' departure over the "monster" remark (when not licking Hendrick Hertzberg's aging sack). Never once -- FIVE DAYS AFTER -- did Berman mention Power's remarks to the BBC. He would conclude his sad eulogy to Sammy (and presumably devote full attention to "Rick") with this, "Thanks to the events of the past week, campaign officials will be even more guarded when dealing with the media, and I don't blame them. It's an outcome that benefits no one." Apparently Ari thought he could help fight that trend by not telling readers what Samantha Power said about the Iraq 'promise'? It needs to be noted that the day the news broke, Ari Berman attempted to distract from Power's statement by filing "Clinton Does McCain's Bidding" which was nothing but his rummaging through old chat & chew transcripts in an effort to discredit Hillary on Iraq. Needless to say, he said nothing about Power. [As we noted in our March 9th in "Editorial: The Whores of Indymedia."]

What we got from the alleged 'independent' media (including The Nation) and from the alleged 'independent' web was inane defenses of War Hawk Samantha Power that avoided her Iraq remarks. Check out Josh Michah's Marshy & Hairy Butt Crack where Greg Sargent posted "New Hillary Campaign Video Seeks To Revive Samantha Power Controversy." It's a March 19th post and what does Sargent conclude of the commercial featuring Power revealing that Barack's 'promise' isn't a promise? A snippy: "Given that this is weeks-old story, the timing of its release is pretty obvious: The Hillary camp is hoping to use it to overshadow Obama's big Iraq speech today." That's from mind reader Greg Sargent and even then (and terming the commercial an "attack video"), check out the reaction of Josh's groupies (conditioned to salivate at the mention of Barack's name): "Ah, Hillary. Desperation becomes her," purrs one while Patagonia and das2003 lead the sizeable number who are offended and outraged that the video was even posted at Joshy's site.



Over at Mother Jones, David CornNuts kind-of sort of covered it (as C.I. noted March 10th) huffing ("An Ugly Moment for the Clinton Campaign," March 10th) that the campaign "took the unusual step of convening a second conference call of the day for reporters. And it was a sorry spectacle." (CornNuts, you went nuts.) Davey C writes "the Clintonites pounced on the comments" -- comments, pay attention Tom Hayden -- that Davey C immediately dismissed: "In other words, a campaign proposal is just that: a proposal. And only a fool would think that a military plan would be applied to reality unchaged a year after it was first devised." That's what happened Tommy Hayden -- AS YOU DAMN WELL KNOW -- Panhandle Media mainly ignored it and then the CornNuts crowd excused it and attacked Hillary for raising the issue. They lied repeatedly and we can outline that (mainly because we already have -- starting with John Nichols' LIE that Samantha Power and Hillary knew each other very well when Power told Charlie Rose they'd only met once). C.I. led on this at The Common Ills, but we all called it out at community sites and we didn't do it for one day or one week. We stayed on the story. The one Tom Hayden couldn't bother to write about until July 4th -- even though it took place March 7th. The Washington Post, The Boston Globe and others in the MSM did cover it and the response was silence from 'independent' media and attacks from the Barack groupies in comments and e-mails to the outlets.

So, no, Time, there is no promise, there is no pledge. That's reality and on that topic, Alissa J. Rubin gets Iraq on the front page of New York Times today and we'll note this from the article:

The Iraqi government, made up of exiles who were able to rise to power only as a result of the American invasion, has been looking for a way to support the pact without appearing to be kowtowing to Americans.

Has the reporting section of the paper ever told such truth on Iraq before?

Public radio note, Monday on WBAI (2:00 pm EST), Cat Radio Cafe features: "Writer/performer Danny Hoch on Taking Over, his hip-hop infused play about New York gentrification; and Coney Island documentarian Charles Denson, photographer Claude Samton, and PS 225/ Shell Bank JHS/Abraham Lincoln HS graduate Sheila Samton on The Puffin Room's multi-media celebration of Coney Island Maybe. Hosted by Janet Coleman and David Dozer." And TV note, Sunday on CBS' 60 Minutes:

" Obama's Brain Trust
Steve Kroft goes behind the scenes on election night to speak to the brains whose strategy propelled Barack Obama into the White House.
The Wasteland
Where do the millions of computer monitors, cell phones and other electronic refuse our society generates end up? Some of it is shipped illegally from the U.S. to China, reports Scott Pelley, where it is harming the environment and the people who salvage its valuable components. | Watch Video
Ted Turner
The nearly 70-year-old media mogul looks back on a life marked by huge successes, steep downfalls and public feuds that have made him an American legend. Morley Safer reports. "

Community member Stan started his own site yesterday entitled Oh Boy It Never Ends. He's still playing around with it and has so far offered "Good for Nader" and "Stan 411" and "Robin Morgan". Also posting yesterday, Mike's "Joshua Frank, Murphy, Cocktail Weinie Norman" covers the strong and the pathetic, Marcia's "A lot including my cousin is blogging!" is a grab bag post on a multitude of topics, Ruth's "McKinney results, Doug Ireland" continues Ruth's following of election results, Kat's "Pathetic Green Party" explores the planned uselessness of a political party, Cedric's "And she smells like urine" and Wally's "THIS JUST IN! TINA FEY'S A SKANK!" (joint-post) pulls a Jim and assigns Ava and I an article (joking, it falls under the topic we're already covering) and Rebecca's "gail collins is an idiot" covers the embarrassment of Collins. On the Green Party, Kimberly and Ian Wilder (On The Wilder Side) are advocating for action and not waiting around until Januray 2012 to start figuring out what to do:

What next for the national Green Party? Let's send Malik Rahim to Congress
The Green Party has a golden opportunity to elect a Congressperson next month. Let's work together, in this lull after the election, to focus on a powerful strategy and a winnable race.
It has created such interesting timing, that the election for Congress, District 2, in Louisiana was changed to December 6, 2008. And, we have one of our strongest Green Party candidates running in that race. In the vacuum of the November elections being over, this is a chance for green throughout the country to focus their energy in one place, on one candidate, who has the qualifications, resume and charisma to win.
Malik Rahim has credentials. He was a member of the Black Panther Party. He was a founder of Common Ground, an organization dedicated to supporting poor and working class people in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. Malik's story has been in a variety of national media outlets. And, Malik's work after Hurrican Katrina is a story in Amy Goodman's book, "Standing Up To The Madness." Malike gave one of the most compelling and inspiring speeches at the Green Party National Convention in Chicago this summer. (Video of his speech is: here.)


The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.




















kimberly wilder
Posted by at

It's a treaty, someone tell the administration

The United States delivered Thursday what it said was the final text of the controversial accord on the stationing of U.S. forces in Iraq, but Iraq said more talks are needed before the government can accept it.
"We have gotten back to the Iraqi government with a final text. Through this step, we have concluded the process on the U.S. side," said Susan Ziadeh, the U.S. Embassy spokeswoman in Baghdad. "Iraq will now need to take it forward through their own process."
The accord, which calls for complete withdrawal of U.S. forces by the end of 2011, has been the subject of tense negotiations for the past seven months.
According to State Department officials, the United States yielded to several important Iraqi demands, including Baghdad's proposal to inspect mail and cargo for U.S. forces in Iraq. One official said he did not know the details of how those inspections would be carried out, adding, "I don't think it's going to be overly intrusive."

The above is from Leila Fadel, Nancy A. Youssef and Warren P. Strobel's "Iraqis seek more 'withdrawal' talks; U.S. says they're over" (McClatchy Newspapers) on the treaty masquerading as a Status Of Forces Agreement and, to be clear for those who've been sleeping, when withdrawal is included, it's a treaty. Someone in the administration forgot their military history. That means it will require Senate approval (unless the Senate caves) and there's no dancing around that. A SOFA does not address withdrawal or ending occupations. On the treaty, Ernesto Londono, Mary Beth Sheridan and Karen DeYoung offer "Iraq Repeats Insistence on Fixed Withdrawal Date" (Washington Post):

Iraqi leaders have typically voiced their insistence on a fixed withdrawal date in Arabic comments aimed at domestic and regional audiences, and U.S. officials have frequently said that their Iraqi counterparts have sounded more conciliatory in private discussions. Dabbagh spoke directly to The Washington Post on Thursday, and in English.
Dabbagh said officials must return to the negotiating table, but a U.S. Embassy spokeswoman said American officials presented Iraqi officials on Thursday with what she called a "final text" of the agreement.
U.S. officials in Washington said they had tried in the new document to accommodate Iraqi concerns, although they described few if any substantive changes. The administration proposed a stronger statement pledging that the United States would not launch attacks on another country from Iraqi soil -- a change prompted by Iraqi criticism of last month's attack by helicopter-borne U.S. troops on an alleged al-Qaeda in Iraq operative several miles inside Syria.

To the topic, Daniel Williams (Bloomberg News) adds:

In an interview, Captain William Murphy, a U.S. team leader for civil affairs, said that if Dec. 31 passes without an agreement, U.S. forces would withdraw into their bases and stop patrols, raids and other work until they leave the country.
The Bush administration and Iraq have been negotiating an agreement since March. With the Nov. 4 election of Illinois Senator Barack Obama to succeed George W. Bush as president, the Iraqi government has sent mixed signals about the chances of concluding an agreement before Dec. 31. During the election campaign, Obama indicated he would withdraw U.S. troops within 16 months of taking office.
Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari told the satellite television network Al-Jazeera his government intended to conclude an accord with ``the current administration.'' Mouafaq Al-Rubaie, al-Maliki's national security advisor, told Al- Arabiya, another Arabic language satellite news channel, that it might be better to wait for the new president. ``We think 16 months is good,'' he said.

But AFP reports resistance to the treaty from within Iraq:

"Every Iraqi should read this agreement and decide for himself whether he agrees or disagrees with it," Sheikh Sattar al-Batat, a follower of anti-American cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, said in the crowded slum of Sadr City.
"Will they agree to the complete immunity for American soldiers to do whatever they wish without accountability, or to use Iraq to strike the neighbours of Iraq?" he told tens of thousands of worshippers.
"No one in his right mind can accept this agreement, so how can we?"

In the New York Times, Alissa J. Rubin's "Obama Victory Alters the Tenor of Iraqi Politics" notes another resistance factor:

Sunni parties are particularly nervous about the pact because in the past couple of years Americans have often been their protectors in sectarian fighting, and the withdrawal could leave Sunnis vulnerable to Shiite forces.

Mia asked for this to be noted from Joshua Frank's "A Look Under the Hood of the (Potential) Obama Administration" (Dissident Voice):

Another potential pick for the post is Robert Rubin, who served under Clinton in the same position and is currently Director and Senior Counselor of Citigroup. Rubin played a key role in abetting another neoliberal objective: deregulation. Where Volker was hung up on economic austerity, Rubin pushed for more deregulatory policies that ended up shifting jobs, and entire industries, overseas.
Rubin even pushed for Clinton's dismantling of Glass-Steagall, testifying that deregulating the banking industry would be good for capital gains, as well as Main Street. "[The] banking industry is fundamentally different from what it was two decades ago, let alone in 1933," Rubin testified before the House Committee on Banking and Financial Services in May of 1995.
"[Glass-Steagall could] conceivably impede safety and soundness by limiting revenue diversification," Rubin argued.
While the industry saw much deregulation over the years preceding these events, the Gramm-Leach-Biley Act of 1999, which eliminated Glass-Steagall, extended and ratified changes that had been enacted with previous legislation. Ultimately, the repeal of the New Deal era protection allowed commercial lenders like Rubin's Citigroup to underwrite and trade instruments like mortgage backed securities along with collateralized debt and established structured investment vehicles (SIVs), which purchased these securities. In short, as the lines were blurred among investment banks, commercial banks and insurance companies, when one industry fell, others could too.
Robert Rubin is in part responsible for supporting the policies that pushed us to the brink of a great recession. When the subprime mortgage crisis hit, instability and collapse spread across numerous industries.


The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.




the washington post
mary beth sheridan
ernesto londono




Posted by at

Thursday, November 06, 2008

I Hate The War

"The soldiers used to talk about the freedom in America and how great life was there, but they used to make jokes about gays," Bashar told DNA. "The Americans who patrolled the streets threw a bottle of water at my friend and I because we were gay. They were driving by in their Humvees, and they had these windows where they could look out from, and I could see that they were laughing at us and calling us f*gs. They'd said that when they came here they would change things -- they would liberate us -- and here they were disrespecting us."
"Nevertheless," Bashar continued, "I began working inside the Green Zone as a translator for the American military police, who were teaching the Iraqi police how to use weapons. They gave me a hard time. They were very negative people. One day, my American friend told me, 'All the people talk about you.' I said, 'Why? I do a good job.' He said, 'They are not open-minded people. They are not predisposed to accept gay people teaching the police."
So, Bashar recounted to the Australian journalist, "I went to see the chief of the American company who had hired the translators to clarify the situation, but he was an asshole. He just looked me up and down and said, 'You are a disease. A piece of s**t. We have no place for people like you. We have enough fa**ots f**king each other in San Francisco.'"
Bashar subsequently went to work translating for other army contingents at the Camp Delta base in southern Iraq, where one night the taxi he was traveling in was stopped by five militiamen loyal to Muqtada al-Sadr, the fundamentalist extremist cleric who has egged on his own anti-gay death squads.
"They put a cape over my face and drove me somewhere," Bashar told DNA, "and when we got there, they took off my clothes and started beating me. They kept me naked for three days. I cried for hours. I couldn't sleep. They didn't give me any food or water. During the beatings I just tuned out and kept thinking of the lyrics of Madonna songs - especially the 'Erotica' album - and that gave me the courage to go through what they did to me.
"They beat me every two or three hours for 10 minutes at a time. They pissed on me many times. I said, 'Please God, I want to die. I come from a good family.' They said I was gay and that they had orders to kill gays and lesbians wherever they found them. Then they said they wanted to f**k me. I refused and they gang-raped me. There were ten of them, and they came in the room one after the other. One of them was so drunk that he threw up on me... This went on for 12 days. "
Bashar was eventually released, naked, to an interrogator ordered to murder him. But knowing Bashar's family, the interrogator instead beat him relentlessly and then took a photograph of his bloodied face to make it seem as if he had killed him.
"I told one of the Americans in charge of security inside the base what had really happened to me," Bashar recounted to the Australian journalist, "and that I hadn't been able to sleep or eat very well since, but he just laughed at me. He said, 'You're lucky to have had ten d**ks in 12 days.'"
Bashar expressed his disillusionment with the US occupier. "I was a fool back in 2003," he told DNA. "I stood in the street and applauded the American troops when they entered Baghdad. But America is living in denial about what it has done to our country...
"You think you've done such a great thing 'liberating' us from Saddam, but where is the freedom for gay men and women? Sure, we are free - free to live in hiding, free to run for our lives, and free to die for the 'crime' of being gay. You in the West do not think about your freedom. It's nothing to you. But there is a price to be paid for freedom."
And Bashar ultimately paid that price in a hail of machine gun bullets.

The above is from Doug Ireland's "Key Gay Leader Slain in Iraq" (Gay City News) and it was published last month. What's being described isn't uncommon in Iraq.

However, it is illuminating. Not only are Iraqi LGBTs targeted by extremist thugs from their own country, they're also targeted by US service members. Complain, be told you're lucky you were gang-raped. Complain, be dismissed. These crimes take place because they are tolerated and not just by Iraqis but by the occupying power which is supposed to be on Iraqi soil to protect the people. But that's not what happens. It's a real shame the US elected to install thugs of the Shi'ite persuasion and then train thugs from the Sunni pool. It's a damn shame that the US stood around saying, "What's with the brain drain? Why are these people leaving?"

They were leaving because it wasn't safe and it wasn't safe because the White House wasn't attempting to create safety. If Iraq hadn't had the brain drain, it would be a lot less easy to attempt to push them around. And an educated class would have been far less dependent upon US handlers for 'training.'

UK Gay News quoted Peter Tatchell on the assassination of Bashar:

This morning, I received news from Iraq that the coordinator of Iraqi LGBT in Baghdad, Bashar, aged 27, a university student, has been assassinated in a barber shop.
Militias burst in and sprayed his body with bullets at point blank range.
He was the organiser of the safe houses for gays and lesbians in Baghdad. His efforts saved the lives of dozens of people.
Bashar was a kind, generous and extremely brave young man -- a true hero who put his life on the line to save the lives of others.
My thoughts go out to his loved ones and to the other members of Iraqi LGBT.
Their courage is an inspiration to all people everywhere fighting against injustice.
Bashir was far from the first one targeted and not even the first for 2008. Tatchell wrote about for the Guardian of London in "Sexual cleansing in Iraq:"

The "improved" security situation in Iraq is not benefiting all Iraqis, especially not those who are gay. Islamist death squads are engaged in a homophobic killing spree with the active encouragement of leading Muslim clerics, such as Moqtada al-Sadr, as Newsweek recently revealed.
One of these clerics, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, issued a fatwa urging the killing of lesbians and gays in the "most severe way possible".
The short film, Queer Fear -- Gay Life, Gay Death in Iraq, produced by David Grey for Village Film, documents the tragic fates of a several individual gay Iraqis. You can view it here. Watch and weep. It is a truly poignant and moving documentary about the terrorisation and murder of Iraqi lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.
Since this film was made, the killings have continued and, many say, got worse. For gay Iraqis there is little evidence of the transition to democracy. They don't experience any newfound respect for human rights. Life for them is even worse than under the tyrant Saddam Hussein.

At the end of July, Frederik Pleitgen, Mohammed Tawfeeq and Wayne Drash's "Gays in Iraq terrorized by threats, rape, murder" (CNN) reported:


Kamal was just 16 when gunmen snatched him off the streets of Baghdad, stuffed him in the trunk of a car and whisked him away to a house. But the real terror was about to begin.
The men realized he was gay, Kamal said, when he took his shirt off and they saw that his chest was shaved.
"They told me to take off my clothes to rape me or they would kill me immediately. This moment was the worst moment in my life," he said, weeping as he spoke of the 2005 ordeal.
"I was watching them taking off their clothes, preparing to rape me. I did not know what to do, so I started shouting loudly, 'Please do not do that! I will ask my family to give you whatever you want.' " Watch the tormented life of gays in Iraq »
His pleas went unheeded. "The other two kidnappers took off my clothes by force, and, at that time, I saw them as three dirty animals trying to tear my body apart."
He was held for 15 days, released only after his family paid a $1,500 ransom. He was raped every day. Only once, he said, was he allowed to talk to his family during captivity. "I told my family that I was beaten by them, but I did not dare to tell my family that I was raped by them. I could not say it, it's too much shame."

Iraqi LGBT is an organization working to improve conditions for Iraq's gay community. Let's jump back to the reaction Bashir recevied from the US military. That attitude can be stopped but it has to come from the top. And what has come from the top has been homophobia. The same as what Barack's offered whether putting homophobes onstage in his primary campaign and in his general election campaign and letting them 'preach' their homophobia or whether it is surrounding himself with homophobes as advisers and supporters. Saturday's "Robin Morgan's homophobic candidate" noted Barack's favorite t-bagger Wlliam McPeak and his insulting homophobic remarks that he should have been held accountable for but instead got waived on through. ("If you want to do something like racial integration or the integration of openly homosexual soldiers, sailors and marines, airmen, the service leadership will have to get ahead of it. Service leadership will have to go to the gay and lesbian annual ball and lead the first dance. I've spoken many, many times at black history week and am proud to do it. . . . But I couldn't see how I could become an advocate for open homosexuality in Air Force combat units. I don't see how people can do it today.") And of course there's always Collie Powell, a major homophobe.
James Kirchick's "Powell's Cautionary Tale" (The Atlantic) provides some background on Collie:

But there is something else that should give those liberals pause: Powell's record on a signature civil rights issue of the age has been nothing short of disgraceful. Powell did more than any uniformed officer to undermine the attempt by President Clinton to allow openly gay people to serve in the military, an explicit promise Clinton made in his presidential campaign. This is a baleful, not to mention dangerous (given the number of gay linguists who have been booted from the uniformed services) policy that the president could, and ought to, have changed by executive order. (The military, seemingly unbeknownst to Powell throughout his decades of government service, operates under civilian control.) But for various reasons (his draft-dodging past chief among them) Clinton refused to stand up to the uniformed officers under his command.
And no officer took better advantage of Clinton's spinelessness than Powell. At one point, he even threatened to resign if Clinton pressed the issue further than the compromise "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy--a policy that soon resulted in the discharge of even more gay soldiers than under the previous protocol. At the time, Powell sought to downplay any comparison between the racial integration of the military and the potential inclusion of open homosexuals, writing in a letter to congresswoman Pat Schroeder that "skin color is a benign, non-behavioral characteristic. Sexual orientation is perhaps the most profound of human behavioral characteristics." That Powell, the highest achieving beneficiary of Harry Truman's decision to unilaterally desegregate the military, would be the individual most responsible for preventing the similar integration of gays is to his everlasting shame.
To be sure, Powell has since softened his stance on the issue. In 2007 he told Tim Russert that his "own judgment is that gays and lesbians should be allowed to have maximum access to all aspects of society," though he did not go so far as to say that the ban should be lifted. Powell's newfound, post-government (read: professionally convenient and less politically consequential) enlightenment on this issue, more than 12,500 unnecessary honorable discharges later, does not absolve him of his original impetuosity nor the weakening effect its had on the caliber of the nation's armed forces.

"Maximum access"? Doesn't sound like equality, does it. A point The Atlantic leaves out is that while Powell's slight shift of positions too late to do any good, it's also true that Collie now depends on coporate monies and bookings and homophobia so upfront rarely flies in corporate America these days. It's not good for the image so if Collie wants to cash in, he knows he has to tone it down. These are the type of people who back Barack, McPeak and Powell. And they are the ones who have institutionalized homophobia in the military and done everything they can to make sure it remains there.

It's over, I'm done writing songs about love
There's a war going on
So I'm holding my gun with a strap and a glove
And I'm writing a song about war
And it goes
Na na na na na na na
I hate the war
Na na na na na na na
I hate the war
Na na na na na na na
I hate the war
Oh oh oh oh
-- "I Hate The War" (written by Greg Goldberg, on The Ballet's Mattachine!)

Last Thursday, ICCC's number of US troops killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war was 4189. Tonight? 4191. Just Foreign Policy lists 1,284,105 finally up from weeks and weeks at 1,273,378.

Off topic for a community note. Stan has started his own site, Oh Boy It Never Ends.

And back to the topic of this entry, we'll close with Leslie Feinberg's "New York Times admits: 'Life better for gay & lesbian Iraqis under Hussein' Lavender & red, part 119" (Workers World, January 27, 2008 ):

The New York Times--an imperialist mouthpiece--admitted in a mid-December article that social life was better for those who it described as "gay and lesbian Iraqis" under the secular government of Saddam Hussein. The Times also confirmed that sanctions, war and occupation crushed that social progress and ushered in death-squad terror.
The Dec. 18 article was a political feature, not based on breaking news. The original headline summed up: "Gays Living in Shadows of New Iraq: Violence Replaces Tacit Acceptance."
Times journalist Cara Buckley interviewed Iraqis who she described as gay. She reported, "And, until the [U.S.] American invasion, they said, Iraqi society had quietly accepted them."
Buckley said those Iraqis she interviewed offered this view of life before sanctions and war: "For a brief, exhilarating time, from the mid-1980s until the early 1990s, they say, gay night life flourished in Iraq. Whereas neighboring Iran turned inward after its Islamic revolution in 1979, Baghdad allowed a measure of liberation after the end of the Iran-Iraq war."
The New York Times newspaper--"all the news that's fit to print" --doesn't see fit to mention that U.S. imperialism instigated the Iran-Iraq war. The Reagan administration armed both sides. Instead, the article continues to attempt to pit the two oil-rich countries against each other.
At the end of the Iran-Iraq war in 1988, Buckley continued, "Abu Nuwas Boulevard, which hugs the Tigris River opposite what is now the Green Zone, became a promenade known for cruising. Discos opened in the city’s best hotels, the Ishtar Sheraton, the Palestine and Saddam Hussein's prized Al-Rasheed Hotel becoming magnets for gay men. Young men with rouged cheeks and glossed lips paraded the streets of Mansour, an affluent neighborhood in Baghdad."
The Times quotes Ali Hili, who left Iraq in 2000 and is now living in London, where he heads the organization Iraqi LGBT-UK. Hili stressed that before the U.S. war and sanctions, "There were so many guys, from Kuwait, from Saudi Arabia, guys in the street with makeup," Hili recalled. "Up until 1991, there was sexual freedom. It was a revolutionary time."
Buckley noted, "Then came the Persian Gulf War, and afterward Saddam Hussein put an end to nightclubs. Iraq staggered under the yoke of economic sanctions."
The late Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, a bourgeois nationalist, reportedly added a religious law that made anal intercourse, prostitution, rape and incest a capital offense in 2001. The edict came after almost a decade of economic strangulation, as the U.S. pressed for shock-and-awe military invasion.
Buckley asked two of the Iraqis she interviewed what life was like in Iraq for them and acquaintances after the 2001 law was written. She reported, "While anti-gay laws were increasingly enforced, Mohammed and Mr. Hili said they still felt safe. Homosexuality seemed accepted, as long as it was practiced in private. And even when it was not tolerated, prison time could be evaded with a well-placed bribe."
The admission by the New York Times that social attitudes towards male-male or female-female sexuality were freer under the secular Ba'athist government of Saddam Hussein is particularly shocking after U.S. finance capital has enforced 12 years of economic warfare, unleashed two blitzkrieg wars and continues to be the military occupation force against the entire population of Iraq based in part on the Big Lie.
Prewar media agitation about a virtual fascist dictatorship for "gays" in Iraq targeted newspapers aimed at lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans audiences in the U.S. and Britain, and helped sell the war as "liberation."
But imperialism, and colonialism before it, has never brought liberation to the Middle East. Just the opposite is true. For example, the Times neglected to mention that British finance capital outlawed "sodomy" in Iraq--almost a century ago.
For the purposes of the Dec. 18 New York Times feature, however, Iraqi history begins with the mid-1980s, and "gay" and "lesbian" are fixed categories, identical to Western concepts, and transcend economic and social relations, cultures and eras.
Translating sex & love
More than a century ago, as the historical sun rose on capitalist economic and accompanying military expansion, Europeans also judged and condemned, speculated and sensationalized, categorized and theorized regarding Arab sexualities, particularly about expressions of love between adult men and adolescent males.
Scholar and author Khaled El-Rouayheb pointed out, "The tendency is very much in evidence already in Sir Richard Burton’s remarks on 'Pederasty' in the 'Terminal Essay' to his translation of The Arabian Nights in 1886. Writing before the term 'homosexuality' was introduced into the English language, Burton still assumed that he was faced with one phenomenon, 'pederasty,' which he claimed was widespread in the Islamic world and regarded as at worse a peccadillo."
El-Rouayheb is the author of a meticulously researched book, entitled "Before Homosexuality in the Arab-Islamic World., 1500-1800," that was published by the University of Chicago Press in 2005.
Khaled El-Rouayheb cautioned, "The assumption that it is unproblematic to speak of either tolerance or intolerance of homosexuality in the pre-modern Middle East, would seem to derive from the assumption that homosexuality is a self-evident fact about the human world to which a particular culture reacts with a certain degree of tolerance or repression.
"From this perspective," he continued, "writing the history of homosexuality is seen as analogous to writing, say, the history of women. One assumes that the concept 'homosexual,' like the concept 'woman,' is shared across historical periods, and that what varies and may be investigated historically is merely the changing cultural (popular, scientific, legal, etc.) attitude toward such people."
El-Rouayheb concluded, "The concept of male homosexuality did not exist in the Arab-Islamic Middle East in the early Ottoman period. There was simply no native concept that was applicable to all and only those men who were sexually attracted to members of their own sex, rather than to women."
Next: British outlawed 'sodomy' in Iraq.
E-mail: lfeinberg@workers.org
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